Hôtel Floresta, Taormina [headed notepaper]:- His mother’s news about George was a ‘great surprize’ to him: is sure George is ‘doing the wise thing in going to Madeira’, and hopes that on his return he ‘will be himself again, and ready for his tripos’; supposes George is ‘so far forward, that the loss of a month or so will not be serious’. Now remembers that George ‘did not seem particularly bright at Welcombe’. Hopes the ‘Spanish Got has not ordered a quarantine at Madeira for Cholera’: almost every year it is ‘seized with a senseless panic, and most absurdly compells all visitors to wait some weeks before landing’; since Cape liners cannot wait, passengers have to go onto the Cape or be ‘transferred to some ship returning to England’.
There was a case in Robert’s Chambers in which a ‘miserable traveller sued the Castle Line (Donald Currie’s) for breach of contract to land him at Madeira’; Chambers were acting for the company, and [T. E.] Scrutton thought there was no case, but Robert ‘rummaged up a rusty old case of Commonwealth times - something about a tenant refusing to pay rent because Prince Rupert and an “ungodly company of horse” had cut down his fruit-trees’, with which the ‘poor traveller’ was ‘confounded’, and Robert ‘gained great éclat for it was a very subtle point of law’. Sir Michael Hicks Beach was ‘shipped to the Cape in like manner’ a few years ago, instead of Madeira, but he was ‘patient and did not sue’. Hopes George does not suffer this fate.
Wishes he had wanted to come to Taormina, but perhaps he is right: the ‘Cacciola library consists partly of Hallington books, but the greater number, and many of the more valuable ones, have been ordered by Louisa or her [Florence Cacciola] and sent out from England’. Is ‘nearly siroccoed out of existence’: the wind has blown continuously for five days, for the last day or two bringing ‘a slow drizzle, and muffling in a mist as impenetrable as a London fog’. The weather should change soon, as it ‘usually lasts only 3 or 4 days’; everyone is ‘more or less seedy, and in the sullens’. Two Roman Catholic priests from Oxford are here; one, ‘a [Charles David?] Williamson is a delightful creature’, and they have become friends. Williamson ‘seems to have met the Herbert Pauls at Venice last year’, having known Herbert well at Eton but then not seen him; now they seem to be ‘great friends again’. Williamson says Herbert Paul ‘doesn’t at all like being out [of Parliament’.
Hope C[harles] will ‘get on the School-Board’. Is ‘very glad to hear that his father has begun writing: ‘“Our Unhappy politics”, as Shelley calls them, are not worth wasting time and trouble over just now’. Hopes ‘[John?] Dillon will do well, but his prospects are not bright’; supposes ‘[Thomas] Sexton could not accept’, yet his conduct resembles ‘Achilles sulking in his tent without sufficient reason’. Robert’s new friend Williamson is ‘very intimate with Dillon and the Matthews [a reference to the Mathews, family of Dillon’s wife Elizabeth?]’