TO——

Dear Friend,—After you bid us good-bye, I began to think about things, and resolved to write you a little letter about my conclusions. Of course, because I am a foreigner, I cannot pretend to make absolutely correct conclusions; but I should like to be of use to you as a friend, and therefore believe that I cannot do any harm by presenting both sides of the question, as they appear to me.

It seems that there is one view of the matter which might not have been fully thought over yet. The woman’s side, I mean. It is true she has not stated it; but I imagine it might be this:—

A woman of cultivation, although seeming very strong, may be very sensitive and delicate—and may suffer more than a strong man can imagine possible, by reason of very little matters. When about to become a mother, her capacity for suffering greatly increases, and after childbirth it remains intense. These are natural conditions; but after the loss of a child, the condition is a very serious one, especially for a lady who has been well educated. I know this chiefly by some knowledge of medical physiology.—Now, what I mean is this: Anything that a wife does during or after pregnancy should, I believe, be not only forgiven, but lovingly forgiven,—because then, what she suffers no man can really understand. And the more educated she is, the more refined she is, the more she suffers.

Suppose now we look at her view,—or at what might be her view. She has a very affectionate and true husband; but he is very strong, has never been nervous or nervously sick, cannot understand what she suffers. She is ashamed to confess her weakness and her pain. So she does not tell him. She smiles and tries to make it appear that she is strong. The loss of her child is a very great pain to her—more than any man could understand; but she tries to forget it. Still, her husband does not know all this. She is not able to be quick and active and ready, and he does not understand why. Even a woman’s memory weakens during this painful period. Her mind is not so strong, and can only become as before after the weaning of her child, or many months after childbirth. To the strong peasant-woman this is a small trial; but to the educated lady it is a question of life and death, and not a few even lose their reason after losing a child—become insane. The physiologist knows this; but many do not. And the wife, in such a case, may seem not to be kind to the parents—simply because she cannot be. She has the will,—not the physical power. She is in the position of one who needs a servant—needs all the help and comfort she can get—all the love she can obtain. She cannot give help and do service; because neither body nor mind is strong enough. And neither is strong enough—because she has been strained to her uttermost by her years of education. It is the same way the world over. The lady cannot do or suffer as much as the woman who has not passed her youth at schools. Mind and body have been transformed by education.

Now, dear friend, I imagine that this must be the state of affairs. Your wife and her parents do not wish to do wrong, in my opinion. She feels that she is not strong enough to remain your wife under the same conditions. She cannot bear hardship, or do many things which seem to a man mere trifles, while in a delicate condition. And she fears that she would be unhappy and sick and lose another child. But she will never tell you. A woman will not tell those things. Unless a husband can understand without being told,—the two cannot live together long. The result must be, for the wife, death!

I think, dear friend, that this is the truth of the matter. Now you can separate good friends, or else—what could you do?

If I were in your place, perhaps I should try to prevent the separation. I should let the wife have her own gentle way. I should try to make her comfortable, and not ask her to help me or my parents in any way,—but only to bear my children and to love me, and to make home happy. But unless she has a good heart, I should be wrong.

There is no question, I think, about the good heart. Your wife has that, surely. It seems to me only a case of misunderstanding. Remember, dear friend, that you are a very strong man, and that you can afford to be very considerate to a weak woman, after the torture of childbirth and the loss of the love—the child-love—for which Nature has been changing the whole body. Remember also, that even your parents—not knowing the strain of this new education on the physical system of the girl—might judge her a little severely. Certainly she must love you, and wish that she could be to you all you wish.

Forgive this long letter. What I want to say is this: If it be not too late, let us try whether a reconciliation is not possible. If you can make allowances, and change conditions a little, all would be well, perhaps. If not,—if you want a stronger woman for a wife,—perhaps it is better to separate. But it would be a great pity to separate simply because of a misunderstanding. So let us try to make things as they were before.

Affectionately your friend,

Y. Koizumi.

TO MITCHELL McDONALD
Tōkyō, January, 1899.

Dear McDonald,—I got home safe and early,—thanks to your carriage! But I feel a little uneasy about you; and when you get perfectly right again in that strong back of yours, I want to hear from you—not before. Don’t imagine that I must have an answer to every scrawl. I don’t know what to say to you and the doctor,—except that you are both spoiling me. Tōkyō seems unusually tristful this rainy evening; and I feel that it is because you and the doctor are both far away,—and that the world is not really anything like what you make it appear to be.

I came up with three Americans, all of whom talked about Manila, Aguinaldo, “the people at home,” Boston, the Pennsylvania Central, Baldwin’s locomotives, the Pacific Coast,—and the commanders of the various iron-clads at Manila. It did me good to hear them. They cocked up their heels on the seats, home-fashion; and I felt sort of pulled towards them,—but we didn’t get acquainted. They knew everything about everything in the whole world; and it did one good to hear them. Wish we had a few men of that sort in the university.

It will feel lonesome in Japan after you go back: I think I should like to be one of those small eaglets that you used to supply with fish on the voyage,—and have a hen wander occasionally within reach of my rope.

Only a line before going to sleep. A stupid note—just to show that I am thinking of you. My wife is delighted with the photo, and says it is the best of all by far—in which I agree with her.

Love to you, and do take every care of your dear self.

Lafcadio.

TO MITCHELL McDONALD
Tōkyō, January, 1899.

Dear McDonald,—I suppose you have heard of a famous old drama which has for its title, “The Woman Killed with Kindness.” Presently, if you do not take care, you will be furnishing the material for a much more modern tragedy, to be called, “The Small Man Killed with Kindness.” Here I have been waiting three days to write you,—and have not been able to write, because of the extravagant and very naughty things which you have done. That whiskey! Those cigars! That wonderful beefsteak! Those imperial and sinfully splendid dinners! Those wonderful chats until ghost-time, and beyond it! And all these things—however pleasing in themselves—made like a happy dream by multitudes of little acts and words and thoughts (all observed and treasured up) that created about me an atmosphere not belonging at all to this world of Iron Facts and Granite Necessities. “Come soon again”—indeed! Catch me down there again this winter! Steep a man’s soul in azure and gold like that again, and you will utterly spoil him for those cold grey atmospheres under which alone good work can be done. It is all tropical down there at No. 20 Bund; and I must try to forget the tropics in order to finish No. 8. The last time I had such an evening was in 1889,—in a flat of Fifth Avenue, New York, where a certain divine person and I sat by a fire of drift-wood, and talked and dreamed about things. There was this difference, however, that I never could remember what passed as we chatted before that extraordinary fire (which burned blue and red and green—because of sea-ghosts in it). That was largely witchcraft, but at No. 20 Bund, without witchcraft, there is more power than that. And if I am afraid of it, it is not because I do not like it even more than the magic of Fifth Avenue, but because—No. 8 must be done quickly!

You must really promise to be less good to me if you want to see me again before the Twentieth Century. I wish I knew how to scold you properly;—but for the moment I shall drop the subject in utter despair!

I hope what you say about my being still a boy may have a grain of truth in it,—so that I can get mature enough to make you a little bit proud of encouraging me in this out-of-the-way corner of the world. But do you please take good care of that health of yours, if you want to see results: I am just a trifle uneasy about you, and you strong men have to be more careful than midges and gnats like myself. Please think twice over these little remarks.

I have no news at all for you;—there is no mail, of course, and nothing interesting in this muddy place. I can only “report progress.” I have a very curious collection of Japanese songs and ballads, with refrains, unlike any ever published in English; and I expect to make a remarkable paper out of them.

By the way, I must tell you that such enquiries as I tried to make for you on the subject of waterfalls only confirm what I told you. The mere idea of such a thing is horribly shocking to the true Japanese nature: it offends both their national and their religious sense. The Japanese love of natural beauty is not artificial, as it is to a large degree with us, but a part of the race-soul; and tens of thousands of people travel every year hundreds of miles merely to enjoy the sight and sound of a little waterfall, and to please their imagination with the old legends and poems concerning it. (The Japanese heart never could understand American willingness to use Niagara for hydraulic or electric machinery—never! And I must confess that I sympathize altogether with them.) But that is not all: the idea of a foreigner using a waterfall for such a purpose would seem to millions of very good, lovable people like a national outrage. The bare suggestion would excite horror. Of course there are men like —— who have suppressed in themselves all these feelings,—but they represent an almost imperceptible minority. They regard the ruin of Fairy-land as certain;—but the mass are still happy in their dreams of the old beauty and the old gods.

Lafcadio.

TO MITCHELL McDONALD
Tōkyō, January, 1899.

Dear McDonald,—Our scare is pretty nearly over;—the fever was broken to-day, and we had a consultation of doctors. It seems to have been pneumonia of the nasty, sudden kind. The little fellow never lost his senses; but for part of yesterday he lost all power to speak. I think he will get strong from now. The other boy got laid up about the same time, but much less severely. The night they caught cold, the thermometer went down to 26°, and the change was too much for them. By constant care for a few days, I think we shall have them all right again: then I shall hope, either to coax you up here, or go down to see you—if only to shake hands. So far I am lucky; for I have been working like a Turk, and keeping well. Work is an excellent thing to keep a fellow from worrying, and my “self-confidence” is growing in the proper cautious way again.

What a funny, funny episode is that story of Lieutenant Hobson, shipped to Manila to keep him from being kissed to death by pretty girls! Wonder if he would not prefer to face the Santiago forts again? The incident is quite peculiarly American, and pretty in its way: it ought to make heroes multiply. There is something to be a hero for,—to have one’s pick of the finest girls in the country. Still I have been thinking that most of us would feel shy about marrying the woman who would stand up and ask for a kiss in a theatre. It is the same sort of enthusiasm that makes women tear out their earrings, and throw them on the stage when a Liszt or a Gottschalk is improvising. I see no reason why heroism should arouse less enthusiasm and affection than musical skill; but don’t you think that in either case we should prefer the silent admiration of the giver that doesn’t lose her head, but remains strongly self-controlled—“all in an iron glow,” as Ruskin calls it? When the brave lieutenant wants a wife, I fancy he will be looking for that kind of woman, rather than the other.

There is no news for me by mail,—but we shall have another mail next week, I suppose. The university course runs smoothly: this is my third year; and my subject happens to be the 19th century, in which I feel more at home than in the other branches of the subject. Fancy! I am lecturing now on Swinburne’s poetry. They would not allow me to do this in a Western university perhaps—yet Swinburne, as to form, is the greatest 19th century poet of England. But he has offended the conventions; and they try to d—n him with silence. I believe you can trust me to do him justice here, when I get the chance.

Affectionately,

Lafcadio.

TO MITCHELL McDONALD
Tōkyō, January, 1899.

Dear McDonald,—Everything is bright and sunny with us again: we have to keep the boys in a warm room, and nurse them carefully, but they are safe now. I shall never forget your kindest sympathy, and the doctor’s generous message. Am I bad for not writing sooner? To tell the truth I was a little tired out myself, and got a touch of cold; but I’m solid and shipshape again, and full of hope to see you. I shall have no more duties until Tuesday morning (31st); so, if you will persist in risking a bad lunch and an uncomfortable room, and the trouble of travelling to Tōkyō, I shall be waiting for you. I think you ought to come up once more, anyhow. I want you to see yourself vis-à-vis with Elizabeth. I want to chat about things. (No mail yet at this writing.) If you cannot conveniently come this week, come just when you please any afternoon between Fridays (inclusive) and Mondays.

Odin said, in the Hávamál,—“I counsel thee, if thou hast a trusty friend, go and see him often; because a road which is seldom trod gets choked with brambles and high grass.”

This is a case of “don’t-do-as-I-do,—but-do-as-I-tell-you”—isn’t it? Besides, I am not worth a d—n as a friend, anyhow. I quote these most ancient verses only because you expressed an interest in them during our last delightful chat;—but whether you come or no, brambles will never grow upon the pathway.

Lafcadio.