Editor's note

Frances Woodsford wrote over seven hundred letters to Mr Bigelow – some six hundred 'Saturday Specials' and a hundred other letters – and this book contains a selection. The letters were closely typed (to save paper and weight) although occasionally, when Frances was away from the office, she sent handwritten Air Mail letters. For ease of reading, numbers, dates and times have been standardised, French accents added and obvious typing errors corrected. At times, and most reluctantly, the editors have been obliged to cut material within the letters, indicated by a three-point ellipsis. The author's own ellipses are reproduced as in the original letters, as six-point ellipses.