It would be handsome of you to write. The doctor says I may be as well as ever; but in the meantime I go slow and am fit for little.--Ever yours, R. L. S. TO EDMUND GOSSE The suggestions contained in the following two letters to Mr. Gosse refer to the collection of English Odes which that gentleman was then engaged in editing (Kegan Paul, 1881). _Hotel Belvedere, Davos, [Dec. 6, 1880]._ MY DEAR WEG,--I have many letters that I ought to write in preference to this; but a duty to letters and to you prevails over any private consideration. You are going to collect odes; I could not wish a better man to do so; but I tremble lest you should commit two sins of omission. You will not, I am sure, be so far left to yourself as to give us no more of Dryden than the hackneyed St. Cecilia; I know you will give us some others of those surprising masterpieces where there is more sustained eloquence and harmony of English numbers than in all that has been written since; there is a machine about a poetical young lady,[33] and another about either Charles or James, I know not which; and they are both indescribably fine. (Is Marvell's Horatian Ode good enough? I half think so.) But my great point is a fear that you are one of those who are unjust to our old Tennyson's Duke of Wellington. I have just been talking it over with Symonds; and we agreed that whether for its metrical effects, for its brief, plain, stirring words of portraiture, as--he "that never lost an English gun," or--the soldier salute; or for the heroic apostrophe to Nelson; that ode has never been surpassed in any tongue or time. Grant me the Duke, O Weg! I suppose you must not put in yours about the warship; you will have to admit worse ones, however.--Ever yours, R. L. S. TO EDMUND GOSSE _Hotel Belvedere, Davos, Dec. 19, 1880._ This letter is a report of a long sederunt, also steterunt, in small committee at Davos Platz, Dec. 15, 1880. Its results are unhesitatingly shot at your head. MY DEAR WEG,--We both insist on the Duke of Wellington. Really it cannot be left out. Symonds said you would cover yourself with shame, and I add, your friends with confusion, if you leave it out. Really, you know it is the only thing you have, since Dryden, where that irregular odic, odal, odous (?) verse is used with mastery and sense. And it's one of our few English blood-boilers. (2) Byron: if anything: _Prometheus_. (3) Shelley (1) _The World's Great Age_ from Hellas; we are both dead on. After that you have, of course, _The West Wind_ thing. But we think (1) would maybe be enough; no more than two any way. (4) Herrick. _Meddowes_ and _Come, my Corinna_. After that _Mr. Wickes_: two any way. (5) Leave out stanza 3rd of Congreve's thing, like a dear; we can't stand the "sigh" nor the "peruke."