WCP55

[1]

Parkstone, Dorset.

July 6th. 1902

My dear Will¹

You will be glad to hear that I have arranged terms with Dr. Paterson² to rent Corfe View³ on lease for 7 years, at £.65 a year, I putting it into thorough order. He wants to move in between 10th. & 20th. October so that we must be out before Michaelmas⁴ day to allow of the work being done.

I shall try & get my study & bedroom, & some upstairs rooms perhaps all — ready by end of August so as to go in & be able to see to the finish^g [2] of other rooms, and move in at our leisure during September, & Percy thinks we can manage it. So it will do if you can arrange to have your holiday about the middle of September, but we shall be able to decide better as to exact time in another month. I think the roof will be finished this week, that is if we get the ridge-tiles, but as they were only ordered last week we may be kept waiting a week or two for them. The zinc nails which were telegraphed for last Friday week, have not come yet, & no explanation! But we get some from Poole every [3] day as two of the labourers or carpenters live there.

I weighed an average pound of the blue-bell bulbs & there were rather over a hundred, and as the whole weighed very nearly ten pounds there must be about a thousand in the lot. Ma⁵ planted them all during the week.

The door opening outside you ask about is the servants’ W.C. It was to open inside on the plan, but Ma objected, both because it was so near the larder, & also ^near to the back door. We will put up a little covered way to reach it, through the Lamp-place, & it will be more convenient to be used by the gardener than if inside.

Pennington has dug a hole at the bottom of the orchard at the very lowest point of the little valley [4] he dug about four feet deep and came to very good sharp sand at about 3 feet, all above being loam such as you dug out of the pit-hole. But there is no sign of water.

Almost all the roses are out now in the vegetable garden, and the sweet-briars in the orchard, so that the whole place looks very gay. We have had several dishes of first-rate peas, & shall have as many as we want during the next month or two. Violet⁶ is coming home I believe for a time at the end of this month & we must then have one more breakfast at Kingston & another raid on the bluebells if we can find the place which I sh^d. think will not be difficult. No more this week.

Your affectionate Pa | Alfred R. Wallace — [signature]