Diplomatic Text
My Dear Miʃs Hamilton
I think my self very unfortunate that
it is impoʃsible for me to Obey Her
Majestys Command having a bad --
Head.ach & I fear not able to bear the
motion of the Chaise nor injoy the
Honour Her Majesty is so good to
design me particularly this day
Mrs Delany has had a cold & were I
able wou'd make me fearfull of her
being out of an evening
It is a great mortification to us both
that we are unable to pay our respects
& congratulate the Princeʃs Royal
on her birth day & wish Her many --
Happy returns of it
I am my dear Madam
Your most Faithfull
Humble Servant
MC Portland
Sep. 29. 82[1]
To
Miʃs Hamilton
red text is normalised and/or unformatted in other panel)
Normalised Text
My Dear Miss Hamilton
I think my self very unfortunate that
it is impossible for me to Obey Her
Majestys Command having a bad --
headache & I fear not able to bear the
motion of the Chaise nor enjoy the
Honour Her Majesty is so good to
design me particularly this day
Mrs Delany has had a cold & were I
able would make me fearful of her
being out of an evening
It is a great mortification to us both
that we are unable to pay our respects
& congratulate the Princess Royal
on her birth day & wish Her many --
Happy returns of it
I am my dear Madam
Your most Faithful
Humble Servant
Margaret Cavendish Portland
To
Miss Hamilton
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 the Duchess of Portland to Mary Hamilton
Shelfmark: HAM/1/7/11/3
Correspondence Details
Sender: Margaret Bentinck (née Cavendish-Harley), Duchess of Portland
Place sent: Gerrards Cross
Addressee: Mary Hamilton
Place received: unknown
Date sent: 29 September 1782
Letter Description
Summary: Letter from the Duchess of Portland to Mary Hamilton. The letter relates to an invitation the Duchess of Portland and Mrs Delany [Mary Delany, née Granville (1700-1788), English Bluestocking, artist, and letter-writer] had received from the Queen to attend a celebration of Princess Charlotte's birthday. The Duchess informs Hamilton that she is unable to attend, as she is suffering from a headache and will be 'not able to bear the motion of the Chaise', and that even if she herself were able, she is 'fearfull [sic] of [Mrs Delany] being out of an evening'.
Length: 1 sheet, 126 words
Transliteration Information
Editorial declaration: First edited in the project 'Image to Text' (David Denison & Nuria Yáñez-Bouza, 2013-2019), now incorporated 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: XML version: Research Assistant funding in 2014/15 and 2015/16 provided by the Department of Linguistics and English Language, University of Manchester.
Research assistant: Donald Alasdair Morrison, undergraduate student, University of Manchester
Transliterator: Nick Barraclough, undergraduate student, University of Manchester (submitted November 2014)
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: 2 November 2021