Page:Father's memoirs of his child.djvu/130

 from their natural enquiries, but wrapped up in absolute falsehoods and manifest absurdities. The new-born brother must be dropped from the clouds, or dug up out of the garden, to throw a meretricious varnish over a tale, which nature would tell in terms the most endearing, and nothing but an imagination, prurient in the extreme, could ever have represented as indelicate. To avoid both these errors was an object aimed at in the present case: whether it was in any degree attained, may be inferred from what follows.

Extract from a Letter dated Jan. 27, 1802.

write to say that my mother cannot favour you with the action, (probably of writing) and also to inform you of the coming of a little boy who was born yesterday.—My mother has been long