WCP240

[1]

Parkstone, Dorset.

Oct[obe]^r 8^th. 1893

My dear Violet¹

I am sure I wrote you in reply to yours to me, & I only wanted to know how you got on, because, after the mere announcement that you had 17 kids’ this term, your next letter ignored them altogether, & we knew nothing of how you got on with them or what help you had &c. &c. &c! Now we are a little more posted up, but still you do not say if you have an assistant from the School, which I understood you were to have. Let²us know what Hughes says— "Infants Mistress" comes here. As to dollars, one equals ^s4/2³ = 50 pence. Therefore 1.80 = 90^d = 7^s./6^d [2] A simple sum for your cleverest pupils! In a few days I will send you a bag of potting stuff for the ferns, but at present everything is soaking and I have just got some bulbs in which require my attention.

After a great deal of asking from Mr. Kelly I gave my lecture on "The Colours of Animals" to the Parkstone Institute on Thursday. They had a pretty fair lantern & it all went off very well. The Vicar preached a little at starting of course.

On Wednesday we went to Canon Usherwood’s to tea & your [3] friend Miss King was there. I should not think you need be much afraid of her. Yesterday we had a lot to tea & she came with Mrs. Usherwood, the Pocock girls, & Mrs Brindley & one of the Miss B’s.

The Miss Horns have moved to a smaller new house up the same road, & that is I think all the Parkstone news. The green pods are as green & as milky as ever. I cut one open & it was just the same as the one you had, so I have cut one off & laid it to dry. Perhaps it may ripen that [4] way. There are a few left on which shall hang till ‘Xmas when perhaps they may be ripe. The "Nineteenth Century" has not printed my Sunday article yet! I think I must stir up the Editor as he may have forgotten it. I should like to write about the coal-strike & other things of that sort, but I am too radical for the big fashionable Reviews, & they won’t have such things. I am just finishing two big articles on the Glacial Lake question which I think I have settled!

Your affectionate Pa | Alfred R. Wallace [signature]