1831 August 1, Philadelphia, to Sister

              Philada 8th. mo 1st. 1831

I dare say, my dear sister,
thee has felt inclined since we parted, sometimes, to apply
to me the old adage with regard to promising people vis.
that, 
“A ready maker
Is a ready breaker:”
since
the offer to write to thee was entirely voluntary on my
part, and yet I have suffered two weeks, nearly, to pass
without making an effort to fulfil my engagement.- As usual,
I am rich in excuses--the most prominent of which, is the
impossibility I found in obtaining a certain direction to my
letter; and either imagining the epistle, when completed,
would be too valuable to be thrown away, or else deeming, (I
did not stop to analyze feelings), my time too precious to
be expended upon that which would profit my correspondant
nothing, I concluded to defer writing altogether, until
Henry came up to this, our quarterly
solemnity.---

And now, having got thro’ the most
important and generally most stupid part of epistolary
communications, vis. the preface, let me dash at once into
my stock of news, and  cull for thy benefit such pieces of
information as will be likely to interest thee. I greatly
fear the selection will be a small one, for summer is a
particularly unsocial season, unless it is with our most
intimate friends and of course, we hear but little of what
is passing in