L. Abbey
2d March
Dear Henry
I have just received a letter from Mr Moore <1> & find he wants to go up to London for a week or ten days on the 9th – Do you think you shall come down here by that time? or if you not, would it be inconvenient to you to have him in the house at the same time, in the up stairs bed room? It would be very disagreeable to me for reasons I have before explained I believe to you, but I ask would you mind it supposing I can get over it? Pray answer these questions by return of Post, as his letter has already been round by Sackville Street <2> & I should be sorry for any further delays in answering it –
I have a letter from Caroline <3> in which she thinks you must want to be dégourdi <4> by this time & ought to leave England for a short change
affly yrs
E F
I have a letter from Mr King <5> in which the man who bought the Bolton Estate proposes to me to encrease [sic] the Mortgage to which I am not at all inclined, as I prefer lower interest in the funds.
I hope you are going to the Party to night at Lansdowne House, <6> it would be a good way of seeing many old friends without the trouble of calling on them.
Notes:
1. Thomas Moore (1780–1852), Irish poet.
2. 31 Sackville Street, London residence of the Feildings, often used as a London base by WHFT.
3. Caroline Augusta Edgcumbe, née Feilding, Lady Mt Edgcumbe (1808–1881); WHFT’s half-sister.
4. Warmed up.
5. Of William Read King & Son, solicitors, London.
6. Lansdowne House, London: home of the Marquis of Lansdowne, WHFT's uncle and cousins.