I thank my dear sister kindly for her friendlinesse and compashin; butt, ah, he is gone, and their semes to be no plesure or comforte on this erth without him! onlie a littel childe of 6 yeres, and yett so dere a creetur to this harte that the worlde is emty and lonely without him.

M.droopes sadly, and is more ailing everry day.
Indede, my dere Ruth, I see nothing butt sorrow before me, and I wou'd be right gladd to lay down at peece in my littel M.'s grave." I can find no actual announcements of death, only sad allusions here and there.

I fancy the majority of Matthew's letters must have been lost, for the dates of those confided to my hands are very far apart, and there is evidence in all of them of other correspondence.

After the letter alluding to little M.'s death, there is a hiatus of eight years.
Then comes a letter with the post-mark London very clear, from which I transcribe an extract.

"_October 4th_, 1759.