"Athens, July 25. 1810.
"Dear Mother,
"I have arrived here in four days from Constantinople, which is
considered as singularly quick, particularly for the season of the
year. You northern gentry can have no conception of a Greek summer;
which, however, is a perfect frost compared with Malta and Gibraltar,
where I reposed myself in the shade last year, after a gentle gallop
of four hundred miles, without intermission, through Portugal and
Spain. You see, by my date, that I am at Athens again, a place which I
think I prefer, upon the whole, to any I have seen.
"My next movement is to-morrow into the Morea, where I shall probably
remain a month or two, and then return to winter here, if I do not
change my plans, which, however, are very variable, as you may
suppose; but none of them verge to England.
"The Marquis of Sligo, my old fellow-collegian, is here, and wishes to
accompany me into the Morea. We shall go together for that purpose.
Lord S. will afterwards pursue his way to the capital; and Lord B.,
having seen all the wonders in that quarter, will let you know what he
does next, of which at present he is not quite certain. Malta is my
perpetual post-office, from which my letters are forwarded to all
parts of the habitable globe:--by the by, I have now been in Asia,
Africa, and the east of Europe, and, indeed, made the most of my time,
without hurrying over the most interesting scenes of the ancient
world. F----, after having been toasted, and roasted, and baked, and
grilled, and eaten by all sorts of creeping things, begins to
philosophise, is grown a refined as well as a resigned character, and
promises at his return to become an ornament to his own parish, and a
very prominent person in the future family pedigree of the F----s, who
I take to be Goths by their accomplishments, Greeks by their
acuteness, and ancient Saxons by their appetite. He (F----) begs
leave to send half-a-dozen sighs to Sally his spouse, and wonders
(though I do not) that his ill written and worse spelt letters have
never come to hand; as for that matter, there is no great loss in
either of our letters, saving and except that I wish you to know we
are well, and warm enough at this present writing, God knows. You must
not expect long letters at present, for they are written with the
sweat of my brow, I assure you. It is rather singular that Mr. H----
has not written a syllable since my departure. Your letters I have
mostly received as well as others; from which I conjecture that the
man of law is either angry or busy.
"I trust you like Newstead, and agree with your neighbours; but you
know _you_ are a _vixen_--is not that a dutiful appellation? Pray,
take care of my books and several boxes of papers in the hands of
Joseph; and pray leave me a few bottles of champagne to drink, for I
am very thirsty;--but I do not insist on the last article, without you
like it. I suppose you have your house full of silly women, prating
scandalous things. Have you ever received my picture in oil from
Sanders, London? It has been paid for these sixteen months: why do you
not get it? My suite, consisting of two Turks, two Greeks, a Lutheran,
and the nondescript, Fletcher, are making so much noise, that I am
glad to sign myself
"Yours, &c. &c.