TALBOT1223

[this is written on the same sheet as a note from Horatia: ]

Paris
12^th December

My Dearest

Horatia ¹ & I think you did not see us draw up alongside of you dans l’obscurité de ² notre Dame des Victoires & wave our Handkerchiefs at the carriage window, for you “gave no sign” & were soon ponder dans les tenèbres. ³ It seemed to us you would have chosen better to have placed yourself in the front part of your Seventy four than buried au fond ⁴ as you were, or as we suppose you were from what Giovanni ⁵ Said. His successor ne brûlera jamais la Thamise, ⁶ I thought he looked very plumbaceous. I have lent Giovanni a great many books, he swallows them wholesale. Gwynne ⁷ has heard of a place for him Piquéur to a Prince, in which he always would have good Horses at command, mais helas! ⁸ il faut porter la livrée. ⁹ I begin to have hopes about the pain in my side as it is much lessened. Pray write very often, it is my greatest pleasure, you cannot imagine what a blank your absence creates. We hope your innocent little pâté found favour in your eyes & that the Gingerbread Nuts warmed you in the cold Moonlight.

M^r F. ¹⁰ has been much disturbed to think that your reception in Sackville Street ¹¹ would be with all Richard’s ¹² vaunted uncomfortableness, as nobody had written to apprize him & he is never where he ought to be, & perhaps ten to one you could get in instead of finding a bed ready & a fire lit at the end of a wintry journey. M^r F. thinks it just possible you remembered to write yourself to Richard a week before Pray let us know what state you found the House in, & whether your new Plumbeus ¹³ contributes to under its gloominess more tolerable by his attentions or vice versa.

God bless you My Dearest

W. H. Fox Talbot Esq^re
31 Sackville Street
London