![WALPOLE, Horace, 4th Earl of Orford (1717-1797). Autograph letter signed ('Hor. Walpole') to an unidentified recipient [Sir William Hamilton], Arlington Street, 18 February 1776, 3 pages, 4to, on a bifolium, docketed by recipient, tipped onto a guard-strip. Provenance: Sotheby's, 3 March 1886, Hamilton sale, lot 111 to Thibaudeau; Sotheby's, 7 May 1919, Alfred Morrison sale, lot 3127 to Maggs; Francis Edwards, Marylebone (c.1925).](https://www.christies.com/img/LotImages/2007/CKS/2007_CKS_07399_0117_000(021231).jpg?w=1)
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WALPOLE, Horace, 4th Earl of Orford (1717-1797). Autograph letter signed ('Hor. Walpole') to an unidentified recipient [Sir William Hamilton], Arlington Street, 18 February 1776, 3 pages, 4to, on a bifolium, docketed by recipient, tipped onto a guard-strip. Provenance: Sotheby's, 3 March 1886, Hamilton sale, lot 111 to Thibaudeau; Sotheby's, 7 May 1919, Alfred Morrison sale, lot 3127 to Maggs; Francis Edwards, Marylebone (c.1925).
'I HAVE NO CURIOSITY ABOUT THE ANATOMY OF NATURE'. Walpole is anxious to catch Sir William before he and Emma leave Naples, returning via Switzerland; he rallies Sir William on his interest in natural history: 'The Mountains of Swisserland are, I am persuaded, a fine sight, & I shall desire to be a subscriber to your Vesuvius: but I wish you had not exchanged your Taste in Painting & Antiquity for Phaenomena. A turn for natural History possesses people enough; so do the Arts, but not many who have your Taste ... I own have no curiosity about the Anatomy of Nature. I admire & revere, but am not more struck, probably less, with the Dissection than with the superficies'; the letter goes on to discuss inscriptions and mottoes (with ironic remarks on the Stuart Pretender's probable feelings at the Hanoverian adoption of 'Dieu et mon Droit'), the state of the art auction market ('Mr Pearson ... brought over a Madonna & Child, by Vandyck as he said, which I doubt ... It was put up to auction yesterday at Christie's at one thousand. Not one Shilling was bidden'), advising Emma Hamilton to acquire feathers on her way back to England for the new fashion in head-dresses ('nay, & gourds & melons into the bargain'), complaining of his gout and the cost of engravers, and ending with advice on what to see in Paris ('Don't look at any of the finest pictures, for they have all been so varnished, that you can see nothing but yourself in them').
'I HAVE NO CURIOSITY ABOUT THE ANATOMY OF NATURE'. Walpole is anxious to catch Sir William before he and Emma leave Naples, returning via Switzerland; he rallies Sir William on his interest in natural history: 'The Mountains of Swisserland are, I am persuaded, a fine sight, & I shall desire to be a subscriber to your Vesuvius: but I wish you had not exchanged your Taste in Painting & Antiquity for Phaenomena. A turn for natural History possesses people enough; so do the Arts, but not many who have your Taste ... I own have no curiosity about the Anatomy of Nature. I admire & revere, but am not more struck, probably less, with the Dissection than with the superficies'; the letter goes on to discuss inscriptions and mottoes (with ironic remarks on the Stuart Pretender's probable feelings at the Hanoverian adoption of 'Dieu et mon Droit'), the state of the art auction market ('Mr Pearson ... brought over a Madonna & Child, by Vandyck as he said, which I doubt ... It was put up to auction yesterday at Christie's at one thousand. Not one Shilling was bidden'), advising Emma Hamilton to acquire feathers on her way back to England for the new fashion in head-dresses ('nay, & gourds & melons into the bargain'), complaining of his gout and the cost of engravers, and ending with advice on what to see in Paris ('Don't look at any of the finest pictures, for they have all been so varnished, that you can see nothing but yourself in them').
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