Genoa
11th February!!
My Dearest Henry
I cannot but write to you on this dear day, tho' from this monotonous place I have nothing to say more interesting than the recollected happiness it has given me & how often I have blessed its return.
Mr F. <1> received a very amusing letter from you at Bowood, <2> but without one word of your plans, which we should be glad to hear, as I conclude you will delay setting out, according to received usage, longer than you said, I shall send you some more commissions, one is a larger box of rhubarb & Ginger pills from Richards the Chymist in St James's St with whom we have I believe a perpetual Bill, & a few common writing books, vulgo copy books, from Clark the Stationer in Piccadilly, Richard knows & frequents both these haunts & will order them if you tell him. Likewise desire him to send me by you the receipts for the bills he paid for me, they are but two, one for Shawls in Bond St & the other for Scissors in Old Bond St. Don't forget this, for I must have them. I was so long confined to my room with an odontalgic affection that I have not profited so much by the neighbourhood of the Oberhofmeister Freyherr von Zach <3> as I should have done, but the few times I have seen him I liked him much more than you had led me to suppose. I am afraid Professor Sanquintino <4> will be gone to Turin before your arrival, he is at the head of the Museum there & is employed here in transporting Egyptian Antiquities for the King. <5> Many of them we saw among Drovetti's <6> at Leghorn. Lady Westmorland <7> has settled herself in Lord Byron's Villa. <8> I was much surprized at her arrival, She says she came here f[or]<9> repose. She lent us Dr Young's <10> wor[k] on Hieroglyphics, which is very interesting Mr M <11> wrote to you the other day, we are in doubt how to direct but conclude Richard <12> has made some arrangement with his friend the Postman of Vigo Lane for the safety of your letters & ours. Mr F. is much displeased with him for concealing his appointment, certainly he ought to have let Mr F. know it a year ago, considering what a friend he has been to him. Your sisters have found out some beautiful walks on the Mountains, & for whoever has strength to walk three or four hours at a time will not find Genoa confined, but that is not for me I have just had a most entertaining letter from Lord Dudley & Ward <13> from Rome, with a full account of all that's going on. I have been reading Moore's Loves of the Angels, <14> the great defect is the want of interest inherent in the subject, but it is very pretty. Sanquintino is always enquiring when you return. The weather is divine, & my garden never without Orange flowers & violets & roses
W.H.F. Talbot Esqr
at the Earl of Ilchester's
Melbury
Sherborne
Dorset
Inghilterra
27 Duke Street <15>
Piccadilly
26th Feby 1824
Notes:
1. Rear Admiral Charles Feilding (1780-1837), Royal Navy; WHFT's step-father.
2. Bowood House, nr Calne, Wiltshire, 5 mi NE of Lacock: seat of the Marquess of Lansdowne.
3. Lord High Stewart Franz Xaver, Baron von Zach (1754-1832), Hungarian astronomer.
4. Giulio dei Conti Cordero Di San Quintino (1778-1857), Italian Egyptologist.
5. George IV, Prince Regent (1762-1830), later King of England (1762-1830).
6. Bernardino Michele Maria Drovetti (1776-1852), Italian diplomat and collector.
7. Jane Saunders, Lady Westmorland (d. 1857).
8. She refers to the Genoan house of George Gordon Byron (1788-1824), poet. [See Doc. No: 01299].
9. Text torn away under seal.
10. Dr Thomas Young (1773-1829), physicist & Egyptologist.
11. Probably Rev George Stephen Molyneux Montgomerie (1790-1850), close friend of Talbot family, artist, Rector of Garboldisham, near Thetford, Norfolk.
12. Richard, a servant.
13. John William Ward, 1st Earl Dudley (d. 1833).
14. Thomas Moore, Loves of Angels (1823).
15. Readdressed.