Ever your loving
Dad.
Epistolary composition on the model of a Gladstonian speech to a deputation on women's suffrage.
[The other is to his daughter, Mrs. Harold Roller, who had sent him from abroad a friend's autograph-book for a signature:—]
Hodeslea, Eastbourne, November 1, 1893.
The epistle of Thomas to the woman of the house of Harold.
1. I said it was an autograph-book; and so it was.
2. And naughty words came to the root of my tongue.
3. And the recording angel dipped his pen in the ink and squared his elbows to write.
4. But I spied the hand of the lovely and accomplished but vagabond daughter.