Diplomatic Text
Vous cultivez votre Jardin, Mademoiʃelle;
permettez que je cultive le mien.[1] -- You
employ'd your ʃelf yesterday, I ʃuppoʃe,
in improving your Mind at the Fireʃide.
I was busied in ʃtrengthening my Body.
I dug two hours in Mr: Kerr's Garden
yesterday morning; -- Why won't you let
this be my Day of reʃt? -- But I'll
proʃecute Mr: Wye for Scandalum mag=
=natum.[2] -- I was out of my Bed when your
ʃervant came, tho' he return'd for Anʃwer --
I was not up. --
I'll write no more to the Coll: for
ʃome time; -- you may tell him I drop
the Subject (to ʃave myself ʃome writing)
for I perceive he is reʃolved to have the
laʃt Word.[3] --
In caʃe you ʃhould be prevented from
going to Church, the Inclosed may ʃerve
as a Text for your ʃerious Meditations[4]
red text is normalised and/or unformatted in other panel)
Notes
1. A play on Candide's ‘Il faut cultiver notre jardin’, from Molière's satirical novel (1759).
2. ‘The utterance or publication of a malicious report against any person holding a position of dignity’ (OED s.v. scandalum magnatum n. Accessed 24-11-2021).
3. Napier writes to Hamilton on 3 March 1773, ‘I am afraid I have lost a Correspondant in Mr- Hope (he may not like my instructions so well) for some time’ (HAM/1/19/35).
4. The bottom of the sheet has been torn away and some text is missing.
Normalised Text
Vous cultivez votre Jardin, Mademoiselle;
permettez que je cultive le mien. -- You
employed your self yesterday, I suppose,
in improving your Mind at the Fireside.
I was busied in strengthening my Body.
I dug two hours in Mr: Kerr's Garden
yesterday morning; -- Why won't you let
this be my Day of rest? -- But I'll
prosecute Mr: Wye for Scandalum magnatum
. -- I was out of my Bed when your
servant came, though he returned for Answer --
I was not up. --
I'll write no more to the Colonel for
some time; -- you may tell him I drop
the Subject (to save myself some writing)
for I perceive he is resolved to have the
last Word. --
In case you should be prevented from
going to Church, the Enclosed may serve
as a Text for your serious Meditations
quotations, spellings, uncorrected forms, split words, abbreviations, formatting)
Notes
Metadata
Library References
Repository: John Rylands Research Institute and Library, University of Manchester
Archive: Mary Hamilton Papers
Item title: Letter from John Hope to Mary Hamilton
Shelfmark: HAM/1/6/8/29
Correspondence Details
Sender: John Hope
Place sent: Northampton (certainty: medium)
Addressee: Mary Hamilton
Place received: Northampton (certainty: medium)
Date sent: between February and March 1773
notBefore February 1773 (precision: medium)
notAfter March 1773 (precision: medium)
Letter Description
Summary: Letter from John Hope to Mary Hamilton, written in French and English. Hope protests that he has been busy, and sends something for Hamilton to read: 'In case you should be prevented from going to Church, the Inclosed may serve as a Text for your serious Meditations'.
Length: 1 sheet, 134 words
Transliteration Information
Editorial declaration: First edited in the project 'Unlocking the Mary Hamilton Papers' (Hannah Barker, Sophie Coulombeau, David Denison, Tino Oudesluijs, Cassandra Ulph, Christine Wallis & Nuria Yáñez-Bouza, 2019-2023).
All quotation marks are retained in the text and are represented by appropriate Unicode characters. Words split across two lines may have a hyphen on the first, the second or both fragments (reco-|ver, imperfect|-ly, satisfacti-|-on); or a double hyphen (pur=|port, dan|=ger, qua=|=litys); or none (respect|ing). Any point in abbreviations with superscripted letter(s) is placed last, regardless of relative left-right orientation in the original. Thus, Mrs. or Mrs may occur, but M.rs or Mr.s do not.
Acknowledgements: Transcription and XML version created as part of project 'Unlocking the Mary Hamilton Papers', funded by the Arts & Humanities Research Council under grant AH/S007121/1.
Transliterator: Christine Wallis, editorial team (completed 27 August 2020)
Cataloguer: Lisa Crawley, Archivist, The John Rylands Library
Cataloguer: John Hodgson, Head of Special Collections, John Rylands Research Institute and Library
Copyright: Transcriptions, notes and TEI/XML © the editors
Revision date: 22 December 2021