TALBOT540

Harrow ¹
July 12^th 1811.

My dear Mamma,

As soon as you left me, I sat down to read, and compose my spirits, Doctor Butler ² lent me a book called Irish Bulls, ³ this as you may imagine was not very agreeable to my present turn of mind, however I continued to amuse myself during the long time Doctor Butler was at dinner with Ld Mulgrave,⁴ with it: afterwards I walked out with Henry Perceval,⁵ down to the place where the boys bathe, he is a very nice little boy about five months older than me, I cannot help crying while I write this letter: in the evening I walked out in the garden with D^r Butler, I had no heart to go and see the match at cricket, neither did I know the way there: O, I hope M^r Feilding ⁶ or you will soon come & see me: but I will go on: after tea I went to bed: I wished to cry but could not: I was forced to tell a story, which was very tiresome: I have four of the most disagreeable boys there can possibly be, in my room - A. Percival, ⁷ Barker, ⁸ Grey, ⁹ & Campbell; ¹⁰ At six in the morning a bell rang, we are allowed from thence to half past seven to get up: I got up immediately as I know you dislike my staying in bed after I am awake, then I went down to Doctor Butler who gave me twenty verses to do, & six lines of Greek to construe, which was a great plague before breakfast; after breakfast he looked over my verses, & heard me say my lesson, then he told me I might go and learn my lessons with the middle remove of the fourth form, but I do not know whether he intends to place me there for good or no: however I suppose he does: well then the fourth form had for their lesson ten lines of Greek & twenty of Ovid, which was a new plague to me as I had not a quarter of the time which they had to do it in, a long time being taken up by my examination. Then we said our lessons to D^r Butler as our private tutor, & I was ashamed of some of the boys who looked over the Latin part of the Greek Epigrams or Farnaby as they call it here D^r Butler asks the derivation and definition &c of almost every word, which not being used to at Rottingdean very much puzzled me: then we went up to the school, up half a dozen pair of stairs, to say our lessons to the master of the fourth form, who kept us also a long time in a hot close stuffy little room, my mind is so unsettled that you must not wonder at my being so annoyed at every little trifle: I am so fatigued that I know not what to do. I do not know the town well enough to go anywhere, besides the scorching heat of the sun prevents me: you know not how many many ages seem to me to have been included in one single day! Today making a slight exertion, one of my braces broke in two as I said it must surely soon do, I would be much obliged to you to send me a new pair 1 ft. 9½ inches long, as also I wish to have a new jacket like this one I have now got, I mean the Green one, as the other is worn out: if you will write often, you will much comfort me, & I shall conclude my sorrowful I hope for the last time, letter by wishing you may never be so sorrowful and ennuyé ¹¹ as I am at present,

Your affectionate Son
W.H.F. Talbot.

P.S. Ask M^r Feilding to come & see me soon: do not let this letter make you unhappy on my account, I hope I shall soon be able to send you a more chearful account, but this is exactly as I feel at present, sad, ennuyé and with a vacant mind now I have disburthened it of what I have told you in this letter: Pray ask M^r Feilding to come & see me soon -

Lady Elisabeth Feilding
31 Sackville S^t
London