"Dark was the sun! Heavy the clouds on the cliffs of Oithona—when the fair-headed son of the Maurialva crossed his claymore with the stern dark-browed Bobthailva and swore friendship on the names of Carry and Damask."
I was moving, and as du Maurier kept on being about to go to Antwerp, I went to pay him a flying visit at Düsseldorf on my way to Paris. We sat into the small hours of the morning (as he depicts us), talking of the past, present, and future, a long-necked Rhine-wine bottle and two green glasses beside us, our hopes and aspirations rising with the cloud that curled from my ever-glowing cigar. We talked till his fertile imagination took us across the sea, and "Ragmar of the Maurialva and Bobthailva, the son of Moscheles, swore eternal amity on their native heath."
Damask was another beauty whom we appreciated, perhaps all the more because we knew she was dying of consumption.
In Paris I was probably absorbed in some work I had in hand and must have neglected du Maurier, for he writes urging me to answer by return of post and give an account of myself. He had been visited, he says, by an alarming nightmare, which he forthwith sketches for my benefit. Carry, the Circe, had captured the lion. The noble beast—that was me—had succumbed to the wiles of the enchantress, and submitted tamely to being combed and brushed and to having his claws clipped by her hand. Like birds of a feather, so do lions of a name, flock together. And so another noble beast—that was he—is seen approaching, presumably to claim his share of the combing and clipping and of whatever other favours may be forthcoming.
Another time when, I suppose, I was again letting him wait for an answer, he writes from Düsseldorf: "DEAR BOBTAIL,—Est-ce que tu te donnes le genre de m'oublier par hazard? I have been expecting a letter from you every day, running thus: 'DEAR RAG,—Come to Paris immediately, to illustrate thirty-six periodical papers which I have got for you. In haste, Bobtail.' My old pal, Tom Armstrong, is here, working hard; eyes the same as ever. Write soon and tell all about that portrait. Düsseldorf rencontre was jolly." The letter is headed by a drawing representing me soaring heavenwards, whilst he, chained to the spot, is philosophically consulting the cards on his prospects of release.
