Monday
My dear Henry,
I am pleased that you approve of my taking the children <1> home on Thursday. –
There is nothing further for me to settle – but I shall expect instructions from you for my guidance on Friday. I shall expect to hear whether you with me to come by an early or a late train to Steventon. – & also where I must enquire for you at Oxford. – Price <2> will be my escort, & I shall of course take her with me inside the Coach at from Steventon to Oxford. I do not think I have lost any of your letters. – I have received four <3> – the 2d dated July 14th was addressed ‘ Marle Hill’ <4> simply and contained the important information that you had written to Carey <5> –
Your affte
Constance
Is Lord Lansdowne <6> ill at Liège as the Newspaper says? –
Notes:
1. Ela Theresa Talbot (1835–1893), WHFT’s 1st daughter, Rosamond Constance ‘Monie’ Talbot (1837–1906), artist & WHFT’s 2nd daughter and Matilda Caroline Gilchrist-Clark, ‘Tilly’, née Talbot (1839–1927), WHFT’s 3rd daughter.
2. Mrs Sarah Henneman, first m Price ( ca.1811–1848), housemaid at Lacock Abbey.
3. Letters not located.
4. Marle-Hill House, Cheltenham, Gloucestershire.
5. William Carey (d. 1855), tiler and plasterer at Lacock Abbey.
6. Henry Petty Fitzmaurice, 3rd Marquess of Lansdowne (1780–1863), MP, WHFT’s uncle.