TALBOT6751

Melbury ¹
7 April 1853

My dear Henry

I was sorry to miss you in town – when are you going there again? perhaps you will go to some of Lord Rosse’s ² soirées – I think of going up the end of next week – to visit a few gardens & repair the losses of this disastrous spring-winter.

I will only tell you a few of my failures.

All the ceanothi except two C. ovalus & thyrsiflorus. Olearia dentata – Opuntia Salmiana. Ilex myrtifolia or angustifolia. Jasminum nepalense & azoricum. Thibaudia glabra – Mahonia pallida. Pteris arguta – Asplenium præmorsum. Ficus australis. Dolichos lignosus – Bougainvillea brasilianus – several Membryanths. several creepers. We shall not know the worst till Midsummer.

I hope you have fared better – & that you are all well at home.

Do give me a receipt for making testpapers to hang up in the open air to test the presence of sea salts in different winds at Abbotsbury ³ & recommend me an intelligent chemist to make them – I often wished for such a thing this winter.

I always regret poor Dr Herbert ⁴ at this season – I should have so much to shew him now – & I have nobody to apply to in bulbous cases.

Yr Aff
W F S

How are Ld Mt E ⁵– & Caroline? ⁶

[envelope:]
Henry F. Talbot Esq
Lacock Abbey
Chippenham