Dear Sir

Downing Feb 2March. 1. 1797.

I believe you may clear me from ever being guilty of neglect of your favors. I received yours of the 6^th in due time. on the [...] tenth I lost my worthy Sister, whose whole life had been a continued series of bounty & liberality to me & mine. Her death affected us all great. we owed her the warmest gratitude; which her kindness to her in the last act of life must make us remember her with respect mixed with sorrow. Her bequest to my son was great. To my daughter considerable & to the rest of us very satisfactory. I drop the subject

Your account of poor chiswel was a great shock to me & very unexpected. I had a letter from him dated Jany 23^d written in his usual manner about prints &c. How dreadful is it for a man blessed with such immensity to give of fortune - to give himself to the sordid passion, to such a degree as to bring on himself, so dreadful an end. Th

Moses has for some time given himself up to paiting miniatures so he has neglected both y^r work, & mine. I have taken it from him & put it into that of Ingleby a protegé of our late unhappy friend who entirely supported him with his work. Poor Chiswel had about twenty pounds worth in hand: about which he has received by order of M^rs Chiswel a very comfortable letter assuring him of payment as soon as it was finished. After which he will be on the wide world. IWe may now be sure of having the work speedily finished.

I lament the account you give of Lord orford: but compassion on his sufferings must make us consider as [sic] death a relief.

I am now engaged to different works indeed. the printing my great work the view of Hindoostan; & arming my neighbors who are most entirely loyal.¹ How I excult that the first great blow has been struck by the welsh.² As to my literary labor³ I am its true caught in a storm but I must go on with it. it will appear the latter end of may. mess^rs White will shew you some of the plates. May heaven bless you & miss Bull & restore you if possible to y^r former tranquillity let me hear from you & let me know how you are. I am surrounded with my whole stock. sons & grandson. my eldest has too much spirit not to be engaged in training his countrymen. my younger between 16 & 17 has taken in an uncommon degree to his studies & useful life. he has recovered his health: & is intended for oxford in oct^r.

Adieu D^r Sir
ever & affect^ly y^r

Tho. Pennant

Pray give me some acc^t of Hastings clandestine dealings with poor Chiswel & to what amount was the concealment?⁴

The strange business of my nephew m^r T. Mostyn comes before the house on the 9^th. never was so audacious an offence against law, so I do not pity him.

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Editorial notes

1. On 9 March 1797 Pennant chaired a meeting to set up an armed corps to be stationed in Holywell, Flintshire, named ‘The Loyal Holywell Volunteers’ and made up of an unit of two companies, each of sixty men. This was largely in response to the Fishguard landing (see next note). Evans, ‘The Flintshire Loyalist Association’, 62.
2. A reference to the Fishguard landing of 22 February 1797.
3. It is not clear to which publication Pennant refers here. He does not seem to have published anything during 1797, but he may have hoped to see his volume on Hindoostan appear that year, and the 'storm' to which he refers may have been a conflict of interest between two printers, White and Hughs. The former is mentioned here as being in charge of 'some of the plates', but it was the latter who eventually published the work in 1798.
4. Chiswell invested in East India stock on behalf of Warren Hastings’s second wife, Anna Maria Apollonia Chapuset (known as Marian; 1747–1837). ODNB; P. J. Marshall, ‘The private fortune of Marian Hastings’, Bulletin of the Institute of Historical Research, 37 (1964), 245–53.