John Blackwood to GE, Edinburgh, 3 February 1860
Title
John Blackwood to GE, Edinburgh, 3 February 1860
Title
John Blackwood to GE, Edinburgh, 3 February 1860
Sender
John Blackwood
Recipient
George Eliot
Date(s)
- 1860-02-03
Place
Edinburgh
Letter Content
John Blackwood to GE, Edinburgh, 3 February 1860
MS: National Library of Scotland. Hitherto unpublished.
Edinburgh | February 3/60.
My Dear Madam
I have just finished reading the first 96 pages of The Mill, which with another sheet will be sent to you along with this.
Pray make your mind easy and abandon dismals. Your pictures are wonderful. The people are all alive and in the flesh. Mrs. Tulliver is a great creation and the superior wisdom of her husband is as irresistible to me as one touch of it was to even the usually immovable Mr. Riley. 466 Maggie, Tom, and Bob Jakin are delightful, and even the glimpse of the Miller's man 467 brings the worthy fellow perfectly before one. The exquisite touches of human nature are very numerous; in fact it is human nature all over. Yap is a good dog, and Tom calling to him on the moment of his arrival 468 is to the life. The Major is out this afternoon so that I have nobody to turn to and say "Isn't this good etc." which is very hard upon me.
I do not like the word lymphatic applied to Mrs. Tulliver. 469 It interferes with the pleasure one has in looking at her.
I am delighted to hear of the professional compliment to Lewes of the dedication. Should we make a paragraph of it?
Mr. Simpson is attending to your "incisive" message about the Sea Side Studies.
If people generally can go at The Mill again and again with as hearty a relish as I do, you will have a triumph that will put to flight the most obstinate of headaches, and I hope in the meantime you have got quit of that from which you were suffering when you last wrote.
always yours truly
John Blackwood.
Mrs. M. E. Lewes.
Has Sir Edward been to see you yet? I am rather curious for an account of that interview.
MS: National Library of Scotland. Hitherto unpublished.
Edinburgh | February 3/60.
My Dear Madam
I have just finished reading the first 96 pages of The Mill, which with another sheet will be sent to you along with this.
Pray make your mind easy and abandon dismals. Your pictures are wonderful. The people are all alive and in the flesh. Mrs. Tulliver is a great creation and the superior wisdom of her husband is as irresistible to me as one touch of it was to even the usually immovable Mr. Riley. 466 Maggie, Tom, and Bob Jakin are delightful, and even the glimpse of the Miller's man 467 brings the worthy fellow perfectly before one. The exquisite touches of human nature are very numerous; in fact it is human nature all over. Yap is a good dog, and Tom calling to him on the moment of his arrival 468 is to the life. The Major is out this afternoon so that I have nobody to turn to and say "Isn't this good etc." which is very hard upon me.
I do not like the word lymphatic applied to Mrs. Tulliver. 469 It interferes with the pleasure one has in looking at her.
I am delighted to hear of the professional compliment to Lewes of the dedication. Should we make a paragraph of it?
Mr. Simpson is attending to your "incisive" message about the Sea Side Studies.
If people generally can go at The Mill again and again with as hearty a relish as I do, you will have a triumph that will put to flight the most obstinate of headaches, and I hope in the meantime you have got quit of that from which you were suffering when you last wrote.
always yours truly
John Blackwood.
Mrs. M. E. Lewes.
Has Sir Edward been to see you yet? I am rather curious for an account of that interview.
Signature
John Blackwood.
Citation
John Blackwood, John Blackwood to GE, Edinburgh, 3 February 1860, 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/95264