_Taiti_, _October_ 16_th_, 1888.
MY DEAR COLVIN,—The cruiser for San Francisco departs to-morrow morning
bearing you some kind of a scratch. This much more important packet will
travel by way of Auckland. It contains a ballant; and I think a better
ballant than I expected ever to do. I can imagine how you will wag your
pow over it; and how ragged you will find it, etc., but has it not spirit
all the same? and though the verse is not all your fancy painted it, has
it not some life? And surely, as narrative, the thing has considerable
merit! Read it, get a typewritten copy taken, and send me that and your
opinion to the Sandwiches. I know I am only courting the most
excruciating mortification; but the real cause of my sending the thing is
that I could bear to go down myself, but not to have much MS. go down
with me. To say truth, we are through the most dangerous; but it has
left in all minds a strong sense of insecurity, and we are all for
putting eggs in various baskets.
We leave here soon, bound for Uahiva, Reiatea, Bora-Bora, and the
Sandwiches.
O, how my spirit languishes
To step ashore on the Sanguishes;
For there my letters wait,
There shall I know my fate.
O, how my spirit languidges
To step ashore on the Sanguidges.
18_th_.—I think we shall leave here if all is well on Monday. I am quite
recovered, astonishingly recovered. It must be owned these climates and
this voyage have given me more strength than I could have thought
possible. And yet the sea is a terrible place, stupefying to the mind
and poisonous to the temper, the sea, the motion, the lack of space, the
cruel publicity, the villainous tinned foods, the sailors, the captain,
the passengers—but you are amply repaid when you sight an island, and
drop anchor in a new world. Much trouble has attended this trip, but I
must confess more pleasure. Nor should I ever complain, as in the last
few weeks, with the curing of my illness indeed, as if that were the
bursting of an abscess, the cloud has risen from my spirits and to some
degree from my temper. Do you know what they called the _Casco_ at
Fakarava? The _Silver Ship_. Is that not pretty? Pray tell Mrs.
Jenkin, _die silberne Frau_, as I only learned it since I wrote her. I
think of calling the book by that name: _The Cruise of the Silver
Ship_—so there will be one poetic page at least—the title. At the
Sandwiches we shall say farewell to the _S. S._ with mingled feelings.
She is a lovely creature: the most beautiful thing at this moment in
Taiti.
Well, I will take another sheet, though I know I have nothing to say.
You would think I was bursting: but the voyage is all stored up for the
book, which is to pay for it, we fondly hope; and the troubles of the
time are not worth telling; and our news is little.
Here I conclude (Oct. 24th, I think), for we are now stored, and the Blue
Peter metaphorically flies.