Thursday 22
Aix –
My dear Henry,
Your Mothers <1> Letters to Cologne & Bruxelles, & Horatias <2> to Manheim & Bruxelles will I hope have reached you, & accounted for my not sooner thanking you for yours from Beune, & for your account of the famous Bridge – It is odd enough that the day before I recd it our little Doctor had made himself very agreable [sic], enlightening our minds on Geological subjects, telling us amongst other Facts, that at a certain level on the Mont du chat, the Jura &ce, there were ancient marks from fossil marine Shells, & other Indicies being found there that the Sea Was certainly at some Time at that heighth, & I do not doubt but that the marks of a sea Beach you perceived at Fribourg are at the same lever – but when was it? & what has become of the water? – His conversation has given me a strong Inclination to read a little on Geology – it is a very interesting subject – & it appears that a great many Facts have been accumulated, with which one may amuse himself by making a Thing of his own – Valletort & Car: <3> went off yesterday for Turin & by the Col de Tande to Nice – I fear they will find more snow than they will like – we go Saturday to Lyons after all & by the Steam Boat to Avignon – thinking that will be the least fatiguing mode of conveying your Mother. She is a great deal better, as she will have told you but not so well as I should want – the weather is breaking up I wish with all my Heart we were well established in the sunny climate of the Croix de Martre – I hope there will be no plague to you in consequence of some Trouble Harriet Galway <4> has made about Sackville St <5> – She has begged so hard to be allowed to remain there some Days in her way to Brighton, the middle of November, that when I found you would certainly be gone to Lacock by the 4 or 5th I wrote to say she might go there when you had left it, naming the Time – a letter from Fanny <6> informed me sometime since Harriet had sent to say she should be there about the end of this month – By return of Post I wrote to her & Harriet herself to say her having the House at that Time was out of the Question –
These letters will have reached England in plenty of Time for her to make a different arrangement & I dare say she will wait in Northhamptonshire as I have advised her till she hears from Fanny you are gone – I have also told Fanny if by any chance she should arrive when you are expected she is not to be admitted – There is something about people having Irish Blood in their Veins which incapacitates them from understanding a plain statement. – It is lucky we had not intended to start today for it pours torrents.–
God bless you Love to Constance <7>
H. Fox Talbot Esqr
Angleterre
31 Sackville St
London
Notes:
1. Lady Elisabeth Theresa Feilding, née Fox Strangways, first m Talbot (1773–1846), WHFT’s mother.
2. Henrietta Horatia Maria Gaisford, née Feilding (1810–1851), WHFT’s half-sister.
3. Ernest Augustus Edgcumbe, Lord Valletort, 3rd Earl of Mt Edgcumbe (1797–1861), WHFT’s brother-in-law and Caroline Augusta Edgcumbe, née Feilding, Lady Mt Edgcumbe (1808–1881); WHFT’s half-sister.
4. Lady Harriet Payne Gallwey (1784-1845), née Quin, widow of Lt Gen Sir William Payne Gallwey (1759-1831), 1st Bart.
5. 31 Sackville Street, London residence of the Feildings, often used as a London base by WHFT.
6. Housekeeper.
7. Constance Talbot, née Mundy (1811–1880), WHFT’s wife.