BIB_ID
362892
Accession number
MA 43.1
Creator
Burns, Robert, 1759-1796.
Display Date
1788 July 18.
Credit line
Purchased by Pierpont Morgan, 1902.
Description
1 item (3 p., with address) ; 32.4 cm
Notes
"Not printed" and "C85" written between the date and the body of the letter on p. [1] in an unknown hand.
Addressed to "Mr. Peter Hill / Bookseller / Parliament Cross / Edinr." Also marked "Single" by Burns.
Docketed "Robert Burns / Mauchline 18 July / 1788." Also with the notes "18 July 1788 / Mr. Peter / Hill" and "Folio 20" in two different hands.
Part of a collection of ten autograph letters signed from Robert Burns to Peter Hill. Letters in the collection are described in individual records (MA 43.1-10).
Part of p. [3-4] is cut away.
Watermark: crowned lion with wheat sheaf and taper within crowned circle, motto PRO PATRIA.
With postmark (Mauchline) and trace of a seal.
Addressed to "Mr. Peter Hill / Bookseller / Parliament Cross / Edinr." Also marked "Single" by Burns.
Docketed "Robert Burns / Mauchline 18 July / 1788." Also with the notes "18 July 1788 / Mr. Peter / Hill" and "Folio 20" in two different hands.
Part of a collection of ten autograph letters signed from Robert Burns to Peter Hill. Letters in the collection are described in individual records (MA 43.1-10).
Part of p. [3-4] is cut away.
Watermark: crowned lion with wheat sheaf and taper within crowned circle, motto PRO PATRIA.
With postmark (Mauchline) and trace of a seal.
Provenance
George Wilson, grandson of Peter Hill; purchased by Pierpont Morgan from the London dealer Pearson, 1902.
Summary
Explaining that he has not been able to write because of his "young wife -- Good God, Sir, could my dearest BROTHER expect a regular correspondence from me! -- I who am busied with the sacred Pen of Nature, in the mystic Volume of Creation"; thanking Hill for his congratulations on Burns's marriage; reporting that the book Hill sent him arrived safely, and asking him to acquire additional books including [Tobias] Smollett's Peregrine Pickle, Launcelot Greaves, and Ferdinand Count Fathom; [William] Cowper's Poems; and a subscription to "Bankes's new & complete Christian's family bible" if it has good engravings; promising to write more promptly in the future.
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