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joSEm^opu).

Mdrei'Private. tetters, j.^

In The Amerian- World's ~ Work ' for January ' the final instalment of Joseph Conrad's private- letters,- some of which were published on -this pace a few weeks

ago, -.are given. ..This .group of letters, although it d-ls.more particularly wifh America, is especially interesting, in that; in addition 'to expressing some of hi* opinions' of well-known . American authors, it gives many intimate gilmpses of. Conrad himself. A letter to Galsworthy, just be for^his voyage to America, early in April, 192?,. is worth a paragraph on its own: — -. 'My Dearest Jack. — I hope that Joumey will not.ium out a fool's errand. As to sneaking in .quietly into the U.S., there is no hope of that. - , . Huirhead Bone is going in the same glr^p Ol'* brother cosu&ands bar) and of course iftmes. Bone (of The Hah. Guardian) knows WT about it and has been talking. I have had qufte'a few wires from various papers, already. The fat is in the fire. But yon need not be nneasy about the safety ot American pressmen. I am- going to leave my revolver at home.- If I have to shew them my teeth (artificial) it will ?only be: in an agreeable .smile. And as to .what may. come. after, I leave it to, chance and .the. inspiration of. the moment. .' I, absolutely, .cannot think about 'it now. Our dear love to you bofh. It would be a hypocritical affecta rioa otr my part to ask you to keep toe in your misd. - I know you will do' that. That it one d the certitudes of -my life.' ? - ???'?. -. ??? ' The Modern Ship. A letter to Capt. Phillips makes one thankful that we have iES books of the great sea writer to keep ns in touch with the beauty and fascination of the ^Windjammer' in these dreary days of unromantic ocean liners:— ''. . . I share to tha full your comments about r.ll kinds of mechanical propulsloa. ' It changed the Jife entirely, changed also the character ol the- men. There is not much difference now between a deck and a factory hand. In tha early part of last year I crossed to New Tcr» with my old friend Capt. David Bone commun ing the Tuscanta. Of course I was made tree of. the bridge and the navigation room. I won't tay I waj not interested. I was, in a wa;. lor about SO hours, till I went twice over all the switches working various gadgets. But I re maiccd cold, completely cold;, before all those things which make the position of a ship's office! almost an indoor occupation. It is a fact that one. can take a ship along now In white gloves, and without, so to speak, opening one'* mouth once. Capt Bone, who had some 10 years of sail, 'told me that they had wholly Jort' the 'weather sense,' that touch with hato t»l phenomena ? of wind' 'and sea which wan tha' very health of our professional life. I ?was. generally in his room when be was Inter viewing th« heads of . 'departments,' - and I went .also with him on, his rounds. Ooce -he made the remark to mo that being a ship master was not lflte .being in command of a ship, but at the head of an administration. However, he told ma also that in certain dr canuitancet ' those biir ferry boat* required cam ?inl hsmflbw 'tad that no two of' them' were alike. ...-.? :- I returned in the Majestic. As to that, all I can. tail you Is that on the. sta and ? half *JJ. Vumg* I hardly pnt my nose one* on deck.\ . It .was really too dreary. I met the Captain at a.te* party fiven. by a fashionable ladr Jpaaasg «,. but only nchanged a few words |*itli him.' wlat I rtmember'best is him t»U lof;ias'thst in' one way or. another the com nund of ?»? bl«;' ship like that mi a pretty heavy load on a man's tboolders.' - ? H. L/ Mencken/ ' ' ? ; JCottnA, with reservations,. had a great admiration for , that . iconoclastic critic, g; Li Mencken. . In a. letter to Mr. pat»B heiirives his opinion of the. dig- trnguished American, and incidentally leaves ?for posterity some intimate biogra phical details:— ;£?'{??-???' ? Mencken'j rigour is astonishing. It is like an electric current. In all he writes there Js'a';.mckto' of. bine' sparks like those on* ? ski in a dynamo house, among revolving masses of metal that give you a sense of anor bkvi 'hidden power: For that/^is 'what he has. :Drhamie- power. ' - Vrhen be takes nb iisun he. snatches him.away- and tuMbni him iato something th|t (in mr.case).Ae Is.pleaied Wth— lockfly for me, bijcanse had, I not pleased wm tie would have, torn me limb. from limb. Whereas, -as it is,' he exalts 'me 'almost above the ' *tanr. ? It ?' makes me giddy. But who could quarrel with tnch generosity, sttSij'tlbrating' sympathy, and with a taind so. intensely alive; What', however, surpriies me is. that a ; petspnality so i genuine in its sensations, so independent in judgment, should now and then condescend to mere parrot talk; for' his harping on my, Clavonisai is ' only that. I wonder what meaning he attaches to tha word.1 Does hs'meaa by Jt primitive natures ?? fashioned by a Byrantin*-- theological coactption ot life, -with. an inslinatlon of per ;wrted Biystlcismt Then it cannot' possibly apply to me. Baclally . I- belong to a- group ?which bos historically a. political put, with a 'Western Boman culture derived .at ' first from Italy and then 'from France; and a rather Southern temperament; an outpost tif Westeraism with a 'Boman tradition situated between Slavo-Tartar Byiantine barbarism oo one. lids and' the.iOannan tribes on tha other; restating both .influences desperately and stUI remaining true to itself, to this very day. ' An Individual, Not * Type. '? 'I' went «ut into the worid before I Was 17, to France and England, and'in neither ' 'country ? tlid I* feel ' myself '» rtranger for a moment; neither as regards ideas, sentimepts,' nor institutions. If he means that I have been influenced by co called SlavoC'c literature' then he is utterly wrong. I suppose 'he means Rus sian; but, as a.' matter of fact, I never knew Bussian. The' few novws I have read. I ha. V9 read in- translation. Their mentality and their emotionalism Lava beeiralwsys repugnant to me, hereditarily and -individually: Apart from Polish, my youth has been fed oh French and Eng lish literature.' While I was aboy in:a great public school' we were steeped 'in classicism to the lips^ and' though our hiBtoncal studies were paturally tinted with Germanism, I know that all we boys, Uw «00 of us, resisted that influence with ?n^ our might, while accepting the re sults of German research and thorough ntse. .And that was only, natural, '. w» » child^ not of a savage, hiib pf » chivalrous .tradition, aad if my mind took a tinge from, anything it wes from French romanticism. It wan fed on ideas, not of revolt, but of liberalism of a perfectly disinterested kind, and' on severe moral lessons of 'national mlifor tune. Of dourse' I'broka away early. Excess of individualism perhaps? But that, and other things, I. have settled a^Iong time ago with my conscience. I admit I was never an average, able boy. As a ??nutter of fact, .1 was not able at all. In whatever I have achieved after wards' I have simply followed my instinct* the, voice from ou.tside. Mencken might have given me the credit «f being Just an individual somewhat out of the com mon, jnjtead of ramming me into a cate^ gory, which proceeding anyhow' is an ex ploded superstition. This, outburst w . provpked, . ,of course by deaj Menckens amazing article about me. so . . raan^ided. ,K . bnUisnt, and so warm-hearted. For that man of »_ really ruthless mind, pitiless to all shams and common formulas, has a great generosity. My debt of graticuda to him has been growjng for. -. years,- and I am ?fi*-i V-i.'' I**-!* ]ong «nough to read the latest contribution.' . ? Jack London. ' ; ..-'prom ? si letter to Dr. Bendr— ft^*i*?.rfb''d '''»» Wend who vUitid 5«fe *** .^'i^t I am ? reprded In that cou«rr as litwrily * sot? of Jack londcm. ^.w \PHtv ,t0. wpwhte '!ta tb« least the .L^»'rta lno!t.Wenffly wav nuny j»ar« iiS«t *'* b«innillif. I think, of his litettry cireer, and with whom I used to' a rtvange menges through friends afterwards; ?2.J5 ? nmalw that temperamentally Went parson. I sympathited much with' tfce U,™.^ f ^ taItnt d '** ^o01100. '??'« 75* £IZ *°vlh'r ot hl» death— bat, utter ZJL Dt, ^J an» «-Ine. for insUnce, I am ESSJ. u.i* ,* JK?2 liumsnitarian thin 'Jack J*?dJ?;v tot J th!?k; that-1 so' not taktag too much on -myself In wyin? that I am a cosmopolittn sane, but la the blood and iwne as i. were, and m the result of a jony heredity. Ui « 's11,.?*, obtli)a» '''I Irfon't pci Et- ht .1BlWi -11'!'1** I' »».T wceptlcmal eerity when I eay that it has po«st*ed and even shaped my thoucAtfc Idiomatically I f# t T5r at fiSM- 'd K U «b»olutelT true I.U hv^tlBent,7riatlLBfa'B''lhI. 'OqW, n0? Mis» Tennyson Jes»e has completed a Bevei with the nnusnal title, 'Modnraker or the Female Pirate and Her Friends.' Ihe story of the female pirate, while an Pfa'ttS '»'JtseIf,' is only a setting lor a wstory of Toussaint 1'pverture, the great negro -general of \$gh Domingo, whose. bravery ol body and soul, and final piti ful defeat, make the kernel of the book.

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