[this is written on the same sheet as a note from Horatia: Doc. No: 00159]
Laycock abbey
24th January
Mr Fox’s Birthday!
My Dear Henry
Gela fin nei pensieri <1> – but I must just present a 4th scheme to your imagination not withstanding mine is frozen. If you are not entirely & for ever decided against the idea of annihilating the new room, I would have you think twice before you resolve as the saying is, to throw good money after bad. Suppose for a moment it had all been left you exactly as it is by some Uncle who had died precisely at the moment Mr Reddings <2> left off, you would then have had no scruple in pulling it down, it is only the unpleasant feel of undoing one’s own doings that is disagreeable but yet you see every day architects & people of the best taste are mistaken where building is concerned it seems the most deceitful of all improvements upon paper. Supposing you take Mr Blore’s <3> opinion on this particular point? It is not only by far the cheapest plan, but it would besides save you the new casing of the [illegible deletion] South front with hewn stone, which must be expensive. as with [illegible] the fitting There is much more to be said in its favour, but I will not trouble you with it now – Horatia <4> is going to Bowood <5> with Mr F. <6> to meet a party of Hamiltons <7> from Fairley Castle <8> & does not return till tomorrow – Pray write again & tell us of your party at the Grange. <9> They have gone on working at filling up the pond, nothing else can be done while the frost is so very severe
W. H. Fox Talbot Esqre
Lady Mildmay’s <10>
Winchester
Notes:
1. My very thoughts are frozen.
2. David Reading, builder, working on Lacock Abbey.
3. Edward Blore (1787–1879), architect & artist.
4. Henrietta Horatia Maria Gaisford, née Feilding (1810–1851), WHFT’s half-sister.
5. Bowood House, nr Calne, Wiltshire, 5 mi NE of Lacock: seat of the Marquess of Lansdowne.
6. Rear Admiral Charles Feilding (1780–1837), Royal Navy; WHFT’s step-father.
7. Possibly related to Louisa Jane Hamilton, née Russell, Duchess of Abercorn (1812–1902).
8. Fairley or Fairlie Castle, Ayrshire. It was in ruins by the end of the 19th c.
9. The house of Alexander Baring, 1st Baron Ashburton (1774–1848), financier & statesman.
10. Jane Dorthea Methuen, née Mildmay (1789–1846).