[_Vailima_, _March_ 1892.]
MY DEAR BURLINGAME,—Herewith Chapters IX. and X., and I am left face to
face with the horrors and dilemmas of the present regimen: pray for those
that go down to the sea in ships. I have promised Henley shall have a
chance to publish the hurricane chapter if he like, so please let the
slips be sent _quam primum_ to C. Baxter, W.S., 11 S. Charlotte Street,
Edinburgh. I got on mighty quick with that chapter—about five days of
the toughest kind of work. God forbid I should ever have such another
pirn to wind! When I invent a language, there shall be a direct and an
indirect pronoun differently declined—then writing would be some fun.
DIRECT INDIRECT
He Tu
Him Tum
His Tus
Ex.: _He_ seized _tum_ by _tus_ throat; but _tu_ at the same moment
caught _him_ by _his_ hair. A fellow could write hurricanes with an
inflection like that! Yet there would he difficulties too.
Do what you please about _The Beach_; and I give you _carte blanche_ to
write in the matter to Baxter—or telegraph if the time press—to delay the
English contingent. Herewith the two last slips of _The Wrecker_. I
cannot go beyond. By the way, pray compliment the printers on the proofs
of the Samoa racket, but hint to them that it is most unbusiness-like and
unscholarly to clip the edges of the galleys; these proofs should really
have been sent me on large paper; and I and my friends here are all put
to a great deal of trouble and confusion by the mistake. For, as you
must conceive, in a matter so contested and complicated, the number of
corrections and the length of explanations is considerable.