Faraday to Mary Reid   4 October 1845

Royal Institution | 4 October 1845

My dear Sister & friend

There are several with & about you I think of when I think of you - but it is to you I shall write - for I long to see you & chat a little with you about the many important things which have arisen since we last met - and also about your self. Our family circle seems very greatly broken up & disturbed this year but by degrees I trust all will come together & quiet again - and then we shall feel as if a little rest were come just now it all seems to be excitement & motion[.]

What chats you & the girls will be having together & really it was time that you should be in some way introduced into the progressing affairs. A mother stands for something. However when the time comes things get on whoever is wanting. It is wonderful how in different ways we all find out that we are not quite so essential as we imagine. I have been in this house so long that I think it could hardly go on rightly without me & yet an underthought comes on my mind that I could very well be spared tomorrow if through any event that were necessary. Still I am glad you are in direct communication as to affairs, only whilst engaged with thoughts of the new characters on the stage do not forget those at home whose turns it is to leave & make way for their successors[.] We rather expect to have the happiness of seeing you all before long[.]

One result of your absence I do regret i.e that you could not hear Ellen Barnard last Sabbath day¹ - however if at home you might not have been able to be out. It was a great pleasure & joy to all who hearing her had part in the same hope. Such a breaking up of her fallow ground such an overpowering destruction of all her wishes & desires as to her approaches to God - but such a free flood of comfort & love replacing what was taken from her I do not remember ever to have heard before. But Mr Boosey² will have told you all this & far more[.]

Give me earnest love to Margery & to Caroline & then to others with you[.] I long to see you all at home again[.]

Ever Your Affectionate Brother | M. Faraday

Address: Mrs. Reid