Page:Memoir and poems of Phillis Wheatley, a native African and a slave.djvu/41

Rh This lady communicates some particulars which we state with great pleasure, as they remove from Phillis the supposition of her having formed a matrimonial connection from unworthy or mercinary motives. She assures us that Peters was not only a very remarkable looking man, but a man of talents and information; and that he wrote with fluency and propriety, and at one period read law. It is admitted, however, that he was disagreeable in his manners, and that on account of his improper conduct, Phillis became entirely estranged from the immediate family of her mistress. They were not seasonably informed of her suffering condition, or of her death.

Lastly, the author of this Memoir is a collateral descendant of Mrs. Wheatley, and has been familiar with the name and fame of Phillis from her childhood.