Letters written by Morley Roberts to George Gissing when Roberts was traveling in the United States and Canada. The earliest letter is written from Texas, and subsequent ones are dated from British Columbia; Oregon; and California. A few items are titled by Roberts as fragments in the accompanying transcripts. One item is on letterhead of The Dominion Saw Mill Company, New Westminster, B. C.; and several are on letterhead of a lodging-house, Rest for the Weary, in San Francisco. One letter (12 March 1886) has the following note at the top: N. B. Say, don't destroy any of my letters; They are the only notes I make; I may want them. Topics include Roberts's travels and current surroundings and activities; and reflections in a literary vein, including what he was reading, or writers he was thinking about, and responses to Gissing's work. Several poems that Roberts wrote at the time are included (one poem that is crossed out in the letter of 3 August 1886 does not appear in the transcript). These letters by Roberts were included in: The collected letters of George Gissing, ed. Paul F. Mattheisen, Arthur C. Young, and Pierre Coustillas (Athens: Ohio UP, 1990-1997; 9 vols.; see: vols. 2 and 3). Roberts's letters to Gissing of a later period were evidently lost; see his annotation about this on his transcript of Gissing's letter to him of 15 January 1895 (folder 46), and his correspondence with Algernon Gissing (folder 44). .
