TO THEODOSIA.
Philadelphia, 31st March, 1794.
I am distressed at your loss of time. I do not, indeed, wholly blame you for it, but this does not diminish my regret. When you want punctuality in your letters, I am sure you want it in every thing; for you will constantly observe that you have the most leisure when you do the most business. Negligence of one's duty produces a self-dissatisfaction which unfits the mind for every thing, and ennui and peevishness are the never-failing consequences. You will readily discover the truth of these remarks by reflecting on your own conduct, and the different feelings which have flowed from a persevering attention to study, or a restless neglect of it.
I shall in a few days (this week) send you a most beautiful assortment of flower-seeds and flowering shrubs. If I do not receive a letter from you to-morrow, I shall be out of all patience. Every day's journal will, I hope, say something of mamma.
A. BURR.
TO THEODOSIA.
Philadelphia, 7th June, 1794.
I have received my dear Theo.'s two little, very little, French letters. The last left you tormented with headache and toothache, too much for one poor little girl to suffer at one time, I am sure: you had doubtless taken solue sudden cold. You must fight them as well as you can till I come, and then I will engage to keep them at bay.
I remark that you do not acknowledge the receipt of a long letter which I wrote you on the road the night after I left New-York. I hope it has not missed you; but it is needless now to ask about it, for I shall certainly see you before I could receive your answer to this.
Whatever you shall translate of Terence, I beg you to have copied in a book in a very fair handwriting.