Coane, John

Hannah More to Marianne Thornton, 28 January 1819

Two mornings successively I have set aside for answering your letter with one or two others, but from breakfast till now when the dinner is almost ready, I have had a number of visitors one after another till I lost my patience as well as my time. However tho I have lost a few minutes (for an inflammation in my eyes prevents my doing any thing by candle light) I snatch up my pen, as perhaps you may be waiting for an answer respecting Mr. Coan, thus he spells his name.^* I am however not well qualified to give an opinion as I do not know him at all. I believe him to be a very pious young /man/ of the Calvinistic School. But he is an Irishman with all the warmth and impetuosity of his country. I should be grieved to say any thing that might be injurious to a deserving Man but it /is/ my private opinion that he would not be well calculated for the temperate zone of Clapham. He has got himself into two or three little scrapes and tho I really am inclined to think he was not the aggressor yet the habit of getting into scrapes generally indicates the want of a cool temper. If Clapham was an obscure Village I should not have said a word of this, as few villages are perhaps better supplied but he does not stay long in a place I observe. I should /think him/ not fit for so enlightened – would say critical congregation as Clapham. Pray present my best regards to ^* and tell him I begin to fear I must wait till we meet in a better world before I shall /enjoy/ that long indulged wish of making his acquaintance I entertain better hopes as to seeing you and your admirable friends if it please God to spare me till the Summer I beg my most affectionate respects to them and love to dear who is to be of the Barley Wood party.