3 Tottenham Place
Clifton <1>
June 15th 1870
My dear Mr Talbot,
I think you are mistaken in thinking that the chaplaincy of Greenwich hospital is vacant, I think it must be for the "Dredmight" hospital ship: which I have seen advertised in the Guardian for some weeks & which I send you a copy: you see it is only £200 per an: and no house and therefore it is quite out of the question my thinking of it: as although the work might be light, which would be no recommendation to me, it would be of such a kind as to prevent my getting anything else -
I was at Oxford yesterday to vote for the Registrar and saw many old friends. Those of the clerical order I consulted as to the likelihood of finding anyone willing to take a chaplaincy in the West Indies in exchange for a living at all equal to Lacock, they one and all scotched the idea: I also saw in London an agent who conducts exchanges to a large extent, two or three hundred every year, who told me it would be hopeless.
In a day or two I shall be in a position I hope of proposing to you a clergyman willing to exchange with me, who is in every way a likely person to suit and who I know the Bishop of Gloucester <2> will recommend. a man who would conduct the services much as I have done, and used to hard work: a gentleman, a Cambridge man & married.
My mother<3> sends her love, but wonders you have not answered her letter -
Yours Truly
Edward Nicholl
Notes:
1. Clifton, Bristol, on the Avon Gorge.
2. Charles John Ellicott (1819-1905), Professor of Divinity at London from 1848-1861, Dean at Exeter and then Bishop of Gloucester & Bristol from 1863.
3. Jane Harriot Nicholl, née Talbot (1796-1874).