to Cosmo Monkhouse

La Solitude, Hyères, [April 24, 1884].

DEAR MONKHOUSE,—If you are in love with repose, here is your occasion: change with me.  I am too blind to read, hence no reading; I am too weak to walk, hence no walking; I am not allowed to speak, hence no talking; but the great simplification has yet to be named; for, if this goes on, I shall soon have nothing to eat—and hence, O Hallelujah! hence no eating.  The offer is a fair one: I have not sold myself to the devil, for I could never find him.  I am married, but so are you.  I sometimes write verses, but so do you.  Come!  Hic quies!  As for the commandments, I have broken them so small that they are the dust of my chambers; you walk upon them, triturate and toothless; and with the Golosh of Philosophy, they shall not bite your heel.  True, the tenement is falling.  Ay, friend, but yours also.  Take a larger view; what is a year or two? dust in the balance!  ’Tis done, behold you Cosmo Stevenson, and me R. L. Monkhouse; you at Hyères, I in London; you rejoicing in the clammiest repose, me proceeding to tear your tabernacle into rags, as I have already so admirably torn my own.

My place to which I now introduce you—it is yours—is like a London house, high and very narrow; upon the lungs I will not linger; the heart is large enough for a ballroom; the belly greedy and inefficient; the brain stocked with the most damnable explosives, like a dynamiter’s den.  The whole place is well furnished, though not in a very pure taste; Corinthian much of it; showy and not strong.

About your place I shall try to find my way alone, an interesting exploration.  Imagine me, as I go to bed, falling over a blood-stained remorse; opening that cupboard in the cerebellum and being welcomed by the spirit of your murdered uncle.  I should probably not like your remorses; I wonder if you will like mine; I have a spirited assortment; they whistle in my ear o’ nights like a north-easter.  I trust yours don’t dine with the family; mine are better mannered; you will hear nought of them till, 2 A.M., except one, to be sure, that I have made a pet of, but he is small; I keep him in buttons, so as to avoid commentaries; you will like him much—if you like what is genuine.

Must we likewise change religions?  Mine is a good article, with a trick of stopping; cathedral bell note; ornamental dial; supported by Venus and the Graces; quite a summer-parlour piety.  Of yours, since your last, I fear there is little to be said.

There is one article I wish to take away with me: my spirits.  They suit me.  I don’t want yours; I like my own; I have had them a long while in bottle.  It is my only reservation.—Yours (as you decide),

R. L. Monkhouse.