Item 232 - Letter from Sir George Trevelyan to R. C. Trevelyan

Welcombe, Stratford on Avon. - Has just heard by telephone about Mary [the birth of her and Charles's twins]; thinks that Miss Clarke [the governess] will bring the older children here in a few days. Booa [Mary Prestwich] is a little better and will be able to 'superintend' them, and he thinks Caroline will be happier to have them; she is still very weak after her illness, which she has not yet got rid of. A good article in the "Nation" last week on "The Bible and popular language and tradition" made him think of 'Julian and his Bible studies'. The 'Irish pieces' by Miss [Maria] Edgeworth are 'excellent'; reminds Rob of the pleasure she felt when Uncle Tom [Macaulay] complimented her in a footnote to the 6th chapter of his "History"; Macaulay used to say that the 'revelation of Lord Calambre' [in Edgeworth's "The Absentee"], like the return of Sir Thomas from Antigua in [Austen's] "Mansfield Park" were the true parallels to 'the discovery of Ulyssess to the suitors'; he also said the discovery of Tom Jones's parentage [in Fielding's novel] was the 'real parallel to the revelations in "Oedipus Tyrannus". Used to read Edgeworth's novels with 'great delight' when young, but cannot now; she wrote in 'more simple and elementary days'.