staccato, I think. Then you sail into the musette.
N.B.—Where I have put an “A” is that a dominant eleventh, or what? or just a seventh on the D? and if the latter, is that allowed? It sounds very funny. Never mind all my questions; if I begin about music (which is my leading ignorance and curiosity), I have always to babble questions: all my friends know me now, and take no notice whatever. The whole piece is marked allegro; but surely could easily be played too fast? The dignity must not be lost; the periwig feeling.
To Sidney Colvin
Written after his return from an excursion to Matlock with his father, following on their visit to London. “The verses” means Underwoods. The suppressed poem is that headed “To ——,” afterwards printed in Songs of Travel.
[Skerryvore, Bournemouth, April 1886.]
MY DEAR COLVIN,—This is to announce to you, what I believe should have been done sooner, that we are at Skerryvore. We were both tired, and I was fighting my second cold, so we came straight through by the west.
We have a butler! He doesn’t buttle, but the point of the thing is the style. When Fanny gardens, he stands over her and looks genteel. He opens the door, and I am told waits at table. Well, what’s the odds; I shall have it on my tomb—“He ran a butler.”
| He may have been this and that, A drunkard or a guttler; He may have been bald and fat— At least he kept a butler. He may have sprung from ill or well, From Emperor or sutler; He may be burning now in Hell— On earth he kept a butler. |
I want to tell you also that I have suppressed your poem. I shall send it you for yourself, and I hope you will agree with me that it was not good enough in point of view of merit, and a little too intimate as between you and me. I would not say less of you, my friend, but I scarce care to say so much in public while we live. A man may stand on his own head; it is not fair to set his friend on a pedestal.