Markeaton <1>
Wednesday October 12
Dearest Henry
I have some idea that you will be hovering about Sackville St. <2> towards this time & therefore as I particularly want you to execute 2 commissions for me as you pass through London, I have determined to give you due notice of them hoping that my bulky letter will escape the possibility of seeking for you among our own dear Cloisters I do not think you would stay at Lacock after they had all deserted it I have been very pleased to hear so often from you since I wrote last, & I feel considerable gratitude towards Uncle John, <3> for doubtless I am partly indebted to his franks for such frequent communications. Horatia <4> sent me a very nice letter indeed; & I should certainly have answered it before she left home, could I have ventured to enclose to Mr Strangways, <5> but I happened to be in total ignorance respecting his movements. And now for my commissions beginning with the most important one; which is to procure for Ela <6> a tippet of Swansdown fur. It must be of the very best quality & the exact size of the & shape of the paper pattern which I have enclosed I do not know the price of these things & must therefore trust to your discretion The Shop people will enlighten you as to the different qualities of Swansdown (if there is any difference, which I am not sure of) & if they are honest Shop people you cannot do wrong. Of course it must be of the purest white not soiled by tumbling about in the Shop I should prefer your buying it from Mrs Yates, 12 Upper Seymour St. Portman Square if you can I know she is a reasonable, dependable person, though not prepossessing in her appearance but I am not sure that she keeps Swansdown goods for sale, though I know she cleans them beautifully. If she does not keep them, she could perhaps procure one for you, or direct you where to enquire. I would advise you to say that the Miss Mundys <7> recommended her to your notice; as she does not know me personally, though she furnished my nuptial wreath of Orange flowers I am very particular about having the tippet as large as the pattern sent but I should not much mind a very trifling variation in the shape, if deemed necessary by Mrs Yates. I want, secondly, 6 yards of green oil silk. probably the haberdashers sell it (Swan & Edgar for instance, which is close to Sackville St.) I believe it costs about six shillings per yard, & probably it varies in price according to quality, but I do not wish for a very expensive one. Only it must be green, a colour which I cannot procure at Derby otherwise should not have troubled you about it Mrs Crowther, a cousin of my Fathers <8> is staying with us It is about thirty years since she was in Derbyshire (excepting for a day or two on one occasion) but before that time Markeaton was her home She is very glad to sojourn here once more, & remembers everybody & everything about the place as well as if she had only just left it I am rather amused by your thinking the London road to be the best between Lacock & Markeaton, it strikes me as being rather circuitous; & without a Servant, I am afraid you will be rather inconvenienced in London. I should like to send him up to you, but do not venture, without permission. You will be glad to hear that he has conducted himself extremely well all the time he has been here, & exerted himself to be useful in the house I think we are lucky in having found at last & after many failures, so respectable & steady a domestic My Father & Sisters profess themselves much pleased at gaining a week more of me, than they expected, though I have discovered that they are growing quite anxious for a little of your society also What will you do without your newspaper. Yesterday & today it has arrived here Will you have them sent back to Sackville St. or kept till you come? I am sure you will delighted [sic] to see how much Ela has improved in intelligence, & also in her talking.
Yr affectionate
Constance.
Henry Fox Talbot Esqre
31 Sackville Street
London
Notes:
1. Markeaton Hall, Derbyshire, NW of Derby: home of the Mundy family.
2. 31 Sackville Street, London residence of the Feildings, often used as a London base by WHFT.
3. John George Charles Fox Strangways (18031859), MP.
4. Henrietta Horatia Maria Gaisford, nιe Feilding (18101851), WHFTs half-sister.
5. William Thomas Horner Fox Strangways, 4th Earl of Ilchester (17951865), botanist, art collector & diplomat.
6. Ela Theresa Talbot (18351893), WHFTs 1st daughter.
7. Laura Mundy (1805 1 September 1842); Emily Mundy (1807 5 November 1839); Marian Gilder, nιe Mundy (1806 14 October 1860); m. 6 August 1844 William Troward Gilder (d. 1871), Army Surgeon (ret).; WHFTs sisters-in-law.
8. Francis Mundy (17711837), politician and father of Constance Talbot.