BIB_ID
437712
Accession number
MA 14300.219
Creator
Gordon, George Huntly, 1796-1868, sender.
Display Date
London, England, 18-- August 27.
Credit line
Bequest of Gordon N. Ray, 1987.
Description
1 item (7 pages) ; 18.4 x 11.2 cm
Notes
Written from the "Staty. Office."
Year of writing suggested by internal evidence; John Gibson Lockhart resigned the editorship of the Quarterly and was replaced in that position by Whitewall Elwin in 1853.
Signed "Huntly"; the author of the letter is tentatively identified as George Huntly Gordon, the Scottish writer and civil servant who was employed as as Sir Walter Scott's amanuensis, and, afterwards, as a clerk in the clerk in the treasury and the government stationary office.
Year of writing suggested by internal evidence; John Gibson Lockhart resigned the editorship of the Quarterly and was replaced in that position by Whitewall Elwin in 1853.
Signed "Huntly"; the author of the letter is tentatively identified as George Huntly Gordon, the Scottish writer and civil servant who was employed as as Sir Walter Scott's amanuensis, and, afterwards, as a clerk in the clerk in the treasury and the government stationary office.
Provenance
Bequest of Gordon N. Ray, 1987.
Summary
Informing her that he received note while vacationing in New Forest; explaining that there appears to have been a misunderstaing betwen them, as he thought she did not expect him to write her again until she had sent him her "causerie on political and other matters", and she evidently expected him to write in acknowledgment of her last letter; regretting that he will not have an opportunity to see her unless he should go to Paris, referring to her "mention of the likeness which Miss Edwards has discovered between you & the Baroness v. Hügel" which "would only tend to increase my intense anxiety to see you - for my cousin is extremely pretty"; asking if she would be willing to sit for a portrait, but "not to a Daguerreotypist (for I detest even of the best of the metallic pictures) but to Talbotypist, Calotypist - Photographer - or whatever else the sun-pictures on paper may be called in Paris"; remarking that, from what she has said of herself, she appears to resemble "Die Vernon" (a reference to the heroine of Blaze de Bury's 1848 novel "Mildred Vernon"); writing that he went to Hurst & Blackett's to relay her wish to obtain copies of (her novel) Falkenberg and that he has received a note from Hurst stating that he would be pleased to send two copies of the book which he will send upon receiving instructions from her; informing her that her book "Germania" does not belong to Hurst & Blackett but to Colburn, and suggesting that she write to him for a copy; recording a postscript that Mr. (John Gibson) Lockhart has been forced to leave the Quarterly owing to his poor health and that he has been replaced by Mr. Hastings (i.e. Whitewall) Elwin, "a Norfolk litterateur of very high character."
Catalog link
Department