Thursday Decr 6th
My dear Father
I have now got into my new lodgings at 18 Sackville St which seem as if they would do very well and are a good deal larger rooms than the ones which I had in Ebury St. <1> I went today into the Second court of the Common Pleas where there is a patent case going on. Grove <2> is one of the counsel employed, & it was rather amusing to hear him cross-examining one witness. The witness never would answer the questions exactly, but once Grove asked him whether certain paste which came out of the Flour mill as [illegible deletion] refuse in a certain year was the same paste as in a certain former year, on which the witness replied “Of course not; how could it be the same paste” so Grove had to ask if it was similar paste or of the same character in order to get an answer I havent made out what the patent is. It is something to do with flour-mills and this witness wanted evidently to prove a prior
The weather has become very warm and rainy. The great Reform demonstration went off very quietly you see. I did not go to see it having an objection to a mob – I see the emperor Maximilian <3> seems to have [illegible deletion] abdicated practically. I went into the Museum of practical geology <4> in Jermyn St, where I saw the remains of the Eozoon <5> which is I believe one of the oldest creatures discovered, but I could make nothing of it. There are a good many stone hatchets and flint hatchets in this museum, & a slab of stalagmite from the bottom of a French cavern with lines of reindeer, and flint hatchets and a bone needle imbedded in it.
your affect son
Charles
[envelope:]
H Fox Talbot Esq
Lacock Abbey
Chippenham
Notes:
1. See Doc. No: 09161.
2. Sir William Robert Grove (1811–1896), scientist; became a member of the royal commission on law of patents, 1864. [See Doc. No: 09159].
3. With the support of Napoleon III, Archduke Maximilian of Austria was made emperor of Mexico in 1864. His unpopular reign was only to last until 1867 when, following the close of the American Civil War, the United States demanded the withdrawl of French troops. Coupled with this, and pressures closer to home, Napoleon III withdrew all support. Maximilian was executed, by firing squad, on 19 June 1867.
4. The Museum of Practical Geology, London, opened in 1851.
5. A once supposed fossil organism in the Archaean system of Canada, which would have been the oldest known living thing. It was later shown to be nothing more than crystalline formations.