Haines' Falls,
Greene Co., N. Y.,
August 27,
1904.
My dear George,
First, thank you for the knife and the distinction of membership in the Ancient and Honorable Order of Knifers. I have made little use of the blades and other appliances, but the corkscrew is in constant use.
I'm enclosing a little missive from the editor of Harper's. Please reserve these things awhile and sometime I may ask them of you to "point a moral or adorn a tale" about that poem. If we can't get it published I'd like to write for some friendly periodical a review of an unpublished poem, with copious extracts and a brief history of it. I think that would be unique.
I find the pictures of Marian interesting, but have the self-denial to keep only one of them—the prettiest one of course. Your own is rather solemn, but it will do for the title page of the Testimony, which is still my favorite reading.
Scheff showed me your verses on Katie's baby, and Katie has since sent them. They are very tender and beautiful. I would not willingly spare any of your "personal" poems—least of all, naturally, the one personal to me. Your success with them is exceptional. Yet the habit of writing them is perilous, as the many failures of great poets attest—Milton, for example, in his lines to Syriack Skinner, his lines to a baby that died a-bornin' and so forth. The reason is obvious, and you have yourself, with sure finger, pointed it out:
"Remiss the ministry they bear
Who serve her with divided heart;
She stands reluctant to impart
Her strength to purpose, end, or care."
When one is intent upon pleasing some mortal, one is less intent upon pleasing the immortal Muse. All this is said only by way of admonition for the future, not in criticism of the past. I'm a sinner myself in that way, but then I'm not a saint in any way, so my example doesn't count.
I don't mind * * * calling me a "dignified old gentleman"—indeed, that is what I have long aspired to be, but have succeeded only in the presence of strangers, and not always then. * * *
(I forgot to say that your poem is now in the hands of the editor of the Atlantic.)