Do you remember a letter I wrote to you a long
time ago about going on the stage? and another, some time before
that, about my becoming a governess? The urgent necessity which I
think now exists for exertion, in all those who are capable of it
among us, has again turned my thoughts to these two considerations.
My father's property, and all that we might ever have hoped to
derive from it, being utterly destroyed in the unfortunate issue of
our affairs, his personal exertions are all that remain to him and
us to look to. There are circumstances in which reflections that
our minds would not admit at other times of necessity force
themselves upon our consideration. Those talents and
qualifications, both mental and physical, which have been so
mercifully preserved to my dear father hitherto, cannot, in the
natural course of things, all remain unimpaired for many more
years. It is right, then, that those of us who have the power to do
so should at once lighten his arms of all unnecessary burden, and
acquire the habit of independent exertion before the moment comes
when utter inexperience would add to the difficulty of adopting any
settled mode of proceeding; it is right and wise to prepare for the
evil day before it is upon us.
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