"I have a Letter from Major Pond": Matthew Arnold, Major James Burton Pond, And an Unpublished Letter from Arnold to Pond (Essay‪)‬

On April 28, 1885, Matthew Arnold wrote to his daughter Lucy, then living in the United States, and stated, "I have a letter from Major Pond to ask what I am going to do; I am waiting to hear from you, but I think from what you say to Dick that you are dropping the intention of coming over this year. But we shall be guided by your decision" (Letters 277). The uncertainty that Arnold express ed regarding his daughter's plans to visit the family in England arose as a result of his essay "A Word More about America," published in February 1885, which Arnold feared might have offended Lucy's American husband, Frederick Whitridge, and his family. (1) In any case, Lucy did, in fact, come to England for a visit in the summer of 1885, perhaps out of a concern for her father's health, and she was joined by her husband later (Honan 410). Arnold's reply to Major Pond was given in the following previously unpublished letter: (2)