expressed
criticism free from all antagonism and in its conclusions showing
an insight which in itself could not fail to move me deeply, but was
associated also with enough commendation to make me feel rich beyond the
dreams of avarice--I mean an artist's avarice which seeks its treasure
in the hearts of men and women.

No! Whatever the preliminary anxieties might have been this adventure
was not to end in sorrow. Once more Fortune favoured audacity; and yet
I have never forgotten the jocular translation of _Audaces fortuna juvat_
offered to me by my tutor when I was a small boy: "The Audacious get
bitten." However he took care to mention that there were various kinds
of audacity. Oh, there are, there are! . . . There is, for instance, the
kind of audacity almost indistinguishable from impudence. . . . I
must believe that in this case I have not been impudent for I am not
conscious of having been bitten.

The truth is that when "The Rescue" was laid aside it was not laid aside
in despair. Several reasons contributed to this abandonment and, no
doubt, the first of them was the growing sense of general difficulty in
the handling of the subject. The contents and the course of the story I
had clearly in my mind. But as to the way of presenting the facts, and
perhaps in a certain measure as to the nature of the facts themselves,
I had many doubts. I mean the telling, representative facts, helpful
to carry on the idea, and, at the same time, of such a nature as not to
demand an elaborate creation of the atmosphere to the detriment of
the action. I did not see how I could avoid becoming wearisome in the
presentation of detail and in the pursuit of clearness. I saw the action
plainly enough. What I had lost for the moment was the sense of the
proper formula of expression, the only formula that would suit. This,
of course, weakened my confidence in the intrinsic worth and in the
possible interest of the story--that is in my invention. But I suspect
that all the trouble was, in reality, the doubt of my prose, the doubt
of its adequacy, of its power to master both the colours and the shades.

It is difficult to describe, exactly as I remember it, the complex state
of my feelings; but those of my readers who take an interest in artistic
perplexities will understand me best when I point out that I dropped
"The Rescue" not to give myself up to idleness, regrets, or dreaming,
but to begin "The Nigger of the 'Narcissus'" and to go on