Reference
X955/1/27
Title
To Mrs Sarah Colenutt
Date free text
28th July 1884
Production date
From: 1884 To: 1884
Scope and Content
My dear friend,
I send you just a word to say that Willie is engaged. We always thought he would not marry, but the lady has at last presented herself. She is a Miss Fripp, daughter of a painter and secretary to the Water Colour Society(1) . She is now at Girton, where she has greatly distinguished herself, and she took two entrance scholarships – one from her school and one from the college. She is singularly unobtrusive, quiet, gentle and unconscious, and she is just 21 years old. I am sure you would love her. Willie wished me to write to you, and now I have discharged my task. The final announcement came to us last week, although I
had suspected for some time what was going on. I am very glad for Willie’s sake. The best of men make such awful mistakes, that it a relief to me to know he has made no mistake. As for myself, apart from my
sympathy with him I have been the victim of the strangest emotions, the description of which will not edify you, and so I will forbear. One goes on living and thinking all one’s life without knowing what lies in us;
when suddenly and event, a shock comes, and we stand revealed to ourselves astonished at the presence of what we never suspected. The steel plate is solid throughout and free from flaw, but lo! The hammer is
swung, the test is applied and it is mere sheet - glass. I am struck dumb by my own ignorance of myself.
It was a most exciting week for me last week, and my head has suffered most painfully for it. A grand entertainment was given at the Sutton Public Hall by the Sutton Girls High School. Molly (2) was asked to take Malcolm in a scene from Macbeth. I hesitated, but at last consented. The little mite appeared on the stage before all the people, and declaimed and acted to perfection. Her voice was heard clear and clean by everybody. The dramatization too of the passages was admirable, though I say it. Of course she had been carefully trained. But I!! I sat and listened in a cold sweat of terror.
Best love to father, Kate, Mary and all. Best wishes to yourself.
Ever yours
W. Hale White
(1) Alfred Downing Fripp (1822–1895), his daughter, Elizabeth Jane Spencer Fripp (d.
1945), married Sir William Hale-White, physician
(2) His daughter Mary.
Level of description
item