I recieved your favor of the 3d three days since it gave me real pleasure as you appear to be in good spirits and write much more cheerfully than you have done some time past—1

I was much surprized at the change you mention in Mrs. Whitcombs person she wrote Caroline she had been unwell but I did not think she had been seriously sick—

I have just done reading Madame de Staals new Novel which makes so much noise in the fashionable world. I scarcely dare form much more give an opinion of it the language is most beautiful but the morals appear to me detestable her characters appear to me to be very much overdrawn and the faults of her hero and heroine are so dressed as to wear the semblance of virtue I wish very much that you would read it as there are several letters in it which I should like to know your oponion of one of these letters is on the subject of divorce it is in general much approved but it strikes me in a very different light in this letter she asks how it is possible if we represent the Deity to ourselves as merciful and good to imagine that any vows can bind us during life upon this idea she recommends every body to divorce as soon as they upon trial find that there dispositions do not accord this letter is I am told very much admired I think I must have misundertood it very much for it appears to me calculated to destroy every moral principal to destroy every tie which binds society together—2

Mr: & Mrs. Law are really seperated She says she has made a Vow never to live with him and he has very generously declared her insanity to be the cause of his parting from Mrs. L. retires into the Country though she says only for a time Mr. L. goes to England and the child is to be taken from her mother and placed at a Boarding School this is setting the opinion of the world at defiance3 I never 373 wish to court it but I should dread it too much ever to set it at defiance—

Adieu my beloved friend write me soon and indulge me by reading this book though the last Vol. is Sentiment on stilts I am sure your mother would like to read it and it would afford her great amusement do not let any one see what I write you as it would destroy all the pleasure I feel when writing to you and though I am now a wretched correspondent time and a sincere desire to please may improve me—

Our Children are both well I have wean’d John and have got over this painful business without much difficulty he has never slept from me one night—

Our family are all pretty well Harriet is so much reduced she is now thinner than I am however she does not complain they all desire to be remember’d to yourself and friends time rolls heavily along my beloved friend and this delightful season seems to me to have lost its greatest charm it is my own fault and I must not complain Adieu believe me most sincerely and affectionately yours

Had You been no other than the private inhabitant of Montecello, I should e’er this time have addrest you, with that Sympathy, which a recent event has awakend in my Bosom. but reasons of various 374 kinds withheld my pen, untill the powerfull feelings of my heart, have burst through the restraint, and called upon me to shed the tear of sorrow over the departed remains, of Your beloved and deserving Daughter, an event Which I most Sincerely mourn.1

The attachment which I formed for her, when you committed her to my care; upon her arrival in a foreign Land:2 has remained with me to this hour, and the recent account of her death, which I read in a late paper, brought fresh to my remembrance the Strong Sensibility She discoverd, tho but a child of nine years of age at having been seperated from her Friends, and country, and brought, as she expressed it, “to a strange land amongst Strangers.” the tender Scene of her Seperation from me, rose to my recollection, when She clung around my neck and wet my Bosom with her tears, Saying, “o! now I have learnt to Love You. why will they tear me from You”3

It has been some time Since that I conceived of any event in this Life, which could call forth, feelings of Mutual Sympathy. but I know how closely entwined arround a Parents heart, are those Chords which bind the filial to the parental Bosom, and when snaped assunder, how agonizing the pangs of Seperation

I have tasted the bitter cup, and bow with reverence, and humility before the great Dispenser of it, without whose permission, and over ruling Providence; not a sparrow falls to the Ground.4 that You may derive comfort and consolation in this Day of your sorrow and affliction, from that only Source calculated to heal the wounded heart—a firm belief in the Being perfections and attributes of God, is the Sincere and ardent wish of her, Who once took pleasure in / Subscribing / Herself Your Friend