"_Sept. 24, 1855._--We have had a visit from Miss Rosam, the last
of the old Sussex family who once lived at Lime. She said when she
was here as a little child the old convent was still standing. She
remembered the deep massive Saxon (?) archway at the entrance and
the large dark hall into which it led.
"'Were there any stories about the place?' I asked.
"'Nothing but about the fish; of course you know that?'
"'No, I don't; do tell me.'
"'Well, I don't say that it's true, but certainly it is very
generally believed that the whole of the great fish-ponds were once
entirely filled with gold and silver fish, and the night my
grandfather died all the fish died too. And then perhaps you do not
know about the horse. My grandfather had a very beautiful horse,
which he was very fond of, and though it was so old and infirm that
it could scarcely drag its legs along, he would not have it made an
end of, and it still remained in the field. But the night my
grandfather died, a man saw the horse suddenly spring up and race
at full gallop over the field, and at the moment my grandfather
died the horse fell down and died too.'
"Just now we have a full moon, and the reflections in the pond are
so clear that you can see the fish dance in the moonbeams. The
mother says, 'It is difficult to realise that this same moon, ever
serene and peaceful, is looking down upon all the troubles and
quarrels of the earth.'"
"_Sept. 29._--We came in the morning to Eastbourne, which is much
altered and enlarged, only a few of the old familiar features left
as landmarks--Sergeant Bruce's house, No. 13--O _how_ I suffered
there!--Miss Holland's, outside which I used to wait in my agonies
of grief and rage--the beach where as a little child I played at
building houses."
"_Oct. 4._--In spite of threatening clouds, we drove to Wilmington,
whence I walked with Mr. Cooper to Alfriston, a most wild
out-of-the-way place, just suited for the beautiful 'effects' of
Copley Fielding. The cruciform church, with its battered shingled
spire, stands on a little hill, and, with a few wind-stricken
trees around it, is backed by a hazy distance of downs, where the
softest grey melts into the green. When we were there, all the
clouds were tossed into wild forms, with only a gleam of frightened
sunshine struggling through here and there."
[Illustration: ALFRISTON.]
"_Oct. 7._--I fear I rather distressed mother to-day by reverting
to the Rectory miseries, the recollection of which was aroused by
finding an old journal. I will never do it again. My darling mother
has been given back to me from the brink of the grave to love and
to cherish, and, whatever it costs me, can I ever say anything to
cause her even one flush of pain? My will is strong, I know, and it
shall be exercised in always ignoring my own troubles and
prejudices, and never forgetting to anticipate each thought, each
wish of hers. Henceforward I am determined to have no separate
identity, and to be only her reflection."
"_Oct. 25._--Went to see old Mrs. Pinnock. She was lying on her
rag-bed in her wretched garret, sadly changed now from the old
woman who, two years ago, would go in the spring-time to Lime Wood
that she might see the bluebells and listen to the nightingales.
Now her old husband sate by, pointing at her worn, dying form, and
exclaiming,'Poor cratur! poor cratur!' She fumbled her poor
shrunken hands over the bedclothes and murmured, 'God bless you,
sir; may God bless you.' They are probably the last words I shall
ever hear from her, and she has always been an object of interest.
As I read 'Shadows' this last evening to the mother, I could not
help feeling how like some of them my own home reminiscences must
some day become, so sad and so softened. But it is no use to think
about the future, for which only God can arrange. 'Good-night,
darling, comfort and blessing of my life,' mother said to me
to-night. 'I will try not to be too anxious. May you be preserved,
and may I have faith. Good-night, my own Birdie.'"
_To_ MY MOTHER.
"_Chartwell_ (Mr. Colquhoun's), _Oct. 18, 1855._--This is a
beautiful neighbourhood.... How every hour of the day have I
thought of my sweetest mother, and longed to know what she was
doing. We have been so much together this vacation, and so
uncloudedly happy, that it is unnatural to be separate; but my
darling mother and I are never away from one another in heart,
though we so often are in body. And what a blessing it is for me to
have left my mother so well, and to feel that she can still take so
much interest and be so happy in the old home, and that I may go on
cheerily with my Oxford work."
"_Harrow, Oct. 11, 1855._--No one is here (with the Vaughans)
except Mr. Munro, whom I find to be the author of 'Basil the
Schoolboy,' which he declares to be a true picture of Harrow life
in his time. A Mr. Gordon has called, who gave a most curious
account of his adventures after having been at school here three
days, and how his companions, having stoned their master's lapdog
to death, forced him to eat it uncooked!"[107]
"_Portishead, Nov. 10._--How often I have thought of my mother when
sitting here in the little bow-window, surrounded by the quaint
pictures and china, and the old furniture. Miss Boyle[108] is in
her great chair, her white hair brushed back over her forehead. The
Channel is a dull lead-colour, and the Welsh mountains are half
shrouded in clouds, but every now and then comes out one of those
long gleams and lines of light which are so characteristic of this
place. The day I arrived, a worn-out clockmaker and a retired
architect came to spend the evening and read Shakspeare, and Miss
Boyle made herself quite as charming to them as she has doubtless
been all summer to the archduchesses and princesses with whom she
has been staying in Germany. The next day we went to Clevedon, and
saw the old cruciform church above the sea, celebrated in 'In
Memoriam,' where Arthur Hallam and his brothers and sisters are
buried. From the knoll above was a lovely view of the
church--immediately below was a precipice with the white breakers
at the bottom, which beyond the church ripple up into two little
sandy bays: in the distance, the Welsh mountains, instead of blue,
were the most delicate green. We returned by Clapton, where, beside
an ancient manor-house, is a little church upon a hill, with a
group of old yew-trees."
"_Oxford, Nov. 15._--On Monday, Miss Boyle came in my fly to
Bristol, her mission being to break a man she had met with of
drunkenness, having made a promise to his wife that she would save
him. She said that she had shut herself up for hours in prayer
about it, and that, though she did not know in the least how it was
to be done, she was on her way to Bristol to _do_ it. One day, as
we were walking, we met a woman who knew that she had seen her in a
drunken state. 'You will never speak to me again, ma'am,' said the
woman; 'I can never dare see you again.'--'God forbid,' answered
Miss Boyle. 'I've been as great a sinner myself in my time, and I
can never forsake you because you've done wrong: it is more reason
why I should try to lead you to do right.' I had an interesting
day at Bath with dear old Mr. Landor, who sent his best
remembrances to you--'the best and kindest creature he ever knew.'"
"_Oxford, Nov. 21._--I have been dining at New College and drinking
out of a silver cup inscribed--'Ex dono Socii Augustus Hare.'
"Yesterday I went to luncheon at Iffley with Miss Sydney Warburton,
authoress of 'Letters to my Unknown Friends,' and sister of the
Rector--a most remarkable and interesting person. She had been
speaking of the study of life, when the door opened and a young
lady entered. Miss Warburton had just time to whisper 'Watch
her--_she_ is a study indeed.' It was Mrs. Eliot Warburton,
uninteresting in her first aspect, but marvellously original and
powerful in all she said."
"_Nov. 26._--I have been a long drive to Boarstall Tower, which is
like an old Border castle, with a moat and bridge. It was defended
during the Civil Wars by a Royalist lady, who, when starved out
after some months' siege, made her escape by a subterranean
passage, carrying off everything with her. Afterwards it was always
in the hands of the Aubreys, till, in the last century, Sir Edward
Aubrey accidentally poisoned his only and idolised son there. The
old nurse imagined that no one knew what had happened but herself,
and she spent her whole life in trying to prevent Sir Edward from
finding out what he had done, and succeeded so well, that it was
years before he discovered it. At last, at a contested election, a
man in the opposition called out, 'Who murdered his own son?' which
led to inquiries, and when Sir Edward found out the truth, he died
of the shock.
"Mrs. Eliot Warburton and her sister-in-law have just been to
luncheon with me in college, and I am as much charmed with them as
before."
"_Dec. 3._--I have been to spend Sunday at Iffley with the
Warburtons."
I have inserted these notices of my first acquaintance with the
Warburtons, because for some years after this they bore so large a share
in all my interests and thoughts. Mrs. Eliot Warburton at that time
chiefly lived at Oxford or Iffley with her two little boys. Her brother,
Dr. Cradock, was Principal of Brazenose, and had married Miss Lister,
the maid of honour, with whom I became very intimate, scarcely passing a
day without going to Dr. Cradock's house. Miss Warburton died not long
afterwards, but Mrs. Eliot Warburton became one of my dearest friends,
and not mine only, but that of my college circle; for she lived with us
in singular, probably unique intimacy, as if she had been an
undergraduate herself. Scarcely a morning passed without her coming to
our rooms, scarcely an afternoon without our walking with her or going
with her on the river. It was a friendship of the very best kind, with a
constant interchange of the best and highest thoughts, and her one
object was to stimulate us onwards to the noblest aims and ambitions,
though I believe she overrated us, and was mistaken in her great desire
that her two boys should grow up like Sheffield and me. We gave her a
little dog, which she called "Sheffie" after him. We often went to a
distant wood together, where we spent whole hours amongst the primroses
and bluebells or wandered amongst "the warm green muffled Cumnor hills,"
as Matthew Arnold calls them; in the evenings we frequently acted
charades in Mrs. Cradock's house. Our intimacy was never broken while I
stayed at Oxford. But I never saw my dear friend afterwards. In 1857 I
heard with a shock of what it is strange that I had never for an instant
anticipated--her engagement to make a second marriage. She wrote to tell
me of it herself, but I never heard from her again. She had other
children, girls, and a few years afterwards she died. Her death was the
first great sorrow I had ever felt from death out of my own family. Her
memory will always be a possession to me. I often saw her husband
afterwards in London, but as I had never seen him with her, it is
difficult for me to associate him with her in my mind.