Holmes Hole Jan 14th /55

My Dear Husband
I have so much on my mind that I want to say to you that I hardly know where to begin, but I have heard say that hope defer,d makes the heart sick and truly since I have heard that you may be absent eight teen months longer I ^feel low spirited and bad enough if it was only to do without the company of one so Dear to me as my loving Husband it would ^be hard but that is not all to be left so long with the care of three Children and all others cares of expences which are not a little as every thing is verry high, it will cost me about as much every year you are gone as it did the whole time you was on your other Voyage but I cannont help it and so I will try to make the best of it and pray for a more thankful heart for the preservation of your life ^and prosperity thus far. I receivd a short letter from you in Dec from Hilo. it was very good. the reminice ence of the past so far back as you went, and should leave to talk over, when I could not find time, to write no more particulars about your voyage, or health, and many other things. you did not tell, what time you left the Whale ground nor what kind of cruise, nor what day you arivd in port did not say how you lik.d you company, and above all you did not say one word about your healt, I have felt verry bad ever since but thought when the second came I should know all the particulars. but that came the eleventh of this month