Bear Inn Devizes
Jany 13.
Dear Talbot/
I am very sorry that it is out of my Power to accept your friendly Invitation to Lacock. For I should have been extremely pleased to see your Cousin, as well as to have passed a few days with you: but I cannot leave this Place during the present week, as we are engaged in Court at our Q. sessions every morning; and I have engagements to dinner on Friday & Saturday; and on Monday we have a Ball here at which I am a Steward, & so cannot avoid attending: and on Tuesday I start for Devonshire, from whence I shall probably not return, before I migrate to London.
I beg my best Compts to Lady Elizabeth & your sisters, <1> and am
dear Talbot, Yours very truly
T H SSB Estcourt
Notes:
1. Lady Elisabeth Theresa Feilding, née Fox Strangways, first m Talbot (1773–1846), WHFT’s mother and her daughters Caroline Augusta Edgcumbe, née Feilding, Lady Mt Edgcumbe (1808–1881); WHFT’s half-sister and Henrietta Horatia Maria Gaisford, née Feilding (1810–1851), WHFT’s half-sister.