Edinb.
Feb. 6th.
My Dear Charles
I enclose the Cambridge Tripos List. We had to search for it in the back numbers of the Times. <1> You seem to have made an interesting visit to Merthyr Tydvil <2> during that severe weather I am glad you made acquaintance with Mr Clark <3> of the Dowlais works. <4> I sent him about 25 specimens of the Nethermore iron ore a few years ago and he obligingly had them analysed, each one separately by the Chemist attached to his works. All the specimens proved good. He then sent me specimens of his iron ore which is quite different, hard and Solid, and does not look as if it contained any iron at all.
I am surprised that Mr Waldron <5> should have made such a mistake about the stamp on the agreement.
There has been a great snow storm in the Highlands, it came on on Sunday morning the 20th, about the time when you say the thaw began in your neighbourhood. The up and down mail trains from Perth to Inverness crossed each other as usual, and soon afterwards the storm came on and both stuck fast, one at Dalwhinnie and one at Darra and the snow buried the engines till only the funnels were visible. The passengers with much difficulty, and floundering in the snow reached places of shelter where they had to stay 2 or 3 days. On another line the Ld Advocate’s son stuck fast in the snow near Galashiels and had to spend the night in the train, under an archway.
Your affte
Father
Envelope:
C. H. Talbot EsqMr Prichard’s
Llandaff
Notes:
1. The Times (London).
2. Glamorganshire, South Wales.
3. George Thomas Clark (1809–1898), engineer and archæologist; trustee of Dowlais estate and ironworks, 1852, and administrator of Dowlais undertakings until 1897. He was the sheriff of Glamorganshire, 1868, and the first president of the British Iron Trade Association, 1876.
4. Established in 1759, Merthyr.
5. Clement Waldron, attorney, Cardiff.