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I must not omit one characteristic incident. He happened to be momentarily hard up and conceived 
the really brilliant idea of concocting a fable that his German girl was a new Sappho. He made her 
copy out a number of poems from my Collected Works and sent her round to Putnam's to persuade 
them to publish the really remarkable work of this romantic young American beauty rose. The girl 
told his wife in bed one night, they having found a bond of common sympathy in their contempt and 
loathing for "The Worm" as we had familiarly called him. She told me at once, and I have every 
reason to believe that the letter I wrote to Putnam's is treasured in the archives of the firm as the 
last word in savage contempt. 
So ended my adventures with these fascinating freaks. I must now run back to New Orleans. 
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78 
New Orleans and San Antonio are said to be the only two towns in the United States which possess 
souls of their own. That of New Orleans was already being driven out under my eyes, and I dare say 
that by this time the work of destruction is complete. Probably San Antonio has shared its fate. The 
most depressing feature in the country is the uniformity of the towns. However singular the 
geographical situation and its topographical peculiarities, the possibilities of beauty have been 
nullified by the determination of the people to do everything just right, according to the measure in 
fashion. Wherever one is, sooner or later, one gets tired of one's surroundings. In Europe, the cure is 
easy. One toddles along to the next place sure of finding some novelty. In America, however far one 
goes, the same hideous homogeneity disappoints one. The relief conferred by the old quarter of 
New Orleans threw me instantly into an ecstasy of creative energy. I wrote day and night 
continuously --- poems, essays and short stories. My principal invention was the detective "Simon Iff" 
whose method of discovering the solution of a problem was calculation of the mental and moral 
energies of the people concerned. 
I wrote a series of six stories about his exploits and followed it by The Butterfly Net or the Net, a 
novel in which he is a secondary character. In this novel I have given an elaborate description of 
modern magical theories and practices. Most of the characters are real people whom I have known 
and many of the incidents taken from experience. 
During this time, I was also granted what mystics describe as "the Beatific Vision" which is the most 
characteristic of those attributed to Tiphereth, the archetypal idea of beauty and harmony. In this 
vision one retains one's normal consciousness, but every impression of daily life is as enchanting and 
exquisite as an ode of Keats. The incidents of life become a harmonious unity; one is lost in a rosy 
dream of romantic happiness. One may compare it to the effect produced by wine on some people. 
There is, however, no unreality in the vision. One is not blinded to the facts of existence. It is 
simply that the normal incoherence and discrepancy between them has been harmonized. 
While on this subject, let me mention that Tiphereth corresponds to the grade of initiation on the 
Threshold of the Order of R. R. et A. C., and to the Knowledge and Conversation of the Holy 
Guardian Angel. It therefore marks a critically important stage in initiation. Only one other is 
equally 
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cardinal: the grade of Master of the Temple, which is the Threshold of the Order of the A.'. A.'.. I 
have called the vision corresponding to this the "Vision of Wonder" which permeates one's daily life 
in a similar way. The difference is that penetrating beyond sensory perceptions, one is aware of the 
mechanism of events, of the subtle chain of causes which connect them. One perceives in detail 
how each impression necessarily succeeds its forerunner. The effect is that one is lost in wonder at 
the ingenuity of the universe, to use a very inadequate word, as being the only one available. One 
feels the intense awed admiration which the greatest masterpieces of Kant, Beethoven, 
Shakespeare, Rembrandt, Riemann, Kelvin, and such as they inspired, with this difference: that all 
impressions are equally puissant to produce it.