1. It is not possible to say with any certainty which paintings were sent. Cottages (F 17 / JH 395 ) comes from Theo’s collection and could therefore have been part of this shipment. However, cf. also letter 406, n. 6.

2. Mrs van Gogh told Theo on 1 October 1883 that she was sorry that he had had to hear from Vincent that Mr van Gogh had had a fall. She described the accident as follows: ‘Pa choked on a mouthful of tea while he was getting dressed and couldn’t get his breath, lost his balance and fell, hitting his nose on the frame at the bottom of the bed, the nose bled severely and Pa was light-headed for the first couple of days, all the same he preached all right twice on Sunday’ (FR b2245).

3. The peat had already been exhausted within the municipal boundaries of Hoogeveen. Since the area around the districts of Eleveld in the municipality of Ruinen (to the north of Hoogeveen) was being reclaimed in the 1880s, but peat was still being dug to the east of this, near Tiendeveen, Nieuweroord and Nieuwlande, Van Gogh must have been here. According to Dijk and Van der Sluis 2001, pp. 130-133, 137.