Joseph Conrad

A Set of Six Joseph Conrad

Mr. X came to me, preceded by a letter of introduction from a good friend of mine in Paris, specifically to see my collection of Chinese bronzes and porcelain."My friend in Paris is a collector, too. He collects neither porcelain, nor bronzes, nor pictures, normedals, nor stamps, nor anything that could be profitably dispersed under an auctioneer's hammer. He would reject, with genuine surprise, the name of a collector. Nevertheless, that's what he is bytemperament. He collects acquaintances. It is delicate work. He brings to it the patience, the passion, the determination of a true collector of curiosities. His collection does not contain any royalpersonages. I don't think he considers them sufficiently rare and interesting; but, with thatexception, he has met with and talked to everyone worth knowing on any conceivable ground. Heobserves them, listens to them, penetrates them, measures them, and puts the memory away in thegalleries of his mind. He has schemed, plotted, and travelled all over Europe in order to add to hiscollection of distinguished personal acquaintances."As he is wealthy, well connected, and unprejudiced, his collection is pretty complete, includingobjects (or should I say subjects?) whose value is unappreciated by the vulgar, and often unknown topopular fame. Of trevolte of modern times. The world knows him as a revolutionary writer whosesavage irony has laid bare the rottenness of the most respectable institutions. He has scalped everyvenerated head, and has mangled at the stake of his wit every received opinion and every recognizedprinciple of conduct and policy. Who does not remember his flaming red revolutionary pamphlets?Their sudden swarmings used to overwhelm the powers of every Continental police like a plague ofcrimson gadflies. But this extreme writer has been also the active inspirer of secret societies, themysterious unknown Number One of desperate conspiracies suspected and unsuspected, maturedor baffled. And the world at large has never had an inkling of that fact! This accounts for him goingabout amongst us to this day, a veteran of many subterranean campaigns, standing aside now, safewithin his reputation of merely the greatest destructive publicist that ever lived