174—To the Hon. Augusta Leigh
Newstead Abbey, Aug'st 30th, 1811.
My Dear Augusta
,—I wrote to you yesterday, and as you will not be very sorry to hear from me again, considering our long separation, I shall fill up this sheet before I go to bed. I have heard something of a quarrel between your spouse and the Prince, I don't wish to pry into family secrets or to hear anything more of the matter, but I can't help regretting on your account that so long an intimacy should be dissolved at the very moment when your husband might have derived some advantage from his R. H.'s friendship. However, at all events, and in all Situations, you have a brother in me, and a home here.
I am led into this train of thinking by a part of your letter which hints at pecuniary losses. I know how delicate one ought to be on such subjects, but you are probably the only being on Earth
now
interested in my welfare, certainly the only relative, and I should be very ungrateful if I did not feel the obligation. You must excuse my being a little cynical, knowing how my
temper
was tried in my Non-age; the manner in which I was brought up must necessarily have broken a meek Spirit, or rendered a fiery one ungovernable; the effect it has had on mine I need not state.
However, buffeting with the World has brought me a little to reason, and two years travel in distant and barbarous countries has accustomed me to bear privations, and consequently to laugh at many things which would have made me angry before. But I am wandering —in short I only want to assure you that I love you, and that you must not think I am indifferent, because I don't shew my affection in the usual way.