Transcription
[STAMP OF SHR, black ink, illuminated candle graphic]
Madrid, Monday Morning
Jan: 23d. 1843
I wrote my dear Molly a long letter to Papa last week, and / to day I take advantage of an English messenger to send a few more last / words by the Steamer of the 4th _ I’m out of patience with them [^ Company], by the / bye, for not despatching two every month in stead of one during the / Winter, but as our friend the Great Western starts again on the 11th Feb’y, . the gap in our steam communication will be vastly filled. /
And first for your + Angel’s movements: I imagine you / about these days leading a very quiet rational life at Nevis, reading, / a great deal, and whenever you can push [Icky? Unrecovered] up to it, sallying / out well muffled to trundle over Snow and ice with the little dogs for / this still life, for comfortable quarters at 58 Varick, and a dip into / the gaieties of the City and that this sheet will be received when you’re / in town. I shall hover round you at the Balls, and other places, / so that you must be careful not to forget me altogether during this / gay period: say a kind word [in season?] to my fair friends, and if / Miss Fanny H. is in the neighborhood tell her that the “very / young man”, now somewhat older felt very sorry that with all / his efforts he could not say “Good bye” to a certain uncertain (I / had almost said) “wriggling” personage: /
The last letters from home were gloomy enough and / you may be sure that I have felt the various mishaps of our friends / a great deal, more than if I were in the midst of them _ One dwells / and dwells upon them, until by dint of turning and twisting them / they assume a thousand disagreeable shapes, and we are then uneasy at /
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The productions of our own _ to day we looked for letters by / the Packet of the 1st of this month, but there have been such storms of rain / and Wind in England & France that the mails are all behind hand: Paris and / Bordeaux are threatened with a deluge, and the Channel has been almost impassable. / OUr old Westminster brought us news to Dec. 20h, and this shocking affair of / Mr. Spencer’s son: Mr. Irving has been quite unhappy with this new adventure of / poor Slidell, to whom all the tragedies in the Navy seem to be allotted. /
We are leading the same quiet domestic life, and the days slide / away without incidents: It sometimes astonishes me that four men [kind?] can / be so very orderly, Uncle Geoffrey is perhaps the most dissipated, and is crony- / =ing with the representative of Denmark, familiarly called [“Old Dalborgo”?] who / is supposed to be 80 or thereabouts, and is the most defatigably social crea - / tur I ever met. He knows every body + is ready to serve every body, and having / a most amiable disposition is every where a favorite: He lives, moves and has / his being in the society, and is the most perfect specimen of this genus / I have encountered. _ /
The two young attaches stick so close to the Legations, that / is the House + office, that is imp;ossible to drag them into Society, save in the / way of diners, partly from [crossed out] timidity and in part from not having / the language they defy all my powers of stirring up and have not visited, / I believe, in a Spanish family since their arrival: Brevoort is full of / knowledge useful + ornamental, but appears like his papa to want the disposi - / =tion to make the most of it: Hector of Goshen, Mr. Irving’s young friend, is a / quiet [rosy?] cheeked little man, who will make a sturdy sensible farmer / on his father’s possessions in that fertile country _ He is by no means of the / material of which Diplomatis are to be made, and in all respects in the / opposite of the easy gentlemanlike Idlers, who hang about the other / legations here: /
Uncle Geoffrey continues in the same unvaried health and /
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Amiability: his is the happiest constitution physical + moral, and tho now / and then his is bothered with little matters, which other men would slide easily / over, yet these troubles pass away quickly and leave him calm and light as / ever: _
For my particular self, I am reading much more than at home, and / in especial the news & Documents of the U.S. with which we are well provided. + / I hope to get back [^ return] ready for Congress! Or the Courts, or any other Situation, in which / such knowledge may be useful: IN the way of [skirmishing?] in light literature, / I try a little both of french + spanish: Letters memoirs +c. Not often novels _ /
As I have said we pass our Evenings quietly at home, and generally / rouse Uncle Geoffrey after his first nap, with a rubber of whist: which he / seems to take to very kindly _ the Opera has almost gone out in snuff, [Rubin’s?] / advent seems more doubtful, and all the prima Donna’s have been ill in succession: / I go to the other theatres about once a week, generally to meet pretty little / Mrs. Scott by request; who carries on a perpetual war against old time, and / in spite of being petted and caressed, and all the means and appliances of / rich + luxurious embassy finds it hard work to gain the victory.
On Sunday Evg.s Mad. Victoria, the wife of the Regent receiver, / and the Diplomats, meet [crossed out] at Buena Vista, where are to be found plenty / of Ministers [ins?] + [arts?]; but very few of the “blue blood”, which affects / to look down upon this parvenu Grandee, _ Among the prettiest girls are / two daughters of M. de Ferrer, who was minister of state a year since _ one has / the prettiest eyes imaginable _ last night it was very pleasant _ I had / several talks with Espartero in the course of the Ev.g and like his frank / manly bearing _ he looks the determined soldier, which is he is and tho’ he is / not an ‘Esprit fort [ni fort bien cultive’?] has the good sense not the venture / beyond his depth: his wife tho not born a duchess, looks and acts it every / inch, and receives her guests admirably _ he played “rigodons” which you / call cotillions, in which Mad.e Albuquerque, and another horrified protestant / resolutely refused to have any part, it being bad enough to look on at /
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Such an enormity; but then some people don’t know what sin they commit: / _ on sunday morning I go to the Chapel Royal, where the music is exquisite and / while the priests are chanting forth in Latin I say my prayers in plain English. / I begin to suspect that I am becoming in practice a [“Puse??ite”?] for I find / that I am most agreably affected by the Catholic accessories, music, Deco - / =ration, incense +c : _ I have only been once (at Gibraltar) in a protestant church / since the month of May, it seems to me however that I have not lost by being
Thrown upon my own resources _ at least I hope not. _
Did I tell you I had a nice letter from Aunt Rebecca, which / I have not yet acknowledged? _ I don’t believe there is any change to be effected in / my absence, which can surprise me so much as this one:
We have amusing accounts from Paris of our friends the / Jones’: in spite of all their efforts they make very little progress among the / Great folks of the Faubourg; [Thorn?] affords them little help or encouragement, / and Mrs. Moulton positively insults them by calling in for a moment, on /
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Her way to some particularly stylish soiree of which perhaps they have not even heard; such / are the friendships of this world! It is said sister Rebecca will dissolve partnership in the / Spring; sister Mary’s purse not allowing her to indulge in a style in accordance /
With the more ample means and intended / ambition of the other. What a load of vexation / these silly women are preparing for / themselves by attempting to make a / figure in Paris with their fortune + / Mr. Robert Ray sets them an example / which would [^ save] their feelings times, and / money if they were wise enough to follow it / I expect to hear of some funny adventure / in that quarter before long.
Good night my darling / give my love to [Armd?], Fan /
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And all in the neighbourhood of old / St. Johns
Your affectionate A. H.
As you [^ will] are probably in town I direct / this to George Schuyler’s care.
[ADDRESS]
Miss Hamilton
New York
[STAMP OF SHR, black ink, illuminated candle graphic]
A.H.
[RED SEAL]
[REVERSE OF ADDRESS]
Alexander
Madrid
Man 7-23d
1843Transcriber
Kathryn AlexanderLanguage
English
