“I have the honour to acknowledge the receipt of your letter respecting ‘The Windsor Auxiliary Bible Society,’ on which the Queen was last year pleased to bestow her patronage, which I have submitted to the Queen, and though Her Majesty does not usually grant a donation to those institutions to which Her Majesty’s patronage only has been given, yet, the Queen, taking into her consideration that the establishment in question is in the immediate neighbourhood of Windsor Castle, has been pleased to direct me to forward twenty guineas as a donation. I beg to enclose a draft for that sum, and request you will have the goodness to acknowledge its receipt. “I have the honour to be, “Your most obedient servant, “H. WHEATLEY.” This letter was conveyed to me by the person addressed, who added the following note:— “I wrote to Sir H. Wheatley about a donation from the Queen to the Bible Society. I have received a satisfactory answer, and a draft for twenty guineas. If it meets your approbation, I would wish that the fact should not be known to any but ourselves just now. At the present moment the country is so _party-mad_, and there is such a determination to catch at anything for party purposes, that I am anxious to avoid giving a handle of any sort to either side in a matter which has no real reference to politics. I only wrote last week from Wales, and got an immediate answer, which I have acknowledged, saying, at the same time, that at the anniversary meeting a more official acknowledgment will be sent. “I remain, “Yours truly, “GODOLPHIN OSBORNE.” This letter sheds light on the state of public feeling existing at that day.