Читать книгу The Story of My Life, volumes 4-6 - Augustus J. C. Hare - Страница 12

“There was a young lady in Denmark, whose family, from circumstances, had lived very much before the Danish world, and with whom, in so small a society as that of Copenhagen, almost every one was acquainted. Consequently it was a subject of interest, almost of universal interest, at Copenhagen, when it became known that this young lady, with the full approval of her parents and joyful consent of every one concerned, had become engaged to a young Danish officer of good family and position.

“ ‘Now in Danish society a betrothal is considered to be almost the same thing as a marriage: new relationships date from that time, and if either the affianced bride or bridegroom die, the family of the other side mourn as for a son or brother, as if the marriage had actually taken place.

“ ‘While this young lady of whom I have spoken was only engaged, her betrothed husband was summoned to join his regiment in a war which was going on; and very soon to the house of his betrothed came the terrible news that he was dead, that he was killed in battle. And the way in which the news came was this. A soldier of his regiment was wounded and was taken prisoner; and as he was lying in his cot in the hospital, he said to his companion who was in the next bed, “I saw the young Colonel—I saw the young Colonel on his white horse, and he rode into the ranks of the enemy and he never came back again.” And the man who said that died, but the man to whom he said it recovered, and, in process of time, he was ransomed, and came back to Copenhagen and told his story with additions. “My comrade, who is dead, said that he saw the young Colonel on his white horse, and that he saw him ride into the ranks of the enemy and the soldiers of the enemy drag him from his horse and kill him, so that he never came back again.” This was the form in which the story reached the family of the affianced wife of the young Colonel, and they mourned him most truly; for they loved him much, and they put on all the outward signs of deepest grief. There was only one person who would not put on the outward signs of mourning, and that was his affianced bride herself. She said, and persisted in saying, that she could not believe that, where two persons had been as entirely united as she and her betrothed had been, one could pass entirely out of life without the other knowing it. That her lover was sick, in prison, in trouble, she could believe, but that he was dead—never, without her having an inner conviction of it; and she would not put on the outward signs of mourning, which to her sense implied an impression of ill omen. Her parents urged her greatly, not only because their own reality of grief was very great, but because, according to the feeling of things in Copenhagen, it cast a very great slur upon their daughter that she should appear without the usual signs of grief. They urged her ceaselessly, and the tension of mind in which she lived, and the perpetual struggle with her own family, added to her own deep grief, had a very serious effect upon her.

“ ‘It was while things were in this state that one day she dreamt—she dreamt that she received a letter from her betrothed, and in her dream she felt that it was of the most vital importance that she should see the date of that letter; and she struggled and laboured to see it, but she could not make it out; and she laboured on with the utmost intensity of effort, but she could not decipher it; and it seemed to her the most wearisome night she had ever spent, so incessant was her effort, but she could not read it: still she would not give it up, and at last, just as the dawn was breaking, she saw the date of the letter, and it was May the 10th. The effort was so great that she woke; but the date remained with her still—it was May the 10th.

“ ‘Now she knew that if such a letter had been really written on the 10th of May, by the 1st of June she must receive that letter.

“ ‘The next morning, when her father came in to see her before she was up, as he had always done since their great sorrow, he was surprised to find her not only calm and serene, but almost radiant. She said, “You have often blamed me for not wearing the outward signs of mourning for my betrothed: grant me now only till the 1st of June, and then, if I receive no letter from him, I will promise to resign myself to believe the worst, and I will do as you desire.” Three weeks of terrible tension ensued, and the 1st of June arrived. She said then that she felt as if her whole future life hung upon the postman’s knock. It came—and there was the letter! Her lover had been taken prisoner, communication with him had been cut off—in fact, till then it was impossible she should hear. Soon afterwards he was exchanged, came home, and they were married.

“ ‘Now,’ said Mademoiselle von Raasloff, as she finished her narrative, ‘that is no story which I have heard. The young lady was my dear mother; she is here to testify to it: the young officer was my dear father, General von Raasloff; he is here to confirm it.’ And they were both present.”

“April 15.—There is a pretty young American lady at the table-d’hôte—most amusing. Here are some snatches from her lips:—

“ ‘I wonder if the old masters who painted such absurd figures of saints and angels meant to be funny, or if they were only funny by mistake.’

“ ‘Pity is like eating mustard without beef, and you wouldn’t like that, would you?’

“ ‘I was at a pension at Castellamare—Miss Baker’s. Avoid it. There were places for fifty at dinner, and forty-nine of them were old maids. No gentleman stayed—of course he couldn’t: they would have gobbled him up alive.’

“ ‘I went to the Trinità to hear the nuns sing. The nun who opened the door said, “You’re too late!”—“Well,” I said, “you declared I was too early yesterday. When am I to come?”—“Well, I don’t know,” she said; “we’re always changing.”—“Well, you are a civil old party, you are,” I said—and the old tigress actually slammed the door in my face.’

“ ‘Somebody said to me about a nigger I was abusing that I shouldn’t, because he was a man and a brother. “Well, sir, he may be your brother,” I said, “but most certainly he is not mine.” I should think not indeed, with a leg that comes down in the middle of his foot.’

“ ‘I shall be burnt, I hope, when I die. I feel like the old lady I heard of the other day who knew she was getting immensely old and could not live long, so paid down three thousand dollars to have a good big stove made right off at once.’

“ ‘I hope when I’m dying my people won’t be able to go on pegging away at their dinner just as if nothing was happening: I should not like that at all.’ ”

To Miss Leycester.

FARFA. [89]

GATE OF CASAMARI. [90]

“Assisi, April 26.—I had a proposal from the Miss Seymours and Miss Ellis that if I would wait at Rome till Saturday the 18th, they would set off with me in search of the lost monastery of Farfa, which was, of all places, the one I wanted most to see, and from which fear of brigands had previously caused all my companions to fail at the last moment. If you have read any old histories of Italy, you will remember how all-important Farfa was in the Middle Ages, and will wonder that no one, not even the best Roman antiquarians, knew anything about its present state, or even where it is. We could only judge by old maps and chronicles. However, the excursion completely answered, and, after divers little adventures, which ‘Days near Rome’ will narrate, we not only arrived at Farfa, but found the Father-General of the Benedictines accidentally there to receive us. Greatly astonished he was at our arrival, but said that one enterprising stranger had reached the place three years before—I need hardly add, an English lady. Really Farfa is one of the most radiant spots in Italy, and the sheets of wild-flowers, and the songs of nightingales and cuckoos enhanced its charms. My companions were so delighted that they consented, if I would stay till Wednesday, to set off again on a long, wild, and very rough tourette to the monasteries of the Hernican mountains. So on the 22nd we went by rail to Frosinone, and thence drove to Casamari, going on by a grand mountain road to sleep at Alatri. The next day we rode up a jagged rock path for many hours to the Carthusian Trisulti, a huge monastery in a mountain forest, amid Alpine flowers and close under the snows. Then we saw the famous Grottoes of Collepardo—a sort of underground Staffa, very grand indeed, and returned at night to Frosinone, and next day to Rome.”

Journal.

“May 4, Florence.—General von Raasloff is here, and says that a friend of his going to China received endless commissions for things he was to bring home, but that only one of the people who gave them sent money for the things they wanted. On his return, this commission was the only one he had fulfilled. His disappointed friends upbraided him, and he said, ‘You see it was very unfortunate, but when we were nearing China, I spread out all my different commissions on the deck that I might examine them, and I put the money for each on the paper to which it belonged: and—it was very unfortunate, but my attention was called away for an instant, and behold a great gust of wind had come, and all those commissions which were not weighted by money had been blown far out to sea, and I never saw them again.’

“Mademoiselle von Raasloff told me that—

“Count Piper, an ancestor of the present Count Piper, was a very determined gambler. Being once at one of his desolate country estates, he was in perfect despair for some one to play with him, but he was alone. At last, in a fit of desperation, he said, ‘If the devil himself were to come to play with me, I should be grateful.’ Soon a tremendous storm began to rage, during which a servant came in and said that a gentleman overtaken by night was travelling past, and implored shelter. Count Piper was quite enchanted, and a very gentlemanlike man was shown in. Supper was served, and then Count Piper proposed a game of cards, in which the stranger at once acquiesced. Count Piper won so enormously, that he felt quite ashamed, and at last he proposed their retiring. As they were leaving the room, the stranger said, ‘I am very much concerned that I have not sufficient money with me to pay all my debt now; however, I shall beg you to take my ring as a guarantee, which is really of greater value than the money, and which has very peculiar properties, one of which is that as long as you wear it, all you possess is safe from fire.’ The Count took the ring, and escorting the stranger to his room, wished him good-night. The next morning he sent to inquire after him: he was not there, his bed had not been slept in, and he never was heard of again. Count Piper wore the ring, but after some time, as it was very heavy and old-fashioned, he took it off and put it away. The next morning came the news that one of his finest farm-houses had been burnt down. And so it always is in that family. The descendants of Count Piper always have to wear the ring, and if ever they leave it off for a single day, one of their houses on one of their great estates is burnt.”

“Florence, May 10.—Ten days here in the radiant spring-tide have been very delightful. I have seen a great deal of Mrs. Ross, Lady Duff Gordon’s beautiful daughter, who is now writing the story of her mother’s life. She has a noble head, which is almost more full of expression than that of any one I know, and I am sure that her character is noble too, with all the smallnesses of life, which make a thoroughly anglicised character ignoble, washed out, and its higher qualities remaining to be mingled with the Italian frankness and kindly simplicity which English-English do not possess, and consequently cannot understand. Her singing to a guitar is capital—chiefly of Italian stornelli, rendered with all the verve which a contadina herself could give them. It is no wonder that Italians adore her. Each summer she and her husband spend at Castagnuolo with the Marchese Lotteria della Stufa, the great friend of her father, who died in his arms. This is ‘Il Marchese’ par excellence with the Florentines, to whom he is public property. When a child accidentally shot him with a pistol through the crown of his hat, thousands of people thronged the street before his house to inquire, and in all the villages round his native valley of Signa the price of wax went up for a fortnight, so many candles were burnt to the Madonna as thank-offerings for his escape. The next day, as he was crossing one of the bridges, he met Giacomo, a flyman he knew, driving a carriage full of very respectable old Scotch ladies. Giacomo flung his reins on the box, and rushing up to the Marchese, threw himself sobbing on his breast.

LA BADIA DI SETTIMO. [91]

“I have been out with Mrs. Ross to the Stufa villa of Castagnuolo, seven miles off, near the Badia di’ Settimo, in a tiny baroccino, drawn by Tocco, the smallest of spirited ponies, and with Picco, the weest terrier ever seen, upon our knees. As we turned up from the highroad to the villa on the hills through the rich luxuriant vineyards, the warmest welcome met us from all the peasants, and Mrs. Ross received them with ‘Ah, caro Maso, e come va la moglie,’—‘Addio, caro Guido mio.’ In a house in the grounds—a ‘podere’—the whole family of inmates thronged round her with ‘Vi pigliero un consiglio, Signora,’ about a sick child. We wandered up the woods, gathering lovely wild orchids, and then went to the farm, where the creatures, like the people, seemed to regard Mrs. Ross as one of themselves: the cows came and licked her, the sheep came and rubbed against her, the pigeons perched, and even the wild boars were gentleness itself. She was first able to make her way at Castagnuolo by nursing day and night an old contadino who died in her arms. She described comically, though pathetically, the frantic grief which ensued: how the son, Antonio, tried to drown himself, and was pulled out of the water by his breeches: how the whole family insisted upon being bled: how a married daughter, a niece, and a cousin came and had strong convulsions; and how, when she ventured to leave them for a little to go to her dinner, the fattore rushed after her with—‘Ma Signora, tutte le donne son svenute;’[92] how eventually she locked up each separately for the night with a basin of soup, having made them a little speech, &c. Whenever any of the contadini have burns, they are cured by poultices of arum-leaves.

“All is simple, graceful goodness at Castagnuolo.”

“Venice, May.—I feel that I am now learning much about masters I never knew before. One is introduced to them at one place and continues the acquaintance at another, till one becomes really intimate. Marco Basaiti is the best of these new friends, with his sad shadowy figures always painted against an afterglow. One learns how, as Savonarola says, ‘every painter paints himself. However varied his subjects, his works bear the sign-manual of his thought.’[93]

“At Milan, on the Eve of S. Ambrogio, an American next me at the table-d’hôte said to his neighbour opposite, ‘I have been, Marm, to see St. Ambrose; and I say, Marm, do you know that to-morrow they are going to tootle the old gentleman all round the town?’ ”

AT MILAN. [94]

PARAY LE MONIAL. [95]

In returning from Italy this year I made the excursion to the curious shrine of Paray le Monial which I have described in an article in Evening Hours. All the time I had been abroad, as during my tour in Spain, I had sent monthly articles to Good Words, for which I was paid at the rate of five guineas a page—a sum, I believe, given besides only to Dean Alford and Arthur Stanley. But those were the palmy days of the magazine. I was paid much less afterwards, till it came down to a fifth of that sum. I spent the rest of the summer in London. It was during this year that I became a member of the Athenæum Club—an incalculable advantage. Twelve years before, old Dr. Hawtrey, the Provost of Eton, had said to me, “You ought to be a member of the Athenæum,” and I had answered “Then I wish you would propose me.” But I had quite forgotten about this, and had never known that the kind old man, long since dead, had really done it; so the news that my name was just coming up for ballot was a joyful surprise. I have since spent every London morning in steady work at the Athenæum, less disturbed there than even at Holmhurst. The difficulties which the club rules throw in the way of receiving visitors are a great advantage to students, and my life at the Athenæum has been as regular as clockwork. At breakfast I have always occupied the same table—behind the door leading to the kitchen, the one which, I believe, was always formerly used by Wilberforce. In the afternoons, when all the old gentlemen arrive, to poke up huge fires in winter and close all the windows in summer, I have never returned to the club.

Journal.

“London, June (in the Park).—Fine Lady.—‘How strange it is to see all these smart carriages driving about and nobody in them.’

“My simple self.—‘Nobody in them! why, they are quite full of people.’

“Fine Lady.—‘Ah, ye-es—people, but nobody all the same. We never drive in the Park now. It was only to show you this mob that I came. We are obliged to retreat, though, before their advancing battalions. They pursue us everywhere. There is no humiliation and suffering they won’t undergo in the chase. They drove us out of the Row long ago, and this year we took a row of chairs on Sunday afternoons on a little rising ground between Albert Gate and Stanhope Gate;[96] but the enemy pursued us, and as they always get the better of us, we shall be obliged to yield that position too. There is never any safety from them but in flight, for they are certainly our superiors in—numbers.’ ”

“June 22.—Went to see Madame du Quaire,[97] whom I found in her low French-looking room in Wilton Street, perfectly covered with pictures and oggetti. She talked of spiritualism—how she had been to a meeting at Mrs. Gregory’s—‘a truthful woman, who would not stand imposture if she knew it.’ She ‘cottoned’ up the medium, ‘parcequ’il faut mieux s’adresser à Dieu qu’à ses saints.’ They sat in the dark, which was depressing. Soon after she felt a shock ‘like a torpedo,’ and something like the leg of a chair came and scratched her head. A voice called her and said, ‘I am John King, and I want you, Madame du Quaire; I have got something for you.’ ‘Then,’ said Madame du Q., ‘he gave me a sort of chain of sharks’ teeth; the kind of thing of which, when it was given to some one at Honolulu, the recipient inquired, “C’est un collier?”—“Mais pardon,” said the donor, “c’est une robe.” ’

“June 24.—I dined with Lord Ravensworth at Percy’s Cross, and he told me—

“When I was a young man, I was staying at Balnagowan with Lady Mary Ross. She had a son and daughter. The daughter was a very handsome, charming girl. One day I was walking with her, and she told me that when her brother was ill of the measles, at their other place, Bonnington, where the Falls of the Clyde are, an old nurse who lived at the lodge some way off used to come up and sit by him in the day, returning home at night. One morning when she arrived, she was most dreadfully depressed, and being questioned as to the cause, said, ‘I am na lang for this warld; and not only me, but a greater than I is na lang for this warld—and that is the head o’ this hoose.’ And she said that as she was walking home, two lights came out of the larches and flitted before her: one was a feeble light, close to the ground; the other a large bright light higher up. They passed before her to the park gates and then disappeared. ‘And,’ she said, ‘I know that the feeble light is myself, and the greater light is the head o’ this hoose.’

“A few days afterwards the old woman took a cold and died, and within a fortnight Sir C. Ross died too,[98] while the little boy recovered and is alive still.”

Captain Fisher, who is engaged to be married to Victoria Liddell, told me that—

‘When Mr. Macpherson of Glen Truim was dying, his wife had gone to rest in a room looking out over the park, and sat near the window. Suddenly she saw lights as of a carriage coming in at the distant lodge-gate, and calling to one of the servants, said, ‘Do go down; some one is coming who does not know of all this grief.’ But the servant remained near her at the window, and as the carriage came near the house, they saw it was a hearse drawn by four horses and covered with figures. As it stopped at the porch door, the figures looked up at her, and their eyes glared with light; then they scrambled down and seemed to disappear into the house. Soon they reappeared and seemed to lift some heavy weight into the hearse, which then drove off at full speed, causing all the stones and gravel to fly up at the windows. Mrs. Macpherson and the butler had not rallied from their horror and astonishment, when the nurse watching in the next room came in to tell her that the Colonel was dead.

“I was surprised to hear that Mrs. Hungerford was in London, and asked why she had left Ireland so unexpectedly. I was told she had had a great fright—then I heard what it was.

“She was in her room in the evening in her beautiful house, which looks out upon a lake, beyond which rise hills wooded with fir-trees. Suddenly, on the opposite side of the lake, she saw a form which seemed—with sweeping garments—to move forward upon the water. It was gigantic. Mrs. Hungerford screamed, and her sister, Miss Cropper (who afterwards married Mr. Jerome), and the nurse came to her from the inner nursery. The three remained at the window for some time, but retreated as the figure advanced, and at length—being then so tall that it reached to the second floor—looked in at the window, and disclosed the most awful face of a hideous old woman.

“It was a Banshee, and one of the family died immediately afterwards.”

Captain Fisher also told us this really extraordinary story connected with his own family:—

“Fisher may sound a very plebeian name, but this family is of very ancient lineage, and for many hundreds of years they have possessed a very curious old place in Cumberland, which bears the weird name of Croglin Grange. The great characteristic of the house is that never at any period of its very long existence has it been more than one story high, but it has a terrace from which large grounds sweep away towards the church in the hollow, and a fine distant view.

“When, in lapse of years, the Fishers outgrew Croglin Grange in family and fortune, they were wise enough not to destroy the long-standing characteristic of the place by adding another story to the house, but they went away to the south, to reside at Thorncombe near Guildford, and they let Croglin Grange.

“They were extremely fortunate in their tenants, two brothers and a sister. They heard their praises from all quarters. To their poorer neighbours they were all that is most kind and beneficent, and their neighbours of a higher class spoke of them as a most welcome addition to the little society of the neighbourhood. On their part the tenants were greatly delighted with their new residence. The arrangement of the house, which would have been a trial to many, was not so to them. In every respect Croglin Grange was exactly suited to them.

“The winter was spent most happily by the new inmates of Croglin Grange, who shared in all the little social pleasures of the district, and made themselves very popular. In the following summer, there was one day which was dreadfully, annihilatingly hot. The brothers lay under the trees with their books, for it was too hot for any active occupation. The sister sat in the verandah and worked, or tried to work, for, in the intense sultriness of that summer day, work was next to impossible. They dined early, and after dinner they still sat out in the verandah, enjoying the cool air which came with evening, and they watched the sun set, and the moon rise over the belt of trees which separated the grounds from the churchyard, seeing it mount the heavens till the whole lawn was bathed in silver light, across which the long shadows from the shrubbery fell as if embossed, so vivid and distinct were they.

“When they separated for the night, all retiring to their rooms on the ground-floor (for, as I said, there was no upstairs in that house), the sister felt that the heat was still so great that she could not sleep, and having fastened her window, she did not close the shutters—in that very quiet place it was not necessary—and, propped against the pillows, she still watched the wonderful, the marvellous beauty of that summer night. Gradually she became aware of two lights, two lights which flickered in and out in the belt of trees which separated the lawn from the churchyard, and as her gaze became fixed upon them, she saw them emerge, fixed in a dark substance, a definite ghastly something, which seemed every moment to become nearer, increasing in size and substance as it approached. Every now and then it was lost for a moment in the long shadows which stretched across the lawn from the trees, and then it emerged larger than ever, and still coming on—on. As she watched it, the most uncontrollable horror seized her. She longed to get away, but the door was close to the window and the door was locked on the inside, and while she was unlocking it, she must be for an instant nearer to it. She longed to scream, but her voice seemed paralysed, her tongue glued to the roof of her mouth.

“Suddenly, she never could explain why afterwards, the terrible object seemed to turn to one side, seemed to be going round the house, not to be coming to her at all, and immediately she jumped out of bed and rushed to the door, but as she was unlocking it, she heard scratch, scratch, scratch upon the window, and saw a hideous brown face with flaming eyes glaring in at her. She rushed back to the bed, but the creature continued to scratch, scratch, scratch upon the window. She felt a sort of mental comfort in the knowledge that the window was securely fastened on the inside. Suddenly the scratching sound ceased, and a kind of pecking sound took its place. Then, in her agony, she became aware that the creature was unpicking the lead! The noise continued, and a diamond pane of glass fell into the room. Then a long bony finger of the creature came in and turned the handle of the window, and the window opened, and the creature came in; and it came across the room, and her terror was so great that she could not scream, and it came up to the bed, and it twisted its long, bony fingers into her hair, and it dragged her head over the side of the bed, and—it bit her violently in the throat.

“As it bit her, her voice was released, and she screamed with all her might and main. Her brothers rushed out of their rooms, but the door was locked on the inside. A moment was lost while they got a poker and broke it open. Then the creature had already escaped through the window, and the sister, bleeding violently from a wound in the throat, was lying unconscious over the side of the bed. One brother pursued the creature, which fled before him through the moonlight with gigantic strides, and eventually seemed to disappear over the wall into the churchyard. Then he rejoined his brother by the sister’s bedside. She was dreadfully hurt and her wound was a very definite one, but she was of strong disposition, not given either to romance or superstition, and when she came to herself she said, ‘What has happened is most extraordinary and I am very much hurt. It seems inexplicable, but of course there is an explanation, and we must wait for it. It will turn out that a lunatic has escaped from some asylum and found his way here.’ The wound healed and she appeared to get well, but the doctor who was sent for to her would not believe that she could bear so terrible a shock so easily, and insisted that she must have change, mental and physical; so her brothers took her to Switzerland.

“Being a sensible girl, when she went abroad, she threw herself at once into the interests of the country she was in. She dried plants, she made sketches, she went up mountains, and, as autumn came on, she was the person who urged that they should return to Croglin Grange. ‘We have taken it,’ she said, ‘for seven years, and we have only been there one; and we shall always find it difficult to let a house which is only one story high, so we had better return there; lunatics do not escape every day.’ As she urged it, her brothers wished nothing better, and the family returned to Cumberland. From there being no upstairs in the house, it was impossible to make any great change in their arrangements. The sister occupied the same room, but it is unnecessary to say she always closed her shutters, which, however, as in many old houses, always left one top pane of the window uncovered. The brothers moved, and occupied a room together exactly opposite that of their sister, and they always kept loaded pistols in their room.

“The winter passed most peacefully and happily. In the following March the sister was suddenly awakened by a sound she remembered only too well—scratch, scratch, scratch upon the window, and looking up, she saw, climbed up to the topmost pane of the window, the same hideous brown shrivelled face, with glaring eyes, looking in at her. This time she screamed as loud as she could. Her brothers rushed out of their room with pistols, and out of the front door. The creature was already scudding away across the lawn. One of the brothers fired and hit it in the leg, but still with the other leg it continued to make way, scrambled over the wall into the churchyard, and seemed to disappear into a vault which belonged to a family long extinct.

“The next day the brothers summoned all the tenants of Croglin Grange, and in their presence the vault was opened. A horrible scene revealed itself. The vault was full of coffins; they had been broken open, and their contents, horribly mangled and distorted, were scattered over the floor. One coffin alone remained intact. Of that the lid had been lifted, but still lay loose upon the coffin. They raised it, and there, brown, withered, shrivelled, mummified, but quite entire, was the same hideous figure which had looked in at the windows of Croglin Grange, with the marks of a recent pistol-shot in the leg; and they did—the only thing that can lay a vampire—they burnt it.”

Journal.

“Highcliffe, June 30, 1874.—It is delightful to be here again. I came on Friday with Everard Primrose,[99] a friend who always especially interests me, in spite of the intense melancholy which always makes him say that he longs for an early death.

“This place, so spiritually near the gates of heaven, is a great rest—quite a halt in life—after London, which, though I thought it filled with all great and beautiful things, packs in too much, so that one loses breath mentally. Here all is still, and the touching past and earnestly hopeful future lend a wonderful charm to the quiet life of the present. ‘Les beaux jours sont là; on ne les voit pas, on les sent.’[100]

“The dear lady of the castle is not looking well. I believe it is owing to her conversion to Lady Jane Ellice’s teetotalism; but she says it is not that. Lady Jane herself is a perpetual sunshine, which radiates on all around her and is quite enchanting. Miss Lindsay is the only other guest. In the evening Lady Jane sings and Miss Lindsay recites—most wonderfully—out of Shakspeare, with great power and pathos.

“It has not been fine weather, but we have had delightful walks on the sand, by the still sad-looking sea, with the Isle of Wight and its Needles rising in the faint distance, or in the thick woods of wind-blown ilex and arbutus. One day we went to ‘the Haven House,’ which is a place that often comes back to my recollection—picturesquely, gauntly standing on a tongue of land at the meeting of river and bay, at the end of a weird pine-wood, where the gnarled roots of the trees all writhe seawards out of the sand. Here groups of children were at play on the little jetties of sea-weedy stones and timber, while a row of herons were catching fish—solitarily—at great intervals, in the bay.

“Lady Mary Lambart came last night—a simple, self-composed girl, with a pale face and golden hair. She lives exclusively with her aunt, Lady Alicia Blackwood.

“Yesterday, in the ‘Lady Chapel’ of the great church at Christ-Church, I suddenly came upon the tomb of Mary Morgan, who died in 1796. She was companion to my great-aunt, the unhappy Countess of Strathmore, and this monument was dedicated ‘to the most rare of all connections, a perfect and disinterested friend, by the Countess of Strathmore, who, conscious of the treasure, valued its possession and mourned its loss. … To her heroic qualities, her cool deliberate courage, and her matchless persevering friendship, the tears of blood shed by one who despises weakness, the records of law and justice, and perhaps even the historic page, will bear witness to an astonished and admiring posterity.’

THE GARDEN TERRACE, HIGHCLIFFE. [101]

THE HAVEN HOUSE. [102]

“On the whole, Christ-Church is dull inside: it is so vast, and chiefly perpendicular. The old tombs are used as pedestals for modern monuments, and the old gravestones, stripped of their brasses, have modern epitaphs inserted between the ancient gothic inscriptions. Outside, the position is beautiful, on a little height above the river, near which are some old ruins, and which winds away to the sea through flat reedy meadow-lands, still marked by sails of boats where its outline is lost in distance.”

“June 30.—Mrs. Hamilton Hamilton came last night. She was a daughter of Sir G. Robinson. Her father’s aide-de-camp, Captain Campbell, a poor man, wanted to marry her, and she was attached to him; but it was not allowed, and they were separated. She was married to Mr. Hamilton Hamilton, but Captain Campbell never ceased to think of her, and he was ambitious for her sake, and became Sir Colin Campbell and Lord Clyde. Afterwards, when she was free, it was thought he would marry her. He sent her an Indian shawl, and he wrote to her, and he came to see her, but he never proposed; and she waited and expected, and at last she heard he had said, ‘No, it could not be; people would say it was absurd.’ But it would not have been absurd at all, and she would have liked it very much.

“One always feels here as if one did not half appreciate the perfection of each day as it goes by. It needs time to recognise and realise the warmth and colour which a noble mind, a true heart, and an ever heaven-aspiring soul can throw into even the commonest things of life. I often wonder how these walks, how these rooms with their old boisserie would appear with another inhabitant; quite unimpressive perhaps—but now they are simply illuminated. Beautiful pictures remain with one from everything at Highcliffe, but most of all that of the noble figure, seated in her high tapestried chair, painting at her little table by the light of the green lamp, and behind her a great vase filled with colossal branches of green chestnut, mingled with tall white lilies, such as Gabriel bore before the Virgin. As Lady Jane sings, she is roused to call for more songs, for ‘something pathetic, full of passion—love cannot be passionate enough.’—‘What! another?’ says Lady Jane. ‘Another, two nothers, three nothers: I cannot have enough.’

“ ‘In the perfect Christian, the principal virtues which produce an upright life and beauty of form are fervent faith and the love of our crucified Redeemer. As faith and love deepen, so external grace and beauty increase, until they become able to convert the hearts of men. … The soul that is beloved of God becomes beautiful in proportion as it receives more of the Divine grace.’ These words are from Savonarola’s Sermons, and do they not apply to our Lady?

“Lady Caroline Charteris[103] came to luncheon—plain in features, but in mind indescribably beautiful and interesting. She brought with her a most touching letter she had received from Dr. Brown[104] after his wife’s death. He spoke of the wells of salvation which men came to when they were truly thirsty, otherwise most people either passed them altogether, or stayed an instant, gazed into them admiringly, and still passed on. With Lady Caroline came Mrs. David Ricardo in a beautiful pink hat, like a Gainsborough in flesh and blood.”

“July 1.—A delightful morning in the library, fitful sunlight gleaming through the stained windows and upon the orange datura flowers in the conservatory, Lady Waterford painting at her table, Lady Jane and Miss Lindsay and Lady Mary Lambart[105] (a noble-looking girl like a picture by Bronzino) working around. Lady Waterford talked of the odd mistakes of words—how an old lady always said ‘facetious’ for ‘officious’—that when she came by the railway the porters had been so very ‘facetious,’ &c. Miss Mary Boyle condoled with an old woman at the Ashridge almshouses on the loss of her old husband. ‘Oh, yes, ma’am, it’s a great loss; but still, ma’am, I’m quite happy, for I know that he’s gone to Beelzebub’s bosom.’—‘I think you must mean Abraham.’—‘Well, yes, ma’am, since you mention it, I think that was the gentleman’s name.’

THE LIBRARY, HIGHCLIFFE. [106]

“In the afternoon we had a delightful walk to Hoborne, across a common on which a very rare kind of ophrys grows. Lady Waterford talked of a visit she had had at Ford from Mr. Wayte, the new Rector of Norham, who told her that a few nights before, his curate, Mr. Simon, had been obliged to go to fetch some papers out of the vestry at night. When he opened the church door, the moonlight was streaming in at the west window, and the middle of the nave was in bright light, but the side aisles were dark. He walked briskly down the middle of the church to the vestry, and, as he went, was aware that a figure dressed in white was sitting motionless in the corner of one of the pews in the aisle. He did not stay, but went into the vestry to get his papers, and, as he returned, he saw that the figure was still in the same place. Much agitated, he did not go up to it, but hurried home, and waited for daylight, when he returned at once to the church. The figure was still there, and did not move as he approached. When he uncovered its face, he saw that it was a dead body. The body had been found in the Tweed the day before, and the finders had not known what to do with it, so they had wrapped it in a sheet, and set it up in the church.”

“July 3.—We drove to Ashley Clinton—a charming place. Lady Waterford talked of the origin of words—of weeds as applied to dress. Mrs. Hamilton said how the Queen of the Sandwich Islands always spoke of flowers as weeds. ‘What pretty weeds there are in the cottage gardens.’

THE FOUNTAIN, HIGHCLIFFE. [107]

“Lady Waterford spoke of the picture of Miss Jane Warburton near her bedroom door; how she was appointed maid of honour to Queen Caroline at a time when maids of honour were rather fast, and how, at dinner, when the maids proposed toasts, and one gave the Archbishop of Canterbury, another the Dean of St. Paul’s, or some other old man, she alone had the courage to give the smartest and handsomest man of the day, the Duke of Argyll.[108] She was so laughed at by her companions that it made her cry, and at the drawing-room somebody said to the Duke of Argyll, ‘That is a young lady who has been crying for you,’ and told him the story. He was much touched, but unfortunately he was married. Afterwards, however, when his Duchess died, he married Miss Warburton, and, though she was very ugly, he thought her absolute perfection. In the midst of the most interesting conversation he would break off to ‘listen to his Jane;’ and he had the most absolute faith in her, till once he discovered that she had deceived him in something about a marriage for one of her daughters with an Earl of Dalkeith, which was not quite straightforward; and it broke his heart, and he died.”

“July 5.—I came up to London with Lady Waterford on Friday, and as usual I find what Carlyle calls ‘the immeasurable, soul-confusing uproar of a London life’ rather delightful than otherwise. To-day I have been with Mary Lefevre to Marylebone, to hear Mr. Haweis[109] preach. He is like a Dominican preacher in Italy, begins without a text, acts, crouches, springs, walks about in the pulpit—which is fortunately large enough, and every now and then spreads out vast black wings like a bat, and looks as if he was about to descend upon his appalled congregation. Part of his sermon was very solemn, but in part preacher and audience alike giggled. ‘He was converted last Sunday week: he was converted exactly at half-past four P.M., but since then they say that he has been seen at a theatre, at a ball, and at a racecourse, and that therefore his conversion is doubtful. Now you know my opinion is that none of these things are wrong in themselves. The question is not what the places are, but with what purpose and in what spirit people go to them. Our Saviour would not have thought it wrong to go to any of these places. John the Baptist certainly acted altogether on a lower level and went out as an ascetic into the wilderness. But our Saviour was both charitable and large-hearted. When He was asked to a feast, he went. He never sacrificed Himself unnecessarily, and so the ‘religious people’ of that day abused him for eating with publicans and sinners. It is just what ‘religious people,’ the Pharisees of our own day, say now. … Oh, let us leave these perpetual judgments of others.’

“I went afterwards to luncheon at Lady Castletown’s; she was not come in from church, but I went up into the drawing-room. A good-looking very smart young lady was sitting there, with her back to the window, evidently waiting also. After a pause, I made some stupid remark to her about heat or cold, &c. She looked at me, and said, ‘That is a very commonplace remark. I’ll make a remark. If a woman does not marry, she is nobody at all, nothing at all in the world; but if a man ever marries at all, he is an absolute fool.’ I said, ‘I know who you are; no one but Miss Rhoda Broughton would have said that.’ And it was she.

“Mr. Browning came and sat on the other side of her at luncheon. She said something of novels without love: I said something of black dose as a cure for love. Mr. Browning said that Aristophanes spoke of ‘the black-dose-loving Egyptians.’ Miss Broughton said, ‘How do you know the word means black dose?’—‘Because there is a similar passage in Herodotus which throws light upon the subject, with details on which it would not be delicate to dwell.’ ”

“July 6.—Dined with Madame du Quaire, meeting Mr. and Mrs. Wigan and Mr. and Mrs. Preston. Mrs. Wigan talked of children’s odd sayings: of one who, being told that God could see everywhere, asked if He could see the top of His own head; of another, at a school-feast, who being asked to have another bun, said, ‘Oh no, want to go home.’—‘Nonsense! have another bun.’—‘No, want to go home;’ upon which the giver of the feast took him up, and the child exclaimed, ‘Oh don’t, don’t bend me.’ ”

“July 8.—A drawing-party at Lambeth. Madeleine Lefevre and I went afterwards to show our drawings to Mrs. Tait, and had luncheon in the large cool pleasant rooms. In the afternoon I went with the Lefevres to the camp at Wimbledon. It is an immense enclosure, with streets of tents, lines of flags. In front of the officers’ tents are masses of flowers in pots sunk in a substratum of tan, as by law the turf may not be broken. Lady Ducie’s tent, whither we went, was most luxurious. We went on afterwards to Lady Leven’s garden, which was a beautiful sight, with brilliant groups of people. At the end, children were watching the manœuvres of some cats, who sat quiet with garlands of mice and birds upon their heads.”

“July 10.—Drew in the Tower of London, and dined at Lord Castletown’s to meet Mr. and Mrs. Godfrey Pearse (she Mario’s daughter), Madame du Quaire, and the truly extraordinary M. Vivier.

GATEWAY, LAMBETH PALACE. [110]

“He talked incessantly, but expected what Lady Castletown called ‘a gallery,’ and perfect silence and attention. ‘Je suis intéressant, moi! La petite de C. elle n’a rien: elle chante, elle fait les oiseaux, voilà tout. Pour entendre les oiseaux, vous ferez mieux d’aller dans vos squares: vous les entendrez, et vous payerez rien. Mais la petite de C. elle est moralement malsaine: moi je ne le suis pas, et je suis—intéressant.’

“He was so surprised at the number of servants: ‘And does all that sleep in the house?’ he said.

THE BLOODY GATE, TOWER OF LONDON. [111]

“In the evening he sang ‘Nellie,’ and his ‘Drame’—of a blind Spanish musician with a violin, watching windows for money, a perfect passion of avarice and expectation.”

“July 11.—Luncheon with Lady Morley, meeting Miss Flora Macdonald, who has still a reminiscence of the great beauty which brought such a surprise to the old Duchess of Gloucester when she asked Victor Emmanuel what he admired most in England, and he answered so promptly, ‘Miss Flora Macdonald.’ Lady Katherine Parker described—‘because, alas! it was discovered that we date just a little farther back than the Leicesters,’ having to sit near——, the most airified man in London. She was congratulated afterwards upon his having condescended to speak to her, but said he wouldn’t, only his neighbour on the other side was even more insignificant than herself, and to her he did not speak at all. He said, apropos of a dinner at Dorchester House, ‘Pray who are these Holfords?’—‘Oh,’ said Lady Katherine, ‘I believe they are people who have got a little shake-down somewhere in Park Lane.’

“I was at the ‘shake-down’ in the evening—something quite beautiful. The staircase is that of an old Genoese palace, and was one blaze of colour, and the broad landings behind the alabaster balustrades were filled with people, sitting or leaning over, as in old Venetian pictures. The dress of the time entirely lends itself to these effects. I sat in one of the arcades with Lady Sarah Lindsay and her daughters, then with Lady Carnarvon. We watched the amusing contrasts of the people coming upstairs—the shrinking of some, the dégagée manner of others, the dignity of a very few—in this, no one to be compared with Princess Mary. The Prince and Princess of Wales were close by (he very merry, talking with much action, like a foreigner), also the Prince and Princess of Prussia. Lady Somers looked glorious in a black dress thickly sprinkled with green beetles’ wings and a head-dress of the same.

“With Lady Carnarvon I had a long talk, and could not help feeling how truly one might apply to her Edgar Poe’s lines:—