* * * * *

Yes, indeed, people treat me with uncontrollable politeness; this is
because of my age. People are indulgent toward me when I am troublesome to
others, when I am eccentric, when I have a screw loose; people forgive me
because my hair is gray. You who live by your compass will say that I am
respected for the writing I have been doing all these years. But if that
were so, I should have had respect in my young days when I deserved it,
not now when I no longer deserve it so well. No one--no one in the world--
can be expected to write after fifty nearly so well as before, and only
the fools or the self-interested pretend to improve after that age.

Now it is a fact that I have been practicing a most distinctive
authorship, better than most; I know that very well. But this is due, not
so much to my endeavors, as to the fact that I was born with this ability.

I have made a test of this, and I know it is true. I have thought to
myself: "Suppose someone else had said this!" Well, no doubt others have
said it sometimes, but that has not hurt me. I have gone even further than
this: I have intentionally exposed myself to direct contempt from other
literary men, and this has not hurt me either. So I am sure of my ground.
On the other hand, my way of life has lent me an inner distinction for
which I have a right to demand respect, because it is the fruit of my own
endeavors. You cannot make me out a small man without lying. Yet one can
endure even such a lie if one has character.

You may quote Carlyle against me--how authors are misjudged!--
"_Considering what book-writers do in the world, and what the world does
with book-writers, I should say it is the most anomalous thing the world