1. This watercolour of a woman knitting is not known. Cf. the letter sketch in letter 200, as well as n. 3 to that letter.

2. The letter sketch at the end of the letter is Scheveningen woman sewing (F - / JH 96), which was based on a large watercolour, Scheveningen woman (F 946v / JH 95 ), only a part of which survives. Van Gogh later painted the watercolour Bleaching ground (F 946 / JH 158 ) on the back of that incomplete work.

3. Only one letter Theo wrote to Vincent in this period has survived (letter 197 of 5 January), but it would have been strange for Vincent to think it ‘brief’. Vincent’s requests for letters from Theo generally had an ulterior motive, i.e. the hope that he would send money along with the letter.

4. Van Gogh says in letter 202 of Sunday that he and Mauve spoke ‘yesterday’, which must therefore have been Saturday.