| Description | Copy letter from Colonel Patrick Duff, Fort William (Bengal), to his brother James, London, glad to have received almost everything James sent by Mr Harvey except for some stockings, Mr Harvey’s ship was upset on the voyage and the cargo soaked, but even the books are perfectly legible, only the boots and shoes are too small, delighted with buckles, thinking of buying land as an investment and place for retirement, particularly with fruit trees and a stream for fishing, somewhere for shooting and preferably near the sea, ‘I abhor a place entirely without wood and water, and would not like to live where I could not see both’, his image of his life when retired, not spending much now so as to save up, ‘I conceive a man may cut a very good figure in the North of Scotland and have all I mention, upon twelve hundred a year, and a few thousand pounds to furnish his house, purchase his coach and horses, and stock his farm’, offer to help Mr Strachan the doctor’s son with a position as surgeon assistant has worked well, he and Mr Duff, son of the Provost of Elgin, stay with him, death of Macveagh with Sir Eyre Coote, busy with artillery practice, comments on mutual acquaintances, fondness for brother William, he does not know his brother John so well, orders for wine, but in better barrels, 16 March 1784; copy note from Colonel Patrick Duff to his brother James ordering wine, 17 March 1784; copy letter from John Stables, one of the Supreme Council at Bengal, to James Duff, London, praising Colonel Duff and ordering wine, 17 March 1784 |