GE to John Blackwood, London, 11 November 1874
Title
GE to John Blackwood, London, 11 November 1874
Title
GE to John Blackwood, London, 11 November 1874
Sender
George Eliot
Recipient
John Blackwood
Date(s)
- 1874-11-11
Place
London
Letter Content
GE to John Blackwood, London, 11 November 1874
MS: National Library of Scotland. Published: Journal of English and Germanic Philology, 47 (October 1958), 705-706.
The Priory, | 21. North Bank, | Regents Park.
November 11. 74.
My dear Mr. Blackwood
Don't despair of me. I am settled down now, and the thick slice of manuscript which had passed into the irrevocable before we left Earlswood, had been read aloud to my private critic and was immensely approved by him. I did not think it up to the mark myself, but he vows it is.
Charles showed me your letter when he was here on Sunday. I have not read his article, 258 so that I have no judgment to give, but I should have been glad to have it appear for Mrs. Senior's sake, who had read and approved it. However, it may do for some other niche.
Charles is a monumental reminder to us of our venerable years. He is the father of two children, wears spectacles, and has just been appointed head of a department in the P.O. with twenty men under his direction. And it seems to us but the other day when we brought him from Hofwyl looking like a crude German lad of seventeen. He is not, thank Heaven, a literary dabbler, but he sometimes writes on practical questions that interest him.
You are rather hard on the Master of Baliol, 259 who is a favourite of mine. But he certainly is not a specimen of muscular Christianity. And he is wonderfully old-seeming for his years. I get on with him delightfully.
If you feel it a grievance to migrate from the country to Edinburgh, think what it is for your wretched fellow Britons who are doomed to London -- a much vaster wilderness of brick and mortar without the grand breaks and outlines of Edinburgh. But I suppose that Miss Blackwood thinks the Londoners the more enviable among the doomed, and indeed
I am not sure that I should like the Edinburgh life as a whole better than what we get here. As an equivalent for golf, I am going to see some tennis playing which, they tell me, is very fine, and possible as a private institution for ladies.
Always yours truly
M. E. Lewes.
MS: National Library of Scotland. Published: Journal of English and Germanic Philology, 47 (October 1958), 705-706.
The Priory, | 21. North Bank, | Regents Park.
November 11. 74.
My dear Mr. Blackwood
Don't despair of me. I am settled down now, and the thick slice of manuscript which had passed into the irrevocable before we left Earlswood, had been read aloud to my private critic and was immensely approved by him. I did not think it up to the mark myself, but he vows it is.
Charles showed me your letter when he was here on Sunday. I have not read his article, 258 so that I have no judgment to give, but I should have been glad to have it appear for Mrs. Senior's sake, who had read and approved it. However, it may do for some other niche.
Charles is a monumental reminder to us of our venerable years. He is the father of two children, wears spectacles, and has just been appointed head of a department in the P.O. with twenty men under his direction. And it seems to us but the other day when we brought him from Hofwyl looking like a crude German lad of seventeen. He is not, thank Heaven, a literary dabbler, but he sometimes writes on practical questions that interest him.
You are rather hard on the Master of Baliol, 259 who is a favourite of mine. But he certainly is not a specimen of muscular Christianity. And he is wonderfully old-seeming for his years. I get on with him delightfully.
If you feel it a grievance to migrate from the country to Edinburgh, think what it is for your wretched fellow Britons who are doomed to London -- a much vaster wilderness of brick and mortar without the grand breaks and outlines of Edinburgh. But I suppose that Miss Blackwood thinks the Londoners the more enviable among the doomed, and indeed
I am not sure that I should like the Edinburgh life as a whole better than what we get here. As an equivalent for golf, I am going to see some tennis playing which, they tell me, is very fine, and possible as a private institution for ladies.
Always yours truly
M. E. Lewes.
Signature
M. E. Lewes.
Citation
George Eliot, GE to John Blackwood, London, 11 November 1874, Complete George Eliot Letters(2026), George Eliot Archive, edited by Beverley Park Rilett. https://GeorgeEliotArchive.org, Accessed September 7, 2026. https://www.georgeeliotarchive.org/items/show/92600