Downing Jan. 8^th 1786.

Dear Sir

Many happy returns of this season attend you & miss Bulls.¹ I give you the good news of y^r Books² being sent in a box to M^r Hughs printer in Turnstile Holborn. they will be in Town the 12^th deliverable to the annexed order. the Catalogue³ is in the first leave of one of the volumes. I made free to add to Moses's account my small one of 3. 5. 0. for the nova scotia drawings. Please to pay the whole into the hands of Mesrs Gosling & send me their note. I will settle y^r account with moses & send you his discharge. He now resumes his work for me: but your commands shall be most punctually attended to. [...] Be so good as to send me word what Thane has done since I left town. He had from me a [...] list of the portraits of the stanlies⁴ at Knowsley, & I hope made a good use of it. M^r Storer tells me that Catherine Cornaro is concealed under the name of the Belle Laura.⁵ can you discover her under that veil. I have just troubled our friend just mentioned with hunting out letters to the little Courts or great Cities along the Rhine to such persons as will be of real use to my son David. as you know what sort of a subject he is, possibly you will not decline being assistant as you know every body. as he is pass thro' the Grisons country I wish if any of the de Salis are in Town that a letter c^d be got to the Bishop of Coire or any person of rank in the Country. excuse all this. but is for a very good lad.

I am with true regard Dear Sir, most faithfully y^rs

Tho. Pennant.

I truely congratulate you on the good fortune attendant on M^rs Luther & yourself.⁶ Do you know any one going into Swisserland who would be so good as to charge himself with a very small parcel to my son.

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Editorial notes

1. Elizabeth and Catherine Bull.
2. This may refer to a multi-volume copy belonging to Bull of The journey from Chester to London, which Pennant had suggested, c. June 1785, might be 'ready by Christmas perhaps before' (see 1046).
3. This may refer to a catalogue of John Thane's, mentioned later in the paragraph.
4. Pennant's interest in the Stanley family of Knowsley relates to his extra-illustration of The journey from Chester to London, where Sir John Stanley's monument at Elford Church and a portrait of Venetia Anastatia Stanley are mentioned at pp. 119 and 335.
5. For a further reference to the confusion over a portrait of Catherine of Cornaro, see 1052.
6. On Levinia Luther's inheritance, see 1052.