London
31st March 1835
My Dear Mr F.
I have heard nothing for a long time of your intended motions after you leave Nice, which I imagine you will soon be doing, as we left it before this time of year in 1822. Your coachman makes frequent anxious enquiries of me, when you will require his services, but I am not able to communicate any information. Ask my mother <1> if she has received a letter from me written, or at least sent off, three days ago. I do not hear that you ever accomplished your projected tour to Genoa, & I suppose the cordon sanitaire <2> must have prevented you from ever crossing the Var. <3> Yet as you lunched one day at St Gervais, <4> you must have crossed the river to get there. Perhaps however I am confounding St Gervais with St André & that your luncheon was in the cool grotto there. Constance <5> is exceedingly well today & has been so all the winter. I have had a bad rheumatic cold, caught I think at the Duke of Devonshire’s <6> ball. – Can you tell me what quantity of coals you generally use per week at Lacock, & also at Sackville St <7> – because we are surprized to find how much we burn & think there must be mismanagement. – We find that it does not suit us to take the beer which Wright <8> spoke of, but that we prefer allowing the servants beer money – Mrs Price <9> buys wine with hers –
Everybody complains of the increased heat & want of ventilation in the new House of Commons, I don’t much regret not being a member, especially in the summer season I shall rejoice at not being confined to London. Lady Ribblesdale’s <10> Tory friends are indignant at her marriage with Lord John Russell <11> just as if she had married OConnell or Wakley. <12>
I had a great deal of trouble last winter about Mr Horlock’s <13> Hounds – He formerly wrote me a letter requesting leave to hunt Inwood <14> which I declined, having first asked your advice on the subject: and 2 years afterwards he repeated the request, to which I sent a similar answer – This winter he appointed the hounds to meet at Inwood in spite of my refusal, upon which I warned him off, which created such a sensation in North Wilts as you can’t imagine, the gentry not being aware, nor supposing it possible that leave had been previously asked and refused; which I afterwards explained to them. Mr Horlock sent an excuse, in which he said that he understood from Lord Kerry <15> there was no longer any objection, and that Lord Kerry had understood so from you. But as you were present when I wrote to Mr Horlock & advised the nature of the reply, I cannot think that you would say so to Kerry without acquainting me with what you had said, because it was placing me in such a false position that a misunderstanding with Mr Horlock became inevitable. I have given permission to Captain Rooke <16> to build a reservoir on Nash Hill & lay down pipes to convey the spring water to his house. He is to pay me 3 guineas a year. It is worth £50 or £100 per ann. to him, which I might have asked had I been disposed to drive a hard bargain. I have planted an avenue of trees extending from Caroline Copse in a line towards the Abbey across the field till it reaches the road.
Other great improvements you will not see many, except that an opening has been made in the shrubbery which admits a view of the orchard from the carriage drive. –
They have had 1 night’s debate on the Irish Church question. <17> I suppose ministers will be beat. They were disgracefully beat on the London University Charter, <18> by a majority of 110, owing to the Tories being at Lady Ann Beckett’s party.
Yours affly
Henry
Monsieur
M. le Capitaine Feilding
Poste Restante
Nice
par Antibes
(Var)
Notes:
1. Lady Elisabeth Theresa Feilding, née Fox Strangways, first m Talbot (1773–1846), WHFT’s mother.
2. An isolation or quarantine zone.
3. River Varus, runs close to Nice and into Liguria region of Italy.
4. In the French Alps on the border with Italy.
5. Constance Talbot, née Mundy (1811–1880), WHFT’s wife.
6. Sir William George Spencer Cavendish, 6th Duke of Devonshire (1790–1858).
7. 31 Sackville Street, London residence of the Feildings, often used as a London base by WHFT.
8. James Wright, footman to the Talbots & Constable for Lacock.
9. Mrs Sarah Henneman, first m. Price ( ca.1811–1848), housemaid at Lacock Abbey.
10. Lady Adelaide Ribblesdale.
11. Lord John Russell (1792–1878), politician.
12. Daniel O’Connell (1775–1847), politician, Irish nationalist, and Thomas Wakely (1795–1862), surgeon and MP.
13. Knightley William Horlock (1802–1882), author & huntsman.
14. Inwood, near Lacock, Wiltshire.
15. William Thomas Fitzmaurice, Earl of Kerry (1811–1836), MP.
16. Captain Frederick William Rooke (ca. 1775–1855), of Lackham, Wilts.
17. See Doc. No: 02602, Doc. No: 02600, Doc. No: 02624, Doc. No: 02725.
18. A product of the Liberal movement of the 19th century. Following a call by poet Thomas Campbell in 1825 for a university to provide education for the class between the “mechanics” and the “enormously rich,” liberals and religious dissenters founded London University (now University College) in 1826; instruction began in 1828. Its application for a royal charter was refused because the college admitted Roman Catholics, Jews, and other non-Anglicans. In 1831 King’s College was founded under Anglican auspices, but its charter was blocked by the dissenters. In 1836 the University of London was created as an administrative entity that would hold no classes of its own but would examine and confer degrees on students of the other two colleges.