第39章

What I meant to say,simply,is that the quarter-deck training does not prepare one sufficiently for the reception of literary criticism.Only that,and no more.But this defect is not without gravity.If it be permissible to twist,invert,adapt (and spoil)Mr.Anatole France's definition of a good critic,then let us say that the good author is he who contemplates without marked joy or excessive sorrow the adventures of his soul among criticisms.Far be from me the intention to mislead an attentive public into the belief that there is no criticism at sea.That would be dishonest,and even impolite.Ever thing can be found at sea,according to the spirit of your quest--strife,peace,romance,naturalism of the most pronounced kind,ideals,boredom,disgust,inspiration--and every conceivable opportunity,including the opportunity to make a fool of yourself,exactly as in the pursuit of literature.But the quarter-deck criticism is somewhat different from literary criticism.This much they have in common,that before the one and the other the answering back,as a general rule,does not pay.

Yes,you find criticism at sea,and even appreciation--I tell you everything is to be found on salt water--criticism generally impromptu,and always viva voce,which is the outward,obvious difference from the literary operation of that kind,with consequent freshness and vigour which may be lacking in the printed word.With appreciation,which comes at the end,when the critic and the criticised are about to part,it is otherwise.

The sea appreciation of one's humble talents has the permanency of the written word,seldom the charm of variety,is formal in its phrasing.There the literary master has the superiority,though he,too,can in effect but say--and often says it in the very phrase--"I can highly recommend."Only usually he uses the word "We,"there being some occult virtue in the first person plural which makes it specially fit for critical and royal declarations.I have a small handful of these sea appreciations,signed by various masters,yellowing slowly in my writing-table's left hand drawer,rustling under my reverent touch,like a handful of dry leaves plucked for a tender memento from the tree of knowledge.Strange!It seems that it is for these few bits of paper,headed by the names of a few Scots and English shipmasters,that I have faced the astonished indignations,the mockeries,and the reproaches of a sort hard to bear for a boy of fifteen;that I have been charged with the want of patriotism,the want of sense,and the want of heart,too;that I went through agonies of self-conflict and shed secret tears not a few,and had the beauties of the Furca Pass spoiled for me,and have been called an "incorrigible Don Quixote,"in allusion to the book-born madness of the knight.For that spoil!They rustle,those bits of paper--some dozen of them in all.In that faint,ghostly sound there live the memories of twenty years,the voices of rough men now no more,the strong voice of the everlasting winds,and the whisper of a mysterious spell,the murmur of the great sea,which must have somehow reached my inland cradle and entered my unconscious ear,like that formula of Mohammedan faith the Mussulman father whispers into the ear of his new-born infant,making him one of the faithful almost with his first breath.I do not know whether I have been a good seaman,but I know I have been a very faithful one.And,after all,there is that handful of "characters"from various ships to prove that all these years have not been altogether a dream.There they are,brief,and monotonous in tone,but as suggestive bits of writing to me as any inspired page to be found in literature.But then,you see,I have been called romantic.Well,that can't be helped.But stay.I seem to remember that I have been called a realist,also.And as that charge,too,can be made out,let us try to live up to it,at whatever cost,for a change.With this end in view,I will confide to you coyly,and only because there is no one about to see my blushes by the light of the midnight lamp,that these suggestive bits of quarter-deck appreciation,one and all,contain the words "strictly sober."

Did I overhear a civil murmur,"That's very gratifying,to be sure?"Well,yes,it is gratifying--thank you.It is at least as gratifying to be certified sober as to be certified romantic,though such certificates would not qualify one for the secretaryship of a temperance association or for the post of official troubadour to some lordly democratic institution such as the London County Council,for instance.The above prosaic reflection is put down here only in order to prove the general sobriety of my judgment in mundane affairs.I make a point of it because a couple of years ago,a certain short story of mine being published in a French translation,a Parisian critic--I am almost certain it was M.Gustave Kahn in the "Gil Blas"--giving me a short notice,summed up his rapid impression of the writer's quality in the words un puissant reveur.So be it!Who could cavil at the words of a friendly reader?Yet perhaps not such an unconditional dreamer as all that.I will make bold to say that neither at sea nor ashore have I ever lost the sense of responsibility.There is more than one sort of intoxication.