s of a superman. Oscar denies to Alfred Douglas
imagination, scholarship, or even a knowledge of poetry: he tells him in
so many words:--he is without brain or heart. Then why did he allow
himself to be hag-ridden to his ruin by such a creature?

Yet how human the letter is, how pathetic!

OSCAR WILDE'S KINDNESS OF HEART

Here is a note which Oscar Wilde wrote to Warder Martin towards the end
of his imprisonment in Reading Gaol. Warder Martin, it will be
remembered, was dismissed from his post for having given some sweet
biscuits, bought with his own money, to some hungry little children
confined in the prison.

Wilde happened to see the children and immediately wrote this note on a
scrap of paper and slipped it under his door so that it should catch
Warder Martin's eye as he patrolled the corridor.

Please find out for me the name of A.2.11. Also, the names of
the children who are in for the rabbits, and the amount of the
fine.

Can I pay this and get them out? If so I will get them out
tomorrow. Please, dear friend, do this for me. I must get them
out.

Think what a thing for me it would be to be able to help three
little children. I would be delighted beyond words: if I can
do this by paying the fine tell the children that they are to
be released tomorrow by a friend, and ask them to be happy and
not to tell anyone.

Here is a second note which shows Oscar's peculiar sensitiveness; what
is ugly and terrible cannot, he thinks, furnish even the subject of art;
he shrinks from whatever gives pain.

I hope to write about prison-life and to try and change it for
others, but it is too terrible and ugly to make a work of art
of. I have suffered too much in it to write plays about it.

A third note simply thanks Warder Martin for all his kindness. It ends
with the words:

... Everyone tells me I am looking better and happier.

This is because I have a good friend who gives me _The
Chronicle_ and PROMISES me ginger biscuits. O.W.

MY COLDNESS TOWARDS OSCAR IN 1897

(See page 408)

When I talked with Oscar in Reading Gaol, he told me that the only
reason he didn't write was that no one would accept his work. I assured
him that I would publish it in _The Saturday Review_ and would pay for
it not only at the rate I paid Bernard Shaw but also if it increased the
sale of the journal I'd try to compute its value to the paper