John Ruskin

Three autograph letters signed, to W.T. Stead as editor of the Pall Mall Gazette:

i) Thanking him for reporting his recent Slade lecture on birds, but correcting an error that suggested Ruskin had influenced the zoologist Albert Günther, 2 pages, 8vo, headed stationery of 84 Woodstock Road, Oxford, 25 November 1884, browned

ii) Discussing the public response to the death of General Gordon ("...I am edified also by the burst of funeral music from the lips of England in praise of Gordon's honour and faith, which she received for thirty years with rage and hissing..."), 2 pages, 8vo, headed stationery of Brantwood, Coniston, Lancashire, 24 February 1885, splitting at fold

iii) Comparing theft with taxation by way of reference to As You Like It ("...I don't object to Orlando's coming in with his sword drawn, and telling the Duke he shan't have any of his own dinner till Adam is served. But I do extremely object to Mr Forster's breakin🦂g into my own Irish servants house, robbing him of thirteen pence weekly out of his poor wages..."), 2 pages, 8vo, headed stationery of Brantwood, Coniston, Lancashire, 27 June 1886

LIVELY AND TYPICALLY OPINIONATED LETTERS TO AN INFLUENTIAL EDITOR. The crusading journalist W.T. Stead edited the Pall Mall Gazette from 1880 to 1889. A key and vocal supporter of Geꦗneral Gordon, his interview in 1884 had been a major pressure on the government behind the appointment o🌸f Gordon to the Sudan.