WCP2674

[1]¹

6 Chester Street

Edinburgh

22 Dec[ember] 1889

A. Russel Wallace Esq. L.L.D.

Corfe View, Parkstone

My dear Sir

Perhaps you may remember my having given a donation to the funds of the Land Nationalistion Society through you of £500, about eighteen months ago, I think. my health has broken down lately, and I am "setting my house in order", though, from the nature of my illness, the final ending may still be some time off.

I am inclined to bequeath a larger sum than that mentioned above, to [2] the L[and]. N[ationalisation]. Society, but cannot help asking myself whether the money could not be better applied in furtherance of the object I have in view. The great inequality of fortune among mankind, and especially the unfair proportion of the products of industry that go to the working man, to the labourer and the artisan, these are the evils that have long vexed my soul, and which I would fain give the little help I can to lessen; that these evils will will ever be wholly removed, under any social system, is a thing more to be wished for than expected, I fear. I come to you for advice, knowing you to be as deeply, as anxiously concerned in the solution of that these problems [3]² as any man, and I ask you whether you consider Land Nationalisation is sufficiently probable of ever being realised on conditions sufficiently advantageous to the public to induce men to come forward with their thousands to push it on? This may seem a strange question to put to one so identified with L[and]. N[ationalisation]. as you are, yea, even an ungracious if not an impertinent one, but I think you will forgive me, and kindly attribute it to a want of clear, decisive opinion on the troubled social questions which perplex mens [sic] minds at present. I have given my support to the L[and]. N[ationalisation]. movement because it has seemed to me the most feasible, and makes the least demand for a great, a [4] wonderfully great direction[?] in the moral[?] nature of mankind of all the social (an almost complete change of nature, in fact) of all the social plans devised for the improvement of the condition of the working classes.

I have written at greater length than I ought in my present state of health, though hardly enough fully to explain my findings and ideas; and the nature of the subject of this letter is such that I dont [sic] wish to employ the hand of another upon it. Try to understand my wishes and feelings from what I have said or hinted, and kindly favour me with a reply at your convenience. At the same time I beg to apologise for this troubling you, knowing something of how valuable time to you is.

I am | yours sincerely | R. Miller [signature]³