Diplomatic Text
Christ Church Coll. Oxford
August 13
You will have been surprised, my
dear friend, at not hearing from me, and you
[w]ill be surprised at the date of this letter.
But first let me tell you that a letter of Yours
dated 24 July, I never got till the 7 of August,
[(]our Servant certainly forgot to put it in
the Post,) so of course I made no Answer to
------ questions I did not receive. By miʃsing that
[le]tter I was also unprepared to expect the
honour Lady and Miʃs Kings did me of a very
[o]bliging Visit. I thank you for making me known
[t]o them. They seem very amiable, and I promised
[m]yself that I shou'd like them much, and we
[we]re to have been very intimate. But, alas!
l'homme propose et Dieu dispose. The oldest friend
I have in the world, about four Miles from Bristol
sent for me suddenly. I went and found her very
near her end; but going to sleep so gently and
so happily, that I found her rather an Object
of Envy than of pity. It was remarkable that on that
day twelvemonth, I had aʃsisted at the death of
her husband. I went home, promising to see her
again soon; when I got home I found a letter
from my excellent friend Mrs. Kennicott from Oxford,
to say that her most pious, worthy and learned
Husband, was in extreme danger and that nothing
wou'd give her so much comfort as to see me.
There was no hesitating, and in a few hours
I found myself in Christ Church. She was the
very picture of Woe, but seemed much revived at
the sight of me, and that was reward enough for
a journey twice as long as that I had taken.
I found the good Dr. as was supposed at the last
extremity, but I thank God, he is now somewhat
better; and we begin to entertain some faint
hopes that he may poʃsibly recover. God grant
he may be restored for the sake of his poor
Wife, who is one of the best Women I ever knew;
for his own sake one ought not to wish it, as no
doubt a bright reward awaits his long and indefatigable
labours in the cause of Christianity. --
Direct to me here and write soon. --
I inclose Louisa's Narrative. I went to see her
last Week. She is grown quite stupid, and looks
miserably thin and weak --
I feel, my sweet friend, that I have used You
vastly ill about the Verses.[1] I am angry that that
wicked Lelius[2] shou'd contrive to get a Copy &
that you shou'd be still without one. I had fully
proposed sending you one, but my journey, and
its consequences have never allowed me time
to copy it, as Soon as that happens you may
depend upon it. -- To my great surprise
I received letters from both the Veseys, full of
thanks and kindneʃs. How in the world cou'd they
know who was the Author? I have not the
smallest gueʃs. If you know pray inform me.
They plead very earnestly to have it published
but I have sent an absolute Negative. I
shou'dd not like it by any means. Adieu I have
omitted a thousand things I wished to say,
but I write near the bedside of my poor
friend, and in a great hurry.
I have added a good many lines to the
Verses, but have not yet sent them. When you
write to dear Mrs. Carter account to her for my
long silence and tell her the Child was not returnd
when I left Bristol for want of a conveyance Yrs. affectionately
H More
red text is normalised and/or unformatted in other panel)
Notes
1. It is unclear as to which verses Hannah More is referring to here. The reference to 'Lelius' in the next line might indicate they were written by Ann Yearsley, as Lelius is a character in her poem ‘Lucy, A Tale for the Ladies’ (see Ann Yearsley, Poems on Various Subjects (London: G.G.J. and J. Robinson, 1787), p.107), which seems to have been inspired by someone from her past (cf. Barbara Bowring From Penury to Published Poet: The Cultural Journey of Ann Yearsley (University of Birmingham PhD Thesis, 2018), p.138).
2. This is likely to be a code name for someone.
Normalised Text
Christ Church College Oxford
August 13
You will have been surprised, my
dear friend, at not hearing from me, and you
will be surprised at the date of this letter.
But first let me tell you that a letter of Yours
dated 24 July, I never got till the 7 of August,
(our Servant certainly forgot to put it in
the Post,) so of course I made no Answer to
------ questions I did not receive. By missing that
letter I was also unprepared to expect the
honour Lady and Miss Kings did me of a very
obliging Visit. I thank you for making me known
to them. They seem very amiable, and I promised
myself that I should like them much, and we
were to have been very intimate. But, alas!
l'homme propose et Dieu dispose. The oldest friend
I have in the world, about four Miles from Bristol
sent for me suddenly. I went and found her very
near her end; but going to sleep so gently and
so happily, that I found her rather an Object
of Envy than of pity. It was remarkable that on that
day twelvemonth, I had assisted at the death of
her husband. I went home, promising to see her
again soon; when I got home I found a letter
from my excellent friend Mrs. Kennicott from Oxford,
to say that her most pious, worthy and learned
Husband, was in extreme danger and that nothing
would give her so much comfort as to see me.
There was no hesitating, and in a few hours
I found myself in Christ Church. She was the
very picture of Woe, but seemed much revived at
the sight of me, and that was reward enough for
a journey twice as long as that I had taken.
I found the good Dr. as was supposed at the last
extremity, but I thank God, he is now somewhat
better; and we begin to entertain some faint
hopes that he may possibly recover. God grant
he may be restored for the sake of his poor
Wife, who is one of the best Women I ever knew;
for his own sake one ought not to wish it, as no
doubt a bright reward awaits his long and indefatigable
labours in the cause of Christianity. --
Direct to me here and write soon. --
I enclose Louisa's Narrative. I went to see her
last Week. She is grown quite stupid, and looks
miserably thin and weak --
I feel, my sweet friend, that I have used You
vastly ill about the Verses. I am angry that that
wicked Lelius should contrive to get a Copy &
that you should be still without one. I had fully
proposed sending you one, but my journey, and
its consequences have never allowed me time
to copy it, as Soon as that happens you may
depend upon it. -- To my great surprise
I received letters from both the Veseys, full of
thanks and kindness. How in the world could they
know who was the Author? I have not the
smallest guess. If you know pray inform me.
They plead very earnestly to have it published
but I have sent an absolute Negative. I
shouldd not like it by any means. Adieu I have
omitted a thousand things I wished to say,
but I write near the bedside of my poor
friend, and in a great hurry.
I have added a good many lines to the
Verses, but have not yet sent them. When you
write to dear Mrs. Carter account to her for my
long silence and tell her the Child was not returned
when I left Bristol for want of a conveyance Yours affectionately
Hannah More
quotations, spellings, uncorrected forms, split words, abbreviations, formatting)
Notes
Metadata
Library References
Repository: Houghton Library Repository, Harvard University
Archive: Elizabeth Carter and Hannah More letters to Mary Hamilton
Item title: Letter from Hannah More to Mary Hamilton
Shelfmark: MS Eng 1778 176
Correspondence Details
Sender: Hannah More
Place sent: Oxford
Addressee: Mary Hamilton
Place received: unknown
Date sent: 13 August 1783
Letter Description
Summary: More, Hannah, 1745-1833. Autograph manuscript letter (signed) to Mary Hamilton; Oxford, 1783 August 13.
Length: 1 sheet, 618 words
Transliteration Information
Editorial declaration: First transcribed for the project 'The Collected Letters of Hannah More' (Kerri Andrews & others) and 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: 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: Kerri Andrews, Senior Lecturer, Edge Hill University (submitted 11 August 2020)
Cataloguer: Bonnie B. Salt, Archivist, Houghton Library
Copyright: Transcriptions, notes and TEI/XML © the editors
Revision date: 19 October 2022