* * * * *
Did you see Markham's review of the "Wine" in "The N. Y. American"?
Pretty fair, but--if a metrical composition full of poetry is not a
poem what is it? And I wonder what he calls Kubla Khan, which has a
beginning but neither middle nor end. And how about The Faerie Queene
for absence of "unity"? Guess I'll ask him.
Isn't it funny what happens to critics who would mark out meters and
bounds for the Muse--denying the name "poem," for example, to a work
because it is not like some other work, or like one that is in the
minds of them?
I hope you are prosperous and happy and that I shall sometimes hear
from you.
Howes writes me that the "Lone Hand"--Sydney--has been commending you.
Sincerely yours,
AMBROSE BIERCE.
[Washington, D. C.,
October 9, 1909.]