106 ELIZABETH CARY AGASSIZ 
December 25 
Waite Christmas is fresh in my mind I must write 
you about it. I dreaded [it] this year, because when 
you were all away it seemed to meI could not make it 
pleasant. But I believe because we all feared it might 
be dull, we “made an effort,” like, or rather unlike, 
poor Mrs. Dombey, and we really were very cheerful. 
I must say, though I say it that should n’t, the tree 
and the room did look lovely. Ida and Henry who had 
never seen it upstairs with all the green boughs and 
garlands and crosses were delighted. Then the chil- 
dren were so enchanted with their presents and so de- 
lighted with the tree that it made everybody else gay. 
TO MISS SARAH G. AND MISS EMMA F. CARY 
Cambridge, January 8, 1868 
I HAVE been waiting for a quiet minute to write to 
you, for you are both so delightfully associated with 
the Brazil book that now it is finished and the great 
burden and responsibility is off my mind, I long to 
talk to you about it and to share with you some of the 
pleasant results. As to its ultimate success, sale and 
that sort of thing, I know nothing. It only makes its 
appearance in the shops today, though it has been 
bound for a fortnight past. I only wanted you to know, 
while they are fresh in my mind, the judgment of the 
few friends who have seen it in its finished form. 
Knowing all my anxieties about it in matters of taste, 
style, etc., and knowing too how my highest aim was 
to show Agassiz — the comprehensiveness of his aims 
