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Otterbourne, Winchester,
September 10, 1858.

MS location unknown. Printed in Coleridge, Life 220

My dear Anne-
Graham and James Yonge1 went away before we were up this morning, and it would all have seemed like a dream if Duke had not been there at breakfast. Alice Moberly came out in the fly that fetched us, and spent the whole day with mamma; they gave the schools some buns and sugared negus by way of celebration, and I think mamma did very well.

I think we must have made a very pretty procession; Julian went into church first with Mrs. Walter and James, and then when the Colonel brought Frances, we six bridesmaids lined the pretty lych-gate, all hung with festoons of flowers, and closed in behind her.2 She had been a good deal overcome while waiting at home, and much more in real need of sal-volatile than Jane was, and I believe she had a very bad headache all day, but she was quite right as long as she had anything to do, and was very bright and pretty at the luncheon, with little Herbert upon her lap. Poor Louisa was very much distressed, and little Gertrude looked so pale, and clung to her every moment she could.3 There were about thirty-six people at the luncheon, at a table arranged like a T. . . . Julian looked very nice and well, and one longs for their coming home to eat the great piece of honeycomb which Kezia’s mother has most appropriately presented….

The school-children scattered laurel leaves and flowers, and the church was very full of people. Julian told me to send thanks for the pretty little obelisk and the two plates—how very well the sweetwilliam is done, and I have a special delight in the white flower at the base of the obelisk. Mr. Keble is going to give him a big Bible. I have so many letters to write that I cannot go on any longer-

Your most affectionate
C. M. Yonge

1Graham Colborne and James Yonge had come to Otterbourne to attend the marriage (9 Sept 1858) of Julian Yonge to Emma Frances Walter (1839-1913). James Edmund Yonge (b. 1843) was the son of Vice-Admiral Edmund Yonge, brother of Lady Seaton and Uncle Yonge.
2Mrs Walter was Frances’s stepmother. Lieut.-Colonel Edward Walter (1804-1862) of the 3rd Bombay Light Cavalry, had married, first, Mary Emma Coulthard and, secondly (1853) Caroline Janetta Bignell.
3Louisa (1840-1916) and Gertrude Walter (1849-1897) were Frances’s younger sisters. Herbert was her half-brother.

Cite this letter


The Letters of Charlotte Mary Yonge(1823-1901) edited by Charlotte Mitchell, Ellen Jordan and Helen Schinske.

URL to this Letter is: https://c21ch.newcastle.edu.au/yonge/3119/to-anne-yonge-37

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