1r:1
London, 21 July 1874.

My dear Theo,
Yesterday a crate was sent to The Hague in which I put a photo of a J. Maris and also ‘The landlady’s daughter’ I promised,1 both of which I hope you’ll hang up in your room.
There’s a photo in the same crate of a Thijs Maris for Mr Tersteeg.2
Schüller at Paris3 sent me 6 copies of both, which I needed in order to give away. I can’t spare another of the Thijs Maris.
Anna and I arrived in London safe and sound,4 and will manage here somehow.  1r:2
I’m not saying that we’ll find something quickly, but each day that she’s here she learns something, and in any case I believe there’s more chance of her finding something here than in Holland.
It’s wonderful for me to walk with her through the streets in the evening; I then find everything here just as beautiful as I did when I first arrived.
I wish you well, old chap, and give my regards to the Rooses, Haanebeeks and Carbentuses5 if you see any of them.
I’m learning to swim.
Write to me whether you’ve begun reading Michelet6 and what you think of it. That book was a revelation to me. Adieu,

Vincent

Regards from Anna.

026

Br. 1990: 026 | CL: 19
From: Vincent van Gogh
To: Theo van Gogh
Date: London, Tuesday, 21 July 1874
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1. Regarding Der Wirthin Töchterlein, see letter 14, n. 15.
2. This was possibly a photograph after Matthijs Maris’s Margaret. Anna, in fact, wrote about it to Theo on 30 July 1874: ‘I’ve already been to see Vincent in the office three times and saw very beautiful paintings there, also the Margaret by M. Maris, of which you have the photograph’ (FR 2712). This could have been any one of three Gretchen/Margaret depictions: The bride (Church bride), 1865-1869 (The Hague, The Mesdag Collection), Girl at the pump, 1872 (Groningen, Groninger Museum) or The spinner, 1873 (Otterlo, Kröller-Müller Museum). Cf. H.E.M. Braakhuis and J. van der Vliet, ‘Bruiden, Gretchens, prinsessen en kastelen. Het werk’, Kunstschrift 34-1 (1990), pp. 9-15.
3. Woutherus Stephanus Schüller was an employee of Goupil in Paris.
4. Vincent and Anna arrived in London on Wednesday, 15 July. Theo had been informed immediately, his parents having forwarded the letter telling of Vincent and Anna’s arrival to him in The Hague (FR b2711, 18 July 1874).
5. The family of Uncle Arie Carbentus and Aunt Fie.
6. Jules Michelet, L’amour, 1858; cf. letter 27.