Eliza Fenwick, London, to Mary Hays, 3 Park Street, Islington, [c. January 1808].1 My dear friend I set out on Tuesday Evening to come to you but before I had reached the end of St John Street a drizzling rain had so penetrated my Plaid Cloak that I thought it unsafe to proceed Since that night I have had no opportunity. Were you at ease my unfortunate & ill used friend, at this moment I should feel such an unabated swell of satisfaction my poor heart would bewilder my head. Fortune seems to turn her wheel in our favour. Yr kindness seems to have set the fickle goddess an example she resolves to emulate. Eliza is offer’d an Irish engagement in which every thing is as we wish. The line of acting in which she is most successful is to be exclusively her own. She is to be engag’d for one year certain at two guineas pr week & three benefits in the course of the year. At the end of it, it is to be at her option to renew her engagement for another year with an advance of Salary. The two Managers are equally pleased with her & are so anxious to have her that they give me no time scarcely for deliberation. This evening, they have sent me word, they will bring the Agreement & hope we shall be ready to sign them. As to deliberation on the
advantage it needs none, for if I could have selected I had begun this when [Speening?] came in. God bless you [no signature] Address: Miss Hays Postmark: none 1 Fenwick Family Papers, Correspondence, 1798-1855, New York Historical Library; Wedd, Fate of the Fenwicks 22-23; not in Brooks, Correspondence. |
MARY HAYS: LIFE, WRITINGS, AND CORRESPONDENCE > MARY HAYS CORRESPONDENCE > 1800-1809 > 1808 >