Abb. <1>
Sunday
Dear Henry
I wish I could have had a little notice of your going to Laycock, & I would have met you there, as it is I must defer it to a later day – I hope you find Mr F. <2> better – The Mundys <3> are here, Harriot <4> looking a great deal better for change of air.–
Your best way of sending to Bologna is by the Ancona Messenger – if you can find out when he goes & nobody ought to know better than Mr Hay, besides I believe the Colonial office despatch their Couriers regularly which the F. O. <5> certainly do not.
Shall you be at Laycock about the 14th – I could come I think then better than any time? What are the Narcissus said to be brought from Genoa by you to Penrice? <6> I have brought a set of Helleborus from Hungary & lost the names – one I recognize coming up as orientalis – two others have flowered – like each other but unlike any other species I know. Also a Wulfenia not Carinthiaca.
Do you possess a 2nd vol of Flora Sicula? <7>
Iris Sisyrinchium is going to flower – & Tulipa Clusiana in quantities. I have two sorts of straw colour Narcissus from a nursery garden which look uncommon. Have you the Lophospermum – the Sollya, & Erodium romanum & hymenodes which are both out, & a 3 beautiful bunches of Cyclamens Persicum, hederæfolium, & Coum.
How singular that on the Terrace rockwork high in the eye of the wind, there are two large groups of yellow & white Polyanthus narcissus, of the greatest size & beauty which resist every storm & there has been very high wind since they flowered – We have Ixia bulbocod. purple & white thousands of Iris pumila dark purple & a light blue one which is new to me – All the Iris tuberosa going to seed. The Cistuses are beginning to look handsome with pink flowers – Glad. tristis is very fine – How have Mr Herberts <8> prospered with you?
Did you not find a Telescope <9> in a case, in Sackville St <10> & did you send it back to B. St? <11> It is a dialytisch-aplanatisch-achromatisches Fernsohn <12> –
Yr Aff
W F S
Henry Talbot Esq. MP <13>
Laycock Abbey
Chippenham
Notes:
1. Abbotsbury, Dorset: home of William Thomas Horner Fox Strangways.
2. Rear Admiral Charles Feilding (1780–1837), Royal Navy; WHFT’s step-father.
3. William Mundy (1801-1877), politician, WHFT’s brother-in-law and family.
4. Harriot Georgiana Mundy, née Frampton (1806-1886), WHFT’s cousin & sister-in-law.
5. Foreign Office.
6. Penrice Castle and Penrice House, Gower, Glamorgan, 10 mi SW of Swansea: home of Christopher Rice Mansel Talbot.
7. Giovanni Gussone (1765–1866), Flora Sicula, sive Descriptiones et Icones Plantarum rariorum Siciliæ Ulterioris (Naples: 1829).
8. William Herbert, Dean of Manchester (1778–1847), MP; clergy; botanist; linguist.
9. See Doc. No: 02771.
10. 31 Sackville Street, London residence of the Feildings, often used as a London base by WHFT.
11. 31 Burlington Street, London home of William Thomas Horner Fox Strangways.
12. Dialitic-aplanatic-achromatic Telescope.
13. WHFT was elected Member of Parliament for Chippenham in December 1832. He left Parliament at the election of January 1835.