The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift/Volume 12/From Elizabeth Germain to Jonathan Swift - 10
FROM LADY BETTY GERMAIN.
I BELIEVE you will not wonder at my long silence, when I tell you, that Mrs. Floyd came ill here, but she kept pretty much to herself; and ever since she has been here, till within these two or three days, I have had no hopes of her life. You may easily guess what I must have suffered for a so long tried, prudent, useful, agreeable companion and friend. And God knows, she is now excessively weak, and mends but slowly: however, I have now great hopes, and I am very good at believing what I heartily wish. As I dare say you will be concerned for her, you may want to know her illness, but that is more than I can tell you. She has fancied herself in a consumption a great while: but though she has had the most dreadful cough I ever heard in my life, all the doctors said, it was not that; but none of them did say what it was. The doctor here, who is an extraordinary good one, (but lives, fourteen long, long miles off) has lately been left ten thousand pounds, and now hates his business; he says, it is a sharp humour that falls upon her nerves, sometimes on her stomach and bowels; and indeed what he has given her, has, to appearance, had much better effect than the millions of things she has been forced to take. After this, you will not expect, I should have followed your orders, and rid, for I have scarcely walked; although I dare not be very much in her room, because she constrained herself to hide her illness from me.
The duke and duchess of Dorset have not been here yet, but I am in hopes they will soon. I do not know, whether you remember Mrs. Crowther, and Mrs. Acourt: they and Mr. Presode are my company; but as I love my house full, I expect more still; and my lady Suffolk talks of making me a short visit. I have been so full of Mrs. Floyd, I had like to have forgot to tell you, that I am such a dunderhead, that I really do not know what my sister Pen's age was; but I think, she could not be above twelve years old. She was the next to me, but whether two or three years younger I have forgot; and what is more ridiculous, I do not exactly know my own, for my mother and nurse used to differ upon that notable point. And I am willing to be a young lady still, so will not allow myself to be more than forty-eight next birthday; but if I make my letter any longer, perhaps you will wish I never had been born. So adieu, dear dean.