LIEUT.-GENERAL THOMAS DYNELEY, C.B., R.A. 407 
is still in hospital; he has been very unwell, but will be out by that 
time. 
It is a great undertaking going by myself, but I shall have nothing 
to do when I have finished my day’s march but refresh myself for 
the next day. 
IT shall not, of course, send Lord Wellington’s or General Hill’s letters 
to them, as they are letters of introduction, and are intended for me to 
deliver myself. 
General Hill had a pack of hounds landed yesterday from England, 
but I fear I shall not be near enough to them to partake of the sport. 
The authorities have altered their way of dealing with the inhabi- 
tants for certain crimes; they now hang for murder, but before the 
English came, unless a man confessed his guilt, he was not hung. We 
hung two men this morning, one was a barber, but instead of shaving 
a poor fellow he almost cut his head from his body, and confessed he 
merely did it because he knew the man had change for a dollar about 
him, which he took and made off with. The murderer’s head has been 
exposed for several days stuck on the end of a pole at his house, in 
which his family are now living with the greatest unconcern. 
All my horses continue remarkably well, and as for old “ Maida,” 
she is so fat she can hardly walk, and what is very singular, she lives 
almost entirely on figs. J have watched her in the garden and seen 
her eat between 15 and 20 at a time that have fallen ripe from the 
tree. My goat I have sent up country with the troop. I suppose by 
the time this reaches England you will have left Shaston, I shall there- 
fore address this to Robert that he may forward itto you. I wish you 
would see that some of those lazy people about you write to me every 
packet. They can have no excuse ; but with me it is really by an under- 
taking, and I am obliged to stick to it. 
Lisson, 28th September, 1811. 
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