John Barlow to Sarah Faraday   15 September 18511

Rectory | Buxted | Uckfield Sep 15

My dear Mrs Faraday,

This note is indited on the pure principles of Hibernian reciprocity viz to “get from the lady all I can and give her nothing in return”[.]

I want you to tell me how you and Faraday are. It is quite three weeks since I heard about you.

My life gives no materials. My wife and I and our friend Miss Grant are living in this quiet parsonage, and I go every day, on some errand or other, to Uckfield where I was curate nearly 30 years ago.

The condition of the rural labourers in this part of England is infinitely better than I have ever known it. Wages 10s a week, and every body employed. Then the harvest has been got in so cheaply & so well that the Farmer cannot lose by the low prices. I hear that the millers prefer the corn of this year for immediate grinding to the old wheat[.]

Spend five minutes and one penny in giving me a bulletin & believe me

Always yours | John Barlow

1
Dated on the basis that Barlow was Rector at Uckfield in 1822, that no evidence has been found that he went abroad in the summer of 1851 (unlike other summers in this period) and because of the reference to Faraday’s illness.

Please cite as “Faraday2464,” in Ɛpsilon: The Michael Faraday Collection accessed on 29 April 2024, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/faraday/letters/Faraday2464