I had this moment the Pleasure of recieving your Letter of the 5th. of this month.1 Your Mama and Brother have lately written to You, and a little Bundle was sent at the same Time— You will probably recieve them before this Letter will come to your Hands.

Your apprehensions relative to a Fever prevailing here are not well founded. I have no Information nor Reason to beleive, that any Credit is due to the Reports which you have heard on that Subject.2

When you return you will find the Grounds within our Enclosure here much altered— they have been levelled, and excepting a little part reserved for a Garden, the Rest is laid out for Grass; and I hope the next Spring to surround the whole with Trees. A Well is now digging near the Kitchen door, so that the Inconveniences we have experienced in that Respect will soon be at

Ann Jay, by Charles B. J. Févret de Saint-Mémin, 1797. (From The St.-Mémin Collection of Portraits [New York, 1862]; Rare Book & Manuscript Library, Columbia University in the City of New York)

an End. Your Brothers & Sisters are well, and your Mama is recovering from the Effects of the accident she met with much faster than was expected; for she again walks with Ease, tho’ I think rather more than is adviseable, considering that her Foot is not yet quite restored to its former State—3

If nothing should occur to detain me, I expect to go to Rye tomorrow, and on my Return shall flatter myself that further Letters from you to some of us, will by that Time have arrived.

I am my dear Nancy Your affte. Father