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15 May 58 Peter Hong Kong Father ______________________________________________________________________________________________

East Point, Hong Kong

15 May 1858

My dear Father

I just write a few words to you, having written a somewhat lengthy letter to my Mother to tell you that by some most extraordinary means, I received the other day a letter from you, & that one in which you tell me to start off to the Mauritius &c. all of which is of course now cancelled.

Still, tho’ I am at present better off here, I by no means think that this Mauritius offer is one to be sneezed at & I write to John by this mail upon the subject. He said in a letter of a very old date that he thought he might manage something, but I have had no late letters from him.

I cannot understand where they can have got to. You say they were sent to Jardine Skinners.* Under any circumstances that would have been wrong, which my Uncle would have told you. For I have not received a single letter addressed to their care.

I have written to them about it & Dundas who is now here says he saw Julius in Calcutta enquiring right & left for me & my letters. I wrote two letters to Julius addressing them differently & I hope one of them will find him. I also wrote to Blyth at Madras that he might tell Arthur where I am. I am however in hopes that Julius may have heard about me from Teddy, from whom (owing to there having been no steamers) I have not heard very lately.

I see you have been touching up the Minister & at a very early date. Why don’t you start the Prison reform again. That would be a capital topic to come out upon. I think you ought to set your mind upon one theme & persevere in it. Marble arches & erections near thereunto as well as sanitary arrangements for the Army would do well to intersperse on the principle of nature delighting in variety.

A kiss to little Helen, a thing I neglected in my letter to my Mother & love &c. to everyone

Yr. affect. Son

Peter G Laurie

P.S. May 19. I have just shipped on board the ‘Florence Nightingale’ a box of our own particular mixture of Tea for which I enclose you the Bill of Lading. It is made expressly for us & is outrageously expensive I can assure you – if that will give it a better flavour. However such as it is I hope you will like it. None the less for its having come direct from China, unadulterated it certainly will be.

In the same B.L. is another package, the particulars of which I will give you another time – being a few small curios as presents to all of you, both from India & China. They are both under special care of Capt Beard & James Thomson & Co., Billiter Square are his agents when the ship will be always heard of.

Your best way will be either to get a custom house officer to clear them or to send some one down to the ship with an order to deliver signed by the agents & he will see them examined at the custom house & pay the duty at once. Unless you do this, you may have some bother.

* Jardine Skinners – Jardine Skinner & Co, a tea and general trading company based in Calcutta