Item 304 - Letter from Sir George Trevelyan to R. C. Trevelyan

Welcombe, Stratford on Avon. - Thanks Robert for his letter [46/245], particularly the part about Lucretius; is not reading it all through this time. Will know whether there is any truth in the atomic theory 'so soon that [he] is prepared to wait'. Describes his reading, alongside Uncle Tom [Macaulay]'s notes; paid as much attention to the last lines of the third book as he would to passages in Juvenal, Horace or Lucan. Is interspersing the books with Cicero dialogues. The winter has been long and wet, and Wallington has suffered from their having to plough up half of the old pasture 'without proper labour, and proper appliances'; they have lost a good deal of money, and it has been 'a dead loss to the nation in terms of productiveness'. Other people have suffered more; ironically mentions a 'comical' account in the "Times" of the editor of the "Almanach de Gotha" having to 're-cast his noble work' due to the disappearance of nearly thirty Royal Houses. Robert must be looking forward to his return from France and reunion with his family. A postscript [on a small scrap of paper] quotes Macaulay's high opinion of the end of Lucretius's fifth book.