My beloved Sidney,
I find age and infirmities are advancing a-pace upon me. My last illness shook me severely, and has left a memorandum of what I may expect in the next visit it makes me. Your family cares are now so much enlarged, that I cannot expect, nor do I desire that you should undertake a journey to Sidney-castle to pay me a short visit; yet, my dear, as you are the comfort of my age, I cannot, in the present precarious state of my health, bear to be at such a distance from you; while God permits me strength I will lay hold of his bounty, and endeavour to get to London. You have told me that you are not conveniently circumstanced at South-park as to room; I will not therefore incommode you, but shall content myself with waiting your arrival in town, at your house in St. James’s-street; but do not hasten your departure from the country on this account. I am in no immediate danger, my dear, only willing to lay hold of an interval of health, to get nearer to you. If God prolongs my life, what joy will it be to me to spend next winter with my darling, and her dear good Arnold, and to feast my eyes with my lovely grandchildren!
If I am called from you, I shall have the comfort of my child’s affectionate hands to close my eyes; and shall leave the world without regret, as I have lived to see my Sidney happy in the arms of a good man, who will supply the loss of parents, and unite in himself those tender ties which nature must soon dissolve.
My prayers for yours, and my dear son’s prosperity, I never fail to offer up to Heaven. Your brother George is with me, and desires to be remembered to you; he purposes staying here the greatest part of the winter.
As I hope to reach London by the latter end of the week, direct your next to me at your own house in town.
I am,
My dear love,
Your most sincerely,
affectionate mother,
Dorothy Bidulph.
My heart is bursting—O Cecilia! What will become of my fond, my dear, venerable parent, when she finds this daughter, this comfort of her age, this beloved of her soul, a poor abandoned outcast; lost to her husband’s love, turned out of his doors, despised, disgraced! My children too—I must leave them behind—My God, for what calamities hast thou ordained thy creature! Tears, tears, you may well flow!
So! I am relieved, and will endeavour to fortify my soul against the two events, that appear to me horrid as an approaching execution to a guilty wretch, the parting with my children, and the meeting with my mother. As the letter I wrote will miss of her at Sidney-castle, I shall write to London, to prepare her to receive the wretch whom her imagination has figured to her so happy.
Lady V—! I hear her coming up stairs—I cannot conceal my affliction, nor my disgrace.