Item 100 - Letter from R. C. Trevelyan to Roger Fry

1 item.

Pensione Palumbo, Ravello, presso Amalfi. - Has not heard from Fry for a while: hopes Helen and Julian are well. Description of 'a Julian at the hotel': Julian Cotton of the Indian Civil Service, honeymooning with his Neapolitan wife [neé Gigia Riccardi Arlotta]. Other guests are Kershaw and his friend Perry, an ex-actor; 'the Lapchinski', who luckily only came for a week; and [William] Wyse of Trinity, an Apostle who has been forced by ill health to give up work for a year. Goes every day to the Cimbrone, passing Fry's old studio, and has overheard prayers there as if to 'rid the room of... some devil who has...haunted there since you painted him in your picture of St Antony'. Taking tea today with Mrs Read [sic: Mrs Reid, widow of Francis Nevile Reid of Villa Rufolo]. Bessie is learning Latin and Trevelyan is rewriting the old play 'which sent [Fry] and Helen to sleep once'. Has heard nothing from Johnson about "Polyphemus" and only seen two reviews. Bridges wrote him an appreciative letter, though he did not like the Faun's song or make much of the irregular metres. Will probably stay at Berenson's on the way north; asks if he and Fry might meet around Florence. Fry should read Defoe's "Moll Flanders", which is the best novel in English. Bessie is now reading "Robinson Crusoe" to him as a 'shaving book', which is also excellent.