1. Mr van Gogh visited him in the middle of May; see letter 343.

2. The biblical text on which the sermon was based.

3. Uncle Vincent and Aunt Cornelie lived in Princenhage.

4. ‘My last letter’ means letter 348.

5. Van Gogh wrote: ‘You’ve fulfilled your duty to inform Pa and Ma, but now that they talk like this they give you the right, it seems to me, to exclude them from further confidences and to consult them less than you would if they were more reasonable. They’re mistaken in the sense that they’re not humble and humane enough in this case’ (letter 348, ll. 88-92).

6. The Nederlands Hervormd Oude-mannen-en-vrouwenhuis on Z. Buitensingel 1; at the time this street was also known as ‘Om en Bij’.

7. The drawing of a gardener by an apple tree and that of a carpenter’s workshop are not known. Van Gogh later did a letter sketch from memory after the first (see letter 362) and the lithograph Gardener near a gnarled apple tree (F 1659 / JH 379 ).

8. A photograph after Meissonier’s Le vin du curé (The priest’s wine), 1860 (Reims, Musée des Beaux-Arts). Ill. 253 . Cf. exhib. cat. Lyon 1993, pp. 96, 122, cat. nos. 16-b, 43. For Bingham, see letter 156. The photograph would have been on sale at Goupil’s at the time.

a. Read: ‘Otherwise I am searching for the right way to draw the dung-heap’.

b. Means: ‘schoudermantel’ (cape).

9. Van Gogh wrote about his hopes of getting a cape in letter 350.

10. Van Gogh had had a sou’wester for his models since the end of January; see e.g. letters 301 and 305.

11. This is the drawing after which Van Gogh had done a small sketch in letter 350.

12. The parents had sent this lady’s coat at the beginning of October 1882; see letter 271.

13. Van Gogh used the word ‘mud’, a Dutch measure of capacity equivalent to 100 litres and applied chiefly to potatoes and coal.

14. After this Van Gogh crossed a word out; it may have been ‘teregt’ (rightly).