TO MISS CAROLINE DERBY Tuscumbia, Alabama, February 18, 1893. ...You have often been in my thoughts during these sad days, while my heart has been grieving over the loss of my beloved friend [Phillips Brooks died January 23, 1893], and I have wished many times that I was in Boston with those who knew and loved him as I did... he was so much of a friend to me! so tender and loving always! I do try not to mourn his death too sadly. I do try to think that he is still near, very near; but sometimes the thought that he is not here, that I shall not see him when I go to Boston,--that he is gone,--rushes over my soul like a great wave of sorrow. But at other times, when I am happier, I do feel his beautiful presence, and his loving hand leading me in pleasant ways. Do you remember the happy hour we spent with him last June when he held my hand, as he always did, and talked to us about his friend Tennyson, and our own dear poet Dr. Holmes, and I tried to teach him the manual alphabet, and he laughed so gaily over his mistakes, and afterward I told him about my tea, and he promised to come? I can hear him now, saying in his cheerful, decided way, in reply to my wish that my tea might be a success, "Of course it will, Helen. Put your whole heart in the good work, my child, and it cannot fail." I am glad the people are going to raise a monument to his memory.... In March Helen and Miss Sullivan went North, and spent the next few months traveling and visiting friends. In reading this letter about Niagara one should remember that Miss Keller knows distance and shape, and that the size of Niagara is within her experience after she has explored it, crossed the bridge and gone down in the elevator. Especially important are such details as her feeling the rush of the water by putting her hand on the window. Dr. Bell gave her a down pillow, which she held against her to increase the vibrations. TO MRS. KATE ADAMS KELLER South Boston, April 13, 1893. ...Teacher, Mrs. Pratt and I very unexpectedly decided to take a journey with dear Dr. Bell Mr. Westervelt, a gentleman whom father met in Washington, has a school for the deaf in Rochester. We went there first.... Mr. Westervelt gave us a reception one afternoon. A great many people came. Some of them asked odd questions. A lady seemed surprised that I loved flowers when I could not see their beautiful colors, and when I assured her I did love them, she said, "no doubt you feel the colors with your fingers." But of course, it is not alone for their bright colors that we love the flowers.... A gentleman asked me what BEAUTY meant to my mind. I must confess I was puzzled at first. But after a minute I answered that beauty was a form of goodness--and he went away.