“My father often talks of the Doctor and you and withall knows that I love you, nay he himself loves you and will be glad to see you here; and now if ever you had any kindness for me, if ever I did or said anything to give you either delight or pleasure, let it not be in vain that I now ask, nor torture me with silence and suspense; by so doing you will lay the highest obligations on one who is in every sense of the word “Your sincere lover “J Strutt.” This proposal elicited the following equally characteristic reply:— “Elizabeth Woollatt to Jedediah Strutt. “addressed to “M^r Jedediah Strutt at Blackwell “to be left at the Bull Inn, Mansfield “London Feby 15^{th} “1755 “Yours of the third came safe, which I would have answered before but had not presence of mind enough for some time to lay it before my master; at length a favourable opportunity offering itself, my resolution got the better of my fear, and, after a short introduction gave him your letter which he said showed you to be a man of sense and he thought of honour and honesty; but as to himself he was so surprised, disconcerted and uneasy as I never saw him, and for some time would say nothing more to me. At length he became able to talk freely on that head, bid me consult my own happiness and not think what he suffered. He then offered to make me independent, that so after his death, I might live where I pleased, not at all intending that as a dissuasive from accepting your generous offer, but as a means to prevent my being influenced by any other motive than that alone which is essential to the most lasting, most perfect happiness. “Such, such is the behaviour of this god-like man; may he meet all the reward that such beneficence deserves in both worlds. “As to myself was I possessed of any desirable qualification, and had I enjoyed the greatest affluence, I should not then hesitate a moment, but comply with whatever you will desire; but my consciousness of my own inferiority in points of fortune as well as anything else, makes me extremely fearful that you should find cause to repent, when it is too late; if this should be the case, what I must suffer from what in me is the least occasion of pain to you, is not for me to say; but be this as it will, you are and ever will be entitled to the best wishes of your most humble servant “E. Woollat. “My service to your father I wish I better deserved his good opinion.”