Margaret Collier to Samuel Richardson, from Ryde, 11 February 1756: 'My good old folks --you can't think how I love them! -- the more I believe, because they hearken with such attention and admiration to Clarissa and Sir Charles Grandison, which latter I have now begun to them [sic]. They believe both Clarissa and Sir Charles to be real stories, and no work of imagination, and I don't care to undeceive them. The good man is more than three score, he believes [...] They love each other, and the husband rejoices in the balance of sense being of her side, which it is, in some degree, and glories in her being able to read and write, which he can scarcely do.'