TALBOT500

Rottingdean ¹
September 25^th 1808

My dear Mama

bathing agrees very well with me as yet & is very Pleasant. I write on Sundays because M^r Hooker ² does not like me to write so often. there is a Guide, most of the boys swim with Bladders, you say I should have received a plum Cake & 3 Bottles of Beer but I received a plum Cake & 4 bottles of Beer for which I am much obliged to you. I divided it into 23 shares I read in the history of the Jews today. I shall read the 11^th Chapter, there is 16. I received M^r F’s ³ Letter. he said he could have shot 9 hares. I will give you an account of the Game of I Spy [illegible]. 2 or 3 of the bigger boys say that they will stand 8 or 9 little boys & Give them 1^st hide so then they hide their eyes by a wall & count 100 in which time the boys would have hid so the boys that hid their eyes go & look for them & if they can see one they say they spy him then the boy that is spied runs out of his hiding place & runs after them & if he can catch one before he has got to the wall he is on their side so they go on till they are all found & they hide their eyes & the ones who hid their eyes before now hide & they may run out before they are spied if they like & whoever’s side has lost all its people are lost. tell Richard the sum he puzzled me with I have found out how it makes 15 every way here it is

294
753
618

your Affectionate Son
W H F de Talbot

[annotated with an apparently unrelated mathematical calculation]

Lady E Feilding
Coombe Farm
Kingston
Surrey