* * * * *
Thank you for the poems, which I've not had the time to
consider--being disgracefully busy in order to get away. I don't
altogether share your reverence for Browning, but the primacy of your
verses on him over the others printed on the same page is almost
startling. * * *
Of course it's all nonsense about the waning of your power--though
thinking it so might make it so. My notion is that you've only _begun_
to do things. But I wish you'd go back to your chain in your uncle's
office. I'm no believer in adversity and privation as a spur to
Pegasus. They are oftener a "hopple." The "meagre, muse-rid mope,
adust and thin" will commonly do better work when tucked out with
three square meals a day, and having the sure and certain hope of
their continuance.
* * * * *
I'm expecting to arrive in Oakland (Key Route Inn, probably) late in
the evening of the 22d of this month and dine at Carlt's on the
24th--my birthday. Anyhow, I've invited myself, though it is possible
they may be away on their vacation. Carlt has promised to try to get
his "leave" changed to a later date than the one he's booked for.
* * * * *
Sincerely yours,
AMBROSE BIERCE.
P.S.--Just learned that we can not leave here until the 19th--which
will bring me into San Francisco on the 26th. Birthday dinner served
in diner--last call!
I've _read_ the Browning poem and I now know why there was a Browning.
Providence foresaw you and prepared him for you--blessed be
Providence! * * *
Mrs. Havens asks me to come to them at Sag Harbor--and shouldn't I
like to! * * * Sure the song of the Sag Harbor frog would be music to
me--as would that of the indigenous duckling.
[The Army and Navy Club, Washington, D. C.,
December 19, 1912.]