To Mrs. J.G. Holland
From ED

spring 1885

Dear Sister,

To "gain the whole World" in the Evening Mail, without the baleful forfeit hinted in the Scripture, was indeed achievement - and I was led resisting to Bed, but Vinnie was firm as the Soudan -

Thank you tenderly - I was breathlessly interested.

Contention "loves a shining Mark." Only fight about me, said the dying King, and my Crown is sure -

It is only the Moss upon my Throne that impairs my Dying.

None of us know her enough to judge her, so her Maker must be her "Crowner's Quest" - Saul criticized his Savior till he became enamored of him - then he was less loquacious -

It was lovely to see your Hand again in the old attitude - a literary one, and the Present flew like a Butterfly, and the Past was, but there we must not linger - too many linger with us -

Love for the "Holy Family," and say to the Son that the Little Boy in the Trinity had no Grandmama, only a Holy Ghost -

But you must go to Sleep. I, who sleep always, need no Bed.

Foxes have Tenements, and remember, the Speaker was a Carpenter -

          Emily.