Thursday
Dear Hy
There is a largish Port Portfolio come directed to you. It is full Will you have it go down? or is it to remain here? Lord A. <1> is wonderfully little altered. What a change for a Man used to be fanned on a panlanquin [sic]<2> to be hustled about on democratic rail roads! & Stuffed into an omnibus!
I shall get yr answer before I go
Yr
EF
Lord A. was here some time yesterday he seemed ému <3> at entering this house & altogether grave & thoughtful of the many friends he has lost since he left England & the losses his particular friends have met with since, such as Kerry & Stavordale and Lord Holland, <4> he was nervous in speaking of. Even after so short a space as 6 years what quantities of events & melancholy ones occur!
Notes:
1. George Eden, 1st Earl of Auckland (1784–1849), Governor General of India. He had recently returned from India.
2. Palanquin - a sedan chair carried by four men.
3. Affected by emotion, moved.
4. William Thomas Fitzmaurice, Earl of Kerry (1811–1836), MP; Stephen Fox Strangways, Lord Stavordale (1817–1848); and Henry Richard Vassal Fox, 3rd Lord Holland (1773–1840).