Laycock Abbey
Thursday
Septr 27th
My dear Henry
I hope this letter will have a better fate than that we sent you at Bangor 3 years ago. How came you not to mention Lord Byron's <1> tomb at Newstead - that is what I should have thought the most interesting part. The Galways <2> left us yesterday to go to Melbury <3> - & Harriet & Mr Mundy <4> are just gone to Bowood <5> - They had been here a week, Amandier <6> arrived Sunday in tolerably good health notwithstanding the cholera - Mr Luttrell <7> came yesterday - Poor old Niemcewicz <8> went away Monday - he said he should never forget the happy days he had passed here. Count Zamoyski <9> is still here he shewed that Polish fable to Mr Moore, <10> who said he would take the idea & make something of it. Caroline <11> is very well all things considered - Lord V. <12> left her here Sunday & went back to canvass in Cornwall. We had some beautiful tableaux Saturday last. Lord V. & Gale <13> together constructed a sort of little stage at the end of the South gallery, out of old materials they poked out in the dormitory, & which was a great improvement on the narrow doorway as it admitted of so many more figures. Lord & Ly Lansdowne, Louisa, Mr Rogers <14> & Mr Luttrell came from Bowood to see them & were highly delighted. What are you going to do in Wales? write me all about it. - I think something is going to happen in Europe - the aspect of affairs is warlike - I wish we [text missing] <15> pelt those Russians a little -
Addio
yr. affte sister
Horatia
Henry Fox Talbot Esqr
Post Office
Bangor
North Wales
Notes:
1. George Gordon Byron (1788-1824), poet. He owned Newstead Abbey, Nottinghamshire.
2. Sir William Payne Gallwey (1807-1881), 2nd Bart, and his wife, Emily Anne, née Frankland-Russell (b. 1822).
3. Melbury, Dorset: one of the Fox Strangways family homes; WHFT was born there.
4. Harriot Georgiana Mundy, née Frampton (1806-1886), WHFT’s cousin & sister-in-law; and her husband, William Mundy (1801-1877), politician, WHFT's brother-in-law.
5. Bowood House, nr Calne, Wiltshire, 5 mi NE of Lacock: seat of the Marquess of Lansdowne.
6. Amélina Petit De Billier, 'Mamie', 'Amandier' (1798-1876), governess and later close friend of the Talbot family [See Amélina's journal].
7. Henry Luttrell (d. 1851), poet.
8. Julian Ursyn Niemcewicz (1757-1841), Polish scholar, poet and statesman and Adjutant to Kosciusko in the fighting against the Russians.
9. Count Wladyslaw Zamoyski (1803-1868), Polish patriot.
10. Thomas Moore (1780-1852), Irish poet. Moore published a series of Moore's National melodies (Philadelphia: G.E. Blake, 1820-1821).
11. Caroline Augusta Edgcumbe, née Feilding, Lady Mt Edgcumbe (1808-1881); WHFT's half-sister.
12. Ernest Augustus Edgcumbe, Lord Valletort, 3rd Earl of Mt Edgcumbe (1797-1861), WHFT's brother-in-law.
13. John Gale, carpenter at Lacock.
14. Henry Petty Fitzmaurice, 3rd Marquess of Lansdowne (1780-1863), MP, WHFT's uncle; and his wife, Louisa Emma Petty Fitzmaurice, née Fox Strangways, Marchioness of Lansdowne (1785-1851), Lady of the Bedchamber to Queen Victoria, 1837-1838; WHFT's aunt.
15. Text torn away under seal.