ID: 1030 [see the .xml file]
Identifier: WCRO CR 2017 / TP 189, 1
Editors: Transcribed by Ffion Mair Jones; edited by Ffion Mair Jones; encoded by Vivien Williams. (2019)
Cite: 'Richard Bull to Thomas Pennant 2 December 1783' transcribed by Ffion Mair Jones; edited by Ffion Mair Jones; encoded by Vivien Williams. (2019) in Curious Travellers Digital Editions [editions.curioustravellers.ac.uk/doc/1030]

Dear Sir

The first opportunity I could find, since my return from a better, and more rationable place than this vast, unsociable London I am employing in giving the best answers I can, to your last obliging letters; and first let me discharge my debt to Mr: Griffith, which I can best do, by sending him herein a half of a ten pound note, and when I know from him, or from you, that it has arrived safe, I will remit the other moiety. The little ballance, he will be pleased to place to account, and send me a remit upon the Bill enclosed, for I am above regarding Stamp duties.

I have been with White, who tells me you was making up an Order for him, but that he did not at all know when he should have any parcell to send You, in the meantime I have executed most of your little commissions; and have got the undermention’d prints ready to send you in any manner you please to direct. vidt.

I have some Duplicates of persons, & places, but till I know in what line they are wanted, ’tis in vain for me to send ’em. the greater part are Foreign heads, & views. Pray take the trouble to convince Moses, how much I feel myself oblig’d to him for the Portrait of himself, which I shall give the first form in my Book to; when I took it from the card upon which it was pasted, I found another unfinish’d portrait of the same ingenious artist, but very unlike the other, so I take it for granted he thought it of no value.

Storer, who goes again to Paris, to morrow morning, has promiss’d [sic] to search for ^the french translation of olaffens [sic] Voyage to Iceland, and he is not apt to be remiss, or forgetful. I have no immediate occasions for the prints belonging to Cordiners letters, but if you have got a spare set, they are always useful to such a miscellaneous jumble as mine. – Thane has no list of the Prints, which he has either engraved, or been the editor of, but says he will endeavor to form one, and send it to my house; if he keeps his word you shall have it directly. – When you see Mr.. Fitzmaurice next, pray give my service to him; I have a high respect for him, and a great opinion of his Brothers abilities, but not of his political heart..

I lament with you the loss of such a neighbor and friend as the late Mr Mytton; you grow towards that time of life, when new friends are little worth looking after, and tis from the remembrance of Joys we have lost, that the arrows of affliction are pointed. –––––

I wait with patience, (I lye, tis with impatience not to be told) for the remainder of your works, enrich’d by your worthy and ingenious domestic, who has always my thanks, and good wishes. –––––

You ask me for news, but where is a deaf old man, out of Parliament, likely to hear any. the Dashing Charles Fox's India Bill,2 is the only thing talk’d of, and which will certainly pass the commons, but its fate in the upper House is doubtful. the King sets himself against it, and will not make any new Lords, for the occasion. I don’t think any ^fomer past Bill had ever so many pours and contres, or so many violent Partizan’s on each side. Lord Macartney is dying in India, and has sent home a few lines to his Wife preparing her for the event.3 Sir Eyre Coote left Sir William Draper a friendly legacy of a thousand pounds per annum, but all the Generals, commissarys, and their agents, to the end of the chapter are kept in hot water by the Commission of Account’s, whoich seems to spare nobody, and have sent their Mirmidons to possess themselves of all General Gages effects, and they have likewise begun with several ^others of the American Gentry. – if Charles Fox can carry his Bill, (which he is resolved to risk upon its own merits), for an equal land tax all over the Kingdom, he will be Minister pour jamais.4 – I saw Captain Gros [sic] this morning, who desir’d me to inform you, that if You would send him a list of what views of Castles &c, you had any occasion for, out of his publication, he could readily accommodate you, and without putting you to any expence. I have receiv’d from Mr Hughes the additional letter Press to your scotch tour, for which I am much your debtor.5 I am apt to think they are paged wrong, at least for my Edition of the Hebrides journey, for they begin at Page 71. but in my Book they should seem to come in at Page 61.

I am Dear Sir
Your much oblig’d, and very
Faithful humble Servant

Richd: Bull

Marginalia

In pencil at the top of the letter, in David Pennant's hand: Mr Bull s correspondence is almost the only one I have not destroyed – He was an observant man of excellent taste


Editorial notes

1. Heads of Richard II and Henry IV are pasted into Pennant's extra-illustrated A tour in Wales (2nd edn., 1784) (here [external link], p. 49); and of Edward the Black Prince, Edward I and Edward II in his extra-illustrated Continuation of the Journey, pt. i (here [external link], pp. 193/2, 217/7 and /8).
2. The Fox-North coalition's East India Bill proposed nationalizing the beleaguered East India Company, and was passed in the Commons on 27 November 1783 but defeated in the Lords (through the intervention of the king) on 15 December. ODNB s.n. Charles James Fox.
3. George Macartney, Earl Macartney (1737–1806), was Governor of Madras from February 1781, but was not accompanied there by his wife (who suffered from deafness). There is no mention his suffering from ill-health at this time. ODNB.
4. 'forever'. The Land Tax Bill was given its first and second readings at the House of Lords on 22 December 1783, and passed following a third reading on 15 March 1784. Journals of the House of Lords, XLIII (H.M. Stationery Office, 1801), p. 126.
5. Hughs (or Hughes), mentioned here by Bull, did not have any connection with the publication of Pennant's Scottish tours. Bull may be referring to Additions to the Tour in Scotland 1769 paginated continuously with Additions to the Voyage to the Hebrides 1772 which appeared in A tour in Scotland 1772, part II (1776), all published by Benjamin White.

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