My dear Marianne The great heads will be 1/6, but I fear they will be long in coming like all the rest.

I will thankfully send you some of all kinds when I get them.

In haste your aff C M Yonge

. . . all. She is doing her reading to me now which is not good for my writing. I hope you are keeping quiet and getting better

Your affectionate Sister C M Yonge

Dear Miss Manning, I am sorry not to have been able sooner to answer you and tell you how much I like your friend’s Stone cutter, whom I shall most gladly have in the Monthly Packet, though I am afraid it can hardly be before the end of the year, as though in the enlarged size of the Monthly Packet I can generally get a short self-contained story in every month, I am engaged a good ... continue reading

My dear Mr Moor Your opinion so entirely coincides with ours that I almost had my pen in my hand to write to you to say that we had only ten girls and five boys at school yesterday, and that I could conceive no variety of weather that will make the way passable for you and your spectators between this and tomorrow evening, and so that I had sent out messages to say the Lantern was ... continue reading

Dear Mr Macmillan Please be so kind as to direct on this letter.

I am taking the Chaplet of Pearls to have a final reading by its greatest critics

Yours sincerely C M Yonge

My dear Mr Macmillan, These Germans to whom I engaged that they should have early sheets and translate the Chaplet of Pearls now want me to have it copied for them at once, a thing I am not inclined for, but if you can at all tell me when it is likely to begin, I should know how to answer them. I am not in haste on my own account only I want to know what ... continue reading

Dear Mr Macmillan, Would you be so kind as to send an order for me for Sir F. Palgraves History of Normandy and England. I cannot get my Cameo’s [sic] correct without it, and Dr Moberly’s copy on which I reckoned proves to be packed up for leaving Winchester so as to be unobtainable. I can do nothing till I get it, and though I could order it from the London Library, one is kept often ... continue reading

My dear Cousin, I enclose a note to Miss Mackenzie, thanking her for her book about Mrs. Robertson. It does one good to read about such a couple. I almost feel as if I should like to write a line to the good man. There was the real genuine love for the people, the secret of course of all missionary success, the consideration for them, the power of sympathy, of seeing with the eyes of others, ... continue reading

My dear Edith,

For I cannot induce myself to write Miss C and you know we are cousins- so that your beginning did not seem natural. We are delighted with your drawing, it has just given the look of reverent awe and foreboding that was wanted, and we are very much obliged to you for it - it just takes the place wanted in our book. I was at Winton House yesterday and found the party ... continue reading

My dear Mrs Elder, In some inexplicable way your sonnet for the collect for the Annunciation has disappeared. Could you—if you have a copy—be so kind as to send it by the next post—direct to

Messrs. Mozley Friar’s Gate Derby,

as they are leaving a gap for it. How it was missed between us I cannot guess. I have all the others, quite safe up to June 29th. I hope you will excuse the blunder, and that it will ... continue reading

My dear Mrs Elder,

In some inexplicable way your sonnet for the collect for the Annunciation has disappeared. Could you—if you have a copy—be so kind as to send it by the next post—direct to

Messrs. Mozley Friar’s Gate Derby,

as they are leaving a gap for it. How it was missed between us I cannot guess. I have all the others, quite safe up to June 29th. I hope you will excuse the blunder, and that it will ... continue reading

My dear Miss Jacob Excuse the blunder of the date there is one of those revolutions going on caused by whitewash and new carpetting which drive oneself to holes and corners and one’s senses no where. It began suddenly on Saturday, or I would then have sent you Gerontius, thinking he might be a pleasant companion in your Oxford week. I hope it is successful, though Mr Wither says the Dean of Emly failed you.

How I ... continue reading

My dear Christabel, I should not have been so ungrateful if I had not been laid up, first by being deluded into eating some Scallop fish that everybody else flourished upon, and then by a wicked chair, which cast its hind leg as I was sitting down on it, and strained my back - Not till lately have I had the energy to pack up the Answers and write to you. I shall be very thankful ... continue reading

My dear Miss Jacob, I think the dream exceedingly beautiful, it went quite to my heart, and the vision of the mother saving the children was the pleasanter to meet with because I remember once talking it over with the dear Warden Barter, though whether I first heard it from him I cannot remember, at any rate it brought me his face and voice.

The only thing that I should have a shadow of doubt about is ... continue reading

Dear Miss Yonge . I am glad the Chaplet is going on. I do so want it in the Magazine, but the two stories now going . . . drag their slow length along. Poor Mrs Norton has been very ill, and had trouble in her family ever since we began. This month she writes from Rome that she cannot send anything. I fear her life has been & is very sad, and one has no heart ... continue reading

My dear Cousin, Our last New Zealand season, for it may be our last, draws near its close. On Monday, only two days hence, the ‘Southern Cross’ sails (weather permitting) with our first instalment. Mr. Palmer has got his house up, and they must stow themselves away in it, three whites and forty-five blacks, the best way they can. The vessel takes besides 14,000 feet of timber, 6,000 shingles for roofing, and boxes of books, &c., ... continue reading

Dear Mr Macmillan, The Chaplet of Pearls is done, and I shall send it by train tomorrow, being glad to get it out of the house, as it entices me into touching it up when I ought to be doing other things. I am afraid you will think that though it is not a story without an end, yet the end is very far away - but it would not be shorter, and judging by the ... continue reading

My dear Miss Jacob, First to answer the question I forgot in my last note. That Sphinx is a faithless monster, he (or she) never came to us this month, nor have I heard of one any where. There is a very good new set of acrostics by A. A. G. published by Lothian.

You are very good to take so kindly all my criticisms of the Gates of Paradise. I feel it rather like the atmosphere ... continue reading

Dear Miss Yonge [illegible] the Chaplet duly arrived. The minimal changes you propose seem to me quite sufficient. Benson will do very well. He was in my young days a popular gentleman on the stage - at least in London which was my only way of hearing about such things.

I will write you about the other matter in a day or to. St John’s seems to me very similar to the earlier one. I had an ... continue reading

My dear Miss Cleveland, I am greatly obliged by your kind notes, and the books which give a very sad and interesting picture. I have read about half through the first volume, and have been greatly interested by many of the lives.

Thanks too for the permission to use those sketches of the good works done among the negroes for Mission Life, it is a very good magazine, edited by the Reverend J.W. Halcombe, and published by ... continue reading

Dear Mr Macmillan I return the two letters, somewhat appalled at Miss Yonge’s statement that the 'Library' is to edit itself & no one is to be responsible. Of course this is not in accordance with your wish but do you not think it is a mistake which is certain to arise unless I - as Editor - take all the correspondence from the first. I see the force of your objection that I am a ... continue reading

Dear Mr Macmillan I believe we agreed that except to those who know me my name shall not be mentioned as Editor of the Sunday Library. I think this, as you say, wise & desirable, but my difficulty with regard to Miss Yonge is that she says there is to be no editor. This of course is quite another thing & would be a very grave misunderstanding & one that would seriously affect me.

For all cases ... continue reading

My dear Miss Jacob, I have the Récit d’une Soeur, and if you like to read it, I could leave it, either at your house in the Close, at Jacob & Johnsons or any other convenient house of call at Winchester. It is a beautiful book - the family are so good and charming, though not equal in intellect or poetry to the Guérins. The great matter in reading it is not to judge it ... continue reading

Dear Madam I am much obliged by your kindness in sending Mr Nobb’s letter - It is however the Melanesian mission, not the Pitcairners, for which I am collector and it is better not to mix the two arrangements. Bishop Patteson’s sisters sent out what is really worth sending to him, but in general money is more useful than goods, and people have been sending such useless things lately that I wished to check them.

I believe ... continue reading

Dear Mr Macmillan I have been more fortunate than I had expected & have much pleasure in sending you a carte of Harriet Martineau which, as you know, I had not expected to obtain. I have not seen her, nor have I sent my letter of introduction, but her niece - to whom one of our friends had written - called yesterday while we were at Furness Abbey & we propose going to the Knoll tomorrow.

Meanwhile ... continue reading

My dear Edith Having always so heard and thought of you it seems the more natural. I was sending a parcel to Dr Moberly’s, and so put yours with it. Alas - what shall we do when it is Dr Moberly’s no longer-! You will find, shut into the book a paraphrase of some lines in German that Alexandrine wrote when she sold her pearl necklace - they were written out from the Month. I mention ... continue reading

My dear Miss Smith, I am ashamed and concerned at not having answered you sooner. If I had known of any thing more likely to suit your purpose than Mr Ridley’s book, I should have done so, but on Saturday I waited to see whether Sunday would inspire me with any conjecture, and I am afraid I must confess that then I forgot it My experience of school work is altogether country and of girls, and ... continue reading

Dear Miss Yonge, [First page largely indecipherable, but seems to be concerned withThe Danvers Papers ]

The Sunday Library is making progress I hope. . . I have found it useful to have someone to depute the correspondence to and combat the kind of [illegible] on the spot to take matters over. A lady friend of Mrs Craik, a Miss Martin, has undertaken this. She is a lady of quite exceptional poise & cultivation, with extensive ... continue reading

My dear Miss Sewell My senses have returned for thinking and writing indeed for anything but walking. It seems to me that we might settle a great deal in a June council, Mary Coleridge is to be here for a week at the beginning of the month otherwise we are quite clear. I will send you Freeman tomorrow. It seems to me that his first seven pages, with perhaps his 4th chapter abridged would be very ... continue reading

Dear Miss Yonge The first instalment of the Book of Worthies has just come to hand. I will at once send it to the printer, as I shall be glad to get it out if possible for the summer. I quite feel that you are right about the length of the Biographies. Too great brevity would lessen the interest of the stories, and a few well told & pretty fully told is better than many made ... continue reading

Dear Miss Yonge

I think I have got a most charming gem of Alexander, whom I was contemplating as one vignette. I am afraid he was rather an unworthy in some ways. But who is always worthy. This face is so beautiful. It is engraved by Worship[?] from the Besborough [sic] Collection. You shall see it.

Very faithfully yours A. Macmillan

Dear Miss Yonge . The presentation copies will be attended to. The book however is hardly yet in the binders hands. Books like 'long-tailed birds of Paradise' will not light at the end.

I am glad that the Danvers name seems connected with Mr Peabody. We should send him a copy.

The 62 pages of your law[?] makes 92 of the Book of Worthies (I am afraid I [illegible] I like our first title best) so we would ... continue reading

My dear Christabel I send you the Barnacle. I had thought of keeping it for May, but as she does not come till the 6th, it would be too long. After all the sheets of the Caged Lion have got bound up wrong by my fault, for I forgot to number the pages. I have now numbered them and put a notice that the reader must manage accordingly The difficulty in keeping always the same order ... continue reading

Dear Mr Macmillan, Thanks for the books which the carrier will probably bring today. I will betake myself to St John’s pupils at once, though it is rather a sudden change from the banks of the Granicus, where I left Alexander.

And there is another thing that I should like to know ie - the sum that will come to me both for the Pupils of St John and the Danvers Papers. The reason I ask is ... continue reading

My dear Edith, You will think there is no end to me but I saw Mr Moore yesterday and he says that his magic lantern came from Carpenter & Newman 24 Regent Street, and that they are much better than Negretti having devoted their minds to magic lanterns His lamp is an Argand These were all your questions I could recollect, but if you have any more, he will gladly and clearheadedly answer them. Mamma has ... continue reading

Dear Miss Yonge I am much obliged to you for so kindly undertaking the new work I hope when you are once in it you will find it not less pleasant than the others.

I propose paying you the same for that as I will for the Worthies. The amounts which will be due to you next half year & part or the whole we can pay you any time after August 1. are:-

Pupils £200 for copyright

Cameos ... continue reading

My dear Miss Smith, I am in a little puzzle about this paper of yours. It ought to be in the August number, for by September, I suppose the exhibition will be over, and I am afraid there is hardly time to give it the touches without which I am afraid I cannot take it. It seems to me that there is too much of biography and not pictures enough. There is such a long piece ... continue reading

My dear Edith, I enclose the sum due to you for the Gates of Paradise. You cannot think how much they are liked, and by people whose opinion I care very much about. I have only had one objection and that from a lady whom I do not consider the judge she thinks herself. Do you not think you could manage some day to come and stay with us, we should get so much better acquainted ... continue reading

My dear Miss Yonge I have arranged with Mr Armitage a painter of considerable reputation particularly for pictures of Sacred & Christian subjects to draw us three designs for your The Pupils of St John. As I hope we may be able to make our start in January, it will be needful to be getting on with both the drawing and the engraving. Could you give Mr Armitage any hints that would enable him to make ... continue reading

Dear Sir Do you know what it is to make the worst blunders in that which one knows so well as hardly to think real recollection worth while. This is the only way in which I can understand my own blunder about that hymn upon Sennacherib, which is not only home made - by my mother - but I have always heard every Sunday for more than twenty years.

I will send the July No of the ... continue reading

Dear Mr Macmillan, I send you three four chapters that I have finished. My plan has come to this and I had been thinking of writing to you or Miss Martin about it.

Chapter I, Description of Ephesus

II Work of St Paul at Ephesus

III Life of St John up to the dispersion of the Apostles from Jerusalem

IV The 2nd visit of St Paul to Ephesus - review of all the chief disciples of Paul & John with the fates ... continue reading

Dear Miss Yonge I write mainly to acknowledge the receipt of your last four chapters, and also to say that your sketch seems to me very good. But were you not to give a third pupil of St John?

I will see Miss Martin today she will no doubt write to you on any point of detail. I do not in the least anticipate any difficulty on point of church arrangements. Only one thing has struck me ... continue reading

Dear Mr Macmillan I believe the childish form does not last, it is always cramping and a scratch of the pen will alter it where it prevails.

I was sorry afterwards I had not mentioned St John being recognised by his former pupil, the captain of the robbers, when he went out to be taken by him. It would be a fine subject for expression, and I wonder it has never been taken before. I believe I ... continue reading

Miss Yonge is much obliged to Miss Alcock for her paper on the Ladies Home which answers a question newly arrived from a correspondent.

My dear Christabel I think they were rather dull questions this time and they have not produced brilliant answers but your tradition is by far the best. Poor Florence strained her back, and cannot do anything for either answers or Barnacle though she is getting better- and some of the Goslings are abroad and some visiting.

I hope your Changeling is coming, as the Barnacle will be very thin. I am keeping it to be bound ... continue reading

Dear Mr Macmillan, I send up the two next chapters of St John, in case it should be convenient to show Mr Armitage the description of the scene with the Robber. Do you mean to have vignettes? If you do the cup with the serpent should come at the end of the last chapter I send you, and the one I am writing now should have the golden candlestick, I should try for Diana for the ... continue reading

My dear Mrs Johns, I am very glad there is a prospect of our seeing Miss Keary. Would you or Kate be so kind as to let us know when she comes, and how long she is likely to be with you, and then we may fix a day for meeting or trying to meet. Next week and the week after too we have friends coming to us just so invalidish that I dare ... continue reading

My dear Miss Poole, I shall be delighted to put in the history of poor Rosa’s dream, only I must let a few numbers go by first, or I shall by [sic] inundated with dreams. The gates of Paradise have set one lady dreaming already, and the Dreams of the Dead another, and I think I must let those wait a few months or we shall fall into a universal visionary mood—but I do like the ... continue reading

Dear Mr Macmillan, Miss Sewell tells me you are going to America. Should you go to Philadelphia, and if so would it be very troublesome to take charge of a roll of paper containing an illumination that cannot be trusted by post?

Yours sincerely C M Yonge

Dear Miss Yonge I have sent the description to Mr Armitage, who I am sure will be very glad to have it.

About vignettes I am rather uncertain. They are very dangerous. Anything short of high excellence is apt to be commonplace and conventional. The cup with the serpent dos not commend itself to me quite. I am afraid I have not much taste for arbitrary symbolism - meanings in fact I do like and in words.

However ... continue reading

My dear Edith It is a sweet little sad face with the Passion flowers, and we have put it in for Lent. The last verses of the Lenten hymn far on in the book seem to suit it so well. Our criticism was that the glory makes rather a strong line against the right, and perhaps next time you come might be a little toned down, but it is after all the mediaeval habit.

The Haughton ... continue reading

My dear Miss Yonge . I have forwarded your letter to Miss Martin who has gone to Bude. I am sure there will be no difficulty in arranging matters. Her only object as I understood her was as the Series is to go over a long space there would be serious danger of one book repeating the work of another, and so there would [be] too much of one part given, and details of another that would ... continue reading

My dear Miss Yonge I have a hurried note from Miss Martin in which she expresses her gratification at the kindly way in which you have written, and says that 'no doubt you have much right reason on your side', and repeats very much what I said yesterday. I am quite sure she will be satisfied with what you feel free to do in the way of abridgement of those early chapters. But I think ... continue reading

My dear Mr Macmillan The sheets came on Tuesday with Miss Martin’s marks, and I have gone over them and marked with ink all that it seems to me that I could well part with. Her marks are in pencil and I see what she wishes to part with is the entire chapters that belong to the Gospels and Acts, which take away all the youth of St John. Now if I might be allowed to ... continue reading

Dear Mr Macmillan I enclose my letter to Miss Yonge and will you send it on if you think well, but if not will you tell me what had better be done.

I have read her proofs again & the fact is that she is writing a Sunday Story Book (of which there are thousands) and she will not have the story broken up. It is very prettily told and no doubt will be very taking. Miss ... continue reading

My dear Miss Yonge' By all means let my satirical country woman send me the novels 'she is not clever enough to write.' I shall certainly give them every attention. You know we Scotch like early Christians love one another. I had a long and very interesting talk with Mr Gladstone yesterday about our Sunday Library in which he is much interested. He asked how we were to adjust and harmonise persons of various shades of ... continue reading

My dear Marianne If I had more time I would send you more thanks - I am going to have some of the big head done but how soon I cannot say. The alias of the other is the Bandit’s Bride. I think these are a little better first look. I am so sorry about Good Words. No one knows where it is. Dear M A. So many thanks

your most affectionate C M Yonge

My dear Miss Yonge I have the pleasure of sending you a statement of publishing doings for the past year, which I am glad to see leaves a larger balance in your favour than we have yet had to pay you. May it go on increasing! This we cannot quite hope as there have been no balances of reprint against you at all this year.

Mr Masson who is much pleased with your story, thinks the title ... continue reading

Dear Miss Yonge The parcel for Miss Lewis reached Tooting safely, and will not in the least inconvenience me. I will endeavour to deliver it early after my arrival.

I have read the Story of the Scotch girl. It is very interesting - rather sensational in fact. Robespierre, Danton, Napoleon, the Guillotine 'La Lanterne,' a sprinkling of smugglers with a slight dash of wreckers, highly toned Irish, Scotch, French nationalities, a mad woman, suicide, a murder or ... continue reading

Dear Mr Macmillan, I am getting well again, and gone to work again. Clement of Alexandria is the first authority for the robber story, but Eusebius takes it from him. I have a queer old translation of Eusebius, Socrates and Co - from which I really did expand the account, and so I think I had better leave Eusebius, as it looks less as if it all came out of Smith’s dictionary as in fact much ... continue reading

My dear Christabel I hope you did get my letter of thanks to Goosedom after all, though I was so stupid as not to direct it to you at your friend’s, it was a stupid letter in itself, but I was very much hurried at the time, and could not even write to you with it and since that I have been quite laid up, though I am promised that the result is to be getting ... continue reading

Dear Miss Yonge I suppose you [illegible] the translation of Alexandre Dumas & after some difficulty we have a shabby copy which I am sending by post.

We will be glad to have the whole M.S. when it is ready. You can either send it to Miss Martin or to us

Yours very [illegible] Geo Lillie Craik

My dear Maggie, Your book marker [is] a great beauty, and I thank you very much for it, particularly admiring the beautiful little shy bee. Mamma thanks Alice for her [note] and good news of you all. I hope we shall see you before long I am much better, and feel quite proud that I am sitting up to my work this morning while Miss Wilford is lying on her back. It is ten weeks since ... continue reading

Dear Miss Yonge The end of the M.S. reached me with your letter. I at once sent it to the Printer. Whatever alteration you may wish to make either in [illegible] or modifying can be done in the proof.

Miss Martin - whom I saw yesterday - agreed with me in this.

Yours very [illegible] Geo Lillie Craik

My dear Mrs Donkin, As soon as may be I will get the Summer Vacation sent to the press, but it cannot be before October at soonest that I send it - as all these remarkable events have thrown other M S back. I have a Naval Review just come, to complete the series you began.

By the by, it was a Woolwich cadet’s uniform that prince Arthur wore - as the daughter of the late commandant ... continue reading

Dear Mr Brett, I am told that to your other labours, you add that of acting for a Society for the promotion of Churches entirely free and unappropriated

I am very much interested in building such a Church at Eastleigh, better known as the Bishopstoke Junction station, where there is a large and fast encreasing [sic] colony of railway men, 3 miles from the parish Church (South Stoneham) and two miles from any other.

We laid the first ... continue reading

We had a wonderful visit yesterday from an utterly unknown little American girl of fourteen or fifteen, who bobbed into the room, rushed up to me, shook hands, ‘Miss Yonge, I’ve come to thank you for your books, I’m an American.’ Papa and mamma were, it appears, seeing the church, and were going round by Hursley back to Winchester. It was odd to be thanked by a little bolt upright mite, ... continue reading

My dear Christabel Here is the September Barnacle – the binder has really made it so, though it ought to be the Midsummer one. I suppose that great MS ought to go round with it as I suppose no one would have patience to copy it out in the right size It was very stupid and this thin Barnacle would be much the better for it. Will you put in a note to that effect when ... continue reading

My dear Florence The constituent parts of the New Barnacle don’t come in fast, but I know there are a few more to come for vol. xvii. If enough do come in to be worth binding, I think I must leave it in your charge. I send you what I have already come in for it, and please keep it to see whether there comes enough in addition to use. If there does, I will write ... continue reading

My dear Miss Sewell (What a horrible pen) We shall be very glad to see you whenever you can come to us in the autumn. We have no engagement in the way. I will try to get the life of St Bernard – but the London Library but I cannot say it is better than other libraries for the ease of getting books. wonder if he is among Lamartine’s biographies some of which are telling, ... continue reading

My dear Mr Ashwell I have been waiting to answer your kind letter till I had seen the new Literary Churchman, which had to travel round by Otterbourn. It was a refreshing sight after so much as one has been hearing of the cui bono apropos to the Synod. I think that in the native Devonian nature there is a strong spirit of thinking for oneself, which has led to much defiance of the Bishop, almost ... continue reading

My dear Christabel If it is copyright, I think they ought to give you at least £10, you did not sell your copyright to the Eagle and it may sometimes make a difference in case of one’s wanting to collect short stories together into a volume

I do not know if this is the right sum, but it seems to me about fair

yours affectionately and much hurried C M Yonge

I shall be here till the 30th so ... continue reading

Dear Mr Craik I am very happy to agree to this arrangement and thank you for providing the early sheets. Is it not however Holland that is concerned and not Denmark?

I am in a difficulty of my own making. I signed an agreement in the spring with one Mr Hugo Borges that he should have the early sheets of the Chaplet of Pearls to translate for a Roman Cronik as he calls it, which he and ... continue reading

Dear Madam, I am at present in Devonshire whither your letter has followed me but not your MS. which awaits me at home.

I do not think it is easy to judge of a tale by one chapter, and I am not sure that it would not be best to bring your story to a conclusion, and then send me the whole. It is always dangerous to accept without seeing the whole. Perhaps therefore when the story ... continue reading

Dear Miss Yonge I am very sorry indeed that you should be perplexed about this matter[.] I hope we will be able to arrange it without giving you serious trouble. I was under the impression that you understood that the volume should be about the size of the Hugh Macmillans - between 300 & 400. On May 10 I am sure I wrote to that effect.

As matters stand I think we had better publish in parts ... continue reading

My dear Marianne To write to you seems matter of necessity, though time does not seem to be found anywhere in the interval of church-going and eating. The Consecration day you heard about, and on the next, after a tolerably quiet day, when we went to luncheon with Mrs. Scroffs, the dear people came. They had fraternised with Mr. Wilson by the way, and he came in the fly with the ladies, while the vigorous Primate ... continue reading

Dear Miss Martin, I have read through Miss Yonge’s “Pupils” yesterday. It really is not satisfactory as regards the earlier part but what is one to do under the circumstances? There is much that is really very fine and especially in the latter part just as well done as it could be. So we must go on. It has occurred to me while reading the extracts from the letters that a complete translation of them ... continue reading

My dear Edith You will not be surprised to hear that Charlotte is over head and ears in work and glad to find any thing that I can help her in. So you must believe it will give us both great pleasure to see you if you will let us know when you can come. The beginning of next week we are sure of and after the third Sunday in Advent, we shall be free till ... continue reading

My dear Miss Yonge I am afraid I omitted to tell you that our intention in publishing the parts is that the parts should not even seem complete, but end at the end of a sheet, or given number of pages quite irrespective of whether a sentence or chapter ends or not. The volumes are to be complete works. Our only motive in publishing extracts is to enable people to pay a little bit at a ... continue reading

Dear Mr Craik, I hope this letter is a sufficient acknowledgement of the £25, as I have no receipt stamp at hand and this village does not provide such articles, and as they must not be bought of the unprivileged I cannot beg or borrow too often from our worthy neighbours at the shop

Yours sincerely C M Yonge

My dear Edith, I quite agree with your brother that your vision is very beautiful. If you were old enough to remember old Mrs Barter, you could hardly have helped putting in her vigil. When her son hoped she would have a good night, she answered ‘O yes, I shall be thinking of My Glorious Resurrection’. All yours are very touching. It would be odd if it came into the same No with a [[cmybook:81]story of ... continue reading

My dear Cousin, One line to you to-day of Christmas feelings and blessings. Indeed, you are daily in my thoughts and prayers. You would have rejoiced could you have seen us last Sunday or this morning at 7 A.M. Our fourteen Melanesian Communicants so reverent, and (apparently) earnest. On Sunday I ordained Mr. Palmer Priest, Mr. Atkin and Mr. Brooke Deacons.

The service was a solemn one, in the Norfolk Island Church, the people joining heartily in ... continue reading

My Lord, Allow me to express my gratitude for the kindness of your invitation and of the arrangement for the journey. I must however beg to decline it until another year when I hope I may have the pleasure of making your daughter’s acquaintance under more cheerful circumstances.

I cannot at present feel inclined to enter on a large party, nor to leave my mother, and I should be much obliged if you would allow me to ... continue reading

My dear Miss Yonge Thanks for your latest letter. I will have the setting up of the Epistle seen to at once.

Indeed you are a valuable ally for us, in our scheme. The man after all is never very far from the Child, and however much we learn we cannot unlearn what is worth all the learning in the world, the common humanity the recognition and expression of which in words is what we call ... continue reading