Lady Hester Grenville to Miss Ann Pitt.
May I not hope, Dr Madam, that the situation I am in with your Brother will dispose you to receive favourably an Instance of the extreme desire I have to recommend myself to your friendship; and that You will give me Leave to employ the only means in my Power from the distance that is between us, of expressing how much I wish to enjoy that Honour. Every Thing makes me Ambitious of Obtaining so great an Advantage, and so flattering a distinction. Your Own peculiar Merit, and the Large share which you possess of Mr Pitt's Esteem and Affection makes me feel it as an Article important to my Happiness, and I indulge myself in the pleasure of thinking that you will not refuse to extend your goodness to a Person whom your Brother has thought worthy of so convincing a proof of his regard and Love, and whose sentiments for Him are full of all that the highest sense of his superior Merit and most amiable qualities can Inspire. I feel a vanity and a pleasure in being the Object of his Choice which can be added to by nothing but the happiness of knowing that you give your Approbation and that you will allow me to flatter myself You will not be sorry for an Event which will give me the valued privilege of addressing you the next time, I have the honour to be thus employ'd, by the endearing name of Sister. Give me leave to say that I have heard with the greatest regret that your state of health does not permit you to return to England this winter, and that I hope as a compensation for the Disappointment your stay will ensure yr perfect recovery. I commit this Letter to Yr Brs Care, and trust to Him for conveying it to you, sure that the best recommendation it can have will be its coming under his protection; accompanied with Marks of His Partiality; and I hope that you will believe Dr Madam, that I am with all the esteem possible, and the highest regard,
Your most faithful and Obed. Humble Servant,
Her: Grenville.
In the next letters Pitt and Lady Hester acknowledge Ann's congratulations. He had, however, moved to London, and amid all these orange-blossoms was forging terrible vengeance on his perfidious chief. Within ten days of his marriage he was making Newcastle and Newcastle's henchmen cower in their offices, though for the present they did not dare oust him from his.
Pay Office. Nov. 8th. 1754.
Dear Sister,—Your letter of the 1st Novr has given me all that remain'd to Compleat my happiness, by the affectionate Share you take in it; and without which, great as it truly is, and shar'd in the kindest manner by every Thing else I value and love in the World, it still wou'd have wanted something ever essential to my Satisfaction. Your Goodness and Friendship has nothing left to give me: Cou'd the re-establishment of your health but add that most sensible Pleasure to all I feel, I may call myself happy, as it is given but to a few to be. Lady Hester Grenville speaks for herself this Post. my Health is not good, but, as yet, it is not quite bad. I have gone on with the World (as I cou'd) with much worse.
I am Dear Sister Your most affectionate Brother
W. Pitt.
I hope in about a week to say more of my happiness.
Lady Hester's letter is not worth giving; it is prim, decorous, and void.
Pitt and Lady Hester are married on November 16. Lady Hester writes to Ann nine days afterwards a letter full of good feeling stiffened and starched by decorum. Some letters are too improper to print, this is too proper.
Ann was now returning home, and Mary goes to meet her with a note of welcome from William. Lord Camelford says that her health and spirits declined grievously in France, and so her brother, 'though not till after repeated notifications of her distress, sent over a clergyman to bring her back to her family and assist in her journey.' This gives us a test of Camelford's bias in dealing with his uncle. For hear Ann herself, in a letter to Lady Suffolk announcing that she was on her way to England, and had arrived as far as Sens, whence she writes. Speaking of William, she says, 'he continued as he began, as soon as the King had put him in the place he is in, by giving me the strongest and tenderest proof of his affection.... I was so sunk and my mind so overcome with all I have suffered, and I was so mortified and distressed, that I do not believe anything in the world could have made it possible for me to get out of this country, but my brother's sending a friend to my assistance, and choosing so proper a person as Mr de la Porte is in all respects. He has known me and my family for about thirty years, from having been my Lord Stanhope's Governor.' She goes on to refer to 'the virtue and goodness of my friends, particularly of my brother, who has always seemed to guess and understand all I felt of every kind, and has carried his delicacy so far as never once to put me in mind of what I felt more strongly than any other part of my misfortune, which was, how very disagreeable and embarrassing it must be to him to have me in France, You may believe that I will be out of it the first minute that is possible.'
So the fact is that the man, whom Camelford endeavours to depict as having acted with hardness and insensibility on this occasion, displayed in reality incessant and delicate tenderness, according to the grateful acknowledgment of Ann herself. Pitt had just attained his supremacy; this was the most critical epoch of his life; all the year he had been fighting the King and the Court, and this was the moment of victory. Eleven days before Ann wrote this letter he had become for the second time Secretary of State and had begun his great ministry. During this time of strain and anxiety he heard of Ann's illness; he must have felt strongly, though he refrained from mentioning it to her, the irksomeness of her being in France when he was waging war against that kingdom, and so he sent an old family friend to conduct her home. Could brother have done more? Is there not here an anxious and thoughtful affection, distorted grievously by the implacable animosity of the nephew? Camelford is, however, obliged to record that on her arrival she went straight to Pitt's villa at Hayes, 'where, tho' her spirits were still weak, she was surprisingly recovered.'
There is no date to the following note which Mary was to hand to Ann. But as Ann's letter to Lady Suffolk cited above is of July 10, 1757, we cannot be far wrong in placing it somewhat later in the same month. It is indeed perplexing to find another letter to Lady Suffolk dated 'Spa, September 5, 1757.' But the year 1757 is a surmise, and in all probability an incorrect surmise, of the editor. Ann was hastening to England in July 1757, stayed some time at Hayes on her arrival, and is not likely to have been on the Continent again in September.
Friday Morning.
Dear Sister,—I Can not let my Sister Mary go away without a line to express my infinite satisfaction to hear you are arrived and that you find your strength and Spirits in so good a condition. at the same time let a Veteran Invalide recommend to you, above all things, to use this returning Strength and Spirits very sparingly at first. I shou'd be happy to accompany Miss Mary to Rochester, but the overwhelming business of this Momentous Conjuncture hardly allow (sic) me time to tell you how impatiently and tenderly I wish to embrace my Dear Sister.[84]