Dear Sir

Stratton Street Jan^y. 3. 1791.

These, I trust, are not my last words, but they are the first I have been able to write since December 12^th. on which day I left Northcourt, very ill indeed. We came over in a violent gale of wind, and I grew worse, and worse, all the journey, and as soon as I came to London, sent for D^r. Turton, who found me in a putrid fever, and till within these few days I have never left by bed, except to have it made. He says there have never been any Symptoms of danger, and I am beginning to gain strength, but it has left me very low, and has taken away almost all the little hearing I had. I have said a great deal more than there was occasion for, because I wish’d to excuse myself as well as I can for not answering your letter, which I was allow’d to see only a few days ago. a few things in your last letter, and in that [...] last [...] which came since my return,¹ require some sort of answer, and then I must finish because I have a painfull Rheumatism in my wrist, which I am with much difficulty, and my head is very weak, and rambling.

The best authenticated heads of Cranmer, are that in the Heroologia and that Engraved by Virtue from Holbein. Granger always prefer’d the first.² - with respect to the Ships – I with pleasure inform you, that a sett are have been publish’d, (I think in 1788) done neatly in mezzotinto, upon a small Quarto paper, from a cutter to a first rate, with their heads, and ornaments upon detach’d plates. they consist of eight prints,³ which I will get for you if providence designs me the powers of acting again, for myself, or my friends

I enclose, the old Balloon –⁴ it was long, very long ago that I tore it out of a book, which I gave to Granger, without taking any account of it, not imagining I should ever have occasion to make any enquiries about the matter, – ’twas [...] before the Ballooning rage began that I bought the book. pray send me the print back again, or bring it when you, come to town, because I am frequently ask’d for it. –

my daughters⁵ are both well. – they were born to be nurses, and for nothing highter higher, but their abilities were never call’d into action before. I sincerely hope you, and yours continue in good health. If you can read this, ’tis all I expect from it.

Adieu my
Dear Sir, believe me, sincerely your

Rich^d: Bull

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Editorial notes

1. Bull refers to letters 1114 and 1115.
2. Bull perhaps intended to refer here to the portrait of Cranmer in Thoroton, The antiquities of Nottinghamshire, recommended by Granger in A biographical history of England, vol. 1, p. 95.
3. Bull responds to a query in 1114. For a comparable set of ten prints held at the British Museum, entitled 'Des Ports d'Angleterre' (The ports of England) (1788), by Antonio Suntach after Thomas Milton, see here [external link] [accessed 29 September 2018].
4. For this print, see 1115, n. 1.
5. Elizabeth and Catherine Bull.