“[John Paul Jones] is a most uncommon Character. I dare Say you would be as much dissapointed in him as I was. … I expected to have seen a Rough Stout warlike Roman. Instead of that, I should sooner think of wraping him up in cotton wool and putting him into my pocket, than sending him to contend with Cannon Ball. He is small of stature, well proportioned, soft in his Speach easy in his address polite in his manners, vastly civil, understands all the Etiquette of a Ladys Toilite as perfectly as he does the Masts Sails and rigging of a Ship. Under all this appearence of softness he is Bold enterprizing ambitious and active. … He knows how often the Ladies use the Baths, what coulour best suits a Ladys complextion, what Cosmecticks are most favourable to the skin. We do not often See the Warriour and the Abigail [a lady’s maid] thus united.”
—
Abigail Adams to Elizabeth Cranch on December 3, 1784
I can’t believe that people have been saying for centuries that they want to wrap precious smol people in blankets and place them into their pockets to protect them.
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Daintyfire 