Dear Miss Roberts, Carlisle Cathedral is a very pretty sketch, and will be very acceptable to the Monthly Packet, I think however it will be better to keep it for next year perhaps, if we and the Packet proceed and prosper as hitherto, so that it may be the opening of a series which promises to be very useful and interesting, I will consult a very good archaeologist at Winchester about the rugged [sic] staff ornament ... continue reading

Dear Miss Roberts, I enclose a paper sent by my archaeological acquaintance with all the information he could gather respecting the Ragged Staff, I hope it is what you wanted.

I am sorry for your want of success with the Garland. My father is going to London for a day or two early next week, and will see Parker, He says if you would trust us with a specimen of the illustrations and explain your plans as ... continue reading

Dear Sir, There are a few slight corrections of the ‘Heir of Redclyffe’ which I will send in a day or two. I am glad to learn that this edition has sold off so well, but I think we should take it into consideration whether it might not be better still further to lessen the price. I have been much urged by influential persons to publish a large and really cheap edition, such as would ... continue reading

Dear Sir, My new tale of ‘Heartsease or The Brother's Wife’ is now complete. I am willing to publish it in the same manner as the ‘Heir of Redclyffe’ and if you are ready to undertake it, will forward it to you, as soon as I have heard from you. At your convenience, I should be glad to know the state of the account of The Little Duke.

Yours faithfully, C M Yonge

My dear Sir I am much obliged for the draft for £300 which I received this morning as well as for the book which accompanied it.

I am glad to hear that the Lances of Lynwood have begun to go off so fast

Yours truly C M Yonge

My dear Mrs Blackburn, I condole with you on the loss of your chicken and hope the other will not follow it at the critical moment of putting out the wing feathers. I am afraid the Empress has no such good amusement, and probably the Imperial prince is much too grand a personage for her to be allowed to touch him. I never read anything more absurd than the account of his 144 garments of ... continue reading

My dear Mrs Blackburn, The price of the binding was /6½ per volume, as that blue is an expensive cloth, and the binding of an illustrated book is always more expensive, because the plates have to be sewn in separately. I must say that I have a suspicion that you had divided the sum total by 1000 instead of 2150, for certainly 1/4 would have been almost enough to bind a quarto. The paper is included ... continue reading

My dear Miss Smith, I meant to have written to you on Saturday, but was hindered. On the whole I think I should say that your case was more disappointing and vexatious than anything else, and that Mr Mozley though his conduct is decidedly provoking did not exactly deserve such strong censure.

You see his view of the case is that if a book do not answer it is no particular pleasure to anyone, ... continue reading

My dear Miss Smith, I like it very much, and am exceedingly ready for some more, much wishing to know Johnny’s fate. Mr and Mrs Arnold are both admirable of their kind, and so is Mary. I am sure her like is often found, as I am afraid Frank’s is too - everybody can remember some dreadful boy before the age of chivalry. We delight too in Sir Hector and his daughter. I ... continue reading

My dear Miss Smith The end of Aggesden does not at all disappoint me, I think Frank's gradual self conquest beautifully done, and John not at all less charming than at first. Mary is a very good lesson altogether, and very nicely done. And now for the subject of those two troublesome verbs to lie and to lay. I observe you say 'he lay down his head' and 'I must lay down all ... continue reading

My dear Miss Smith I hope and trust the tale is safe, I sent it off with the letter on Saturday, in a brown paper cover and a shilling stamp which our post office told me was the sufficient sum. If it be not come, we must write to the General Post Office but I hope to hear it is all right, as I know the book post will sometimes detain a heavy parcel for a ... continue reading

My dear Miss Smith Here is £8..4 for your kind help in the course of the last half year. I think Frances has been entirely successful. The sole criticism I have heard is that she might have found plenty of misery at the West End - but then as her father was a landowner in the East, I think she had every call thither.

Thank you for your promise of a story for that far ... continue reading

My dear Miss Smith I was on a visit in Devonshire when your note reached me, or I would sooner have written to thank you for telling me of the commencement of the printing of Aggesden Vicarage. I suppose Mr Parker intends to have it out in the ‘publishing season’ at Christmas, and I hope it will progress.

Frances Dysart has given unmitigated satisfaction except by coming to an end, everyone likes and admires her, ... continue reading

My dear Sir, I have to thank you for the pretty tale of the Nut Brown Maids which we are reading with much interest and pleasure.

Some months ago, Miss Roberts, I believe, wrote to you about a tale of the Roman Revolution of 1848 which you rejected. She has since lent me the M S and I am so much struck with it, that I cannot for bear venturing to ask whether it were an account ... continue reading

My dear Miss Smith Parker has sent me the two pretty volumes of Aggesden, and very nice they look in print. I hope they will succeed for it is a very pretty story, and I think all it wants is more attention on your part to composition as a study. I do think, if you will allow me to say so, that to make your pretty narratives take thoroughly you should go carefully through ... continue reading

My dear Sir, I have authorized M. Tauchnitz to republish “The Little Duke,” and Mr Sydney Williams tells me that he is about to apply to you for a cast of the frontispiece - I am afraid however that the lithographs can be no longer renewed, and I must reply to him that only the vignette of the little page is still to be had. I believe Mrs Blackburn had the stones broken up after the ... continue reading

I wish to consult you on a question of publishing. Rather more than a year ago, I consented at the request of Messrs Saunders and Otley to let my tale Hopes and Fears appear in their periodical the Constitutional Press, reserving to myself the copy right, and intimating to them my intention of putting the tale when completed into your hands for publication. I have just heard that the Magazine ... continue reading

My dear Sir,

I am obliged for your letter received this morning, and will decide on bringing out Hopes and Fears as soon as possible. I will send the chapters from the Constitutional Press to be reprinted as soon as I have looked over them. I think that the first edition should certainly be in two volumes uniform with the others, but after the experience of Dynevor Terrace, I am not inclined to make the number ... continue reading

My dear Sir,

Let the 5000 copies be put in hand, as you think it more advisable- Perhaps it was a mistake of mine to take fright, but after the first lessening of popularity, there is always a fear that the next attempt may fall still shorter - and one of my earlier books would not have left the 290 in hand.

I suppose the printing will hardly be finished long before October, if it were I ... continue reading

My dear Miss Butler

I cannot tell you much about poor Mr Parker. I fancy he has not been in good health for some time he went abroad for the winter about 4 years ago, and was abroad again all August & September this year, only coming home just at the beginning of October, when I had one or two notes from him, but when my book came out, 5 weeks ago, his man [[person:178]Mr ... continue reading

Miss Yonge is much obliged to Mr Bourn for sending her several reviews and critical notices of Hopes & Fears.

She would be glad to know how the sale of the work has been proceeding.

Miss Yonge would be much obliged if Mr Bourn would inform her whether Mr Parker is pretty well, and also to express to him her sincere regrets and condolence

My dear Miss Smith

I have all but finished Mrs Grant and most interesting she is. Many many thanks for her. I am not sure whether she is not a little too long, to be in thorough proportion with the others, and if I find it so, perhaps I may have to take out a few of the letters that relate less directly to her personal history, but certainly not the American ones. What an old ... continue reading

My dear Miss Smith

Here is a note for Mr Bourne that I hope may do good service. I am not inclined to augur ill from the selling off of Aggesden, for of course tales do cease to sell after a time, and Parker certainly has published three or four one volume ones since his son’s death, such as Baby Bianca, Martha Brown, or the Queen’s Maries.

I am glad you will kill Mrs Forrest, only recollect ... continue reading

Dear Sir I have been so much interested by the book you have kindly sent me, in common with rest of the Author’s Society and, having had a little correspondence with you many years ago, when you were editing the English Plutarch, I venture to write, thinking you may care to hear some experiences of a long life of writing, not from necessity but because I had something to say.

The passion for telling a story developed ... continue reading