Volume 58: Sir George Macleay correspondence, 1848-1880: No. 050

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[Page 50]

put all the money which used to be kept as duty in the English Treasury into the pockets of the Bordeaux people, while the English [indecipherable] have to pay as much as even for good wine.  What a monstrous bungle that [indecipherable] Cobden has made of this Treaty by the Gt.  How the French chuckle over it.   How man our Emperor they say, defeats the Austrian Generals in war, beats your [indecipherable] & Mercantile men in [indecipherable] matters  With respect to the Clino, the plants do not appear to me to bear very abundantly.  It is always stunted in growth & hideously ugly.  Their stunted aspect is occasioned by its being planted in [indecipherable] & generally very poor soil.  Nothing can be worse than the large Olives they eat a day almost always [indecipherable], nothing can be

[indecipherable - 3 lines]

 slaters about 8 feet long & from 3 to 4 inches wide [indecipherable].  The pole is insected about 3 feet deep in the ground, and then covered up with soil for 4 or 5 feet like this [see image for drawing).  I was much disappointed with the far famed orange groves of Seville.  The trees there are not to be confused with those of the Parramatta and Camden orchards nor is the fruit so good.  They have no variety growing simply the Bitter Orange, the Lisbon lemon and an ordinary second rate Sweet Orange.  The trees are all regularly watered every garden having a large well for the purpose.  They are planted very close & seem not to be free as I was assured they were of all disease.  They have no scale evident, and no insect enemies of any kind.  They live to an indefinite time according to their account, but some trees planted in the time of the Moors were all more or less in a state of decay.  The abundant supplies of water I suspect have something to do with their longevity.  And now I have come to a close.  I leave giving you a long yarn my dear fellow, and shall expect a long one from you in return.  I saw yr brother James the day before yesterday no the day before that, looking I thought very well.  The ladies have not yet been in Town.  The General is looking well too.   Poor George Leslie died on Sunday last down in Hampshire sensible & quiet to the last.  My wife I am sure you will be glad to know is very much better in health being looked all her friends say that they never saw her looking so well.  And now with her & my best wishes to you and kind regards to Mr & Mrs Chisholm believe me my dear Macarthur

Yr very sincere friend

Geo: Macleay

Burn this letter.

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