Stache Gift 11-18-68 ΤΟ EDWARD DOWDEN Professor of English Literature at the University of Dublin. MY DEAR DOWDEN, During sixteen years of a close and warm friendship-made sacred by two great sorrows, in which we have grieved together-you have put me so largely in your debt by all kinds of cheer, encouragement, and aid, that I have acquired some of the recklessness of the bankrupt debtor; and I am bold enough to beg from you one thing more-your acceptance of the dedication of this little book. I have not asked your consent to such a conjunction of your name and my work; because, had such a petition been made and granted, you might have incurred a certain shadowy responsibility for the faults which, I am sure, are to be found in these essays; and, though your affection might have made you somewhat indifferent to such responsibility, it would ill have become me to burden you with it. As it is, I can do you no injustice and I can give myself a great pleasure by writing and printing words which imply no more than this-that long ago you gave me the right to sign myself-Your friend, JAMES ASHCROFT NOBLE. |