Lacock
31st Decr 1844
My Dear Mother
Constance <1> wrote you a line the same evening I came home, & I hope you received it.
I had not an unpleasant journey, but on the contrary very comfortable, & got home in less than seven hours, notwithstanding a delay caused by running against a cart somewhere near Trowbridge for it was a pitch dark night and no moon,
If Emily Murray <2> reads my Genesis, <3> I am afraid she will think me as speculative as her brother Edward <4> –
Your affte
Henry
The tulips Horatia <5> brought from London are making a grand show in the library window; the heath by their side is eclipsed.
Notes:
1. Constance Talbot, née Mundy (1811–1880), WHFT’s wife.
2. Amelia ‘Emily’ Matilda Murray (1795–1884), author.
3. WHFT, The Antiquity of the Book of Genesis, Illustrated by Some New Arguments (London: Longman, Orme, Green, Brown and Longman, 1839). [See Doc. No: 05130].
4. Rev Edward Murray (1798–1852), author & inventor.
5. Henrietta Horatia Maria Gaisford, née Feilding (1810–1851), WHFT’s half-sister.