Quebec 22^nd February 1837

My Dear Sir

Your very kind and obliging letter of the 27^h of last month should not have remained so long unacknowledge, but for a variety of occupations and impediments which in a measure put it out of my power to write letters except on business[.] It is not too late however to thank you for your friendly congratulations good wishes on the commencement of the year, and for your too kind expressions of congratulation on my election as President of the Literary & Historical Society, an honour which I certainly did not expect but which as it was unanimously conferred, lays upon me an obligation to exert myself to the utmost for the advantage & honour of the Society.

I should be sorry you should judge by the tardiness of my replies, of the pleasure which it gives me to hear from you or to write to you[.] I hope your health has not suffered this winter, Sickness is prevalent at Quebec in a remarkable degree[.] Our friend M^r Smith yesterday lost his widowed daughter M^rs Rob^t Sewell, after eighteen days illness of a severe fever[.] She has left two little daughters, now orphans[.] I too have had severe sickness in my family, which is one of my excuses for not writing to you sooner[.] My eldest boy has been exceedingly ill, but I thank God that he seams now to be decidedly recovering, though it will be some months before he is quite restored[.] The Catholic Clergy in the Suburbs say, that, even in the time of the Cholera, they were not more frequently called in to attend sick beds. In other respects too this is a hard winter upon our community; the dreadful high prices of bread, meat, potatoes, meal, oats, oatmeal, forage & fuel, bear most severely upon the poor; and the difficulties of the Gov^t and of the officers of Gov^t add to the general pressure of distress[.] But yet we have one comfort this winter; and a blessed comfort it is, – we have no House of Assembly sitting, — no political storms; — the Society is comparatively at peace, though distressed: there is no painful or unpleasant excitement; all we pursuing their private business or their private pleasure[.] Lord Gosford is very hospitable & sociable; — never was a man more fitted to win friends by his private demeanour; it is impossible not to like him as the head of the Society[.] I have seen a great deal of him at his

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