sister Lady Jocelyn.’ She spoke of the extreme quietude of her own life.
‘A day like this (pointing out the crowd below) shows me that what this
place wants is--_people_, and I never have any. I think I must hire some
puppets to walk about and represent them.’ There are a number of
inscriptions in the grounds to different past-members of the family and
their friends. Lady Cowper said that Lady Palmerston, who was very
matter-of-fact, thought that of course they were buried there, and said,
‘How I do pity Anne, living alone at Wrest, surrounded by all those
graves of her family.’ Graves, however, there are, but of deceased dogs,
a regular burial-ground, with headstones like those in a churchyard,
surrounded by a wall of clipped yew.
“I was very glad to find Henry Cowper, who showed me the rooms, which
were full of people for the ‘breakfast,’ but I saw the two great Sir
Joshuas, which are magnificent, especially that of Lady Lucas and Lady
Grantham, as very young girls, with a bird.
“In the evening at Ampthill I told the story of Mary-Eleanor, Lady
Strathmore, to which Lady Wensleydale added her reminiscence of having
been told, at four years old, of Stoney Bowes having ‘nailed his wife’s
tongue to a table.’”
* * * * *
“_August 30._--Yesterday I drew with Miss Lowther at the ruins of
Houghton Hall, the old home of the Russells, where Philip Sidney wrote
verses under the trees. It is a very stately though not a large house,
and beautiful in colour, from the mixture of red brick and
yellow-lichened stone. A great avenue, now utterly ruined, leads away
from it direct to Bedford, which lies six miles away in the elm-lined
plain. It was deserted because Lord Tavistock, returning from hunting,
was thrown from his horse and killed on the spot in the presence of his
wife, who was waiting for him on the doorstep: the family could never
bear to live there again.[215]
“After luncheon, I walked with the old Duchess in the avenue. She
described being couched. ‘Did you take chloroform?’--‘Oh, certainly not:
no such thing: I should not have thought of it. Don’t _you_ know that
couching is a very dangerous operation? the very slightest movement
might be fatal to it. I did not know what might happen under chloroform,
but I knew that _I_ should never flinch if I had my senses, and I never
did: and in three weeks, though I was still bandaged up, I was out
walking.’
“‘What was worse than becoming blind in my case,’ said the Duchess, ‘was
breaking my knee-pan, for then, you know, one bone goes up and the other
goes down, and you never really have the use of your knee again.’
“‘And yet here you are walking, Duchess.’
“‘Yes, certainly _I_ am. Prescott Hewitt said I never should walk again,
and I said “Yes, I should,”--and he answered, “Ah! well, with you
perhaps it is different; you belong to a family that have got a will;”
and I walk, but I walk by the sheer force of _will_.’
“The Duchess said she remembered old Lady Penrhyn and her pugs, and
their being dressed like children, and keeping a footman, and having a
key of Grosvenor Square.
“In the evening I drove with Mr. Lowther to Haynes, till lately written
Hawnes, the fine old place of Lord John Thynne (Sub-Dean of
Westminster), which he inherited from his uncle, Lord Carteret. We met
the old man riding in his park, and so much taken up with a sick cow
that he almost ignored us. But when we had walked round by the charming
old-fashioned gardens, we found him waiting for us on the garden
doorstep, all courtesy and kindness. Several sons and daughters-in-law
dropped in to tea in a kind of passage-room, but Lord John took me to
see all the curiosities of the house himself, and warmed up over them
greatly. There is a most noble staircase and a very fine collection of
family portraits. In the drawing-room is that of Lady Ann Carteret in a
white satin dress, which she always wore, and is always remembered still
as ‘The White Lady.’ Her husband was Jack Spencer, of whom there is also
a fine picture. His grandmother, Sarah, Duchess of Marlborough, one day
said to him suddenly, ‘Jack, you must marry, and I will give you a list
of the ladies you may propose to.’--‘Very well, grannie,’ he said, and
he proposed to the first on the list. When he came back with his wife
from their wedding tour they went to pay their respects to the old lady.
‘Well, now,’ she said, ‘I am the root and you are only the branches, and
therefore you must always pay me a great deal of deference.’--‘That is
all very well,’ said Jack impertinently, ‘but I think the branches would
flourish a great deal better if the root was under ground.’
“There is a great collection of small treasures at Haynes--snuff-boxes
of royal persons, of Lord Chesterfield, &c., and one with a portrait of
a lady ancestress,--‘not a good woman, she had nothing but her
beauty,’--which takes off and puts on a mask. But the great relic of all
is, in its own old shagreen case, the famous Essex ring--a gem
beautifully set. With it is a most interesting letter from Weigall, the
famous jeweller, explaining a great number of reasons why it must be
_the_ ring. There is also the pedigree of the ring, which came through
the hands of a great number of females--heiresses.
“To-day the Duchess (Dowager of Cleveland) has been talking much of the
wicked Duchess of Gordon, her ancestress. She married all her daughters
to drunken Dukes. One of them had been intended to marry Lord Brome, but
his father, Lord Cornwallis, objected on account of the insanity in the
Gordon family. The Duchess sent for him. ‘I understand that you object
to my daughter marrying your son on account of the insanity in the
Gordon family: now I can solemnly assure you that there is not a single
drop of Gordon blood in her veins.’
“The Duchess of Cleveland went out walking this morning in beating rain
and bitter wind--blind, broken-kneed, and eighty-four as she is. ‘Well,
you _are_ a brave woman, Duchess,’ some one said as she came in. ‘You
need not take the trouble to tell me that: I know that I _am_ a brave
woman,’ she answered.
“Old Miss Thornton called--Lady Leven’s sister. She talked much of the
misuse of charitable funds in dinners to directors, payment of matrons,
ex-matrons, &c., and said, ‘There really ought to be a society formed
for the demolition of charitable institutions.’
“At dinner the Duchess vehemently inveighed against the deterioration
of the times. ‘Was there ever _anything_ so ridiculous and uncalled-for
as a school-feast?’--‘But it is such a pleasure to the
children.’--‘Pleasure to them! In my days people were not always
thinking how children were to be amused. Children were able to amuse
themselves in my day. It is not only with the lower classes: all classes
are the same--the same utterly demoralising system of indulgence
everywhere. Why are not the children kept at home to learn to wash and
sew and do their duty?’--‘But the school-feast is only one day in the
year.’--‘One day in the year! Fiddlesticks! don’t tell me. I tell you
it’s utterly demoralising. Why, if the feast is only one day, it
unhinges them for ten days before and ten days after.
“‘Formerly, too, people knew how to live like gentlemen and ladies. When
they built houses, they built houses fit to live in, not things in which
the walls were too thin to allow of the windows having any shutters....
Why, now people do not even know how to keep a great house. Look at ----,
do you think she knows it, with her alternate weeks for receiving
visitors. _That_ is not what ought to be; that is not hospitality. A
great house ought to be open always. The master and mistress never ought
to feel it a burthen, and if it was properly managed, they never would.
There should always be a foundation of guests in the house, a few
relations or intimate friends, who would be quite at home there, and who
would be civil and go out to walk or drive, or do whatever might be
necessary to amuse the others. There ought to be no _gêne_ of any kind,
and there ought to be plenty of _equipages_--that should be quite
indispensable.’
“The conversation fell upon Rogers the poet. ‘Mr. Rogers came here
once,’ said Lady Wensleydale, ‘and I did not like him; I thought him so
ill-bred. He came with the Duchess of Bedford of that time, who was the
most good-natured woman in the world, and when he went out into the park
and came in quite late for luncheon, she said he must have some, and
went into the dining-room herself to see that he had it properly, and
while he was eating cold beef, mixed him herself a kind of salad of oil
and vinegar, which she brought to him. He waited a moment, then took up
a piece of the beef in his fingers, rolled it in the sauce, and, walking
round the table, popped it into the Duchess’s mouth. She went into the
drawing-room afterwards and complained to his friend Luttrell about it,
“What can I have done that Mr. Rogers should treat me so?” Luttrell
said, “I have known Rogers for sixty years, and have never yet been able
to account for any one of his vagaries.”
“‘Rogers and Luttrell were great friends, though they always quarrelled.
When they walked out together, they never walked side by side, but
always one behind the other.
“‘Rogers met Lord Dudley at one of the foreign watering-places, and
began in his vain way, “What a terrible thing it is how one’s fame
pursues one, and that one can never get away from one’s own identity!
Now I sat by a lady the other night, and she began, ‘I feel sure you
must be Mr. Rogers.’”--“And _were_ you?” said Lord Dudley, looking up
into his face quite innocently. It was the greatest snub the poet ever
had.
“‘Rogers hated Monckton Milnes. He was too much of a rival. If Milnes
began to talk, Rogers would look at him sourly, and say, “Oh, _you_ want
to hold forth, do you?” and then, turning to the rest of the party, “I
am looking for my hat; Mr. Milnes is going to entertain the company.”’
* * * * *
“_Holmhurst, Sept. 1._--I had rather dreaded the _tête-à-tête_ journey
with the Duchess to-day, and truly it was a long one, for we had an hour
to wait at Ampthill Station, and then missed the express at Bletchley.
When we first got into the carriage the Duchess said, ‘Well, now, I am
going to be quiet and rest my eyes,’ which I thought was a hint that I
was to take my book; but very soon she got bored and said, ‘I can’t see,
and am obliged to go on asking the names of the stations for want of
being amused;’ so then I was obliged to talk to her all the rest of the
way.
“At Ampthill she told me how she was going to London to meet Admiral
Inglefield, who was going to help her to ‘pick a child out of the
gutter.’ ‘That child,’ she said, ‘will some day be Earl Powlett. Lord
Powlett took a wager that he would run away with the lady-love of one of
his brother-officers, and he did run away with her; but she made it a
condition that he should marry her before a Registrar, which he believed
was illegal, but it was not, and they were really married. Her only
child, a boy, was brought up in the gutter. His name is Hinton, and he
is presentable,[216] which his wife is not, for she is a figurante at
the opera; but she gets more than the other danseuses, because she has
the courage to stand unsupported upon a tight-rope, which the others
have not. Powlett offered his son £400 if he would go away from England
and never come back again, but he refused, so then he would only give
him £100. He lives by acting at small theatres, but sometimes he does
not live, but starves. He had four children, but one is dead. It is the
eldest I mean to take away and place with a clergyman and his wife, that
he may learn something of being a gentleman. I shall undertake him for
three years, then I shall see what he is likely to be fit for. If I live
so long, I can settle it; if not, I must leave the means for it. Facts
are stranger than fiction.’
“At the stations, the Duchess was perfectly furious at the bonnets she
saw. ‘If any respectable persons had gone to sleep twenty years ago and
woke up now, they would think it was Bedlam let loose.’ She said how
Count Streletski, who had travelled everywhere, said there was no
country in which people were satisfied with nature: if tall, they wished
to make themselves short; if short, tall: if they were light, they
wished to be dark, and _vice versâ_. She talked of the peculiarities of
vanity in different people--how the first Lady Westmoreland made the
coiffeur wait and touch her up when she was _in_ the carriage.
“The Duchess parted from me at Euston Station, with a cordial invitation
to Osterley.”
* * * * *
“_Sept. 27._--I have had a constant succession of visitors at my little
Holmhurst.
“A singular subject of interest has been Mr. Freeman’s virulent letters
against and about me. He seems insane on the subject of creating
imaginary injuries.[217] Certainly it is a little annoying to be called
a thief in the public papers, though it may be useful for one’s morals.
However, ‘Experience is the best teacher, only the school fees are
heavy.’”
* * * * *
“_Conington Castle, Sept. 29._--I came here yesterday to old Mr.
Heathcote’s. It is a low-lying place in the Fens, close to what was once
Whitlesea Mere, but is now drained, only patches of reeds and marshy
ground remaining here and there. The house is near the site of an old
castle, but its only claim to be called a castle itself arises from its
having been partly built out of the ruins of Fotheringhay, from which a
row of arches remain. To ordinary eyes the country is frightful, but Mr.
Heathcote, as an artist, sees much beauty--which really does exist--in
the long unbroken lines where the mere once was, and the faint blue
shadows in the soft distances. And he has preserved very interesting
memorials of all that the district has been, within his memory, in an
immense series of sketches of the mere in summer, and in winter, when
covered with people skating; and of the mere life--its fisheries, wild
birds, and its curious draining mills, now all of the past.
“We have been to draw at Peterborough, a wonderfully foreign-looking
town, more so, I think, than any other in England. I saw Bishop Jeune’s
grave: it almost looks old now, and it really is many years since we
lost him; yet, on looking back, the time seems nothing, so quickly does
life pass, and living become out-living.”
* * * * *
“_Sept. 30._--We have been to Hinchinbroke. Lord and Lady Sandwich were
alone. She was the Lady Blanche Egerton[218] of my long ago Chillingham
days. Lord Sandwich took me all over the pictures. The best is that of
Lady Castlemaine, afterwards Duchess of Cleveland, very young and
lovely, with all her hair down. There is also a fine full-length of
Charles II., and a curious picture of Charles II. of Spain by Herrera.
By Gainsborough there is a beautiful portrait of Miss Martha Ray. Mr.
Hackman, who saw her with Lord Sandwich, fell in love with her, and took
orders in order to be able to marry her. Afterwards, when he saw her in
Covent Garden receiving the attentions of somebody else, he shot her in
a fit of jealousy, and suffered for it at Tyburn. In the ‘Ship Room’ is
an interesting picture by Vanderwelt of the naval action in which the
first Lord Sandwich died. His ship was fired by a fireship and blown up,
and he was drowned. Ten days afterwards his body was recovered, and the
garter and medal found upon it are preserved in a glass case near the
picture.
“The rooms at Hinchinbroke are very pleasant and livable, but the oldest
parts of the house are burnt and the oak staircase is painted. Near the
foot of it, the skeletons of two prioresses (for the house was once a
monastery) were found in their stone coffins, and were buried again in
the same place! Lord Sandwich showed us the MSS. of the great Lord
Sandwich--journals and letters in many volumes; also many letters of
George III., showing his great interest in very minute public matters.
He has also a splendid collection of Elzevirs.
“When Lady Sandwich was going to visit a school the next day, Miss Mary
Boyle heard the mistress say, ‘Now, girls, to-morrow my Lady is coming,
and so, recollect, pocket-handkerchiefs must be the order of the day:
there must be no _sniffling_.’”
* * * * *
“_Conington, Oct. 1._--This is one of the clockwork houses, with a
monotonous routine of life suited to the flat featureless country.
To-day, after church, the male part of the family set off to walk a
certain six miles, which they always walk after church, and, when we
reached a certain bridge, the female part said, ‘Here we turn back; this
is the place where we turn every Sunday through the year: we always go
as far as this, and we never go any farther.’”
* * * * *
“_Sarsden House, Chipping Norton, Oct. 4._--I came here on Monday. At
Paddington Station I met Lady Darnley and Lady Kathleen Bligh, and a
procession of carriages in waiting showed that a large party was
expected by the same train. It came dropping in round the five-o’clock
tea-table--Lord and Lady Denbigh; Lord and Lady Aberdare and a daughter;
Mr. and Mrs. J. A. Symonds; two young Plunketts; George, Lady Constance,
and Madeleine Shaw-Lefevre; Lord Morton.... I like Lord Denbigh very
much, and feel sure that no Roman Catholic plotter would induce him to
do what he did not believe to be right, or say what he did not believe
to be true.
“On Tuesday afternoon I drove to Heythorp with Lady Darnley, Lady
Denbigh, and Lady Aberdare. A long unfinished avenue leads up to the
very stately house, which has been well restored by Albert Brassey.
“In the evening Lord Denbigh told us:--
“‘Dr. Playfair, physician at Florence, went to the garden of a villa to
see some friends of his. Sitting on a seat in the garden, he saw two
ladies he knew; between them was a third lady dressed in grey, of very
peculiar appearance. Walking round the seat, Dr. Playfair found it very
difficult to see her features. In a farther part of the garden he met
another man he knew. He stayed behind the seat and asked his friend to
walk round and see if he could make out who the odd-looking lady was.
When he came back he said, “Of course I could not make her out, because
when I came in front of her, her face was turned towards you.” Dr.
Playfair then walked up to the ladies, and as he did so, the central
figure disappeared. The others expressed surprise that Dr. Playfair,
having seen them, had not joined them sooner. He asked who the lady was
who had been sitting between them. They assured him that there had
never been any such person.
“‘The next morning, Dr. Playfair went early to see the old gardener of
the villa, and asked him if there was any tradition about the place. He
said, “Yes, there is a story of a lady dressed in grey, who appears once
in every twenty-five years, and the singular part is that she has no
face.” Dr. Playfair asked when she had appeared last. “Well, I remember
perfectly; it was twenty-five years ago, and the time is about coming
round for her to appear again.”’
“Lord Aberdare said that when Edward Lear was drawing in Albania, he was
in perfect despair over the troops of little ruffians who mobbed him and
would not go away. Suddenly his india-rubber tumbled down and bobbed
down some steps--bob-bob-bob. The boys all ran away as hard as they
could, screaming, ‘Thaitan! Thaitan!’ and never came back again.
“A delightful old Mrs. Stewart has arrived from Scotland. I sat by her
at dinner. She talked much of Mrs. Grote. She described an interview
Mrs. Grote had with Madame George Sand. She said to Madame Sand that it
was a pity she did not employ her great powers for the leavening and
mellowing of mankind, as Miss Austen had done. ‘Madame,’ said Madame
Sand, ‘je ne suis pas philosophe, je ne suis pas moraliste, et je suis
romancière.’”
* * * * *
“_Oct. 4._--While Madeleine has been drawing my portrait, Mrs. Stewart
has talked delightfully, contradicting the theory of De Tocqueville that
‘the charming art of conversation--to touch and set in motion a
thousand thoughts without dwelling tiresomely on any one--is amongst the
lost arts, and can only be sought for in History Hut.’[219] She
described her visit to Ober Ammergau. Her anxiety to go was intense, but
all the means seemed to fail. The Princess Mary of Hanover and the Grand
Duchess Elizabeth (to whom she had intended to annex herself) _walked_.
But, to be in waiting upon them, went Baron Klenck, her Hanoverian
son-in-law, and he came back greatly impressed, and said to his wife
when he came in, ‘If thy mother still wishes to go, in God’s name let
her set forth;’ and she went. She described the life at the village--the
simplicity, the cheapness; then, in the play, the awful agony of the
twenty minutes of the Crucifixion, the sublimity of the Ascension. ‘I
have seen hundreds of “ascensions” on the stage and elsewhere, but I
have never seen anything like that simple _re-presentation_.’
“At luncheon Mrs. Stewart described a sitting with Mrs. Guppy the
spiritualist. Count Bathyany, her daughter, and others were present.
They were asked what sort of manifestation they would have. They
declared they would be satisfied with nothing less than a ghost. There
was a round hole in the table with a lid upon it. Presently the lid
began to quiver, gradually it was thrown on one side, and a hand came up
violently agitating itself. ‘Mrs. Guppy said, “Dear spirit” (we are
always very affectionate you know), “would you like the glass?” and a
great tall fern-glass was put over the place: otherwise, I should have
touched that hand. Then, inside the glass (but we could not touch it,
you know) came up something wrapped in muslin: Mrs. Guppy said it was a
head. Afterwards we were asked to go down to supper: there was quite a
handsome collation. A young American who was with us was so disgusted
with what he had seen that he would touch nothing--would take neither
bread nor salt in that house. I was weak: I did not quite like to
refuse, and I ate a few strawberries. Of course, as far as the moral
protest went, I might as well have eaten a whole plateful. Bathyany made
a very good supper. He took a rose away with him for his Countess, for
at the end of our séance quantities of flowers appeared, we knew not
whence, quite fresh, dewy, beautiful flowers: they appeared on the table
close to Count Bathyany.
“‘The spirits are very indulgent. They think we are in better humour if
our spirits are kept up. After I have been sitting there for some time
they generally say, “Harriet is exhausted; let her have a glass of
wine.” Then sometimes they give us nicknames--beautiful nicknames; my
daughter they called “Mutability,” and me they named “Distrust.”’
“We have been a long drive to a charming old house, Chastleton,
belonging to Miss Whitmore Jones, who lives there alone, ‘le dernier
rejeton de sa famille.’ It is in a hollow with fine old trees around it,
manor-house, church, arched gateway, and dovecot on arches grouped close
together, all of a delicate pink-yellow-grey. Inside is a banqueting
hall with very fine old panelling and curious furniture, and upstairs a
long gallery and nobly panelled drawing-room.”
* * * * *
“_Sarsden, Oct. 5._--Last night Mrs. Stewart talked much of Hanover and
her life there. Her daughter was lady-in-waiting to the Queen. She
described how all the royal family might have their property back at
once, but the King would make no concession--‘God has given me my crown;
I will only give it back to Him.’
“Mrs. Stewart was with the Queen and Princess for five months at
Herrenhausen after the King left for Langensalza, when ‘like a knight,
he desired to be placed in the front of his army, where all his soldiers
could see him, and where he was not satisfied till he felt the bullets
all whizzing around him.’ The people in Hanover said he had run away.
When the Queen heard that, she and Princess Marie went down to the place
and walked about there, and, when the people pressed round her, said,
‘The King is gone with his army to fight for his people; but I am here
to stay with you--to stay with you till he comes back.’ But alas! she
did not know!