Originally enclosing a cutting from the "Manchester Guardian", which may interest Julian; knows he has 'long been much interested in American cotton'; knows nobody can be expected to read 'all that dull stuff about the Leonids and Nova Cygni'. Julian's mother is currently 'teaching the kitchen-maid at Tanhurst to play the violin' in the study, while he and [Harry] Norton sit by the drawing room fire. 'Mammy's hand' is getting better slowly. Peter [Elms] is 'shouting in the garden'. The sun is shining and there is some peat, 'or, as Mammy calls it, turf' on the fire. Mr Reynier came for a visit recently. Now has a letter to write to his Spanish friend Juan Menendez y Aranz[z de la Torre], which he should have done two months ago; is afraid Julian's handwriting is getting 'better and neater' than his own.
Apartado 847, Madrid, Spain. - Thanks his father for his letter [12/312] and the 'amusing enclosure', which he returns. Will much look forward to reading the correspondence [Theodore Roosevelt's, published in Scribner's Magazine] when he returns. Expects he will start back in about ten days, and 'after a few days in Paris to see friends', get home in early December. Has 'quite an interesting time here', and has done 'a good deal of work, chiefly [translating] Lucretius'. Politics are 'somewhat less stormy' here than when he arrived: the 'Barcelona lock-out seems to be settled', and the government, 'probably the best Spain has had for many years, seems likely to survive for the present'.
The weather is 'fairly cold, but otherwise perfect'. Has made some 'interesting friends', and learned some Spanish. Hopes to visit Toledo before he leaves, but 'hardly Valladolid' which he passes on the train, 'even for the sake of Browning's Corregidor [in How It Strikes a Contemporary]. Bessie 'writes cheerfully, and Julian seems to be well'. Robert sends love to his mother, and thanks for her letter.
A friend is coming soon, Don Juan Menendez y Arranz, with whom he reads Spanish poetry; in exchange he helps him read English poetry. He is 'not as big or grand as his name, but very charming, and also very well read'