The Life and Letters of Lewis Carroll Part 29

We met for the first time in the Forbury Gardens, Reading.

He was, I believe, waiting for a train. I was playing with my brothers and sisters in the Gardens. I remember his taking me on his knee and showing me puzzles, one of which he refers to in the letter (given below. This puzzle was, by the way, a great favourite of his; the problem is to draw three interlaced squares without going over the same lines twice, or taking the pen off the paper), which is so thoroughly characteristic of him in its quaint humour:--

"The Chestnuts, Guildford,

_August _22, 1869.

My Dear Isabel,--Though I have only been acquainted with you for fifteen minutes, yet, as there is no one else in Reading I have known so long, I hope you will not mind my troubling you. Before I met you in the Gardens yesterday I bought some old books at a shop in Reading, which I left to be called for, and had not time to go back for them. I didn't even remark the name of the shop, but I can tell _where_ it was, and if you know the name of the woman who keeps the shop, and would put it into the blank I have left in this note, and direct it to her I should be much obliged ... A friend of mine, called Mr. Lewis Carroll, tells me he means to send you a book. He is a _very_ dear friend of mine. I have known him all my life (we are the same age) and have _never_ left him. Of course he was with me in the Gardens, not a yard off--even while I was drawing those puzzles for you. I wonder if you saw him?

Your fifteen-minute friend,

C.L. Dodgson.

Have you succeeded in drawing the three squares?"

Another favourite puzzle was the following--I give it in his own words:--

A is to draw a fict.i.tious map divided into counties.

B is to colour it (or rather mark the counties with _names_ of colours) using as few colours as possible.

Two adjacent counties must have _different_ colours.

A's object is to force B to use as _many_ colours as possible.

How many can he force B to use?

One of his most amusing letters was to a little girl called Magdalen, to whom he had given a copy of his "Hunting of the Snark":--

Christ Church, _December_ 15, 1875.

My dear Magdalen,--I want to explain to you why I did not call yesterday. I was sorry to miss you, but you see I had so many conversations on the way. I tried to explain to the people in the street that I was going to see you, but they wouldn't listen; they said they were in a hurry, which was rude. At last I met a wheelbarrow that I thought would attend to me, but I couldn't make out what was in it. I saw some features at first, then I looked through a telescope, and found it was a countenance; then I looked through a microscope, and found it was a face! I thought it was father like me, so I fetched a large looking-gla.s.s to make sure, and then to my great joy I found it was me. We shook hands, and were just beginning to talk, when myself came up and joined us, and we had quite a pleasant conversation. I said, "Do you remember when we all met at Sandown?" and myself said, "It was very jolly there; there was a child called Magdalen," and me said, "I used to like her a little; not much, you know--only a little." Then it was time for us to go to the train, and who do you think came to the station to see us off? You would never guess, so I must tell you. They were two very dear friends of mine, who happen to be here just now, and beg to be allowed to sign this letter as your affectionate friends,

Lewis Carroll and C.L. Dodgson.

Another child-friend, Miss F. Bremer, writes as follows:--

Our acquaintance began in a somewhat singular manner. We were playing on the Fort at Margate, and a gentleman on a seat near asked us if we could make a paper boat, with a seat at each end, and a basket in the middle for fish! We were, of course, enchanted with the idea, and our new friend--after achieving the feat--gave us his card, which we at once carried to our mother. He asked if he might call where we were staying, and then presented my elder sister with a copy of "Alice in Wonderland," inscribed "From the Author." He kindly organised many little excursions for us--chiefly in the pursuit of knowledge. One memorable visit to a light house is still fresh in our memories.

It was while calling one day upon Mrs. Bremer that he scribbled off the following double acrostic on the names of her two daughters--

DOUBLE ACROSTIC--FIVE LETTERS.

Two little girls near London dwell, More naughty than I like to tell.

1.

Upon the lawn the hoops are seen: The b.a.l.l.s are rolling on the green. T ur F

2.

The Thames is running deep and wide: And boats are rowing on the tide. R ive R

3.

In winter-time, all in a row, The happy skaters come and go. I c E

4.

"Papa!" they cry, "Do let us stay!"

He does not speak, but says they may. N o D

5.

"There is a land," he says, "my dear, Which is too hot to skate, I fear." A fric A

At Margate also he met Miss Adelaide Paine, who afterwards became one of his greatest favourites. He could not bear to see the healthy pleasures of childhood spoiled by conventional restraint. "One piece of advice given to my parents," writes Miss Paine, "gave me very great glee, and that was not to make little girls wear gloves at the seaside; they took the advice, and I enjoyed the result."

_Apropos_ of this I may mention that, when staying at Eastbourne, he never went down to the beach without providing himself with a supply of safety-pins. Then if he saw any little girl who wanted to wade in the sea, but was afraid of spoiling her frock, he would gravely go up to her and present her with a safety-pin, so that she might fasten up her skirts out of harm's way.

Tight boots were a great aversion of his, especially for children. One little girl who was staying with him at Eastbourne had occasion to buy a new pair of boots. Lewis Carroll gave instructions to the bootmaker as to how they were to be made, so as to be thoroughly comfortable, with the result that when they came home they were more useful than ornamental, being very nearly as broad as they were long! Which shows that even hygienic principles may be pushed too far.

The first meeting with Miss Paine took place in 1876. When Lewis Carroll returned to Christ Church he sent her a copy of "The Hunting of the Snark," with the following acrostic written in the fly-leaf:--

'A re you deaf, Father William?' the young man said, 'D id you hear what I told you just now?

E xcuse me for shouting! Don't waggle your head L ike a blundering, sleepy old cow!

A little maid dwelling in Wallington Town, I s my friend, so I beg to remark: D o you think she'd be pleased if a book were sent down E nt.i.tled "The Hunt of the Snark?"'

'P ack it up in brown paper!' the old man cried, 'A nd seal it with olive-and-dove.

I command you to do it!' he added with pride, 'N or forget, my good fellow, to send her beside E aster Greetings, and give her my love.'

This was followed by a letter, dated June 7, 1876:--

My dear Adelaide,--Did you try if the letters at the beginnings of the lines about Father William would spell anything? Sometimes it happens that you can spell out words that way, which is very curious.

I wish you could have heard him when he shouted out "Pack it up in brown paper!" It quite shook the house. And he threw one of his shoes at his son's head (just to make him attend, you know), but it missed him.

He was glad to hear you had got the book safe, but his eyes filled with tears as he said, "I sent _her_ my love, but she never--" he couldn't say any more, his mouth was so full of bones (he was just finishing a roast goose).

Another letter to Miss Paine is very characteristic of his quaint humour:--

Christ Church, Oxford, _March_ 8, 1880.

My dear Ada,--(Isn't that your short name? "Adelaide" is all very well, but you see when one's _dreadfully_ busy one hasn't time to write such long words--particularly when it takes one half an hour to remember how to spell it--and even then one has to go and get a dictionary to see if one has spelt it right, and of course the dictionary is in another room, at the top of a high bookcase--where it has been for months and months, and has got all covered with dust--so one has to get a duster first of all, and nearly choke oneself in dusting it--and when one _has_ made out at last which is dictionary and which is dust, even _then_ there's the job of remembering which end of the alphabet "A"

comes--for one feels pretty certain it isn't in the _middle_--then one has to go and wash one's hands before turning over the leaves--for they've got so thick with dust one hardly knows them by sight--and, as likely as not, the soap is lost, and the jug is empty, and there's no towel, and one has to spend hours and hours in finding things--and perhaps after all one has to go off to the shop to buy a new cake of soap--so, with all this bother, I hope you won't mind my writing it short and saying, "My dear Ada"). You said in your last letter you would like a likeness of me: so here it is, and I hope you will like it--I won't forget to call the next time but one I'm in Wallington.

Your very affectionate friend,

Lewis Carroll.

It was quite against Mr. Dodgson's usual rule to give away photographs of himself; he hated publicity, and the above letter was accompanied by another to Mrs. Paine, which ran as follows:--

I am very unwilling, usually, to give my photograph, for I don't want people, who have heard of Lewis Carroll, to be able to recognise him in the street--but I can't refuse Ada.

Will you kindly take care, if any of your ordinary acquaintances (I don't speak of intimate friends) see it, that they are _not_ told anything about the name of "Lewis Carroll"?