TALBOT3103

Nice
22^d June

My Dear Henry

I have discovered a most singular rose in a Garden al ponente, the most soigné dans les environs. ¹ M. Lacroix ² Knows the Proprietor & I have desired him to ask for a sucker. You know he is so good natured & having lately bought a Villa on the Cimius road, has set apart a piece of ground Where Caroline ³ may plant pro tempore ⁴ the things She gets for you, to keep them alive till Somebody goes to England. I wish that might be me, but have little hopes. I think incessantly of all the objects that interest me at home, both animate & in animate – and dear little Ela ⁵ that I have never seen! My heart yearns towards her. I consider this year as blotted from My life, – but it is nobody’s fault, it could not be helped, it is the infliction of Providence that Kept L^d V. ⁶ ill for five Months & prevented the possibility of Caroline’s reaching London in time. I am some times seized with des accès de décoragement ⁷ When I think how happy I should be transported to that beloved Abbey –

–“O Who will give
The fields of England to my exiled eyes
The joys which once were mine!”

To add to our cares Bimbo ⁸ has been ill with dentition & is so wasted away with that & the excessive heat that he is only the Shadow of What he was two Months ago. This is vexative & there are no places to go to for change of air for him, up in the Mountains it is worse, as they have not the Sea breeze which never fails in the evening all along the coast. He told me with an air of mystery that he had got a new cousin called Ela, this must make a sad confusion in his mind with the cousins which bite & plague him sadly.

Pray tell me what you are about at Laycock – & Why you selected Fir trees to plant in that new Walk [illegible] ⁹ Will you any Where, then Why waste your rich soil upon such upstarts? Tell me what else you are doing. How often I long for the thick Shade in which you luxuriate under the ancient Elms the Spissa nemora domusque Nympharum We are going to Move into another house at the other end of the Terrace to be nearer to Caroline as I cannot leave C– quite alone Tell me more about Ela & her progress & love to dear Constance ¹⁰ who I like to think of enjoying her little daughter in health & spirits –

Lord V. is able now to ride & means to go by the next Steam boat to Leghorn & Lucca If he does (which is always uncertain) I shall he prevented making my giro to Pignerol ¹¹ & Finestralle

H. Fox Talbot Esq^r
Laycock Abbey
Chippenham
Wiltshire
Angleterre