"Sir,
"I feel exceedingly obliged to you for your kind and considerate offer of a remembrance of old Rochester Bridge; that will interest me very much. I accept the relic with many thanks, and with great pleasure.
"Do me the favor to let it be delivered to a workman who will receive instructions to bring it away, and once again accept my acknowledgments.
"Yours faithfully,
"Charles Dickens.
"Mr. John H. Ball."
The present Mr. William Ball, then a young lad, was the bearer of the gift, and on being asked by us why he didn't ask to see the great novelist, replies, "Yes, I ought to have done so, but I was afraid of the dogs!"
The balustrade, which was placed on the back lawn at Gad's Hill, was mounted on a square pedestal, on the sides of which were representations of the four seasons, and a sun-dial crowned the capital. Something like it, but a little modified, appears in one of Mr. Luke Fildes's beautiful illustrations to the original edition of Edwin Drood, entitled "Jasper's Sacrifices." Three more of the balustrades now ornament Mr. Ball's garden at Hillside.
Mr. Ball the elder was invited to send in a tender for the construction of the tunnel at Gad's Hill previously mentioned, but it was not accepted, as appears from a letter addressed to him by Mr. Alfred L. Dickens (Charles Dickens's brother), of which we are allowed to take a copy:—
"8, Richmond Terrace,
"Whitehall, S.W.
"August 30th, 1859.