Maria Grace Saffery, Salisbury, to Philip J. Saffery, April 1826.

Dear Philip,

   I have your letter – your book – your request – your message – at the first I look as at the loss of a Series, with some very deep emotion – at the second, with a tender Sentiment and longing Eye toward the injured “Boys band” – at the third, with a patient design to oblige you – at the fourth I mean the expression of love that was to be particularly mentioned with hope that sighs itself into prayer for a blessing. Adieu dear Philip in thy yet unmingled character of Child! Adieu!  I hear the voice of departed years blessing thee in the accents of thy father’s love, and the Echo from thy Mothers heart vibrates with their long Amen.

                                 M. G. Saffery 

April 1826. Wednesday Morng

   Mr Draper comes. Say everything to every body – I am going to arrange your books &c – and the box for Weymouth is packing –

   Jane has just left the room – begging me to find language from the heart of a Sister to suit a moment of subduing recollections  Imagine then what a heart so tender, and so delicate, would convey to you if you could listen to the gentle whisper. 

Text: Saffery/Whitaker Papers, acc. 142, II.A.3.(a.), Angus Library, Regent's Park College, Oxford. No address page. For an annotated version of this letter, see Timothy Whelan, gen. ed., Nonconformist Women Writers, 1720-1840 (London: Pickering & Chatto, 2011), vol. 6, pp. 401-02. P. J. Saffery (1800-69) would succeed his father at Brown Street in 1826, remaining there until 1836, when he removed to Leeds, working as a field representative for the BMS. In 1845 he moved to Waltham Abbey, eventually leaving the Baptist Missionary Society to perform a similar service for the Religious Tract Society. His final years were spent in Hammersmith.