Dear Betty,—The pencils all tumbled on the car-floor out of my light overcoat pocket. I then recalled somebody's command that I should put them into the portmanteau at once, the day they came home from the stationer's. I have found a fortune-telling, second-sighted person in the car. She has the section next to mine and has been directed by a familiar spirit to go to Seattle. She has a parrot with her, and they are both very excitable and communicative. She just told me that it is revealed to her that my youngest boy will have a genius for sculpture. I miss you more than usual to-day. You could help me with some copying, and there is positively nothing interesting to see out of the window; what there is of uninteresting twirls itself about. We shall soon be reaching the mountains, in fact, I have just caught my first glimpse of them beyond these great plains. I must really have some one to write for me next year, but this winter we keep holiday, you and I, if we get in for nothing new. It pleases me to write to you and takes up the long day. You will have finished "L'Allegro" by this time; suppose you learn two of the "Sonnets" next. I wish you to know your Milton as well as possible, but I am sorry to have you take it while I am away. Take Lowell's "Biglow Papers" and learn the Spring poem. You will find nothing better to have in your mind in the Tideshead June weather. And so good-by for this day.
T. Leicester.
Mr dear Betty,—Your letter is very good, and I am more glad than ever that you chose to go to Tideshead. You will learn so much from Aunt Barbara that I wish my girl to know and to be. And you must remember, in Aunt Mary's self-pitying moments, all her sympathy and her true love for us both, and remember that she has in her character something that makes her the dearest being in the world to such a woman as Aunt Barbara. She is a person, in fact they both are, to be liked and appreciated more and more. You and your Mary Beck interest me very much, Are you sure that it is wise to call her Becky? I thought that she was a new girl, but a nickname is indeed hard to drop. I remember her, a good little red-cheeked child. Let me say this: You have indeed lived a wider sort of life, but I fear that I have made you spread your young self over too great a space, while your Becky has stepped patiently to and fro in a smaller one. You each have your advantages and disadvantages, so be "very observant and respectful of your neighbor," as that good old Scottish preacher prayed for us in Kelso. Be sure that you don't "feel superior," as your Miss Murdon used to say. It is a great thing to know Tideshead well. Remember Selborne and how famous that town came to be!
Yours fondly,
T. L.
Interlaken, July 11th.
Dear Betty,—Ada and I mean to take turns in writing to you,—one letter on Sunday and one in the middle of the week; for if we write together we shall tell you exactly the same things. So, you see, this is my turn. We do so wish for you and think that you cannot possibly be having so much fun in Tideshead as if you had come with us. We see such droll people in traveling; they do not look as if they were going anywhere, but as if they were lost and trying hard to find their way back, poor dears! There was an old woman sitting near us on a bench with a stupid-looking young man, to hear the band play, and when it stopped she said to him: "Now we've only got three tunes more, and they will soon be done." We wondered why she couldn't go and do something else if she hated them so much. Ada and I play a game every morning when we walk in the town: We take sides and one has the Germans and one the English, and then see which of us can count the most. Of course we don't always know them apart, and then we squabble for little families that pass by, and Ada is sure they are Germans,—you know how sure Ada always is if she feels a little doubtful!—but yesterday there were Cook's tourists as thick as ants and so she had no chance at all. Miss Winter writes that she will be ready to join us the first of August, which will be delightful, and mamma won't have us to worry about. She said yesterday that we were much less wild without you and Miss Winter, and we told her that it was because life was quite triste. She wishes to go to some far little villages quite off the usual line of travel, with papa, and does not yet know whether to go now and take us, or wait and leave us with Miss Winter. I promised to be triste if she would let us go. Triste is my word for everything. Do you still wear out two or three dozen hates a day? Ada said this morning that you would hate so many hard little green pears for breakfast; but we are coming to plum-time now, and they are so good and sweet. Every morning such a nice Swiss maiden called Marie (they are all Maries, I believe) comes and bumps the corner of her tray against our door and smiles a very wide smile and says "Das frühstück" in exactly the same tone as she comes in, and we have such delectable breakfasts of crisp little rolls and Swiss honey and very weak and hot-milky café au lait. I don't believe Miss Winter will let us have honey every day, but mamma doesn't mind. I think she gives orders for a very small dish of it, because Ada and I have requested more until we are disheartened. Mamma says that while we run up so many hillsides here we may eat what we please. Oh, and one thing more: no end of dry little mountain strawberries, sometimes they taste like strawberries and sometimes they don't; but this is enough about what one eats in Interlaken. I have filled my four pages and Ada is calling me to walk. We are going on with our botany. Are you? I send a better edelweiss which I plucked myself. I must let Ada tell you next time about that day. She is the best at a description, but I love you more than ever and I am always your fond and faithful
Bessie Duncan.
P. S. I forgot to say that Ada has made such clever sketches. Papa says that they quite surprise him, and we just long to show them to Miss Winter. There is one of a little girl whom we saw making lace at Lauterbrunnen. The Drummonds of Park Lane drove by us yesterday; we couldn't hear the name of their hotel, though they called it out, but we are sure to find them. They looked, however, as if they were on a journey, the carriage was so dusty. It was so nice to see the girls again.