William Dean Howells 



pretending to some scientific place 

 in the government, in the intervals of 

 actual scientific work in the West, 

 and was putting lightly by all tra- 

 ditions of his literary achievement. 

 We met at the White House, to the 

 occupant of which, in those pleasant 

 eighteen-seventies when everybody 

 was reasonably young, I had been 

 the means of introducing him with 

 an enthusiasm which he deprecated 

 as " din." 



He was above everything indifferent 

 to literary repute. He would have 

 preferred not to own the things he 

 wrote, and kept only for his reward 

 the aesthetic delight he had in doing 

 them. I think he had the greatest 

 delight in them ; a man who could so 

 fit incident and character with phrases, 

 must have had ; and I believe that he 

 always vaguely meant to write a great 

 work of fiction, though I do not be- 

 lieve he would ever have done it. He 

 141 



