I'm very interested by what you say about Vera. Isn't the end extraordinarily good. It would have been so easy to miss it. She carried it right through. I admired page 167 the end most, I think. Have you never known a Wemyss? Oh, my dear, they are very plentiful! Few men are without a touch. And I certainly believe that husbands and wives talk like that. Lord, yes!

You are so very superior, Miss, in saying half an hour would be sufficient. But how is one to escape? And also, though it may be “drivel” in cold blood, it is incredible the follies and foolishness we can bear if we think we are in love. Not that I can stand the Wemyss “brand.” No. But I can perfectly comprehend Lucy standing it. I don't think I agree about Lucy either. She could not understand her father's “intellect” but she had a sense of humour (except where her beloved was concerned). She certainly had her own opinions and the Aunt was very sodden at the funeral because of the ghastly effect of funerals! They make the hardest of us melt and gush. But all the same I think your criticism is awfully good of the Aunt, of the whole book in fact. Only one thing, my hand on my heart, I could swear to. Never could Elizabeth be influenced by me. If you knew how she would scorn the notion, how impossible it would be for her. There is a kind of turn in our sentences which is alike but that is because we are worms of the same family. But that is all.

About Paris. I have now received the doctor's address from a secretary of the Institute and have written him again to-day. If I hear I will let you know. It seems more hopeful now that I send direct. I am still in bed and dear knows when I shall be out. A reply from Manoukhin would be the only thing, I think. (I am a bit disheartened to be back here again with all the old paraphernalia of trays and hot bottles. Accursèd disease!)