My dear Henry
We are not likely to be at Abby <3> just yet - I am an invalid but recovering from all sorts of pains & aches in my face which they have had possession of some time - but if you can come here on Monday or any day after Harry <4> desires me to say he will be happy to see you Mr Selwyn <5> I believe comes about that time, I wish you could take Kilmington <6> in your way, see his garden, & come on with him, which as this is so much shorter a distance than Abby you would have time to do, by giving previous notice - it is exactly in the way from Warminster to Wincanton close to Stourton to which you can send for horses while you stop -
I am reading the review on Lyells Geology <7> in the Quarterly <8> which I think you told me was by Scrope <9> - There are a good many things that require explanation <10> & I think must be explained away. I wrote to Horatia <11> the other day & the letter was franked to Caroline, <12> I suppose they have not settled who is to answer it yet - pray tell them so when you write - I hear Mary & Bella <13> are both better.
Yr aff
W F S
Notes:
1. Melbury, Dorset: one of the Fox Strangways family homes; WHFT was born there.
2. That is, 6 January, the 12th day after Christmas.
3. Abbotsbury, Dorset: home of WTHFS.
4. Henry Stephen Fox Strangways, 3rd Earl of Ilchester (1787-1858).
5. Rev Townshend Selwyn (1783-1853), botanist, Vicar of Kilmington, Somerset, and Canon of Gloucester.
6. The home of the Rev Townshend Selwyn.
7. Charles Lyell (1797-1875), Principles of Geology: being an attempt to explain the former changes of the earth's surface, by reference to causes now in operation (London: 1830).
8. The Quarterly Review xlii. 411, line 406.
9. George Julius Duncombe Poulett Scrope (1797-1876), MP & scientist.
10. Both Lyell and Scrope put forward the 'uniformitarian' theory of geology - essentially that the present is the key to the past, and that the surface of the Earth is and always has been formed by certain dynamic processes. This was opposed to the attempts of, for example, William Buckland, friend of the Talbot/Strangways families, to link geology to the Bible.
11. Henrietta Horatia Maria Gaisford, née Feilding (1810-1851), WHFT's half-sister.
12. Caroline Augusta Edgcumbe, née Feilding, Lady Mt Edgcumbe (1808-1881); WHFT's half-sister.
13. Mary Thereza Talbot (1795-1861), WHFT's cousin, and Isabella Catherine Franklen, née Talbot (1804-1874).