[this is written on the same sheet as a note from Caroline - see Doc. No: 01435]
May 22d
My dear Henry I am sorry to find you have not received any of our letters directed to Corfu. They were all sent in different ways. How I wish you had happened to buy a villa before you went - it would have done us so much good to go & refresh there; & we could have<1> got it ready for you. London has been very disagreeable this year, nothing but unpleasant things except that Caroline <2> has met with a great deal of sterile admiration. Lord Winchilsea <3> is very ill, & your Aunt Charlotte <4> not better, & a gloom seems over every thing which I should be sorry to communicate to you. and I am very glad you have been in happier climes this unfortunate Spring.
William <5> will tell you all our news, as he hears constantly from his Mother <6>, tho' owing to melancholy events I have not written often to him lately
Monsieur
Monsieur W. H. F. Talbot
aux soins de <7> Mr Strangways
chargé d'Affaires de S. M. Britannique
à Florence
en Toscane
Italie
Notes:
1. Smudged.
2. Caroline Augusta Edgcumbe, née Feilding, Lady Mt Edgcumbe (1808-1881); WHFT's half-sister.
3. George Finch, 9th Earl of Winchilsea (1752-1826).
4. Sir Charles Lemon (1784-1868), politician & scientist; WHFT's uncle.
5. William Thomas Horner Fox Strangways, 4th Earl of Ilchester (1795-1865), botanist, art collector & diplomat.
6. Juliana Maria Strangways, née Digby (d. 1842).
7. Care of.