I have the Yosemite book, and Miss Christiansen has the Mandarin coat. I thank you very much. The pictures are beautiful, but of them all I prefer that of Nanny bending over the stove. True, the face is not visible, but it looks like you all over. I'm filling out the book with views of the Grand Canyon, so as to have my scenic treasures all together. Also I'm trying to get for you a certain book of Canyon pictures, which I neglected to obtain when there. You will like it--if I get it. Sometime when you have nothing better to do--don't be in a hurry about it--will you go out to Mountain View cemetery with your camera and take a picture of the grave of Elizabeth (Lily) Walsh, the little deaf mute that I told you of? I think the man in the office will locate it for you. It is in the Catholic part of the cemetery--St. Mary's. The name Lily Walsh is on the beveled top of the headstone which is shaped like this: [Illustration: Headstone] You remember I was going to take you there, but never found the time. Miss Christiansen says she is writing, or has written you. I think the coat very pretty. Affectionately, AMBROSE. [Washington, D. C., February 15, 1911.] DEAR GEORGE, As to the "form of address." A man passing another was halted by the words: "You dirty dog!" Turning to the speaker, he bowed coldly and said: "Smith is my name, sir." _My_ name is Bierce, and I find, on reflection, that I like best those who call me just that. If my christen name were George I'd want to be called _that_; but "Ambrose" is fit only for mouths of women--in which it sounds fairly well. _How_ are you my master? I never read one of your poems without learning something, though not, alas, how to make one. Don't worry about "Lilith"; it will work out all right. As to the characters not seeming alive, I've always fancied the men and women of antiquity--particularly the kings, and great ones generally--should not be too flesh-and-bloody, like the "persons whom one meets." A little coldness and strangeness is very becoming to them. I like them to _stalk_, like the ghosts that they are--our modern passioning seems a bit anachronous in them. Maybe I'm wrong, but I'm sure you will understand and have some sympathy with the error. Hudson Maxim takes medicine without biting the spoon. He had a dose from me and swallowed it smiling. I too gave him some citations of great poetry that is outside the confines of his "definition"--poetry in which are no tropes at all. He seems to lack the _feel_ of poetry. He even spoils some of the "great lines" by not including enough of the context. As to his "improvements," fancy his preference for "the fiercest spirit of _the warrior host_" to "the fiercest spirit _that fought in Heaven_"! O my! Yes, Conrad told me the tale of his rescue by you. He gave me the impression of hanging in the sky above billows unthinkably huge and rocks inconceivably hard. * * * * *