Dear Sir

Downing June 16^th 92

I truely thank you for your very acceptable & elegant present. I wish much to learn the state of painting in India: As soon as my new friend M^r Hastings is got out of his troubles, I hope to receive full information, for he is both able, & willing: which the mass of the nabobs are neither one or the other. I wish you & yours had faced to the North: but you cannot live but in a gay tempest. I have set to my desk some time amazingly deep in china, that country of wonders. I cannot but say I rejoice to say that I see land: for this year will finish my magnum opus, & bring me into port at New Guinea: the final of this vast undertaking.¹

I wish I may get through the isle of wight²: I arrived near Havant two years ago & will make one effort for both our sakes.

our best compliments attend [...] the Ladies³ & yourself. I am
Dear Sir
most truely y^rs

Tho. Pennant

Pray write soon.

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Editorial notes

1. Pennant describes work on China and New Guinea, included in volumes XVII and XIX of his 'Outlines of the Globe'.
2. Pennant's 'A journey from Dover to the Isle of Wight' was to form volume XXI of his 'Outlines of the Globe'.
3. Elizabeth and Catherine Bull.