Here in London our life has been exceedingly quiet, but useful. I have met a number of excellent people, and have received some social attention. I have done considerable work, mostly in the way of verse. I wish you would write to John F. Ballantyne, asking him to send you copies of the paper containing my work since I came here. I am anxious to have you see it, particularly my poem in the Christmas Daily News, and my tale in the Christmas number of the Chicago America. I am just now at work on a Folklore tale of the Orkney Islands, and I am enjoying it very much. I hope to get it off to the paper this week. I am hoping that my two books pleased you; they are the beginning only, for if I live I shall publish many beautiful books. Yesterday I got a letter from a New York friend volunteering to put up the money for publishing a new volume of verse at $20 a copy, the number of copies to be limited to fifty. Of course I can't accede to the proposition. But I am thinking of publishing a volume of verse in some such elaborate style, for my verse accumulates fast, and I love to get out lovely books! The climate here in London is simply atrocious—either rain or fog all the time. Yet I should not complain, for it seems to do me good. Julia is well, and she joins me in wishing you and yours the best of God's blessings.
May you and I meet again, dear venerated friend, this side of the happy Islands!
Ever affectionately yours,
EUGENE FIELD.
London, January 9th, 1890.
Do give my best love to Mrs. Bacon, and tell her that, being a confirmed dyspeptic now, I forgive her that mince-pie. My permanent address is care New York Herald Office, 110 Strand, W.C., London.
Speaking of the number of excellent people met in London, Field on his return told with great gusto his experience at a dinner-party there at which he was seated between the wife of a member of Parliament and Mrs. Humphry Ward. The conversation turned upon P.T. Barnum, who was then in London with his "greatest show on earth." One of the ladies inquired of Field if he was acquainted with the famous showman, to which Field said he replied, with the utmost gravity and earnestness:
"From my earliest infancy. Do you know, madame, that I owe everything I am and hope to be to that great, good man? When he first discovered me I was living in a tree in the wilds of Missouri, clothed in skins and feeding on nuts and wild berries. Yes, madam. Phineas T. Barnum took me from my mother, clothed me in the bifurcated raiment of civilization, sent me to school, where I began to lisp in numbers before I had mastered the multiplication table, and I have been lisping ever since." Field had a peculiar hesitation in his speech, almost amounting to the pause of an embarrassed stutterer; and if he related this experience to the British matrons as he rehearsed it to his friends afterward, it was small wonder that they swallowed it with many a "Really!" "How curious!" "Isn't it marvellous?"
This dinner occurred at the time when the trial of several members of the Clan-na-gael for the murder of Dr. Cronin was in progress in Chicago. The case was followed with as much interest in England as in America. When Mrs. Ward learned that Field hailed from that city, she said to him, "I am so glad to meet somebody from Chicago, for I am greatly interested in the town. Do tell me, did you know Dr. Cronin or any of those horrid Clan-na-gaels?"
"I had the satisfaction of telling her," said Field, "that Martin Bourke (one of the suspects) and I had been very intimate friends, and that Dan Coughlin (another) and I belonged to the same hunting club, and had often shot buffaloes and cougars on the prairie a few miles west of Chicago. As for Sullivan, the ice-man, I assured her that if that man was convicted it would be a severe blow to the best circles of the city." "Still more satisfaction had I," Field added, "in the conviction that my auditor believed every one of the preposterous yarns I told her."
"The new volume" referred to in Field's letter to Mr. Gray was that which subsequently took the form of "Echoes from the Sabine Farm," published by his friend and fellow-bibliomaniac, Francis Wilson. The story of how it came to be issued in that particular form is told by Mr. Wilson in his introduction to the subscription edition. It was originally Field's intention that I should take charge of this publication, although I had never been consulted about it. Therefore I was somewhat surprised on receiving the following note: