I THOUGHT that probably my connection with Cranford would cease after Miss Jenkyns’s death;^c at least, that it would have to be kept up by correspondence, which bears much the same relation to personal intercourse that the books of dried plants I sometimes see (‘Hortus Siccus,’ ²⁸ I think they call the thing,) do to the living and fresh flowers in the lanes and meadows. I was pleasantly surprised, therefore, by receiving a letter from Miss Pole (who had always come in for a supplementary week after my annual visit to Miss Jenkyns) proposing that I should go and stay with her; and then, in a couple of days after my acceptance, came a note from Miss Matty, in which, in a rather circuitous and very humble manner, she told me how much pleasure I should confer, if I could spend a week or two with her, either before or after I had been at Miss Pole’s; ‘for,’ she said, ‘since my dear sister’s death, I am well aware I have no attractions to offer; it is only to the kindness of my friends that I can owe their company.’