t.

It is needless to add that none of the letters were intended for
publication; they were written to near relatives and friends _currente
calamo_, and are full of familiar expressions and allusions which may
seem trivial and uninteresting to ordinary readers. Those, however,
who care to study my sister's character I think cannot fail to trace
in these records some of its strongest features; her keen enjoyment of
the beauties of Nature,--her love for animals,--for her Home,--her
_lares_ and _penates_;--and her Friends. Above all that love of
GOD which was the guiding influence of everything she wrote
or did. So inseparable was it from her every-day life that readers
must not be surprised if they find grave and gay sentences following
each other in close succession.

Julie's sense of humour never forsook her, but she was never
malicious, and could turn the laugh against herself as readily as
against others. I have ventured to insert a specimen of her fun, which
I hope will not be misunderstood. In a letter to C.T.G., dated March
13, 1874, she gave him a most graphic picture of the erratic condition
of mind that had come over an old friend, the result of heavy
responsibilities and the rush of London life. Julie had no idea when
she wrote that these symptoms were in reality the subtle beginnings of
a breakdown, which ended fatally, and no one lamented the issue more
truly than she; but she could not resist catching folly as it flew,
and many of the flighty axioms became proverbial amongst us.

The insertion of Bishop Medley's reply to my sister, April 8, 1880,
needs no apology, it is so interesting in itself, and gives such a
charming insight into the friendship between them.

The _List of Mrs. Ewing's Works_ at the end of the Memoir was made
before the publication of the present Complete Edition; this,
therefore, is only mentioned in cases where stories have not been
published in any other book form. All Mrs. Ewing's Verses for
Children, Hymns, and Songs for Music (including two left in MS.) are
included in Volume IX.

Volume XVII., "Miscellanea," contains _The Mystery of a bloody hand_
together with the Translated Stories, and other papers that had
appeared previously in Magazines.

In Volume XII., "Brothers of Pity and other tales of men and beasts,"
will be found _Among the Merrows_; _A Week spent in a Glass Pond_;
_Tiny's Tricks and Toby's Tricks_; _The Owl in the Ivy Bush, and
Owlhoots I. II._, whilst _Sunfl