Page:Some unpublished letters of Henry D. and Sophia E. Thoreau; a chapter in the history of a still-born book.djvu/50

 "145 Via Rasella, Rome, Dec'r 17, 1897. "Really, there is not much to tell about the Froude letter. Miss Sophia Thoreau sent for me, a few weeks before her death, to give me some last instructions and to ask my assistance in distributing personal things; and at the same time she gave me several letters for myself, among them this, knowing that I would value them as autographs.

"My impression is that she feared people would think it too flattering, and for that or some other reason she did not at that time care to have it published.

"She gave me other letters and manuscripts, requesting me to place them with my own hands in one of the trunks deposited in the Concord