Journeying in Ireland, with my husband and a young friend, some thirty
years ago, on arriving in Dublin, having a letter of introduction to
Miss Edgeworth, we sent it, with a note from myself proposing to spend a
day with her, if convenient and agreeable, and shortly received the
following very gracious reply:--
"EDGEWORTHTOWN, September 3, 1836.
"DEAR MADAM,--I hasten to assure you and Professor F---- that we feel
highly honored and gratified by your kind intention of paying us a
visit. Mrs. Edgeworth desires me to say, that we shall be at home all
next week, and we shall be most happy to receive you, and your young
friend, Mr. W----, any day after the 5th which may be most convenient
to you. We say after the 5th, because on the 5th my sister, (Harriet,)
Mrs. Butler, and her husband, the Rev. Mr. Butler, will come to us, and
independently of the pleasure they will have, I am sure, in your
society, I own I wish that you should become acquainted with them,
especially as we are unlucky at this moment in not having any of my
brothers at home. My brother-in-law, Mr. Butler, is, as you will find, a
man of literature and learning, besides being all that you will like in
other respects, from the truth and rectitude and simplicity of his
character.
"I am much obliged to you for the letters you were so good as to enclose
to me. Of all our friends in Boston and Cambridge, we shall, I hope,
have time to inquire further and to converse.
"There was only one thing in your letter which did not give us pleasure;
and we trust that after your arrival, and after you have had some hours
to reflect, and a night quietly to sleep upon it, you will repent and
recant, and give up your _cruel purpose_ of giving us only one day. Mrs.
Edgeworth will remonstrate with you, I think, more effectually than I
can; and in the mean time I promise to allow you till the morning after
your arrival to become sufficiently acquainted with the ways of the
house and family, before I turn to you, as I shall (I warn you) at
breakfast, for your _ultimatum_.
"I am, dear Madam, (for the present,)
"Your much obliged and grateful
"MARIA EDGEWORTH.
"P.S. It must increase my interest in making your acquaintance, my dear
Mrs. F., to know that you are sister to Mr. Benjamin R., whose talents I
with great reason admire, and for whose kindness and agreeable letters I
have equally great reason to be grateful."
* * * * *
The cordiality and frankness of this letter made us all desirous of
visiting the writer. We were much struck with the manner in which Mrs.
Edgeworth was mentioned and made of importance as the lady of the house,
when the whole place was the property of Miss Edgeworth, and she was at
least thirty years older than her step-mother. Mr. Edgeworth had been
dead several years, and his son had become so embarrassed in his affairs
as to be obliged to sell his patrimonial estate; and to prevent its
passing into the hands of strangers, Miss Edgeworth had bought it, and
made her step-mother mistress of the establishment, whilst she lived
with her as a daughter. They were on the very best terms, each admiring
and loving the other.
Another member of the family was Mrs. Mary Sneyd, a very aged lady of
the old school, and sister to Honora Sneyd, who refused the hand of
Major Andre, and became the wife of Richard Lovell Edgeworth. The
unhappy fate of the gallant Major is well known; but few persons now
living ever read the monody written on his death by Miss Seward, in
which she makes her hero say,--
"Honora lost, I woo a sterner bride;
The armed Bellona calls me lo her side."
It was a great pleasure to me to see the sister of two of Mr.
Edgeworth's wives,--one belonging to the same period, and dressed in the
same style, as the lovely Honora. She did not appear till lunch-time,
when we found her seated at the table, in a wheelchair, on account of
her lameness. She reminded me of the pictures of the court beauties of
the time of Louis XIV. Her dress was truly elegant and very elaborate.
Her white hair had the effect of powder, and the structure on it defies
description. A very white throat was set off to advantage by a narrow
black velvet ribbon, fastened by a jewel. The finest lace ruffles about
her neck and elbows, with a long-waisted silk dress of rich texture and
delicate color, produced an effect that was quite bewitching. She was
wonderfully well preserved for a lady of over eighty years of age, and
it was pleasant to see the great attention paid to her by all the
family. She was rather deaf; so I was seated by her side, and requested
to address my conversation to her. When lunch was over, she was wheeled
into the library, and occupied herself making a cotton net to put over
the wall fruit, to keep it from the birds. It was worth a journey to
Edgeworthtown only to see this elegant specimen of old age.
I had heard that Mr. Edgeworth's house was full of his inventions and
contrivances, and when shown to our bed-room, we found such an
extraordinary lock on the door, that we dared not shut it for fear of
not being able to open it again. That room, too, was unlike any other I
ever saw. It was very large, with three huge windows, two of them
heavily curtained, and the third converted into a small wardrobe, with
doors of pink cotton on a wooden frame. It had two very large
four-posted bedsteads, with full suits of curtains, and an immense
folding-screen that divided the room in two, making each occupant as
private as if in a separate room, with a dressing-table and ample
washing conveniences on each side. A large grate, filled with turf, and
all ready for lighting, with a great basket lined with tin, and also
filled with the same fuel, reminded us strongly that we were in Ireland.
Large wax candles were on the mantel-piece, and every convenience
necessary to our comfort; at the same time the furniture was so very
old-fashioned and dilapidated, that no one in this country would think
it possible to use it.
We were shown other contrivances of the former owner, such as a door in
the entrance hall, (through which the servants were continually
passing,) the motion of which wound up a clock, the face being over the
sideboard, in the dining-room. Several doors in the house were made
double, in a way that I could not see the use of. Two doors were
fastened together at the hinge side, making a right angle with each
other, so that in opening one door you shut the other, and had to open
that before you could enter, and when that opened, the one behind you
shut. Miss Edgeworth said it was for safety in times of danger. She
always mentioned her father with great respect, and even reverence, in
her manner; but nothing that I saw or heard there raised my opinion of
him. I think his never allowing his gifted daughter any retirement, but
insisting on her writing all her books in that great library, where he
was teaching the children their lessons, and everyone occupied in
various ways, was a real act of tyranny; but she did not so regard it.
In building his house, Mr. Edgeworth would have no drawing-room, no
sitting-room, but the one large library, with numerous windows on one
side, some made into alcoves by projecting book-shelves. There were a
great many books, some fine engravings, beautiful drawings, and very
good oil paintings by Mrs. Edgeworth. It was a very pleasant
family-room, fully furnished with tables, sofas, and lounges, a curious
clock, and various models. A little old-fashioned work-table, with a
small desk on it, was used by Miss Edgeworth for writing all her books.
The fourth wife of Mr. Edgeworth was our hostess, and performed her part
charmingly. She must have been very pretty, for, though short, fat, and
forty, her appearance was very agreeable. Miss Edgeworth was shorter
still, and carried herself very upright, with a dapper figure and quick
movements. She was the remains of a blonde, with light eyes and hair;
she was now gray, but wore a dark frisette, whilst the gray hair showed
through her cap behind. She was so plain that she was never willing to
sit for her portrait, and that is the reason why the public has never
been made acquainted with her personal appearance.
In conversation we found her delightful. She was full of anecdotes about
remarkable people, and often spoke from her personal knowledge of them.
Her memory, too, was stored with valuable information, and her manner of
narrating was so animated that it was difficult to realize her age. In
telling an anecdote of Mirabeau, she stepped out before us, and,
extending her arm, spoke a sentence of his in the impassioned manner of
a French orator, and did it so admirably that it was quite thrilling.
She told us two speeches of Madame de Stael which are worth remembering.
Madame Necker was a harsh mother, and always found a great deal of fault
with her daughter; but her husband knew his child's merits, and liked
her to have her own way. One day a gentleman entered the room, just as
Madame Necker flourished out of it, after reprimanding her daughter, who
stood abashed in the middle of the room, with tears on her face. He
endeavored to console her by saying that she must not mind her mother's
reproofs, as long as her father was satisfied with her, and he told her
how much M. Necker admired her. To this the girl replied, "_Mon pere
pense a mon bonheur present, ma mere songe a mon avenir_." I talked with
Miss Edgeworth of a work on Progressive Education by Madame Necker de
Saussure; she thought it dull and tedious, and said that Madame de Stael
had a great admiration of that cousin, and said of her, "_Elle a tous
les talens qu' on me suppose, et toutes les vertus qui me manquent_."
Miss Edgeworth and all her family took the part of the English
Government in their treatment of the Irish, and had no sympathy for the
wrongs and sufferings of their countrymen. Bigoted Episcopalians, they
would grant no rights to the Roman Catholics, and this made them very
unpopular in their own neighborhood.
They had been instrumental in establishing a free school for the sons of
poor Protestant clergymen in the town which bordered on their grounds,
and they took us to see it. It was market-day, so the main street was
full of the lower order of Irish, with their horses and carts, asses and
panniers, tables and stands full of eatables and articles of clothing.
Sometimes the cart or car served as a counter on which to display their
goods. The women in bright-colored cotton gowns and white caps with full
double borders, made a very gay appearance. As we all passed through the
crowd to the school-house, the enmity of the Papists to Protestant
landholders was but too evident.
Though Mrs. Edgeworth had been the Lady Bountiful of the village for
many years, there were no bows or smirks for her and her friends, no
making way before her, no touching of hats or pleasant looks. A sullen
expression and a dogged immovability were on every side of us. Mr.
Butler, who had but just arrived in Edgeworthtown, was as much struck
with it as we were, and it quite excited him. He remarked upon it as a
want of manners in the people, and called them uncivilized; but there
was more in it than that. It spoke to us Americans of the long train of
oppressive measures under which the Irish had groaned for years; of the
Protestant clergy paid by rates levied on the Roman Catholics, and of
the tyranny exercised by Protestant landholders. Twenty-nine years have
passed since I stood in that Irish crowd, and much has been done to
improve their condition; all the political disabilities then complained
of by the Papists have been removed, oppressive laws have been done away
with, emigration has relieved the land of its surplus population; and
were it not for the designs of the Romish Church to wrest the island
from the dominion of a Protestant power, that country might now be
prosperous and happy.
When we visited Miss Edgeworth, she had published her last work,
"Helen," and was writing another to be called "Taking for Granted," but
I never heard of its being published. She told me that she meant to show
the mischief of taking things for granted, and acting upon them as if
they were known facts; and she begged me to send her any instances of
the evil consequences of "taking for granted" which fell under my
observation.