Harrow ^<1>

Nov. 23. 1812.

My dear Mamma,

I hope you have received my last letter, which I suppose must have reached Middleton Park about the time you left it; In it I told you the holidays begin on Tuesday the 8^th of December at 4. P.M. - Whose House seat is Middleton Park? Is it L^d Jerseys? ^<2> - The water is frozen, but not firmly, for the ice cracks a little under one's weight, but I hope it will freeze tonight, so, as tomorrow is an holiday, we may have some sport on it - I am going to buy a pair of skaits and learn to skait - Our trial for the fifth form comes on next Thursday the 26^th - when it will be nearly, not quite, finished - We shall not know in what order we have got in, till Saturday, December the 5^th - My favourite amusement now is football, I have left off marbles - I have just had my study refitted and made right and tight, and impervious to every curious eye - Mind you tell me, why my horsehair Exp^t did not succeed - My next lesson is out of a Roman Historian M. V. Paterculus; ^<3> Are you acquainted with him? I must now prepare for it, so good bye

Y^r Aff^te Son

WHF. Talbot

Give my love to M^r Feilding -

Lady E. Feilding
Bowood
Calne
Wilts

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Notes:

1. Harrow School: WHFT attended from 1811-1815 and his son Charles from 1855-1859.

2. Middleton Park, in Middleton Stoney, Oxfordshire, was the estate of the Earls of Jersey; George Child Villiers, 5^th Earl of Jersey (1773-1859).

3. Velleius Paterculus (19BC-30AD)