"Why, Fanny, what are you about, and where are you? I shall write at you, not knowing how to write to you, as Swift did to the flying and romantic Lord Peterborough."
Miss Burney to Mrs. Phillips.
"Friday, May 31, Chessington.
"My dearest Fredy, in the beginning of her knowledge of this transaction, told me that Mr. Lock was of opinion that the £100 per annum might do, as it does for many a curate. M. d'A. also most solemnly and affectingly declares that le simple nécessaire is all he requires, and here, in your vicinity, would unhesitatingly be preferred by him to the most brilliant fortune in another séjour.
"If he can say that, what must I be not to echo it? I, who in the bosom of my most chosen, most darling friends——"
Dr. Burney to Miss Burney.
"May 1793.
"Dear Fanny,—I have for some time seen very plainly that you are éprise, and have been extremely uneasy at the discovery. You must have observed my silent gravity, surpassing that of mere illness and its consequent low spirits. I had some thoughts of writing to Susan about it, and intended begging her to do what I must now do for myself—that is, beg, warn, and admonish you not to entangle yourself in a wild and romantic attachment which offers nothing in prospect but poverty and distress, with future inconvenience and unhappiness...."
From Madame d'Arblay to Mrs. ——.
"August 2, 1793.