_Vailima_, _Samoa_, _December_ 1, 1894.
MY DEAR LANG,—For the portrait of Braxfield, much thanks! It is engraved
from the same Raeburn portrait that I saw in ’76 or ’77 with so extreme a
gusto that I have ever since been Braxfield’s humble servant, and am now
trying, as you know, to stick him into a novel. Alas! one might as well
try to stick in Napoleon. The picture shall be framed and hung up in my
study. Not only as a memento of you, but as a perpetual encouragement to
do better with his Lordship. I have not yet received the transcripts.
They must be very interesting. Do you know, I picked up the other day an
old _Longman’s_, where I found an article of yours that I had missed,
about Christie’s? I read it with great delight. The year ends with us
pretty much as it began, among wars and rumours of wars, and a vast and
splendid exhibition of official incompetence.—Yours ever,