packed till Emily came to walk with me, and packed after I came in till
it was time to go shopping and visiting. I went to bid the L----'s
good-bye; we dined with the Procters, and had a pleasant dinner: Mr. and
Mrs. Grote, Rogers, Browning, Harness and his sister. In the evening I
went to Miss Berry's, where Lady Charlotte Lindsay and I discoursed
about you, and she pitied you greatly for having, upon the top of all
your troubles, forgotten your keys....
Sunday morning I packed instead of going to church, and, in fact, packed
the blessed livelong day, with an interval of rest derived from an
interminable visit from Frederick Byng (_alias_ Poodle). Yesterday my
father and Victoire (my aunt), and Adelaide and E---- (who, to my
infinite joy, came home on Saturday), dined with us. My father was
better, I think, than the last evening we were with him, though, of
course, a good deal out of spirits. Victoire was pretty well, but quite
surprised and mortified at hearing that I would not suffer her to pack
my things, for fear of its fatiguing her; and told me how she had been
turning in her mind her best way of contriving to be here packing all
day, and home in Charlotte Street in time to give my father his dinner.
She is Dall's own sister!
Yesterday I completed, with Emily's assistance (which nearly drove me
mad), the packing of the great huge chest of books, boxes, etc., and she
and I walked together, but it was bitter cold and ungenial, regular
_beasterly_ wind. (Mrs. Grote says _she_ invented that name for it, and,
for reasons which will be obvious to you, I gave it up to her without a
blow.) In the afternoon I went shopping with Adelaide, and then flew
about, discharging my own commissions.
In the evening our "first grand party of the season came off;" nearly
two hundred people came, and seemed, upon the whole, tolerably well
amused. Adelaide and Miss Masson and I sang, and Benedict played, and it
all went off very well. There were six policeman at the door, and Irish
Jack-o'-lanterns without count; "the refreshment table was exceedingly
elegantly set out" by _Gunter_--at a price which we do not yet know....
I dread our sea-voyage for myself, for all sorts of physical reasons;
morally, I dare say I shall benefit from a season of absolute quiet and
the absence of all excitement. The chicks are well; they are to go down
to Liverpool on Saturday, in order to be out of the way, for we leave
this house on Monday, and their departure will facilitate the verifying
of inventories and all the intolerable confusion of our last hours. Mrs.
Cooper, as well as Miss Hall, will go with them to Liverpool, and I have
requested that, instead of staying in the town, they may go down to
Crosby Beach, six miles from it, and wait there for our arrival. This is
all my history. I am in one perpetual bustle, and I thank Heaven for it;
I have no leisure to think or to feel....
I beg leave to inform you that Miss Hall came to my party in a most
elegant black satin dress, with her hair curled in _profuse ringlets_
all over her head.
God bless you, my dear Hal. Good-bye.
Ever yours,
F. A. B.
Thursday, April 27th, 1843.
DEAREST HAL,
You ask how it goes with me. Why, I think pretty much as it did with the
poor gentleman who went up in the flying machine t'other day, which,
upon some of his tackle giving way, began, as he describes, to "turn
round and round in the air with the most frightful velocity." My
condition, I think, too, will find the same climax as his, viz. falling
in a state of _senselessness_ into a steam-packet. If the account be
true, it was a very curious one. As for me, I am absolutely breathless
with things to do and things to think of.... Still, I get on (like a
deeply freighted ship in a churning sea, to be sure), but I _do_ make
some way, and the days _do_ go by, and I am glad to see the end of this
season of trial approaching, for all our sakes.
Any one would suppose I was in great spirits, for I fly about, singing
at the top of my voice, and only stop every now and then to pump up a
sigh as big as the house, and clear my eyes of the tears that are
blinding me. Occasionally, too, a feeling of my last moments here, and
my leave-taking of my father and sister, shoots suddenly through my
mind, and turns me dead sick; but all is well with me upon the whole,
nevertheless.
Adelaide was in great health and spirits on Monday night, and sang for
us, and seemed to enjoy herself very much, and gave great delight to
everybody who heard her. She sang last night again at Chorley's, but I
thought her voice sounded a little tired. To be sure, in those tiny
boxes of rooms, the carpets and curtains choke one's voice back into
one's throat, and it just comes out beyond one's teeth, with a sort of
muffled-drum sound. Thus far, dearest Hal, yesterday. To-day, before I
left my dressing-room, I got your present. Thank you a thousand times
for the pretty chain [a beautiful gold chain, which, together with a
very valuable watch, was stolen from me in a boarding-house in
Philadelphia, almost immediately on my return there], which is
exquisite, and will be very dear. Yet, though I found the "fine gold,"
the empty page of letter-paper on each side of it disappointed me more
than it would have been grateful to express; but when I came down to
breakfast I found your letter, and was altogether happy.... I was
wearing my watch again, for I found the risk and inconvenience of always
carrying it about very tiresome, but I had it on an old silver chain
that I have had for some years. Yours is prettier even than my father's,
and I love to feel it round my neck.
You say you hope my sister will be brave on the occasion of our parting,
and not try my courage with her grief. I will answer for her. I am sure
she will be brave. I know of no one with more determination and
self-control than she has....
The secret of helping people every way most efficiently is to stand by
and be _quiet_ and _ready_ to do anything you _may be asked to do_. This
is the only real way to help people who have any notion of helping
themselves.
On Monday evening we had our first party, which went off exceedingly
well. On Tuesday morning Emily and I walked together, and I packed till
lunch, after which I drove out with Adelaide, shopping for her, and
doing my own _do's_. In the evening I went to my father, whom I found in
most wretched spirits, but not worse in health. He has determined, I am
thankful to say, not to see the children again before they go, which I
think is very wise. After leaving him, I went to a party at our friend
Chorley's, where dear Mendelssohn was, and where I heard some wonderful
music, and read part of "Much Ado about Nothing" to them. Yesterday
Emily came, and we walked together, and I packed and did commissions all
day. Our second party took place in the evening, and we had all our
grandee friends and fine-folk acquaintances....
God bless you, dear Hal. Emily is waiting for me to go out walking with
her.
Ever yours,
FANNY.
26, UPPER GROSVENOR STREET.
MY DEAR CHARLES GREVILLE,
I send you back Channing's book, with many thanks. The controversial
part of his sermons does not satisfy me. No controversy does; no
arguments, whether for or against Christianity, ever appear to me
_conclusive_; but as I am a person who would like extremely to have it
demonstrated _why_ two and two make four, you can easily conceive that
arguments upon any subject seldom seem perfectly satisfactory to me. As
for my convictions, which are, I thank God, vivid and strong, I think
they spring from a species of intuition, mercifully granted to those who
have a natural incapacity for reasoning, _i.e._ the whole female _sect_.
And, talking of them, I do not like Dryden, though I exclaim with
delight at the glorious beauty and philosophical truth of some of his
poetry; but oh! he has nasty notions about women. Did you ever see
Correggio's picture of the Gismonda? It is a wonderful portrait of
grief. Even Guercino's "Hagar" is inferior to it in the mere expression
of misery. Knowing no more of the story years ago than I gathered from a
fine print of Correggio's picture, I wrote a rhapsody upon it, which I
will show you some day.
The "Leaf and the Flower" is very gorgeous, but it does not touch the
heart like earnest praise of a virtue, loved, felt, and practised; and
Dryden's "Hymns to Chastity" would scarcely, I think, satisfy me, even
had I not in memory sundry sublime things of Spenser, Dante, and Milton
on the same theme. Thank you for both the books. Each in its kind is
very good.
I am yours very truly,
F. A. B.
[Mr. Greville had lent me a volume of Dr. Channing's "Sermons," and
Dryden's "Fables," which I had never before read.]
26, UPPER GROSVENOR STREET, Saturday, April 29th.
DEAREST GRANNY,
I send you back, with thanks, the critique on Adelaide. It is very civil
and, I think, not otherwise than just, except perhaps in comparing my
sister _at present_ to Pasta.
If genius alone were the same thing as genius and years of study, labor,
experience, and practice, genius would be a finer thing even than it is.
My sister perpetually reminded me of Pasta, and, had she remained a few
years longer in her profession, would, I think, have equalled her. I
could not give her higher praise, for nobody, since the setting of that
great artist, has even remotely reminded me of her. My sister's voice is
not one of the finest I have heard; Miss Paton's is finer, Clara
Novello's (the most perfect voice I ever heard) is finer. Adelaide's
real voice is a high mezzo-soprano, and in _stretching_ it to a higher
pitch--that of the soprano-assoluto--which she has done with infinite
pains and practice, in order to sing the music of the parts she plays, I
think she has impaired the quality, the perfect intonation, of the notes
that form the joint, the hinge, as it were, between the upper and middle
voice; and these notes are sometimes not quite true--at any rate, weak
and uncertain. In brilliancy of execution, I do not think she equals
Sontag, Malibran, or Grisi; _but_ there is in other respects no possible
comparison, in my opinion, between them and herself, as a lyrical
dramatic artist; and Pasta is the only great singer who, I think,
compares with her in the qualities of that noble and commanding order
which distinguished them both. In both Madame Pasta and my sister the
dramatic power is so great as almost occasionally to throw their musical
achievements, in some degree, into the shade. But in their lyrical
declamation there is a grandeur and breadth of style, and a tragic depth
of passion, far beyond that of any other musical performers I have
known. In one respect Adelaide had the promise of greater excellence
than Pasta--the versatility of her powers and her great talent for
comedy.
How little her beautiful face was ever disfigured by her vocal efforts
you have seen; and noted, I know, that power of appealing to Heaven at
once with her lustrous eyes and her soaring voice; ending those fine,
exquisite, prolonged shakes on the highest notes with that gentle quiver
of the lids which hardly disturbed the expression of "the rapt soul
sitting in her eyes." She has a musical sensibility which comprehends,
in both senses of the word, every species of musical composition, and
almost the whole lyrical literature of Europe; in short, she belongs, by
organization and education, to the highest order of artists. But
why--oh, why am I giving you a dissertation on her and her gifts, for a
purpose which will never again challenge her efforts or their exercise?
(Quite lately, one who knew and loved her well told me that Rossini had
said of her, "To sing as she does three things are needed:
this"--touching his forehead,--"this"--touching his throat,--"and
this"--laying his hand on his heart;--"she had them all.")
I sometimes think, when I reflect upon the lives of theatrical artists,
that they are altogether unnatural existences, and produce--pardon the
bull--_artificial natures_, which are misplaced anywhere but in their
own unreal and make-believe sphere. They are the anomalous growth of our
diseased civilizations, and, removed from their own factitious soil,
flourish, I half believe, in none other. Do not laugh at me, but I
really do think that creatures with the temperaments necessary for
making good actors and actresses are unfit for anything else in life;
and as for marrying and having children, I think crossing wholesome
English farm stock with mythological cattle would furnish our fields
with a less uncanny breed, of animals.
I wish some laws were made shutting up all the theatres, and only
allowing two dramatic entertainments every year: one of Shakespeare's
plays, and one of Mozart's operas, at the cost of Government, and as a
national festivity. Now, I know you think I am quite mad, wherefore
adieu.
I am ever yours most truly,
F. A. B.
UPPER GROSVENOR STREET, May, 1843.
DEAREST GRANNY,
I am of Lord Dacre's mind, and think it wisest and best to avoid the
pain of a second parting with you. Light as _new_ sorrows may appear to
you, the heart--your heart--certainly will never want vitality enough to
feel pain through your kindly affections. God bless you, therefore, my
good friend, and farewell. For myself, I feel bruised all over, and
numbed with pain; so many sad partings have fallen one after another,
day after day, upon my heart, that acuteness of pain is lost in a mere
sense of unspeakable, sore weariness; and yet these bitter last days are
to be prolonged.... God help us all! But I am wrong to write thus sadly
to you, my kind friend; and indeed, though from this note you might not
think my courage what it ought to be, I assure you it does not fail me,
and, once through these cruel last days, I shall take up the burden of
my life, I trust, with patience, cheerfulness, and firm faith in God,
and that conviction which is seldom absent from my mind, and which I
find powerful to sustain me, that duty and not happiness is the purpose
of life; and that from the discharge of the one and the forgetfulness of
the other springs that peace which Christ told His friends He gave, and
the world gives not, neither takes away. Let dear B---- come and see me;
I shall like to look on her bright, courageous face again. Give my
affectionate love to Lord Dacre, and believe me
Ever gratefully and affectionately
Your grandchild,
FANNY.
UPPER GROSVENOR STREET, May 3rd, 1843.
Thank you, dearest Hal, for Sydney Smith's letter about Francis Horner:
it is bolder than anything I had a notion of, but very able and very
amiable, and describes charmingly an admirable man. There is one
expression he--Sydney Smith--applies to Horner that struck me as
strange--he speaks of "important human beings" that he has known; and, I
cannot tell why, but with all my self-esteem and high opinion of human
nature and its capabilities in general, the epithet "important" applied
to human beings made me smile, and keeps recurring to me as comical. It
must have appeared much more so to you, I should think, with your
degraded opinion of humanity.
You ask how our second party went off. Why, very well. It was much
fuller than the other, and in hopes of inducing people to "spread
themselves" a little, we had the refreshments put into my drawing-room;
but they still persisting in sticking (sticking literally) all in the
room with the piano, which rather annoyed me, because I hate the
proximity of "important human beings," I came away from them, and had a
charming quiet chat in the little boudoir with Lord Ashburton and Lord
Dacre, during which they discussed the merits of Channing, and awarded
him the most _unmitigated_ praise as a good and great man. It is curious
enough that in America the opponents of Dr. Channing's views perpetually
retorted upon him that he was a clergyman, a mere man of letters, whose
peculiar mode of life could not possibly admit of his having large or
just, or, above all, practical political knowledge and ideas, or any
opinions about questions of government that could be worth listening to;
whereas these two very distinguished Englishmen spoke with unqualified
admiration of his sound and luminous treatment of such subjects, and,
instancing what they considered his best productions, mentioned his
letter to Clay upon the annexation of Texas, even before his moral and
theological essays.
Our company stayed very late with us, till near two o'clock; and upon a
remark being made about the much smaller consumption of refreshments
than on the occasion of our first party, D----, our butler, very
oracularly responded, "Quite a different class of people, sir;" which
mode of accounting for the more delicate appetite of our more
aristocratic guests, made with an ineffable air of cousinship to them
all, sent me into fits of laughing.
You ask me what I shall have to do from Monday till Wednesday, to fill
up my time and keep my thoughts from drowning themselves in crying. I
shall leave this house after breakfast for the _Clarendon_. I have a
great many small last articles to purchase, and shall visit all my
kindred once more. Then, too, the final packing for "board ship" will
take me some time, and I have some letters to write too. I dine with
Lady Dacre on Monday; they are to be alone except us and E---- and my
sister. I shall leave them at eight o'clock to go and sit with my father
till ten, his bed-time; and then return to Chesterfield Street [Lord
Dacre's]. As for Tuesday--Heaven alone knows how I shall get through it.
On Thursday last we dined with Sydney Smith, where we met Lord and Lady
Charlemont, Jeffrey, Frederick Byng, Dickens, Lady Stepney, and two men
whom I did not know,--a pleasant dinner; and afterwards we went to Mrs.
Dawson Damer's,--a large assembly, more than half of them strangers to
us....
On Friday morning Adelaide and E---- and we breakfasted with Rogers, to
meet Sydney Smith, Hallam, and his daughter and niece, the United States
Minister, Edward Everett, Empson, and Sir Robert Inglis. After breakfast
I went to see Charles Greville, who is again laid up with the gout, and
unable to move from his sofa. We dined with my sister, who had a large
party in the evening; and as the hour for breaking up arrived, and I saw
those pleasant kindly acquaintances pass one after another through the
door, I felt as if I was watching the vanishing of some pleasant vision.
The nearest and dearest of these phantasmagoria are yet round me; but in
three days the last will have disappeared from my eyes, for who can tell
how long? if not forever!
All day yesterday I was extremely unwell, but packed vehemently....
Charles Young, who is a most dear old friend of mine, and dotes upon my
children, came to see them off, and went with them to the railroad.
S---- begged for some of her grandfather's hair, but that he might not
be told it was for her, for fear of grieving him!
This is the last letter you will get from me written in this house.
Victoire, quite tired out with packing, is lying asleep on the sofa, and
poor dear Emily sits crying beside me.
Ever yours,
F. A. B.
LIVERPOOL, Thursday, May 4th, 1843.
I wrote to you last thing last night, dearest Hal; and now farewell! I
have received a better account of my father.... Dear love to Dorothy,
and my last dear love to you. I shall write and send no more loves to
any one. Lord Titchfield--blessings on him!--has sent me a miniature of
my father and four different ones of Adelaide. God bless you, dear.
Good-bye.
Yours,
FANNY.
HALIFAX WHARF, Wednesday, May 17th, 1843.
MY DEAR FRIEND,
When I tell you that yesterday, for the first time, I was able to put
pen to paper, or even to hold up my head, and that even after the small
exertion of writing a few lines to my father I was so exhausted as to
faint away, you will judge of the state of weakness to which this
dreadful process of crossing the Atlantic reduces your very _robustious_
grandchild.
It is now the 17th of May, and we have been at sea thirteen days, and we
are making rapid way along the coast of Nova Scotia, and shall touch at
Halifax in less than an hour. There we remain, to land mails and
passengers, about six hours; and in thirty-six more, wind and weather
favoring us across the Bay of Fundy, we shall be in Boston. In fifteen
days! Think of it, my dearest Granny! when thirty used to be considered
a rapid and prosperous voyage.
My dear friend, how shall I thank you for those warm words of cheering
and affectionate encouragement which I received when I was lying worn
out for want of sleep and food, after we had been eight days on this
dreadful deep? My kind friend, I do not want courage, I assure you; and
God will doubtless give me sufficient strength for my need: but you can
hardly imagine how deplorably sad I feel; how poor, who lately was so
rich; how lonely, who lately was surrounded by so many friends. I know
all that remains to me, and how the treasure of love I have left behind
will be kept, I believe, in many kind hearts for me till I return to
claim it. But the fact is I am quite exhausted, body and mind, and
incapable of writing, or even thinking, with half the energy I hope to
gather from the first inch of dry land I step upon. Like Antaeus, I look
for strength from my mother, the Earth, and doubt not to be brave again
when once I am on shore.
The moment I saw the dear little blue enamel heart I exclaimed, "Oh, it
is Lady Dacre's hair in it!" But tears, and tears, and nothing but
tears, were the only greeting I could give the pretty locket and your
and dear B----'s letters.
My poor chicks have borne the passage well, upon the whole--sick and
sorry one hour, and flying about the deck like birds the next....
Our passage has been made in the teeth of the wind, and against a heavy
sea the whole way. We have had no absolute storm; but the tender mercies
of the Atlantic, at best, are terrible. Of our company I can tell
nothing, having never left my bed till within the last three days. They
seem to be chiefly English officers and their families, bound for New
Brunswick and the Canadas. The ship stops, and to the perpetual flailing
of the paddles succeeds the hissing sound of the escaping steam. We are
at Halifax. I send you this earliest news of us because you will be
glad, I am sure, to get it.
Give my love to my dear lord; my blessing and a kiss to dear B----. I
will write to her from New York, if possible. God bless you, my dear
friend, and reward you for all your kindness to me, and comfort and make
peaceful the remainder of your earthly pilgrimage. I can hardly hold my
pen in my hand, or my head up; but am ever your grateful and
affectionate
FANNY.
PHILADELPHIA, Tuesday, May 23rd, 1843.
MY DEAREST HAL,
We landed in Boston on Friday morning at six o'clock, and almost before
I had drawn my first breath of Yankee air Elizabeth Sedgwick and Kate
had thrown their arms round me.
You will want to know of our seafaring; and mine truly was miserable, as
it always is, and perhaps even more wretched than ever before. I lay in
a fever for ten days, without being able to swallow anything but two
glasses of calves'-foot jelly and oceans of iced water. At the end of
this time I began to get a little better; though, as I had neither food,
nor sleep, nor any relief from positive sea-sickness, I was in a
deplorable state of weakness. I just contrived to crawl out of my berth
two days before we reached Halifax, where I was cheered, and saddened
too, by the sight of well-known English faces. I had just finished
letters to my father, E----, and Lady Dacre, for the _Hibernia_, which
was to touch there the next morning on her way _home_, and was sitting
disconsolate with my head in my hands, in a small cabin on deck, to
which I had been carried up from below as soon as I was well enough to
bear being removed from my own, when Mr. Cunard, the originator of this
Atlantic Steam Mail-packet enterprise, whom I had met in London, came
in, and with many words of kindness and good cheer, carried me up to his
house in Halifax, where I rested for an hour, and where I saw Major
S----, an uncle of my dear B----, and where we talked over English
friends and acquaintances and places, and whence I returned to the ship
for our two days' more misery, with a bunch of exquisite flowers, born
English subjects, which are now withering in my letter-box among my most
precious farewell words of friends.
The children bore the voyage as well as could be expected; sick one half
hour, and stuffing the next; little F---- _pervading_ the ship from stem
to stern, like Ariel, and generally presiding at the officers' mess in
undismayed she-loneliness.