LETTER CLXXVI 275 



the advances of Selbourne towards Perfection. I feel a Par- 

 tiality for that Place, from it's being such a Favourite of your's, 

 & from the many happy & usefull Hours that I have spent there. 



I thank You for ye Piece of Mr Grimm ; * but surely I was 

 never more dissappointed ; I declare that had the Picture come 

 thro' any Hands but a White's, which might have directed me, 

 I should not have guess'd at the Place. A Print in general does 

 ill with Perspective; but in this, neither the Hill itself, or the 

 neighbouring Country are in Character. I hope I do not mortify 

 You to say so : & I hope better things of your other Views. We 

 have had a Miss Hartley here, who would have done You more 

 Justice ; She has all ye wildness of Salvator Eosa. 



If You have an honest & handy Servant to dispose of in your 

 Parts send him to me. Your poor Friend is bound to prosecute 

 at ye next Quarr Sessions a Wm Hall who has been my Servt, 

 whom I & my Son found in a dark Eoom without his Shoes ; as 

 I have miss'd money lately, & some since last Monday, he caused 

 a just Suspicion ; I had him seized, & he is in the Bridewell 

 to answer for ye misdemeanour : a Eobbery cannot be proved. 



You see I write in vast Hast, but I had not a Mind that You 

 shd see a lame Acct of this in ye Papers first ; I thought it would 

 look unkind. 



Comps. to neighbours. All our best wishes attend You, 

 especially of, 



Dear Gil, Your's faithfully, 



J. Mulso. 



Dr Warton is getting well apace. Poor John Scrope ! 



Letter 176. 

 Eevd Mr White, Winchester, 



Selbourne near Alton, Hants. Jan : 5, 1778. 



Dear Gil : 



I was truly greived at the very melancholy Account that 

 You gave in your's of yesterday of your poor Brother John. If 

 my most fervent Prayers for him will be of any avail, they have 

 been & shall be offer'd up for him. But God is pleased at his 

 own Time to set the Faith of his Servants upon severe Tryals 

 by Dispensations that seem strange to Us ; and lets second 

 Causes operate in a Manner that makes the distress'd Soul stop 

 short of the first, and subside in Fatalism. Who would have 

 thought that your Brother would have been rescued from the 

 Eock of Gibraltar, to perish, or even worse than perish in his 

 own Country? That the mending of his Fortune should end 

 in Distress ? and that the Cold of Lancashire should be permitted 



* A proof of Grimm's vignette drawing of " The Hermitage " at Selborne, 

 which subsequently appeared on the title page of Gilbert White's book. 



