I owe you, sir, besides this, some account of my little affairs since the beginning of your expedition. Notwithstanding my own and my son's violent illness, which held me half a year, and him above twelve months, I have made a shift to get more than three parts in four of my _Dissertations on Job_ printed off, and both the paper, printing, and maps, hitherto, paid for. My son John at Oxford, now that his elder brother has gone to Tiverton, takes care of the remainder of the impression at London, and I have an ingenious artist here with me in my house at Epworth who is graving and working off the remaining maps and figures for me; so that I hope, if the printer does not hinder me, I shall have the whole ready by next spring, and, by God's leave, I shall be in London myself to deliver the books perfect. I print five hundred copies, as in my proposals; whereof I have about three hundred already subscribed for; and, among my subscribers, fifteen or sixteen English Bishops, with some of Ireland.
"If you will please herewith to accept the tender of my most sincere respect and gratitude, you will thereby confer one further obligation, honored sir, on
It appears, from a list of subscriptions annexed to Mr. Wesley's _Dissertations on the Book of Job_, that General Oglethorpe took _seven_ copies of the work on large paper, which would amount to at least twenty pounds.
The elder son of the Rector, also, paid a tribute of respect to the General; and this in harmonious and polished verses; in which, however, he indulged, too freely, the poetic license in highly wrought description of the settlement of Georgia, and of the climate and productions of the region.[1]
[Footnote 1: GEORGIA, _a Poem_; TOMO CHICHI, _an Ode; and a copy of Verses on_ Mr. Oglethorpe's _Second Voyage to Georgia_. These were beautifully printed, in a large type, on nineteen folio pages. They were ascribed to SAMUEL WESLEY, as their author, in the tract entitled "_True and Historical Narrative of the Colony of Georgia," by P. Telfair and others_. Charlestown, S.C. 1741, page xi. of the Preface.]
As our narrative is brought near to the period when the General is about to return thither, it may be pertinent to introduce a short extract, in which the poet addresses the new settlers, eagerly expecting his arrival.