Downing Lodge
Octr 8 1838
Dear Talbot
Your room is ready, bed well aired &c &c nevertheless the Fly & Telegraph have both passed <1>so that if you do not appear by the 9 oClock relay, I shall fire this shot at you.
There seems no great probabilities of my being obliged to go to Town again just yet; & if I am, you shall have a blank V.C.’s order for picture books & you may study Weale<2> or Rosellini <3> ad libitum <4> – Such a resumption of private studies must I am afraid be your fate whether I go or stay, under existing circumstances – as for example tomorrow& the next day are distinguished by the following beautiful order of things
Tuesday Octr 9/ 10 oClock
Clerum
11 – Licensing Lodging Houses at the Schools
1 – Ditto Public Houses An operation which will last to about 4 or 5 Wednesday Octr 10 Term begins
11 oClock congregation at Senate House Election of Univy officers
2. Congregation again to complete the Elections &c &c &c
with Sundry interludes of payment orders – things indescribably unutterable, abominable – corresponding generally to the word business (πολυπραγμοσυνη) that which frittereth away a mans time & animal spirits – I think it but fair to tell you the posture of things; & my counsel to your Permanent is this – If you are staying in Town but a short time, & it must be soon or not at all, do not defraud me of your promised visit, but let your portmanteau be lined with the Chartæ stoicorum quorundam <5> & adventure boldly – If you have more time at command, defer your visit for a week or ten days when things will have been set a going & gained some little inherent momentum. When at all events some of your Trinity friends will have returned at present I watch over our Athens almost alone; & like a sentinel at dawning feel it drowsier & chiller than even during the dead waste & middle of the long vacation And now having waited some time beyond six, I shall proceed to dine & [illegible deletion] expect the Evening Coaches
Yours Ever
Thos Worsley
Henry Fox Talbot Esqre
31 Sackville Street
London
Notes:
1. The scheduled coaches from London to Cambridge.
2. Possibly John Weale, who published pictorial handbooks on London.
3. Ippolito Rosellini, Monumenti dell' Egitto e della Nubia (Florence, 1832-1840). Rosellini had accompanied Jean-François Champollion on his 1828 expedition to Egypt, and after Champollion's untimely death in 1832, went on to publish ten elaborate folio volumes. At some point, WHFT acquired a set (presumably not Worsleys's!) and annotated the plates with his own observations.
4. According to pleasure.
5. With the papers of certain stoics.