“On the 21st there was a delightful party at Holland House to meet the Prince of Wales, and on Wednesday I was thankful to come home.
“Never has little Holmhurst been pleasanter than this year, and I have so enjoyed being alone, the repose of the intense quietude, the radiance of the flowers, the delicious sea-breezes through windows open to the ground, the tame doves flitting and cooing in the branches of the tall lime-tree.”
ToMiss Wright.
“August 6, 1877.—I came home on Wednesday week, and have been alone ever since, and over head and ears in work. I have seen nobody except last Tuesday, when, though I thought no one knew Iwas at home, fourteen afternooners appeared. Miss Hamilton, who has taken a fancy to do my portrait, has done it very cleverly against a window, with ivy hanging down outside, only it is a sentimental suggestion of
‘He sat at the window all day longAnd watched the falling leaves.’”
‘He sat at the window all day longAnd watched the falling leaves.’”
enlarge-imageHOLMHURST, THE POULTRY-YARD.HOLMHURST, THE POULTRY-YARD.
“August 19.—I have had a pleasant visit of three days to Cobham, and felt much inclined to accede to Lord and Lady Darnley’s wish at the end, that I would consider my visit just begun, and stay another threedays. It is indeed a glorious old place externally, and the gardens and immense variety of walks under grand old trees, are enchanting in hot weather. I had many happy ‘sittings out’ and talks with Lady Darnley, and could not sufficiently admire, though I always observe it, how her perfectly serene nature enables her to carry out endless people-seeing, boundless literary pursuit, and inexhaustible good works, without ever fussing herself or any one else, leaving also time to enter into all the minute difficulties of her friends in the varied gyrations of their lives.... I was taken to see Cowling Castle, a romantic old place; just on the edge of those marshes of the Thames which Dickens describes so vividly. We also saw his house, close to Dover road.”
Journal.
“Walton Heath, Oct. 6.—After a delightful visit from Harry Lee at Holmhurst, I have come here to Miss Davenport Bromley at a quaint cottage, partly built out of a church, in a corner of the vast Walton Heath, but full of artistic comfort and brightness within. We drove on Thursday to Box Hill, which is most beautiful, the high steep chalky ground covered with such a luxuriance of natural wood, box grown into trees and the billows of pink and blue distance so wonderfully luxuriant and wooded. The time of year is quite beautiful, and all the last festival of nature in the clematis wreaths and the bryony with its red berries dancing from tree to tree.
“We have been to see a quaint old house of the Heathcotes. There is a great stone hall with a highgallery, from which a young lady threw herself in her rage at her lover marrying some one else, and was killed on the spot. Her picture hangs on the staircase wall, and her ghost walks on the stairs, pretty, in white, something like a shepherdess. A housemaid cut a great cross in the picture, ‘to let the ghost out,’ as the old woman who showed the house said, and the hole has never been mended. This country is full of little traditions. There is a green lane close by, down which a headless lady walks, and a phantom coach drives along the road: a countryman who met old M. de Berg on the common declared that he had seen it—that it had driven over him.
“Yesterday we went to Gatton (Lord Monson’s), which formerly belonged to Sir Mark Wood. It is a curious place: the ugly church fitted inside with beautiful Flemish carving and glass, and the house having a hall of coloured marbles, copied from the Corsini Chapel at Rome—minus the upper story.
“I have much enjoyed learning to know Miss Bromley better. She is the kindest of women, wonderfully clever and full of insight into every minutest beauty of nature. Her devotion to animals, especially pugs, is a passion. Another pleasure has been finding Mrs. Henry de Bunsen here. She told me—
“‘There was, and there is still, living in Cadogan Place, a lady of middle age, who is clever, charming, amiable, even handsome, but who has the misfortune of having—a wooden leg. Daily, for many years, she was accustomed to amble every morning on her wooden leg down Cadogan Place, and to take the air in the Park. It was her principal enjoyment.
“‘One day she discovered that in these walks she was constantly followed by a gentleman. When she turned, he turned: where she went, he went: it was most disagreeable. She determined to put an end to it by staying at home, and for some days she did not go out at all. But she missed her walks in the Park very much, and after a time she thought her follower must have forgotten all about her, and she went out as before. The same gentleman was waiting, he followed her, and at length suddenly came up to her in the Park and presented her with a letter. He said that, as a stranger, he must apologise for speaking to her, but that he must implore her to take the letter, and read it when she got home: it was of great importance. She took the letter, and when she got home she read it, and found that it contained a violent declaration of love and a proposal of marriage. She was perfectly furious. She desired her lawyer to enclose the letter to the writer, and say that she could not find words to describe her sense of his ungentlemanly conduct, especially cruel to one afflicted as she was with a wooden leg.
“‘Several years elapsed, and the lady was paying a visit to some friends in the country, when the conversation frequently turned upon a friend of the house who was described as one of the most charming, generous, and beneficent of mankind. So delightful was the description, that the lady was quite anxious to see the original, and was enchanted when she heard that he was likely to come to the house. But when he arrived, she recognised with consternation her admirer of the Park. He did not, however, recur to their formermeeting, and after a time, when she knew him well, she grew to esteem him exceedingly, and at last, when he renewed his proposal after an intimate acquaintance, she accepted him and married him.
“‘He took her to his country-house, and for six weeks they were entirely, uncloudedly happy. Then there came a day upon which he announced that he was obliged to go up to London on business. His wife could not go with him because the house in Cadogan Place was dismantled for the summer. “I should regret this more,” he said, “but that where two lives are so completely, so entirely united as ours are, there ought to be the most absolute confidence on either side. Therefore, while I am away, I shall leave you my keys. Open my desk, read all my letters and journals, make yourself mistress of my whole life. Above all,” he said, “there is one cupboard in my dressing-room which contains certain memorials of my past peculiarly sacred to me, which I should like you to make yourself acquainted with.” The wife heard with concern of her husband’s intended absence, but she was considerably buoyed up under the idea of the three days in which they were to be separated by the thought of the very interesting time she would have. She saw her husband off from the door, and as soon as she heard the wheels of his carriage die away in the distance, she clattered away as fast as she could upon her wooden leg to the dressing-room, and in a minute she was down on all fours before the cupboard he had described.
“‘She unlocked the cupboard. It contained two shelves. On each shelf was a long narrow parcel sewnup in canvas. She felt a tremor of horror as she looked at them, she did not know why. She lifted down the first parcel, and it had a label on the outside. She trembled so she could scarcely read it. It was inscribed—“In memory of my dear wife Elizabeth Anne, who died on the 24th of August 1864.” With quivering fingers she sought for a pair of scissors and ripped open the canvas, and it contained—a wooden leg!
“‘With indescribable horror she lifted down the other parcel, of the same form and size. It also bore a label—“In memory of my dearest wife Wilhelmine, who died on the 6th of March 1869,” and she opened it, and it contained—another wooden leg!
“‘Instantly she rose from her knees. “It is evident,” she said, “that I am married to a Blue Beard—a monster whocollectswooden legs. This is not the time for sentiment, this is the time for action,” and she swept her jewels and some miniatures that she had into a handbag and she clattered away on her own wooden leg by the back shrubberies to the highroad—and there she saw the butcher’s cart passing, and she hailed it, and was driven by the butcher to the nearest station, where she just caught the next train to London, intending to make good her escape that night to France and to leave no trace behind her.
“‘But she had not consulted Bradshaw, and she found she had some hours to wait in London before the tidal train started. Then she could not resist employing them in going to reproach the people at whose house she had met her husband, and she told them what she had found. To her amazement theywere not the least surprised. “Yes,” they said, “yes, we thought he ought to have told you: we do not wonder you were astonished. Yes, indeed, we knew dear Elizabeth Anne very well; she was indeed a most delightful person, the most perfect of women and of wives, and when she was taken away, the whole light seemed blotted out of Arthur’s life, the change was so very terrible. We thought he would never rally his spirits again; but then, after two years, he met dearest Wilhelmine, to whom he was first attracted by her having the same affliction which was characteristic of her predecessor. And Wilhelmine was perhaps even a more charming person than Elizabeth Anne, and made her husband’s life uncloudedly happy. But she too was, alas! early snatched away, and then it was as if the whole world was cut from under Arthur’s feet, until at last he met you, with the same peculiarity which was endeared to him by two lost and loved ones, and we believe that with you he has been even more entirely, more uncloudedly happy than he was either with Wilhelmine or Elizabeth Anne.
“‘And the wife was so charmed by what she heard, that it gave quite a new aspect to affairs. She went home by the next train. She was there when her husband returned; and ever since they have lived perfectly happily between his house in the country and hers in Cadogan Place.’
“Mrs. De Bunsen said that a cousin of hers was repeating this story when dining at the Balfours’. Suddenly he saw that his host and hostess were both telegraphing frantic signals to him, and by a great effort he turned it off. The lady of thewooden leg and her husband were both amongst the guests.”
“Milford Cottage, Oct. 8.—I came here with Miss Bromley on Saturday to visit Mrs. Greville and her most engaging mother, Mrs. Thellusson. It is a red house, standing almost in the village street, but with a French-looking garden behind, with clipped hedges and orange trees in tubs. It was left to Mrs. Greville by her husband, an old gentleman whom she married when the Thellussons were ruined, and he said, ‘You had better marry me; there is nothing else that I can do for you.’ He always treated her with the greatest generosity and kindness, but died very suddenly, intending to leave his wife very rich. There was, however, some mistake about the will, and she only inherited this cottage and just enough to live upon. I found at Milford, Lady Elizabeth Bryan, a Paget, who goes out visiting with four dogs, one of whom, Constance Kent, is most beautiful, and she has adopted a little cousin and presented her with six-and-thirty dolls. I went to see the adopted daughter in bed; two little dogs were cuddled in her bosom, and seven dolls lay at her feet with their heads out. Lately, the little girl has displayed signs of vanity, paraded her small person before a mirror, and exulted in fine clothes, and on these occasions she is always dressed in ‘Sukey,’ a little workhouse girl’s gown, to remind her that ‘in the sight of God she is no better.’
“This afternoon I have been with Mrs. Greville to Mr. Tennyson at Haselmere. It is a wild, high, brown heath, with ragged edges of birch, and an almostlimitless view of blue Sussex distances. Jammed into a hollow is the house, a gothic house, built by Mr. Knowles, the editor of theNineteenth Century—‘that young bricklayer fellow that Alfred is so fond of,’ as Mr. Carlyle calls him. Though the place is a bleak, wind-stricken height, where the flowers in the garden can never sit still, the house is pleasant inside and well and simply furnished, but is without any library whatever. Tennyson is older looking than I expected, so that hisunkemptappearance signifies less. He has an abrupt, bearish manner, and seems thoroughly hard andunpoetical: one would think of him as a man in whom the direst prose of life was absolutely ingrained. Mrs. Greville kissed his hand as he came in, which he received without any protest. He asked if I would like to go out, and we walked round the gardens. By way of breaking the silence I said, ‘How fine your arbūtus is.’—‘Well, I would say arbūtus,’ he answered, ‘otherwise you are as bad as the gardeners, who say Clemātis.’ When we returned to the house, Hallam Tennyson brought in his mother very tenderly and put her on a sofa. She is a very sweet-looking woman, with ‘the glittering blue eyes’ which fascinated Carlyle, and a lady-abbess look from her head-dress—a kind of veil. Mrs. Greville revealed that she had broken her promise of not repeating an unpublished poem of Tennyson’s by reciting it to Mr. Carlyle, who said, ‘But did Alfred give you leave to say it?’ and Tennyson said, ‘You are the wickedest old woman I ever met with: it is mostprofligateconduct’—and he half meant it too. Tennyson then insisted that I should tell him some stories. I did notlike it, but found it was no use to resist; I should have to do it in the end. He asked for ‘a village tragedy,’ so I told him the story of Caroline Crowhurst: he said he should write it in a play or a poem. Then I told him the stories of Mademoiselle von Raasloff and of Croglin Grange. He was atrociously bad audience, and constantly interrupted with questions. He himself repeated a little story, which Mr. Greene of the ‘English History’ had told him—of a man who felt that his fiddle, to which he was devoted, was the source of temptation to him by leading him to taverns where he got drunk. On the Mississippi river, he said, he heard a voice saying to him that he must destroy the fiddle; so he went down, kissed the fiddle, and then broke it to pieces. ‘Iput in that kiss,’ said Tennyson, ‘because I thought it sounded better.’
“On the whole, the wayward poet leaves a favourable impression. He could scarcely be less egotistic with all the flattery he has, and I am glad to have seen him so quietly. The maid who opened the door was Mrs. Cameron’s beautiful model, and there were pictures of her by Mrs. Cameron all about the house.
“For the poet’s bearish manners the Tennyson family are to blame, in making him think himself a demigod. One day, on arriving at Mrs. Greville’s, he said at once, ‘Give me a pipe; I want to smoke.’ She at once went off by herself down the village to the shop, and returning with two pipes, offered them to him with all becoming subservience. He never looked at her or thanked her, but, as he took them, growled out, ‘Where are the matches? I suppose now you’ve forgotten the matches!’—‘Oh dear! I never thought of those.’
“Mrs. Greville has a note of Tennyson’s framed. It is a very pretty note; but it begins ‘Dear Madwoman.’”
“Babworth, Oct. 14.—This house overflows with loveliness in the way of amateur art, and the drawings of its mistress, Mrs. Bridgeman Simpson, are most beautiful. She is the kindest and most good-natured of hostesses.... Yesterday we went to Sandbeck, an ugly dull house in a flat, and looking bare within from paucity of furniture. Lord Scarborough, once a bold huntsman, is now patiently awaiting a second stroke of paralysis in a wheel-chair. Lumley, a pleasant boy, just going to join his regiment at Dublin, drove me after luncheon to Roche Abbey, a very pretty ruin in a glen.”
“Oct. 15.—Mrs. Simpson’s very charming Polish sister-in-law, Mrs. Drummond Baring, recounted yesterday evening a curious story out of the reminiscences of her childhood, of which her husband from knowledge confirmed every fact. Her father, Count Potocka, lived in Martinique. His wife had been married before, and her beautiful daughter, Minetta, idolised by her second husband, had made a happy marriage with the Marquis de San Luz, and resided at Port Royal about five miles from her parents. The father was a great naturalist, and had the greatest interest in introducing and naturalising all kinds of plants in the West Indies. Amongst other plants, he was most anxious to introduce strawberries. Every one said he would fail, and the neighbouring gardenersespecially said so much about it that it was a positive annoyance to them when his plants all seemed to succeed, and he had a large bed of strawberries in flower. His step-daughter, Minetta, came to see them, and he always said to her that, when the strawberries were ripe, she should have the first fruit.
“A ball was given at Port Royal by the Governor, and there her parents saw Minetta, beautiful and radiant as ever; but she left the ball early, for her child was not well. As she went away, she said to her stepfather, ‘Remember my strawberries.’
“Her parents returned home in the early morning, and a day and a night succeeded. Towards dawn on the second morning, when night was just breaking into the first grey daylight, the mother felt an irresistible restlessness, and getting up and going to the window, she looked out. A figure in white was moving to and fro amongst the strawberries, carefully examining each plant and looking under the leaves. She awoke her husband, who said at once, ‘It is one of the gardeners, who are so jealous that they have come to destroy my plants;’ and jumping up, he put on hisgola—a sort of dressing-gown wrapper worn in Martinique—and, taking his gun, rushed out. On first going out, he saw the figure in white moving before him, but as he came up to the strawberry beds it seemed to have disappeared. He was surprised, and turning round towards the house, saw his wife making agonised signs to him to come back. Such was her livid aspect, that he threw down his gun upon the ground and ran in to her. He found her in a dead faint upon the floor. When sherecovered, she said that she had watched him from the window as he went out, and that, as he reached the strawberry beds, the figure seemed to turn round, and she saw—like a person seen through a veil and through the glass of a window, and, though perfectly distinct, transparent—her daughter Minetta. Soon after describing this, she was seized with violent convulsions. Her husband was greatly alarmed about her, and was just sending off for the doctor, who lived at some distance, when a rider on a little Porto Rico pony came clattering into the court. They thought it was the doctor, but it was not; it was a messenger from Port Royal to say that Minetta was dead. She had been seized with a chill on returning from the ball, and it had turned to fatal diphtheria. In her last hours, when her throat was so swelled and hot, she had constantly said, ‘Oh, my throat is so hot! Oh, if I had only some of those strawberries!’”
“Thoresby, Oct. 17.—Lord Manvers sent for me after luncheon three days ago, and we came with a horse fleet as the wind through the green lanes of Clumber, and across part of the (Sherwood) forest, to this immense modern palace by Salvin. All around is forest. No one was at home when I arrived, so I went out for a walk, and was joined by Lord Manvers on returning.... Lady Manvers is quite delightful, and so are her son and daughter, so I have been very glad of two days alone with the family; and the forest is enchanting from its varieties of gnarled oak, silver birch, endlessly contorted fir, and gigantic beeches, with ever-varying lights on the golden and crimsonfern in its first beautiful decay. Now guests have arrived, including Mr. Frederick Tayler, the artist,[267]whose blottesque treatment of the green in the forest with only gamboge, indigo, and sepia is very interesting to see. He was very funny about the late Lord Manvers, who was a wit, and who, when Lord Ossington was rather boastful about his lake, said—‘Come, come now, Ossington, don’t speak of a lake; just wipe it up and say no more about it.’
“In the afternoon we drove through ‘the Catwhins’ to Clumber—a dull ugly low-lying house. There is much fine china, but it is a dreary place.”
“Glamis Castle, Oct. 26.—I had a delightful visit to the salt of the earth at Hutton,[268]where Mr. and Mrs. Pease were entertaining a large party, chiefly of semi-Quaker relations, including Miss Fox of Falmouth, who is most interesting and agreeable. Mrs. Pease is as delightful as she is beautiful, and the place is an oasis of good works of every kind. Thence I came here, meeting Mr. Waldegrave Leslie and Lady Rothes at the station. As we drove up to the haunted castle at night, its many turrets looked most eerie and weird against the moonlit sky, and its windows blazed with red light. The abundance of young life inside takes off the solemn effect—the number of charming children, the handsome cordial boys, the winning gracious mistress; only Lord Strathmore himself has an ever sad look. The Bishop of Brechin, who was a great friend of the house, felt this strange sadness so deeplythat he went to Lord Strathmore, and, after imploring him in the most touching manner to forgive the intrusion into his private affairs, said how, having heard of the strange secret which oppressed him, he could not help entreating him to make use of his services as an ecclesiastic, if he could in any way, by any means, be of use to him. Lord Strathmore was deeply moved, though he said that he thanked him, but that in his most unfortunate positionno onecould ever help him. He has built a wing to the castle, in which all the children and all the servants sleep. The servants will not sleep in the house, and the children are not allowed to do so.
“I found a large party here, and was agreeably surprised to see Lady Wynford come down to dinner. Then Lady Holmesdale appeared, with her piteous little white-mouse aspect; Mr. and the charming Mrs. Streatfeild, Lady Strathmore’s sister; Miss Erica Robertson, and Lord and Lady Rosehill.
“There is much of interest in the life here—the huge clock telling the hours; the gathering in early morning for prayers by the chaplain in the chapel, through a painted panel of which some think that the secret chamber is concealed, though others maintain that it is entered through Lord Strathmore’s study, and occupies the space above ‘the crypt’—an armour-hung hall where we all meet for dinner, at which the old Lion of Lyon—gold, for holding a whole bottle of claret, which the old lords used to toss off at a draught—is produced. There are lions everywhere. Huge gilt lions stand on either side in front of the drawing-room fireplace, lions are nut-crackers, a lion sits on the letter-box, the very door-scraper is guarded by two lions.
“The boys are charming, so very nice that one cannot believe any curse can affect them. Claudie (Glamis) is very handsome, and looks strikingly so in his Scotch dress. Frank is ill now, but most engaging.
“To-day, as I was drawing, Mr. Waldegrave Leslie gave a curious account of his life at Lady Rothes’ castle—that they themselves inhabit the ghost-room, and that the ghost comes frequently, and not only groans, buthowls; they often hear it. When Lady Rothes’ brother died, the episcopal service was read over him in the house by a clergyman, and the ghost then howled so horribly that the service was quite inaudible, and eventually had to be stopped. He said they did not mind the ghost, but that Lady Rothes’ Dandie Dinmont dog was distracted with terror when it came, and crept upon the bed quivering convulsively all over.
“Lady Rosehill has been meeting Mr. (Dicky) Doyle, the genial fairy lover, who told her that one day when a man was walking down Pall Mall with a most tremendous swagger, somebody walked up to him and said, ‘Sir, will you have the kindness to tell me,areyou anybody in particular?’”
“Oct. 29.—Yesterday was Sunday, and we had three services in the chapel, which is painted all over with figures of saints by the same man who executed the bad paintings of the Scottish kings at Holyrood. The sermons from Mr. Beck, the chaplain, head of ‘the Holy Cross’ in Scotland, were most curious: the first—apropos of All Saints—being a mere catalogueof saints, S. Etheldreda, S. Kenneth, S. Ninian, &c., and their virtues; and describing All Saints’ festival as ‘the Mart of Holiness’: the second—apropos of All Souls—speaking of prayers for the dead as a duty inculcated by the Church in all ages, and taking the words of Judas Maccabeus as a text.”
“Gorhambury, Nov. 20.—It was dark when I reached the St. Albans Station yesterday. Lord Verulam’s carriage was in waiting for guests: I got into it with three others. ‘Lord Beaconsfield was with us in the train,’ said the young lady of the party, ‘and I am sure he is going to Gorhambury, and oh! Iamso glad he has taken a fly.’ We drove up to the great porticoed house in the dark, and a small winding staircase took us to a great lofty hall, furnished as a sitting-room. Here we found Lady Verulam, two of her daughters, Lady Catherine Weyland, &c. Other guests appeared at dinner—the sallow basilisk face of Lord Beaconsfield: his most amusing secretary, Montagu Corry: Lord Exeter, with long black hair: Lady Exeter, tall, very graceful and refined-looking, but with the coldest manner in the world: a young Lord Mount-Charles: Scudamore Stanhope, remarkably pleasant: Charlie Duncombe, very pleasant too: Lady Mary Cecil: Dowager Lady Craven, always most agreeable.
“Lord Verulam is permanently lame and on two crutches, but most agreeable and kindly. This morning I sat to draw the ruin of Lord Bacon’s house (Lady Craven saved it when it was going to be pulled down). The place is full of relics of him, his observatoryin the park: the ‘Kissing Oak,’ beneath which Queen Elizabeth embraced him: the ‘Queen’s Ride,’ used when she came to visit him: curious painted terra-cotta busts of his father and mother and of himself as a child, in the library: and in the dining-room a large portrait of his brother, which he (the brother) painted himself, the most prominent feature being his legs, of which he was evidently exceedingly proud.
“In the afternoon I drove with Lady Exeter, Lady Catherine Weyland, and Lady Jane Grimston to St. Albans, and went over the abbey with Mr. Chapel, the delightfully enthusiastic clerk of the works, who repeatedly exclaimed, ‘It is the pride of my life, sir; it is the pride of my life.’ He has most beautifully put together, from the fragments found, the two great shrines of the place, of St. Alban and St. Amphipolis (Arthur Stanley doubts the existence of the latter saint, and thinks the name was only that of a cloak), not adding or inventing a single bit; and the whole interior of the abbey has been hitherto done in the same way, being perhaps the one church in England really restored, not remodelled. In returning we stopped at St. Michael’s to see the tomb of Lord Bacon, represented as he sat in his chair—‘sic sedebat.’”
“Nov. 21.—At dinner last night and all day Lord Beaconsfield seemed absorbed, scarcely noticed any one, barely answered his hostess when spoken to. Montagu Corry[269]said that his chief declared that the greatest pleasure in life was writing a book, because ‘in that way alone man could become a creator:’ thathis habit was to make marionettes, and then to live with them for some months before he put them into action. Lately he had made some marionettes; now he was living with them, and their society occupied him entirely.
“To-day Lord Verulam showed me many of the relics of the house—the decision of his ancestor, Judge Crook, releasing Hampden: a deed of free-warren from Henry II. confirming to one of his ancestors another deed of his grandfather Henry I.: the portrait of Edward Grimston (1460), the oldest known authentic portrait in England, representing a man who fought at Towton, but afterwards made peace with Edward IV., lived in retirement, and is mentioned in the Paston Letters.
“Lord Verulam told me of his discovery that Lord Lovat was seventy-three at the time of his execution, not eighty, as is generally affirmed. The supposed date of his birth and the date of his learning to fence tend to confirm this, and hissmilingwhen he looked upon his coffin-plate on the scaffold and the line he quoted from Horace.”
“Nov. 25.—On Friday I drove with Lord Verulam in his victoria to Wrothampstead. The old house there is one of the long many-gabled houses, vine-covered, with windows and chimneys of moulded brick, standing, backed by fine trees, in a brilliant garden. Inside it is gloriously panelled, and has a staircase approached by balustraded gates with a tapestried room at the top of it. It belongs to a Mr. Lawes, who for a long time was supposed to be wasting allhis time and most of his money in chemistry, but at length by his chemistry he discovered a cheap way of making a valuable manure, and ‘Lawes’s manure’ has made him a millionaire.
“Yesterday we went to Tittenhanger, already familiar to me from Lady Waterford’s descriptions. It is a charming old house, utterly Cromwellian, most attractive and engaging, depending for its effect upon its high overhanging roofs, and the simple, admirable brick ornaments of its windows. The rooms are full of beautiful pictures and china, but Lady Caledon was not there, and it is always a loss not to see the ownerwitha place.
“It was on hearing some one mention this house that Sydney Smith made the impromptu—
‘Oh, pray, where is Tittenhanger?Is it anywhere by Bangor?Or, if it is not in Wales,Can it, perhaps, be near Versailles?Tell me, in the name of grace,Is there really such a place?’
‘Oh, pray, where is Tittenhanger?Is it anywhere by Bangor?Or, if it is not in Wales,Can it, perhaps, be near Versailles?Tell me, in the name of grace,Is there really such a place?’
“Lady Lilian Paulet was very absurd at dinner with her story of an American who said that, going down Piccadilly, he met a mad dog, so, as he could not avoid him, he thrust his hand down its throat and pulled out its inside; after which the dog ran on still, but it could no longer say ‘bow-wow,’ it could only say ‘wow-bow.’
“It was amusingseeingLord Beaconsfield at Gorhambury:hearhim I never did, except when he feebly bleated out some brief and ghastly utterance. His is an extraordinary life. He told Lord Houghtonthat the whole secret of his success was his power of never dwelling upon a failure; he ‘had failed often,constantlyat first, yet had never dwelt on it, but always gone on to something else.’”
enlarge-imageTITTENHANGER.TITTENHANGER.[270]
“Burghley, Nov. 29.—I have been glad to come to the place which is often called ‘the finest house in England’—a dictum in which I by no means agree. The guests are a row of elderly baronets of only hunting and Midland-county fame. An exception is Sir John Hay, a thorough oldgentleman(an Admiral) and very agreeable. I took a Miss Fowke in to dinner, andcomplained to her of the number of old baronets. ‘Yes,’ she said, ‘they are old and they are numerous, and the central one is my father.’
“The house is immense, but has little internal beauty. There is a series of stately rooms, dull and oppressive, with fine tapestry and china, and a multitude of pictures with very fine names, almost all misnamed—a copy of the well-known Bronzino of the Medici boy being called Edward VI.; a copy of the well-known Correggio in the National Gallery being marked as an original by Angelica Kauffman, &c.[271]In a small closet is a number of jewelled trinkets, including Queen Elizabeth’s watch and thimble, and there hangs the gem of the picture collection—‘The Saviour Blessing the Elements,’ a very expressive but most unpleasing work of Carlo Dolci. It is the halo of the great Lord Burghley which gives the place all its interest. He lies on his back in a scarlet robe under a canopy in St. Martin’s Church at the entrance of the town, and close by is a cenotaph to his father and mother, who are buried at St. Margaret’s, Westminster. All the five churches of Stamford have merit, and the town is interesting and picturesque.
“Lord Exeter, with his lank black hair and his wrinkled yellow jack-boots high above the knee, looks like a soldier of Cromwell. In the evening he and the whole family dance incessantly to the music of a barrel-organ, which they take it in turn to wind.[272]
“The great idol of family adoration is ‘Telemachus’—the memory of Telemachus, or rather a whole dynasty of Telemachi, for they are now arrived at Telemachus X. The bull Telemachus I. gained more than £1000 at small county cattle-shows. His head is stuffed in the hall; his statue in silver stands in the dining-room (where there are also silver statues of Telemachus II. and III.), and his portrait hangs on the wall.”
“Dec. 6.—On Tuesday, at King’s Cross, I met Elizabeth Biddulph, Marie Adeane, Alethea Grenfell, and the Dalyells, and we came down together, a merry party, to Hertford, whither the Robert Smiths sent to fetch us to their picturesque new house of Goldings. Alethea is full of the story of Jagherds (near Corsham)—that ‘in the difficulty of finding a house there suitable for the clergyman, an old manor-house was suggested, which seemed to meet all requisites. The Bishop (Ellicott) himself went to see it, and was quite delighted with it, and the clergyman went to reside there. But his servants would not stay, his governesses would not stay; all said they were worried out of their lives by the figure of a lady in blue, which appeared all over the house and on all possible occasions; and at last the clergyman himself gave in and went away. With the next clergyman the same thing happened, and he appealed to the Bishop. The Bishop said he never could tell why he suggested it, but in his answer he said, “If the apparition comes again, I should advise you to throw as much sympathy as you can into your manner, and ask what you can do for it.” Soon after he heard from the clergymanthat this had quite succeeded. The blue lady had appeared again, and the clergyman immediately, with an appearance of the utmost sympathy in his countenance, said, “Madam, is there nothing in the world I can do for you?”—upon which a seraphic smile came over the face of the spirit, and it vanished away and never appeared again.’
“Lately the Bishop had a letter from an old clergyman at Wisconsin in America, who wrote to him that an aged parishioner of his had sent for him on his deathbed, saying that he could not die happy without recounting the facts of a crime which he had witnessed in his boyhood. He had been taken by a gang of highwaymen who held their headquarters at Jagherds Court in Wiltshire, and while there was witness to many deeds of violence committed by them. Amongst others, they carried off a young lady, and in the row and quarrels which ensued, the young lady was murdered at Jagherds Court.
“The old clergyman, not knowing what to do with this confession, thought the best way was to write it to the Bishop of the diocese in which Jagherds was situated, and he wrote it to the Bishop of Gloucester, who verified the whole, finding his correspondent a veritable clergyman, &c. The Bishop of Gloucester told the story last week at Lord Ducie’s.”
“Holmhurst, Dec. 16.—I have been intensely busy. The life of Madame de Bunsenunfoldsitself in her letters more than any life I have ever heard of. I long for the time to come when I may begin to unite, my links, but at present I have only been makingextracts—such extracts! Her power of expression is astonishing. I discover so much that I fancy I have felt myself, and never been able to put into words. I see in the vast piles of MS. the means of building a very perfect memorial to her.”
“Ampthill, Christmas Day, 1877.—I came here yesterday from Holmhurst.... It was a great pleasure to find charming old Sir Francis Doyle here with his son and daughter. Sir Francis talks incessantly and most agreeably, and makes the mornings as interesting as the evenings. ‘C’étaient des matinées excellentes, pour lesquelles je me sentirais encore du gout,’ as Talleyrand used to say. Sir Francis has just been saying, apropos of how little one knows the true characters of those one meets:—
“‘H. told me a curious thing one day. He went to dine with a cabinet minister (I suppress the name), and there came down a lady, the governess, cherished by the family—“a perfect treasure.” He recognised her at once as a lady he had known very well, very intimately indeed. She sank after that, sank into the lowest depth of that class of life. “I used to help her with money,” he said, “as long as I could, but at last she sank too low even for that, quite out of my sphere of possibilities altogether, and here I found her reinstated. As I was questioning what I ought to do, she passed near me and said only, ‘I have sown my wild oats.’ I never told of her: I had nothing to do with placing her where she was.”’
“With the same intention Sir Francis told a curious story of ‘Two Shoes,’ a boy at Eton:—
“‘Two Shoes took a box to a boy-friend of his who was in another house and said, “A number of curious things are happening in my house, and this box contains things of value to me; I wish you would let it stay here for a little.” The boy said, “Yes, you may leave your box, provided only that it contains no money: I will not be responsible for anything with money in it.” Two Shoes said there was no money in the box, and it was left. Afterwards, when the box was moved, a great rattle as of sovereigns was heard inside, and as the tutor of the house whence it had been taken declared himself robbed at the same time, the boy in whose charge the box was left thought it necessary to declare what had happened. The sixty sovereigns lost by the tutor were found in the box. Two Shoes was expelled.... H. went down into —— shire lately, and there he found Two Shoes confidential solicitor to half the county.’
“Apropos of the secret crimes of so-called ‘religious people,’ Sir Francis said—
“‘I am quite sure that Abigail murdered her husband; that one is quite left to understand. He could not have died of the shock of having escaped David. Oh, no; she was a religious woman, so she waited till six o’clock on the Sabbath evening, and then she poisoned him.’
“His stories of old times and people are endless. He said—
“‘I always keep a reminiscence of poor Lady Davy to laugh at. It was one of those great days at Stafford House, one of their very great gala days, and Lady Davy was in the hall in the greatest anxietyabout her carriage; and she, little woman, walked up to one of those very magnificent flunkeys, six feet high at least and in resplendent livery, and besought him to look after her carriage. I never saw any onesocivil as that man was. “I have called your Ladyship’s carriage three times,” he said, “and it has not answered, but if your Ladyship wishes, I will try again.”
“‘I saw the second act of that little drama. I went through the door, beyond the awning, just when the footman was stalking haughtily and carelessly among the link-boys and saying disdainfully, “Just give old Davy another call.”’
“At dinner the conversation turned on Lord and Lady Lytton. She was a Miss Doyle, a distant cousin of Sir Francis, and shortened his father’s life by her vagaries and furies. After his father’s death Sir Francis left her alone for many years; then it was represented to him that she had no other relations, and that it was his duty to look after her interests, and he consented to see her, and, at her request, to ask Sir E. Bulwer to give her another hundred a year. This Sir Edward said he was most willing to do, but that she must first give a written retractation of some of the horrible accusations she had brought against him. When Lady Bulwer heard that this retractation was demanded of her, she turned upon Sir Francis with the utmost fury, and abused him with every vile epithet she could think of. She afterwards wrote to him, and directed to ‘Sir Francis Hastings Doyle, Receiver of her Majesty’s Customs (however infamous), Thames Street, London.’ ‘But,’ said Sir Francis, ‘Ialso had my day. I was asked as to her character. I answered, “Fromyourpoint of view I believe her character to be quite immaculate, for I consider her to be so perfectly filled with envy, hatred, malice, and all uncharitableness, as to have no possible room left for the exercise of any tenderer passion.”’ Lady Bulwer appeared on the hustings against her husband. His son told Sir Edward, ‘Do you know my Lady is here?’—‘What, Henry’s wife!’—‘No,yours.’ She said, ‘He ought to have gone to the colonies long ago, and at the Queen’s expense.’”
“Ampthill, Dec. 26.—This morning Sir Francis was attracted by the portrait of old Lady Carlisle hanging by the drawing-room door, and he said, ‘That portrait always reminds me of something Lady Carlisle said once. I was speaking to her of the death of one of her sisters, and she said, “We were all very sorry, very sorry indeed; but she (pointing to another sister), shecared.”’
“For my benefit Sir Francis narrated the story of the thirty-nine Yaconines.
“In Japan, there was one Daimio who was in rivalry with another, and who was superseded by him, and of course his honour could not stand that, so he committed ‘the happy despatch.’ His followers ought to have avenged him, it was Japanese etiquette that they should, but they did not; they, lamented and howled, but they did nothing, and the chief of them in his agony lay down in the gutter and remained there fasting for several days. Then one day the head-follower of the successful Daimio, passing by,saw him in the gutter, and spurned him with his foot and said, ‘You beast, you coward, you brute! do you intend to lie there and let your master go unavenged?’ but the man still lay crouched and grovelling and took no notice.
“But a time came when the followers of the successful Daimio were dispersed, and then the thirty-eight servants of the dead man arose and went to him, and kneeling around him said with courtesy, ‘We do not wish to cut your throat, do not compel us; take the happy despatch;’ but the Daimio would not take their advice, he could not bring his mind to it; so then the Yakonines performed their duty, and they cut his throat. When they had done that, the thirty-eight Yakonines summoned all the people together to attend them, for they were about to perform their final duty, their ‘happy despatch’ to the manes of their master, and the thirty-eight performed it, amid the acclamations of the people over their fidelity even to death. But when, afterwards, men came to count the corpses, behold there were thirty-nine: the enemy who had spurned the Yakonine as he lay in the gutter repented when he saw that he had accused him falsely, and had silently joined the procession of death: there were thirty-nine Yakonines who died.”
“Dec. 27.—Last night a French play was acted, ‘Madame Choufleuri reçoit chez elle.’ Mr. Lowther, who was merely an old French gentleman spectator, created for himself a part which was a whole dumb dramatic performance in itself.
“I had a charming drive to-day with Lady Ashburton to Woburn, the rest having preceded us. There is a long winding double avenue in the park. The stables are so enormous that we mistook them for the house, and were surprised when we turned the other way. However, the door of the real house was most dilapidated and unducal. Long passages, surrounding an open court, and filled with portraits, led to a large sitting-room, where we found most of our own party and the guests of the house. The Duchess was kind and cordial. We all went to luncheon in the Canaletti room, enlivened by endless views of Venice, which, regardless of their artistic merits, are most pleasing to the eye through their delicate green-grey tints. Afterwards we went through the rooms, full of portraits, one of Lucy Harington in a ruff, very fine. In one corner is a set of interesting Tudor portraits, including a large one of Jane Seymour; hideous I thought, though Froude, when he saw it, said he did not wonder Henry VIII. cut Anne Boleyn’s head off to marry so bewitching a creature. A great portrait of the famous Lord Essex in a white dress has a mean feeble face and stubby red beard. The Duke[273]offered to take us to the church. Lady Ashburton, Lady Howard of Glossop, and I drove there with him. We passed ‘the Abbot’s Oak,’ where the last abbot was hung. Froude says he went up to London and was swallowed up by his fate. The Duke asked what this meant. It did mean that he was hung, drawn, and quartered, ‘but Froude was very angry at the question; historians never like being askedfor details.’ The banks of a stone quarry are planted with cedars and evergreens, and the drive to the church is very pretty. The church was built by Clutton, who was turned loose into a field and told to produce what he could. Hedidproduce a very poor mongrel building, neither gothic nor romanesque. The Duke said, ‘Would you like to see what is going to be done with me when I am dead?’ and he showed us the hole in the floor where he was to be let through ‘to the sound of solemn music,’ and then took us down into the vaults beneath to see the trestles on which his coffin was to repose! I long tried in vain to get Lady Ashburton to leave the endless letters, some of Sarah, Duchess of Marlborough, who stayed with her grand-daughter and complained that the house was so dreadfully out of repair that the rain came into her bedroom, but another year that was to be remedied. We were deep in a ‘Boethius de Consolatione,’ printed in Tavistock Abbey, when the Duchess came in. ‘Would you like to see my golden image?’ So we went by a long open cloister, with wooden pillars rose-entwined, to see where the statue of the Duchess stands on a hill, all gilt like the figure of the Prince Consort, so that one really couldseenothing except that it was a standing figure, and I couldsaynothing except that it was very well placed. Then we were taken through the sculpture-gallery, in which the great feature is a glorious sarcophagus, with a relief of the body of Hector being weighed against gold, Priam and Hecuba standing by with tears upon their cheeks.”
“Dec. 28.—The hours at Ampthill were especially pleasant from five to seven, when one was allowed to sit with Lady Wensleydale, who, in the beautiful halo of her evergreen old age, is all that is most winning and delightful—with full memory of her ‘wealthy past’ and gratitude for present peace, hemmed in by loving care of children and grandchildren.”
“Ascot Wood, Dec. 29.—Sir John Lefevre has been talking of an old acquaintance of his named Balm, who was very extravagant. Some one said to him once, ‘Balm, Balm, if you are notsage, you’ll spend amintin time (thyme), and then you’llrue.’
“He described a dinner-party at which he was present with ten others, including Sydney Smith, who made them all laugh so much that they were obliged tostand up. It was the only time he ever saw it—‘Laughter holding both its sides.’”
“Jan. 6, 1878.—At Ascot Station I met Mark Napier, who resigned his first-class ticket and the companionship of Plato’s ‘Republic,’ his usual reading in the train, to travel with me. His conversation is always full of thought and interest. I went to Cobham in the evening, and liked my visit, as I always do, meeting many people, including Mrs. Russell Barrington, who dresses like a figure by Burne Jones, and is even ambitious of becoming a Botticelli.”
“Crewe Hall, Jan. 6.—The number of hats in the hall told me on arriving here that there was a large party in the house, but I find no remarkable elementsexcept Lord Houghton and Mr. Nugee, a clergyman still in appearance, but one who has gone out of the Church at the High end, and has a sort of monastery for training ecclesiastics somewhere in London. He preached to-day in the chapel, standing on the steps of the altar, a discourse like that of a French preacher, most dramatic, most powerful, most convincing—yet, oh! how difficult it is to carry away anything even from the sermons one likes best.
“Lord Crewe welcomed me very cordially, and made himself so pleasant that I thought his eccentricities had been exaggerated, till suddenly, at dinner, he began a long half-whispered conversation with himself, talking, answering,acting, and nothing afterwards seemed able to rouse him back to ordinary life. During the fire which destroyed the interior of Crewe some years ago, Lord Crewe bore all with perfect equanimity, and said not a word till the fire-engines came and were at work. Then he turned to his sister, Lady Houghton, who was present, and said, ‘I think I had better send for my goloshes.’[274]
“It is a very fine house, with noble alabaster chimney-pieces inlaid with precious marbles, but since the fire all has been too much overlaid with decoration, and in many respects indifferent decoration. The Sir Joshuas are glorious and numerous.
“This afternoon Lord Houghton told an interesting story which he heard from Mrs. Robert Gladstone:—
“‘She went to stay in Scotland with the Maxwells of Glenlee. Arriving early in the afternoon, she went to her room to rest. It was a lovely day. Mrs.Maxwell lay upon the sofa at the foot of her bed. Soon it seemed to her as if the part of the room opposite to her was filled with mist. She thought it came from the fireplace, but there was no fire and no smoke. She looked to see if it came from the window; all without was bright clear sunshine. She felt herselffrisonner. Gradually the mist seemed to assume form, till it became a grey figure watching the clock. She could not take her eyes from it, and she was so terrified that she could not scream. At length, with terror and cold, her senses seemed going. She became unconscious. When she came to herself the figure was gone. Her husband came in soon after, and she told him. He took her down to five-o’clock tea. Then some one said, “You are in the haunted room,” and she told what had happened. They changed her room, but the next morning she went away.
“Soon afterwards Mrs. Stamford Raffles went to stay at Glenlee. It was then winter. She awoke in the night, and by the bright firelight burning in her room saw the same effect of mist, collecting gradually and forming a leaning figure looking at the clock. The same intense cold was experienced, followed by the same unconsciousness, after a vain endeavour to awaken her husband, for her limbs seemed paralysed.
“‘The Maxwells soon afterwards became so annoyed that they gave up Glenlee.’
“Lord Houghton also told the story of General Upton:—
“‘Whilst at Lisbon he saw a military friend of his in England pass across the end of the room. On reaching England he went to see his friend’s family,found them in deep mourning, and learnt that his friend was dead. “Oh, yes,” he said, “I know that; he died on such a day, for I saw him.” Upon this the family became greatly agitated, and vehemently denied that he had died till several days later. “Nothingwill convince me,” said General Upton, “but that he died on that particular day.” Upon this the widow flung herself on her knees before him and implored him for God’s sake not to bring utter ruin upon her by saying this to any one else. “Very well,” he said; “I do not want to injure you, but the best way will be to tell me the whole truth.” Then she confessed. It was one of those cases in which the time for a pension was not quite due for a few days, and she concealed the death till those days were past.’
“Lady Egerton, who is here, told of young De Ritchie, whose wife died in Fiji. He obtained leave of absence immediately, and wishing to break the shock of his wife’s sudden death to her friends, merely telegraphed that they were coming home at once, for Ranee was very ill. On the day they were expected to arrive, the grandparents said to the little boy left in their charge that they were going to meet his papa and mama, who were coming home. The child looked very grave and said, ‘Papa, yes; Mama, no: poor Mama sleep in Fiji;’ and nothing would make it say any more. Dr. De Ritchie (the grandfather) was so impressed with this, that he was hardly surprised when, on going to Southampton, he met his son alone.
“Sir Watkin Wynne described a curious event on his property. A poor woman earnestly implored thata certain tree near her cottage might be cut down, for she had dreamt that her husband would be killed by it. She besought it so earnestly that the tree was ordered to be cut down. In falling, the rope attached to the tree caught the poor man, and crushed him against the wall, and he was killed.”
“London, Jan. 22.—A very pleasant dinner at Lady Ashburton’s. Miss Hosmer[275]was there, very full of her strange discovery of being able to turn limestone into marble, and then to colour it to any tint she wishes—a discovery perhaps not unknown to the ancient Romans.”
“Jan. 26.—Dined with old Lady Lyndhurst,[276]who has all the clever vivacity acquired by her early life in France. Speaking of bullying at public schools, she said, ‘I discovered that my Lord had been a bully when he was a boy, and I can assure you I thumped him well at eighty for what he had done at fourteen.’”
“Battle Abbey, March 10, 1878.—I came here yesterday, finding Lady Marian Alford, and to-day Lord Houghton came. Speaking of Mrs. L. E—— ‘s poverty, the Duchess said, ‘It is so sad; really often she has actually not bread to eat.’—‘Yes,’ said Lord Houghton, ‘but then she has so many kind friends who give hercake.’
“Lady Marian described the railway adventure ofa friend of hers. Two ladies got into a carriage at King’s Cross, one old and the other young. Into the same carriage got a gentleman and sat down between them. As soon as the train started, he looked round at one and then at the other. Then he took from his pocket six razors and laid them upon the seat opposite to him. Then he looked round at each of them again. Then he took from his pocket an orange and laid it down in front of the razors. Then he began to cut up the orange, using one razor for each pig. He looked round at each of his victims again. Then he walked across the carriage and sat down opposite the old lady, who instantly wound her boa three times round her throat. He said, ‘Do you like orange?’ She said, ‘Very much indeed,’ and he took up a pig on the point of one of the razors and popped it into her mouth. He then said, ‘Will you have another?’ She said, ‘Yes, presently, but wait a few minutes: I like to have time tosavourermy orange.’—‘How many minutes?’ he demanded. She answered, ‘Five.’—‘Very well,’ he said, and he took out his watch and counted the minutes, and then he took up another pig on the end of another razor and popped it into her mouth. Each time she prolonged the minutes, and the gallant old lady actually kept the madman at bay till an hour had elapsed and the train stopped at Peterborough, and she and the other lady were able to escape.
“Lord Houghton’s vanity is amusingly natural. Something was said of one of Theodore Hook’s criticisms. ‘You know evenInever said anything as good as that,’ said Lord Houghton, and quiteseriously. Yet how truly kind Lord Houghton is, and how amusing, and he does most truly, as Johnson said of Garth, ‘communicate himself through a very wide set of acquaintance.’ In hishistoires de sociétéhe is unrivalled.”
“March 12.—Yesterday Lord Houghton and I sat very long after breakfast with the Duke, who talked of his diplomatic life. He was appointed from St. Petersburg to Paris, and the revolution which enthroned Louis Philippe occurring just then, he hurried his journey. When he reached Frankfort, Chad, who was minister there, assured him that he would not be allowed to enter France, but, provided with a courier passport, he pushed on, and crossed the frontier without difficulty. At Paris the barricades were still up. The town was in the hands of the Orleanists (they bore the name then). On the evening of his arrival the Duke was introduced to Lafayette, ‘quite a grand seigneur in manner.’ Lafayette asked him if he did not know Lord and Lady Holland, and on his answering in the affirmative, begged that he would write to assure Lord Holland that he meant to save the lives of the late ministers, because he was accused of intending to have them executed.
“The Duke talked much of the wonderful gallantry of the Emperor Nicholas—how when the rebel troops were drawn out opposite his own in the square at St. Petersburg, he stalked out fearless between them, though the Governor of St. Petersburg was shot dead at his feet. The rebel troops were only waiting to fire till they saw a rocket, the signal from PrinceTroubetskoi, whose courage failed him at the last. Troubetskoi was sent to Siberia, whither his wife insisted upon following. He was sentenced for life, so was legally dead, and she might, had she preferred it, have married any one else.
“We drove to Normanhurst in the afternoon. Mrs. Brassey showed her Japanese and Pacific curiosities; the house is full of them, like a bazaar. We returned through a very lovely bit of Ashburnham.”
“April 3.—I came to London on the 19th, and dined that day with Lady Margaret Beaumont, hearing there of the dear kind old Lord Ravensworth being found dead that day on the floor of the Windsor rooms at Ravensworth, when his daughter Nellie sent for him because he did not come in to luncheon.”
“On Monday, March 25, as I was breakfasting at the Athenæum, I glanced into the paper, and the first thing which met my eyes was the news of the total loss of theEurydice, with dear good Marcus Hare and more than three hundred men. It was a terrible shock, and seemed to carry away a whole mass of one’s life in recollections from childhood.... It is many days ago now, and the dreadful fact has seemed ever since to be hammering itself into one’s brain with ceaselessly increasing horror. How small now seem the failings in Marcus’s unselfish and loving character, how great the many virtues. It is difficult also to realise that there is now scarcely any one left who really cares for the old traditions of the Hare family, the old portraits, the old memorials, which were always somuch to him, and which I hoped, through him, would be handed down to another generation.”
“April 14.—On the day on which theEurydicewas lost, Sir J. Cowell and Sir John McNeill were standing together in a window of Windsor Castle which overlooks a wide extent of country. Suddenly Sir J. McNeill seemed to be dreaming and speaking aloud. ‘What a terrible storm,’ he said. ‘Oh, do you see that ship? It will be lost: oh, how horrible! Good God, it’s gone!’ It was at that moment that theEurydicewent down.[277]
“I have little to tell of London beyond the ordinary experiences, except perhaps having been more than ever shocked by the slanderous malignity of so-called ‘religious people,’ as I have been charmed by the chivalrous disinterestedness of many who do not aspire to that denomination. One often finds Archbishop Whately’s saying too true—‘The God of Calvinists is the devil, with God written on their foreheads.’ Of the many dinner-parties I have attended, I cannot recollect anything except that some one—I cannot remember who—spoke of D’Israeli as ‘that old Jew gentleman who is sitting on the top of chaos.’
“Last Sunday I went to luncheon at Mrs. Cavendish Bentinck’s. I arrived at two, having been requested to be punctual. No hostess was there, and the many guests sat round the room like patients in a dentist’s anteroom, or, as a young Italian present said, when I made his acquaintance—‘like lumps of ice.’ Lady Waterford came in and Mr. Bentinck, and we wentin to luncheon. There was a table for about forty, who sat where they liked. Mrs. Bentinck came in when all were seated, greeting nobody in particular. The lady next me, a perfect stranger, suddenly said, ‘I want you to tell me what I must do to get good. I do not feel good at all, and I want to be better: what must I do?’
“‘That depends on your peculiar form of badness,’ I replied.
“‘Well, I live where I have a church on each side of me, and a church on the top of the hill under which my house is situated. But they do me no good. Now I wonder if that is owing to the inefficiency of the churches, or to the depravity of my own heart?’
“‘Probably half to one and half to the other,’ I said.
“I asked afterwards who the lady was, but neither her hostess nor any one else had an idea.
“Yesterday I dined with the Pole-Carews. Mrs. Carew told me that Dr. Benson, Bishop of Truro,[278]told her:—
“‘At my table were two young men, one of them a Mr. Akroyd. He began to talk of a place he knew in one of the Midland counties, and how a particular adventure always befell him at a certain gate there.
“‘Yes,’ said the other young man, ‘your horse always shies and turns down a particular lane.’
“‘Yes,’ exclaimed Mr. Akroyd, ‘but how do you know anything about it?’
“‘Oh, because I know the place very well, and the same thing always happens to me.’
“‘And then I come to a gateway,’ said Mr. Akroyd.
“‘Yes, exactly so,” said the other young man.
“‘And then on one occasion I drove through it and came to a house.’
“‘Ah! well,thereI do not follow you,’ said the other young man.
“‘It was very long ago,’ continued Mr. Akroyd, ‘and I was a boy with my father. When we drove down that lane it was very late, quite dark, and we lost our way. When we reached the gateway, we saw within a great house standing on one side of a courtyard, brilliantly lighted up. There was evidently a banquet inside, and through the large windows we saw figures moving to and fro, but all were in mediaeval dress: we thought it was a masquerade.
“‘We drove up to the house to inquire our way, and the owner came out to speak to us. He was in a mediaeval dress. He said he was entertaining his friends, and he entreated us, as chance had brought us there that night, to come in and partake of his hospitality. We pleaded that we were obliged to go on, and that to stay was impossible. He was excessively civil, and said that if we must really go on, we must allow him to send a footman to guide us back into the right road. My father gave the footman half-a-crown. When we had gone some distance I said, “Father, did you see what happened to that half-crown?”—“Yes, my boy, Idid,” said my father. It had fallenthroughthe footman’s hand on to the snow.’
“‘The gateway really exists in the lane. There is no house, but there was one once, inhabited by verywicked people who were guilty of horrible blasphemies—a brother and sister, who danced upon the altar in the chapel, &c.’”
“Seaton, Devon, May 7.—I came here on Friday to visit Lady Ashburton, but found that erratic hostess gone off to Torquay, so had two days here alone with Mrs. Drummond’s two pleasant, lively boys. This is an enchanting little paradise, looking down over the sea from a cliff. Delightful walks ramble along the edge through miniature groves of tamarisk and ilex. On one side rises the bluff chalk promontory and high down of Bere Head; on the other, one looks across a bay to the cliffs near Lyme Regis, and Portland is seen in the blue haze.”
“May 7.—Drove with Lady Ashburton and her daughter to Shute, a beautiful old house of the Poles, now a farmhouse, with a gateway like a college gate at the entrance of the park. We sat to draw in the courtyard, full of colour and beauty, and afterwards had a delicious tea in the farmhouse kitchen. In returning, we went to an old ruined house which was the original homestead of the great Courtenay family.”
“May 8.—We were off at 7A.M.into Somersetshire by train. We got out at Yeovil, in a lovely country of orchards in full bloom, and drove first to Brympton, the lovely old house of the Ponsonby Fanes. They inherited it from Lady Georgiana Fane, who is represented in the church, having had her ownhead added to the body of an ancestress who was headless. The place is perfectly delightful—such a broad staircase winding endlessly away, and quaint but fresh and airy rooms opening upon a terrace with balustrades and a staircase, and close by the most picturesque of churches.
“We went on to Montacute, Mrs. Phelips’s—a most grand old house of yellow-grey stone, partly of Edward VI.’s time.”