_Union Club_, _Sydney_ [_September_ 1890].
MY DEAR MRS. FAIRCHILD,—I began a letter to you on board the _Janet
Nicoll_ on my last cruise, wrote, I believe, two sheets, and ruthlessly
destroyed the flippant trash. Your last has given me great pleasure and
some pain, for it increased the consciousness of my neglect. Now, this
must go to you, whatever it is like.
. . . You are quite right; our civilisation is a hollow fraud, all the
fun of life is lost by it; all it gains is that a larger number of
persons can continue to be contemporaneously unhappy on the surface of
the globe. O, unhappy!—there is a big word and a false—continue to be
not nearly—by about twenty per cent.—so happy as they might be: that
would be nearer the mark.
When—observe that word, which I will write again and larger—WHEN you come
to see us in Samoa, you will see for yourself a healthy and happy people.
You see, you are one of the very few of our friends rich enough to come
and see us; and when my house is built, and the road is made, and we have
enough fruit planted and poultry and pigs raised, it is undeniable that
you must come—must is the word; that is the way in which I speak to
ladies. You and Fairchild, anyway—perhaps my friend Blair—we’ll arrange
details in good time. It will be the salvation of your souls, and make
you willing to die.
Let me tell you this: In ’74 or 5 there came to stay with my father and
mother a certain Mr. Seed, a prime minister or something of New Zealand.
He spotted what my complaint was; told me that I had no business to stay
in Europe; that I should find all I cared for, and all that was good for
me, in the Navigator Islands; sat up till four in the morning persuading
me, demolishing my scruples. And I resisted: I refused to go so far from
my father and mother. O, it was virtuous, and O, wasn’t it silly! But
my father, who was always my dearest, got to his grave without that pang;
and now in 1890, I (or what is left of me) go at last to the Navigator
Islands. God go with us! It is but a Pisgah sight when all is said; I
go there only to grow old and die; but when you come, you will see it is
a fair place for the purpose.
Flaubert {201} has not turned up; I hope he will soon; I knew of him only
through Maxime Descamps.—With kindest messages to yourself and all of
yours, I remain,