[_Vailima_, _August_ 1892.]
MY DEAR LANG,—I knew you would prove a trusty purveyor. The books you
have sent are admirable. I got the name of my hero out of Brown—Blair of
Balmyle—Francie Blair. But whether to call the story _Blair of Balmyle_,
or whether to call it _The Young Chevalier_, I have not yet decided. The
admirable Cameronian tract—perhaps you will think this a cheat—is to be
boned into _David Balfour_, where it will fit better, and really
furnishes me with a desired foothold over a boggy place.
_Later_; no, it won’t go in, and I fear I must give up ‘the idolatrous
occupant upon the throne,’ a phrase that overjoyed me beyond expression.
I am in a deuce of a flutter with politics, which I hate, and in which I
certainly do not shine; but a fellow cannot stand aside and look on at
such an exhibition as our government. ’Taint decent; no gent can hold a
candle to it. But it’s a grind to be interrupted by midnight messengers
and pass your days writing proclamations (which are never proclaimed) and
petitions (which ain’t petited) and letters to the _Times_, which it
makes my jaws yawn to re-read, and all your time have your heart with
David Balfour: he has just left Glasgow this morning for Edinburgh, James
More has escaped from the castle; it is far more real to me than the
Behring Sea or the Baring brothers either—he got the news of James More’s
escape from the Lord Advocate, and started off straight to comfort
Catriona. You don’t know her; she’s James More’s daughter, and a
respectable young wumman; the Miss Grants think so—the Lord Advocate’s
daughters—so there can’t be anything really wrong. Pretty soon we all go
to Holland, and be hanged; thence to Dunkirk, and be damned; and the tale
concludes in Paris, and be Poll-parrotted. This is the last authentic
news. You are not a real hard-working novelist; not a practical
novelist; so you don’t know the temptation to let your characters
maunder. Dumas did it, and lived. But it is not war; it ain’t
sportsmanlike, and I have to be stopping their chatter all the time.
Brown’s appendix is great reading.
My only grief is that I can’t
Use the idolatrous occupant.
Yours ever,