Woodrow Wilson to Jessie Woodrow Wilson Sayre

Title

Woodrow Wilson to Jessie Woodrow Wilson Sayre

Creator

Wilson, Woodrow, 1856-1924

Identifier

WWP17446

Date

1908 July 28

Description

Woodrow Wilson writes to Jessie in Lyme about his vacation in Scotland.

Source

Seeley G. Mudd Manuscript Library, Princeton University

Language

English

Text

Telephone:—No. 4. Grasmere.
Cowperthwaite's
Rothay Hotel, English Lakes, Grasmere, Westmoreland.

My darling Jessie,

Your letter made me very happy, its love and its interesting, thoughtful account of the round of pleasures and occupations you are having in Lyme. I am so glad that it is all turning out so enjoyable,—and, above all, that you like the people upon whom your pleasure must depend. It is delightful that the fine Sabians should be your immediate neighbors. None of you had said yet whether dear old Bishop Sabian is still living. Is he? I took a great fancy to him, as I know mama did.

My days are going very quietly and pleasantly here. Sometimes the call of the open road is very strong and clear in my ears, when the day is fine and the air keen and stimulating, but the rest is very grateful to me, too,—the equable days in which nothing happens except what I choose to have happen! It is a little hard to write here at my window. It opens upon the road right in front of the hotel, where every coach either from Windermere or Keswick stops (“Five minutes, ladies, to see the graves of Wordsworth and Coleridge in the graveyard, and buy some of the celebrated gingerbread at the gate, if y'd like to”) as well as numberless charabancs which take on or discharge their passengers here or bring parties of most uninteresting looking “trippers” through, or set out for or return from Coniston or the Langdales (doesn't that sound tempting?); and I am constantly looking up (0r, rather, down) from my letter to watch the human comedy going on underneath my very eyes. The real rush of excursionists has not begun yet. There is a big exhibition of some sort on in London (Franco-British) and until Saturday the Olympian games were going on. The children are not out of school yet, and the Americans have not turned back from Paris and the Rhine and Switzerland. They will come with the rainy season and other discomforts. I have seen practically no acquaintances on the coaches, though Dean Hulbert of Harvard introduced himself to me yesterday. He was here for only an hour or two, his ignorant choice of a place to stay being Bowness!

I go up to see the Yates every day I can, and we read a good deal together. Just now we are reading a charming little book called “Uncle William”, by Jeanette Lee, which I hope you will all read. It is really quite a charming little idyll. Mrs. Yates read it to us while Mr. Yates was working on my portrait, and, now that he is away in London, I am reading it to Mrs. Yates and Mary. They had all read it once together.

It is so pleasant to feel at home here, and not like a traveller; to be free not to know or think about the fool Democrats; to have only casual thoughts of Princeton and its too complicated affairs, and constant thoughts of the dear, dear ones with whom this place will always be associated, and whom I love with all the love and joy there is in me.

Distribute as much love from me in the beloved circle as each will take, and keep all you can possibly want for yourself, from

Your devoted
Father

Original Format

Letter

To

Sayre, Jessie Woodrow Wilson, 1887-1933

Files

http://resources.presidentwilson.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/WWtoJWS19080728.pdf

Citation

Wilson, Woodrow, 1856-1924, “Woodrow Wilson to Jessie Woodrow Wilson Sayre,” 1908 July 28, WWP17446, Jessie Wilson Sayre Correspondence, Woodrow Wilson Presidential Library & Museum, Staunton, Virginia.