Penrice <1>
July 26
My dear Henry
I am quite shocked at having been at home a whole fortnight & never writing to you in answer to your last letter, some how the time passes so rapidly I have not time to do half I intend every day & tho’ I do not forget my absent friends I must own I seem to do so; I must now endeavor to make some amends & not waste both time & paper in trying in vain to exculpate myself. – You will be glad to hear that Charlotte <2> is a great deal better since we got home & the rest very well. – We are now all at home with the exception of Sir C <3> – Jane <4> came a day or two ago & is looking very well she enjoyed her tour very much indeed & says she did get your letter at Paris, she intends answering it soon. – She is very sorry indeed at missing you, it is very unlucky you should have been so much longer in getting to London than you originally told us. – We are just returned from a very nice walk on Oxwich Point, <5> the air is delightful & the sea so blue! Kit’s <6> yacht is a great ornament to the bay, I sailed in it one day for an hour or two & liked it very much I hope you found Aunt Charlotte <7> quite satisfied with Augusta’s <8> improvement in health & Charley <9> as well as when I heard last. – Have you heard of poor William Floyer’s <10> death (he was the son of the late Clergyman of Stinsford <11>) he came round from Plymouth in a boat intending to go to Weymouth, but was not able to get out of the race off Portland! it is a heavy blow to his poor Mother & Aunt Susan <12> feels it very much too, his box was saved & in it there was a letter from Capt. I Pellew <13> giving him the highest character whilst he had been under his command. – Uncle John <14> is enjoying himself here very much, he is going to Dublin to see Giles <15> & Kit talks of accompaning him & after staying a few days returning here & leaving John to his own devices. –
I must tell you what rare things I found at Williamstrip, <16> the wi[ld licquor]ice,<17> Verbascum blattaria & the Monotropa hypopithys of Sowerby! <18> I hope in time I shall begin to remember the rare plants as well as the common ones for at present I am obliged to trust to my neighbours. They were sinking a well at Williamstrip & there we found such curiosities petrified oysters quantities of corals & wood in the blue clay & other shells in the stone as the well was a hundred feet Deep we had a great variety of things as you may imagine; in short it was very amusing to those who did not want the water for that seemed a scarce article, tho in the garden close to the house there was water at nine foot! – All send their kindest love. –
I am your affate coz
Mary
W. H. F. Talbot Esqre
31 Sackville Street <19>
London.
Notes:
1. Penrice Castle and Penrice House, Gower, Glamorgan, 10 mi SW of Swansea: home of Christopher Rice Mansel Talbot.
2. Charlotte Louisa 'Charry' Traherne, née Talbot (1800–1880), WHFT’s cousin.
3. Sir Christopher Cole (1770–1836), Captain, MP & naval officer.
4. Jane Harriot Nicholl, née Talbot (1796–1874).
5. Two or three miles southeast of Penrice Castle.
6. Christopher Rice Mansel Talbot (1803–1890), immensely wealthy landowner, mathematician & politician; WHFT’s Welsh cousin.
7. Lady Charlotte Anne Lemon, née Strangways (d. 1826), WHFT’s aunt.
8. Augusta Lemon (d. ca.1825), daughter of Sir Charles and Charlotte Lemon.
9. Charles Lemon (d. 1826), son of Sir Charles and Charlotte Lemon.
10. William Floyer (1803–1822).
11. Stinsford, Dorsetshire, 2 mi E of Dorcester.
12. Susannah Sarah Louisa O’Brien, née Strangways (1743–1827), WHFT’s great aunt.
13. Probably Sir Israel Pellew (1758–1832), admiral.
14. John George Charles Fox Strangways (1803–1859), MP.
15. Giles Digby Robert Fox Strangways (1798–1827).
16. Williamstrip Park, near Fairford, Gloucestershire. [See Doc. No: 00657].
17. Page torn away under seal.
18. James Sowerby (1757–1822), botanical illustrator, collaborated with Sir James Edward Smith, MD (1759–1828), botanist on English botany: or coloured figures of British plants (London: 1790).
19. 31 Sackville Street, London residence of the Feildings, often used as a London base by WHFT.