Seward House
Badsey
Evesham
7th March /12
My dear little Juliet,
I am glad you enjoyed your weekend at Sydenham, I knew you would do so, & now you have not very many more weeks of term.
Arthur has left Birmingham & is in London for a couple of days & will come home tomorrow for a few days & then probably go to South Wales to see the Schenks & Hubert Philipps; I am glad he is getting a little holiday before starting work at Bart’s. Did you know that Ethel had the mumps? The swelling showed itself on Monday week & is nearly gone now, fortunately it has not made her feel ill, but she has to keep indoors & avoid draughts. She spends a great part of her time in my room & in the evening we have great fights at Colarito & she nearly always beats me.
I am feeling much better but am still kept upstairs, I sit up now for a few hours, generally getting up in time for tea & back to bed, again directly after supper, or earlier if I feel tired. We had a gale of wind & a thunder storm here on Monday afternoon, one of the G.W.R. draymen taking a load of soot up near Badsey fields was blown off his dray & the horse & dray blown right over.
Father has sold Dinah to a poultry farmer near Worcester, she went on Monday & he thinks she will have quite a good home. Scot is paying me a visit this morning & lying in front of the fire, Duke has not been in the last day or two, I think he was rather offended one day because he was rather wet & smelly & I wouldn’t let him get on the bed.
The servants are spring cleaning Cyril’s room today, he will be coming home next week; both Alice & Louisa have been so good during my illness, ready to do anything, I am so thankful that I got rid of Annie when I did, she would have been such a worry.
Have we told you that May & Miss Slater have now thirty pupils? It makes them both very busy & May has a lot of corrections & preparing lessons to do.
I am sending you your Friendly Leaves, we cannot have the girls this week on account of mumps. Ethel had them a fortnight ago. Alice Johns went by with her baby this morning, it is a nice bright day for the little one to be out.
Poor old Mr Adkins is very bad, Father called to enquire yesterday. Lady Lifford called here yesterday, she had not heard of my illness & came upstairs to see me for a few minutes.
How did your speech on Tariff Reforms go? You did not send it to us as promised. My dinner will be coming up soon, so I will stop.
With very much love to your dear,
I am
Your loving mother
Eugénie N Sladden
P.S. May sends love & thanks for your letter received this afternoon, I am glad you enjoyed the fancy dress party & should like to have seen you as “Granny”.
