MY EVER DEAREST,—I have received yours from Salisbury, and am glad to hear you came so farr well, with poore Jack. Ye shall be sure of my prairs, which is the best service I can doe you. I canott perceave whither you had receaved mine by Tom, or no, but I believe by this time you have mett that and another since by the post. Truly I have been out of frame ever since you went, not with a cough, but in another kinde, much indisposd. However, I have striven with it, and was at Church last Sunday, but not the former. I have been vexed with diverse demands made of money than I could satisfie, but I instantly paid what you sent, and have intreated Mr. Rous his patience a while longer, as you directed. It grieves me to think how chargeable your family is, considering your occasion. It hath this many yeares troubled me to think to what passe it must come at last, if it run on after this course. How many times what hath appeared hopefull, and yet proved contrary in the conclusion, hath befalen us, I am loth to urge, because tis farr from my desire to disturbe your thoughts; but this sore is not to be curd with silence, or patience either, and while you are loth to discourse or thinke of that you can take little comfort to see how bad it is, and I was unwilling to strike on that string which sounds harsh in your eare (the matter still grows worse, though). I can never putt it out of my thoughts, and that makes me often times seeme dreaming to you, when you expect I should sometimes observe more complement with my frends, or be more active in matters of curiousity in our House, which doubtlesse you would have been better pleasd with had I been capable to have performd it, and I believe though I had a naturall dullnes in me, it would never so much have appeard to my prejudice, but twas increasd by a continuance of sundry disasters, which I still mett with, yet never till this yeare, but I had some strength to encounter them, and truly now I am soe cleane overcome, as tis in vaine to deny a truth. It seems to me now tis high time to be sensible that God is displeased, having had many sad remembrances in our estate and childrene late, yet God spard us in our children long, and when I strive to follow your advice in moderating my grieffe (which I praise God) I have thus farr been able to doe as not to repine at God’s will, though I have a tender sence of griefe which hangs on me still, and I think it as dangerous and improper to forgett it, for I cannott but think it was a neer touched correction, sent from God to check me for my many neglects of my duty to God. It was the tenth and last plague God smote the Egyptians with, the death of their first borne, before he utterly destroyed them, they persisting in their disobedience notwithstanding all their former punishments. This apprehension