I hope this letter is _décousue_ enough for you. What is a man to write when a reef is being taken in his existence, and absence from thought and life is all he aspires to. Better times will come, though, and with them better letters. Good-bye! Ever yours, WM. JAMES. _To O. W. Holmes, Jr., and John C. Gray, Jr._ [_Winter of 1868-69._] Gents!--entry-thieves--chevaliers d'industrie--well-dressed swindlers--confidence men--wolves in sheep's clothing--asses in lion's skin--gentlemanly pickpockets--beware! The hand of the law is already on your throats and waits but a wink to be tightened. All the resources of the immensely powerful Corporation of Harvard University have been set in motion, and concealment of your miserable selves or of the almost equally miserable (though not _as such_ miserable) goloshes which you stole from our entry on Sunday night is as impossible as would be the concealment of the State House. The motive of your precipitate departure from the house became immediately evident to the remaining guests. But they resolved to _ignore_ the matter provided the overshoes were replaced within a week; if not, no _considerations whatever_ will prevent Messrs. Gurney & Perry[52] from proceeding to treat you with the utmost severity of the law. It is high time that some of these genteel adventurers should be made an example of, and your offence just comes in time to make the cup of public and private forbearance overflow. My father and self have pledged our lives, our fortunes and our sacred honor to see the thing through with Gurney and Perry, as the credit of our house is involved and we might ourselves have been losers, not only from you but from the aforesaid G. & P., who have been heard to go about openly declaring that "if they had known the party was going to be _that_ kind of an affair, d--d if they would not have started off earlier themselves with some of those aristocratic James overcoats, hats, gloves and canes!" So let me as a friend advise you to send the swag back. No questions will be asked--Mum's the word. WM. JAMES. _To Thomas W. Ward._ _March_ [?], 1869.