Thank you for the photographs. Miss * * * is a pretty girl, truly, and has the posing instinct as well. She has the place of honor on my mantel. * * * But what scurvy knave has put the stage-crime into her mind? If you know that life as I do you will prefer that she die, poor girl.
It is no trouble, but a pleasure, to go over your verses—I am as proud of your talent as if I'd made it.
Sincerely yours, Ambrose Bierce.
[over]
About the rhymes in a sonnet:
| "Regular", or | "English" | Modern | |
| Italian form | form | English | |
| (Petrarch): | (Shakspear's): | 1 | |
| 1 | 1 | 2 | |
| 2 | 2 | 2 | |
| 2 | 1 | 1 | |
| 1 | 2 | 1 | |
| 1 | 3 | 2 | |
| 2 | 4 | 2 | |
| 2 | 3 | 1 | |
| 1 | 4 | Two or three | |
| 3 | 5 | rhymes; any | |
| 4 | 6 | arrangement | |
| 5 | 5 | ||
| 3 | 6 | ||
| 4 | 7 | ||
| 5 | 7 |
There are good reasons for preferring the regular Italian form created by Petrarch—who knew a thing or two; and sometimes good reasons for another arrangement—of the sestet rhymes. If one should sacrifice a great thought to be like Petrarch one would not resemble him. A. B.
Washington, D. C.,
May 2,
1901.
My dear Sterling,