My dear Madam, Julia Tu'mah Dimashqiyah,

Peace be upon you, and health be yours. I have delayed my answer deliberately, because I thought it easier to come in person and pour out to you my sincere thanks and admiration than to ink a few lines that would need to hold enough delicacy, wit, eloquence, and depth to be worthy of meeting your unique letter.

But my visit to you availed me nothing of the kind, and all the praise I spoke to you, all the sentiments of gratitude I showed and the admiration and affection I affirmed, did not turn you from one idea in your head: to obtain a written reply from me. Good God, how unjust you are! — no, I ask God's pardon, for you have given me a second chance to enjoy the loveliest of the soul's pleasures, since I returned to your letter and read it twice over and three times, and relished the prayer in it for the ruin of houses, in implication and in meaning; and I felt a gladness without match, for you showed me what I had not known of myself, and made plain to me that there is still left in me, in the corner, something with which to pluck the strings of hearts. I am today as I was a quarter of a century ago; and here you are, carrying me anew to that world far from matter, the world of the spirit and the higher ideals, as you say. So you find that the passage of time has not changed my point of view or my judgment “on such verbal whispers and improvised appreciation as reach my ear or fall beneath my eyes”; in this respect I am still as I was: I see in some ruin a beauty. And this “sincere verbal expression” that calls down ruin upon me

is dearer to my soul than the incense of praise which lips pour forth and hearts do not feel.

And how it pleases me in you — and fills my heart with joy — that in spite of what you suffer, you still defy time, and age, and bitter pain, to soar whenever a breath of the spirit of God blows upon you in whatever form it may be; and that is because there is in you a metal of everlasting radiance which days and events have no power to quench: the lofty mind, which supplies creation with its sweetest breezes and feeling with its most delicious beats.

I write these lines and picture to

myself how you will show them to your people: Badr will laugh and call down blessings on the Prophet at your having worn me down with appointments; Nadim will give his head a diplomatic shake; Samia will smile the smile of contentment; Salwa's eyes will brim, sharing in your emotion; and were the daughter of the Thames to grasp what is in them, she would flash me a gleam of lightning from her pearly mouth.

I picture this and laugh with you, as though I were among you. And am I anything else?!!

Ever your devoted Fayyad

Jibran Matni

This is one of the fashions that arrived by airplane for the stores of

Jibran Matni

Always new models

Always new art

See for yourself, dear lady, and visit the dress department at the stores of

Jibran Matni

Weygand Street

An airplane every week carrying the latest achievements of the art of fashion in New York