Your first volume of poems has been read by one man, at least, beside wild watchfires in the Rocky Mountains." Tom did not say that he pitched the said volume into the river in disgust; and that it was, probably, long since used up as house material by the caddis-baits of those parts,--for doubtless there are caddises there as elsewhere.
Poor Elsley rose at the bait, and smiled and bowed in silence.
"I have been so long absent from England, and in utterly wild countries, too, that I need hardly be ashamed to ask if you have written anything since 'The Soul's Agonies'?
No doubt if you have, I might have found it at Melbourne, on my way home: but my visit there was a very hurried one.

However, the loss is mine, and the fault too, as I ought to call it." "Pray make no excuses," says Elsley, delighted.

"I have written, of course.

Who can help writing, sir, while Nature is so glorious, and man so wretched?
One cannot but take refuge from the pettiness of the real in the contemplation of the ideal.

Yes, I have written.