GE to Sara Sophia Hennell, Richmond, [5 September 1858]
Title
GE to Sara Sophia Hennell, Richmond, [5 September 1858]
Title
GE to Sara Sophia Hennell, Richmond, [5 September 1858]
Sender
George Eliot
Recipient
Sara Sophia Hennell
Date(s)
- 1858-09-05
Place
Richmond
Letter Content
GE to Sara Sophia Hennell, Richmond, [5 September 1858]
MS: Yale. Endorsed: Sep. 5. 1858. Extract published: Cross, II, 64.
Park Shot | Sunday.
Dear Sara
You have surely been thinking me the shabbiest of mortals, to send you that curt note at the back of the autograph without saying one word about your interesting letter which you sent to bid me welcome home. Unless, as Helps says, you have employed your imagination in the service of charity, and conceived the possibility of my not having seen your letter at the time I scribbled said shabby note; which was the fact. For our good landlady had placed carefully before us a pile of letters, all of which we should have been content to wait for until the day of judgment, when the writers of unnecessary letters will doubtless receive their reward, and had with equal care locked up in her desk the two letters we should have been glad to see -- yours and another, equally agreeable in its way, since it contained a cheque for £40. I need not enter into details -- you foresee of course that I got your letter just when mine was gone to the irrevocable Post. Not that I am going to make you the least amends now -- only to thank you and tell you how pleasant it was to read your letter aloud after dinner.
Your account of Spurgeon 1184 tallies with all I had conjectured from newspaper accounts and from one or two of his printed sermons which I have read -- also with his portrait. The only thing that shook me with a doubt in his favour was Ruskin's testimony; but Ruskin is a man of strange whims.
There is a sad beauty in what you tell me of Edward Bache. I never saw him after he was grown up, but I remember his sweet mother and the expression of her face perfectly. I did not know of her death. 1185
Will you not write to the author of Thorndale 1186 and express your sympathy? He is a very diffident man, who would be susceptible to that sort of fellowship, and one should give a gleam of happiness where it is possible. Mr. Lewes has no autograph of his, not being a preserver of letters.
I shall write you nothing worth reading for the next three months, so here is an opportunity for you to satisfy a large appetite for generous deeds. You can write to me a great many times without getting anything worth having in return.
Mr. Lewes has suffered a good deal from his head during our absence, but he has been better the last week or two. In all other respects we are faring well.
Yours gratefully
Marian.
I was affected by reading of George Combe's death in Galignani, and Mr. Bray, I am sure must be still more affected by the good and able man's death. For good and able he was, with the utmost that severity might make of his weaknesses. -- Robert Cox, I suppose, will write a Memoir of him. 1187
MS: Yale. Endorsed: Sep. 5. 1858. Extract published: Cross, II, 64.
Park Shot | Sunday.
Dear Sara
You have surely been thinking me the shabbiest of mortals, to send you that curt note at the back of the autograph without saying one word about your interesting letter which you sent to bid me welcome home. Unless, as Helps says, you have employed your imagination in the service of charity, and conceived the possibility of my not having seen your letter at the time I scribbled said shabby note; which was the fact. For our good landlady had placed carefully before us a pile of letters, all of which we should have been content to wait for until the day of judgment, when the writers of unnecessary letters will doubtless receive their reward, and had with equal care locked up in her desk the two letters we should have been glad to see -- yours and another, equally agreeable in its way, since it contained a cheque for £40. I need not enter into details -- you foresee of course that I got your letter just when mine was gone to the irrevocable Post. Not that I am going to make you the least amends now -- only to thank you and tell you how pleasant it was to read your letter aloud after dinner.
Your account of Spurgeon 1184 tallies with all I had conjectured from newspaper accounts and from one or two of his printed sermons which I have read -- also with his portrait. The only thing that shook me with a doubt in his favour was Ruskin's testimony; but Ruskin is a man of strange whims.
There is a sad beauty in what you tell me of Edward Bache. I never saw him after he was grown up, but I remember his sweet mother and the expression of her face perfectly. I did not know of her death. 1185
Will you not write to the author of Thorndale 1186 and express your sympathy? He is a very diffident man, who would be susceptible to that sort of fellowship, and one should give a gleam of happiness where it is possible. Mr. Lewes has no autograph of his, not being a preserver of letters.
I shall write you nothing worth reading for the next three months, so here is an opportunity for you to satisfy a large appetite for generous deeds. You can write to me a great many times without getting anything worth having in return.
Mr. Lewes has suffered a good deal from his head during our absence, but he has been better the last week or two. In all other respects we are faring well.
Yours gratefully
Marian.
I was affected by reading of George Combe's death in Galignani, and Mr. Bray, I am sure must be still more affected by the good and able man's death. For good and able he was, with the utmost that severity might make of his weaknesses. -- Robert Cox, I suppose, will write a Memoir of him. 1187
Signature
Marian.
Citation
George Eliot, GE to Sara Sophia Hennell, Richmond, [5 September 1858], Complete George Eliot Letters(2026), George Eliot Archive, edited by Beverley Park Rilett. https://GeorgeEliotArchive.org, Accessed September 7, 2026. https://georgeeliotarchive.org/items/show/94083