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Dunbar, 11th Dec., 1894. My dear Mr. Muir: I have just received your most kind presents, and I hasten to tell you how
very much I and my son value it. Mrs. Lunam a few weeks ago let us have a short sight of her copy with which we were deeply
interested, and which we thoroughly enjoyed. Both John and I have a taste for natural history and I, in my small way, have
a turn for geology, while both of us are very fond of plants. So you can guess we highly appreciate the simpler parts of your
delightful book, and I feel proud that you should think me capable of understanding it. But we still more value it for the
sake of the author, in whose company we felt so much pleasure a year ago. I mean to begin and study it during those long dark
days which I have to pass in the house from inability to get out much from sciatica and gout. I was much interested in the
incident you quote in it, as to the squirrels and birds loving the auld Scotch tunes in preference to the Old Hundred. You
told us the story here, and it was quite impressed on my mind, and seeing it inprint will remind both my son and me of one
of the most pleasant and instructive visitors we ever had the good fortune to entertain. I am disappointed you have not written
to tell us of the welfare of your household. I hope Mrs. Muir and those fine children whose pictures I had in the drawing
room all summer for admiration of all my friends are all as well as you could wish them to be. I have been reading a book
which described the N. West Ter. and Alaska was apparently visited by the author, a Mr. Young, a missionary. It was not a
very deep concern, and certainly it was a little prosy, but it noticed and described his life in places the names of which
are very familiar to me, through my son Charlie, for when he left I studied all the geography of his adopted country, and
was much interested. Last time I was in Edin. I asked Mr. Forbes of Douglas and S. if your book was out yet. He said, No,
and did not seem aware there was a prospect of any such. Shortly after I saw a notice of it in the Scotsman. Again I thank
you very much, and wishing you and all dear to you a happy Christmas time, I am joined in this by my son. Yours very sincerely.
Agnes Kelly