Anne Whitaker, Bratton, to Maria Grace Saffery, Salisbury, Wednesday [c. January 1818].

Wednesday Evening

My dear Maria

   I was greatly relieved by your letter which I obtained last night for indeed my capacity of sympathizing with you under your late malady is much increased by a monthly painful experience during the Autumn – my fears respecting you run high from the mournful description by our good brother on Sunday. But I now hope the worst is past.  My cough still remains though my general health is certainly amended – it is one of the most obstinate I ever endured.

   You seem anxious to know my sentiments with regard to the Ravenscrofts or rather of the < > you have taken in offering them an opportunity of communication with you.  I can only say on this very delicate subject that I am not at all disposed to question the propriety of your measures or the purity of your motives – should any good result I shall rejoice with you and I do not perceive any evil that is likely to accrue at least of any magnitude. I am pained to find that no salutary change is visible in either of them; you know I feel a good deal of partiality for the gentleman – whose urbanity and whose manners captivated my youthful mind & many years since – but now to a still more interesting subject, I mean to the dear children I had waited with my natural impatience to hear your plan when you should have arranged it respecting the dear boys, and when Carey was sent down I had hoped it was to stay though I carefully avoided hinting anything of the kind to him for fear of producing irritation or disappointment as it now is ordered I hope all may be well. I shall only venture one remark which is that the entire grammar School plan pursued at Mill Hill seems unfortunate for the dear boy who is confined in the exercise of his understanding, to that for which he has no natural taste – and in which it is not probable he will make any great proficiency.  I am happy < > to observe that he is not deficient in general faculties and that the inquisitive cast of his mind and docility of his disposition render him a hopeful and interesting subject of instruction – We have been much pleased with him and entertained by the sprightliness of his conversation which is happily removed from his loquacity on the one hand and dulness and insipidity on the other – poor fellow! I cannot but think that those occasional fits of ill-humour which have given you so much uneasiness as to be attributed principally to an unhappy temperature and an excessive sensibility in which his judgment is but too ill-informed to govern.  Samuel and Carey have shed many tears of regret that they were not to remain together though they have concealed it as much as may be from me  I supposed their being so much separated increases rather than abates their affection for each other.

   You will expect me perhaps to say something about my little Anne but really I do not know how to enter on this subject by letter – there are unhappily between her and me but few points of agreement and whether at home or abroad there does not seem to be a propensity to cultivate those dispositions or faculties which would < > useful or agreeable to me while < > opposite to Fancy those scenes < > rapid advance.  I do not think I cannot < > I should cling to her with a too partial < > of pertinacious disobedience and a total opposition in thinking and feeling did not render it impossible.

   She has I believe just improved in the continuing business of the School and has certainly sufficient capacity. I carefully avoided contentions with her through the holy days on account of my own < >.

   I hope you will < > dear Jane < > I could not but think her deficient in both < > spirits – when she first arrives  Anne’s health appears to be much improved.

   As I understand Miss Salter is much interested in astronomical observations – I have sent Edwards diagrams – as they may perhaps assist her – I will not vouch for their correctness – Ned is apt to blunder.

   I am glad to find your School is on the increase  I hope dr Charlotte’s spirits will be adequate to her engagements. She is a very interesting person – < >

                                             A Whitaker

Text: Timothy Whelan, gen. ed., Nonconformist Women Writers, 1720-1840 (London: Pickering & Chatto, 2011), vol. 6, pp. 368-69 (annotated version); Reeves Collection, Box 20.2.(g.), Bodleian. Address: Mrs Saffery. No postmark.