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OCR Rendition - approximate
578 Life and Letters. of Francis Galton between the garden 'and the stables a cistern 20 x 10 x 10 feet is just dug out and built round; and in an ingenious way all the water that falls on the many roofs connected with the . farm-yard is collected into a pipe to feed it. Ever so much is going on besides. I had a quick but stuffy journey from Newton Abbot. The fast train was easily caught there, but there was overcrowding in it. The three nights in London were very profitable, for I finished my little paper and did various jobs, and I reached here, as arranged, on Thursday. Eva is at Bibury. I join her there to-morrow, for the week ; then I go home, and she for a few days to Warwickshire, and we converge in London afterwards. I wonder if the droughtt has continued with you. There has been a little rain here, and yesterday a big threatening: cloud, with apparently waterspouts of rain, hung over Leamington and elsewhere, but only a few drops touched us. The newcomers at Gannoway Gate (where Darwin lived as a bachelor, and the Torres till lately) were here while getting their furniture in. It transpired that the male could whistle through his fingers and after moderate persuasion he did. He gave us lessons in that musical and very useful art, but although I blow with his diagram by my side, in front of the looking-glass, for five minutes at a stretch, I have not yet caught the trick. Edward occasionally succeeds. I shall go on night and morning till I can. How many useful accomplishments are neglected in our youth!-this of making °°cat-calls " among the number. I want it every day to get a cab in London. It beats all whistles hollow, but confessedly is not elegant to the eyes. I do not suggest Amy's acquiring it. 5, Bertie Terrace is not yet sold, several things that they all are glad to have stored are still there. I had not the heart to look at it. Gifi cycled over to Leamington and saw Temple, who had been here for, a little while in Claverdon, and learnt that since then she had been somewhat seriously ill, a doctor-threetimes-a-day business; I don't know more. She is convalescent now, but weak. Yeales is I hear, losing her memory. Everything ages, and is extruded when of no further use. Among others, I am glad to reckon my pinched thumb nail, only one half 'of the old one is left now. Goodbye, loves to you all. Fred was very patient. We were z hour too early at the station and the train was late as well! Ever affectionately, FRANCIS GALTON. I am writing before breakfast so have no message to send. 42, RUTLAND GATE, S.W. September 23, 1906. DEAREST MILLY, I am really at this moment still in Bibury, but go home for good to-morrow. We, like you, have much sunshine and warmth, but I hear dismal stories from the Cumberland Lake country of what the weather is and has been there. Thank Amy ever so much for Mrs Benson's letter which I keep and which confirms essentials. Amy seems to have told her that I said it WAS Pob etc.*, my point was that I thought it could not have been him but that I quite forgot who it was and wanted to learn. This, Mrs Benson supplies. The object of the visit to-Lambeth was to see some papers in the library there which bore on the history of the Greek Church. For all the rest, I can trust my own memory. The interview was described by the Archbishop most graphically and forcibly. I have now been a week here at Bibury in extreme cottage-comfort. Eva has a lady artist friend, Miss Savile, who has to sleep out but takes her meals here. The post has just brought me the photo-process reduction of the diagram in my forthcoming paper (composed at Edymead); the proof will doubtless be at Rutland Gate. I shall be glad to have this preliminary off my hands. You shall have a copy of the thing when Nature has published it. I am receiving excellent tracings off profiles, full of character, from Dance's big works. They are large enough to fill (allowing a full margin) one page of this note-paper, and are all of well-known contemporaries, sketched from life. They are making a most interesting subject for study and comparison. The caster of the British Museum coins is on his holiday, but undertakes to cast them all when I come back. I mean all in the list of 100 or so that I sent him. To cast all in the British Museum would indeed be a large order. To-morrow we all separate. Eva goes for a week to Warwickshire and then she rejoins me for good in London. We have not yet absolutely, but approximately, decided against wintering partly in England. The probable event will be that of going slowly Rome-wards early in November. I look back with ever so much pleasure to Edymead. Pray give suitable remembrances all round, not omitting the Signora. Ever affectionately (from the awning as usual), FRANCIS GALTON. This probably refers to C. P. Pobedonosteff. See p. 548 above.  0  e  N
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