Albano
Thursday
12th Octr
My dear Henry
We have just made an expedition that made us think of you for it was just exactly what you would have enjoyed so much. We left this early Tuesday & stopped an hour to bait at Velletri (where we slept by your advice to see the sunset years ago!) then proceeded to Cori, up in the mountains - we had to leave the carriage at the gate & walk a long way up to the top of the town, a steep paved ascent - crowned by the Temple of Hercules of which I remember there is a view in Rossini's Contorni di Roma <1> at Laycock - There are also the remains of a temple of Castor & Pollux - & some very curious bits of Cyclopean walls - & a fine view over the Campagna - This however was nothing to the next day - when we set off for Norba a place I had never heard of & wonder so few people think of visiting. We went first to Cisterna & turned off the Naples road a little further on till we came to a curious place called Ninfa, where are some remains of antiquity which we could not well make out & very picturesque walls & towers of the bassi tempi <2> covered with ivy & a little lake fed by several springs as clear as crystal. Here the carriage road stopped - & we saw Norba perched on the rock exactly above our heads - It was out of the question to attempt climbing it on foot in the broiling sun - but most luckily we got some mules from a miller who lives near the lake & mounted on men's saddles we very hard & somewhat difficult to sit upon, we accomplished the ascent, & were amply rewarded for our toil - The ancient remains are some little way from the village & must have been a very large town - The walls are composed of enormous blocks of stone, in the Cyclopean fashion - & the date quite unknown. The view of the mountains, & the plain spread beneath was magnificent - Monte Circello in the hazy distance & several islands in the Sea. We had our lunch among the olives, seated on rocks - with a pleasant breeze to cool us, & plenty of figs & grapes for dessert. They are just beginning the vintage now - the vines are quite beautiful literally bending with the clusters of fruit. There was a quantity of yellow amaryllis growing about the rocks at Norba I have seen no where else. Altogether it was quite a place after your own heart. We got home at ½ past 11 rather tired but much pleased. We talk of an excursion to Palestrina next week. The inn is very bad, but Pss Doria has offered us their castle at Valmontone to sleep at, some miles off, & I believe we are going there Monday. It was rather tantalizing to get so far on our way to Naples & turn back. Ld Mt E. <3> has taken the Palazzo Spina for the winter - it is near the Via de due Macelli that goes out of the Piazza di Spagna - & the Fountain of Trevi, & seems very comfortable - I am afraid there is no hopes of persuading you to come but I think it would do you all a deal of good. I fancy the climate would agree with Constance & the children <4> are now at a very good age for travelling. The journey thro' the N. of Italy might perhaps not be pleasant - but I think thro' France there would now be no difficulty - do think of it, dear Henry we shd be so snug all together & I think you want a little change of scene. It would be a good time to set out now not hot or cold, but if you wait it will be too late. Jane <5> &c are now at Florence, & coming to Rome the 2nd or 3rd week in Novr. They have enjoyed their summer at Lucca Baths very much. We are still in great trouble about Sicily - there is such a difficulty of getting any tidings. There is however a report of the King <6> having offered very good terms with the condition only of Naples & Sicily being still united under the same crown <7> - in short very much what they wd have got by Ld Minto's <8> mediation if they had been well enough to take accept them. I should be most glad to hear it was all settled for poor Annie's <9> sake. Caroline <10> hopes you received her letter containing a very important commission for her comfort - but in case you should not I will repeat it. It is to get her 3 or 4 rolls of anodyne paste about the size of her little finger done up with a great deal of cotton so as not to be flattened, & sent in a fat letter - if flattened they wd be spoilt. At Patterson & Clarks, 5 Sackville St or if he shd be out of town at his partner Mr Rogers opposite 31. Please to do this for her without delay. Addio dear Henry - pray come or at least write - Love to C. & A. & the ragazzine <11> -
Yr aff Sister
Horatia
We see a good deal of M. de Kestner the Hanoverian Minister <12> - such a nice old man they say his mother was the original of Werther's Charlotte - & he has a great many of Goethe's letters to her <13> - I shall ask him to shew me some day -
The whole country is now covered with pink Cyclamens so pretty. They call them here pane porcino. <14>
Notes:
1. L. Rossini, The Antiquities of the contours of Rome that is piu the famous cities of Lazio III the antiquities of Albano and Castelgandolfo (Rome: 1824-1826).
2. Late times.
3. Ernest Augustus Edgcumbe, Lord Valletort, 3rd Earl of Mt Edgcumbe (1797-1861), WHFT's brother-in-law.
4. Constance Talbot, née Mundy (1811-1880), WHFT's wife; Ela Theresa Talbot (25 Apr 1835 - 25 Apr 1893), WHFT's 1st daughter; Rosamond Constance Talbot (16 Mar 1837 - 7 May 1906), 'Rose'; 'Monie'; artist & WHFT's 2nd daughter; died & buried at San Remo, Italy, with a memorial at Lacock; Matilda Caroline Gilchrist-Clark, née Talbot (25 Feb 1839-1927), 'Tilly', WHFT's 3rd daughter; Charles Henry Talbot, (2 Feb 1842 - 26 Dec 1916), 'Charlie'; 'Tally'; antiquary & WHFT's only son.
5. Jane Harriot Nicholl, née Talbot (1796-1874).
6. King Ferdinand II (1810-1859), King of the Two Sicilies; nick-named "King Bomba", after his preferred method of ruthlessly suppressing insurrections.
7. Actually the same constitution but with separate parliaments.
8. Elliot Murray, 2nd Earl of Minto (1782-1859), statesman.
9. Lord Mt Edgcumbe's niece, Annie Sarah (sometimes Sarah Anne), who earlier in 1848 married Alfredo Salvatori Ruggioro Andrea, Baron Porceilli di Sant Andrea, a Sicilian nobleman and revolutionary commander.
10. Caroline Augusta Edgcumbe, née Feilding, Lady Mt Edgcumbe (1808-1881); WHFT's half-sister.
11. Children.
12. Georg Christian August Kestner (1777-1853), art collector, lawyer, civil servant and diplomat in the service of Hannover.
13. Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Die Leiden des jungen Werthers (The Sorrows of Young Werther) (1774). Charlotte Kestner, née Buff (1753-1828). After her marriage, Goethe remained a correspondent and helped her children, but did not see her again until after 1800.
14. Swine bread. An English name for 'Cyclamen hederifolium' is sowbread, as pigs will root for the corms.