Franklin’s closest sibling was his sister Jane Franklin Mecom. His letters to her were always informative and affectionate, and he lamented that he was unlikely ever to see her again. He could, however, still chide her for her sloppiness in keeping post office accounts and make fun of the edgy qualities of their relatives.
TO JANE MECOM, AUGUST 3, 1789
Dear Sister,
I have received your kind letter of the 23rd past, and am glad to learn that you have at length got some of those I so long since wrote to you. I think your post office is very badly managed. I expect your bill, and shall pay it when it appears. I would have you put the books into cousin Jonathan’s hands who will dispose of them for you if he can, or return them hither. I am very much pleased to hear that you have had no misunderstanding with his good father. Indeed if there had been any such, I should have concluded that it was your fault for I think our family were always subject to being a little miffy. By the way, is our relationship in Nantucket quite worn out? I have met with none from thence of late years who were disposed to be acquainted with me, except Capt. Timothy Foulger. They are wonderfully shy. But I admire their honest plainness of speech. About a year ago I invited two of them to dine with me. Their answer was that they would if they could not do better. I suppose they did better, for I never saw them afterwards; and so had no opportunity of showing my miff, if I had one. Give my love to cousin Williams’s, and thank them from me for all their kindess to you, which I have always been acquainted with by you, and take as if done to myself. I am sorry to learn from his son, that his health is not so firm as formerly. A journey hither by land might do him good, and I should be happy to see him. I shall make the addition you desire to my superscriptions, desiring in return that you would make a subtraction from yours. The word excellency does not belong to me, and dr. Will be sufficient to distinguish me from my grandson. This family joins in love to you and yours, with