Faithfully yours always.
Mr. Clarkson Stanfield, R.A.
Gad's Hill Place, Higham by Rochester,Thursday, April 18th, 1867.
My dear Stanny,
The time of year reminds me how the months have gone, since I last heard from you through Mrs. Stanfield.
I hope you have not thought me unmindful of you in the meanwhile. I have been almost constantly travelling and reading. England, Ireland, and Scotland have laid hold of me by turns, and I have had no rest. As soon as I hadfinished this kind of work last year, I had to fall to work upon "All the Year Round" and the Christmas number. I was no sooner quit of that task, and the Christmas season was but run out to its last day, when I was tempted into another course of fifty readings that are not yet over. I am here now for two days, and have not seen the place since Twelfth Night. When a reading in London has been done, I have been brought up for it from some great distance, and have next morning been carried back again. But the fifty will be "paid out" (as we say at sea) by the middle of May, and then I hope to see you.
Reading at Cheltenham the other day, I saw Macready, who sent his love to you. His face was much more massive and as it used to be, than when I saw him previous to his illness. His wife takes admirable care of him, and is on the happiest terms with his daughter Katie. His boy by the second marriage is a jolly little fellow, and leads a far easier life than the children you and I remember, who used to come in at dessert and have each a biscuit and a glass of water, in which last refreshment I was always convinced that they drank, with the gloomiest malignity, "Destruction to the gormandising grown-up company!"
I hope to look up your latest triumphs on the day of the Academy dinner. Of course as yet I have had no opportunity of even hearing of what anyone has done. I have been (in a general way) snowed up for four months. The locomotive with which I was going to Ireland was dug out of the snow at midnight, in Wales. Both passages across were made in a furious snowstorm. The snow lay ankle-deep in Dublin, and froze hard at Belfast. In Scotland it slanted before a perpetual east wind. In Yorkshire, it derived novelty from thunder and lightning. Whirlwinds everywhere I don't mention.
God bless you and yours. If I look like some weather-beaten pilot when we meet, don't be surprised. Any mahogany-faced stranger who holds out his hand to you will probably turn out, on inspection, to be the old original Dick.
Ever, my dear Stanny, your faithful and affectionate.
P.S.—I wish you could have been with me (of course in a snowstorm) one day on the pier at Tynemouth. There was a very heavy sea running, and a perfect fleet of screw merchantmen were plunging in and out on the turn of the tide at high-water. Suddenly there came a golden horizon, and a most glorious rainbow burst out, arching one large ship, as if she were sailing direct for heaven. I was so enchanted by the scene, that I became oblivious of a few thousand tons of water coming on in an enormous roller, and was knocked down and beaten by its spray when it broke, and so completely wetted through and through, that the very pockets in my pocket-book were full of sea.
Mr. George Stanfield.
Office of "All the Year Round,"Sunday, May 19th, 1867.
ON THE DEATH OF HIS FATHER.
My dear George,
When I came up to the house this afternoon and saw what had happened, I had not the courage to ring, though I had thought I was fully prepared by what I heard when I called yesterday. No one of your father's friends can ever have loved him more dearly than I always did, or can have better known the worth of his noble character.
It is idle to suppose that I can do anything for you; and yet I cannot help saying that I am staying here forsome days, and that if I could, it would be a much greater relief to me than it could be a service to you.
Your poor mother has been constantly in my thoughts since I saw the quiet bravery with which she preserved her composure. The beauty of her ministration sank into my heart when I saw him for the last time on earth. May God be with her, and with you all, in your great loss.
Affectionately yours always.
Mr. W. H. Wills.
Thursday, June 6th, 1867.
My dear Wills,
I cannot tell you how warmly I feel your letter, or how deeply I appreciate the affection and regard in which it originates. I thank you for it with all my heart.
You will not suppose that I make light of any of your misgivings if I present the other side of the question. Every objection that you make strongly impresses me, and will be revolved in my mind again and again.
When I went to America in '42, I was so much younger, but (I think) very much weaker too. I had had a painful surgical operation performed shortly before going out, and had had the labour from week to week of "Master Humphrey's Clock." My life in the States was a life of continual speech-making (quite as laborious as reading), and I was less patient and more irritable then than I am now. My idea of a course of readings in America is, that it would involve far less travelling than you suppose, that the large first-class rooms would absorb the whole course, and that the receipts would be very much larger than your estimate, unless the demand for the readings isenormously exaggerated on all hands. There is considerable reason for this view of the case. And I can hardly think that all the speculators whobeset, and all the private correspondents who urge me, are in a conspiracy or under a common delusion.
* * * * * *
I shall never rest much while my faculties last, and (if I know myself) have a certain something in me that would still be active in rusting and corroding me, if I flattered myself that I was in repose. On the other hand, I think that my habit of easy self-abstraction and withdrawal into fancies has always refreshed and strengthened me in short intervals wonderfully. I always seem to myself to have rested far more than I have worked; and I do really believe that I have some exceptional faculty of accumulating young feelings in short pauses, which obliterates a quantity of wear and tear.
My worldly circumstances (such a large family considered) are very good. I don't want money. All my possessions are free and in the best order. Still, at fifty-five or fifty-six, the likelihood of making a very great addition to one's capital in half a year is an immense consideration.... I repeat the phrase, because there should be something large to set against the objections.
I dine with Forster to-day, to talk it over. I have no doubt he will urge most of your objections and particularly the last, though American friends and correspondents he has, have undoubtedly staggered him more than I ever knew him to be staggered on the money question. Be assured that no one can present any argument to me which will weigh more heartily with me than your kind words, and that whatever comes of my present state of abeyance, I shall never forget your letter or cease to be grateful for it.
Ever, my dear Wills, faithfully yours.
Mr. W. H. Wills.
Gad's Hill Place, Higham by Rochester, Kent,Sunday, June 13th, 1867.
My dear Wills,
I have read the first three numbers of Wilkie's story this morning, and have gone minutely through the plot of the rest to the last line. It gives a series of "narratives," but it is a very curious story, wild, and yet domestic, with excellent character in it, and great mystery. It is prepared with extraordinary care, and has every chance of being a hit. It is in many respects much better than anything he has done. The question is, how shall we fill up the blank between Mabel's progress and Wilkie? What do you think of proposing to Fitzgerald to do a story three months long? I daresay he has some unfinished or projected something by him.
I have an impression that it was not Silvester who tried Eliza Fenning, but Knowles. One can hardly suppose Thornbury to make such a mistake, but I wish you would look into the Annual Register. I have added a final paragraph about the unfairness of the judge, whoever he was. I distinctly recollect to have read of his "putting down" of Eliza Fenning's father when the old man made some miserable suggestion in his daughter's behalf (this is not noticed by Thornbury), and he also stopped some suggestion that a knife thrust into a loaf adulterated with alum would present the appearance that these knives presented. But I may have got both these points from looking up some pamphlets in Upcott's collection which I once had.
Your account of your journey reminds me of one of the latest American stories, how a traveller by stage-coach said to the driver: "Did you ever see a snail, sir?" "Yes, sir." "Where did you meet him, sir?" "Ididn'tmeethim, sir!" "Wa'al, sir, I think you did, if you'll excuse me, for I'm damned if you ever overtook him."
Ever faithfully.
Mrs. Henderson.
Gad's Hill,Thursday, July 4th, 1867.
My dear Mrs. Henderson,
I was more shocked than surprised by the receipt of your mother's announcement of our poor dear Marguerite's death. When I heard of the consultation, and recalled what had preceded it and what I have seen here, my hopes were very slight.
Your letter did not reach me until last night, and thus I could not avoid remaining here to-day, to keep an American appointment of unusual importance. You and your mother both know, I think, that I had a great affection for Marguerite, that we had many dear remembrances together, and that her self-reliance and composed perseverance had awakened my highest admiration in later times. No one could have stood by her grave to-day with a better knowledge of all that was great and good in her than I have, or with a more loving remembrance of her through all her phases since she first came to London a pretty timid girl.
I do not trouble your mother by writing to her separately. It is a sad, sad task to write at all. God help us!
Faithfully yours.
Mr. Percy Fitzgerald.
Gad's Hill,July 21st, 1867.
My dear Fitzgerald,
I am heartily glad to get your letter, and shall be thoroughly well pleased to study you again in the pages of A. Y. R.
I have settled nothing yet about America, but am going to send Dolby out on the 3rd of next month to survey the land, and come back with a report on some heads whereon I require accurate information. Proposals (both from American and English speculators) of a very tempting nature have been repeatedly made to me; but I cannot endure the thought of binding myself to give so many readings there whether I like it or no; and if I go at all, am bent on going with Dolby single-handed.
I have been doing two things for America; one, the little story to which you refer; the other, four little papers for a child's magazine. I like them both, and think the latter a queer combination of a child's mind with a grown-up joke. I have had them printed to assure correct printing in the United States. You shall have the proof to read, with the greatest pleasure. On second thoughts, why shouldn't I send you the children's proof by this same post? I will, as I have it here, send it under another cover. When you return it, you shall have the short story.
Believe me, always heartily yours.
Mr. Percy Fitzgerald.
EXTRACT.
July 28th, 1867.
I am glad you like the children, and particularly glad you like the pirate. I remember very well when I had a general idea of occupying that place in history at the same age. But I loved more desperately than Boldheart.
Miss Hogarth.
Adelphi Hotel, Liverpool,Friday Night, Aug. 2nd, 1867.
My dearest Georgy,
I cannot get a boot on—wear a slipper on my left foot, and consequently am here under difficulties. My foot is occasionally painful, but not very. I don't think it worth while consulting anybody about it as yet. I make out so many reasons against supposing it to be gouty, that I really do not think it is.
Dolby begs me to send all manner of apologetic messages for his going to America. He is very cheerful and hopeful, but evidently feels the separation from his wife and child very much. His sister[17]was at Euston Square this morning, looking very well. Sainton too, very light and jovial.
With the view of keeping myself and my foot quiet, I think I will not come to Gad's Hill until Monday. If I don't appear before, send basket to Gravesend to meet me, leaving town by the 12.10 on Monday. This is important, as I couldn't walk a quarter of a mile to-night for five hundred pounds.
Love to all at Gad's.
Mr. W. H. Wills.
Gad's Hill,Monday, Sept. 2nd, 1867.
My dear Wills,
Like you, I was shocked when this new discovery burst upon me on Friday, though, unlike you, I never could believe in ——, solely (I think) because, often as I have tried him, I never found him standing by my desk when I was writing a letter without trying to read it.
I fear there is no doubt that since ——'s discharge,he (——) has stolen money at the readings. A case of an abstracted shilling seems to have been clearly brought home to him by Chappell's people, and they know very well whatthatmeans. I supposed a very clear keeping off from Anne's husband (whom I recommended for employment to Chappell) to have been referable only to ——; but now I see how hopeless and unjust it would be to expect belief from him with two such cases within his knowledge.
But don't let the thing spoil your holiday. If we try to do our duty by people we employ, by exacting their proper service from them on the one hand, and treating them with all possible consistency, gentleness, and consideration on the other, we know that we do right. Their doing wrong cannot change our doing right, and that should be enough for us.
So I have givenmyfeathers a shake, and am all right again. Giveyourfeathers a shake, and take a cheery flutter into the air of Hertfordshire.
Great reports from Dolby and also from Fields! But I keep myself quite calm, and hold my decision in abeyance until I shall have book, chapter, and verse before me. Dolby hoped he could leave Uncle Sam on the 11th of this month.
Sydney has passed as a lieutenant, and appeared at home yesterday, all of a sudden, with the consequent golden garniture on his sleeve, which I, God forgive me, stared at without the least idea that it meant promotion.
I am glad you see a certain unlikeness to anything in the American story. Upon myself it has made the strangest impression of reality and originality!! And I feel as if I had read something (by somebody else), which I should never get out of my mind!!! The main idea of the narrator's position towards the other people was the idea that Ihadfor my next novel in A. Y. R. But it is very curiousthat I did not in the least see how to begin his state of mind until I walked into Hoghton Towers one bright April day with Dolby.
Faithfully ever.
Mr. F. D. Finlay.
CONTRADICTING A NEWSPAPER REPORT OF HIS BEING IN A CRITICAL STATE OF HEALTH.
Gad's Hill Place, Higham by Rochester, Kent,Tuesday, Sept. 3rd, 1867.
This is to certify that the undersigned victim of a periodical paragraph-disease, which usually breaks out once in every seven years (proceeding to England by the overland route to India and per Cunard line to America, where it strikes the base of the Rocky Mountains, and, rebounding to Europe, perishes on the steppes of Russia), isnotin a "critical state of health," and hasnotconsulted "eminent surgeons," and never was better in his life, and isnotrecommended to proceed to the United States for "cessation from literary labour," and has not had so much as a headache for twenty years.
Charles Dickens.
M. Charles Fechter.
"All the Year Round" Office,Monday, Sept. 16th, 1867.
My dear Fechter,
Going over the prompt-book carefully, I see one change in your part to which (on Lytton's behalf) I positively object, as I am quite certain he would not consent to it. It is highly injudicious besides, as striking out the best known line in the play.
Turn to your part in Act III., the speech beginning
Pauline,by prideAngels have fallen ere thy time:by pride——
You have made a passage farther on stand:
Then did I seek to riseOut of my mean estate. Thy bright image, etc.
I must stipulate for your restoring it thus:
Then did I seek to riseOut of the prison of my mean estate;And, with such jewels as the exploring mindBrings from the caves of knowledge, buy my ransomFrom those twin jailers of the daring heart—Low birth and iron fortune. Thy bright image, etc. etc.
The last figure has been again and again quoted; is identified with the play; is fine in itself; and above all, Iknowthat Lytton would not let it go. In writing to him to-day, fully explaining the changes in detail, and saying that I disapprove of nothing else, I have told him that I notice this change and that I immediately let you know that it must not be made.
(There will not be a man in the house from any newspaper who would not detect mutilations in that speech, moreover.)
Ever.
Miss Hogarth.
Monday, Sept. 30th, 1867.
My dearest Georgy,
The telegram is despatched to Boston: "Yes. Go ahead." After a very anxious consultation with Forster, and careful heed of what is to be said for and against, I have made up my mind to see it out. I do not expect asmuch money as the calculators estimate, but I cannot set the hope of a large sum of money aside.
I am so nervous with travelling and anxiety to decide something, that I can hardly write. But I send you these few words as my dearest and best friend.
Miss Dickens.
Office of "All the Year Round," No. 26, Wellington Street, Strand,London, W.C.,Monday, Sept. 30th, 1867.
My dearest Mamie,
You will have had my telegram that I go to America. After a long discussion with Forster, and consideration of what is to be said on both sides, I have decided to go through with it. I doubt the profit being as great as the calculation makes it, but the prospect is sufficiently alluring to turn the scale on the American side.
Unless I telegraph to the contrary, I will come to Gravesend (send basket there) by 12 train on Wednesday. Love to all.
We have telegraphed "Yes" to Boston.
I begin to feel myself drawn towards America, as Darnay, in the "Tale of Two Cities," was attracted to the Loadstone Rock, Paris.
Mr. William Charles Kent.
26,Wellington Street,Saturday, Oct. 19th, 1867.
My dear Kent,
In the midst of the great trouble you are taking in the cause of your undersigned affectionate friend, I hope the reading of the enclosed may be a sort of small godsend. Of course it is very strictly private. The printers are not yettrusted with the name, but the name will be, "No Thoroughfare." I have done the greater part of it; may you find it interesting!
My solicitor, a man of some mark and well known, is anxious to be on the Committee:
Frederic Ouvry, Esquire,66, Lincoln's Inn Fields.
Ever affectionately yours.
P.S.—My sailor son!
I forgot him!!
Coming up from Portsmouth for the dinner!!!
Der—er—oo not cur—ur—urse me, I implore.
Penitently.
Mrs. Power.
Gad's Hill,Wednesday, Oct. 23rd, 1867.
My dear Mrs. Power,
I have a sad pleasure in the knowledge that our dear Marguerite so remembered her old friend, and I shall preserve the token of her remembrance with loving care. The sight of it has brought back many old days.
With kind remembrance to Mrs. Henderson,
Believe me always, very faithfully yours.
Mr. J. L. Toole.
Gad's Hill Place, Higham by Rochester, Kent,Saturday, Nov. 2nd, 1867.
My dear Mr. Toole,
I heartily thank you for your elegant token of remembrance, and for your earnest letter. Both have afforded me real pleasure, and the first-named shall go with me on my journey.
Let me take this opportunity of saying that on receiptof your letter concerning to-day's dinner, I immediately forwarded your request to the honorary secretary. I hope you will understand that I could not, in delicacy, otherwise take part in the matter.
Again thanking you most cordially,
Believe me, always faithfully yours.
Mr. W. H. Wills.
26,Wellington Street,Sunday, Nov. 3rd, 1867.
My dear Wills,
If you were to write me many such warm-hearted letters as you send this morning, my heart would fail me! There is nothing that so breaks down my determination, or shows me what an iron force I put upon myself, and how weak it is, as a touch of true affection from a tried friend.
All that you so earnestly say about the goodwill and devotion of all engaged, I perceived and deeply felt last night. It moved me even more than the demonstration itself, though I do suppose it was the most brilliant ever seen. When I got up to speak, but for taking a desperate hold of myself, I should have lost my sight and voice and sat down again.
God bless you, my dear fellow. I am, ever and ever,
Your affectionate.
The Hon. Mrs. Watson.
Office of "All the Year Round,"Tuesday, Nov. 5th, 1867.
My dear Mrs. Watson,
A thousand thanks for your kind letter, and many congratulations on your having successfully attained a dignity which I never allow to be mentioned in my presence. Charley's children are instructed from their tenderestmonths only to know me as "Wenerables," which they sincerely believe to be my name, and a kind of title that I have received from a grateful country.
Alas! I cannot have the pleasure of seeing you before I presently go to Liverpool. Every moment of my time is preoccupied. But I send you my sincere love, and am always truthful to the dear old days, and the memory of one of the dearest friends I ever loved.
Affectionately yours.
Miss Dickens.
Aboard the "Cuba," Queenstown Harbour,Sunday, Nov. 10th, 1867.
My dearest Mamie,
We arrived here at seven this morning, and shall probably remain awaiting our mail, until four or five this afternoon. The weather in the passage here was delightful, and we had scarcely any motion beyond that of the screw.
We are nearly but not quite full of passengers. At table I sit next the captain, on his right, on the outside of the table and close to the door. My little cabin is big enough for everything but getting up in and going to bed in. As it has a good window which I can leave open all night, and a door which I can set open too, it suits my chief requirements of it—plenty of air—admirably. On a writing-slab in it, which pulls out when wanted, I now write in a majestic manner.
Many of the passengers are American, and I am already on the best terms with nearly all the ship.
We began our voyage yesterday a very little while after you left us, which was a great relief. The wind is S.E. this morning, and if it would keep so we should go along nobly.My dearest love to your aunt, and also to Katie and all the rest. I am in very good health, thank God, and as well as possible.
Miss Hogarth.
Aboard the "Cuba," Five Days out,Wednesday, Nov. 13th, 1867.
My dearest Georgy,
As I wrote to Mamie last, I now write to you, or mean to do it, if the motion of the ship will let me.
We are very nearly halfway to-day. The weather was favourable for us until yesterday morning, when we got a head-wind which still stands by us. We have rolled and pitched, of course; but on the whole have been wonderfully well off. I have had headache and have felt faint once or twice,but have not been sick at all. My spacious cabin is very noisy at night, as the most important working of the ship goes on outside my window and over my head; but it is very airy, and if the weather be bad and I can't open the window, I can open the door all night. If the weather be fine (as it is now), I can open both door and window, and write between them. Last night, I got a foot-bath under the dignified circumstances of sitting on a camp-stool in my cabin, and having the bath (and my feet) in the passage outside. The officers' quarters are close to me, and, as I know them all, I get reports of the weather and the way we are making when the watch is changed, and I am (as I usually am) lying awake. The motion of the screw is at its slightest vibration in my particular part of the ship. The silent captain, reported gruff, is a very good fellow and an honest fellow. Kelly has been ill all the time, and not of the slightest use, and is ill now. Scott always cheerful, and useful, and ready; a better servant for the kind of workthere never can have been. Young Lowndes has been fearfully sick until mid-day yesterday. His cabin is pitch dark, and full of blackbeetles. He shares mine until nine o'clock at night, when Scott carries him off to bed. He also dines with me in my magnificent chamber. This passage in winter time cannot be said to be an enjoyable excursion, but I certainly am making it under the best circumstances. (I find Dolby to have been enormously popular on board, and to have known everybody and gone everywhere.)
So much for my news, except that I have been constantly reading, and find that "Pierra" that Mrs. Hogge sent me by Katie to be a very remarkable book, not only for its grim and horrible story, but for its suggestion of wheels within wheels, and sad human mysteries. Baker's second book not nearly so good as his first, but his first anticipated it.
We hope to get to Halifax either on Sunday or Monday, and to Boston either on Tuesday or Wednesday. The glass is rising high to-day, and everybody on board is hopeful of an easterly wind.
Miss Hogarth.
Saturday, 16th.
Last Thursday afternoon a heavy gale of wind sprang up and blew hard until dark, when it seemed to lull. But it then came on again with great violence, and blew tremendously all night. The noise, and the rolling and plunging of the ship, were awful. Nobody on board could get any sleep, and numbers of passengers were rolled out of their berths. Having a side-board to mine to keep me in, like a baby, I lay still. But it was a dismal night indeed, and it was curious to see the change it had made in the faces of all the passengers yesterday. It cannot be denied that these winter crossings are very trying and startling;while the personal discomfort of not being able to wash, and the miseries of getting up and going to bed, with what small means there are all sliding, and sloping, and slopping about, are really in their way distressing.
This forenoon we made Cape Race, and are now running along at full speed with the land beside us. Kelly still useless, and positively declining to show on deck. Scott, with an eight-day-old moustache, more super like than ever. My foot (I hope from walking on the boarded deck) in a very shy condition to-day, and rather painful. I shaved this morning for the first time since Liverpool; dodging at the glass, very much like Fechter's imitation of ——. The white cat that came off with us in the tender a general favourite. She belongs to the daughter of a Southerner, returning with his wife and family from a two-years' tour in Europe.
Sunday, 17th.
At four o'clock this morning we got into bad weather again, and the state of things at breakfast-time was unutterably miserable. Nearly all the passengers in their berths—no possibility of standing on deck—sickness and groans—impracticable to pass a cup of tea from one pair of hands to another. It has slightly moderated since (between two and three in the afternoon I write), and the sun is shining, but the rolling of the ship surpasses all imagination or description.
We expect to be at Halifax about an hour after midnight, and this letter shall be posted there, to make certain of catching the return mail on Wednesday. Boston is only thirty hours from Halifax.
Best love to Mamie, and to Katie and Charley. I know you will report me and my love to Forster and Mrs. Forster.I write with great difficulty, wedged up in a corner, and having my heels on the paper as often as the pen. Kelly worse than ever, and Scott better than ever.
My desk and I have just arisen from the floor.
Miss Dickens.
Parker House, Boston,Thursday, Nov. 21st, 1867.
I arrived here on Tuesday night, after a very slow passage from Halifax against head-winds. All the tickets for the first four readings here (all yet announced) were sold immediately on their being issued.
You know that I begin on the 2nd of December with "Carol" and "Trial"? Shall be heartily glad to begin to count the readings off.
This is an immense hotel, with all manner of white marble public passages and public rooms. I live in a corner high up, and have a hot and cold bath in my bedroom (communicating with the sitting-room), and comforts not in existence when I was here before. The cost of living is enormous, but happily we can afford it. I dine to-day with Longfellow, Emerson, Holmes, and Agassiz. Longfellow was here yesterday. Perfectly white in hair and beard, but a remarkably handsome and notable-looking man. The city has increased enormously in five-and-twenty years. It has grown more mercantile—is like Leeds mixed with Preston, and flavoured with New Brighton; but for smoke and fog you substitute an exquisitely bright light air. I found my rooms beautifully decorated (by Mrs. Fields) with choice flowers, and set off by a number of good books. I am not much persecuted by people in general, as Dolby has happily made up his mind that the less I am exhibited for nothing the better. So our men sit outside the room door and wrestle with mankind.
We had speech-making and singing in the saloon of theCubaafter the last dinner of the voyage. I think I have acquired a higher reputation from drawing out the captain, and getting him to take the second in "All's Well," and likewise in "There's not in the wide world" (your parent taking first), than from anything previously known of me on these shores. I hope the effect of these achievements may not dim the lustre of the readings. We also sang (with a Chicago lady, and a strong-minded woman from I don't know where) "Auld Lang Syne," with a tender melancholy, expressive of having all four been united from our cradles. The more dismal we were, the more delighted the company were. Once (when we paddled i' the burn) the captain took a little cruise round the compass on his own account, touching at the "Canadian Boat Song," and taking in supplies at "Jubilate," "Seas between us braid ha' roared," and roared like the seas themselves. Finally, I proposed the ladies in a speech that convulsed the stewards, and we closed with a brilliant success. But when you dine with Mr. Forster, ask him to read to you how we got on at church in a heavy sea. Hillard has just been in and sent his love "to those dear girls." He has grown much older. He is now District Attorney of the State of Massachusetts, which is a very good office. Best love to your aunt and Katie, and Charley and all his house, and all friends.
Miss Hogarth.
Parker House, Boston,Monday, Nov. 25th, 1867.
I cannot remember to whom I wrote last, but it will not much matter if I make a mistake; this being generally to report myself so well, that I am constantly chafing at not having begun to-night instead of this night week.
The tickets being all sold for next week, and no other announcement being yet made, there is nothing new in that way to tell of. Dolby is over at New York, where we are at our wits' end how to keep tickets out of the hands of speculators. Morgan is staying with me; came yesterday to breakfast, and goes home to-morrow. Fields and Mrs. Fields also dined yesterday. She is a very nice woman, with a rare relish for humour and a most contagious laugh. The Bostonians having been duly informed that I wish to be quiet, really leave me as much so as I should be in Manchester or Liverpool. This I cannot expect to last elsewhere; but it is a most welcome relief here, as I have all the readings to get up. The people are perfectly kind and perfectly agreeable. If I stop to look in at a shop-window, a score of passers-by stop; and after I begin to read, I cannot expect in the natural course of things to get off so easily. But I every day take from seven to ten miles in peace.
Communications about readings incessantly come in from all parts of the country. We take no offer whatever, lying by with our plans until after the first series in New York, and designing, if we make a furore there, to travel as little as possible. I fear I shall have to take Canada at the end of the whole tour. They make such strong representations from Montreal and Toronto, and from Nova Scotia—represented by St. John's and Halifax—of the slight it would be to them, if I wound up with the States, that I am shaken.
It is sad to see Longfellow's house (the house in which his wife was burnt) with his young daughters in it, and the shadow of that terrible story. The young undergraduates of Cambridge (he is a professor there) have made a representation to him that they are five hundred strong, andcannot get one ticket. I don't know what is to be done for them; I suppose I must read there somehow. We are all in the clouds until I shall have broken ground in New York, as to where readings will be possible and where impossible.
Agassiz is one of the most natural and jovial of men. I go out a-visiting as little as I can, but still have to dine, and what is worse, sup pretty often. Socially, I am (as I was here before) wonderfully reminded of Edinburgh when I had many friends in it.
Your account and Mamie's of the return journey to London gave me great pleasure. I was delighted with your report of Wilkie, and not surprised by Chappell's coming out gallantly.
My anxiety to get to work is greater than I can express, because time seems to be making no movement towards home until I shall be reading hard. Then I shall begin to count and count and count the upward steps to May.
If ever you should be in a position to advise a traveller going on a sea voyage, remember that there is some mysterious service done to the bilious system when it is shaken, by baked apples. Noticing that they were produced on board theCuba, every day at lunch and dinner, I thought I would make the experiment of always eating them freely. I am confident that they did wonders, not only at the time, but in stopping the imaginary pitching and rolling after the voyage is over, from which many good amateur sailors suffer. I have hardly had the sensation at all, except in washing of a morning. At that time I still hold on with one knee to the washing-stand, and could swear that it rolls from left to right. TheCubadoes not return until Wednesday, the 4th December. You may suppose that every officer on board is coming on Monday, and thatDolby has provided extra stools for them. His work is very hard indeed. Cards are brought to him every minute in the day; his correspondence is immense; and he is jerked off to New York, and I don't know where else, on the shortest notice and the most unreasonable times. Moreover, he has to be at "the bar" every night, and to "liquor up with all creation" in the small hours. He does it all with the greatest good humour, and flies at everybody who waylays the Chief, furiously. We have divided our men into watches, so that one always sits outside the drawing-room door. Dolby knows the whole Cunard line, and as we could not get good English gin, went out in a steamer yesterday and got two cases (twenty-four bottles) out of Cunard officers. Osgood and he were detached together last evening for New York, whence they telegraph every other hour about some new point in this precious sale of tickets. So distracted a telegram arrived at three that I have telegraphed back, "Explain yourselves," and am now waiting for the explanation. I think you know that Osgood is a partner in Ticknor and Fields'.
Tuesday morning.—Dolby has come back from New York, where the prospects seem immense. We sell tickets there next Friday and Saturday, and a tremendous rush is expected.
Mr. Charles Dickens.
Parker House, Boston, U.S.,Saturday, Nov. 30th, 1867.