1825-1827
_Miss Eden to Miss Villiers._
_Eyam_,
_Saturday_ [1825].
MY DEAR MISS VILLIERS, What a shame it is that I should have been so
long writing to you, particularly after Mrs. Villiers had made the
discovery that my letters amused her. My sister Louisa [Colvile] and
four of her children passed a fortnight here at the end of last month,
and our whole time was spent in “exploring in the barouche landau,” as
Mrs. Elton observes.
By the time I have had nine or ten more of my sisters here, and thirty
or forty of their children, I shall be tired of my own enthusiasm in the
great picturesque cause; but at present all other employments are
sacrificed to it. However, it may amuse you.
I shall continue to think a visit to Chatsworth a very great trouble.
You are probably right in thinking the Duke[194] takes pleasure in
making people do what they don’t like, and that accounts for his asking
me so often. We have now made a rule to accept one invitation out of
two. We go there with the best dispositions, wishing to be amused,
liking the people we meet there, loyal and well affected to the King of
the Peak himself, supported by the knowledge that in the eyes of the
neighbourhood we are covering ourselves with glory by frequenting the
_great house_; but with all these helps we have never been able to stay
above two days there without finding change of air absolutely
necessary,--never could turn the corner of the third day,--at the end of
the second the great depths of _bore_ were broken up and carried all
before them: we were obliged to pretend that some christening, or a
grand funeral, or some pressing case of wedding (in this country it is
sometimes expedient to hurry the performance of the marriage ceremony)
required Robert’s immediate return home, and so we departed yawning. It
is odd it should be so dull. The G. Lambs are both pleasant, and so is
Mr. Foster and Mrs. Cavendish and a great many of the habitués of
Chatsworth; and though I have not yet attained the real Derbyshire
feeling which would bring tears of admiration into my eyes whenever the
Duke observed that it was a fine day, yet I think him pleasant, and like
him very much, and can make him hear without any difficulty, and he is
very hospitable and wishes us to bring all our friends and relations
there, if that would do us any good. But we happen to be _pleasanter_ at
home. However private vices may contribute to public benefit, I do not
see how private bore can contribute to public happiness, do you?
Pray give my love to your mother, and believe me, your affectionate
E. E.
_Miss Eden to her Sister, Lady Buckinghamshire._
LANGLEY,
_July 15, 1825_.
MY DEAREST SISTER, Do you recollect my asking you whether you would give
us a dinner in the course of the year? Well, at one of our pleasant
dinners the other day we were all so mortal agreeable that we settled
we should go to Astley’s on the 18th. The party consisted of Maria
Copley, Lord Henry Thynne,[195] Colonel Arden,[196] Mr. Wall,[197] Henry
Eden,[198] and our three selves. To that it was necessary to add for
decency’s sake Sir Joseph and Coppy.[199] It occurred to me this
afternoon whilst murmuring over the heat, which is extremely unpleasant,
that Astley’s would be the death of us all, and that if the weather
continued in its present state, it would be better to change it for a
water party.
It would be very pleasant if your carriage and two or three of those
nice little poney-carriages you keep on the heather were to meet us at
the water-side to bring us to your nice little place, and you receive us
in your nice little way, and give us a nice little collation at about 6
o’clock, and let us walk about the place and then leave you, and talk
you well over in the boat, as we go back again.
In the first place, these are all the people whom you have read about
over and over again, and whom you are dying to see. Then, though they
are ten now, yet by the end of the week they will not be above seven or
eight.
Sir Joseph hates the water, so as I mean to make a vacancy for the
present list I will ask your own Mr. G. Villiers to come with us, and he
will be _such_ a support to you. Well, what do you think?
My own interest in the question is this: that I am going to establish a
coolness between myself and Lord Henry, who is exposing me to the
remarks of the invidious public without any earthly purpose; and I had
all the advantage at Burlington House on Thursday of being supposed to
be honoured by a proposal from him in the face of many curious
spectators, when he was imparting to me his intentions of admiring
another person more than me. I do not know whether it was fun or spite,
or a tryal of my feelings, or whether he is serious; but as I found that
I did not care which it was, I do not mean to favour the world with the
sight of any more such long conversations. It amuses them more than it
does me, and henceforth I mean not to let him go _tagging_ after me as
he has done lately. The Astley party was made before this wise
resolution, and I want to change it to a water-party, which will cut him
out without offending him, as he never goes on fresh water, and we will
ask Mr. Villiers in his place.
Don’t let yourself be frightened, you will find us so pleasant.
Good-night. I can’t help laughing when I see myself introducing the
Colonel to you. Your most affectionate
E. E.
_Miss Eden to Miss Villiers._
SPROTBRO’,
_Sunday, 1825_.
You must have got hold of some other family in the same street. It is
not _my_ story you are telling me. I am Emily Eden, of No. 30 [Grosvenor
Street], who has been marrying a brother[200] in Derbyshire; then has
been to Kent to visit a married sister; then found another sister
setting off into Yorkshire, and took advantage of an offered place in
her carriage and was deposited yesterday at Sprotbro’. I am really
delighted that Mrs. Villiers is getting better. Is not Doctor Pidcock
the man who cured Mr. H. Greville and whom Mrs. Villiers abused with
unusual injustice, first because he was a doctor and no doctor could be
of any use to anybody, and next because he was a quack and therefore no
doctor. He is taking such a generous revenge! heaping such large coals
of fire on her head! I hope he will go on, dear man!--skuttle-full after
skuttle-full of fiery coals till she is quite well.
I saw your brother riding up the deep solitudes of Parliament Street the
day I drove through London. It was an awful sight. The street so quiet
you might have heard a pin drop.
Sister and I left Eastcombe last Monday and went to Gog Magog. I invited
myself of course, but Charlotte[201] bore it very well. I was there
fifteen years ago in the capacity of a child: I therefore did not see
much of her, or know anything of her, and except that, have not seen her
but for two or three morning visits per annum; so it was a voyage of
discovery, in the style of a North Pole expedition. The Frost
intense--and a good deal of _hummocky_ ice to sail through. However, I
really liked it much better than I expected. Lord Francis is
particularly pleasant in his own house, and young Charlotte[202] very
civil and good-natured. I found _nine_ letters yesterday here and have
had two more to-day, all requiring answers. I mean to put my death in
the papers. It would be cheaper than if I really were to die from the
over-exertion of writing eleven letters.
Robert’s new relations write to me, which is kind, but hard, as I must
answer them. Lord Bexley[203] has given Robert the living of
Hertingfordbury.[204] I have written so much about it lately, that I
have at last forgotten how to spell it, and I am, beside, related to it,
and am in the habit of familiarly terming it Hert.
Robert leaves this place next week. At first we thought he was going to
be immensely rich, but dear Lord Bexley in a fit of conscientiousness
divided from Hertingfordbury the living of St. Andrews, which has been
given with it for the last 150 years. He thinks it will be a good
example to his successors if he divides them in a case where he has a
nearer interest, as in a brother-in-law. I can’t guess what his
successor may think, and never shall know probably, as I never look to
be Chancellor of the Duchy; but I can tell him that I think his
relations think it extremely unpleasant, and it makes the benefit rather
a doubtful one.
However, it is very good of him, only it is a pity where the principle
is so good the result is not more agreeable. And he is so complacent and
pleased with his decision! I have found out he is just what a
sea-Captain said of one of Wesley’s preachers: “a heavenly-minded little
Devil.” Your ever affectionate
E. E.
_Monday._--I was prevented by a very long ride on Saturday from sending
this. I am so grieved to see poor Captain Russell’s[205] death in the
paper. It is not formally announced, but I see it in the Ship news
mentioned by the captain of some other ship. Perhaps it may not be true,
but yet I fear it is. I saw Eliza[206] the other day in her way from
Scotland, as I believe I told you, and she talked with such pleasure of
her brother George’s promotion. I had a letter from her a fortnight ago
delighted that he had escaped the fever which his ship’s company had all
had. Poor thing! I am so sorry for her. She was so fond of him, and the
unexpected loss of a dearly loved brother is a grief that must, like all
others, be endured, but one that, God knows, time itself cannot heal,
and hardly mitigate. I wonder where Eliza is now--whether they are gone
to Paris. If you hear anything of her or of Captain Russell’s death will
you let me know? I suppose everybody feels most for the calamity under
which they themselves have suffered, and from my very heart I pity
Eliza, and it was impossible not to like Captain Russell for his own
sake.
Good-bye, dear Theresa. Your ever affectionate
E. E.
_Miss Eden to Miss Villiers._
HERTINGFORDBURY,
[_December_] 1825.
I say Theresa, I shall be in Grosvenor Street on Tuesday from twelve to
four. Please, if you are in the land of the living, commonly called
Knightsbridge, to come and see me and we will talk a few.
We (thereby meaning Robert, his wife, and me) arrived here from
Derbyshire last night, and are quite delighted with this place. It is a
real country place, not like a parsonage, with a little park something
in the Irish class of parks, but with fine trees in it and a pretty
garden, and everything very nice.
We are just come back from our first church here. There are a great many
_nervous_ points in a clergyman’s life, and I think the first interview
with his parishioners rather awful. I remember the time when I used to
think a clergyman’s life the most pitiable thing in the world. I am
wiser now, and can see the numerous advantages a man has whose duties
and pleasures must necessarily be one and the same thing.
Robert preached to-day a sermon I wrote, and to my horror I detected a
disguised quotation from Shakespeare in an imposing part of it, which
was not obvious till it was read aloud. However, it was probably not
very apparent to anybody but myself. I was rather in hopes of seeing you
in a corner of the Cowper pew, but it was quite empty. Well, I can’t
stay chattering here all day. Your ever affectionate
E. EDEN.
_Miss Eden to her Sister, Fanny Eden._
LANGLEY FARM, BECKENHAM, KENT,
_November 11, 1825_.
MY DEAREST FANNY, Begin writing to me again forthwith. I have heard from
the Copleys with fresh plans for my going there, so that I should not
have been in want of a house.
Mary says Mr. H. Greville[207] is so cross she does not know what to do
with him. What if it is love for Isabella Forester.[208] She is sorry he
is so foolish, and if it is bile--she is sorry he does not take more
pills.
Why, Foolish the 5th, don’t you remember my white muslin gown with tucks
and blue stars between them, and the body done with blue braiding, and I
wore it the Chatham day, and it smelt of the tobacco old gentlemen were
pleased to smoke in our faces, so I would not let it be washed for their
dirty sakes till Wright showed it me by daylight and told me I was
probably not aware I had worn it 30 times. And to be sure it was not the
cleaner for it. Still, it grieved me to have it washed. I shall go and
see our Caroline [Vansittart] in town and shall come down with all my
hair stroked up the wrong way by her remarks. Your most affectionate
E. E.
[The year 1826 brought many troubles and great unhappiness to Lady
Campbell. Her sister Lucy, who had always been an anxiety to her,
had married Captain George Lyon, R.N., in 1825. Lucy evidently had
her full share of FitzGerald beauty and charm, large dark eyes and
beautiful chestnut auburn hair.
In January she arrived at Calne, where the Campbells were now
living, in a great state of misery, having just parted with her
husband, who had gone to take up an appointment in Mexico. The
couple had sailed together, but for eleven days the ship tossed
about in a storm and finally was obliged to put back. Mrs. Lyon was
ill, and she decided to remain in England; her husband left her at
home, hoping to rejoin her in a year and a half.
In February Lady Campbell’s cousin, Arthur de Roos, died at Boyle
Farm, and in the following autumn her two elder children were
dangerously ill with scarlet fever. Her friend, Miss Wellesley, and
four of the servants also caught this illness, and her sister Lucy
died of it at Thames Ditton when her child was born.
“I have had eight persons ill of the fever. As soon as they come
into the house to help _do_ for us,--they fall sick.”]
_Lady Campbell to Miss Eden._
[CALNE,]
_January 13, 1826_.
MY DEAREST EMILY, I never was so provoked in my life at anything, and I
cursed the aristocracy of the country, and I was told of it[209] as
coolly as if it was a distress in Ireland. Seriously, what provoked me
was her never telling me till after it was all given up, and put an end
to, for thank Heaven I have a small house, and therefore can always make
room, and I could perfectly have put up Fanny, and you, and your maid.
I had the gratification of seeing the whole party swamped in Crambo, and
water-logged in Charades, and a large party writhing in the agonies of
English Xmas conviviality, without any young ladies, without any music
to break the awful solemnity of the evening, and no Lord Auckland to
make them gamesome.
Lord Dudley was their wit, and as there was nobody to play with him, I
saw he tried to domesticate himself, as he could make nothing of his
jokes, or, what was worse, saw them torn to pieces before his eyes by
the avidity with which the hungry society seized on them, to support
themselves thro’ the day. But who could even domesticate in that
drawing-room?
Sir Guy nearly died of Crambo, and was very near taking a Dictionary
with him the next time. But as he is not at all of the go-along tribe he
kicked, and would not cramb.
The event of the next time was Charades, and our enthusiasm knew no
bounds when Lord Dudley joined the crew, and appeared with his coat
turned inside out, and enacted a chimney-sweeper, and rattled a stick
upon a bit of wood. Our rapture was indescribable, and it reminded me of
the feelings of those who in ancient times beheld great men doing little
things! Anecdotes which Historians always dwell on with that delight
which human beings naturally feel on seeing a dry patch in a bog, or a
green patch in a waste--the man who ploughed in Rome after heading the
Yeomanry or Militia of the Republic; the man who picked up shells near
the same place; that other who had the horticultural turn for sowing
Lettuces--all these men were nothing in effect to Lord Dudley playing at
sweep. I felt it deeply.
It was that day too he said when they offered him toasted cheese, “Ah!
yes; to-day is Toasted-cheese day, and yesterday was Herring day!!”
How we all laughed!!!
How goodly is it to earn fair Fame! Once get your charter for a Wit, and
you may sit down with all the comfort of being a fool for the rest of
your life. One joke a year--not so much--even one _bad_ joke now and
then, is a better tenure than all those forms of carrying a Hawk, or the
King’s Pepper-box, at the Coronation, for an estate.
We had a ball at Bowood the night before Twelfth Night. It went off
very well indeed. I had the pleasure of cramming my small Pam[210] into
a pink body and seeing it dance, and seeing everybody make a fuss with
it because it was by many degrees the smallest thing in the room....
No; there never, never, never, was anything so cross as your not coming
to Bowood this year, because I had looked to it just as you did, and had
even distressed myself about how I should manage to see enough of you,
and whether Lady Lansdowne would facilitate our intercourse, and I meant
to show you all my new editions of children, and even make you
superintend the new one, for certainly the one you picked up in Cadogan
Place is the prettiest of the whole set. I cannot tell you how kind Lady
Lansdowne is to me, and she need be so after putting you off; but she
does really load me with kindnesses. However, we are not to stay in this
house. It smokes and is too dear for us, so alas! I am again hunting a
domicile. We get poorer and poorer, but as Guy bears it better and
better, I don’t mind.
I am glad you see William.[211] He is so dear a creature! His Family
cannot forgive him for having picked out a little happiness for himself
his own way.... Your affectionate
PAMELA C.
_Miss Eden to Miss Villiers._
_March 30_ [1826].
MY DEAR THERESA, Robert and his wife are coming for a week to Grosvenor
Street, and I must be there to order their dinner and sweep their room,
so I shall go there on Saturday and stay in town ten days. I shall be
very glad to see you again. Pray come as soon as you can--Saturday
afternoon if possible. I want you to come in the light of something
good, to take the taste of going back to London out of my mouth. It is
an ugly place, is it not? Probably I shall forget my troubles to-morrow
if I do not _fix_ them by mentioning them to you to-day. I always find
that when I have withstood a strong temptation to mention to my friend
the worry of the moment, it ceases to be a worry much sooner than the
grief which has gone through the process of discussion. But the struggle
is unpleasant.
I liked Malachi particularly.[212] I have not seen the answers, but hear
they are very amusing, which is a pity. I have long vowed never to be
amused by anything Mr. Croker should say or do, be it ever so
entertaining, and “shall I lay perjury on my precious soul?” as Shylock
says, for a mere pamphlet?
I have been trying to read _The Last of the Mohicans_ and have come to a
full stop at the end of the first volume. I am sure you will not like
it. Those vulgar Mohicans only wear one long scalp-lock of hair--they
don’t _crêper_! Nasty savages! And so far from wearing full sleeves, it
is painfully obvious that they wear no sleeves at all, and not much else
in matter of cloathes.
Have you been uneasy about Sarah? Sister would have been if she could,
but it came out unfortunately by the admission of those who saw her,
that she had not been quite so ill as angry, and Sister weakly goes
backwards and forwards to London on the chance of being admitted, and
then hears Sarah is gone out airing. They say it is a fine sight to see
the preparations for her airing. She “plays such fantastic tricks before
high heaven” and the clerks of the Treasury; but whether she has
succeeded in making any “angel weep” but dear Robin,[213] I do not
know. However, it is wrong to laugh, because I believe nervous
complaints are great suffering, and at all events poor Mr. R. was
frightened.
Good-bye, my love to your mother. Your most affectionate
E. E.
_Miss Eden to Miss Villiers._
TUNBRIDGE WELLS, _Sunday, August 6_ [1826].
DEAREST THERESA, I had such a desire to write to you yesterday because
it was not post day and I had no frank, and to-day it goes all against
the grain, because I have plenty of time and George is come back to give
me a frank and my letter can go. But you always make me write first;
why, I never make out. Have you any good reason for it?
Our Tunbridge speculation is answering so well to us. I always knew I
should like it, but George’s content, indeed actual enjoyment of the
place and way of life, surprises me. We have such a clean house, just
finished, and we are its first inhabitants, so we run no hazard of being
devoured by a flea hacknied in the arts of devouring and tormenting. I
was just going to bother myself by inventing a description of our way of
life, when George showed me his answer to a vain-glorious description of
the joys of Worthing, which Mr. Wall, who is living there, has just
sent, meaning to put us out of conceit with Tunbridge by the vulgar
notion of the Agar-Ellis’[214] man-cook and carriage and four, and so I
shall copy part of George’s answer.
It opens with a moral: “We are better off and happier than is properly
compatible with a life of innocence and vegetation. Our house is
delightfully clean and comfortable. The living very good. Fish caught
at eight in the morning at Hastings is devoured here at three. The eggs,
cream, and butter, are brought to us in an hourly succession of
freshness. All the material of the kitchen excellent, and the appetite
too pure to think that it is a female that cooks it. Then a few glasses
of hock and some coffee, and an hour’s repose, and we meet at Lady C.
Greville’s,[215] Alvanley[216] and his sisters, and the F.
Levesons.[217] We assort ourselves upon horses, into barouches, etc.,
and start for some of our inexhaustible lions; and we end our evening
together with the feast of nonsense and the flow of tea.” He ends his
letter with a promise to be at Norman Court the 1st of September, and
adds, “My guns are at home and the locks click sweetly. Water the
turnips when it does not rain.”
How much more foolish men are than women, particularly about their
amusements. We none of us write to each other about our white sattin
gowns that are hanging sweetly up at home.
George does not mention what is I think the most curious part of our
life--that I am actually dressed and down at the Wells every morning
before half-past eight, and he generally arrives only five minutes
later. We dine at three and go to bed at eleven, and are in a ravenous
state of hunger at all hours; and the consequence is that I can already
walk three or four miles without being tired.
The Duchess of Kent arrived two days ago, and we live in a transport of
loyalty. We insisted on illuminating for her and dragging her into the
town, which naturally alarmed her, so she put off coming, meaning to
step in unobserved. But that our loyalty could not suffer; and I never
stepped out without 50 yards of rope in one pocket, and a Roman candle
in the other, for fear of accidents. However, I believe she was allowed
to drive up to her own door, but there were some fine illuminations
afterwards.
Lord Alvanley is an amusing incident at this sort of place, and it is a
pity he is not more likeable, because there is certainly nobody more
amusing. He goes away Tuesday, but he liked it so much he means to come
back again. We all parted yesterday evening, quite worn out with
laughing, and yet I cannot recollect what he said. But it was very
delightful. Except these tea-drinkings we could not be quieter or more
independent in a country home of our own. Nobody visits of a morning,
and in the evenings they are all in their coloured morning dresses.
You will be happy to hear that our three-shilling coarse straw bonnets
are only a shade too good for the style of dress here.
I wish you were here. The man who built this house might have guessed we
should like to have you. The upholsterer knew it, for there are more
beds than enough, two in each room, but there are only three good
bedrooms, and neither Fanny nor I could sleep except in a room by
ourselves. But you must let me know your plans, because George will be
obliged to go away in a fortnight more, and unless any of my sisters
mean to take his place, which I do not suppose they will do, I think you
might give us a visit. It is the sort of life you would like. I have not
done so much drawing for years as during the last week. I have copied
those six Prints on six cards for that tiresome Hertford fair, and they
looked so pretty in that small shape I was quite sorry to send them to
Robert.
What nice weather you have for your Gravesend expedition. Is the great
review of Tide-waiters[218] taking place to-day? I have not the least
idea what they are, what are the origin, manners, and customs of the
nation of Tide-waiters? If they are people who wait till the tide serves
they will flourish for ever. The poor dear tide never serves anybody,
and if they gain their bread by tide-waiting, what floods of tears they
must shed at Othello’s description of the Pontic Sea, which knows no
retiring ebb....
I am decidedly in what Swift calls “a high vein of silliness” this
afternoon; but it is the fault of the weather and of being in the
country, which, after all, is the only thing that makes actual
happiness. Your affectionate
E. E.
_Miss Eden to Miss Villiers._
THE GRANGE,[219]
_Sunday_, 1826.
MY DEAREST THERESA, I should have written sooner to tell you where to
write to me, but I was rather in hopes George would let me stay another
month at Tunbridge. Everybody was going away, so we might have had a
very small house for half the price we gave for ours, and as the
servants will eat whether they are there or in Grosvenor Street, I
thought we might have lived more economically than in posting all over
England. However, after much correspondence, George, who terrifies me by
the way in which he spends his own money, settled that the expenses were
nearly equal, and that being the case that he would rather have us with
him. “I never met with such an instance of politeness all my life,” as
the immortal Collins observes,--not the Professor Collins, but the far
greater “Pride and Prejudice” Collins. And so we packed up and came
here, and I expect George and Mr. Wall to arrive every minute.
In shooting season they only travel on Sundays, I observe. We lived at
Tunbridge almost entirely with the F. Levesons. I had a great idea that
I should dislike her, which was a mistake, and if I were given to
_engouements_, I should suppose I were suffering under one now for her,
only it came very gradually, which is not the case with that complaint,
I believe. First a decrease of dislike, and then not caring whether she
were in the room or not, and then a willingness to walk towards her
house, and then an impossibility to walk in any other direction.
The last fortnight we had the de Roos’s, who dined with the F.
Levesons’s as often as we did, or else we all dined with the Peels;[220]
and if we dined early, we rode after dinner and met again for tea. I can
ride four hours at a time now without the least fatigue and walk in
proportion. I like the Peels too, only I wish Lady Jane would bind him
apprentice to a tinker, or a shoemaker, or to anybody who would make him
work, as he seems to have an objection to the liberal professions. From
mere want of employment, he has fancied himself into bad health, and
does nothing but hold a smelling-bottle to his nose all day, even at
dinner. How it would annoy me if I were his wife!--because he has
talents enough, and can be pleasant when he is roused. I cannot think
how any clever man who has not estate enough to find his property an
occupation, can consent to be thrown by his own choice out of all
professions. I should be a lawyer to-morrow if I were Lawrence Peel, or
a lawyer’s wife if I were Lady Jane. She might persuade him into it I am
sure, if she would try, and it would be so much better economy than
consulting Doctor Mayo three times a day, which he does sometimes.
There is nobody here but Lord Carnarvon and his daughter, and Mr. Newton
the painter, and one of the sons of the house. This is such a delicious
house now it is finished, and heaps of new books and good pictures.
I intend to make much of a friendship with Newton. Mr. Baring tells me
he has seen a great deal of you, which is an additional reason why I
should make his acquaintance. He seems to me clever and paradoxical and
a little Yankeeish and perhaps conceited, but that picture of
Macheath[221] is a great _set off_ against any faults he may have. It is
impossible, too, that I can know anything about him, as I only saw him
for five minutes at the other end of the breakfast-table; but I like to
state my first impressions. They are invariably wrong, and now I know
that, they are just as good as if they were right, I may believe with
much assurance the contrary of what I think.
Is your brother George in town? And did I fancy, or could he have told
me that I might enclose to him at the Custom House a parcel above the
usual weight. I want to send to my sister-in-law some interesting little
caps I have been making which will not be much above weight. Your most
affectionate
E. E.
_Miss Eden to Miss Villiers._
HERTINGFORDBURY,
_Monday, September_, 1826.
MY DEAREST THERESA, Your account of yourself pleases me, partly because
it is evident the proper remedy for your illness has been found out, and
also because you write so much more legibly, which is a good sign....
I do not know what state of appetite you are in or how much you eat, but
could not you live lower, and so require fewer leeches? Give up that egg
you mix so neatly with your tea and put on the leeches less.
You ask if I care about the present state of politics? Why, dear child,
I never cared for anything half so much in my life,--almost to the pass
of being sorry I am out of town this week. I am trying to _subside_,
simply because I do not think any of our people will get anything in the
scramble; but still it is amusing to see such a mess as all the other
side is in, and any change must be for the better, you know we think....
I doubt if the Chancellor[222] is safely out yet. He writes such
characteristic letters to an old sister-in-law of his who lives in this
village, talking of his release from fatigues that were too much for
him, and rest for his few remaining days, etc.
We dined at Panshanger yesterday. Lady Cowper[223] is miserable at being
out of all the ferment of London. She is a Whig only by marriage, I
suspect, and a regular courtier at heart, but talks bravely just now,
with only occasional regrets that the Duke of Wellington should have
been so _ill-advised_....
I saw Lady Ouseley yesterday and she is quite aware how ill you have
been, and that you could not write to her. I never can give my mind to
her conversation, but she looked very melancholy, and yet I cannot
recollect that she mentioned any misfortune except that Sir Gore[224]
had the rheumatism. Janie looked to me like a standing misfortune. She
is so very plain, and she does not pay the slightest attention to her
poor melancholy mother.
I am glad you are reading those books. To be sure, you are reading
Boswell’s _Life of Johnson_ only now. I knew that, the _Memoires de
Retz_, Shakespeare, and a great part of the Bible, almost by heart
before I was eleven years old; so then there was not a thought left for
me to think upon manners, men, imagination, or morals. Everything is in
those books. On scientific subjects I never could understand other
people’s thoughts, and am guiltless of having had one of my own even on
the simplest question. My sentiment, later in life, I took by the lump,
in absolute cwts. out of _Corinne_[225] and Lord Byron’s Poems, and so,
as I said before, I have never had a thought of my own and I do not
believe any of us can, in the way we are all educated; and I suppose it
is lucky, as they would be foolish thoughts probably if they came.
God bless you, dear, and go on getting better. Your ever affectionate
E. E.
_Miss Eden to Miss Villiers._
BOWOOD,
_September_ 24, 1826.
MY DEAR THERESA, I am in such a bad mood for writing, that I could not
set about it with a worse grace, only you will not write to me if I do
not write to you.
I am devoted to the arts just now, and to the improvement of my small
mind, which I have brought to a high state of cultivation by studying
fifteen books at a time, some of them amazingly abstruse, such as the
_Life of James Mackoul the Housebreaker_--very improving. Also I have
finished my Denham’s _Travels_, and the _Life of Professor Clarke_ and
_Les Barricades_,[226] a diluted sort of history, partly history and
partly dialogue, which Lord Lansdowne likes because it is the fashion at
Paris, but it is uncommonly stupid. And I have been dipping into
Pothier’s _Histoire de l’Eglise_,--and in short, if we stay here a week
there is no saying how much I shall read, or how little I shall
remember.
Think of the agonies of coming here last Monday doubtful if we were
expected or not! _Il Fanatico per la Musica_ (by which form of words I
opine that the Italians translate: Lord Lansdowne) passed last week at
the Gloucester music meeting, so he did not receive George’s letter in
proper time, and of course there was some mistake about his answer, as
there always is about any letter that signifies, and so we did not know
if this week suited them. A warm reception from her is in the best of
times doubtful, and arriving against her wish would have been horribly
degrading. George never will enter into those sort of feelings, but that
only makes them worse. However, he promised, if he found we had not been
expected, to go on to Bath, and then we had a beautiful wild scheme, if
I could have made my mind up to twelve hours’ steam-boat, of going from
Bristol to see Elizabeth Cawdor.[227] But unfortunately we found our
rooms here all ready, so we shall not see Wales this year. The
Lansdownes were quite alone, expecting us, and she in the most cordial
affectionate state; the place, which I have never seen but at Christmas,
quite beautiful, and in short, I never liked Bowood half so much before.
That was sure to be the consequence of expecting to dislike it.
Our Newton we have overtaken here again. He left the Grange rather in a
huff some days ago, affronted somehow about his singing (at least so I
heard, for I was not in the room to hear it); but he went away suddenly
and ungraciously. I certainly don’t like him, he is so argumentative,
and talks so much of himself. His opinion of your brother George amused
me particularly. He raves about you, but sensibly and properly, and
calls you Miss Villiers. I have not a notion what line you take when
you praise me, but he will distrust your judgment in future whatever you
said, for he is one of the people to whom I must be odious. I go and
look at his picture of “Macheath,” which is in the drawing-room here,
and which I think one of the best modern pictures I know, and collect a
large mass of esteem and admiration for the painter, and rush into the
library and address myself to him while it is all smoking hot; and
before I have been five minutes there, all my good opinion turns sour
and bitter and tough and cold, and he might just as well never have
painted the picture at all.
Moore[228] has been here the last three days, singing like a little
angel. He has some new songs that make one perfectly and comfortably
miserable, particularly one, set to a very very simple air, and with a
constant return of the words, “They are gone,” etc. He was singing it
here on Friday, and there was a huge party of neighbours, amongst others
a very vulgar bride who is partly a Portuguese, but chiefly a thorough
vulgar Englishwoman, calls Lord Lansdowne “Marquis” when she speaks to
him, and turns to Lady Lansdowne all of a sudden with “Law, how ‘andsome
you look.” Just as Moore had finished this, and we were most of us in
tears, she put her great fat hand on his arm and said, “And pray, Mr.
Moore, can you sing Cherry Ripe?” George and I, who were sitting the
other side of him, burst out laughing, and so Moore was obliged to make
a good story out of it afterwards; else he owns he was so angry he meant
to have sunk it altogether. Your ever affectionate
E. EDEN.
_Miss Eden to Miss Villiers._
EASTCOMBE,
_October_ 1826.
MY DEAR THERESA, I must be come to my second childishness and mere
oblivion, for I cannot recollect whether I have answered the letter you
wrote to me at Shottesbrook, and which followed me here, or not. If I
have written, you had better put this in the fire, because it must be
the same thing over again. One thing I know: That I have written above
_twenty_ letters since I came here. My family are all dispersed, and I
have unwisely enlarged my list of friends, and my acquaintances have
been uncommonly troublesome; and in short, I have been ill-used in the
article of letter writing.
I have such miserable letters from my poor dear Pamela. It breaks one’s
heart to read them, and yet she is very good. She wrote to tell me of
Lucy’s death _immediately_ after it occurred, and wrote in the greatest
agony, but even then resigned, at least trying to be so, and thinking
much of the life of trouble which poor Lucy would have had before her.
Pamela said, “Think of her Aunt, think of her poor husband, think of all
but _her_, for she was miserable and it was in mercy that God took her.”
And I believe her death to have been in fact occasioned by the state of
excitement and anxiety in which she had lived since her marriage; and
she had little chance, with her strong feelings and the peculiar
circumstances of her situation, of anything but an increase of anxiety.
Pamela writes me word to-day that her four servants--all she keeps--are
in the scarlet fever, and her eldest little girl had just begun with it,
and she has had, ever since Lucy’s death, a sort of nervous pain in her
throat that prevents her swallowing anything but liquids, and is grown
very weak. I am telling you a long story, but I think you are
interested about her, and it is such a melancholy situation that I can
think of nothing else. To be sure, I have, as it is, a great many more
blessings than I deserve; but it is hard that the want of a little
foolish money should keep me from the best friend I have in the world at
the only time in which I could be of use to her. However, if it had been
possible, George would have taken me to her, and there is no use in
murmuring at impossibilities. God knows I can enter into her feelings as
a sister; and now that she has so much sickness in her home, it is cruel
to leave her with a half-broken heart to struggle through it by herself.
And yet I do not see how it is to be managed. Pamela writes but little
of the scenes she has been through. She says she cannot endure to
express her feelings in writing, though she thinks she would be better
if she could talk it over.
Captain Lyon was coming home in January, but perhaps this will prevent
him. Poor creature! What an arrival it will be if he has set off before
this news reaches him.
You are quite right. I followed you in Berkshire, and next week I am
going to Robert. It is doubtful whether his child[229] will live, and
Mrs. Eden has hardly been allowed to see it; but she wrote yesterday in
the greatest spirits saying there had been a great change for the
better, and the baby was then in her room; so I trust now it must be
thought out of danger. What a horrid piece of work a lying-in is! I am
more and more confirmed in the idea that a life of single blessedness is
the wisest, even accompanied, as Shakespeare mentions, by the necessity
of chanting faint hymns to the cold lifeless moon, which, as I have no
voice, rather discomposes me. I shall astonish the moon, poor fellow,
when I set off, but as for going through all my sister-in-law has done
this fortnight, I could not, and would not, for all the Roberts in
creation.
I cannot come to Knightsbridge just now, I am sorry to say. It is highly
flattering, my sisters are all fighting for me, and with a very superior
cool air I allow them to divide me.
I will not say anything about Sarah; she is too bad, if she knows what
she is about. Poor Mr. Robinson was summoned back from Wrest[230]
yesterday, where he had been amusing himself three days. She sent him
word she was dying, and when he arrived in the greatest haste yesterday,
she was gone out airing. He was very cross, but too late. It relieves
Sister from a very fatiguing attendance, and that is all the good I
know.
I shall probably have to unsay all I have said of Newton, for George has
discovered he thinks him pleasant, which is an unexpected blow. Do not
twit me with inconstancy if I say so too. Your most affectionate
E. EDEN.
[Lady Sarah Robinson was the daughter of Robert, 4th Earl of
Buckinghamshire. Her mother died in 1796. Three years later her
father married Eleanor Eden, who proved to be a good, hard-working
stepmother; Lady Sarah gave her constant employment in that
capacity even after her marriage to Mr. Robinson in 1814.
Lady Bucks saw that her stepdaughter was comfortably provided with
clothes. Amongst other items in her trousseau, were “five beautiful
sattin gowns all covered with lace, and twelve high gowns all
covered with lace, and nineteen more low gowns all covered with
lace--thirty-six in all.”
Lady Sarah had one daughter Elinor, who, seeing the discomfort her
mother underwent before the birth of one of her children, said she
was “determined to have all her children before she married, and
enjoy herself afterwards.” Elinor died, aged eleven, in 1826. A
year later her only son was born, George Frederick Samuel, who
succeeded his father as Earl of Ripon in 1859, and was created
Marquess of Ripon in 1871.
Lady Sarah was highly nervous and hysterical, and a constant source
of amusement and irritation to her relations and friends. Her
husband resigned after he had been Premier for five months, stating
that his wife’s health would no longer allow him to remain in
office.]
_Miss Eden to Miss Villiers._
EASTCOMBE,
_Sunday, 1 o’clock, October 30, 1826._
DEAR THERESA, I am sorry you had the trouble of sending for me
yesterday, for Mary Drummond settled when I arrived that my remaining
here would allow her to go home to her children, so she went home after
dinner last night and I sent up to London for my things and all here was
in such confusion, and there was so much to write that I could not write
to you. The poor child[231] is still alive, and yesterday afternoon we
had all talked ourselves into spirits about her, though Warren and
West[232] continue to repeat that they cannot allow the slightest
_expectation_ of her recovery to be entertained. Since that, my sister’s
maid writes me word this morning that she has had a most wretched night,
constantly screaming and groaning without one moment’s quiet, and that
the attendants all thought her very much worse, but that Warren did not
think her materially so, as they did.
Think what it must be to witness. Sister has not been out of the room
since seven yesterday morning, and with the exception of Tuesday night
has sat up seven nights. She sees no one, but I had a composed letter
from her last night. Sarah sat up on Friday, and from fatigue and
anxiety gave way yesterday morning entirely, and had several fainting
fits. Nobody can tell what he goes through, and he is, I think, as
nearly angelic in his feelings and conduct as it is possible for man to
be. The doctors speak of him with tears in their eyes. Fanny and I are
going to walk there now and may perhaps see him, but at all events some
of the doctors. You have no idea what it is the waiting here, expecting
every hour to have directions to have this house prepared to receive
them. They will all come here as soon as it is over. Yours
affectionately
E. E.
_Lord Auckland to Miss Eden._
LONDON,
_October 30, 1826_.
I have not been able to hear anything about you to-day, and am almost
fearful I shall go out of town without doing so. At all events direct to
me at Pixton, Dulverton. Your last note was far more cheerful, but yet
it is a frightful and wretched state of things.[233] I saw Mrs. Villiers
yesterday, and Newton to-day; he is putting Theresa’s monkey into one of
his pictures, and goes to Knightsbridge to draw him. She seems to be
ill.
_November 21, 1826._
I saw your de Roos yesterday, and he begged me to tell you that Sir Guy
Campbell has an appointment in Ireland which will put him and Pam more
at their ease--£600 a year. It is very satisfactory.
Little Macdonald is going to be married to an Irish widow, an old
acquaintance and attachment with a very small jointure. He is going over
to be married, and returns to attend the January Sessions. John Murray,
too (you may remember him at Edinbro’), is going to be married. He was
on his way to Bowood, and passed a week at Sydney Smith’s on his road,
who had to meet him a fat Yorkshire lady of forty, with £60,000, and
rather blue. Just the thing for him, and it was all arranged, and Sydney
Smith is delighted, and expects visits from Scotchmen without end.
Lansdowne is in town, but she is not, and the Lambs are here, and the
Duke of Devonshire,[234] who says he is too poor after Russia to go to
Chatsworth. But he has a cloak of black Fox worth £500 and is happy.
_Miss Eden to Miss Villiers._
EASTCOMBE,
_Tuesday night, November 1826._
DEAREST THERESA, You will have heard before this that all is over. I
could not write sooner, and I knew you would hear. To the last the poor
dear child’s sufferings were dreadful, and she never had one moment’s
consciousness....
Lord Grantham[235] arrived at the moment she expired. I wrote to him on
Saturday to say he had better come, or rather to ask him if he did not
think so, and he came off instantly, and I am so glad now, for you have
no idea of the good effect it had on Mr. R.
Poor Sarah surprised me more than anybody. She cried a great deal, but
was perfectly reasonable in her grief, and has fortunately taken the
turn of feeling that it is only by her exertions her poor husband can be
supported at all, and she kept repeating all the morning how much worse
her calamity might have been, that at all events she had him left and
ought not to repine. She thanked Sister, and, in short, nothing could be
better than her conduct.
All hours come to an end at last; all griefs find, or make, a place for
themselves. Don’t you know what I mean,--how they work themselves into
the mind, and so, by degrees, the surface of life closes over and looks
smooth again, and I always think what a blessing it is in these cases
there are so many little things that must necessarily be talked over and
done. It fills up the time.
Sarah and Mr. R. come here to-morrow, and then go to Nocton[236] for the
funeral.
I think this day has lasted a year, and I cannot see to read, and my
eyes are sore, and Sister cannot bear the light. In short, you must bear
with me to-night. I am tired to death in my mind, and it rests me
writing to somebody.
It was such a house of misery--the poor little French girl and the
governess crying in one room; Warren[237] with his cold sarcastic manner
talking to West, who was crying like a child. And yet he need not. He
was right from the first, and perhaps that is a painful feeling, to
think that all the misery he saw, might have been spared if he had not
been thwarted....
There is nothing I would not have given to escape the journey to Nocton.
I had a sort of cowardly wish that George would not let me go (though I
would have gone too, at all events), and I was almost sorry when his
letter began, “You are quite right, and so go.” And yet I have been
often pretending to wish that I had more positive duties to do. We are
such horrid hypocrites to ourselves. I am going to Nocton, I suppose,
from the same feelings that lead Catholics to go up the Scala Sancta on
their knees--a sort of superstition. It must be right, it is so
unnatural and disagreeable; and yet I am very fond of Sister, and Sarah
was once very kind to me, and is now again. It is very wrong; when you
praised me in your letter it smote my conscience. Almost everybody but
me has a pleasure in doing right. I have often thought how much you must
have to learn on the subject of calamity for the loss of friends, but do
not learn it before you must.
Lord Grantham has been such a comfort to them all. Your most
affectionate
E. E.
_Miss Eden to Miss Villiers._
NOCTON, LINCOLNSHIRE,
_Monday evening, December 13, 1826_.
Bless your foolish heart! No, child, there is nothing the matter--never
_was_ anything worth mentioning. We have ruralized some time in this
rustic Bedlam, and some of us got loose on Wednesday; but we are all
caught and shut up again, and there is no harm done except 250 guineas
gone and spent in post-horses, and we are all thin and exhausted with
anxiety and shame, some for themselves, and some for others. I believe I
sent you, at the time of Clarke’s[238] last visit, my farce of the new
“Mayor of Garratt,” with the plot made out into scenes, and specimens of
the dialogue; but a good five-act comedy has written itself since
Wednesday. Sarah is willing to laugh at it all herself now, and does so,
I hear;--and after all, poor thing, it is no wonder she is nervous about
health just now. All her fears I can excuse, with the death of her child
from mismanagement constantly weighing on her mind; and the folly she is
betrayed into, her fear is responsible for; but as she knows that her
mind is beyond her own control, the provoking thing is that from the
moment she begins to be ungovernable, she refuses to see anybody except
servants who cannot contradict her.
As long as Mr. Robinson is forthcoming that does not signify, as to a
certain degree he prevents her doing anything outrageously foolish; but
he was _took_ with a bad headache on Wednesday, such as he often has, a
regular case of Calomel and black dose which the Lincoln doctors
prescribed, and said he would be better the next day. But in the
meanwhile Sarah worked herself into such a state that she sent off at
eight in the morning two expresses, one for Clarke who lives in Norfolk,
and another for Henry Ellis, Doctor Warren, West, and I fancy any others
of the profession who chose to come. She would not see Sister, or rather
speak to her; for Sister once went into her room and found her (who has
not had her feet to the ground since I was here) walking about like
anybody else, and actually _running_ into the library to write her
letters.
Poor dear Mr. Robinson got quite well as the day went on and the dose
went off, and then Sarah began to be frightened at what she had done;
and then she saw Sister and was content to be advised, and a third
messenger was sent off to stop all the doctors he could find on the
road. He turned back Warren in his chaise and four at Biggleswade; and
West in his chaise and four, a few miles beyond. Before the express came
back, we were living in the pleasing expectation of going in to
dinner,--Sister, Anne,[239] Mary, and I--each arm in arm with a
doctor--Clarke, Warren, West, and Swan--the Lincoln man. I wanted to
make a pleasant evening of it, as there was not much sickness about, and
after dancing a quadrille with them that we should take a little senna
tea, and then have a good jolly game at Snap-dragon with some real Epsom
Salts.
I forgot to mention that Sarah, with fatigue and worry, had made herself
so ill that a fourth express went on Thursday to fetch Clarke again. She
makes all these people travel in chaises and four _par parenthèse_;
Clarke came on Saturday night, and then it was to be broke to that dear
good gull Mr. Robinson that any doctor whatever had been sent for. I had
no idea before that she could have been enough afraid of him to have
kept anything from him; but he even read that paragraph in the paper
about himself and wondered what the mistake could be.
However, Sister, as usual, was persuaded to take a great deal of the
scrape on her shoulders, and Clarke, who seems clever enough, undertook
to announce and explain the rest. Mr. R. was, I heard, horribly annoyed
at first, but is resigned now, and it is all smothered up in her
dressing-room where she has shut him up, and I do not know when he will
be allowed to call himself well again.
I hear she is very low now the excitement is over, but wisely declares
she shall do just the same next time, and he begs he may go as his own
express. Poor man! he has a bad prospect before him, but I do not think
that he minds it.
She professes the degree of religious feeling that is seldom met with,
and which appears to me inconsistent with any worldly feelings whatever,
above all with her feelings for _self_. The _quantity_ of her religion
it is impossible to deny, but I doubt its _quality_ being right; and
when I see that her high-flown mystical ideas end in making everybody
round her perfectly miserable, I go back to the suspicions I have
entertained for some time that the old simple religion we were taught at
four years old out of Watt’s catechism is the real right thing after
all. “If you are good, you will go to Heaven, and if you are naughty,
etc., etc.” You ought to know your Watt’s catechism. I shall learn mine
over again, and begin quite fresh in the most practical manner.
Oh, by the bye, and another thing I have found out and meant to tell you
is, that Virtue is _not_ its own reward. It may be anybody’s else, but
it is not its own. I take the liberty of asserting that my conduct here
has been perfectly exemplary. I never behaved well before in my life,
and I can safely add I never passed so unpleasant a month.
Well, my dear, good old George arrived to-night, which is payment for
everything, and he has not blown his head off to signify.[240] There are
no marks visible by candle-light, though he looks ill from starving. I
have been very poorly myself with a cold caught by the open windows, and
what it appears is called swelled glands. I never knew anything but a
horse had that complaint or something like it, and that then they were
shot; and as far as humanity goes that is a good cure. I went stamping
and screeching about one day like an owl with the pain. If I get better
we are going to Woburn, George says; but if I continue poorly I shall
leave him there, and go home on Saturday. It is astonishing how kindly I
feel towards Grosvenor Street. I am almost wishing to be settled there,
for the first time in my life.
I am sorry to give up Sprotbro’, but if we had gone there, we must have
done Erswick first where the Copleys will be, and where there is a great
charity bazaar meeting and a ball, and all sorts of County troubles, and
George prefers Woburn.
I am sorry not to see Maria Copley; Anne and Mary are still here, and I
quite agree to all you say of Anne. I am so fond of her, and so is
Sister. Mary is very dull, but seems amiable. I cannot tell you whether
Sarah is kind to them. You must see her to understand the state she is
in; but she is not unkind to anybody, and never now finds fault with
anybody she speaks of. She very seldom speaks at all, unless she is
excited to defend some religious point.
She sometimes smiles when Mr. Robinson and I have been talking nonsense,
but does not say anything. Your most affectionate
E. E.
_Miss Eden to Miss Villiers._
NOCTON,
_December 15, 1826_.
MY DEAR THERESA, I wish to apprise you not to go in search of me in
Grosvenor Street, because I am not there. “I am very bad with the ague,”
as people must be in the habit of saying in these fenny districts. I
_’ticed_ my poor dear George out of town into this horrid place, and
here he is with nobody to play with and nothing to do, and missing his
Woburn shooting.... Still the idea of another’s bore is a heavy weight
on my mind.
You will be happy to hear that Mr. Robinson is very well. George says he
never saw him better, and he makes a point of telling him so three times
a day at least. The poor man is starving, as Sarah will not allow him to
dine except in her dressing-room at two o’clock, because, as she does
not dine down with the family, she says she cannot trust to his promises
not to eat more than is right, as she is not there. He happens to have
an immensely good appetite since his headache, and frets like a child
about this; but has not courage to dine like a man on the most
unwholesome things he can find. I would live on mushrooms and walnuts
and fried plum-pudding if I were him.
This conversation passed verbatim yesterday, but do not for your life
mention it again. He wanted to go to the stables when he was out
walking, but said Sarah had told him not. However, he went boldly to her
window and knocked at it. “Sarah, I wish I might go to the
stables?”--“No, dearest, I told you before not to go.”--“Yes; but I want
to see my horses. Mayn’t I go?”--“No, darling, you said you would not
ask it if I let you go out.”--“Yes; but one of my horses is sick, and I
want to see it.”--“Well, then, if Mama will go with you, you may.” So
Sister actually had to go with him to take care of him. She told me
this, and did not know whether he was ashamed of it; but I saw him in
the evening and he repeated it, evidently rather pleased that he was
made so much of. He is a poor creature after all, Theresa, though you
are so fond of him. Your most affectionate
E.E.
* * * * *
Anne and Mary went on Wednesday. I did not see them the last two days,
but Mr. Auckland still does not admire them. I wish Anne would be as
pleasant in society as she is alone with one. I think she is nervous.
_Miss Eden to Miss Villiers._
NOCTON,
_December 1826_.
DEAREST THERESA, There is a shameful substitution of the donkey for the
poney who ought to take these letters to post, so allowing for the
difference of speed, the letters go an hour and a half sooner than
usual! and Mr. Robinson has just sent up the frank for you, he says the
letter must go in ten minutes, so it is no use my trying to make a
letter. I have mentioned your and Mrs. Villiers’s enquiries constantly
to Sarah, and read her aloud bits of your letter yesterday. I think she
likes enquiries.
It is more than I do; I pass my life answering them still, because
people whom I never saw or wish to see, know dear Miss Eden will excuse
them if they trouble her again, etc. I don’t excuse them at all, but I
am obliged to answer their letters just as if I did.
It is difficult to know what to say.... When first we came down I
thought her really low for two days, though it struck me as odd that she
was so little attentive to him. However, I believe she thought him too
cheerful, though God knows it was the falsest cheerfulness ever was
acted.
Since Saturday she has been exactly in the state in which she was before
poor Elinor’s death. She talks and thinks of nothing but her health, and
I really believe (and I do not think it is want of charity that makes me
so, for I pity her still) that a thought of her child does not cross her
mind twice in the day.
She is absorbed in herself, and has been more animated since she has
been--or called herself--ill, for she talks of her complaint without
ceasing and without reserve. It will be said more than ever she is in
the family way, for they have sent an express for Clarke, and we are
expecting him to-night, and nobody knows what to say to him when he
comes.
I think she is a little ashamed about Clarke, and I grudge the hundred
guineas, which would be better bestowed on weavers, or the people in the
village here.
Sister tried to be candid about it last night, and said that Clarke
would probably stay a day or two when he came, and he would amuse Sarah;
I suggested that for half the money I could have persuaded several
pleasant men to come from London to stay double the time, so it must not
be defended on the plea of economy.. She could not help laughing,
because in fact she is less taken in than anybody. The cold of this
place surpasses anything I have ever felt. Yours
E.E.