Letter from Uvedale Price, Foxley, to Sir George Beaumont, 1803 April 23 : autograph manuscript signed.

Saying that Lady Margaret will have told her husband how he too has reason to "confound the Influenza"; describing the illness as a "Female Divinity" and mentioning that "she laid hold of a parson at Hereford of the name of Morgan, who might well be called Morgante Maggiore, for he is full six feet six, & strong in proportion"; quoting lines from Milton's Samson Agonistes; adding that he is glad that the "Abbe de Lille" (probably the poet Jacques Delille) was not stricken with influenza and thanking Lady Beaumont for sending a copy of his verses; saying that he thinks Delille has been influenced by Cowper and referring to Cowper's poem The Task; discussing Delille's work Les Jardins; reading his poetry as expressing French national character; stopping midway through the letter and writing that his comments on Delille are really addressed to Lady Margaret, and that therefore the letter itself should be formally addressed to her; writing "Nothing will ever correct me of my rage for getting franks for you & Sir George" and discussing franks and postage generally; commenting on the change in Lady Margaret's handwriting and the way it reflects her drawing practice: "you are afraid of writing like a writing master instead of a painter, & of making thin meagre strokes; & you write now, as if Rembrandt had left you a legacy of all his old pens"; discussing two Claude landscapes and commenting on Claude's work generally; returning to addressing Sir George, and asking for more information about the Claude paintings; referring to another Claude in the Beaumonts' possession; asking about "the preservation of these pictures"; saying that he is very busy at Foxley and may not come to London, though it will mean he misses an Academy dinner; referring to an occasion on which the president of the Academy (Benjamin West) tried to "pass off an old picture for a new one" and speculating about why he did this; requesting that, if West explains the incident, Sir George will "put down every slip-slop in the tablets of your memory that I may have it all from you when we meet next"; adding in a postscript that he has received the invitation from the Royal Academy and asking the Beaumonts to "make my excuses, but not a word of my conjecture."