TO ANDREW STEVENSON[145]
My Dear Sir
I return you many thanks for the warm cap
which came safe to hand a few days ago. It is as
comfortable as it may be fashionable, which is
more than can be said of all fashions. I recd. at
the same time a duplicate of the excellent pair
of gloves as well which Mrs. Stevenson, allow me
rather to say, my cousin Sally has favored me.
Being the work of her own hands they will impart
the more warmth to mine. As they are a gift not
a Gauntlet, I may express thro' her husband, the
heartfelt acknowledgments with which they are
accepted. Mrs. Madison has also provided well
for my feet. I am thus equipt cap-a-pie, for the
campaign agst. Boreas, & his allies the Frosts &
the snows. But there is another article of covering,
which I need most of all & which my best friends
can not supply. My bones have lost a sad portion
of the flesh which clothed & protected them, and
the digestive and nutritive organs which alone can
replace it, are too slothful in their functions.
I congratulate Richmond & my friends there
on the departure of the atmospheric scourge which
carried so many deaths and still more of terror with
it. I join in the prayer that as it was the first it
may also be the last visit.
Mrs. Stevenson in her letter to Mrs. Madison
mentions that since you left us, you have had a
sharp bilious attack, adding for our gratification
that you had quite recovered from it. It is very
important that you shd. carry a good share of
health into the chair at the capitol, we cannot
expect that it will be a seat of Roses, whatever our
hopes, that it may be without the thorns that
distinguished the last season.
Inclosed is a letter from Mrs. M. to Mrs. S. As
she speaks for me as I do for her, Mrs. S. & yourself
will have at once joint & several assurances of our
constant affection and of all our good wishes.
