So if you don’t come in propria persona, at least send something.  The old Dock has been as grumpy as a bear to-day and I have had a hard time bearing with him.  He announced to me to-day that he thought that I was fickle—­I tell you this so that you may repeat it to Miss Marie Mathilde, who, I believe, invented that opinion. Entre nous:  Hawkins tells me that some of his friends are trying to buy the St. Paul Dispatch for him.  There was a fire in the Chicago Opera House building to-night, but, unfortunately, no serious damage was done.

  Stone is thinking of having the three of us—­Dock, you and your
  habit—­write a department for the Saturday News after the fashion of
  the Noctes.  Think it all over whilst you are away.  What are you
  going to bring me for a present?  Don’t go to buying any foolish
  trumpery; you have no money to waste on follies.  What I need is a
  “Noctes,” and any other useful book you may get hold of in New York. 
   Love to the folks.

  Ever yours,

  FIELD.

The proposed “Noctes,” except the set for Field, never materialized.

  XII

  CHICAGO, September 28th, 1886.

Dear Nomp:—­I am just cunning enough to send this to the care of our New York office, for I surmise that it will reach there in time to intercept you.  I do not intend that you shall get out of New York without being reminded of that present you intend bringing me for being so good as to write to you regularly whilst you were away.  I confidently expect to see you back here next Sunday.  On Monday I go to Indianapolis for two or three days, and I heartily wish you were going with me to help bear the expense of the trip.  In fact, I am so anxious to have you along that I would cheerfully consent to letting you pay everything.  But at any rate I agree to take supper with you at Mr. Pullman’s godless hotel the night you return.  The Dock invited me out to supper to-night.  We went to the Drum.  Suspecting that I was going to exceed his capability of payment, he handed me over a dollar—­all the money he had.  I had the check charged to me and kept the dollar.  Whereat the Dock grieves passing sore.

I have begun to surmise that my remarks about Literary Life will lead to Miss Cleveland’s retirement from the editorship of that delectable mush-bucket.  The signs all point that way now.  I enclose you a letter to my friend Mitchell of the Sun.  Tell him about the Goethe poem.  I promised to send him a copy of it when Literary Life printed it.  Scrutinize young Kingsbury’s daily life carefully.  Heaven forefend all the temptations that compass him in the modern Babylon.  Give my love to Mr. Scribner.

  Yours as ever,

  FIELD.

Field’s satirical comments on Literary Life, a weekly that sought to make capital by engaging President Cleveland’s sister, Miss Rose Cleveland, as its editor, not only led to her early retirement from an impossible position, but to the early collapse of the publication itself.  When Miss Cleveland first came to Chicago to assume the duties of editorship Field welcomed her in verse: