Part 29 (2/2)

He does not speak, but says they may N o D

5

”There is a land,” he says, ”my dear, Which is too hot to skate, I fear” A fric A

At Margate also he reatest favourites He could not bear to see the healthy pleasures of childhood spoiled by conventional restraint ”One piece of advice given to lee, and that was not to loves at the seaside; they took the advice, and I enjoyed the result”

_Apropos_ of this Iat Eastbourne, he never went down to the beach without providing himself with a supply of safety-pins Then if he saw any little girl anted to wade in the sea, but was afraid of spoiling her frock, he would gravely go up to her and present her with a safety-pin, so that she ht boots were a great aversion of his, especially for children One little girl as staying with him at Eastbourne had occasion to buy a new pair of boots Lewis Carroll gave instructions to the boothly comfortable, with the result that when they ca very nearly as broad as they were long! Which shows that even hygienic principleswith Miss Paine took place in 1876 When Lewis Carroll returned to Christ Church he sent her a copy of ”The Hunting of the Snark,” with the following acrostic written in the fly-leaf:--

'A re you deaf, Father Willia man said, 'D id you hear what I told you just now?

E xcuse , sleepy old cow!

A littleto remark: D o you think she'd be pleased if a book were sent down E ntitled ”The Hunt of the Snark?”'

'P ack it up in brown paper!' the old man cried, 'A nd seal it with olive-and-dove

I coood fellow, to send her beside E aster Greetings, and give her my love'

This was followed by a letter, dated June 7, 1876:--

My dear Adelaide,--Did you try if the letters at the beginnings of the lines about Father Willia? Sometimes it happens that you can spell out words that hich is very curious

I wish you could have heard him when he shouted out ”Pack it up in brown paper!” It quite shook the house And he threw one of his shoes at his son's head (just to lad to hear you had got the book safe, but his eyes filled with tears as he said, ”I sent _her_ my love, but she never--” he couldn't say any more, hisa roast goose)

Another letter to Miss Paine is very characteristic of his quaint humour:--

Christ Church, Oxford, _March_ 8, 1880

My dear Ada,--(Isn't that your short name? ”Adelaide” is all very well, but you see when one's _dreadfully_ busy one hasn't ti words--particularly when it takes one half an hour to reet a dictionary to see if one has spelt it right, and of course the dictionary is in another rooh bookcase--where it has been for ot all covered with dust--so one has to get a duster first of all, and nearly choke oneself in dusting it--and when one _has_ made out at last which is dictionary and which is dust, even _then_ there's the job of re which end of the alphabet ”A”

comes--for one feels pretty certain it isn't in the _o and wash one's hands before turning over the leaves--for they've got so thick with dust one hardly knows theht--and, as likely as not, the soap is lost, and the jug is empty, and there's no towel, and one has to spend hours and hours in finding things--and perhaps after all one has to go off to the shop to buy a new cake of soap--so, with all this bother, I hope you won't , ”My dear Ada”) You said in your last letter you would like a likeness of et to call the next titon

Your very affectionate friend,

Lewis Carroll

It was quite against Mr Dodgson's usual rule to give away photographs of himself; he hated publicity, and the above letter was accompanied by another to Mrs Paine, which ran as follows:--

I araph, for I don't want people, who have heard of Lewis Carroll, to be able to recognise him in the street--but I can't refuse Ada

Will you kindly take care, if any of your ordinary acquaintances (I don't speak of inti about the name of ”Lewis Carroll”?