Of course, there isn't _much_ companionship possible, after all, between an old man's mind and a little child's, but what there is is sweet--and wholesome, I think.
Three letters of his to a child-friend, Miss Kathleen Eschwege, now Mrs. Round, illustrate one of those friendships which endure: the sort of friendship that he always longed for, and so often failed to secure:--
[Illustrations and: Facsimile of a "Looking-Glass Letter" from Lewis Carroll to Miss Edith Ball.]
My dear Kathleen,--I was really pleased to get your letter, as I had quite supposed I should never see or hear of you again. You see I knew only your Christian name--not the ghost of a surname, or the shadow of an address--and I was not prepared to spend my little all in advertisements--"If the young lady, who was travelling on the G.W. Railway, &c." --or to devote the remainder of my life to going about repeating "Kathleen," like that young woman who came from some foreign land to look for her lover, but only knew that he was called "Edward" (or "Richard" was it? I dare say you know History better than I do) and that he lived in England; so that naturally it took her some time to find him. All I knew was that _you_ could, if you chose, write to me through Macmillan: but it is three months since we met, so I was _not_ expecting it, and it was a pleasant surprise.
Well, so I hope I may now count you as one of my child-friends. I am fond of children (except boys), and have more child-friends than I could possibly count on my fingers, even if I were a centipede (by the way, _have_ they fingers? I'm afraid they're only feet, but, of course, they use them for the same purpose, and that is why no other insects, _except centipedes_, ever succeed in doing _Long Multiplication_), and I have several not so very far from you--one at Beckenham, two at Balham, two at Herne Hill, one at Peckham--so there is every chance of my being somewhere near you _before the year_ 1979. If so, may I call? I am _very_ sorry your neck is no better, and I wish they would take you to Margate: Margate air will make _any_ body well of _any_ thing.
It seems you have already got my two books about "Alice." Have you also got "The Hunting of the Snark"? If not, I should be very glad to send you one. The pictures (by Mr. Holiday) are pretty: and you needn't read the verses unless you like.