our lips. May the great God comfort you! You know
that Mary and Katie are coming on Thursday. They will bring dear Lotty
what she little needs with you by her side--love; and I hope their
company will interest and please her. There is nothing that they, or any
of us, would not do for her. She is a part of us all, and has belonged
to us, as well as to you, these many years.

Ever your affectionate and faithful.

[Sidenote: Miss Dickens.]

GAD'S HILL, HIGHAM BY ROCHESTER, KENT,
_Monday, June 11th, 1859._

MY DEAREST MAMIE,

On Saturday night I found, very much to my surprise and pleasure, the
photograph on my table at Tavistock House. It is not a very pleasant or
cheerful presentation of my daughters; but it is wonderfully like for
all that, and in some details remarkably good. When I came home here
yesterday I tried it in the large Townshend stereoscope, in which it
shows to great advantage. It is in the little stereoscope at present on
the drawing-room table. One of the balustrades of the destroyed old
Rochester bridge has been (very nicely) presented to me by the
contractor for the works, and has been duly stonemasoned and set up on
the lawn behind the house. I have ordered a sun-dial for the top of it,
and it will be a very good object indeed. The Plorn is highly excited
to-day by reason of an institution which he tells me (after questioning
George) is called the "Cobb, or Bodderin," holding a festival at The
Falstaff. He is possessed of some vague information that they go to
Higham Church, in pursuance of some old usage, and attend service there,
and afterwards march round the village. It so far looks probable that
they certainly started off at eleven very spare in numbers, and came
back considerably recruited, which looks to me like the difference
between going to church and coming to dinner. They bore no end of bright
banners and broad sashes, and had a band with a terrific drum, and are
now (at half-past two) dining at The Falstaff, partly in the side room
on the ground-floor, and partly in a tent improvised this morning. The
drum is hung up to a tree in The Falstaff garden, and looks like a
tropical sort of gourd. I have presented the band with five shillings,
which munificence has been highly appreciated. Ices don't seem to be
provided for the ladies in the gallery--I mean the garden; they are
prowling