Pièce 178 - Letter from Eily Darwin to R. C. Trevelyan

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Newnham Grange, Cambridge. - Thanks Bob for letting her 'share with Bernard [his] delightful sheaf of poems' ["From the Shiffolds"]; already knew "Philip Erasmus"; thinks she especially likes "Rarely rarely comest thou", while the one about spectacles talks about what she herself has 'so often realised with passion - the beauty of the world... with myopic eyes'. She never wore spectacles until she went to the Slade, and 'most of the value of the... good drawing' she did before she was seventeen was 'due to the simple short sighted vision' she had then; wishes she could go back to the 'simple vision of a child'. "Valentine" should be a song; tells him to give it to R.V.W. [Ralph Vaughan Williams] to set. Was lovely to see Julian, Ursula, and 'that little "varmint" [Philip Erasmus]', who is 'really adorable'.