“If this fails—and I have seen too much of the public to be surprised at any ingratitude—there are always those wonderful new goldfields, where men of our race and speech are flocking, pickaxe on shoulder. Surely after their arduous toil for the filthy lucre, they must be longing of an evening for a glimpse of the higher life—I understand they have only drinking shanties.
“Imagine it, Jinny—a theatre for the rugged miners amid the primeval mountains with a practicable moon shining over the tropical scene. Pity I sold Duke that theatre-tent, but I suppose it couldn’t be transported to Australia as easily as a convict. (Good gag, that, eh?) Admission, I suppose, by nugget. I don’t see how you can give change—unless they take it in gold-dust—and anyhow, flush as they are, they will probably hand in considerable chunks at the box-office, reckless of petty calculation.
“So do not be surprised if one Easter morn you receive a golden egg laid by some Australian goose (I understand it is half a mole). Which reminds me to enclose herewith the half-crown I owe you. I dare say you have forgotten my borrowing it from you in the caravan of my blood-sucking son-in-law. But players have long memories.
“I suppose you see nothing of him or of Polly, for Chipstone is a poor pitch, but I am afraid from a Christmas card Polly sent me in reply to mine that the rascal is making her happy, so I can’t hate him as much as he deserves.
“ ‘I hope,’ I scribbled across the picture of the snowy Mistletoe Bough I sent her, ‘you are experiencing all that matrimony was designed for, when this institution was introduced into Eden.’ Lovely, isn’t it? And where do you suppose it came from? It was that delicious Martha’s farewell wish to me on my wedding morning! I fancy she took it out of the number of the Lightstand that I bought her.
“Poor, dear Martha! Do give her my love and tell her there is a branch of the New Jerusalemites in Boulogne—no, best make it two, while you are about it, a French branch as well as an English branch, mutually emulous in ‘Upbuilding!’
“And how is her dashing cavalier of a son who posed as an American? I expect he’s married by now to the queen of the wasp-killers, judging by the warm way things were going at my own wedding-party. If so, pray hand him back his mother’s Christadelphian wedding-wish with my kind regards.
“Oh, and don’t forget to say amiable things (as they put it here) to Miss What’s-a-name, the young and lovely bridesmaid! Tell her I haven’t forgotten about her becoming wardrobe mistress, though if we go to Australia, I’m afraid it’ll be too rough for her at her age, and even Madame F. may shrink from the snakes and the blacks and the convicts and the desperado diggers, in which case we shall have boys to do the female parts and revive the glories of the Shakespearean stage.
“Heavens, how I have let myself chatter on! My paper is nearly at an end—like youth and hope! Believe me, dear Jinny, in this world or the next (don’t be alarmed, I only mean Australia),
“Your ever devoted,