Liesbeth Heenk

Van Gogh on Christmas: And now we__e slowly heading towards winter, and many dread it, but Christmas is wonderful, it__ like the moss on the roofs and like the pine and the holly and the ivy in the snow. Isleworth, 10 November 1876

Van Gogh on his brother's upcoming marriage: "It__ because he__ in Holland, where he__ getting married one of these days. Now, while not denying the advantages of a marriage in the very least, once it has been done and one is quietly set up in one__ home, the funereal pomp of the reception &c., the lamentable congratulations of two families (even civilized) at the same time, not to mention the fortuitous appearances in those pharmacist__ jars where antediluvian civil or religious magistrates sit _ my word _ isn__ there good reason to pity the poor unfortunate obliged to present himself armed with the requisite papers in the places where, with a ferocity unequalled by the cruellest cannibals, you__e married alive on the low heat of the aforementioned funereal receptions.