Thanks for all the trouble that you are taking about the houses, I am quite ashamed it should all fall to your share. Is Harley Street house quite out of the question? I received a letter from Mama, earnestly desiring that we should keep near the park; she would not at all like Bentinck Street. Don’t weary yourself with searching. I certainly will return on Thursday (probably much before) then we will look together again.... If it would secure the Harley Street house by all means let us pay all the taxes whatever they may be. I am writing in the dark. Goodbye, my own darling treasure. I am, Yours affectionately, OCTAVIA HILL. Mama has an affection now for Harley Street.” Finally, the house 14 Nottingham Place was taken, and rather more than the customary number of difficulties had to be worked through in connection with it. In addition to this, illness broke out in the house, and there were several invalids to be nursed. The most forgiving of mothers writes after a visit to her daughter: “It is all your own choice and doubtless right, but it sometimes grieves me to think how many discomforts you have, and how many indulgences I have—only it is not my doing that you have them not. I wish I did not think of you as worn and fagged. Do assure me that you go to bed as early as you can and get good rest.” Fortunately youth and friendship make all things easy, or at least bearable. During S. J.-B.’s brief absence in December Miss Hill writes: “Oh, child, your letters are such a delight, but I miss you so dreadfully. I wander like a lost thing about the house and long for you intensely. Every place seems so desolate. Every witness of your thought and active care of and for me contrasted vividly with Z’s odd procrastination till I almost felt unjust and unkind. And yet I ought to glory in your kindness and goodness, and in all that mighty and glorious energy that _will_ help so many people in this sad world, if it is spared to us. Your room, the fire, the thought of all you had told me to provide for myself, fills my eyes with tears. I mean to spend a very quiet and happy Sunday.” And again, later,—“Do you know I get on very much more easily with strangers than I used, all of which I owe to you. It is a great satisfaction to me: it pleases one’s friends to have their friends like one.”