_Vailima Plantation_, _Upolu_, _Samoan Islands_, 18_th_ _July_ 1892.
MY DEAR CHARLES,—. . . I have been now for some time contending with
powers and principalities, and I have never once seen one of my own
letters to the _Times_. So when you see something in the papers that you
think might interest the exiles of Upolu, do not think twice, out with
your saxpence, and send it flying to Vailima. Of what you say of the
past, eh, man, it was a queer time, and awful miserable, but there’s no
sense in denying it was awful fun. Do you mind the youth in Highland
garb and the tableful of coppers? Do you mind the SIGNAL of Waterloo
Place?—Hey, how the blood stands to the heart at such a memory!—Hae ye
the notes o’t? Gie’s them.—Gude’s sake, man, gie’s the notes o’t; I mind
ye made a tune o’t an’ played it on your pinanny; gie’s the notes. Dear
Lord, that past.
Glad to hear Henley’s prospects are fair: his new volume is the work of a
real poet. He is one of those who can make a noise of his own with
words, and in whom experience strikes an individual note. There is
perhaps no more genuine poet living, bar the Big Guns. In case I cannot
overtake an acknowledgment to himself by this mail, please let him hear
of my pleasure and admiration. How poorly—compares! He is all smart
journalism and cleverness: it is all bright and shallow and limpid, like
a business paper—a good one, _s’entend_; but there is no blot of heart’s
blood and the Old Night: there are no harmonics, there is scarce harmony
to his music; and in Henley—all of these; a touch, a sense within sense,
a sound outside the sound, the shadow of the inscrutable, eloquent beyond
all definition. The First London Voluntary knocked me wholly.—Ever yours
affectionately, my dear Charles,