Life of Octavia Hill as Told in Her Letters

by Octavia Hill

We reached here last night. Miss Yorke is kinder, brighter, and with subtler sympathy than I had imagined. She is an excellent manager, and prevents one’s feeling forlorn in travelling. It is an immense comfort that all my work is so well started, and that I am anxious about nothing.... I hope dear Gertrude found all as easy as could be; but one feels how puzzling things might be, from there being omissions of form, when once the living voice was gone.

Octavia Hill.
From a Drawing by Edward Clifford. 1877.

Villa Cattaneo, Nervi Riviera de Levante,

February 4th, 1878.

The MacDonalds are very kind, but I rest much more on Miss Yorke’s quiet, strong, wise help. There is something so sterling in her. She says little, and does so much. I am deeply interested about the war, and long for news. We get no newspapers here! And, for the first time in my life, I do miss them sadly.

AN ARTIST’S WISH FOR HIS FRIEND

52, Wigmore Street,

January 24th, 1878.

Edward Clifford[^[87]] to Octavia.