Saty 8th
My dear Henry
I have just heard from my Aunt Frampton <1> in reply to my communication respecting her Drawings and she desires I will thank you very much indeed for all your kind exertions in her behalf, of which I assure you she is duly sensible.– She has (very wisely I think) decided on giving up the publication of them altogether, because the work as a Flora of Dorsetshire wd be incomplete without the plants she copied from Curtis,<2> & it would be great labor to do them over again in a different position – Moreover she should hate the bother of the things she says & therefore must rest satisfied without giving the money to the Hospital.– Tell Constance <3> I am delighted to hear there is a chance of seeing her before long.– I am sorry my hopes must be at an End about the Encrinites<4> but it cannot be helped & I am equally obliged to her . –
Yr affte Cousin
H Grg Mundy
I have got the Drawings safe & will forward them to their home again.–
Notes:
1. Mary Frampton (1773-1846), botanist and author.
2. In 1787, William Curtis (1746-1799) founded The Botanical Magazine; or Flower-Garden Displayed, famous for its illustrations; after his death, it was re-named Curtis’s Botanical Magazine in his honour and continues publication to the present day.
3. Constance Talbot, née Mundy (1811–1880), WHFT’s wife.
4. Encrinites are the fossil remains of crinoids, marine animals also known as sea lilies or feather-stars. They were common in Devonshire, but it is not known what the two women were planning for them.