Mr. Williams's marriage to a kinswoman of his noble patron (as you
have heard was in treaty) is the next; and there is great reason to
believe, from the character of both, that they will likewise do credit
to the state.

The third is Mr. Adams and Polly Barlow; and I wish them, for both
their sakes, as happy as either of the former. They are set out to his
living, highly pleased with one another; and I hope will have reason
to continue so to be.

As to the first, I did not indeed think the affair would have been so
soon concluded; and Miss kept it off so long, as I understood, that
her papa was angry with her: and, indeed, as the gentleman's family,
circumstances, and character, were such, that there could lie no
objection against him, I think it would have been wrong to have
delayed it.

I should have written to your ladyship before; but have been favoured
with Mr. B.'s company into Kent, on a visit to my good mother, who was
indisposed. We tarried there a week, and left both my dear parents, to
my thankful satisfaction, in as good health as ever they were in their
lives.

Mrs. Judy Swynford, or Miss Swynford (as she refuses not being called,
now and then), has been with us for this week past; and she expects
her brother, Sir Jacob, to fetch her away in about a week hence.

It does not become me to write the least word that may appear
disrespectful of any person related to your ladyship and Mr. B.
Otherwise I should say, that the B----s and the S----s are directly
the opposites of one another. But yet, as she never saw your ladyship
but once, you will forgive me to mention a word or two about her,
because she is a character that is in a manner new to me.

She is a maiden lady, as you know, and though she will not part with
the green leaf from her hand, one sees by the grey-goose down on her
brows and her head, that she cannot be less than fifty-five. But so
much pains does she take, by powder, to have never a dark hair in her
head, because she has one half of them white, that I am sorry to see,
what is a subject for reverence, should be deemed, by the good lady,
matter of concealment.

She is often seemingly reproaching herself, that she is an _old maid_,
and an _old woman_; but it is very discernible, that she expects
a compliment, that she is _not so_, every time she is so free with
herself: and if nobody makes her one, she will say something of that
sort in her own behalf.

She takes particular care, t