“Bertha, my dear, pray tell your mother what we have just been saying.
Many years ago she convinced me of the justice of these ideas; your aunt
and I have adopted them from her; and you will judge for yourself as to
our success.”
I have written this conversation as well as I can remember it; and I may
add, dear Mamma, that nothing can be more just than what is said of my
cousins, for they are truly religious, but without any show or
ostentation. Some day I will send you the nice simple prayers which have
been composed for little Grace.
_5th._--Besides the two species of the little bird that builds pendulous
nests, which I have already mentioned in my journal, my aunt has just
told me of another, the Sociable grossbeak. It is about the size of a
bulfinch, brown and yellow, and is found in the interior country at the
Cape of Good Hope. Its habits were thus described to my aunt:--
These birds live together in large societies, and build in a species of
acacia, which grows to an uncommon size; they seem to select it on
account of its strong branches, which are able to support their
extensive buildings, and also for its tall, smooth trunk, which their
great enemies, the monkey tribes, are unable to climb. In the tree
described to my aunt, there could not have been fewer than eight hundred
birds residing under a single roof, which appears like thatch, and
projects over the nests, and is so smooth and steep that no reptiles can
approach them. The industry of these birds is equal to that of the bee:
throughout the day they appear to be busily employed in carrying a fine
species of grass, which is the principal material they employ in the
construction of this extraordinary work, as well as for repairs and
additions.
It appears that, as they increase annually in numbers, they join nest to
nest, till at last the bough on which they have built gives way under
their weight, and they are forced to seek for a new dwelling. One of
these deserted colonies was examined, and found to be as ingeniously
contrived within as without. The entrances formed a regular street, with
nests on both sides, at about two inches distance from each other; and
it was evident, from the appearance, that a part of it had been
inhabited for many years. The grass with which they build is called
Boshman’s grass, and its seed is their principal food; but the remains
of insects, found in their nests, prove that they prey on them also.
_6th._--I wonder, dear Mamma, whether it is as difficult to others, as
it is to me, to lay aside old habits. I must acknowledge, that I have
been of late too much addicted to lying in bed, and have quite disgraced
myself, after having for some time made great efforts. It is a strange
sort of indolence that chains me down, and makes me delay, from moment
to moment, the trifling exertion of jumping up;--it is not sleep, for I
am generally awake, merely thinking, in a confused sort of way, of
things that are past, or things that I intend to do. My aunt says, that
were I asleep all the morning, she would not then struggle against my
habits, for my constitution might require sleep; but I have not that
excuse to plead.
When I do get up early, there is no time of the day that I enjoy so
much. The brightness of the morning sun makes the dewy trees and grass
look so beautiful; and then the birds seem so happy, and so active, in
the sweet fresh air. These are pleasures that I knew not till I came to
England, and they are every day within my reach. I have determined not
to let them slip any more. You have often told me of the danger of
giving way to bad habits, but nothing teaches one so forcibly as
experience.
My aunt and uncle are both of them early risers; and they consider it of
great importance that young people should so manage their time as to
have some part of every morning to employ in serious reading. “I wish my
little Bertha,” said he, “to bestow ample time on the neatness and
propriety of her dress; but it is still more necessary that she should
never feel in the least hurried in the performance of those religious
exercises with which every day should begin, and which should be gone
through with calmness and leisure before she joins the family circle at
breakfast, and before the cares or pleasures of the day mix with her
graver thoughts.”
They spoke to me very kindly on this subject yesterday, and I think and
hope that I shall not again shew myself unmindful of their advice.
I have consulted Caroline about it. I find that she and Mary are always
up early, and are seriously engaged for a part of the morning.
Caroline is indeed an extremely early riser, and she has engaged to
rouse me regularly at a reasonable hour. She began this morning, and to
encourage me, she read a pretty little poem on early rising. By copying
it for Marianne, I shall recollect it the better.
Good morn, good morn--see the sweet light breaking,
O’er hill and dale to greet thy waking!
The dark grey clouds are flitting away,
And the young sun sheds forth a twilight ray;
And an halo of bloom is in the skies,
Yet the night of slumber is on thine eyes.
The dew lies fresh on the opening flower,
And sweetly cool is the youthful hour;
And the birds are twittering their tender song
The bright and weeping boughs among;
And all seems fresh and with rapture rife,
While wakening into conscious life.
Oh, rouse thee! rouse thee! the precious time
Is fleeting fast--and merrily chime
The morning bells; and the beautiful view
Thy touch should arrest, is fading too!
The glow of the cloud is darkening fast,
And the sunny mist is almost past;
And thy lyre is lying all unstrung;
And thy matin hymn is still unsung;
And thy lip is mute, and thy knee unbending,
Nor is yet the sweet prayer to heaven ascending.
---- What! slumbering still! Arise, arise!
For thy lively dreams are fantasies,
And mock thy waking; but come with me
And listen to life’s reality.
And come and muse on that deeper sleep,
O’er which Hope will her silent vigils keep,
And soothe and shield with her guardian wing
The Spirit’s secret fluttering;
And lead it on to that brighter day,
Which knows no evening and no decay.
_7th._--My uncle says, that agriculture is only gardening on an enlarged
scale; and that all the implements are only magnified garden tools. The
sharp edge of the sloping ploughshare turns up the earth in the same
manner as the spade, which is put into the ground in a slanting
direction; but the plough being drawn by animals, whose strength is far
superior to that of man, in a few hours the earth is separated and
thrown back, in a space that, to be dug, must have occupied days.
The harrow is only a large rake, and is useful, not only in breaking the
clods of earth, but in covering over the newly sown seeds. What useful
inventions were these machines, and all the improvements that have been
made in them!
My uncle explained to me, that vegetation is the common source from
whence all animals derive their food; either at once, from the growing
plant, or at second hand from their prey, who had been nourished by it;
and that vegetables, in their turn, live on all that has already lived
and vegetated. There is a continual succession of production and decay;
for it is by decay, and the decomposition that follows, that nature
restores to the ground those substances of which it is robbed by
vegetation.
But when the produce of the soil is removed for the use of man, and not
left to immediate decay, the agriculturist is obliged to assist nature,
by supplying other decayed vegetable matter, or else, by mixing it with
some artificial manure. To do this more effectually, people are obliged
to study the principles of the different soils, in order to know what
species of manure should be applied to fertilize, or to correct them; to
render one, for instance, more alkaline, or to lessen the siliceous
nature of another. Even rest restores to the earth some of its
productive powers; and when it is ploughed up, and long exposed in what
is called a _fallow_, the air has considerable influence in improving
it.
This led to a conversation on the many varieties of soils; and my uncle
says I shall become acquainted with them in time. They are all well
known to good farmers, who can thereby determine what crops are adapted
to each. Who could have thought, Mamma, that all this skill and
knowledge was necessary to a common farmer! I imagined that any one
could sow what seed he chose, and then reap and gather the produce; but
as to feeding the earth in return for the nourishment drawn from it, I
cannot say that ever entered my head. So, you see, that I have learned
something to-day--something real, Mamma.
_8th._--My uncle has been very much interested in the account which Ker
Porter gives of Babylon, in his second volume, and has been so kind as
to read to us the description of what this great city was, when at the
summit of its glory; and what it is now, and has been for so many ages.
According to Herodotus, the walls of this prodigious city were sixty
miles in length, and formed a square of fifteen miles each way, in which
gardens, lawns, and groves were included. They were built of large
bricks, cemented together with bitumen, and, he says, were 350 feet
high, and 87 feet thick, and protected on the outside by a vast ditch,
lined with the same materials. There were 25 gates of solid brass on
each side, and from every gate a street of 150 feet wide crossed the
city to the opposite gate. According to his description, the temples,
palaces, and hanging gardens were equally wonderful. A branch of the
Euphrates flowed through the city, from north to south. To prevent this
great river from overflowing, it was confined by walls or quays of
brick; and while these were building, the course of the river was turned
into a basin, forty miles square, and thirty-five feet deep, which had
been cut for the purpose of receiving it.
The wealth, and power, and grandeur of this magnificent city, is
strongly expressed in the Scriptures, where it is spoken of as “The lady
of kingdoms given to pleasure, that dwellest carelessly, and sayest in
her heart, I am, and there is none beside me.”
Among its vast buildings, was the Tower of Babel, erected ages before,
by Nimrod, on the plain of Shinaar--a pyramid, or rather a mountain of
masonry in that form, and on which it is supposed that, in after ages,
Nebuchadnezzar raised the temple of Belus. This temple was of such
prodigious magnitude, that having been destroyed by Xerxes, it cost
Alexander, who intended to rebuild it, the labour of 1600 men for two
months, in merely removing the rubbish caused by its destruction.
Of all these immense buildings, the traces can now be scarcely
distinguished; confused heaps of bricks extending many miles, and grown
over with grass, still exercise the ingenuity of travellers and
antiquaries. In this dreary waste, there are, however, three very
conspicuous mounds. The principal one, now called the Birs Nimrod, is
supposed to be the temple of Belus. Ker Porter says that, in passing
this barren tract, his eyes ranged on all sides, for something to point
out the remains of this once imperial city; but all was withered and
gone, and comparatively level with the horizon, except where the
gigantic Birs Nimrod presented itself, “standing in the solitary waste,
like the awful figure of Prophecy, pointing to the fulfilment of her
word.”
The two other mounds of ruins are supposed to be the citadel and the
palace. The former is of an oblong shape, and flat at the summit; and
several excavations which have been made in it by the Turks, when
searching for hidden treasures, are now occupied by wild beasts. In his
second visit, his party suddenly halted, on seeing several objects
moving about the summit, which they at first imagined to be Arabs; but
which were soon discovered to be lions.
What numerous reflections this sight must have produced!--Those savage
animals thus wandering amidst the towers of Babylon, and dwelling within
the cavities of her once magnificent palaces, proved how faithfully the
prophecies had been fulfilled, which relate to her fall, and how exactly
the words of Isaiah have been verified,--“wild beasts of the desert
shall lie down there, and the houses shall be full of doleful
creatures.”
Among the fragments, and elevated on a sort of ridge, he found the
famous solitary tree which has escaped the general destruction. It bears
the marks of almost as great antiquity in its appearance as tradition
gives it. The Arabs call it _athelé_, but its species was quite unknown
to him; the trunk must have been enormous, and now, though hollow and
shattered, it supports very large spreading branches, which are adorned
with tress-like tendrils resembling heron feathers. These long and
delicate tendrils bend towards the ground, like a weeping willow, and
while gently waving in the wind, they make a low melancholy sound.
The Euphrates wanders in solitude through this desolate region, its
banks are covered with reeds, and now unrestrained by its former stately
quays, it annually overflows the country; producing high rank grass, and
leaving stagnant pools and swamps among the hollows of the adjacent
plain.--“I will make thee a possession for the bittern, and pools of
water.”
Upon the whole, though so little remains to point out the several parts
of this once stupendous city, there is enough to convince the attentive
examiner, that he is on the very spot where the hand of God wrote on the
wall the awful and well known denunciation against Babylon!
“How the scene is now changed! At that time these broken hills were
palaces--these long undulating mounds were streets--and this desolate
solitude was filled with the busy subjects of the proud daughter of the
East.”
My dear Mamma, I hope you will not think that I fill up my journal with
too long extracts; but I was so much interested in all that relates to
Babylon, that I could not deny myself the pleasure of copying some parts
of this great book, which I am sure will not for a long time make its
way to Rio.
_Sept. 9._--Do you recollect, dear Mamma, that I mentioned in my journal
about a fortnight ago, my uncle’s surprise at meeting an old
acquaintance at the harvest home, who, when he formerly knew him, was in
the gay world; and who, it then seemed very improbable would have to
lead a rural life, and to associate with plain farmers? My uncle’s
notice was attracted by his very gentlemanlike air, even in the homely
dress of a farmer; and when he discovered who he was, he doubted at
first whether he should address him, as he feared that the evident
change in his situation might make it disagreeable to him to be
recognised. However, they did renew their acquaintance, and my uncle
obtained permission to wait on him.
He rode to see him in a few days, and was much charmed with the neatness
of his farm and cottage, and, indeed, with all his family. He lives on
the borders of the forest, as well as my uncle, but at a distance of
several miles from this place. My uncle gave us a little sketch of his
history in the evening, as nearly in his own words as he could; and he
was so kind as to permit me to tell it to you, because he thinks you
once knew this gentleman yourself. I have never heard his name, so I do
not know what to call him; and I will try to write it just as my uncle
repeated it to us:
“At the period that you knew me,” said he, “I was moving in the most
fashionable circles, occupied by the world, and all its silly
amusements, and without any other object than to amuse away my idle
life. I travelled on the continent--I afterwards went into the army; but
at home or abroad, I was pursued by that _ennui_ which is always the
consequence of idleness. I need not recount to you, sir, all the
extravagant follies I committed in search of pleasure, that brilliant,
but deceitful phantasm, which leads us into error, and betrays us to
disappointment.
“From the time that I was a schoolboy, pleasure had been my only object;
the mistaken indulgence of my parents increased the fault, and
diminished the enjoyment; for it left me no difficulties to overcome--no
efforts to make. My father was rich, and profusely generous to me;--and
though I was the second son, I knew that my mother intended to bequeath
me her estate, which was in her own power.
“At last I grew tired of idle prosperity; I sighed for novelty to
relieve me from the burden of time; and I sometimes felt that I had a
mind capable of more than had hitherto occupied it. Having gone with
some of my friends to shoot on my mother’s property of Strath-morton, I
was attacked by a feverish and tedious cold; and as my gay associates
left me when I could no longer join in their pursuits, I had abundant
leisure for reflection. The good-natured old steward was my principal
visiter, and his conversation generally turned on the miseries of not
having a resident master at Strath-morton; for my father and mother
always resided at their place in Sussex; and a poor tenantry and
impoverished land were of course the effect. This led me to think of my
insignificant life. I began to wish for the variety of being useful; and
at last I determined to become an active country-gentleman, in order to
become of consequence, as well as for the pleasure of having a new
object. The motives were undoubtedly erroneous; but I tell them, sir, in
order to shew you the progress of my mind.
“I readily obtained my father’s permission to make Strath-morton my
abode; and with his sanction, I entered on my new life as soon as it was
possible to make my arrangements. The novelty alone could at first have
made me endure it; but I found a sort of pleasure that seemed
extraordinary at the time; and in the course of a few months I had, with
the natural energy of my character, quite devoted myself to my new
occupations. My mother was gratified to see me interested in the place
that was to become mine; and full powers were given me to thin the
ancient woods, to make whatever changes I pleased, and to lay out money
to a considerable amount in improving the estate, which had been much
neglected. By degrees, the increase of knowledge, and the encouragement
of a little success, made these employments become less irksome; and I
began to feel a real interest for the tenants and labourers. I found
that I could easily promote their comfort; I felt that I was of
consequence, and I began to enjoy all the pleasures of assisting the
industrious.
“I had been attached to a young lady whom I had known in London only. I
knew that, though fashionable, she was well principled, clever, and
literary, and I imagined that I was equally well acquainted with all her
tastes. We married: I expected her to be perfect; and when I brought her
early in the summer to Strath-morton, I anticipated the delight of
having a companion to sympathize with, and to assist me in the plans to
which I had devoted myself. Judge then of my disappointment at finding,
that she had no taste for a real country life, and disliked its
monotonous occupations. For some time, however, we lived happily, till I
lost my kind, indulgent father, who was succeeded in his honours and
estates by my brother; and as I perceived that my expensive improvements
could not well be continued, now that I had no longer my father’s wealth
to support them, I took that opportunity to indulge my wife in a visit
to the continent.
“On our return to England, my mother was apparently in health, but in a
few weeks she was suddenly seized with a severe illness, and died before
she could collect her thoughts sufficiently to arrange her affairs.
Forgetful of the uncertainty of life, she had made no will; and her
estate, which I had long considered as my own, was inherited by my
brother as heir at law.
“What was now to become of us? My father, anxious to preserve the wealth
of the head of the family, and knowing that Strath-morton was to be
mine, had left me but a very small property; and as my brother was not
sufficiently convinced of what had been my mother’s intentions, he
retained her estate.--My wife’s fortune had been small.--In short, we
were suddenly reduced from the thoughtlessness of affluence, to absolute
poverty. I might, perhaps, have obtained some employment, which would
have just enabled us to live; but I was not much inclined to take up my
abode in London, in so different a style from that in which I had always
appeared there. Vanity and pride survive all the other passions--and my
country life had rather increased than subdued them. However, though
painful to me to return to London, I determined to do so, if my wife
approved; and I left all to her decision; I knew she did not love the
country, and I anticipated that her sentence would be some hard-working
office for the rest of my life.
“But I little knew the soundness of my wife’s judgment, and her generous
forgetfulness of self. Her decision was soon made; ‘In our
circumstances,’ she said, ‘and for our children’s sake, a laborious
country life will be vastly preferable to the confined, and not less
laborious, situation of a clerk, or some such thing in town; we can more
easily submit to deprivations, and shall be better able to support and
assist each other’s toils.’ I reminded her that she disliked the
country--‘Oh,’ said she, ‘think no more of those fancies; it is on
ourselves alone, and not on the gratifications of either town or country
that our happiness must now depend. Let us take a small farm--let us be
really farmers.--You will be able to apply the agricultural knowledge
you have acquired; and I will not neglect my part. Our children must be
bred up usefully--they will not be accomplished--but what does that
signify?--they will be our real comforts, and we can teach them real
virtues.
We’ll form their minds, with studious care,
To all that’s manly, good, and fair.
“I gladly consented, and was so fortunate as to procure this farm at a
reasonable rent, and with a comfortable cottage. My creditors saw that
my intentions towards them were honourable; and satisfied with the
assignment of my little patrimony, they insisted on my retaining my
books, and such furniture as could be useful. We soon removed; and
firmly resolved to submit to any distress, however abject, rather than
get into debt. I may now acknowledge that our distress was sometimes
severe, while learning the little details of economy. The art of good
management, if not acquired in youth, can only be gained by bitter
experience. You will perceive, then, that I became a real hard-working,
drudging farmer; and you will wonder, probably, how we could get on,
when I had such an ignorant wife.--My dear sir, I cannot do her
sufficient justice--I cannot describe the strength of mind with which
she cheerfully submitted to the change of life, nor the energy with
which she sought the common knowledge requisite for our situation. She
had proposed this life of labour, and she almost seemed to enjoy it, and
to find a pleasure in her continual exertions. For some years we could
only have one servant, a poor hard-working, willing creature, who,
though doing her best, could not do half that was necessary for our
family. But this best of wives, instead of unreasonably expecting every
thing from one poor slave, as I might almost call her, worked hard
herself. She who had been used to late hours, and luxurious ease, was up
at six every morning, to superintend her little household, and to make
with her own hands most of the preparations for our meals. She was the
same in every thing, and never uttered a complaint.
“Oh! how often in these years of distress, when every shilling we could
spare was devoted to discharging old debts--did I think of the sums I
had lavished in my days of gaiety--on useless trifles--those trifles
that are well named ‘_’tis buts_’--on dress--on all those indulgences of
appetite which leave no pleasure behind; and the taste for which I can
distinctly trace back to the habits of petty self-indulgence permitted
at our great schools.