MADAM,
Your much obliged friend,
and most obedient
humble servant,
HESTER CHAPONE.
LIFE
OF
HESTER CHAPONE.
Among the illustrious women whose literary productions adorned and improved the age in which they appeared, and are likely to be transmitted with reputation to posterity, Mrs. Chapone is entitled to distinguished consideration. However, incited by the persuasions and encouraged by the applauses of Richardson, she had many prejudices to encounter, many impediments to overcome. Female writers, always severely scrutinized, and often condemned, had not then obtained the estimation they have since commanded.
Hester Mulso, better known as Chapone, was the daughter of Thomas Mulso, Esq. of Twywell, in Northamptonshire; who, in the year 1719, married the posthumous daughter of Colonel Thomas, of the Guards. She lived long enough to see the last props of an ancient and towering family fall to the dust.
Of the immediate connections of Mr. Mulso, his elder sister, Anne, was married to the Rev. Dr. Donne, formerly Prebendary of Canterbury; and the younger, Susanna, to the brother of his own wife, the Rev. Dr. John Thomas, who was preceptor to his Majesty King George III., and who successively held the bishoprics of Peterborough, Salisbury, and Winchester. Mr. Mulso had himself several children; but of these only five lived to grow up, and even of the five, Charles, his third son, who was an officer in the navy, died, in the Mediterranean, at the age of twenty-one.
Thomas, the eldest of Mr. Mulso's sons, was bred to the law; and, for some years, he went the Oxford circuit. He declined legal practice on coming to the possession of his paternal inheritance; but was afterwards made Registrar of Peterborough, and a Commissioner of Bankrupts. He published, in 1768, 'Calistus, or the Man of Fashion;' and 'Sophronius, or the Country Gentleman.' Thomas was the elect brother of Mrs. Chapone. He died early in February, 1799; and, as his death was not thought near, she lost, in him, the tie that bound her to life.