532.
To his Stepmother.
Sheffield-place, July the 18th, 1788.
My dear Madam,
A kind and generous behaviour is what I always expect from you; and your obliging condescension with regard to Buriton, the sale of which would place me in so desirable a situation, excites rather gratitude than surprize in my breast. I agree with you in wishing to refer the detail of this business to your correspondence with Lord Sheffield, who will weigh every circumstance and every objection, who will consider in the first place your satisfaction, and my interest in the second. Let me only say that the idea of a Mortgage was partly for your security and partly from an apprehension of trusting my whole fortune to the public credit; that such an investment of money unites, when it is carefully made, the solidity of land with the clear ready payment of the funds, and that I am not less averse than yourself to any connection, open or clandestine, with the member for Petersfield.
To-morrow I shall leave this place, where I have been detained much longer than I intended by an indisposition of poor Severy which prevented him from waiting on you at Bath. I dine to-morrow at Tunbridge-Wells with Lord North, reach Dover Sunday, pass the water, if possible, Monday, and repose myself at Lausanne about Wednesday sevennight the 30th instant. You are too well acquainted with the World and with me not to smile at the report of my approaching marriage, of which you might be sure of having the earliest and most direct information. Cadell is too discreet to have opened his mouth on a subject, on which for particular reasons we had mutually promised secrecy. The public, where it costs them nothing, are extravagantly liberal; yet I will allow with Dr. Johnson "that booksellers in this age are not the worst patrons of litterature."
I am, Dear Madam,
Ever yours,
E. G.