My dear Miss Smith, Many thanks for your kind answer, I think these ladies’ biographies will be very nice work to do together, and I believe that to look into real life minutely is the best school for one’s own mind or for fiction. If I write nothing but fiction for some time, I begin to get stupid, and to feel rather as if it had been a long meal of sweets - then history is ... continue reading

Sir,

Some time ago you were kind enough to mention, in a letter to Mrs Austin, the life of Madam de Montagu as one that would be very desirable among the ‘biographies of good women’ that I have been attempting to collect for the improvement of young girls; I have ventured to desire my publisher to send you a copy of the first series that you may see at what I have aimed; I am now ... continue reading

My dear Child, I am sorry to say that my dearest wife is unable to write you a little Christmas greeting as she had hoped, and as you simply have earned by your better than best behaviour in writing to her so regularly, for which we can never love and thank you enough. I wish I could say that she is at all better, but her breathing and palpitations become, I fear, more and more troublesome, ... continue reading