I am very flowery. I must catch the post. I do hope my Head Gardener is not in bed with rheumatic fever!!!! I trust your poor back is rather easier?
Please most gratefully thank the girls for me.
Yours gratefully and affectionately,
J.H.E.
To the Rev. J. Going.
All Fools, 1884.
My Dear Head Gardener,
You are too good, and—as to the confusion of one's principles is sometimes the case—your virtues encourage my vices. You make me greedy when I ought only to be grateful.
I've been too busy to write at once, and also somewhat of set purpose abstained—for those bitter winds and hard-caked soil were not suited for transplantation, and still less fit for you to be playing the part of Honest Root-gatherer without your Cardigan Waistcoat!!!!
To-day