John Brent2 is come & I will send it down by Hope or Effie—3 I enclose the address that you may know where it comes from. I hope your journey has been prosperous & that you wont be frightened at coming again4
The year is conjectured on the basis of the publication of J. Brent 1865; the day and month are conjectured on the assumption that the letter was written on the day of CD’s return to Down from London in November 1865 (see nn. 2 and 4, below).
Possibly a reference to Village bells, Lady Gwendoline and other poems, by the novelist and antiquarian John Brent (J. Brent 1865). The book was published between 1 and 15 July 1865 (Publishers’ Circular 1865, p. 369).
According to his ‘Journal’ (Correspondence vol. 13, Appendix II), CD ‘staid ten days’ in London with his brother Erasmus, beginning 8 November 1865; however, Emma Darwin recorded in her diary (DAR 242) that she and CD returned to Down on 20 November.