Chapter II: Introduction: Letters From the Raven (2)

"But everybody gets that here. You live so abstemiously and thirst so little after the flesh-pots that I think you would not have much to fear. I go swimming a good deal; but I find the water horribly warm. The lake seems to be situated directly over the great furnace of Hell....

"I'll be doubly d--d if I have the vaguest idea what I shall do. I have a delightfully lazy life here; and I assure you I never intend to work fourteen hours a day again. But whether to leave here I don't know. I'm only making about ten dollars a week, but that is better than making twenty-five dollars and being a slave to a newspaper. I write what I please, go when I please, and quit work when I please. I have really only three hours a day office duty,--mostly consumed in waiting for proofs. If I stay here, I can make more soon. But I don't really care a damn whether I make much money or not. If I have to make money by working hard for it, I shall certainly remain poor. I have done the last hard work I shall ever do.

"On the success of some literary work, however, I have a vague idea of receiving enough ready money to invest in some promising little specs, here,--of the nature I have already hinted at. If they pay, they will pay admirably. If I lose the money, I shan't die of starvation....

"I shall certainly not leave here before seeing Cuba. It would be a mortal sin to be so near the Antilles and yet never have sailed that sapphire sea yclept the Spanish Main.

"I never felt so funny in my whole life. I have no ambition, no loves, no anxieties,--sometimes a vague unrest without a motive, sometimes a feeling as if my heart was winged and trying to soar away, sometimes a vague longing for pleasurable wanderings, sometimes a halfcrazy passion for a great night with wine and women and music. But these are much like flitting dreams, and amount to little. They are ephemeral. The wandering passion is strongest of all; and I feel no inclination to avail myself of the only anchor which keeps the ship of a man's life in port.

"Then again,--I have curiously regained memories of long ago, which I thought utterly forgotten. Leisure lends memory a sharp definition. Life here is so lazy,--nights are so liquid with tropic moonlight,--days are so splendid with green and gold,--summer is so languid with perfume and warmth,--that I hardly know whether I am dreaming or awake. It is all a dream here, I suppose, and will seem a dream even after the sharp awakening of another voyage, the immortal gods only know where. Ah! Gods! beautiful Gods of antiquity! One can only feel you, and know you, and believe in you, after living in this sweet, golden air. What is the good of dreaming about earthly women, when one is in love with marble, and ivory, and the bronzes of two thousand years ago? Let me be the last of the idol-worshippers, O golden Venus, and sacrifice to thee the twin doves thou lovest,--the birds of Paphos,--the Cythendae!"

Hearn had had his troubles with New Orleans and Cincinnati newspaper men, some of whom pirated his translations, while others printed slanderous stories concerning his manner of living,--slanders which Mr. Watkin combated in a personal letter to the editor of the _Commercial_ some years after, when his attackers again became busy. On July 10, 1878, Hearn wrote:

"MY DEAR OLD MAN: Was delighted to hear from you. I am very glad the thing is as much of a mystery to you as it is to me. I can only surmise that it must have been a piece of spite work on the part of a certain gentleman connected with the N. O. _Times,_ who printed some of my work before, and got a raking for it. My position here is a peculiar one, and not as stable as I should like, so that if it were made to appear that I had re-utilized stuff from the _Item_, I would certainly get into trouble. I have been very ill for a week, break-bone fever. I do not expect to return North 'broke.' 'Cahlves is too scace in dis country to be killed for a prodigal son.' I wish you were near that I might whisper projects of colossal magnitude in your ear. I am working like hell to make a good raise for Europe. Will write more soon. Editor away to-day and the whole paper on my hands.

"_Monday._ Delayed posting letter. I find this climate terribly enervating. No one could have led a more monastic life than I have done here; yet I find I cannot even think energetically. The mind seems to lose all power of activity. I have been collecting materials for magazine articles, and I can't write them out. I have only been able to do mechanical work,--translating, &c., and one Romanesque essay, which was successively rejected by three magazines. Wish I was on a polar expedition.

"I have been an awfully good boy down here, and have no news to tell you of amours or curious experiences."

Hearn once more tells of his trouble with a Cincinnati paper, alleging the owners failed to pay him for his New Orleans correspondence, and how finally he was "happily discharged."

Then he resumes: "By the way, I wrote a poem for the decoration of the soldiers' graves at Chalmette National Cemetery, on the 30th inst. I think it was. The poem was read by Col. Wright of this city at the decoration and published in the _Democrat_. It was the first bit of rhyme I wrote, and so you must excuse it. But it is not as good as--

"_The love of Hearn and Watkin_,
_What is its kin_?--
_It is two toads encysted_
_Within one stone_,
_Two vipers twisted_
_Into one._

"Here is the poem:

_"Fairflowers pass away:_
_In perfumed ruin falls the lily's urn_;
_In pallid pink decay_
_Moulders the rose;--all in their time return_
_To the primeval clay._

_"Yet still their tiny ghosts_
_Hover about our homes on viewless wings;_
_In incense-breathing hosts_
_They love to haunt those stores of trifling things_
_Of which affection boasts_,--

_"Some curl of glossy hair_,--
_Some loving letter penned by pretty fingers_,--
_Some volume old and rare_,
_On whose time-yellow fly-leaf fondly lingers_
_The name of a woman fair._

_"So in that hour_
_When brave lives fail and brave hearts cease to beat_,--
_Each deed of power
Lives on to haunt our memories,--faintly sweet_
_Like the ghost of a flower._

_"Each flower we strew_
_In tribute to the brave to-day shall prove_
_A token true_
_Of some sweet memory of the dead we love_,--
_The Men in Blue._

_"Perchance the story_
_Of Chalmette's heroes may be lost to fame,_
_As years wax hoary;_
_But Valor's Angel keeps each gallant name_
_On his Roll of Glory."_

August 14, 1878, Hearn wrote a letter to the man who had always cheered him and who now in turn needed cheering. Business in all lines in Cincinnati was bad, and Mr. Watkin was quite despondent. He had written Hearn something of this, and also had hinted that he might move to Kansas or somewhere farther West. In return he received the following letter, expressive of all that was most fun-loving in its writer:

"MY DEAR OLD MAN: I think you had better come here next Oktober and rejoin your naughty raven. It would not do you any harm to reconnoitre. Think of the times we could have,--delightful rooms with five large windows opening on piazzas shaded by banana trees; dining at Chinese restaurants and being served by Manila waitresses, with oblique eyes and skin like gold; visiting sugar-cane plantations; scudding over to Cuba; dying with the mere delight of laziness; laughing at cold and smiling at the news of snowstorms a thousand miles away; eating the cheapest food in the world,--and sinning the sweetest kind of sins. Now you know, good old Dad, nice old Dad,--you know that you are lazy and ought to be still lazier. Come here and be lazy. Let me be the siren voice enticing a Ulysses who does not stuff wax in his ears. Don't go to horrid, dreadful Kansas. Go to some outrageous ruinous land, where the moons are ten times larger than they are there. Or tell me to pull up stakes, and I shall take unto myself the wings of a bird and fly to any place but beastly Cincinnati.

"Money can be made here out of the poor. People are so poor here that nothing pays except that which appeals to poverty. But I think you could make things hop around lively. Now one can make thirty milk biscuits for five cents and eight cups of coffee for five cents. Just think of it! ...

"Cincinnati is bad; but it's going to be a d--d sight worse. You know that as well as I do. Leave the vile hole and the long catalogue of Horrid Acquaintances behind you, and come down here to your own little man,--good little man. Get you nice room, nice board, nice business. Perhaps we might strike ile in a glorious spec. Why don't you spec.? You'd better spec, pretty soon, or the times will get so bad that you will have to get up and dust. This is a seaport. There are tall ships here. They sail to Europe,--to London, Marseilles, Constantinople, Smyrna. They sail to the West Indies and those seaports where we are going to open a cigar store or something of that kind.

_Oh, I have seven tall ships at sea,_
_And seven more at hand;_
_And five and twenty jolly, jolly seamen_
_Shall be at your command._

May the Immortal Gods preserve you in immortal youth."

There now follow some letters whose dates it has been impossible to fix. The cancellation marks on the envelopes give the months, but not the years. However, there is internal evidence to show that they belong to the period between the last group and the group of 1882, so that they were written in the years 1879, 1880, and 1881, in all probability. The first is one of the most interesting letters in the whole set. The future great writer is displayed as the owner of a five-cent eating-house. The letter is replete with ridiculous little sketches of a bird, which he claimed was a raven. In fact:, in the following, wherever "raven" is used, the reader must understand that there is a drawing of one in the letter. It was written in February:

"MY DEAR O. M.: Your style of correspondence--four letters a year--leads me to suppose that the fate of the Raven is of little consequence. It was therefore with surprise that I heard of a letter concerning It being received at the _Item_ office. The letter warranted the assumption that you had at least some curiosity, if nothing better, in regard to It. That curiosity should be gratified. The Raven keepeth a restaurant in the city of New Orleans. It is secretly in business for itself. It is also in the newspaper business. The reason It has gone into business for itself is that It is tired of working for other people. The reason that It is still in the newspaper line is that the business is not yet paying, and needs some financial support. The business is the cheapest in N. O. All dishes are five cents. Knocks the market price out of things. The business has already cost about one hundred dollars to set up. May pay well; may not. The Raven has a partner,--a large and ferocious man, who kills people that disagree with their coffee. The Raven expects to settle in Cuba before long. Is going there to reconnoitre in a few months,--if Fortune smileth. It has mastered the elements of Spanish language, and has a Spanish tutor who comes every day to teach It. It has been studying Spanish assiduously for six mos.; and trusts to be able to establish a _meson de los estrangeros,_ or stranger's restaurant, in Havana,--unless It is busted up pretty soon. It might be busted up. As yet It has remained poor. Economy is the cause thereof. It has seen little of wine and women in this city. Its notions are mean and stingy. It is constantly suspicious that Its partner may go back on It. It is of a suspicious character. It has debts on its mind, but prefers to look after its own interests at present,--until It can buy some clothes. It also proposes to establish another five-cent eating-house here in the French quarter, sooner or later, if this one pays. If the O. M. ever leaves Cincinnati, he may see the Raven. Otherwise he will not. If he comes to this part of the world, he can obtain board cheap at the five-cent restaurant. The Raven would not object: to see him again,--on the contrary, he is filled with CURIOSITY to see him. The Raven may succeed right off. He may not. But he is going to succeed sooner or later, even if he has to start an eating-house in Hell. He sends you his respects,--reserving his affection for a later time."

Hearn enclosed with the latter a yellow handbill advertising his restaurant. It was as follows:

"_The_ 5 _cent Restaurant_
160 _Dryades Street_"

_This is the cheapest eating-house in the South. It is neat, orderly, and respectable as any other in New Orleans. You can get a good meal for a couple of nickels. All dishes_ 5 _cents. A large cup of pure Coffee, with Rolls, only_ 5 _cents._ _Everything half the price of the markets_."

In a letter postmarked June 27, he again refers to his knowledge of Spanish, and, what is more interesting, makes his first reference to Japan, the country where he was to achieve his best work: "Your little Raven talks Spanish. Has a fair acquaintance with the language. Just now rusty for want of practice. Soon pick it up again.... "Have also wild theories regarding Japan.

Splendid field in Japan Climate just like

England,--perhaps a little milder. Plenty of Europeans. English, American and French papers....

"Would not be surprised if you could make N. Orleans trip pay--now that I have seen your circulars. Only--remember C. O. D. Everybody here is a thief. Must be careful even in changing a quarter not to get counterfeits or false change. Horrid den of villains, robbers, mutual admiration,--political quacks, medical quacks, literary quacks,--adventurers, Spanish, Italian, Greek, English, Corsican, French, Venezuelan,--Parisian roués, Sicilian murderers, Irish ruffians.... Couldn't be half so bad in Japan."

The censure of New Orleans people must not be taken too seriously. He afterwards had some very dear friends there, who changed his opinions to a great extent. On November 24 came a letter liberally sprinkled with drawings of the raven and replete with his fun:

"DEAR OLD MAN: The Raven has not found letter-writing a pleasant occupation lately. It has had some trouble; It has also been studying very hard; It has had Its literary work doubled, and It has had little leisure time, as Its grotesque and fantastic Eye is not yet in a healthy condition. It cannot write at night, not in these beautiful Southern Nights, which flame with stars,--the 'holy Night,' as the old Greek poet called it, which is 'all Eye, all Ear, all perfume to the student.'

"The Raven would like to see you, as It could tell you a great many queer things about Southern matters, which no paper has published or dare publish, and about the city and about the people. But It hardly hopes to see you; for after this summer It will not be here. It has latterly heard much of advantages held out to It in Mexico City, where the great exposition is soon to be held; and Its Spanish studies have been successful. It wants to find a temporary resting-place among Spanish people, and cannot stay here. It would be pleased to forget Its own language for a while, whether in Cuba or elsewhere.... The Raven cannot go North, as It cannot afford to. It will require all It can save to carry It through troubles which await It somewhere else,--for thou knowest full well that Woe is the normal condition of the Raven's existence. The Raven passeth Its time thusly: In the morning It a-riseth with the Sun and drinketh a cup of coffee and devoureth a piece of bread. Then It proceeded to the office and concocteth devilment for the _Item,_ Then It returned to Its room, whose windows are shadowed by creeping plants and clouds of mosquitoes, and received Its Spanish tutor. Then It goeth to a Chinese restaurant, where It eateth an amazing dinner,--Its bump of ALIMENTATIVENESS being enormously developed. Then It spendeth two hours among the second-hand bookstores. It then goeth to bed,--to arise in the dead vast and middle of the night and smoke Its pipe. For a year It hath not smoked a cigar; and Its morals are exemplary. It sendeth you Its affectionate good-will and proceedeth forthwith to smoke Its pipe."

Again, without any clue as to its date and without any aid from the memory of Mr. Watkin, is a small photograph of the writer, with this characteristic note:

"DEAR OLD DAD: Would like to hear from you, to see you, to chat with you. Write me a line or two. As soon as I can find time, will write a nice, long, chatty letter,--all about everything you would like to hear. Am doing well. New Orleans is not, however, what I hoped it was. Are you well and happy? I have thoughts of cemeteries and graves, and a dear old Ghost with a white beard,--a Voice of the Past.

"I press your hand.

"LAFCADIO HEARN"

In a letter dated July 7, 1882, Hearn tells of his first adventures in the book-writing line and of the horrified criticisms of some of the Eastern book-reviewers. All told, however, he becomes the more purposeful Hearn, the man Mr. Watkin had always predicted he would be if he continued at his literary work in his own way. It is interesting for another reason, too, in that it shows how already, in these New Orleans days, Hearn was preparing himself by his studies for his future life in Japan.

"MY DEAR OLD DAD: Your letter lies before me here like a white tablet of stone bearing a dead name; and in my mind there is just such a silence as one feels standing before a tomb,--so that I can press your hand only and say nothing.

"I must go North in a few months, by way of Cincinnati, and spend a week or so in the city. My intention is to see Worthington about a new publication. He is now in Europe. Here I make thirty dollars a week for about five hours' work a day, and the position appears tolerably solid; but the climate is enervating, the man who refuses to connect himself with church or clique lives alone like a hermit in the Thebaids, and one sickens of such a life at times. Sometimes I fancy that the older I grow, the more distasteful companionship becomes; but this may be owing to the situation here. Nevertheless I am feeling very old, old almost as the Tartar of Longfellow's poem,--'three hundred and sixty years.'

"Imagine the heavy, rancid air of a Southern swamp in midsummer, when the very clouds seem like those which belonged to the atmosphere of pregeologic periods, uncreated lead and iron,--never a breath of pure air,--dust that is powdered dung,--quaking ground that shakes with the passage of a wagon,--heat as of a perpetual vapor bath,--and at night, subtle damps that fill the bones with rheumatism and poison the blood. Then, when one thinks of green hills and brisk winds, comes a strange despondency. It is something like the outlying region through which Milton's Lucifer passed, half crawling, half flying, on his way to the Garden of Eden. Your little reprints provoked very pleasant old memories. I paid the Somebody one hundred and fifty dollars for the publication.[1] Have not yet heard from him. The understanding is that I get my money back and something besides. However, I shall be satisfied with the something. I have had many nice notices, letters from authors of some note, and a few criticisms of the true Pharisaic species. I enclose one for your amusement. I have also built up a fine library, about three hundred picked volumes, and have a little money saved. Have also some ambition to try the book business,--not here, but in San Francisco or somewhere else. However, I have no definite plans,--only a purpose to do something for myself and thus obtain leisure for a systematic literary purpose. Were you situated like me,--that is, having no large business or large interests,--I think I should try to coax you to seek the El Dorado of the future, where fortunes will certainly be made by practical men,--Mexico,--where no one ever lights a fire, and where one has only to go in the sun when he is too cold, into the shade when he is too warm. But for the present I will only ask you to come down here when the weather gets healthy and your business will allow it. You will stay with me, of course, and no expense. The trip would be agreeable in the season when the air is sweet with orange blossoms.

[Footnote 1: Translation of Gautier's short stories.]

"The population here is exceedingly queer,--something it is hard to describe, and something which it is possible to learn only after a painful experience of years. At present I may say that all my acquaintances here are limited to about half a dozen, with one or two friends whom I invite to see me occasionally. Yet almost daily I receive letters from people I do not know, asking favors which I never grant. New Orleans is the best school for the study of human selfishness I have ever been in. Buddhism teaches that the second birth is to this life 'as the echo to the voice in the cavern, as the great footprints to the steps of the elephant.' According to the teaching of the Oriental Christ, this whole population will be born again as wild beasts,--which is consoling. ... You say you cannot write. I differ with you; but it would certainly be impossible for either of us to write many things we would like to say. Still, you can easily drop a line from time to time, even a postal card, just to let me know you are well. If I do not get up to see you by September, I hope to see you down. I dreamed one night that I heard the ticking of the queer clock,--like the longstrides of a man booted and spurred. You know the clock I mean,--the long, weird-faced clock. My eyes are not well, of course,--never will be; but they are better. More about myself I cannot tell you in a letter,--except that I suppose I have changed a little. Less despondent, but less hopeful; wiser a little and more silent; less nervous, but less merry; more systematic and perhaps a good deal more selfish. Not strictly economical, but coming to it steadily; and in leisure hours studying the theories of the East, the poetry of antique India, the teachings of the wise concerning absorption and emanation, the illusions of existence, and happiness as the equivalent of annihilation. Think they were wiser than the wisest of Occidental ecclesiastics.

"And still there is in life much sweetness and much pleasure in the accomplishment of a fixed purpose. Existence may be a delusion and desire a snare, but I expect to exist long enough to satisfy my desire to see thee again before entering Nirvana. So, reaching to thee the grasp of friendship across the distance of a thousand miles, I remain in the hope of being always remembered sincerely as your friend."

On September 10, 1882, in reply to a letter from Mr. Watkin, in which the latter said he thought of going to Tampa for a rest and possibly also to look around and see what the business prospers were, Hearn filled five big sheets with all the information he could gather about Tampa, from facts about fleas to a glowing eulogy of the moon,--"seven times larger than your cold moon."

Following upon his translations of Gautier, Hearn busied himself with translations from Flaubert, and sent the manuscript of the proposed title-page and introduction to Mr. Watkin to set up, as he was superstitious about his "Dear Old Dad" bringing him luck. As usual he urged his friend to visit him, drawing in a letter of September 14, 1882, the following alluring pictures:

"In October we shall have exquisite weather--St. Martin's summer, the Creoles call it,--something like Indian summer North. Then I shall indeed hope to see you. No danger now of fever; and will have a nice healthy room for you. If you can't get away in October, wait till November,--nice and clear month generally, with orange-blossom smells. Raven wants to have a big talk. As for writing, don't write if it bothers you. I am sure you cannot have much time and must take care of your eyes. Perhaps some day we can both take things more easily, and a long rest by running streams, near mountain winds and in a climate like unto an eternal mountain springtime. Dream of voices of birds, whisper of leaves, milky quivering of stars, laughing of streams, odors of pine and of savage flowers, shadows of flying clouds, winds triumphantly free. Horrible cities! vile air! abominable noises! sickness! humdrum human machines! Let us strike our tents! move a little nearer to Nature!"

October 26, 1882, still writing about the promised visit of Mr. Watkin, he sent the following:

"MY DEAR OLD MAN: As the twig is bent, &c.--neither you nor I can now correct ourselves of habits. We are both old. [Hearn was thirty-two and Mr. Watkin fifty-nine.] I, for my part, feel ancient as the moon, and regret the departure of my youth. But I observe that all my best friends have the same habit. There's Charley Johnson,--wrote me twice in five years. There's the old newspaper coteries never write me at all. There is myself, just as bad as anybody. When somebody asked Théophile Gautier to write, he answered, 'Oh, ask a carpenter to plane planks just for fun!' It is a fact. Life's too short.... I was afraid for a while that Yellow Jack was trying to climb up this way from Pensacola; but I think all danger is now over. The weather feels chilly to us,--alligator-blooded and web-footed dwellers of the swamp (the Dismal Swamp): it will feel warm to you....

"Yes; I think a river trip down would be nicer for you, as it would include rest, good living, and a certain magical illusion of Southern beauties which bewitched me into making my dwelling-place among the frogs and bugs and the everlasting mosquitoes. 'Bugs' here mean every flying and crawling thing whereof the entomology is unknown to the people. The electric lights nightly murder centillions of them."

The letter is signed as usual with the drawing of a raven. As a novelty, the bird is looking at a steamer bearing over the side-wheel the name _Watkin_.

November 24, 1882, he wrote to Mr. Watkin, foreshadowing the book, "Stray Leaves from Strange Literatures," which was to bring him his first meed of praise from all sides. Again in this letter he somewhat despondently referred to his being a small man in a world where, according to his morbid views, big men won all the battles:

"I'm busy on a collection of Oriental legends,--Brahmanic, Buddhistic, Talmudic, Arabic, Chinese, and Polynesian,--which I hope to have ready in the spring. I think I can get Scribner or Osgood to bring it out.

"I think myself that life is worth living under the conditions you speak of; but they are very hard to obtain. I would be glad to try a new climate,--a new climate is a new life, a new youth. Here the problem of existence forever stares one in the face with eyes of iron. Independence is so hard to obtain,--the churches, the societies, the organizations, the cliques, the humbugs are all working against the man who tries to preserve independence of thought and action. Outside of these one cannot obtain a woman's society, and if obtained one is forever buried in the mediocrity to which she belongs.... My idea of perfect bliss would be ease and absolute quiet,--silence, dreams, tepidness,--great quaint rooms overlooking a street full of shadows and emptiness,--friends in the evening, a pipe, a little philosophy, wandering under the moon.... I am beginning to imagine that to be forever in the company of one woman would kill a man with ennui. And I feel that I am getting old--immemorially old,--older than the moon. I ought never to have been born in this century, I think sometimes, because I live forever in dreams of other centuries and other faiths and other ethics,--dreams rudely broken by the sound of cursing in the street below, cursing in seven different languages. I can't tell you much else about myself. I live in my books, and the smoke of my pipe, and ideas that nobody has any right expelling a good time in this world unless he be gifted with great physical strength and force of will. These give success. Little phantoms of men are blown about like down in the storms of the human struggle: they have not enough weight to keep them in place. And the Talmud says: 'There are three whose life is no life: the Sympathetic man, the Irascible, and the Melancholy.' But alas! the art by which the Sorceress of Colchis could recreate a body by cutting it up and boiling it in a pot is lost. Don't you think happiness is solely the result of perfect health under normal conditions of existence? I believe in the German philosopher who said that whether one had a billion dollars a day or only one dollar a week, it made no difference in regard to the amount of happiness a human brain was susceptible of. Still, it would be so nice to avoid the opposite by walling oneself up from the human species,--like the Cainites, whose cities were 'walled up to Heaven.'"

There now ensues in the correspondence, a silence extending over a period of nearly five years. These were busy years for Hearn. His position in the New Orleans newspaper world became a prominent one, and his translations of stories from the French, made for the papers by which he was employed, were so favorably received as to give him greater confidence in his own abilities.

Early in June of the year 1887 things began to take a turn for greater work for Hearn. His studies of the negroes and the Creoles of Louisiana had attracted the attention of the publishers, and he had received some rather tempting offers to do work for them. It was then that he left New Orleans, going to New York by way of Cincinnati. With all of his old shyness, his avoidance of mere acquaintances, and his love of the white-haired old gentleman, who alone in Cincinnati had understood him, Hearn spent his entire day in Cincinnati in chat at Watkin's printing office, which was then situated at 26 Longworth Street. It was there that Hearn saw once more the tall clock, whose peculiar ticking seemed to have fascinated him and to which references are made even in his few letters from Japan. After the day with Mr. Watkin, he went direct to New York, where he was the guest of his friend, Mr. H. E. Krehbiel, the well-known musical critic, who was then living at 438 West 57th Street. From there it was that Hearn wrote to his mentor the following confession of affection and gratitude:

"DEAR OLD MAN: A delightful trip brought me safe and sound to New York, where my dear friend Krehbiel was waiting to take me to his cosy home. I cannot tell you how much our little meeting delighted me, or how much I regretted to depart so soon, or how differently I regarded our old friendship from my old way of looking at it. I was too young, too foolish, and too selfish to know you as you are, when we used to be together. Ten years made little exterior change in me, but a great deal of heart-change; and I saw you as you are,--noble and true and frank and generous, and felt I loved you more than I ever did before; felt also how much I owed you, and will always owe you,--and understood how much allowance you had made for all my horrid, foolish ways when I used to be with you. Well, I am sure to see you again.' I am having one of the most delightful holidays here I ever had in my life; and I expect to stay a few weeks. If it were not for the terrible winters, I should like to live in New York. Some day I suppose I shall have to spend a good deal of my time here. The houses eleven stories high, that seem trying to climb into the moon,--the tremendous streets and roads,--the cascading thunder of the awful torrent of life,--the sense of wealth-force and mind-power that oppresses the stranger here,--all these form so colossal a contrast with the inert and warmly colored Southern life that I know not how to express my impression. I can only think that I have found superb material for a future story, in which the influence of New York on a Southern mind may be described. Well, new as these things may seem to me, they are, no doubt, old and uninteresting to you,--so that I shall not bore you with my impressions. I will look forward to our next meeting, when during a longer stay in Cin. I can tell you such little experiences of my trip as may please you. I want to get into that dear little shop of yours again. I dreamed of it the other night, and heard the ticking of the old clock like a man's feet treading on pavement far away; and I saw the Sphinx, with the mother and child in her arms, move her monstrous head, and observe: 'The sky in New York is grey!'

"When I woke up it _was_ grey, and it remained grey until to-day. Even now it is not like our summer blue. It looks higher and paler and colder. We are nearer to God in the South, just as we are nearer to Death in that terrible and splendid heat of the Gulf Coast. When I write God, of course I mean only the World-Soul, the mighty and sweetest life of Nature, the great Blue Ghost, the Holy Ghost which fills planets and hearts with beauty.

"Believe me, Dear Old Dad,

"Affectionately, your son,

"LAFCADIO HEARN"

Below this is once more the familiar drawing of the raven.

From this time on the letters came at greater and greater intervals. There were only three more from America and then four from Japan. It was not that Hearn forgot his old friend or cared less for him. But he became busier, and with larger projects, newer aims, and a different life, there was less time in which to indulge himself in the active correspondence of former years. Between the New York group of letters and those from Japan is a gap. Letters on both sides had become a matter of years instead of weeks or months. Mr. Watkin, with the increasing weight of years on his shoulders and the increasing cares of a business that had begun to decline with the introduction of modern printing methods, found less time to write to his Raven.

Early in July, 1887, Hearn at last departed on that long-wished-for journey to the West Indies. A note, hastily scribbled to Mr. Watkin, told of the arrangements:

"DEAR OLD MAN: I leave on the _Barracouta_ for Trinidad, Sunday, at daybreak. I have been travelling about a good deal, and have been silent only because so busy and so tired when the business was over. Your dear letter and your excellent little stamp both delighted me. I will let you hear from me soon again,--that is, as soon as I can get to a P. O.

"With affection, always your little Raven,

"LAFCADIO HEARN"

This promise of frequent letters was one he was not destined to keep. Once in the West Indies, he found himself so enthralled by its beauties, so busy putting on paper his impressions of what he was seeing and breathing and feeling, that it was not until he was once more in the United States that he found time to write.

September 21, 1887, he sent the following from Metuchen, New Jersey:

"DEAR OLD DAD: After three months or so in the West Indies and British Guiana, I am back again in the U. S. in first-rate health and spirits. I ought to have been able to write you, I thought, from Martinique; but the enormous and unexpected volume of work I had to do rendered it almost impossible to write anything except business letters to Harpers, and one or two necessary notes to friends looking after my affairs elsewhere. My conviction is that you and I would do well to spend our lives in the Antilles. All dreams of Paradise (even Mahomet's) are more than realized there by nature;--after returning, I find this world all colorless, all grey, and fearfully cold. I feel like an outcast from heaven. But it is no use trying to tell you anything about it in a letter. I wrote nearly three hundred pages of manuscript to the Harpers about it,--and I have not been able to say one thousandth part. I got two little orders for stamps for you at Martinique,--pencil stamps like the one you made for me. One is to be 'Plissonneau, fils;' the other, 'A. Testart.' Send bill to me, and stamps to A. Testart, St. Pierre, Martinique, French W. Indies. I hope to see you on my way South, dear old Dad.

"Believe me always,

"LAFCADIO HEARN"

In view of the terrible catastrophe at St. Pierre, it would be interesting to know whether Hearn's friends perished in that fury of fire and lava and hot ashes. Hearn's expectations about returning to New Orleans were not destined to be fulfilled. So successful had he been in his work for Harpers that, a week later than the date of the previous letter, he had the satisfa&ion of announcing that he was going back to what at that time seemed to him the most delightful region in the world. The opening of this letter is unique, in that it is the only one in which he is in the least ceremonious:

"H. WATKIN, ESQ., DEAR OLD DAD: I am going right back to the Tropics again, this time to stay. I have quit newspapering forever. Wish I could see you and chat with you before I go, but I cannot get a chance this time. My address will be care American Consul, St. Pierre, Martinique, Lesser Antilles. I may not be there all the time, but that will be my headquarters, and there letters will always reach me. To-day I am packing, rushing around breathlessly, preparing to go,--so that my letter must be brief. I did better with my venture than I ever expected; for I got for my work done seven hundred dollars, besides having secured material for much better work. You will hear of me in the _Harper's Magazine_ this winter,--beginning about January and February. I shall be able hereafter to rest where I please; so that I shall have no trouble, when I get to New York again, in running to Cincinnati. Of course I don't want my little plans known yet,--because no one knows what might turn up; but these are the present prospers,--quite bright for me. I will write from Martinique or Guadeloupe, and try to coax you to go down there. Good-bye for a little while, with my best love to you. "L. HEARN"

Again this promise of letters from the West Indies was destined to be broken. While lotus-eating, Hearn wrote few letters. He was most probably busy, amid the glow and color of the Antilles, studying the philosophical, scientific, and religious works which were destined so strongly to color his writings about Japan. He went to the latter country in 1890. In order that the reader may have a clear understanding of events, the facts in Hearn's Japanese career may be told in a few words. In 1890 and 1891 he served as English teacher in the ordinary middle school and the normal school of Matsue in Izumo. Next he was connected with the government school at Kumamoto. Then came newspaperwork at Kobe, and finally in 1896 he was honored by being made lecturer on English literature at the Imperial University of Tokio, which position he held until 1903, when he retired, owing to increasing trouble with his eyes, which had caused him anxiety all his life. He was contemplating a lecture trip in the United States, but ill health prevented. He died at his Tokio home September 26, 1904, and was buried September 29, with the Buddhist rites, the funeral service being held at the temple of Jito-in of Ichigaya. He now sleeps in the lonely old cemetery of Zōshigaya in the outskirts of the capital. Shortly after Hearn reached Japan Mr. Watkin obtained his address, and wrote him a letter telling how often he had thought of him and had expected to hear from him in the two years and more that had elapsed since their last letters. This brought a speedy reply,--a reply which showed that, so far as his feeling for the old English printer was concerned, there was little difference between the immature, ambition-stung youth of nineteen and the well-known, mature author of forty, who felt in some dim way that there amid this Oriental people he was destined to live and die. The reply to Mr. Watkin is from Yokohama, and, contrary to Hearn's previous rule, is actually dated,--April 25, 1890.

"DEAR OLD DAD: I was very happy to feel that your dear heart thought about me; I also have often found myself dreaming of you. I arrived here, by way of Canada and Vancouver, after passing some years in the West Indies. I think I shall stay here some years. I have not been getting rich,--quite the contrary; but I am at least preparing a foundation for ultimate independence,--if I keep my health. It is very good now, but I have many grey hairs, and I shall be next June forty years old.

"I trust to make enough in a year or two to realize my dream of a home in the West Indies; if I succeed, I must try to coax you to come along, and dream life away quietly where all is sun and beauty. But no one ever lived who seemed more a creature of circumstances than I; I drift with various forces in the direction of least resistance,--resolve to love nothing, and love always too much for my own peace of mind,--places, things, and persons,--and lo! presto! everything is swept away, and becomes a dream,--like life itself.

"Perhaps there will be a great awakening; and each will cease to be an Ego, but an All, and will know the divinity of Man by seeing, as the veil falls, himself in each and all.

"Here I am in the land of dreams,--surrounded by strange Gods. I seem to have known and loved them before somewhere: I burn incense before them. I pass much of my time in the temples, trying to see into the heart of this mysterious people. In order to do so I have to blend with them and become a part of them. It is not easy. But I hope to learn the language; and if I do not, in spite of myself, settle here, you will see me again. If you do not, I shall be under big trees in some old Buddhist cemetery, with six laths above me, inscribed with prayers in an unknown tongue, and a queerly carved monument typifying those five elements into which we are supposed to melt away. I trust all is well with you, dear old Dad. Write me when it will not pain your eyes. Tell me all you can about yourself. Be sure that I always remember you; and that my love goes to you.

"LAFCADIO HEARN

"I could tell you so much to make you laugh if you were here; and to hear you laugh again would make me very happy."

An interval of over four years now occurred before Hearn wrote once more to Cincinnati. Some very decided changes had taken place in his life. He had wedded a Japanese woman, he had a son, and he was reputed to have become a Buddhist. He had been successful with his literary work, his essays on things Japanese being among the most noteworthy and popular articles in the _Atlantic Monthly._ It was at this period, when Mr. Watkin thought his friend was most happy, that he received a long reply from Japan in response to a joint letter sent by the old gentleman and his daughter, Miss Effie Watkin. It is a singular thing that it was not until this time that Hearn ever mentioned Mr. Watkin's wife and daughter. He had in truth been few times in their presence. Mrs. Watkin, a woman of strong common sense, had found the foolish superstitions of the young lad hard to bear, and he had accordingly, when in Cincinnati, confined his particular friendship to the husband and father. The letter from Hearn rather surprised its recipient by reason of its despondency. It had much of the old gloomy cast of thought. For this there were two potent reasons. One was his worry over his son's future. The other was his worry over that Japan he had learned to love so well. He felt doubtful about the outcome of the war with China,--the letter was written in September, 1894,--and troubles for the Mikado's empire always made him a little sad. Singularly enough, the same feeling can be traced very clearly in his book, "Japan, An Attempt at Interpretation," written in the first months of the struggle with Russia.

One other word of introductory comment is necessary. His seeming depreciation of his own essays was only the reflection of his general gloomy viewpoint at the time the letter was written. Hearn was dwelling at the time at Kumamoto.

"DEAR OLD DAD: It delighted me to get that kindest double letter from yourself and sweet-hearted little daughter,--or rather delighted us. My wife speaks no English, but I translated it for her. She will send a letter in Japanese, which Miss Effie will not be able to read, but which she will keep as a curiosity perhaps. Our love to you both.

"How often I have thought of you, and wondered about you, and wished I could pass with you more of the old-fashioned evenings, reading ancient volumes of the_ Atlantic Monthly_,--so much better a magazine in those days than in these, when I am regularly advertised as one of its contributors.

"I often wonder now at your infinite patience with the extraordinary, superhuman foolishness and wickedness of the worst pet you ever had in your life. When I think of all the naughty, mean, absurd, detestable things I did to vex you and to scandalize you, I can't for the life of me understand why you did n't want to kill me,--as a sacrifice to the Gods. What an idiot I was!--and how could you be so good?--and why do men change so? I think of my old self as of something which ought not to have been allowed to exist on the face of the earth,--and yet, in my present self, I sometimes feel ghostly reminders that the old self was very real indeed. Well, I wish I were near you to love you and make up for all old troubles.

"I have a son. He is my torment and my pride. He is not like me or his mother. He has chestnut hair and blue eyes, and is enormously strong,--the old Gothic blood came out uppermost. I am, of course, very anxious about him. He _can't_ become a Japanese,--his soul is all English, and his looks. I must educate him abroad. Head all above the ears,--promises to be intelligent. I shall never have another child. I feel too heavily the tremendous responsibility of the thing. But the boy is there,--intensely alive; and I must devote the rest of my existence to him. One thing I hope for is that he will never be capable of doing such foolish things as his daddy used to do. His name is Kaji-we or Ka-jio. He does not cry, and has a tremendous capacity for growing. And he gives me the greatest variety of anxiety about his future.

"When you hear that I have been able to save between thirty-five hundred and four thousand dollars, you will not think I have made no progress. But I have put all, or all that I could reasonably do, in my wife's name. The future looks very black. The reaction against foreign influence is strong; and I feel more and more every day that I shall have to leave Japan eventually, at least for some years. When I first met you I was--nineteen. I am now forty-four! Well, I suppose I must have lots more trouble before I go to Nirvana.

"Effie says you do not see my writings. My book will be out by the time you get this letter,--that is, my first book on Japan.[1] Effie can read bits of it to you. And I figure in the _Atlantic_ every few months. Cheap fame;--the amazing fortune I once expected does n't turn up at all. I have been obliged to learn the fact that I am not a genius, and that I must be content with the crumbs from the table of Dives.

"But this is all Egotism. I am guilty of it only because you asked for a small quantity. About yourself and all who love you my letter rather ought to be. Speak always well of me to John Chamberlain [a journalist]. I liked him well. Do you remember the long walks over the Ohio, in the evening, among the fireflies and grasshoppers, to hear lectures upon spiritual things? If I were near you now, I could saturate you with Oriental spiritualism,--Buddhism,--everything you would like, but after a totally novel fashion. When one has lived alone five years in a Buddhist atmosphere, one naturally becomes penetrated by the thoughts that hover in it; my whole thinking, I must acknowledge, has been changed, in spite of my long studies of Spencer and of Schopenhauer. I do not mean that I am a Buddhist, but I mean that the inherited ancestral feelings about the universe--the Occidental ideas every Englishman has--have been totally transformed.

"There is yet no fixity, however: the changes continue,--and I really do not know how I shall feel about the universe later on. What a pity that Western education and Western ideas only corrupt and spoil the Japanese,--and that the Japanese peasant is now superior to the Japanese noble!

"You have heard of the war. The Japanese are a fighting race; and I think they will win all the battles. But to conquer a Chinese army is not the same thing as to conquer the Chinese government. The war makes us all uneasy. Japan's weakness is financial. A country where it costs a dollar a month to live, and where the population is only forty million, is not really strong enough for such an enormous job. Our hope is that science and rapidity of movement may compensate for smallness of resources.

"I am almost sure I shall have to seek America again. If that happens, I shall see you or die. All now is doubt and confusion. But in this little house all is love to you. We have your picture;... we all know you, as if you were an old acquaintance.

"I wish we could be together somewhere for a pleasant evening chat, hearing in the intervals the office clock, like the sound of a long-legged walker. I wish we could talk over all the hopes and dreams of ideal societies, and the reasons of the failure to realize them. I wish I could tell you about the ideas of Western civilization which are produced by a long sojourn in the Orient. How pleasant to take country walks again! that is, if there be any country left around Cincinnati. How pleasant to read to you strange stories and theories from the Far East! Still, I have become so accustomed to Japanese life that a return to Western ways would not be altogether easy at first. What a pity I did not reach Japan ten years sooner!

"Tell me, if you write again, all pleasant news about old friends. Love to you always, and believe me ever,

"Your extremely bad and ungrateful
"Grey-headed boy,
"LAFCADIO HEARN"

[Footnote 1: _Glimpses of Unfamiliar Japan._]