Single Letter

HAM/1/1/2/4

Note from Queen Charlotte to Mary Hamilton

Diplomatic Text


Q. Lodge Windsor. 30 August. 1780.

My dear Miʃs Hamilton. What can I
have to say? not much indeed! but to
wish You a good Morning, in the pretty
Blue and white Room where I had
the pleasure to sit and read with
You the Hermit[1] a Poem which is such
a Favorite with me that I have read
it twice this Summer, Oh what a bleʃ-
                                                         sing




to keep good Company. very likely I should
never have been acquainted with either
Poet or Poem was it not for You.
      The season continues so fine that
Our Terrace is constantly filled, as
I do not partake of that amusement
and am but a Spectator. all alone at
times, a droll Idea started up in my mind



which by any cleaver Person my be
made much of, but with my way of
thinking I thought it dangerous to
indulge, what do You think it was?
well Madam it was comparing
the Terraʃse the Royal Terraʃse
with what..? Patience. with a Market
Oh Fie upon the Queen. Now You



know this Wicked thought of mine. and
I promise You to have done with it for
ever. and You promise me to keep it to
Yourself.
      Every body belonging to You is gone in
the country. exepting Mrs. Veesy. or Weasy.
who is in this Neighborhood and come twice
to Lady Causton - in order to see the Royal
Family upon the Terrace. I made her two
Courtsies from the Window and was told
that my politeneʃs had almost thrown her
down, I was sorry to find that I had been
doing mischief. Adieu, this will be the last scrawl
You will receive from me till we meet.           Charlotte

(hover over blue text or annotations for clarification;
red text is normalised and/or unformatted in other panel)


Notes


 1. The Hermit, a poem by Rev. Thomas Parnell (d. 1717/18).

Normalised Text


Queen's Lodge Windsor. 30 August. 1780.

My dear Miss Hamilton. What can I
have to say? not much indeed! but to
wish You a good Morning, in the pretty
Blue and white Room where I had
the pleasure to sit and read with
You the Hermit a Poem which is such
a Favourite with me that I have read
it twice this Summer, Oh what a blessing




to keep good Company. very likely I should
never have been acquainted with either
Poet or Poem was it not for You.
      The season continues so fine that
Our Terrace is constantly filled, as
I do not partake of that amusement
and am but a Spectator. all alone at
times, a droll Idea started up in my mind



which by any clever Person may be
made much of, but with my way of
thinking I thought it dangerous to
indulge, what do You think it was?
well Madam it was comparing
the Terrasse the Royal Terrasse
with what..? Patience. with a Market
Oh Fie upon the Queen. Now You



know this Wicked thought of mine. and
I promise You to have done with it for
ever. and You promise me to keep it to
Yourself.
      Every body belonging to You is gone in
the country. excepting Mrs. Veesy. or Weasy.
who is in this Neighbourhood and come twice
to Lady Causton - in order to see the Royal
Family upon the Terrace. I made her two
Curtsies from the Window and was told
that my politeness had almost thrown her
down, I was sorry to find that I had been
doing mischief. Adieu, this will be the last scrawl
You will receive from me till we meet.           Charlotte

(consult diplomatic text or XML for annotations, deletions, clarifications, persons,
quotations,
spellings, uncorrected forms, split words, abbreviations, formatting)



 1. The Hermit, a poem by Rev. Thomas Parnell (d. 1717/18).

Metadata

Library References

Repository: John Rylands Research Institute and Library, University of Manchester

Archive: Mary Hamilton Papers

Item title: Note from Queen Charlotte to Mary Hamilton

Shelfmark: HAM/1/1/2/4

Correspondence Details

Sender: Queen Charlotte

Place sent: Windsor

Addressee: Mary Hamilton

Place received: unknown

Date sent: 30 August 1780

Letter Description

Summary: Note from Queen Charlotte to Mary Hamilton. The Queen begins by noting that she does not have much to say except 'a good Morning'. She writes that she has read twice this summer 'The Hermit', a favourite poem of hers, acknowledging that she would not be acquainted with either poem or poet if it were not for Hamilton. The rest of the letter relates to life at Court, noting that the Royal Terrace is constantly filled but that she herself 'does not partake of that amusement and [is] but a spectator[,] all alone at times'. All of Hamilton's friends have left for the country except Mrs Vesey [Elizabeth Vesey (c.1715-1791), literary hostess], who came twice to Lady [?]Causton to see the Royal Family. Charlotte notes that she curtsied twice from her window to her and was told 'that [her] politeness had almost thrown [Mrs Vesey] down', and was 'sorry to find that [she] had been doing mischief'. She ends her note by stating that this will be her last writing to her before they next meet.
   

Length: 1 sheet, 284 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: Hollie Barker, 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

Document Image (pdf)