The heat of the summer while we remained at Butler Place was something quite indescribable, and hardly varied at all for several weeks, either night or day, from between 90 and 100 degrees.
People sat up all night at their windows in town; and as for me, more than once, in sheer desperation, after trying to sleep on a cane sofa under the piazza, I wandered about more than half the night, on the gravel walks of the garden, bare-footed,—et dans le simple appareil d'une beauté qu'on vient d'arracher au sommeil.
We tried to sleep upon everything in vain,—Indian matting was as hot as woolen blankets. At last I laid a piece of oilcloth on my bed, without even as much as a sheet over it, and though I could not sleep, obtained as much relief from the heat as to be able to lie still. It was terrible!...
I have been for two months up here, not having been allowed to go to the Virginia springs, on account of the difficulty of carrying my children there; but I am promised that we shall all go there next summer, when there is to be something like a passable road, by which the health-giving region may be approached....
I have an earnest desire to return to Europe in the autumn—not to stay in England, unless my father should be there, but to go to him, wherever he may be, and to spend a little time with my sister.... All this, however, lies far ahead, and God knows what at present invisible prospects may reveal and develop themselves on the surface of the future, as a nearer light falls on it....
My youngest child's accomplishments are hitherto unaccompanied by a syllable of speech or utterance, and the idea sometimes occurs to me whether a child of mine could have enough genius to be dumb.
Good-bye, my dearest Harriet.
Ever affectionately yours,
F. A. B.
Butler Place, October 10th, 1839.