Reference
X955/1/76
Title
To Mrs Sarah Colenutt
Date free text
August 1892
Production date
From: 1892 To: 1892
Scope and Content
Derwent View, Fitz Road,Cockermouth,
My dear friend,
I should like to have just a word from you to say how you and your belongings are, and whether you have moved.
Molly and I have been here for about ten days. We came to Cockermouth in order to be near Jack and his wife who live at Brigham, about a mile and a quarter to the east of us. They are both well, and she
is lovelier than ever. Willie, his wife, and children are at a farm-house hard by. We are not in amongst the mountains but close to them, and in many respects this is better. They lie in a magnificent extended heap to
the south of us, and the sights we have seen, especially at sunset, are beyond all words. Criffle, just across the Solway, rises like a cloud about 20 miles northwards, and all the Redgauntlet country is between. No more mountain climbing, however! An end has come to that, as an end comes to all things, and I content myself now with gazing on the hills from their feet.
Do you know, I never go into a new land without wishing I had your husband with me. I always think of him and his interest in all that goes on in the earth, and I want him to tell me about the strange sheep and the strange cattle. The milk here, by the way, is abominable. It is cheap enough, 3d a quart, but is water itself compared with the milk of the south. How long we shall remain in these parts I don’t know, but
we shall certainly call on Kate as we go back if all is well.
What I want more particularly to hear about yourselves is whether either of you will feel the removal. If you wish to beguile any cares buy two little pocket volumes 10d each, by M.E.Wilkins (1), called A Humble Romance and A Far-away Melody. They are a collection of short New-England stories. Doubtless you have heard of them. Don’t forget them, and tell me what you think of them. I think they are very good, although I do not mean to claim the first rank for them. I have been reading Consuelo (2) again for the second or third time, and this time in French. So much is left out in the English translation, and some of the best things are omitted. What a book it is! Emerson somewhere talks about Consuelo as a new figure in literature, and so she is; a new,
living thing, a real extension of humanity. She is all on the right side too. Love from us both to yourself your husband and the children.
Ever yours
W. Hale White
I was asked to write something for the Shelley Centenary. It appears in the August number of the Bookman. It is called 'Our Debt to France, and may interest you. I haven't got a copy or I would send you one.
(1) WILKINS, afterwards FREEMAN, Mary Eleanor. A Humble Romance and other stories. 1887 & 1892
A Far-away Melody: and other stories. 1890 1891
(2) Consuelo by George Sand 1852
Level of description
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