Autograph letter signed : Siena, to Dr. Baldwin, [1892] June 25.

Asking if he might "...know of an English maid, out of place, in Florence" who might be able to work for the Bourgets "for a couple of months - mainly to go with them to Ceresole, in the Piedmontese Alps...I fear there is but the smallest possibility of your having such a person in your eye - especially a good & trustworthy specimen; but the inquiry is perhaps worth making. They are sending back to France their old French maid (to await them in Paris) she being elderly, tired, ill, discontented (with 2 years of Italy - which she hates) & exasperated...If such a phoenix in Florence is to your belief unfindable, you have only kindly to say so & not to trouble yourself further. I hope you may manage to put in a day or two here before the Bourgets depart - as a student of the human animal you would I think be interested in their (to us) strange French incarnation of genius & irritability. (All this, please, in strict & inviolable confidence.) They have had to give up their attempt at Siena housekeeping & have very wisely come back to this singularly good hotel. This place continues to charm & satisfy me - & the heat, though greater, is very tolerable yet. My plan remains to wait now for the horse race in the piazza, which is supposedly medieval & curious & which takes place on the 2nd July. Shouldn't you like to see it?...I am much pulled about & strained by opposing & irreconcilable social claims on my attention - & especially by the fact that in the midst of these claims, on this side of the Alps, my brother & his wife & children, whom I haven't seen for years are counting upon me from week to week in Switzerland;" telling him he has had an offer from Mme. Peruzzi to use her farm house in Vallombrosa for the summer however his "...reply will be immediate - & disappointing;" expressing his hope that he will see him soon.