"I was in the village this afternoon and called at the post-office for some stamps, and the old lady who keeps the place, which is about seven feet square, and hardly high enough to yawn in, was sticking up a fresh notice about the Xmas mails, giving the latest dates for foreign parts. This reminded me I owed you a letter, and here it is with tons of good wishes to everybody for a happy time and no end of prosperity in the coming year. When are you coming over to spend a holiday with us? You'd love this part of the world. I'm sure you'd love the old lady at the post-office as much as you do the young lady at the post-office over there. She's a beautiful old person, really. She lives in a cottage set well back from the road, with rose-trees on each side of a narrow, flagged path, and honeysuckle all over the house right up to the thatch, which is quite a yard thick. I have a water-colour of her, sitting outside her door, with the Royal Arms and _Georgius Rex_ just showing over her cap, and a fat tabby cat asleep on the threshold. It was late summer when I did it, and the air was warm gold with purple shadows. I know it is a detestable trick to talk painter's shop, but I can't help it sometimes. I am reminded of this by the experiences I've had recently with my friend Carville, who now appears in the daily press rather frequently under his flying name of Francis Lord. There is a great row on between the papers owned by Lord Cholme (known as the Stunt Press) and the few other miserable rags which try to survive. I don't pretend to know what it's all about. There is, you know, an Aerial Telephone Company, promoted by Cholme and a lot of other guinea-pigs. Carville, I believe, wanted shares, or a seat on the board, or something, if he flew to America under their auspices. You know how jealously these moneyed people guard the sources of their wealth. Anyhow, negotiations hung fire, for Carville has D'Aubigne quite under his influence, and nothing could be done with the aeroplane or the patents until these two came in somehow. The rival newspapers go it blind, and sling all sorts of journalistic mud about. I won't bore you with it in a Xmas letter. What I was going to say was about Carville himself. He simply says 'No!' and goes on with his (to him) intensely interesting '_affaires_.' And here is one of those coincidences, as the old lady at the post-office calls them. I was at an at-home in Chelsea one Sunday not long ago, and met a Mrs. Hungerford, Carville's grand _bien-aimee_, on and off, for a long time. She had recently married a wealthy Australian, who was also present, a large, subdued creature. My hostess was Mrs. Chase, the wealthy widow who married poor Enderby Chase the artist. I forget whether you ever met them.