The Letters of Charles Dickens Volume I Part 37

I beg to send my kind regards to Mrs. Chappell, and I shall hope to see her and you at Teddington in the long bright days. It would disappoint me indeed if a lasting friendship did not come of our business relations.

In the spring I trust I shall be able to report to you that I am ready to take my Farewells in London. Of this I am pretty certain: that I never will take them at all, unless with you on your own conditions.

With an affectionate regard for you and your brother, believe me always,

Very faithfully yours.

[Sidenote: Mr. Rusden.]

"ALL THE YEAR ROUND" OFFICE, _Tuesday, 18th May, 1869._

MY DEAR MR. RUSDEN,

As I daresay some exaggerated accounts of my having been very ill have reached you, I begin with the true version of the case.

I daresay I _should_ have been very ill if I had not suddenly stopped my Farewell Readings when there were yet five-and-twenty remaining to be given. I was quite exhausted, and was warned by the doctors to stop (for the time) instantly. Acting on the advice, and going home into Kent for rest, I immediately began to recover, and within a fortnight was in the brilliant condition in which I can now--thank G.o.d--report myself.

I cannot thank you enough for your care of Plorn. I was quite prepared for his not settling down without a lurch or two. I still hope that he may take to colonial life. . . . In his letter to me about his leaving the station to which he got through your kindness, he expresses his grat.i.tude to you quite as strongly as if he had made a wonderful success, and seems to have acquired no distaste for anything but the one individual of whom he wrote that betrayed letter. But knowing the boy, I want to try him fully.

You know all our public news, such as it is, at least as well as I do.

Many people here (of whom I am one) do not like the look of American matters.

What I most fear is that the perpetual bl.u.s.ter of a party in the States will at last set the patient British back up. And if our people begin to bl.u.s.ter too, and there should come into existence an exasperating war-party on both sides, there will be great danger of a daily-widening breach.

The first shriek of the first engine that traverses the San Francisco Railroad from end to end will be a death-warning to the disciples of Jo Smith. The moment the Mormon bubble gets touched by neighbours it will break. Similarly, the red man's course is very nearly run. A scalped stoker is the outward and visible sign of his utter extermination. Not Quakers enough to reach from here to Jerusalem will save him by the term of a single year.

I don't know how it may be with you, but it is the fashion here to be absolutely certain that the Emperor of the French is fastened by Providence and the fates on a throne of adamant expressly constructed for him since the foundations of the universe were laid.

He knows better, and so do the police of Paris, and both powers must be grimly entertained by the resolute British belief, knowing what they have known, and doing what they have done through the last ten years.

What Victor Hugo calls "the drop-curtain, behind which is constructing the great last act of the French Revolution," has been a little shaken at the bottom lately, however. One seems to see the feet of a rather large chorus getting ready.

I enclose a letter for Plorn to your care, not knowing how to address him. Forgive me for so doing (I write to Alfred direct), and believe me, my dear Mr. Rusden,

Yours faithfully and much obliged.

[Sidenote: Miss Emily Jolly.]

OFFICE OF "ALL THE YEAR ROUND,"

_Thursday, 22nd July, 1869._

DEAR MISS JOLLY,

Mr. Wills has retired from here (for rest and to recover his health), and my son, who occupies his place, brought me this morning a story[104]

in MS., with a request that I would read it. I read it with extraordinary interest, and was greatly surprised by its uncommon merit.

On asking whence it came, I found that it came from you!

You need not to be told, after this, that I accept it with more than readiness. If you will allow me I will go over it with great care, and very slightly touch it here and there. I think it will require to be divided into three portions. You shall have the proofs and I will publish it immediately. I think so VERY highly of it that I will have special attention called to it in a separate advertis.e.m.e.nt. I congratulate you most sincerely and heartily on having done a very special thing. It will always stand apart in my mind from any other story I ever read. I write with its impression newly and strongly upon me, and feel absolutely sure that I am not mistaken.

Believe me, faithfully yours always.

[Sidenote: Hon. Robert Lytton.]

26, WELLINGTON STREET, LONDON, _Thursday, 2nd September, 1869._

MY DEAR ROBERT LYTTON,

"John Acland" is most willingly accepted, and shall come in to the next monthly part. I shall make bold to condense him here and there (according to my best idea of story-telling), and particularly where he makes the speech:--And with the usual fault of being too long, here and there, I think you let the story out too much--prematurely--and this I hope to prevent artfully. I think your t.i.tle open to the same objection, and therefore propose to subst.i.tute:

THE DISAPPEARANCE OF JOHN ACLAND.

This will leave the reader in doubt whether he really _was_ murdered, until the end.

I am sorry you do not pursue the other prose series. You can do a great deal more than you think for, with whatever you touch; and you know where to find a firmly attached and admiring friend always ready to take the field with you, and always proud to see your plume among the feathers in the Staff.

Your account of my dear Boffin[105] is highly charming:--I had been troubled with a misgiving that he was good. May his shadow never be more correct!

I wish I could have you at the murder from "Oliver Twist."

I am always, my dear Robert Lytton, Affectionately your friend.

Pray give my kindest regards to Fascination Fledgeby, who (I have no doubt) has by this time half-a-dozen new names, feebly expressive of his great merits.

[Sidenote: The same.]

OFFICE OF "ALL THE YEAR ROUND,"

26, WELLINGTON STREET, STRAND, LONDON, _Friday, 1st October, 1869._

MY DEAR ROBERT LYTTON,

I am a.s.sured by a correspondent that "John Acland" has been done before.

Said correspondent has evidently read the story--and is almost confident in "Chambers's Journal." This is very unfortunate, but of course cannot be helped. There is always a possibility of such a malignant conjunction of stars when the story is a true one.

In the case of a good story--as this is--liable for years to be told at table--as this was--there is nothing wonderful in such a mischance. Let us shuffle the cards, as Sancho says, and begin again.

You will of course understand that I do not tell you this by way of complaint. Indeed, I should not have mentioned it at all, but as an explanation to you of my reason for winding the story up (which I have done to-day) as expeditiously as possible. You might otherwise have thought me, on reading it as published, a little hard on Mr. Doilly. I have not had time to direct search to be made in "Chambers's;" but as to the main part of the story having been printed somewhere, I have not the faintest doubt. And I believe my correspondent to be also right as to the where. You could not help it any more than I could, and therefore will not be troubled by it any more than I am.

The more I get of your writing, the better I shall be pleased.

Do believe me to be, as I am, Your genuine admirer And affectionate friend.

[Sidenote: Mr. Rusden.]