Diplomatic Text
X
Kisses Welcome
to Prince Alfred
20
1782
/[1] You woul'd have received the
inclosed Letters, my dear Friend, by Yesterday's
post, if I had been capable of writing you
my Thanks for them. What a delightful
Thing it is to see so much Strength & vivaci
ty of Understanding in an Age so advanced
as Mrs Delany's! May this extraordinary, &
good Woman be yet preserved some years
longer to the Comfort of her Friends. Where
Life is capable of so much Enjoyment to the
Owner, & of so much Usefullneʃs to the world
it is not unreasonable to wish for it's Continu
ance, even in Cases where Age affords a natural
Expectation to the Grave, & when Virtue is
ripe for Immortality.
As to the other Letter which
you inclosed from our excellent & dear Friend,
one Should have had better Hopes of the
Happineʃs of a person mentioned in it, if she had
appeared soberly cheerful, than affectedly gay[2]
But sober Cheerfullneʃs belongs to a different
Temper of mind.
Our party here is most grie
vously disconcerted by the sudden departure of
our dear Lady Charlotte Finch. I hope she
Will be restored to us again, by the Amend
ment of prince Alfred's Health. I feel quite
interested for him. Except his own inmediate
Friends & Attendants I believe my nephew & I
were his R. H.'s Chief Favorites. He never
refused me his dear little Hand to kiʃs, &
sometimes held it out, the moment he saw
me.
When you write to Miʃs H. More be so
good to remember me to her in the most affect
ionate Manner, & thank her for her very
kind Attention. Adieu my dear Friend.
Ever most faithfully & affectionately yours
EC.
Be so good to say every Thing that is respectful
& affectionate for me to dear Ly Ch. F. -- I wd say
PS.
You desire me to give you an Account
how I like the Book which the Queen
had the goodneʃs to lend me.[3] I must do
it at different Times, as thit contains
such a Number & variety of Stories, that
it is impoʃsible to recollect the Whole. I
mentioned some particulars in my last: since
that I have read the death of Roschgen,
which is finely drawn, but horrible to a
degree that made me shudder. Surely there
is scarcely an Example to be found in real
Life of any woman, educated in a virtuous
Family, becoming so infernally wicked. -- To
repay one for all this Horrour, the
description which Radegast gives of
his parsonnage, & of his own Emotions at
the first Sight of it, is beautiful, & affecting
to a high degree; particularly his Sentiments
on the View of the Church Yard.
There are many very excellent
Things in this Book, & the Stories for
the most part keep the Attention very
Much awake. The 2 principal Objections
that I have yet found are, that the Author
Seems to discover a very illiberal Aversion
to persons in the higher Claʃses of Society:
& that his Miʃses are rather too sud
-den & violent in falling in Love.
I would fain say something to his
little Royal Highneʃs: But it wd. be too ri
diculous to send one's duty to an Infant, &
too familiar to send one's Love to a prince.
However, do kiss his dear little Hand, &
say Carter.
Recd.. August 4th. 1782
PS.
You will be so good to expreʃs in the
most repectful & grateful manner my
Sense of her Majesty's Condescension in
thinking of a Remedy for my worthleʃs
Head. I have read 3 volumes of Sophia
& grow more & more in Love with
Cornelius puff. The Author contrives to
keep his Readers in a long Suspence
about the Heroine of his Book: I cannot
even gueʃs what will be the Conclusion
of Sophia's Fate. She is not yet very
highly in my good Graces: & I am rather
doubtful about her Favorite, L——. There
is something mysterious in his History,
which I do not like, having from long
Experience laid it down as a Rule, that
honest people very seldom live in the dark
[4]
red text is normalised and/or unformatted in other panel)
Notes
1. The annotator who marks this paragraph with ‘/’ shows a particular interest in Mrs Delany and continues such marks in all the letters in this subseries where Carter mentions her, with the possible exception of MS Eng 1778 58: see MS Eng 1778 23 p.3, MS Eng 1778 41 p.5, MS Eng 1778 53 pp.2 and 3, MS Eng 1778 56 p.3, MS Eng 1778 57 p.1, MS Eng 1778 60 p.1, MS Eng 1778 63 p.1, MS Eng 1778 67 p.3, MS Eng 1778 68 p.1 and MS Eng 1778 71 p.2. The same marking appears in the relevant letters by Hannah More: see the note on MS Eng 1778 114 p.5.
2. Hamilton must have sent Carter the letter written by Hannah More on 23 July 1782 in which More reports that Mary Sharpe ‘was in great spirits, and gay quite to affectation’ (see MS Eng 1778 114 p.2).
3. For details of the book see MS Eng 1778 17 p.3n. The names of the characters mentioned by Carter have been verified in the HathiTrust online edition.
4. This page is blank.
Normalised Text
You would have received the
enclosed Letters, my dear Friend, by Yesterday's
post, if I had been capable of writing you
my Thanks for them. What a delightful
Thing it is to see so much Strength & vivacity
of Understanding in an Age so advanced
as Mrs Delany's! May this extraordinary, &
good Woman be yet preserved some years
longer to the Comfort of her Friends. Where
Life is capable of so much Enjoyment to the
Owner, & of so much Usefulness to the world
it is not unreasonable to wish for it's Continuance
, even in Cases where Age affords a natural
Expectation to the Grave, & when Virtue is
ripe for Immortality.
As to the other Letter which
you enclosed from our excellent & dear Friend,
one Should have had better Hopes of the
Happiness of a person mentioned in it, if she had
appeared soberly cheerful, than affectedly gay
But sober Cheerfulness belongs to a different
Temper of mind.
Our party here is most grievously
disconcerted by the sudden departure of
our dear Lady Charlotte Finch. I hope she
Will be restored to us again, by the Amendment
of prince Alfred's Health. I feel quite
interested for him. Except his own immediate
Friends & Attendants I believe my nephew & I
were his Royal Highness's Chief Favourites. He never
refused me his dear little Hand to kiss, &
sometimes held it out, the moment he saw
me.
When you write to Miss Hannah More be so
good to remember me to her in the most affectionate
Manner, & thank her for her very
kind Attention. Adieu my dear Friend.
Ever most faithfully & affectionately yours
Elizabeth Carter
Be so good to say every Thing that is respectful
& affectionate for me to dear Lady Charlotte Finch --
PS.
You desire me to give you an Account
how I like the Book which the Queen
had the goodness to lend me. I must do
it at different Times, as it contains
such a Number & variety of Stories, that
it is impossible to recollect the Whole. I
mentioned some particulars in my last: since
that I have read the death of Roschgen,
which is finely drawn, but horrible to a
degree that made me shudder. Surely there
is scarcely an Example to be found in real
Life of any woman, educated in a virtuous
Family, becoming so infernally wicked. -- To
repay one for all this Horror, the
description which Radegast gives of
his parsonage, & of his own Emotions at
the first Sight of it, is beautiful, & affecting
to a high degree; particularly his Sentiments
on the View of the Church Yard.
There are many very excellent
Things in this Book, & the Stories for
the most part keep the Attention very
Much awake. The 2 principal Objections
that I have yet found are, that the Author
Seems to discover a very illiberal Aversion
to persons in the higher Classes of Society:
& that his Misses are rather too sudden
& violent in falling in Love.
I would fain say something to his
little Royal Highness: But it would be too ridiculous
to send one's duty to an Infant, &
too familiar to send one's Love to a prince.
However, do kiss his dear little Hand, &
say Carter.
PS.
You will be so good to express in the
most respectful & grateful manner my
Sense of her Majesty's Condescension in
thinking of a Remedy for my worthless
Head. I have read 3 volumes of Sophia
& grow more & more in Love with
Cornelius puff. The Author contrives to
keep his Readers in a long Suspense
about the Heroine of his Book: I cannot
even guess what will be the Conclusion
of Sophia's Fate. She is not yet very
highly in my good Graces: & I am rather
doubtful about her Favourite, Leff. There
is something mysterious in his History,
which I do not like, having from long
Experience laid it down as a Rule, that
honest people very seldom live in the dark
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 Elizabeth Carter to Mary Hamilton
Shelfmark: MS Eng 1778 20
Correspondence Details
Sender: Elizabeth Carter
Place sent: unknown
Addressee: Mary Hamilton
Place received: unknown
Date sent: c.4 August 1782
notAfter 4 August 1782 (precision: high)
Letter Description
Summary: Letter from Elizabeth Carter to Mary Hamilton. Carter returns two letters. One prompts expressions of delight concerning Mrs Delany, ‘this extraordinary, and good Woman’, the other, of regret concerning the ‘affectedly gay’ behaviour of Mary Sharpe. Carter reports the sudden departure of Lady Charlotte Finch with Prince Alfred; she asks Hamilton to ‘kiss his dear little Hand, & say Carter’. Two postscripts concern her reactions to characters in the book Sophiens Reise von Memel nach Sachsen, which the Queen had lent her.
Original entry in Houghton Library catalogue: Carter, Elizabeth, 1717-1806. Autograph manuscript letter (signed) to Mary Hamilton, 1782 August 4.
Length: 3 sheets, 000 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: XML version first created without transcription as part of project 'Unlocking the Mary Hamilton Papers', funded by the Arts & Humanities Research Council under grant AH/S007121/1. Transcription added after the funded period under the supervision of David Denison and Nuria Yáñez-Bouza.
Transliterator: Pete Morris, Artificial Intelligence and Ideas Adoption (AIIA), The University of Manchester Library (Plain text transliteration submitted 26 February 2026)
Cataloguer: Bonnie B. Salt, Archivist, Houghton Library
Copyright: Transcriptions, notes and TEI/XML © the editors
Revision date: 7 October 2026
