My Friends and Acquaintance
R. Plumer Ward XII
Robert Plumer Ward to Peter George Patmore, 9 December 1836
“My dear Mr. Patmore,—I have
had the truest pleasure in seeing your handwriting again, not merely from the
gratifying things you are pleased to say of me, for which, thinking them
sincere, I sincerely thank you; but because what I most wished is accomplished,
and you are again in com-![]()
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munication with
——, whom I have often assured him could never get a
more able ally. Long before I left England, and since too, I applied to him for
your address, wishing much to consult you on my embryo work. But he knew it
not, and I have been forced to act without your valuable assistance. However,
having recovered my health and spirits in a great measure, I was glad to employ
my leisure as you say, and shall continue to do so if I continue well.
“I have been delighted with Germany and the Germans,
high and low. Not so with the Swiss, though much with their country. In this I
am like Rousseau.
“I have a little treatise on Enthusiasm, which I wish I
could show you, but this distance is untoward.
“We shall be home in June, which I am sorry for, but my
little step-son (I don’t know
whether you saw him at Gilston) has been left heir to his uncle Okeover, and succeeds to a landed
property and Okeover Hall, full 6000l. a year, his
mother being guardian; so we must return.
“Do you mark the coincidence of his name ![]()
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with that in ‘De Vere,’ when I wrote which I did not
know it was in existence.
“Pray let me know where I can address you. We stay here
till spring, and then for Paris.
“Sincerely yours,
“R. P. W.”
Haughton Charles Okeover (1825-1912)
Of Okeover in Staffordshire, England; he was the son of the Charles Gregory Okeover and
Mary Anne Anson, afterwards Plumer Ward. He was educated at Eton and Christ Church,
Oxford.
Haughton Farmer Okeover (1776-1836)
Originally of Oldbury, co. Warwick; the son of Rowland Okeover, he was educated at Eton
and Christ Church, Oxford, and inherited Okeover in Staffordshire. He was High Sheriff of
Staffordshire in 1800.
Peter George Patmore [Tims] (1786-1855)
English writer and friend of Charles Lamb and Leigh Hunt; an early contributor to
Blackwood's, he was John Scott's second in the fatal duel, editor of
the
Court Journal, and father of the poet Coventry Patmore.
Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712-1778)
Swiss-born man of letters; author of, among others,
Julie ou la
Nouvelle Heloïse (1761),
Émile (1762) and
Les Confessions (1782).
