TO THE RIGHT HONOURABLE SIR WILLIAM GRANT, Knt. MASTER OF THE ROLLS. IT SIR, Ir is very probable that the friends, by whofe folicitations I was induced to arrange in the following pages my early recollections, ftudied more the amufement I fhould derive from executing this tafk, than any pleasure they could expect from its completion. The principal object of this work is to record the few incidents, and the many virtues which diverfified and diftinguished the life of a moft valued friend. Though no manners could be more fimple, no notions more primitive than thofe which prevailed among her affociates, the ftamp of originality with which they were marked, and the peculiar circumftances in which they stood, both with regard to my friend, and the infant fociety to which they belonged, will, I flatter myself, give an intereft with reflecting minds, even to this defultory narrative; and the mifcellany of defcription, obfervation, and detail, which it involves. If truth, both of feeling and narration, which are its only merits, prove a fufficient counterbalance to care careleffnefs, laxity, and incoherence of style, its prominent faults, I may venture to invite you, when you unbend from the useful and honourable labours to which your valuable time is devoted, to trace this feeble delineation of an excellent, though unembellished character; and of the rapid pace with which an infant fociety has urged on its progrefs from virtuous fimplicity, to the dangerous "knowledge of good and evil :" from tremulous imbecility to self-sufficient independence. To be faithful, a delineation must neceffarily be minute. Yet if this sketch, with all its imperfections, be honoured by your indulgent perufal, A. 3 fuch |