Single Letter

HAM/1/15/2/23(1)

Letter from Mary Hamilton to Charlotte Margaret Gunning

Diplomatic Text


                                                         14th. July 1782


        20
      I recd. Your Dear letter this day week &
postpon'd writing to You till I could answer Your
question respecting the drawing Rooms -- the next,
will not be till Thursday the 25th. & then you may
reckon the fortnight Drawing Rooms. dating ym. from ye. 25th --
I am quite delighted that You can send me so good
an account of Your health (for I know You never
deceive me). I have seen Hero -- & flatter myself
I am in good Odour with her; I waited on her
ye. 1st. Eveg. I was at liberty -- and last Tuesday
Morng we went together to Walkers Lecture & in
the Eveg. She carried me & Miʃs Thursby to
Brislaws (these two Genius's being here for a few
days -- Mrs. & ye. 2 Miʃs Crewes were also of both these
Parties -- do You know ym.? I did not see enough
of them to form even an Outline of their Characters
Hero talk'd of You but not one word drop'd of
Your coming to her & I did not dare venture
the question. What does Your Father say to all
the changes in the Ministry? I cannot help



thinking but that they are agreeable to the People
I live with; & Ld. Shelborne, I pronounce is
already a greatin favorite[1]
You reproach me for not having congratulated You on
finding Your Pocket Book -- indeed I was vastly
glad when I heard it -- I will endeavour -- but I
do not promise, that I will procure You the
hair You wish to have; remember, that you
must on no account boast of having this invaluable
Treasure in Your poʃseʃsion. Pray what are Your
Studies this Summer, & what book's of amusement
have You -- I have just finished Potters[2] transla-
tion
of Euripides -- the 1st. Vol. only, ye. 2d. I believe
is not yet published -- I wish we could have read
it together, I think ye. same paʃsages would have
equally pleased each -- I have just begun some books
------------------------------
------------------------[3] on Natural History
& hope I shall acquire some Knowledge in my favorite
studies of this kind -- particularly too as Monr. de 'Luc



is come to settle at Windsor to whom I can apply
to explain wt. I do not comprehend. &c.
I have seen advertised another Novel[4] by Miss
Burney
who wrote Evelina[5] -- I shall like to
see it for I think her first production was
a wonderful proof of genius for that Kind of
Writing. if it is true that she was so young
& had no aʃsistance -- it is call'd Cecilia & is
in 5 Vol:s. I think it might be a good lounging
book for You at Horton. -- pray get it & tell me how
You like it.
      Adieu my best love -- remember
one of my greatest Comforts is receiving letters
from You -- Adieu God Bless You.

Give my love to Is: I hope to hear she has
lost ye pain in her side.

      let me know if you have franks for me

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


Notes


 1. The annotator, presumably Mary Hamilton, has cancelled the name 'Shelborne', and adjusted 'a great favorite' to 'in favor'.
 2. Robert Potter (1721-1804), author.
 3. The preceding deletion is apparently censorship by the annotator.
 4. Cecilia, or Memoirs of an Heiress was first published in July 1782.
 5. Evelina, or the History of a Young Lady's Entrance into the World was published in 1778.

Normalised Text


                                                         14th. July 1782


        
      I received Your Dear letter this day week &
postponed writing to You till I could answer Your
question respecting the drawing Rooms -- the next,
will not be till Thursday the 25th. & then you may
reckon the fortnight Drawing Rooms. dating them from the 25th --
I am quite delighted that You can send me so good
an account of Your health (for I know You never
deceive me). I have seen Hero -- & flatter myself
I am in good Odour with her; I waited on her
the 1st. Evening I was at liberty -- and last Tuesday
Morning we went together to Walkers Lecture & in
the Evening She carried me & Miss Thursby to
Brislaws (these two Genius's being here for a few
days -- Mrs. & the 2 Miss Crewes were also of both these
Parties -- do You know them? I did not see enough
of them to form even an Outline of their Characters
Hero talked of You but not one word dropped of
Your coming to her & I did not dare venture
the question. What does Your Father say to all
the changes in the Ministry? I cannot help



thinking but that they are agreeable to the People
I live with; & Lord , I pronounce is
already in favour
You reproach me for not having congratulated You on
finding Your Pocket Book -- indeed I was vastly
glad when I heard it -- I will endeavour -- but I
do not promise, that I will procure You the
hair You wish to have; remember, that you
must on no account boast of having this invaluable
Treasure in Your possession. Pray what are Your
Studies this Summer, & what book's of amusement
have You -- I have just finished Potters translation
of Euripides -- the 1st. Volume only, the 2d. I believe
is not yet published -- I wish we could have read
it together, I think the same passages would have
equally pleased each -- I have just begun some books

on Natural History
& hope I shall acquire some Knowledge in my favourite
studies of this kind -- particularly too as Monsieur de 'Luc



is come to settle at Windsor to whom I can apply
to explain what I do not comprehend. &c.
I have seen advertised another Novel by Miss
Burney who wrote Evelina -- I shall like to
see it for I think her first production was
a wonderful proof of genius for that Kind of
Writing. if it is true that she was so young
& had no assistance -- it is called Cecilia & is
in 5 Volumes. I think it might be a good lounging
book for You at Horton. -- pray get it & tell me how
You like it.
      Adieu my best love -- remember
one of my great Comforts is receiving letters
from You -- Adieu God Bless You.

Give my love to Isabella I hope to hear she has
lost the pain in her side.

      let me know if you have franks for me

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



 1. The annotator, presumably Mary Hamilton, has cancelled the name 'Shelborne', and adjusted 'a great favorite' to 'in favor'.
 2. Robert Potter (1721-1804), author.
 3. The preceding deletion is apparently censorship by the annotator.
 4. Cecilia, or Memoirs of an Heiress was first published in July 1782.
 5. Evelina, or the History of a Young Lady's Entrance into the World was published in 1778.

Metadata

Library References

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

Archive: Mary Hamilton Papers

Item title: Letter from Mary Hamilton to Charlotte Margaret Gunning

Shelfmark: HAM/1/15/2/23(1)

Correspondence Details

Sender: Mary Hamilton

Place sent: unknown

Addressee: Charlotte Margaret Digby (née Gunning)

Place received: Horton, Northamptonshire (certainty: low)

Date sent: 14 July 1782

Letter Description

Summary: Hamilton begins this letter noting that she has waited on Hero [Charlotte Hanbury Boyle-Walsingham (née Williams) (d. 1790)] and flatters herself that she is 'in good Odour with her'. They attended Walker's Lecture together. She continues that Hero talked of Gunning but did not say anything about Gunning's coming to her and Hamilton did not 'venture the question'. Hamilton asks what Gunning's father has to say about all the changes to the Ministry. Gunning has asked Hamilton to obtain for her a lock of hair (she does not specify whose, possibly one of the princesses') and writes that she will do so but that she 'must on no account boast of having this invaluable Treasure in [her] possession'. Hamilton is interested to know what Gunning intends to study during the summer and which books she has been reading. She continues on the subject of books and wishes they could have read together. Some text has been censored by Hamilton so it is not possible to read all that she writes on her interests, but she does note that she wishes to know something on natural history. She has seen advertised a new novel, Cecilia, by Miss Burney [Frances Burney (1752-1840)], who wrote Evelina, and she would like to see it. Hamilton thought Evelina to be 'a wonderful proof of genius for that Kind of Writing[,] if it is true that she was so young & had no assistance'. The new book is in five volumes and Hamilton thinks it may be a good 'lounging' book, and advises Gunning to purchase it and write to her on how she gets on with it.
    Original reference No. 20.
   

Length: 1 sheet, 498 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: Rachael Lunt, 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: 28 April 2023

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