Autograph letter signed : London, to Dr. Baldwin, 1891 Dec. 29.

Wishing him and his family "a peaceful and merciful new year. It is always the same old pleasant torment to hear from you - always the same phantasmagoric vision of unattainable Italy. I rejoice that your house holds together as it were - a feeble way of putting it & that you are doing such public as well as such private service...Yes - poor Wolcott Balestier's death was horribly, hideously superfluous. He carried some mysteriously contracted but abominably virulent typhoidal poison with him from London to Dresden & succumbed there - alone in a private hospital - in 12 days. He was full of capacities & possibilities - & to me an unspeakable loss - so many services did it seem likely he would render me. I went to Dresden in time to see him buried, & to try to do something for his mother & sisters; but it was a sorry & weary errand - My sister fails & fails, but the end is not yet. She has had great relief from hypnotism - in the way of (indirect) alleviation of pain - or of exasperated consciousness of it - & of direct quieting of nerves - but everything is exhausted in its turn save her persistent duration in suffering. Her condition however is simplified very considerably from what it was three months ago - & Miss Loring is more than ever a beneficent sorceress. I spent an afternoon with Miss Woolson lately - she clings to her antique Oxford & is very busy & contented, seemingly - void of any offence save that of writing hours & hours on end & bringing on that horrid complaint in her arm & shoulder. But of this she is incurable. I am intensely occupied in averting or rather confronting Xmas bills - & doubtless you are engaged in the same sweet pastime...Farewell, my dear Baldwin & be sure that I share with you every reminiscence of that perspiring pilgrimage. I never yet have quite filled up the cavity in my stomach at Volterra. I think of Taccini as a fat Xmas turkey - with plenty of dressing. I salute him so much. I wish you the best for the next months that Florence can give you..."