.--I told him how ill you
were, and communicated to him some of the contents of your letter. He
admired you, cursed Lovelace, and raved against all your family.--He
declared that they were all unworthy of you.

At his earnest request, I permitted him to take some brief notes of such
of the contents of your letter to me as I thought I could read to him;
and, particularly, of your melancholy conclusion.*

* See Letter XXXII. of this volume.

He says that none of your friends think you are so ill as you are; nor
will believe it. He is sure they all love you; and that dearly too.

If they do, their present hardness of heart will be the subject of
everlasting remorse to them should you be taken from us--but now it seems
[barbarous wretches!] you are to suffer within an inch of your life.

He asked me questions about Mr. Belford: and, when he had heard what I
had to say of that gentleman, and his disinterested services to you, he
raved at some villanous surmises thrown out against you by that officious
pedant, Brand: who, but for his gown, I find, would come off poorly enough
between your cousin and Lovelace.

He was so uneasy about you himself, that on Thursday, the 24th, he sent
up an honest serious man,* one Alston, a gentleman farmer, to inquire of
your condition, your visiters, and the like; who brought him word that
you was very ill, and was put to great straits to support yourself: but
as this was told him by the gentlewoman of the house where you lodge,
who, it seems, mingled it with some tart, though deserved, reflections
upon your relations' cruelty, it was not credited by them: and I myself
hope it cannot be true; for surely you could not be so unjust, I will
say, to my friendship, as to suffer any inconveniencies for want of
money. I think I could not forgive you, if it were so.

* See Letter XXIII. ibid.

The Colonel (as one of your trustees) is resolved to see you put into
possession of your estate: and, in the mean time, he has actually engaged
them to remit to him for you the produce of it accrued since your
grandfather's death, (a very considerable sum;) and proposes himself to
attend you with it. But, by a hint he dropt, I find you had disappointed
some people's littleness, by not writing to them for money and supplies;
since they were determined to distress you, and to put you at defiance.

Like all the rest!--I hope I may say that without offence.

Your cousin imagines that, before a