Saturday
My Dear Henry
I have been so taken up with preparations for Court & Horatia’s <1> presentation that I have never had a moment to tell you that I sent for Thrupp<2> to scold him & told him you would not have had your new wheels of him but because he had said the coach should stand for nothing, & therefore you thought it would be unhandsome to have them of any other Coach maker, though they might be dearer & were dearer from him. I likewise told him I thought his letters to you impertinent, he said he was sorry I thought so, he did not mean it &c &c but that no trademan of any feeling could read your letters without being extremely hurt – he was very civil & apologetic but maintained that tho’ I was not to pay for the stand of the coach (because of being an old customer for more than thirty years) till it was sold, yet he had never said you (who were not a regular customer) should not do so. But at last he could not but be convinced he must have said what you understood to mean that he should not charge for the stand of the carriage, by your having been influenced by that alone to have the new wheels of him. Caroline <3> asked Mrs. Gent to put upon paper all particulars which I enclose. As for the woman being suited only to a large establishment, yours as far as the nursery is concerned is so. The Duke of Beaufort <4> has not more attendants in the Nursery at Badminton than you have. The finest lady of a head nurse could not object to walking out with Donkeys, Pages, & Nursery Maids, just like young princesses, so that need not be a reason against taking her. While Ela <5> was the only one, she had 3 times as many people about her as ever Mary Fitzmaurice <6> had. Mrs Gent does not know who Caroline inquired for. Think what a quantity of work (in all senses) Nurse Moore did for Eleven years together! & all for twenty guineas a year, and never had even a Nursery Maid to help her. Burn this as Constance <7> seems afraid of its being known prematurely, & therefore I have as she desired burnt hers, that nobody here might be the wiser – Ask her if I shall enquire else where for the same article?
Horatia looked very handsome as the Drawing room en Cérise <8> – Wright <9> took your Photogenics to the Palace
Notes:
1. Henrietta Horatia Maria Gaisford, née Feilding (1810–1851), WHFT’s half-sister.
2. Charles Joseph Thrupp (d. 1866), a high quality coachbuilder on Oxford Street, London, later succeeded by his more famous son, George Athelstane Thrupp (1822–1905).
3. Lady Caroline Augusta Edgcumbe, née Feilding (1808-1881); WHFT's half-sister; Lady of the Bedchamber to Queen Victoria, 1840–1854 & 1863–1865.
4. Henry Somerset, 7th Duke of Beaufort (1792-1853).
5. Ela Theresa Talbot (25 Apr 1835 - 25 Apr 1893), WHFT's 1st daughter.
6. Lady Mary Caroline Fitzmaurice (1835–1927).
7. Constance Talbot, née Mundy (1811–1880), WHFT’s wife.
8. In cherry-red.
9. James Wright, footman to the Talbots & Constable for Lacock. WHFT's cousin, Theresa Anna Maria Digby, née Fox Strangways (1814-1874, requested some photogenic drawings to show to Queen Victoria - see Doc. No: 03859 and Doc. No: 03862.