Sin,—Professor Alfred J. Church ' s letter in last week's Spectator about
my father is for the most part so noble and true in its expressions that I am reluctant to be at issue with him. But the closing words give me and other members of my family some pain. When Professor Church speaks of my father as sometimes buying a book when it should have been a .leg of mutton he is exposing Liti ignorance. My father's self-abnegation was nowhere more manifest than in his library. I grant be had something akin to love for his books and the collector's delight in a choice copy ; yet to suppose that be could ever have bought a book when his little ones needed meat looks foolish to those same children. Literature earned but poor pay in the days when my father had eleven of his own to educate besides three adoptions, and he was seldom ahead of his necessities ; but many are still living who will testify to his fine business capacity and his invariable right use of money.—I am, Sir, &c., GREVILLE MACDONALD:,
85 Harley Street, W. 85 Harley Street, W.
[We can assure Dr. Greville Macdonald that the last thing Professor Church desired was to suggest that Dr. George Macdonald would have been guilty of any real neglect. of an essential duty. He merely wished to emphasise the scholar's occasional innocent indifference to material concerns. —ED. Spectator.]
A CORRECTION.
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