Scope and Contents The series includes 115 letters and one piece of verse in both English and French. Novikova met Napier at the St. Petersburg court in the 1860s, and Napier may have been Novikova's first political and diplomatic acquaintance. Early letters from Napier mostly consist of excuses for missing Novikova at social occasions or descriptions of what she had missed at other occasions; later letters describe Napier's life elsehwere during his diplomatic career, including during his years at Madras,...