Page:Tex; a chapter in the life of Alexander Teixeira de Mattos (IA texchapterinlife00mcke).pdf/139

 which I quoted were unmoved by the endowment of motherhood, by educational reform and by housing schemes.

In reply, Teixeira wrote, 11. 8. 20:

'' Don't slay the suggestions of the big political novel off-hand or outright. I mean a bigger thing than you do; a thing that not Wells nor Barker nor Harwood could write, whereas you, I think, could; a thing as big as Coningsby; a thing called The Secretary of State or The First Lord of the Treasury, or some such frank affair as that.''

''You have kept up a "very average" logical position in life. You know a number of statesmen, but you know only those whom you like and you like only those whom you esteem. Your portraits of those whom you esteem could not offend them; your sketch even of a genial rogue could not offend him; and you don't or ought not to care if your daguerreotypes of S., M. and B. offended them or not''

''Incidentally you might do no little good, to Ireland, which should have been your native land, to England, which by your own choice remains your home, and to the world in general, to which I hope that you bear no ill-will''