I received last Wednesday your letter of the 16th of October, and
could scarcely have thought that any one from you could give me
so much uneasiness as this has done. I have let slip one post in
order to consider it with more attention, and I believe I must visit
again every thing I have seen, or seemed to see, in the intermediate
days. I must own, Dear Sir, that I am frightened both when I look
back, and when I look forwards. A mortgage of £10,000 contracted
about six years ago, £1200 taken out of Hervey's hands; and now an
urgent necessity of selling one of our very best estates! Where
must this end? Believe me, Dear Sir, I am very far from meaning the
smallest reproach. I am convinced that all these measures have been
dictated by necessity, and that this necessity has been occasioned
by the intricacy of affairs, the iniquity of men, and a variety of
accidents over which prudence has no power. But this very conviction
encreases my uneasiness. What may be one day my fate without half
your knowledge of business, and deprived of all those ressources
which you must have found in living so many years in the Country, and
in managing and improving your estate? With less æconomy and perhaps
more wants, I may very easily find my way to a Gaol.
Notwithstanding all this, Dear Sir, I am very sensible of the unhappy
difficulties of Otway's affair, and both duty and inclination would
engage me to submit to every thing in order to extricate you from it.
But for a sum which is not very considerable, will it be necessary to
sell an Estate which I have heard you often speak of as the clearest
and most valuable you are in possession of? If it is absolutely
necessary to sell something, would it not be better to endeavour to
part with Putney? I speak, Dear Sir, very much at random for want
of knowing the respective values of the Estates, and what you are
offered for Lenborough.[83] Indeed without some such knowledge I can
scarcely say anything positive upon the subject; more than that, if
you still persist in that scheme, it would be very difficult for me
to dispute any thing that you think expedient, or conducive to your
own ease and happiness.
But in that case, Dear Sir, should you think the following
conditions unreasonable?--1st. That upon the sale of the estate,
after discharging the mortgage and deducting £1200 for Otway's
affair, the residue of the money should be paid into a banker's hands
and be lodged in the funds in our joint names. The interests should
be solely yours, and we should have what we have so often desired,
a sum of money ready for any emergency, and sufficient to execute
any plan, either of bringing me into Parliament, or any thing else.
Surely, Dear Sir, this scheme is preferable to purchasing more land.
Have not we enough already? The only thing that hurts me in this
proposal is the air of distrust it seems to carry with it. Believe
me, Dear Sir, when I say that I can as little doubt of your care and
regard for me as of my own, and that if I take any precautions, they
are such only, as I should think it equally prudent to take against
myself. My other condition would be the same which I mentioned
last year, that of changing my annuity into a rent charge upon the
estate, and permitting me to convert that into another annuity which
I apprehend would be at least double what I at present enjoy. I have
often considered it coolly since that time, and a scheme which would
make me easy and happy for life, appears to me much more eligible
than any other which would make a small addition to my income at
your expence. Marriage, and the consideration of posterity would be
the only motives which could ever make me repent of such a step, and
against these my circumstances, my constitution and a way of thinking
grounded upon reasoning and strengthened by experience and habit,
will I hope effectually secure me. My views will never extend beyond
the happiness of your life, that of Mrs. Gibbon's and of my own.
Let us mutually consult what may the most contribute towards that
object without calculating what estate may at last remain _for the
Elliots_.[84]
I hope you will excuse, Dear Sir, the warmth [with] which I have
expressed myself on a subject so highly interesting to us both. I
am sure I have not wrote a line that has not been dictated by those
sentiments of respect, duty and gratitude upon which you have so
many claims, and which will always engage to place your ease and
happiness upon a level with my own. I shall wait your order as to the
time and manner of my coming home; but I hope you will not insist
upon it's being before the month of June.
I am, Dear Sir,
Most sincerely and most affectionately yours,
E. G.
[83] The Manor and Mansion-house of Lenborough, in the county
of Bucks, passed, by purchase from the families of Ingoldsby
and Dormer, into the hands of Mr. John Rogers, of Buckingham,
who, about the year 1730, sold them to the grandfather of Edward
Gibbon. The "Mansion" was converted into a farmhouse for the
tenant of the farm.
[84] The grandfather of Edward Gibbon died in 1736, leaving
one son and two daughters. Catherine, the eldest of these two
daughters, married Mr. Elliston, of South Weald, Essex, and her
only child married, in 1756, Mr. (created in 1784 Lord) Eliot, of
Port Eliot in Cornwall. Their three sons were Gibbon's nearest
male relatives.
[Sidenote: HIS CREDIT WITHDRAWN.]
40.
_To his Father._
Rome, December the 5th, 1764.