WCP5

[1]

Parkstone, Dorset.

Nov^r 18th. 1890

My dear Willie¹

I send you a few lines to report progress.

Owing to the wet & drizzle work has not got on much & the mess about the Summer house is awful. The front drawing room wall is built up to the eaves, but owing to the ^new pottery window-sills not being baked yet he ^(Charley) cannot finish the window, the roof cannot be put on & it all remains open to the weather & the front door almost blocked up with scaffolding. The drains have been finished laying, & the coal-cellar has been paved [2] so as to have half a ton of coals in it yesterday enabling us to get the old coal-cellar cleared out for the paving. The carpenters have been at work & have put down the floors in the passage bath-room & balcony room, which they have made a workshop. The kitchen floor will be down in a day or two, & then, when the bath &c. &c. comes the fitter will get on with that.

Monk & I finished the new bank & fernery at bottom, & now you can hardly tell where thegreat mounds, top & bottom, have gone to: — it all looks quite natural as if it had always [3] been as it is.

I bought a little timber at a sale, and soon we are going to put up the shed at top which will be all glass-roofed. The C.S.S.Assⁿ [Association] sent me the glass I ordered without saying anything about this year’s ticket.

I send you by book post an American Railway Paper I have just received. The advertisements are very interesting showing the immense number of inventions & new dodges the Americans are always getting.

[4] I do not see much chance of the work here being finished by ‘Xmas so you will probably have the pleasure of seeing the "winding up."

Let us have some more "journals" of days work & amusement. Mr. Sharpe² is a little better. We went to see him on Friday. He was reading your "Huck Finn" which I had lent him. Also "Treasure Island" which he liked immensely. If we have some clear sunny weather he will get on I hope.

Your affectionate Papa | Alfred R. Wallace [signature]