TALBOT3212

Nice
29 February

My Dear Henry

at last a letter from you – after three Months! but you are very tantalizing, not to tell me what you have been writing, something very interesting certainly – that made you insensible to the snowy landscape without. Here there has not been so severe a winter for seventeen years, & all over Italy. The legumes which are usually so plenty & so good, have been frozen – no green peas & few flowers. The Geraniums & Datura & most things have been killed in all the gardens & the Orange & Olives [sic] trees much injured. Not only the nearest Mountains are still covered with Snow, but even the hills behind the town which so refrigerates the air that it is not like Nice & many invalides have gone by the Steam boat in search of warmer climes. The storms & rain we have had for so long have put the roads into such a state that we are obliged again to put off our journey, which was fixed for the 9^th March. (It is like a spell). The Malle poste ¹ from France is now about always 3 jours en retard, ² the roads are so cut up – The Col de Tende is blocked up with avalanche & the torrents & huge pieces of rock that have been torn from the Mountains & fallen across the route de la Corniche have made it quite impassable for the present. Sir Henry & Lady Bunbury ³ who went that way not long ago, were obliged to remain a week at the little Inn at Mentone, while the Workmen repaired la route dégradée, ⁴ & were almost starved, for it seems that in the state of Monaco provisions are scarce. Vû les circonstances ⁵ you have every probability of a longer possession of Sackville Street ⁶ than was originally contemplated, but I will write again either from Genoa or Turin to let you know when we are actually set out because it will take at least a fortnight to clear thoroughly du fond en comble, ⁷ and you shall have due notice when you must make way for the badigeonneur. ⁸ What you say about the dear old Abbey, I feel cannot be discussed by letter – but I hope we may be able to make some compromise to suit both our tastes, M^r F. ⁹ will do what he can knowing how much my happiness depends on it. If the place really disagrees with you of course I cannot gainsay that. I grieve over the Juniper & Arbor Vitae! – but the brick house built by Barton ¹⁰ I cannot comprehend. I thought, the field en face ¹¹ was yours – but at any rate how could it be built without your seeing it & M^r Awdry ¹² preventing it? of which there must always be ways & means. Mr F. is quite afflicted to hear of it & says he would have bought the field to have hindered such a thing which would have been as good an investment for money as any other. It appears to me a wiser scheme for you not to take or buy a permanent residence by the Sea side, but to take a house for a few Months at a time on the coast, by which you would find out which best suited you – leaving the mass of your library at Laycock & taking with you a certain quantity. Because it is only by living at a place you find out its désagrémens. ¹³

Horatia ¹⁴ has had a very gay Carnival Balls without end.

H. F. Talbot Esq^r
31, Sackville Street
London
Angleterre