TO MRS. ADOLPH C. MILLER
Washington, [January 1, 1916]
Having just sent a wire to you I shall now indulge myself in a few minutes talk with that many-sided, multiple-natured, quite obvious-and-yet-altogether-hidden person who is known to me as Mary Miller.
The flash of brilliant crimson on the eastern side of the opal, do you catch it? Now that is the flash of courage, the brilliant flame that will lead you to hold your head high. … I like very much what you say as to wearing our jewel "discreetly but constantly." No combination of words could more perfectly express the relationship which this bit of sunrise has established between us—devotion, loyalty, telepathic communication without publicity. I am sure you are belittling yourself. … you are a game bird,— good, you understand, but with a tang, a something wild in flavor, a touch of the woods and mountain flowers and hidden dells in bosky places, and wanderings and sweet revolt against captivity. …
This is my first line of the New Year. Anne is a true daughter of Martha this morning—her heart is troubled with many things, getting ready for the raid of the Huns this afternoon. She says she will write when she repossesses herself of her right arm. Good health!
Some days later
… I have been receiving your wireless messages all week, my dear Mary, and not one was an S. O. S. Good! The fair ship MARY MILLER is safe. Hurrah! She never has been staunch, but she was the gayest thing on the sea, and when her sails were all set from jib to spanker she made a gladsome sight, and some speed.
Of course, being so gay she was venturesome. That's where the Devil comes in. He is always looking about for the gay things. He hates anything that doesn't make medicine for him. If you are gay you are likely to be venturesome, and if venturesome, you can be led astray. So the good ship MARY MILLER instead of hugging the shore took a try at the vasty deep and got all blown to pieces. Then she sent out a cry for help. The wireless worked and now with a little puttering along in the sunshine and a lazy sea, she will be her gay self once more, and like Kipling's Three Decker will "carry tired people to the Islands of the Blest."
That was a most charming letter you sent me, a real bit of intimate talk. Anne read it first. She is very careful as to my reading. And I was glad to know that she could discover nothing in it which might injuriously affect my trustful young mind. Anne is really a good woman. I don't believe in husband's abusing their wives, publicly. Good manners are essential to happiness in married life. We are short on manners in this country, and that explains the prevalence of divorce. How much better, as our friend L. Sterne once said, "These things are ordered in France."