Chapter I (3)

I will not attempt to describe the painful disappointment I feel at
being obliged to give up all hopes of seeing you and the rest of
my dear friends in America this year. A small pamphlet which you
will receive with this letter will acquaint you with the reasons
which have induced me to postpone my intended voyage; and you
will, I am confident, agree with me in opinion that I have done
right in sacrificing the pleasure that voyage would have afforded
me to the more important objects to which my attention has been
called. I beg you would be so kind as to give my dear mother the
earliest notice of this change in my plans, and that you would at
the same time endeavour to give her just ideas of the very great
importance of the undertaking in which I have been called upon to
give my assistance, and show her how impossible it was for me to
refuse that assistance, especially as it was asked in a manner so
honourable to myself. And as the success of the undertaking will be
productive of so much good, and will place me in so distinguished
a situation in the eyes of the world and of posterity, you will, I
am persuaded, find little difficulty in persuading her that I have
done perfectly right, and in reconciling her to the disappointment
she will naturally feel at not seeing me arrive in America at the
time appointed.

The undertaking was the Royal Institution, and the pamphlet was the ‘Proposals’ for its foundation.

On September 8 Mr. King again wrote to Count Rumford:

London, September 8, 1799.

I have more than once expressed to you a wish that you might find
leisure, as well as inclination, to revisit your native country,
where I have been persuaded you would meet with a friendly and
cordial reception, and by your presence and advice might be of
great advantage to our public institutions, the establishment
of which, upon approved principles, is an object of the highest
consequence. I am happy that I have it in my power to assure you
that I have not been mistaken in these sentiments, and it affords
me peculiar satisfaction to execute the order that I have lately
received from my Government to invite you in its name to return and
reside among us, and to propose to you to enter into the American
service.[7]

Count Rumford answered:

Brompton, September 12, 1799.

I am deeply sensible of the honour that has been conferred upon
me by the Government of the United States, by the kind invitation
they have sent me to come and reside in my native country, and
also by the other distinguished and most flattering proofs of
their confidence and esteem with which that invitation has been
accompanied.

Nothing could have afforded me so much satisfaction as to have had
it in my power to have given to my liberal and generous countrymen
such proof of my sentiments as would in the most public and
ostensible manner have evinced, not only my gratitude for the kind
attentions I have received from them, but also the ardent desire I
feel to assist in promoting the prosperity of my native country.

His affection for his mother, his daughter, and his friend is seen in the following letter to Colonel Baldwin, which he wrote the day before his daughter sailed for America:

Brompton, near London, August 24, 1799.

I cannot permit my daughter to return to America without charging
her with a few lines for my _oldest_ friend and schoolfellow,
the companion of my earliest youth. In straining my recollection
as much as possible, in order to look back into that dark cloud
that covers the early period of my life, I can remember no person
distinctly, longer than yourself, except it be my mother. I must
therefore consider you as one of my oldest acquaintances, and I
have never ceased to regard you and to love you as one of my best
friends. A few months ago I flattered myself with the hope of
soon seeing you, but events happened to frustrate those hopes.
But though my voyage to America is postponed, it is by no means
abandoned. On the contrary, I really think it very likely that I
shall pay you a visit next spring.

My daughter will tell you what I am doing in this country, and will
acquaint you with my plans and wishes respecting her establishment
in America. If you can further the execution of my schemes, I have
no doubt but you will do it. There is nothing I have so much at
heart as to make my dear mother perfectly comfortable and happy
during the remainder of her life.

And a year later he wrote to Colonel Baldwin:

Royal Institution, June 9, 1800.

I must begin my letter with a subject which is ever uppermost
in my mind. My daughter and my dear mother will probably be in
your neighbourhood when this letter reaches you. I most earnestly
recommend them both to your kind attentions. I have one wish, and
one only, respecting them, which is, that they may be as happy as
possible. As I am at so great a distance from them, I am but ill
qualified to judge of their wants and their wishes. Pray assist
them in every way in which your friendly assistance can be of use
to them, or make them comfortable and contented.

Perhaps my daughter may marry (which she has my leave to do
whenever she pleases, and with whom she pleases).[8] This may
greatly alter her relative situation with me and with my mother.
She may perhaps wish at some future period to make me another
visit in Europe, and even in this scheme I shall not oppose her
inclinations, if her heart should be set on the gratification of
them. I do not mean to be an indulgent father in theory only.

Tell me how I must act to make two persons who are very dear to me
as happy as possible.