MANUSCRIPT: Mather. Pencil. Unpublished.

The date is conjectured from the handwriting. Professor Mather's first wife died in 1877. He married again in March 1881. ED never saw the second Mrs. Mather, but they were near neighbors and from time to time exchanged tokens of friendship, such as flowers or an oven delicacy. This note may have initiated the exchange, for it implies that Mrs. Mather had "presumed" to send a small gift which ED acknowledges in kind. Mrs. Mather may have sent flowers at the time of ED's illness in April.