BIB_ID
437422
Accession number
MA 14300.440
Display Date
England, London 1847? January 15
Credit line
Bequest of Gordon N. Ray, 1987.
Description
1 item (4 pages) ; 20.7 x 13 cm
Notes
Written from the "Atheneaum".
Addressed to "My dearest R".
First portion of letter, lacking signature.
Year of writing suggested by the writer's commentary on the "Spanish match", presumably referring to the "Affair of the Spanish Marriages", a series of intrigues between France, Spain, and Great Britain in 1846 concerning the marriages of Queen Isabella II of Spain and her sister the infanta Luisa Fernanda.
Addressed to "My dearest R".
First portion of letter, lacking signature.
Year of writing suggested by the writer's commentary on the "Spanish match", presumably referring to the "Affair of the Spanish Marriages", a series of intrigues between France, Spain, and Great Britain in 1846 concerning the marriages of Queen Isabella II of Spain and her sister the infanta Luisa Fernanda.
Provenance
Bequest of Gordon N. Ray, 1987.
Summary
Acknowledging receipt of a letter, promising to see Knight "on the matter of Corneille" and to "ask at Ridgeway's about 'France and her Government'", which he will send with Dr. Spurstowe "when Dr. Spurstowe comes out, which I hear will be in another ten days or so"; questioning whether "it will be quite fair to make Jarnac frank a book, your seditious book, I mean, which is contraband in France."; writing that he saw "our dear Mrs. Willy", and that "She has suffered a good deal, and is still very feeble", and that "My god daughter [i.e. Mrs. Willy's child] weighs 10 pounds which I am proud of", with a small, simple sketch of the baby illustrating the writer's description of the child within the text of the letter at the head of the third page; remarking "I am glad your affair with John Knox is arranged-and to your satisfaction"and wondering how her views and those of Knox could ever be reconciled, adding "Money is of no religion-or rather is of all"; stating that he is surprised how "Knight and my Lord have managed to fall out" as"the two men who quarrel with everybody else" should be "best fitted to agree together"; responding to her inquiries as to his thoughts on the "Spanish match and Crakow and whether we were to be at war", and stating that he thinks "we English have played the fools to an extent almost unconcievable, even of a Whig ministry ... That you French have played the rogue a leetle I don't deny, but that is what all nations do, when they can. But to make a clutter about an old treaty ... when all the world knew that no House of Commons would ever let us go to war about such Trumpery - and then to content ourselves with protesting forsooth - and then to have our protest spit upon ... And then to see the Arbitrary Northern Powers just take advantage of our hot blood with France ..."
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