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Letter from Gertrude Bell to her stepmother, Dame Florence Bell

Summary
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Reference code
GB/1/1/1/1/9/25
Recipient
Bell, Dame Florence Eveleen Eleanore
Creator
Bell, Gertrude Margaret Lowthian
Person(s) mentioned
Chirol, Valentine
Creation Date
Extent and medium
1 letter plus envelope, paper
Language
English
Location
Coordinates

49.4521018, 11.0766654

Nuremburg [Nürnberg] Thursday night. Dearest Mother. This is being really too charming. You never met a more delightful travelling party. Florence is in the seventh heaven all the time, his Ex a perfect angel, Mr Chirol (and in fact all of us) endlessly cheerful and delighted with everything. We got to Rothenburg [Rothenburg ober der Tauber] soon after one yesterday, found the others waiting for us at the Hirsch, the same delicious rooms we had last time looking over the Tauber valley with the sun streaming into all our little windows. We lunched and rested a little and then all sallied out and walked about the town and round the walls, Florence and I photographing. Rothenburg looked more fascinating than ever - sure, it is the nicest little town in the world. We had tea on a balcony looking over the walls, after which we selected a spot for Mr Chirol to sketch, Uncle Frank sat beside him plunged in the study of Wagner, Florence and I sat on the bridge down in the valley and watched the sunset turn all the towers purple, and Hugo walked up the opposite hill and had a lovely view. We dined quite late so as to miss none of the heavenly evening, Uncle Frank and I then played our patiences - we had a most comfy little sitting room, and we all went early to bed. This morning we breakfasted at 9, it was a lovely day with a bright sun and a cool air. Florence and I then went photographing and were presently joined by Domnul and His Ex and we all strolled about together till lunch. Hugo spent the morning reading Parsifal. We left at 3, very regretfully, and travelled to Anspach [Ansbach] which we reached at 5. There we broke our journey for 2 hours and went to see the schloss, Mr Chirol having previously notified Uncle Frank's arrival and begged them to keep it open for us. It was interesting, a miniature Versailles like all the little 18th century German palaces, and full of portraits of Frederic the Great and his brothers and sisters, one of whom married a Margrave of Anspach you remember. They are so agreeable these little German princely towns with their foolish palaces and big gardens. We got to Nuremburg at 8, dined and retired to bed, very sleepy. Tomorrow we are going to get up early and walk about the town a little, leave by a special at 10.30 and get to Bayreuth comfortably before Parsifal. Mr Chirol is an excellent guide to Germany! We are having such fun. I wonder how your guests fare! Ever your affectionate daughter Gertrude

IIIF Manifest
https://cdm21051.contentdm.oclc.org/iiif/info/p21051coll46/7668/manifest.json
Licence
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/