A. [A bathchair man] This is not me.
B. [A child with a hoop] Nor is this, really.
C. [An indistinguishable figure] This might be.
D. [A picture of the hotel] But probably I am here, lurking in the Royal Hotel, where I can sea the sea but the sea can’t see me.
I think little of your latest joke, I wrote, 24.11.20, and have myself made several of late that put yours into the shade. Thus, on learning that a woman of my acquaintance had left her rich husband and run away with a penniless lover, I added the conclusion that they were now living in silver-gilty splendour. I can assure you that that is far more in the true Crawshay tradition....
My effort met with less than no approval:
My poor Stephen!, Teixeira wrote 25.11.20. The worst of your jokes, when you attempt to play upon words, is that they have all been made before. It must be 36 (thirty-six) years (I said, years) since I saw at the old Strand Theatre a play called Silver Guilt parodying The Silver King.
I am glad or sorry, whichever I should be, that your arm[19] has taken (arma virumque cano: beat that if you can! Virus poison, acc. (I hope and trust) virum)....
My conscience smites me, he writes, 26.11.20, for having omitted in either of my last two letters to express the sympathy which I feel with Seymour Leslie—and you—in this serious illness of his. What is it exactly? Whatever it may be, I hope that he will get the better of it....
His aunt Crawshay has been good enough to pass “once bitter, twice shining.” She says that it “is a really worthy phrase and will be of use to us all!”...