LADY PEEL
stress on good reading aloud, and also on reading to improve their minds and to form their style of writing. They are not to read novels, "for ninety-nine times in a hundred they are sad stuff, and very poor in thought. Read solid sense—history, poetry, Shakespeare's plays, Pliny's letters," and this to children of whom the eldest was only twelve, the very age, her father reminded her, at which he set out from home to seek his fortune. They are to study arithmetic, geography, and music, especially singing. Needlework and, above all, dancing—"I think, with such insteps and ankles as some folks have, it would be sad indeed if some folks did not skip over the ground in true airy style of a fairy, preserving always the beautiful aplomb, or plumb line, without stiffness"—are not to be neglected.
On 29th July 1805 Floyd took a second wife, Anna, daughter of Crosbie Morgell of Castle Morgell, Ireland, and widow of Sir Barry Denny, Bart., of Tralee Castle, Co. Kerry. The children still remained with their aunt in England, and Lady Denny—Floyd never calls her anything else in his letters—with her husband in Dublin, where he was now on duty. He became a full General on 1st January 1812, and was appointed Governor of Gravesend and Tilbury Forts in
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