My clearest memory of her is of a little girl calling out “Good-night” from her room, and of your mother taking me in to see her in her bed, and wish her good-night.  I have a yet clearer memory (like a dream of fifty years ago) of a little bare-legged girl in a sailor’s jersey, who used to run up into my lodgings by the sea.  But why should I trouble you with foolish reminiscences of mine that cannot interest you?

    Yours always lovingly,

    C. L. Dodgson.

It was a writer in The National Review who, after eulogising the talents of Lewis Carroll, and stating that he would never be forgotten, added the harsh prophecy that “future generations will not waste a single thought upon the Rev. C.L.  Dodgson.”

If this prediction is destined to be fulfilled, I think my readers will agree with me that it will be solely on account of his extraordinary diffidence about asserting himself.  But such an unnatural division of Lewis Carroll, the author, from the Rev. C.L.  Dodgson, the man, is forced in the extreme.  His books are simply the expression of his normal habit of mind, as these letters show.  In literature, as in everything else, he was absolutely natural.

To refer to such criticisms as this (I am thankful to say they have been very few) is not agreeable; but I feel that it is owing to Mr. Dodgson to do what I can to vindicate the real unity which underlay both his life and all his writings.

Of many anecdotes which might be adduced to show the lovable character of the man, the following little story has reached me through one of his child-friends:—­

My sister and I [she writes] were spending a day of delightful sightseeing in town with him, on our way to his home at Guildford, where we were going to pass a day or two with him.  We were both children, and were much interested when he took us into an American shop where the cakes for sale were cooked by a very rapid process before your eyes, and handed to you straight from the cook’s hands.  As the preparation of them could easily be seen from outside the window, a small crowd of little ragamuffins naturally assembled there, and I well remember his piling up seven of the cakes on one arm, and himself taking them out and doling them round to the seven hungry little youngsters.  The simple kindness of his act impressed its charm on his child-friends inside the shop as much as on his little stranger friends outside.

It was only to those who had but few personal dealings with him that he seemed stiff and “donnish”; to his more intimate acquaintances, who really understood him, each little eccentricity of manner or of habits was a delightful addition to his charming and interesting personality.  That he was, in some respects, eccentric cannot be denied; for instance he hardly ever wore an overcoat, and always wore a tall hat, whatever might be the climatic conditions.  At dinner in his rooms small pieces of cardboard took the place of table-mats; they answered the purpose perfectly well, he said, and to buy anything else would be a mere waste of money.  On the other hand, when purchasing books for himself, or giving treats to the children he loved, he never seemed to consider expense at all.