[Amy Cruse, author and editor; Englishman & His Books] Album of correspondence from Maurice Baring; Sidney Colvin; Alfred Noyes; Austin Dobson; Stopford Brooke, Lord Sanderson and others, drafts and notes by widower C. J. Cruse, and news cuttings.

It is perhaps appropriate that we should have been left such a collection by an author who made a name for herself with pioneering works on the social history of English literature. (Two of the books written by her during the period covered by this collection - ‘The Englishman and his Books in the Early Nineteenth Century’ (1930) and ‘Victorians and their Books’ (1935) - succeeded in making the difficult cross-over from literary criticism to general popularity.) The collection comprises sixty-three items, 30 in manuscript and typescript, and 33 printed (all but a couple of the latter news cuttings of reviews of books by her). The correspondence contains some surprisingly entertaining items: Sidney Colvin does a ‘growl’ over Robert Louis Stevenson; Maurice Baring corrects her over an incident from his childhood; Stopford Brook admires the view from his new home; and an American clergyman asks for a free copy of one of her books, in exchange for ‘publicity in my pulpit & in my pastoral visitations’. Most of the material is tipped in or laid down on 45pp of a sturdy folio album, bound in patterned black cloth with ‘News Cuttings’ in gilt on cover and unused thumb index. Both contents and binding are in good condition, and the only damage is to one leaf where an item of correspondence has been removed. ONE: Correspondence in manuscript and typescript. 29 items, of which 22 are tipped in and laid down between pp. 30 and 53, and the other seven loosely inserted. Together with a duplicated typescript of Cruse’s publications, laid down on pp.26 and 27. The most striking items are two ALsS from Sidney Colvin, 15 and 17 June 1914. In the first he writes: ‘The right of reprinting passages from the letters of R[obert]. L[ouis]. S[tevenson]. does not rest with me but with his stepson & heir Mr Lloyd Osbourne. / Will you forgive me for saying that in my view there are a great many too many lives of R. L. S. already in various series, & that I am very sorry Messrs Harrap are going to add another. - Miss Masson has just done one for a Scottish series: Sir A. Quiller Couch has one in hand for the English Men of Letters Series: there are others by Watt, Cornford, and I don’t know how many more writers who never knew him and cannot add anything worth mentioning to the already published material. - / Some day I am going to do my own book, which will have fresh & first hand material for other people to dig in: but till then I should have thought it wiser that publishers should cease from multiplying books about him. / Pray pardon my ungraciousness.’ In the second he thanks her for her ‘courteous answer to my growl’, adding that if she only proposes ‘to quote short passages, and not page-long screeds, from the letters, I don’t think you risk any possible objection from Lloyd Osbourne or from the publishers’. Also present are two TLs from Maurice Baring (both ‘P. P. M. M.’), 17 and 21 January 1939. In the first he notes that she has done him ‘the honour of quoting me several times. On page 114 there is a slight slip. You say that when I discussed Haggard and Stevenson at breakfast with Mr. Impey, “Mr. Impey greatly preferred Haggard, and told how he had sat up very late one night reading “She”.” It is the other way round. I say (see “Puppet Show of Memory” page 107) that I told Mr. Impey that I greatly preferred Haggard and told how I had sat up very late one night reading “She”. I remember Mr. Impey making no comment, merely looking sympathetic. He liked Stevenson best but knew that my preference was natural at my age.’ He ends by explaining that he is ‘crippled and invalided and cannot write myself’. Among the other items are: Stopford A. Brooke, two ALsS, 26 February and 28 September 1914 (in second: ‘I have left London & am living now in the Country, here on the top of a heathery hill with all the Weall of Sussex at my feet.’); Austin Dobson, ACS, 14 December 1911 (‘You can use the poems you mention; but not in one vol. as my arrangment with my publishers does not permit me to give permission for more than one piece for one book. Anything more has to be paid for.’; Alfred Noyes, ALS, 24 January 1912 (granting permission for use of a poem ‘on the suggested terms’); Harry C. W. Verney, two ALsS, 22 January 1933 and 7 June 1935 (in second: ‘I suppose the most distinguished Victorian I knew well was our great-aunt Florence Nightingale: she always gave me 10/- when I went to school. But there were 2 who influenced me more: one was Augustine Birrell to whom I was private secretary for many years: the other was my Mother, who wrote the Verney Memoirs. [...] She brought us up to think Scrooge the greatest Dickens character [...] I wonder what “Edmund” is reading today: our eldest boy Ralph at Balliol is a good deal thrilled by modern poetry & our Mary Verney (aged 18) is deep in economics’) with a third item by him, a TLS, 12 April 1947 (stating that ‘The Verney papers now belong to my Son’ and making two corrections to the material she has sent him); Lord Sanderson, two ALsS, 16 April and 3 June 1936 (in first: ‘I see that you have done me the honour of quoting from a book of mine “Memories of Sixty Years”. But you have described me as “Sir Harry Sanderson” “Henry Sanderson” “Lord Sanderson” in different places. I wrote my book under the name: Henry Sanderson Furniss (Lord Sanderson). I became Lord Sanderson in 1930 & - at the time I wrote my book I was better known as Henry Sanderson-Furniss. (I was never “Sir Harry” anything).’ Also ALsS from: George L. Moore of Cedar Lodge (on cancelled letterhead of Laurel Bank, Osborne Park, Belfast (valediction: ‘Your admirer (I’m married) / & / Well-wisher’); C. Levi Shelby of the Rayland Presbyterian Church, Ohio, 5 December 1935 (‘I lost in two bank failures during the depression, and for over four years I have been serving my Church without my stated salary. [...] I am just wondering if you would have any extra author’s copies of your book (furnished by your publishers and if so if you would feel inclined to send me a copy. I will give it publicity in my pulpit & in my pastoral visitations’). And TLsS from: Richard H. Hindel of the University of Pennsylvania (asking demanding questions); G. Oliver Anderson, Director of George G. Harrap, publishers (on ‘the death of Mr. Harrap’: ‘up to the last he was a wonderful young man [...] I have often thought of the friendly terms on which we were with you, and wished the connection had continued longer. It is not impossible that I may call upon you to do something for us one of these days. Some of your books still continue to do very well.’); W. N. Brown (‘Author and Journalist’); Alicia C. Perceval (regarding the book she is writing with ‘Miss Mare’ on ‘Miss Charlotte M. Yonge’). Also of interest is the Harrap reader’s very positive report (3pp, 4to) of ‘The Englishman and his Books’, with pencil note by Cruse’s husband: ‘Copy of Report of the Reader (name not given) to whom Harrap sent the MS. C. J. C.’ Also three items which elicited responses from Amy Cruse’s widower: long ALS from Professor Lennox Grey of the University of Sydney, 2 August 1958, addressed to Amy Cruse in the hope of consulting her when in England, with autograph copy of C. J. Cruse’s reply beginning ‘My wife would have been delighted on receiving your appreciative letter wh reached me this morng but I am very sorry to say she died on Jan 12th 1951.’; TLS from Jean M. Szczypien of Little, Brown & Co (on letterhead of the L. W. Singer Company, Inc., New York), 19 June 1961, regarding reprinting a selection from a children’s book of Cruse’s, with typed copy of C. J. Cruse’s reply, giving information regarding his wife and her works including: ‘Her last book, completed during the second World War (about 1943) I still have in MS form, 165 foolscap pages. It gives a vivid picture of the life lived by an English lady of the time of Charles I Mary Lady VErney - early 17th. century. Title - “Portrait of a Stuart Lady.” / At the time the MS was completed, publication owing to paper shortage and other war difficulties, was impossible.’ TLS from Martin Blackman of George Allen & Unwin Ltd, London, 21 March, 1963, reporting that the American publishers Houghton Mifflin are ‘urgently requesting biographical information about Mrs. Cruse’; with typed copy of C. J. Cruse’s reply, giving another account of his wife and her works. Laid down on two pages preceding the correspondence is a duplicated typescript listing 36 titles by Cruse, ‘Copied from the Catalogue in the Reading Room of the British Museum. July 1951’. TWO: News cuttings. Laid down over the first 25pp are 31 news cuttings from the years 1927 to 1938, along with a brief obituary from 1951, and a four-page publicity leaflet by publisher Harrap of her ‘The Englishman and his Books’ (1930). Evidence of the use of a press cutting bureau. Most of the articles are substantial, and almost all are positive. Sources include: Author (Stanley Leathes), Cape Argus of Cape Town, Church Times, Daily Telegraph (Arthur Waugh), Evening Standard (Arnold Bennett), John O’London’s Weekly (two, one by John Brophy), Journal of Education, Manchester Guardian (Allan Monkhouse), National Review (Mary Maxse), New Statesman (two, one by Raymond Mortimer), News Chronicle (Robert Lynd), Observer (two, Michael Sadleir and Malcolm Elwin), Seafarer (E. H. Young), Spectator (two, one by Edmund Blunden), Sunday Times (two, Dilys Powell and Lord Ernle), Time and Tide, The Times, TLS.