Your letter of yesterday came this morning. Yours of 5th came safe—Sunday night late, (on returning from spending the evening, so you see I gad about some—)2 I found it waiting for me, & read it all through. Both letters are welcome. Thank you particularly for the slip from the Nation,3 which I had not seen nor heard of. Nelly, I looked some five or six weeks ago for Mrs. Banfield's letter—& now day before yesterday a second hunt—but cannot find it, & fear it has been destroyed or lost—I am distressed that I cannot find & return it, as I know you think so much of your friend's letters—(Besides moving in this house from the former one—I have twice hurriedly destroyed a large mass of letters & MSS.—to be ready for what might happen)4—
I am indeed interested in what you write about Mrs. Huntington5—it does not surprise me that she meets emergencies, &c. so splendidly & expands to greater womanly beauty & development—I always thought it in her to do so—Nelly, when you next see her give her my love—I return Willie's6 picture—dear child—it has pleased me much—I held it a long time in my hand & thought of H street—
Nelly, I think very highly everyway of little Harold's picture—it is, to begin with, one of the best photos ever taken, & it seems so beautiful, & a real man-child—I liked it much, & have always kept it where I could see it. (Nelly, did you wish me to return it? I have overlooked—or forgotten—any request to that effect in the letter sending it)—
I send my love to Mrs. Brownell—also to Garry Howard7 when you see her—(what you say of her in your letter I fully endorse as my mature conviction—she is a good, tender girl—true as steel.) Nelly dear, I am guiltless of the cologne present—(don't know any thing about Peter Doyle, in this case)—
Dear Nelly, I feel that you are—or have been—under the depressing influences of Mr Dilles's8 and Mr. Townsend's9 deaths—If it were eligible you should come frequently & spend the days with me, to cheer you up—meantime take early opportunities to get a change of scene of surroundings—& often—
It is very fine here, to-day—I have been hobbling out—plenty of snow on the ground—but air, sun & sky delightful—
Waltnearly 5—It is near sundown, very fine, & I am going out—as I like to be on the river, (on those strong boats crashing through the ice now plentiful on the Delaware)—I shall probably cross to Phil —& mail this letter thence.
Henry Townsend, an employee in the First Auditor's office, died on February 7, 1874; he lived at 1013 O Street, next door to Ellen O'Connor.
The allusion to Townsend's death establishes the year.
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