108 CORRESPONDENCE WITH HIS FAMILY. 



effusus labor." Sam will tell you the meaning of the Latin. 

 Molly White thrives well at Selborne, and grows tall, fair and 

 handsome, and is a fine girl ; Nanny Woods also is very stout 

 and hardy, and is a nut-brown maid. Poor Nanny White, 

 who came to Newton in so deplorable a condition, has for 

 these last five weeks mended in a most marvelous manner, so 

 that her friends about her have good hopes — and, if she has 

 no relapse, will be again soon in a comfortable state, tho' 

 London, I fear, will be no ways fit for her for some time *. 

 Berriman lies still in the same sad deplorable way, helpless 

 and hopeless ! 



Winter comes on with hasty strides this year ; and I begin 

 to fear we shall have a severe one. Tell my niece Betty that 

 I don't love snow now near so well as when I was of her age; I 

 then thought it a very amusing pleasing meteor. 



Jack is five feet 8 inches and f high without shoes, and 

 proportionably large. Pray tell Sam that I shall expect to 

 hear from him in prose or in verse, in Latin or English, as he 

 likes best. The insinuation that Mrs. Chapone | is a papist is 

 a foolish slander, thrown out by somebody that envies her her 

 literary reputation. I have been assured since that she is an 

 Italian stage-dancer ! 



I am, with all due respect to all friends, 



Your affectionate Brother, 



;gil. white. 



* [This young lady was the daughter of Benjamin White. The hopes 

 of her recovery were fallacious ; she died at Newton in October 1777, at 

 the age of 21, and was buried at Selborne. — T. B.] 



t [This was the well-known authoress, to whom, when Miss Mulso, 

 Gilbert White was attached, and of whom an account is given in the 

 memoir. — T. B.] 



