TALBOT684

March 19^th 1816

My dear Henry

I never remember the success or defeat of any Measure in the House of Commons, having caused such a Sensation as the loss of the Property Tax ¹ last Night. M^r Feilding ² was there at the Division, & the Shouts & Exultations were excessive when the Victory was announced. It is supposed M^r Vansittart ³ must go out, & that M^r Huskisson ⁴ will succeed him, but this is not known. The others it is conjectured will stick to office. The whole town has been in an uproar of joy all this Morning, your Aunt Louisa ⁵ came dancing into the room to me, & it has animated the most posé people. It certainly was Folly as well as wickedness in Ministers to attempt such a tax at a moment of such universal distress as the present.

Has Nuttall any Irish blood in his veins? – I heard you had lost your way in the close of the Evening among the Coal Pits, & very near fell in, owing to want of Light & want of Eyes.

Lord Porchester ⁶ hopes to renew his friendship with you when he comes from Eton at Easter, he sent this Message by one of his Sisters. I am glad you grow to like History better, I remember that Alcibiades ⁷ was once so much my Hero that I called my Squirrel after him. That was in my happy days, with Miss Porter⁸ at Redlynch, ⁹ – when Socrates¹⁰ was my Dormouse, & le Chevalier Bayard ¹¹ my Canary Bird – happy days indeed! I have known none like them since.

God Bless You
My dearest

London March twenty 1816 Auckland ¹²
H^y Fox Talbot Esqr
Rev^d M^r Barnes
Castleford
Ferrybridge