William Steele, [Salisbury], to Mary Steele, Yeovil, Friday morning, [8 October 1773].

   Two Lines just to acquaint My Dear Polly that I had a very pleasant Journey hither Yesterday and arriv’d before Sunset thro’ Mercy in good health & so little fatigued that I went to hear the Oratorio of Sampson (it being St Cecilia) and was greatly delighted with it.

   I am now just setting out homewards and hope by Ten o’Clock to have the pleasure of the Company of our dear Friends at peaceful Broughton from whence I hope to write to you soon, and am My Dear Girls ever Affectionate Father

                                             W Steele

Saturday Morn

Text: Timothy Whelan, ed., Nonconformist Women Writers, 1720-1840, 8 vols.  (London: Pickering & Chatto, 2011), vol. 3, pp. 236-37 (annotated version); STE 4/5/xxvi, Steele Collection, Angus Library, Regent's Park College, Oxford. Address: Miss Steele / at Mr Geo: Bullock’s / Yeovil / Somerset. William Steele has written the date as the 9th, but it is actually the 8th. 

The musical performance of Handel’s oratorio, Samson, was part of the annual Salisbury Music Festival, which was celebrated from 6-8 October 1773. Samson was performed on Friday evening, the 7th, at the Assembly Rooms; the ticket price was 5 shillings. A reviewer for the Salisbury and Winchester Journal wrote that the performance “met with universal applause: Signora Graffi sung several songs, and was much admired; Mr. Bach favoured the company with an elegant performance on the harpsichord; Mr. Fischar played some of his choicest concertos every night on the hautboy, and met with the highest approbation ... We must not omit to do justice to the merits of Miss Storace, who sung several songs with great spirit and judgment, and shewed uncommon signs of an early genius for music” (see Salisbury and Winchester Journal, 20 September 1773, p. 3; 11 October 1773, p. 3). The oratorio, based on Milton’s Samson Agonistes, was first performed in London in 1743.  St. Cecelia was the patron saint of musicians, but the reference is not to St. Cecelia’s day, which would have been Monday 22 November.  Two years later, Jane Attwater attended the same festival, hearing Handel’s Messiah on 5 October 1775 in the Cathedral. She writes, “Ye musick was noble & ye words more so & if ye hearts of ye musicians & their auditors where rightly ingaged in it twas a noble performance but as to my self I have no just reason to complain – If ye faint sounds wch ye best of mortals can give to his praise is so delightful & on Earth so much tending to exalt ye mind what are those anthems wch are sung above where perfect harmony resides & where discord knows no place?  May I whilst in ye journey of Life be fitted for yt blest abode & at last have an abundant Entrance through Jesus ye blessed Messiah who reigns triumphant above & who will Crown his people with the mild beams of comforting Strength[en]ings & Sanctifying grace here and at last with glory in the regions of never ending Felicity.”