suspect, be counted on one’s fingers, even in fairy-lore, and then traced back to a very different origin.  Of course the market is abundantly stocked with modern versions, but I don’t think they are done the right way.  This is, however, for the Editorial ear, and to gain your unbiased criticism.  But, above all, don’t tell any friends that they are mine for the present.  Of course if they DID succeed, I would republish and add my name.  But I want to be incognito for the present—­1st, to get free criticism; 2nd, to give them fair play; 3rd, not to do any damage to my reputation in another “walk” of story-writing.  I do not in the least mean to give up my own style and take to fairy tale-telling, but I would like to try this experiment....

Monday, April 19, 1869.

...  I have two or three schemes in my head.

“Mrs. Overtheway” (2nd series), “Fatima’s Flowers,” etc.

“The Brownies (and other Tales).”

“Land of Lost Toys,” “Three Christmas Trees,” “Idyll,” etc.

“Boneless,” “Second Childhood,” etc., etc.

“The Other Side of the World,” etc., etc.

“Goods and Chattels” (quite vague as yet).

“A Sack of Fairy Tales” (in abeyance).

“A Book of weird queer Stories” (none written yet).

“Bottles in the Sea,” “Witches in Eggshells,” “Elephants in
Abyssinia,” etc.

And (a dear project) a book of stories, chiefly about Flowers and Natural History associations (not scientific, pure fiction),

“The Floating Gardens of Ancient Mexico,” the “Dutch Story,” “Immortelles,” “Mummy Peas,” etc., etc. (none even planned yet!)...

To H.K.F.G.

[Undated, Fredericton.]

...  How well I know what you say about the truth of Mother’s sayings of the soothing effects of Nature!  I used to feel it about gardening also so much.  Visions of three yellow, three white, and three purple crocuses blooming in one pot beguile the mind from less happy fancies—­perhaps too the largeness and universality of Nature disperse the selfishness of personal cares and worries.  Then I think the smell of earth and plants has a physical anodyne about it somehow!  One cannot explain it....

TO MRS. GATTY.

Fredericton, N.B. 5th Sunday after Trinity, 1869.

...  We have another “dogue."... Trouve is the name of Hector’s successor.  ’Cos for why, we found him locked up in one of the barrack rooms, when I was with Rex on one of his inspections.  He is a “left behind” either of the 1st Battalion 22nd, or the 4th Battalion 60th Rifles, we do not know which.  He has utterly taken to us, and is especially fond of me I think.  He is a big, black fellow, between a Newfoundland and a retriever.  In the “Sweep” line,