Abbotsbury <1>
Sepr 3. 1823.
My dear Henry
We have just heard that Jane <2> has got a boy that is said to be extremely like her already & all well – I was engaged to let you know this intelligence as early as possible & have deferred answering your last letter in expectation of this opportunity
Your shaggy Scabiosa I cannot guess at – Your grassleaved one, not the graminifolia – seems to answer the description of a Caucasian plant which the Fl. T.C. <3> calls Sc. Caucasica & of which I have seen a poor or as Withering <4> would say a starved specimen in a Garden – but have not got it myself – as yours is an Alpine plant they may be the same, or allied. I ought to have Sc. graminifolia, but the seed is one of the few that have not come up. Among my others, I have Cerinthe aspera, Silene canescens, Pancratium maritimum (wch I expect will turn out Illyricum) come up in the open ground & air – Veronica Buxbaumii is in flower, & very pretty it has a creeping root, which I do not remember that it had at Naples. Thuya pyramidalis Rhamnus Paliurus – Canna Indica & a Cypress from Constantinople Cassia corymbosa, Melia azedarahtita Mimosa Iulibrissin[?], Ocymum basilicum, Ceratonia siliqua – Glycyrhiza glabra from Sarepta are also up – all these are two years old seeds. I have a prickly pear which has lived out three winters & bids fair to establish itself. Dianthus squarrosus is coming into flower here but not at Melbury. <5> Of the plants you mention I know Silene Otites from Sowerby’s <6> figure. Epilobium Angustissimum is in the garden & E. Dodonæi, very like it. E. Angustifolium I found lately wild at Evershot. I now want to see E. latifolium – all these I would put aside as Chamænesiums. Prenanthes purpurea I have seen at Penrice, <7> brought by Mr Buckland <8> from Hungary. Narcissus poeticus I found at Lanslebourg. Is Thlaspi alpestre like Th. saxatile? I am persuaded the Ophrys I found at Fontainebleau is O. Anthropophosa – Sowerby figures a poor specimen & says the French botanists go to Fontainebleau to see it.
I have been mustering all my old plants here & find them all except Glaux maritima which has disappeared. Vicia lutea if I must call it so is very abundant & very pretty – invariably with large (for a vetch) milkwhite blossoms. I found today Scabiosa Arvensis & Centaurea nigra both with white flowers – I am collecting seed of Linum angustifolium which I fear will soon be lost in this neighbourhood, to send abroad, as I find it is often confounded with L. tenuifolium – for namesake only as they are most unlike – I would call L. t. grandiflorum or roseum – or L. a. procumbens or prostratum which in that genus would mark them better than their present names do. We have a tall yellow flax with few short leaves far apart name unknown. I got the other day in a garden at Blandford a strange Campanula with Small leaves heartshaped & crenated – long spike of flowers dark blue almost sessile petals deep cut & linear so as to look like a star rather than a bell – it was called betonicæfolia which it is not. I have a gigantic Thalictrum which I wish you would name – also a Mentha floribus secundis with a pleasant smell slightly citrine. an ugly Anthemis [secudiramea?] – a Chenopodium – & a [illegible deletion] which have flowered already. Several Sedums Salvias & a Rhododendron are appearing – Euphorbias &c – the bulbs remain over to next year – This rainy season has produced such incredible quantities of insects of all sorts, slugs, wasps, &c that the plants have suffered very much. Pray let me know in your next when I may expect to see you & where – for I am ignorant just now whether you are coming home or not & I talk of leaving England in October –
Where are your family to be this winter? if at home I shall certainly profit by it – Do you know Coronopus Ruellii? Tenores <9> Cucubalus angustifolius is come up & though I see as yet only the leaves & stalks, I see it is quite a different thing from either Behen or maritima both of which we have wild here – indeed I brought it on purpose to compare, & shall take him seeds back – do you know S. longifolia I have it [text missing] blow it is very triste <10> as was its companion chloræfolia which is now departed or gone under ground as our gardener calls it & not come up again. You must write soon
Yr Aff
W T H F S
W. H. F. Talbot Esqre
Poste Restante
Milan
Varese <11>
WTHFS
Notes:
1. Abbotsbury, Dorset: home of William Thomas Horner Fox Strangways.
2. Jane Harriot Nicholl, née Talbot (1796–1874). Her first child, John Cole Nicholl, was born 30 August 1823.
3. Friedrich August, Freiherr Marschall von Bieberstein (1768–1826), Flora Taurico-caucasica stirpes phænogamas in Chersoneso Taurica et regionibus caucasicis sponte crescentes (Charkov, 1808, 1819).
4. William Withering (1741–1799), physician, botanist and mineralogist. A Botanical Arrangement of British plants; . . . with an easy Introduction to the Study of Botany, &c. Illustrated by copper plates. (Birmingham: M. Swinney, 1787).
5. Melbury, Dorset: one of the Fox Strangways family homes; WHFT was born there.
6. Probably James Sowerby (1757–1822), botanist and scientific illustrator. His publications included English Botany (1790).
7. Penrice Castle and Penrice House, Gower, Glamorgan, 10 mi SW of Swansea: home of Christopher Rice Mansel Talbot.
8. William Buckland (1784–1856), Dean of Westminster & scientist.
9. Michel Tenore (1780–1861), Italian botanist & traveller.
10. Unhappy or sad.
11. Readdressed in another hand.