2. During Theo’s visit the brothers had fallen out about Vincent’s behaviour: Vincent apparently lashed out ‘furiously’ at his brother one evening (see letter 458).

The fact that this was an eventful time, and that there were other things going on too, emerges in a letter Mr van Gogh wrote Theo on 22 August 1884. He had a feeling that there was something wrong, but didn’t know the details of it: ‘[Vincent] is overwrought, whether it is related to other things – I should almost think it is’ (FR b2256; quoted at greater length in the notes to letter 455, n. 4).

3. On 2 April 1881 Vincent wrote to Theo: ‘I heard from Pa that you’ve already been sending me money without my knowing it ... in this way I’m learning a handicraft, and although I’ll certainly not grow rich by it, at least I’ll earn the 100 francs a month necessary to support myself once I’m surer of myself as a draughtsman and find steady work’ (letter 164).

4. Margot Begemann, who lived next door to the Van Goghs. Ill. 2124

. Mrs van Gogh ran a sewing class at home. When she was recovering from her broken leg, Margot took it over for her; that was in July 1884 (FR b2255). It was while his mother was laid up that the relationship between Margot and Vincent developed, as he himself says in letter 469. The suicide attempt must have happened a few days before Van Gogh wrote this letter.

5. Margot’s brother Jacobus Lodewijk (Louis) Begemann. He had a linen mill at no. 65 Berg, in other words close to the Van Goghs’ house.

a. Means: ‘mij heenzonden om het aanzoek twee jaar later opnieuw te doen’ (sent me away and told me to propose again in two years’ time).

6. Mr van Gogh did not tell Theo what he knew about the incident until 2 October 1884: ‘We have had difficult days with Vincent again. Apparently he wanted to arrange a marriage with Margot, who proved not entirely averse, but it came up against insuperable objections, on the part of her family too. After news of the business started to leak out, Margot went to Utrecht, where she still is.

It’s said that the relationship has been broken off, but the friendship will continue. They still correspond constantly’ (FR b2257). The rest of this letter is quoted in the notes to letter 464, n. 1.

7. In Gustave Flaubert’s Madame Bovary. Moeurs de province (1857) the provincial doctor Charles Bovary carries out his mother’s plan that he should marry the 45-year-old widow Heloïse Dubuc for her money. This ‘first’ Madame Bovary died from coughing up blood (see also letter 457) a week after Charles’s parents had demanded that she account for the fact that she had lied about her wealth. See Gustave Flaubert, Oeuvres. La tentation de Saint Antoine. Madame Bovary. Salammbô. Ed. A. Thibaudet and R. Dumesnil. Paris 1951, pp. 342-343.

b. Variant of ‘korte metten maken’.

8. Arnold van de Loo was a physician, surgeon and accoucheur. He set up in practice in Willemstraat in Eindhoven and was the Van Gogh family doctor, see also letter 423.

9. Margot may have stayed with Dr Petrus Johannes Idenburg and his wife Rosine Alexandrine Frederike van der Hegge Spies. They had lived at 238 Hamburgerstraat in Utrecht since 1 August 1883. The schoolboy Aart Begemann, Margot’s nephew, was also registered at the same address (GAU).

10. Margot was a partner in her brother Louis’s linen mill. Letter 469 tells us that when her brother went bankrupt she put her own money into the business. See also Tralbaut 1974, pp. 73-84.

11. In letter 457 there is a suggestion that Margot might be suffering from religious mania. See also letter 464, n. 11.