The Letters of T. S. Eliot, Volume 1: 1898-1922 (8 page)

1–Thomas Lamb Eliot (1841–1936), brother of TSE’s father, was Pastor of the First Unitarian Society of Portland, Oregon, 1867–93; author of
The Radical Difference between Liberal Christianity and Orthodoxy.
See Earl M. Wilbur,
Thomas Lamb Eliot,
1841–1936 (Portland, 1937).

2–From a copy made by the recipient’s granddaughter.

3–Thomas Dawes Eliot (1889–1973), who was to become Professor of Sociology at Northwestern University, 1924–54.

4–Although his illness was not serious, he was unable to sit his final examinations.

MS
Houghton

[Postmark 23 December 1910]     [Paris]

 

MS
Houghton

[late February? 1911]

Paris

My Dear Theodora,

Thank you very much for the nice letter that you sent me, and the Valentine of Puss in Boots. Have you the puss in the green boots still, and do you remember the story about him?

You must have been studying hard in order to be able to write so nicely. I have been studying too. But I often go out and walk in the Luxembourg Gardens, which is a sort of park like the Boston Public Gardens, or the park back down the hill from your home in Brookline, where you used to go. There is a pond there too, and the children play boats when it is not too cold. There are lots of boats and they sail right across the pond and right through the fountain and never upset. They spin tops and roll hoops. You would like the French children. I don’t think they have as many playthings as the American children, but they seem quite happy. I see lots of them in the Champs Elysées (which is a long wide street) on Sunday afternoon, riding in little carts behind goats. But it is hard to talk to the little ones, because they don’t talk French very well yet, and I don’t either.

When they are older and go to school you see them walking out two by two, very quiet and proper, in a long line, with their teachers. They all wear black capes, and carry their schoolbooks on their backs underneath the capes, so that they all look as if they had big bumps on their backs. And they wear black pinafores, and have their legs bare all winter. But it is never very cold in Paris. It has not snowed here all winter, and the little steamboats go up and down the river like black flies: ‘fly-boats’, they call them.

Just about now you are having supper in America, and here, it is my bed time. Isn’t that funny?

– With love to mother and father and all the dolls

Your
Uncle
TOM

PC
Houghton

[Postmark 24 March 1911]

[Paris]

Dear Eleanor, I have been meaning to write a letter to thank you for your Christmas card, and I don’t think that I did. I am not sure that this card will go through the American post. I have not seen this costume
²
on the street and I don’t think it will be a success. Is the Cambridge season agreeable this year? I have no news from there.

Ever sincerely yours
T

Give my regards to Aunt Susie and Barbara
³

1–Eleanor Hinkley, TSE’s cousin; see Glossary of Names.

2–It showed a model wearing
la jupe-culotte
(divided skirt) at the Auteuil races, where it continues, according to the caption, ‘à égayer les habitués … qu’elle intrigue par la nouveauté de ses mystérieux dessous’ [‘to amuse the race-goers … intriguing them by the novelty of the mysterious under-garments’].

3–Eleanor’s mother (sister of TSE’s mother) and Eleanor’s sister, Barbara (1889–1958), who in 1909 had married Edward Welch (1888–1948).

MS
Houghton

26 April [1911]

151 bis rue Saint Jacques [Paris]

Dear Eleanor,

I just came back from London
¹
last night, and found a pile of letters waiting for me, with yours sitting on the top. I mounted to my room to read them; then my friend the
femme de chambre
burst in to see me (after two weeks absence). She tells me I am getting fat. Also she had a store of news about everyone else in the house. Monsieur Dana
²
has gone to the Ecole Normale, where he has to rise every day at seven. This is a prime joke, and lasted for ten or twelve minutes. Monsieur Verdenal
³
has taken his room, because it is bigger than M. Verdenal’s room, and gives upon the garden. Had I been out into the garden to see how the trees
poussent
[are growing]? So then I had to go into M. Verdenal’s room to see how the garden did. Byplay at this point, because M. Verdenal was in the garden, and because I threw a lump of sugar at him. And a Monsieur
americain
named Ladd has taken M. Verdenal’s room. He does not speak French very well yet. He speaks as Monsieur spoke in November. (And I shortly heard Monsieur Ladd bawling through the hall ‘
A-vous monté mes trunks
à l’attique?’
⁴
– I settle the affair by crying out
‘les malles au grenier!’

But finally I read the letters, and enjoyed yours more than any. In fact I must compliment you on it – you have a gift for letter writing. This was quite different from any I have had all year. I have no news equally amusing to repay with. I feel rather guilty about that, I do: for Paris has burst out, during my absence, into full spring; and it is such a revelation that I feel that I ought to make it known. At London, one pretended that it was spring, and tried to coax the spring, and talk of the beautiful weather; but one continued to hibernate amongst the bricks.
⁵
And one looked through the windows, and the waiter brought in eggs and coffee, and the
Graphic
(which I conscientiously tried to read, to please them) and commented on the chauffeurs’ strike
⁶
and all was very wintry and sedate. But here! –

But I was outdoors most of the time. I made a pilgrimage to Cricklewood.
⁷
‘Where
is
Cricklewood?’ said an austere Englishman at the hotel. I produced a map and pointed to the silent evidence that Cricklewood exists. He pondered. ‘But why go to Cricklewood?’ he flashed out at length. Here I was triumphant. ‘There is no reason!’ I said. He had no more to say. But he
was
relieved (I am sure) when he found that I was American. He felt no longer responsible. But Cricklewood is mine. I discovered it. No one will go there again. It is like the sunken town in the fairy story,
⁸
that rose just every May-day eve, and lived for an hour, and
only one man saw it.*

<*
Note explanatory
: I suggest that if the Sayward family were English
– well, they might live in Cricklewood.>

– I have just discussed my trip with the prim but nice English lady at the
pension
. She said ‘And did you go through the Tower?’ ‘No!’ ‘Madame Tussaud’s?’ ‘No!’ ‘Westminster Abbey?’ ‘No!’ here I triumphed again – ‘the Abbey was closed due to the coronation preparations!’
⁹
(This is a remark which, in a novel, would be ‘flung back’). I then said – do you know

and finally – Camberwell Work House! And she knew none of these. ‘I have it on you!’ I cried (for I know her well enough for that). But she does not understand the American dialect.

– But at this point, lest you should give people the idea that I wasted my
time! note that I have seen

 

And so I will close this spring letter which becomes more and more foolish. Do write again.

Thanking you in advance
Yours faithfully
Thos. S. Eliot