Melbury <1>Dorchester
3 May 1863
My dear Henry
I cannot send you as interesting a letter from here as I could from Abby <2> but the beauty of the season & garden improvements we are making supply the place of other things. We receive now & then a box of flowers from Abb. I enclose specimens from one that came last night – with fish – of which some 18 or 20,000 have been taken
The season has been so forward it has put my late planting quite out of course – & many young trees are so forward that they must be reserved for the autumn.
I am very much obliged to Profr Balfour <3> for his offer & as soon as I go back to Abb I will mark out some bulbs to send him after flowering. What is his speciality? has he travelled in Europe or beyond? McNab <4> I know is good at American plants.
The palms Profr B. is good enough to offer are not in my way. At least Palmetto I have several of. One of the same country that I desiderate is Ch. <5> serrulata – true as gardeners say – it seems scarce. I have all the other extratropical that I know of except Areca sapida of N. Zealand. It is so long since you were at Abb you do not know how very Southern an aspect the Terrace wears now –
Another set of plants I want are Madeira & Canary plants – so many do well with us – the C. <6> Vidalii you gave me has done remarkably well, but as a Greenhouse plant. Ardisia excelsa is what I want most.
I wish you could find some of the plants I remember at the Embassy at Constantinople <7> Oxalis compressa – Acacia Nilotica – Terebinthus – Trifolium uniflorum
Let me know when you are at Lacock – we stay here till the 20th then to Abby & then I suppose to town.
Your have found some interesting natives at Millburn <8> –
Yr affte
Wm
[envelope, "Melbury Dorchester" imprinted on flap:]
H. Fox Talbot Esqr
Millburn Tower
Edinburgh
Notes:
1. Melbury, Dorset: one of the Fox Strangways family homes; WHFT was born there.
2. Abbotsbury, Dorset: home of William Thomas Horner Fox Strangways.
3. Dr John Hutton Balfour (1808–1884), Scottish botanist.
4. James McNab, director of the Botanic Garden, Edinburgh.
5. Chamærops. See Doc. No: 00285.
6. Campanula. See Doc. No: 07764.
7. See Doc. No: 00285.
8. Millburn Tower, Gogar, just west of Edinburgh; the Talbot family made it their northern home from June 1861 to November 1863. It is particularly important because WHFT conducted many of his photoglyphic engraving experiments there. The house had a rich history. Built for Sir Robert Liston (1742-1836), an 1805 design by Benjamin Latrobe for a round building was contemplated but in 1806 a small house was built to the design of William Atkinson (1773-1839), best known for Sir Walter Scott’s Abbotsford. The distinctive Gothic exterior was raised in 1815 and an additional extension built in 1821. Liston had been ambassador to the United States and maintained a warm Anglo-American relationship in the years 1796-1800. His wife, the botanist Henrietta Liston, née Marchant (1751-1828) designed a lavish American garden, sadly largely gone by the time the Talbots rented the house .