LETTER: Autograph letter signed.
GRANT (Anne), 1775-1838, poet, letter-writer and traveller. Autograph letter signed, addressed to Mrs Boott, dated 12 May 1826 from her residence, Brae House, Edinburgh, Scotland. 8vo. Four pages, approximately 1,000 words.
A substantial unpublished letter mentioning several prominent Scots of the time, notably Charlotte, Lady Scott, Walter Scott's wife. The letter was written two days before her death and describes her dying and her character vividly: "Lady Scott is dying & knows it. She has been always considerd a weak capricious woman, Yet bears both the reverse of fortune & the certain approach of death with an equanimity, that might rather be expected from her admirable Husband." Also described is Sir Walter Scott's recent financial tragedy, and his "admirable" response to it. Others mentioned, whom Grant knew well, include the botanist Robert Kaye Greville, who found a more successful but less accomplished rival in Robert Graham: "He [Graham] is rich & not thought a profound Botanist he has the advantage over his more accomplished rival in having the Botanical Garden to lecture in"; and the publisher Archibald Constable: "Was it not impudent in Constable who was trading on a fictitious credit having been for many years deeply in debt, Yet lived at the rate of four thousand a year..."
Scots apart, an important figure mentioned is the London-born Edward Gibbon Wakefield for whom Grant was essentially arranging the education - and no doubt to a degree his attempted rehabilitation in Edinburgh: "Is it worth while to tell you that Edward Gibbon Wakefield who has of late so disgracefully distinguished himself, is an old acquaintance & protege of mine. I am not proud of the connection which cost me no small trouble & vexation. His grandmother Priscilla sent him down to me to have him placed at the high School I settld him with Mr Gray [poet and schoolmaster, friend of Burns] neither he nor I knowing that he had before been turnd out of Westminster School. We were so worried with his misconduct of every kind that it was quite necessary his Father should be brought down to take him away four years after he came disguised to Ed[inburg]h with an Heiress of very large fortune whom he had stolen & married here with her own consent..." After being regarded as a scoundrel, even incorrigible, for a great deal of his youth and early adulthood, Wakefield later made a career in politics, promoting colonization and coming to be regarded in his time as the founder of New Zealand and of South Australia.
Grant's correspondent, Mrs. Mary Boott , was also a correspondent of Darwin, as was her husband, the botanist Dr. Boott. In "Memoirs and Correspondence of Mrs. Grant of Laggan" (1845) there are several letters to Mrs. Boott. Bound in recent boards, the last leaf window-mounted. In nice condition.
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