Weisbaden
Monday August 12th
My dear Henry
I have received both your letters from Bellinzona & Coine<1> - the last dated the 4th arrived the 10th - You seem to have made a most charming & prosperous tournée, <2> & to have explored more than anybody ever did before in such a short space of time - any ladies I mean. Two letters of mine must be already waiting your arrival at Berne one for you & one for Amandier <3>. Be sure you let me know the instant your direction changes, that no time may be lost in our correspondence. We made an excursion to Frankfort a few days ago - it is only 8 stunds off, so we got there in 3 ½ hours, Everything there is perfectly quiet, but they are so afraid of fresh tumults among the students, that they have got a body of Prussian troops on one side of the town & Austrians on the other. The gardens that go all round the town are beautiful. I hear of nothing but water parties from London - Mama & Horatia <4> went in the Galathea <5> nearly to the Nore, <6> with an immense party of Verulams <7> &c - They were thinking of going soon to Laycock Abbey, but Papa <8> will be kept some time longer in London by Lady Stuart's death. I write this, in case your correspondence with them should not be as active as mine. Ld Valletort <9> is better just now than he has been for a long time. The baths agree very well with him - I think we shall stay about 10 or 12 days a fortnight longer & then proceed on our journey to Meiningen <10> Direct here still, & I will let you know soon where to write to next. Bimbo <11> grows tall & fat & his two teeth begin to faire de l'effet - he is delighted with two balls Mamma has sent him - they are made of air, covered over with a think coat of India-rubber & bright coloured worsted. They are extremely light & bound famously. Pray tell me if Giovanni's <12> information was correct, about your wintering at Rome, Addio caro fratello -
Yr affte Sister
Caroline
Notes:
1. Possibly Cogne, in the Aosta Valley.
2. Tour.
3. Amélina Petit De Billier, 'Mamie', 'Amandier' (1798-1876), governess and later close friend of the Talbot family [See Amélina's journal].
4. Lady Elisabeth Theresa Feilding, née Fox Strangways, 1st m Talbot (1773-1846), WHFT's mother, and Henrietta Horatia Maria Gaisford, née Feilding (1810-1851), WHFT's half-sister.
5. Misspelling for 'Galatea', the yacht of Christopher Rice Mansel Talbot (1803-1890), immensely wealthy landowner, mathematician & politician; WHFT's Welsh cousin.
6. Sandbank at the mouth of the Thames, 47 miles east of London Bridge: this was the location of Britain's first lightship.
7. James Walter Grimston, 1st Earl of Verulam (1775-1845), and his wife Charlotte. [See Doc. No: 02535].
8. Rear Admiral Charles Feilding (1780-1837), Royal Navy; WHFT's step-father.
9. Ernest Augustus Edgcumbe, Lord Valletort, 3rd Earl of Mt Edgcumbe (1797-1861), WHFT's brother-in-law.
10. Meiningen, in Thuringia, Germany.
11. William Henry Edgcumbe, 'Val', 4th Earl Mt Edgcumbe (1832-1917), JP & Ld Steward of the Royal Household; WHFT's nephew 'Bimbo'.
12. Giovanni Percij.