"Je pars dans quelques jours pour Nouméa, corvée annuelle."

Autograph letter signed by Victor Segalen addressed to Emile Mignard. Four pages written in black ink on a double sheet. Transverse fold inherent to the mailing.
Emile Mignard (1878-1966), also a doctor from Brest, was one of Segalen's closest childhood friends whom he met at the Jesuit college Notre-Dame-de-Bon-Secours in Brest. The writer maintained with this companion an abundant and sustained correspondence in which he described with humor and intimacy his daily life in the four corners of the globe. It was at Mignard's wedding, on February 15, 1905, that Segalen met his wife, Yvonne Hébert.
Segalen laments a new voyage to New Caledonia: "Je pars dans quelques jours pour Nouméa, corvée annuelle. Serai de retour dans un mois ½ donc ne rien changer à mon adresse. Comme toujours je quitte à regret Papeete où j'ai une vie tiède, active, confortable et pécuniairement très avantageuse." ["I leave in a few days for Nouméa, annual chore. Will be back in a month and a half so don't change my address. As always I leave Papeete with regret where I have a comfortable, active, pleasant life and financially very advantageous."] The health council indeed brought together each year in Nouméa the doctors of the ships of the French Pacific division to decide on convalescences, leaves and transfers. Doctor Segalen contemplates through this letter his professional future, which will be quite different from his predictions: "Un projet « possible » entre autres, amusant à dessiner dans la fumée : dans 4 ans, parler anglais, un an de chirurgie à Paris, revenir à San Francisco, métropole d'avenir qui va doubler en 10 ans le chiffre d'habitants, et exercer comme médecin français à diplômes français (oiseaux rares là-bas)." ["A possible project among others, amusing to sketch in smoke: in 4 years, speak English, one year of surgery in Paris, return to San Francisco, metropolis of the future which will double its population in 10 years, and practice as a French doctor with French diplomas (rare birds over there)."] In a nearer future, he envisages his return to France: "Retour de Nouméa vers Juin. Départ probable en Septembre pour Brest, et arrivée (si nous y arrivons, car la Vienne n'y arriva jamais) en Décembre prochain." ["Return from Nouméa around June. Probable departure in September for Brest, and arrival (if we get there, as the Vienne never made it) next December."] If the departure will indeed take place on September 1, 1904, the Durance will be somewhat delayed and will not reach Toulon until February 1905.