BR TO FRANCES RUSSELL, 1 MAY 1892
BRACERS 53642. ALS. McMaster. SLBR 1: #5
Edited by N. Griffin. Proofread by A. Duncan and K. Blackwell

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May 1st 1892.

Dearest Granny

What a glorious May-Day it has been! Quite an ideal one here, warm and springy and every way delightful. I hope the Anarchists have not been doing anything horrible in Paris1 on such a day. — We have been quite busy getting ready the first number of the Cambridge Observer, though I personally have done very little beyond discussing a prospectus and sundry articles written by other people. I will certainly order it to be sent to you, as it will very likely not run more than a term you will not have much time to bear it. — I have been doing a fair amount of work, but not really much; I have also been out a great deal except on the afternoons when I have had to go to the dentist, who will I hope have finished in a week or two. — Sanger2 is back now and is very interesting with the accounts of his Spanish travels in the Vac., as Spain is a country that quite few people go to and which I gather from him to be very uncivilized. He read a paper to the Apostles last night trying to make science independent of metaphysics but everybody present disagreed with him, and Dickinson,3 a King’s Don, finally demolished him even in his own (Sanger’s) estimation. It was lucky for Sanger that McTaggart4 is in Australia or he would probably have conclusively disproved Sanger’s existence or done something equally frightful. — I have just been elected to the Trin. Tennis Club so I hope I shall play a good deal this term; all the Decemviri almost belong and play often. —

Yesterday afternoon I went to town with Sanger and Tansley to see Ibsen’s Doll’s House, ostensibly for the purpose of criticizing it in our paper. I was prepared to dislike the play, but in spite of very bad acting I thought it powerful though full of faults. — A joint-stock criticism will probably be found in our 2nd number. (By the way, the terminal subscription is 3s.6d this term). — Please tell Auntie the country here is charming just now; there are delightful woods full of flowers and birds, and nightingales in every hedge. But very soon we shall have the invasion of smart ladies, who are already beginning to appear in small numbers. — I hope you and Auntie are well and are having as delightful weather as we are.

Your affec. grandson
Bertrand Russell

• 1

  I hope the Anarchists have not been doing anything horrible in Paris “Anarchist outrages” were widely anticipated at the May Day demonstrations in Paris that year. None eventuated, however.

• 2

  Sanger Charles Percy Sanger (1871–1930), one of Russell’s close Cambridge friends. Like Russell, he was studying for part one of the Mathematical Tripos, but he switched to economics in his fourth year. A man of very diverse interests, he became a barrister.

• 3

  Dickinson Goldsworthy Lowes Dickinson (1862–1932), a classics don and man of letters who wrote widely on historical and political topics. He was among the so-called “new dons” who brought about reform in nineteenth-century Cambridge.

• 4

  McTaggart John McTaggart Ellis McTaggart (1866–1925), recently elected a Fellow of Trinity, was just beginning a distinguished career as Cambridge’s most important neo-Hegelian philosopher. He was the leading figure in the Apostles at this time.