My dear Thompson,
Your welcome Letter was forwarded to me here To day.
I feel sure that the Lady I once saw at the Deanery is all you say; and you believe of me, as I believe of myself, that I don’t deal in Compliment, unless under very strong Compulsion. I suppose, as Master of Trinity you could not do otherwise than marry, and so keep due State and Hospitality there: and I do think you could not have found one fitter to share, and do, the honours. And if (as I also suppose) there is Love, or Liking, or strong Sympathy, or what not? why, all looks well. Be it so!
I had not heard of Spedding’s entering into genteel House-keeping till your Letter told me of it. I suppose he will be a willing Victim to his Kinsfolk.
A clerical Brother in law of mine has lost his own whole Fortune in four of these Companies which have gone to smash. Nor his own only. For, having, when he married my Sister, insisted on having half her Income tied to him by Settlement, that half lies under Peril from the ‘Calls’ made upon him as Shareholder.
At Genus Humanum damnat Caligo Futuri.
So I, trusting in my Builder’s Honesty, have a Bill sent in about one third bigger than it should be.
All which rather amuses me, on the whole, though I spit out a Word now and then: and indeed am getting a Surveyor to overhaul the Builder: a hopeless Process, I believe all the while.
Meanwhile, I go about in my little Ship, where I do think I have two honest Fellows to deal with.
We have just been boarding a Woodbridge Vessel that we met in these Roads, and drinking a Bottle of Blackstrap round with the Crew.