Bessie wishes Barbara a merry Christmas. It is doubtful that she will be able to visit Barbara in Algiers because of a ‘succession of deaths & anxieties’, including the death of Bessie’s uncle, Joseph Priestley, in Pennsylvania and the death of grandmother Priestley; also the death of the mother of Mary M[erryweather], the continued illness of Adelaide [Procter], who depends on Bessie for companionship, and the illness of ‘poor old Pierrotti’. [Letter incomplete.]