Chapter XXI (2)

What a price she has paid for her great celebrity!--weariness,
vacuity, and utter deadness of spirit. The cup has been so highly
flavored that life is absolutely without savor or sweetness to her
now, nothing but tasteless insipidity. She has stood on a pinnacle
till all things have come to look flat and dreary; mere shapeless,
colorless, level monotony to her. Poor woman! what a fate to be
condemned to, and yet how she has been envied, as well as admired!

After dinner had only just time to go over my part and drive to the
theater. My dear, delightful Portia! The house was good, but the
audience dull, and I acted dully to suit them; but I hope my last
dress, which was beautiful, consoled them. What with sham business
and real business, I have had a busy day.

_Saturday, May 14th._--Received a note from Theodosia [Lady
Monson], and a whole cargo of delicious flowers from Cassiobury.
She writes me that poor old Foster [an old cottager who lived in
Lord Essex's park and whom my friend and I used to visit] is dying.
The last I saw of that "Old Mortality" was sitting with him one
bright sunset under his cottage porch, singing to him and dressing
his hat with flowers, poor old man! yet after walking this earth
upward of ninety-seven years the spirit as well as the flesh must
be weary. His cottage will lose half its picturesqueness without
his figure at the door; I wonder who will take care now of the
roses he was so fond of, and the pretty little garden I used to
forage in for lilies of the valley and strawberries! I shall never
see him again, which makes me sad; I was often deeply struck by the
quaint wisdom of that old human relic, and his image is associated
in my thoughts with evening walks and summer sunsets and lovely
flowers and lordly trees, and he will haunt Cassiobury always to
me. I went with my mother to buy my dresses for "Hernani," which
will cost me a fortune and a half.

GREAT RUSSELL STREET, Saturday.
MY DEAREST H----,

You see I have taken your advice, and, moreover, your paper, in
order that, in spite of the dispersion of Parliament and the
unattainability of franks, our correspondence may lose nothing in
bulk, though it must in frequency. I think you are behaving very
shabbily in not writing to me. Are you consulting your own
pleasure, or my purse? I dedicate so much of my income to purposes
which go under the head of "money thrown away;" don't you think the
cost of our correspondence may be added to that without seriously
troubling my conscience? What shall I say to you? "Reform" is on
the tip of my pen, and great as are our private matters of anxiety,
they scarcely outweigh in our minds the national interest that is
engrossing almost every thinking person throughout the country. You
know I am no politician, and my shallow causality and want of
adequate information alike unfit me from understanding, much less
discussing, public questions of great importance; but the present
crisis has aroused me to intense interest and anxiety about the
course events are taking. You can have no conception of the state
of excitement prevailing in London at this moment. The scene in the
House of Lords immediately preceding the dissolution the papers
will have described to you, though if the spectators and
participators in it may be believed, the tumult, the disorder, the
Billingsgate uproar on that occasion would not be easy to describe.
Lord Londonderry, it seems, thought that the days of _faust-recht_
had come back again, and I fancy more than he are of that opinion.

An illumination was immediately ordered by the Lord Mayor Donkin
(or _key_, as "t'other side" call him); but, owing to the shortness
of the notice he gave, it seems the show of light was not
satisfactory to the tallow chandler part of the population, so
another was appointed two nights after. My mother and the two
Harrys went out in the open carriage to drive through the streets.
I was depressed and disinclined for sight-seeing, and did not go,
which I regretted afterward, as all strong exhibitions of public
feeling are curious and interesting. They say the crowd was immense
in all the principal thoroughfares, and of the lowest order. They
testified their approbation of the various illuminated devices by
shouts and hurrahs and applause; their displeasure against the
various non-illuminators was more violently manifested by assailing
their houses and breaking their windows.

Sundry were the glass sacrifices offered at the shrine of
consistent Tory patriotism at the West End of the town. The mottoes
and sentences on some of the illuminations were noteworthy for
their democratic flavor: "The king and the people," "The people of
England," "The glorious dissolution," "The glorious reform," "The
people and the press," "The people's triumph." A man who seemed by
his dress to belong to the very lowest class (a cross apparently
between a scavenger and a rag-seller), with a branch of laurel
waving in his tattered hat, stopped before this last sentence and
exclaimed, "No--they don't yet; but they will."

I have been having quite a number of holidays at the theater
lately. They have brought out a comedy in which I do not play, and
are going to bring out a sort of historical melodrama on the life
of Bonaparte, so that I think I shall have easy work, if that
succeeds, for the rest of the season. I have just finished
correcting the proof-sheets of "Francis I.," and think it looks
quite pretty in print, and have dedicated it to my mother, which I
hope will please her....

Dear H----, this is Saturday, the 14th, and 'tis now exactly three
weeks since I began this letter. I know not what you will think of
this, but, indeed, I am almost worn out with the ceaseless
occupations of one sort and another that are crowded into every
day, and the impossibility of commanding one hour's quiet out of
the twenty-four....

I am afraid we shall not come to Ireland this summer, after all, my
dear H----. The Dublin manager and my father have not come to
terms, and I hear Miss Inverarity (a popular singer) is engaged
there, so that I conclude we shall not act there this season. This
is so great a disappointment to me that I cannot say anything
whatever about it. I have been acting Lady Teazle for Mr. Bartley
and my father's benefit. It seems to have pleased the public very
well. Without caring for it much myself, I find it light and
amusing work, and much easier for me than Lady Townley, because it
is a natural and that an entirely artificial character; the whole
tone and manners, too, of Sheridan's rustic belle are much more
within my scope than those of the woman of fashion of Sir John
Vanbrugh's play.

On Friday we had our first rehearsal of "Hernani," at Bridgewater
House, and I was greatly surprised with some of the acting, which,
allowing for a little want of technical experience, was, in Mr.
Craven's instance, really very good. He is the grandson of old Lady
Craven, the Margravine of Anspach, and enacts the hero of the
piece, which I think he will do very well. The whole play, I think,
will be fairly acted for an amateur performance. Lord and Lady
Francis have pressed my mother very much to go down for a little
while to Oatlands, the beautiful place close to Weybridge, which
belonged to the Duke of York, and of which they have taken a lease.
My mother has accepted their invitation, and looks forward with
great pleasure to revisiting her dear Weybridge. I know a good deal
more of that lovely neighborhood and all its wild haunts than the
present proprietors of Oatlands. Lady Francis is a famous
horsewoman, and told me by way of inducement to go there that we
would gallop all over the country together, which sounded very
pleasant....

I called on my aunt Siddons the other day, and was shocked to find
her looking wretchedly ill; she has not yet got rid of the
erysipelas in her legs, and complained of intense headache. Poor
woman! she suffers dreadfully.... Cecilia's life has been one
enduring devotion and self-sacrifice. I cannot help wishing, for
both their sakes, that the period of her mother's infirmity and
physical decay may be shortened. I received a charming letter from
Theodosia yesterday, accompanying a still more charming basketful
of delicious flowers from dear Cassiobury--how much nicer they are
than human beings! I don't believe I belong to man (or woman) kind,
I like so many things--the whole material universe, for
example--better than what one calls one's fellow-creatures. She
told me that old Foster (you remember the old cottager in
Cassiobury Park) was dying. The news contrasted sadly with the
sweet, fresh, living blossoms that it came with. The last time that
I saw that old man I sat with him under his porch on a bright sunny
evening, talking, laughing, winding wreaths round his hat, and
singing to him, and that is the last I shall ever see of him. He
was a remarkable old man, and made a strong impression on my fancy
in the course of our short acquaintance. There was a strong and
vivid _remnant_ of mind in him surviving the contest with ninety
and odd years of existence; his manner was quaint and rustic
without a tinge of vulgarity; he is fastened to my memory by a
certain wreath of flowers and sunset light upon the brook that ran
in front of his cottage, and the smell of some sweet roses that
grew over it, and I shall never forget him.

I went to the opera the other night and saw Pasta's "Medea" for the
first time. I shall not trouble you with any ecstasies, because,
luckily for you, my admiration for her is quite indescribable; but
I have seen grace and majesty as perfect as I can conceive, and so
saying I close my account of my impressions. I fancied I was
slightly disappointed in Taglioni, whose dancing followed Pasta's
singing, but I suppose the magnificent tragical performance I had
just witnessed had numbed as it were my power of appreciation of
her grace and elegance, and yet she seemed to me like a _dancing
flower_; so you see I must have like her very much.

God bless you, dear; pray write to me very soon. I want some
consolation for not seeing you, nor the dear girls, nor the sea. I
could think of that fresh, sparkling, fresh looking, glassy sea
till I cried for disappointment.

Ever yours,
F. A. K.

The Miss Inverarity mentioned in this letter was a young Scotch singer of very remarkable talent and promise, who came out at Covent Garden just at this time. She was one of the tallest women I ever saw, and had a fine soprano voice as high as herself, and sang English music well. She was a very great favorite during the short time that I remember her on the stage.

MY DEAREST H----,

My mother has just requested me to talk with A---- about her
approaching first communion, and it troubles me because I fear I
cannot do so satisfactorily to her (I mean my mother) and myself. I
think my feeling about the sacrament, or rather the preparation
necessary for receiving it, is different from hers. It is not so
much to me an awful as a merciful institution. One goes to the
Lord's Table because one is weak and wicked and wretched, not
because one is, or even has striven to be, otherwise. A holy
reverence for the holy rite is indispensable, but not, I think,
such a feeling as would chill us with fear, or cast us down in
despondency. The excess of our poverty and humility is our best
claim to it, and therefore, though the previous "preparations," as
it is rather technically called, may be otherwise beneficial, it
does not seem to me necessary, much less indispensable. Our Lord
did not say, "Cleanse yourselves, amend yourselves, strip
yourselves of your own burdens and come to me;" but, "Come to me
and I will cleanse you, I will cure you, I will help you and give
you rest." It is remembering this that I venture to take the
sacrament, but I know other people, and I believe my mother among
them, think a much more specific preparation necessary, and I am
afraid, therefore, that I might not altogether meet my mother's
views in what I might say to A---- upon the subject. I wish you
would tell me what your opinion and feeling is about this.

Your affectionate F. A. K.

_Sunday, May 15th._--Walked home from church with Mrs. Montagu and
Emily and Mrs. Procter, discussing among various things the
necessity for "preparation" before taking the sacrament. I suppose
the publican in the parable had not prepared his prayer, and I
suppose he would have been a worthy communicant.

They came in and sat a long time with my mother talking about Sir
Thomas Lawrence, of whom she spoke as a perfect riddle. I think he
was a dangerous person, because his experience and genius made him
delightfully attractive, and the dexterity of his flattery amounted
in itself to a fine art. The talk then fell upon the possibility of
friendship existing between men and women without sooner or later
degenerating, on one part or the other, into love. The French
rhymster sings--

"Trop tot, hélas, l'amour s'enflamme,
Et je sens qu'il est mal aisé;
Que l'ami d'une belle dame,
Ne soit un amant déguisé."

My father came in while the ladies were still here, and Mrs.
Procter behaved admirably well about her husband's play....

I do think it is too bad of the management to have made use of my
name in rejecting that piece, when, Heaven knows, so far from
_rejecting_, I never even _object_ to anything I am bidden to do;
that is, never visibly or audibly....

Mrs. P---- called, and the talk became political and lugubriously
desponding, and I suddenly found myself inspired with a
contradictory vein of hopefulness, and became vehement in its
defense. In spite of all the disastrous forebodings I constantly
have, I cannot but trust that the spread of enlightenment and
general progress of intelligence in the people of this country--the
good judgment of those who have power and the moderation of those
who desire improvement--will effect a change without a _crash_ and
achieve reform without revolution.

_Wednesday, May 18th._--My mother and I started at two o'clock for
Oatlands. The day was very enjoyable, for the dust and mitigated
east wind were in our backs; the carriage was open, and the sun was
almost too powerful, though the earth has not yet lost its first
spring freshness, nor the trees, though full fledged, their early
vivid green. The turf has not withered with the heat, and the
hawthorn lay thick and fragrant on every hedge, like snow that the
winter had forgotten to melt, and the sky above was bright and
clear, and I was very happy. I had taken "The Abbot" with me, which
I had never read; but my mother did not sleep, so we chatted
instead of my reading. She recalled all our former times at
Weybridge. It was a great pleasure to retrace this well-known road,
and again to see dear old Walton Bridge and the bright, broad
Thames, with the noble chestnut trees on its banks, the smooth,
smiling fields stretching beyond it, and the swans riding in such
happy majesty on its bosom. I really think I do deserve to live in
the country, it is so _delightsome_ to me. We reached Oatlands an
hour before dinner-time and found the party just returned from
riding. We sauntered through part of the grounds to the cemetery of
the Duchess of York's dogs.... We had some music in the evening.
Lady Francis sang and I sang, and was frightened to death, as I
always am when asked to do so....

_Thursday, 19th._--A bright sunny morning, the trees all bowing and
bending, and the water chafing and crisping under a fresh, strong,
but not cold, wind. I lost my way in the park and walked toward
Walton, thinking I was going to Weybridge, but, discovering my
mistake, turned about, and crossing the whole park came out upon
the common and our old familiar cricketing ground. I flew along the
dear old paths to our little cottage, but "Desolate was the
dwelling of Morna"--the house closed, the vine torn down, the grass
knee-deep, the shrubs all trailing their branches and blossoms in
disorderly luxuriance on the earth, the wire fence broken down
between the garden and the wood, the gate gone; the lawn was sown
with wheat, and the little pine wood one tangled maze, without
path, entrance, or issue. I ran up the mound to where John used to
stand challenging the echo with his bugle....

O tempo passato!--the absent may return and the distant be brought
near, the dead be raised and in another world rejoin us, but a day
that is gone is gone, and all eternity can give us back no single
minute of the past! I gathered a rose and some honeysuckle from the
poor disheveled shrubs for my mother, and ran back to Oatlands to
breakfast. After breakfast we went over "Hernani," with Mrs.
Sullivan for prompter, and when that was over everybody went out
walking; but I was too tired with my morning's tramp, and sat under
a tree on the lawn reading a very good little book on the
sacrament, which went over the ground of my late discussion with
Mrs. Montagu and Mrs. Procter on the subject of "preparation" for
taking it.

After lunch there was a general preparation for riding, and just as
we were all mounted it began to rain, and persevered till, in
despair, Mr. and Mrs. Sullivan rode off without our promised
escort. Mr. C---- arrived just as we had disequipped, and the
gentlemen all dispersed. Lady Francis and I sang together for some
time, and suddenly the clouds withholding their tears, she and I,
in one of those instants of rapid determination which sometimes
make or mar a fate, tore on our habits again, jumped on our horses,
and galloped off together over the park. We had an enchanting,
gray, soft afternoon, with now and then a rain-drop and sigh of
wind, like the last sob of a fit of crying. The earth smelt
deliriously fresh, and shone one glittering, sparkling, vivid
green. Our ride was delightful, and we galloped back just in time
to dress for dinner.

In the evening, sauntering on the lawn and pleasant, bright talk
indoors. Lord John (the present venerable Earl Russell) would be
quite charming if he wasn't so afraid of the rain. I do not think
he is made of sugar, but, politically, perhaps he is the salt of
the earth; he certainly succeeds in keeping himself _dry_.

_Friday, Oatlands._--Walked out before breakfast; the night's rain
had refreshed the earth and revived every growing thing, the east
wind had blown itself away, and a warm, delicious western breeze
came fluttering fitfully over the new-mown lawn. After breakfast we
rehearsed Mr. Craven's and Captain Shelley's and my scenes in
"Hernani." I think they will do very well if they do not shy at the
moment of action, or rather acting. We had some music, and then the
gentlemen went out shooting. I took "The Abbot" and established
myself on a hay-cock, leaving Lady Francis to her own indoor
devices. By and by the whole party came out, and we sat on the lawn
laughing and talking till the gentlemen's carriage was announced,
and our rival heroes took their departure for town, cheek by jowl,
in a pretty equipage of Mr. Craven's, in the most amicable mood
imaginable. As soon as they were off we mounted and rode out, past
our old cottage, down by Brooklands, through the second wood, and
by the Fairies' Oak. O Lord King, Lord King (we were riding through
the property of the Earl of Lovelace, then Lord King), if I was one
of those bishops whom you do not love, I would curse,
excommunicate, and anathematize you for cutting down all those
splendid trees and laying bare those deep, dark, leafy nooks, the
haunts of a thousand "Midsummer Night's Dreams," to the common air
and the staring sun. The sight of the dear old familiar paths
brought the tears to my eyes, for, stripped and thinned of their
trees and robbed of their beauty, my memory restored all their
former loveliness. On we went down to Byefleet to the mill, to
Langton's through the sweet, turfy meadows, by hawthorn hedges
musical as sweet, over the picturesque little bridge and along that
deep, dark, sleepy water flowing so silently in its sullen
smoothness. On we went a long way over a wide common, where the
coarse-grained peaty earth and golden glory of the flowering gorse
reminded me of Suffolk's motto--

"Cloth of gold, do not despise
That thou art mix'd with cloth of frieze;
Cloth of frieze, be not too bold
That thou art mix'd with cloth of gold."

Back by St. George's Hill, snatching many a leaf and blossom as I
rode to carry back to A---- mementoes of our dear Weybridge days,
and so home by half-past seven, just time to dress for dinner. As
we rode along, Lord Francis and I discussed poets and poetry _in
general_--more particularly Byron, Keats, and Shelley; it was a
very pretty and proper discourse for such a ride.

In the evening heard all manner of delicious ghost stories;
afterward made music, Lady Francis and I trying all sorts of duets,
my mother keeping up a "humming" third and Lord Francis listening
and applauding with equal zeal and discretion....

_Saturday, May 21st._--My brother John come home from Spain....

_Sunday, 22d._--What a very odd process dreaming is! I _dreamt_ in
the night that John had come home, and flung myself out of bed in
my sleep to run downstairs to him, which naturally woke me; and
then I remembered that he was come home and that I had seen and
welcomed him, which it seems to me I might as well have dreamed too
while I was about it, and saved myself the jump out of bed. I hate
dreaming; it's like being mad--having one's brain work without the
control of one's will.

Dear A---- took the sacrament for the first time at the Swiss
church. On my return from church in the afternoon found Sir Ralph
and Lady Hamilton and Don Telesforo de Trueba. I like that young
Spaniard; he's a clever man. It was such fun his telling me all the
story of the Star of Seville, little imagining I had just
perpetrated a five-act tragedy on that identical subject.

_Tuesday, May 24th._--Drove down to Clint's studio to see Cecilia's
(Siddons's) portrait. It's a pretty picture of a "fine piece of a
woman," as the Italians say, but it has none of the very decided
character of her face....

_Wednesday, May 25th._--After dinner went over my part, dressed and
set off for Bridgewater House for our dressed rehearsal of
"Hernani." Found the stage in a state of _unfinish_, the house
topsy-turvy, and every body to the right and left. Sat for an hour
in the drawing-room while our very specially small and select
audience arrived. Then heard Lady Francis, Henry Greville, Mrs.
Bradshaw, and Mr. Mitford try their glee--one of Moore's melodies
arranged for four voices--which they sang at the top of their lungs
in order to hear themselves, while the carpenters and joiners
hammered might and main at the other end of the gallery finishing
the theater.

About nine they were getting under way, and we presently began the
rehearsal. The dresses were all admirable; they (not the clothes,
but the clothes pegs) were all horribly frightened. I was a little
nervous and rather sad, and I felt strange among all those foolish
lads, taking such immense delight in that which gives me so very
little, dressing themselves up and acting. To be sure, "nothing
pleaseth but rare accidents." Mr. M----, our prompter, thought fit
by way of prompting to keep up a rumbling bass accompaniment to our
speaking by reading every word of the play aloud, as the singers
are prompted at the opera house, which did not tend much to our
assistance. Everything went very smoothly till an unlucky young
"mountaineer" rushed on the stage and terrified me and Hernani half
to death by _in_articulating some horrible intelligence of the
utmost importance to us, which his fright rendered quite
incomprehensible. He stood with his arms wildly spread abroad,
stuttering, sputtering, madly ejaculating and gesticulating, but
not one articulate word could he get out. I thought I should have
exploded with laughter, but as the woman said who saw the murder,
"I knew I mustn't (faint), and I didn't." With this trifling
exception it all went off very well. Either I was fagged with my
morning's ride or the constitution of the gallery is bad for the
voice; I never felt so exhausted with the mere effort of speaking,
and thought I should have died prematurely and in earnest in the
last scene, I was so tired. When it was over we adjourned with Lord
and Lady Francis and the whole _dramatis personæ_ to Mrs. W----'s
magnificent house and splendid supper....

While we were at table everybody suddenly stood up, my mother and
myself reverently with the rest, when the whole company drank my
health, and I collapsed down into my chair as red and as _limp_ as
a skein of scarlet wool, and my mother with some confusion
expressed my obligation and her own surprise at the compliment. I
talked a good deal to Captain Shelley, who is a nice lad, and,
considering his beauty, and the admiration bestowed on him by all
the fine ladies in London, remarkably unaffected. We are asked down
to Oaklands again, and I hope my work at the theater will allow of
my going. What a shocking mess those young gentlemen actors did
make of their greenroom this evening, to be sure! rouge, swords,
wine, mustaches, soda water, and cloaks strewed in every direction.
I wonder what they would say to the drawing-room decorum of our
Covent Garden greenroom.

_Thursday, May 26th._--Tried on dresses with Mrs. Phillips, and
talked all the while about the characteristics of Shakespeare's
women with Mrs. Jameson, who had come to see me. I pity her from
the bottom of my heart; she has a heavy burden to carry, poor
woman.... Went in the evening to rather a dull dinner, after which,
however, I had the pleasure of hearing Mrs. Frere sing, which she
did very charmingly, and so as quite to justify her great society
musical reputation. After our dinner at the F----s' we went to Mrs.
W----'s evening party, where I sat alone, heard somebody sing a
song, was introduced to a man, spoke incoherently to several
people, got up, was much jostled in a crowd of human beings, and
came home--and that's society. We are asked to a great supper at
Chesterfield House, after a second representation which is to be
given of "Hernani." My mother thinks it is too much exertion and
dissipation for me, and as it is not a ball I do not care to go.

_Friday, May 27th._--At eight o'clock drove with my mother to
Bridgewater House. We went into the library, where there was
nobody, and Lady Francis, Henry Greville, and Lady Charlotte came
and sat with us. I was literally crying with fright. Lady Francis
took me to my dressing-room, my mother rouged me, blessed me, and
went off to join the audience assembled in the great gallery. I
went over my part once and my room a hundred times in every
direction. At nine they began; the audience very wisely were
totally in the dark, which threw out the brilliantly illuminated
stage to great advantage, and considering that they were the finest
folk in England they behaved remarkably well--listened quietly and
attentively, and applauded like Covent Garden galleries. It all
went well except poor Mr. Craven's first speech, in which he got
out. I don't know whether Lady L---- was among the spectators, and
gave him _des éblouissements_. It all went off admirably, however,
and oh, how glad I was when it was over!

_Saturday, May 28th._--I was awakened by a basket of flowers from
Cassiobury, and a letter from Theodosia. Old Foster is dead. I wish
he might be buried near the cottage. I should like to know where to
think of his resting-place, poor old man!...

In the evening Mrs. Jameson, the Fitzhughs, R---- P----, and a Mr.
K----, a friend of John's, and sundry and several came.... We acted
charades, and they all went away in high good humor.

_Sunday, May 29th._--An "eternal, cursed, cold, and heavy rain," as
Dante sings. My mother, A----, and I went to the Swiss church; the
service is shorter and more unceremonious than I like; that sitting
to sing God's praise, and standing to pray to Him, is displeasing
to all my instincts of devotion.

After church my mother was reading Milton's treatise on Christian
doctrine, and read portions of it aloud to me. I always feel afraid
of theological or controversial writings, and yet the faith that
shrinks from being touched lest it should totter is certainly not
on the right foundation. I suppose we ought, on the contrary, to
examine thoroughly the reason of the faith that is in us. Declining
reading upon religious subjects may be prudent, but it may be
indolence, cowardice, or lack of due interest in the matter. I
think I must read that treatise of Milton's.

GREAT RUSSELL STREET, May 29th, 1831.
MY DEAREST H----,

I have but little time for letter-writing, getting daily "deeper
and deeper still" in the incessant occupations of one sort and
another that crowd upon and almost overwhelm me; and now my care is
not so much whether I shall have time to write you a long letter,
as how I shall get leisure to write to you at all. You complain
that, in spite of the present interest I profess in public affairs,
I have given you no details of my opinion about them--my hopes or
fears of the result of the Reform movement. I have other things
that I care more to write to you about than politics, and am chary
of my space, because, though I can cross my letter, I can only have
one sheet of paper. "The Bill," modified as it now is, has my best
prayers and wishes, for to say that the removal of certain abuses
will not give the people bread which they expect is nothing against
it; but, at the same time that I sincerely hope this measure will
be carried, I cannot conceive what Government will do _next_, for
though trade is at this moment prosperous, great poverty and
discontent exist among large classes of the people, and as soon as
these needy folk find out that Reform is really not immediate bread
_and_ cheese _and_ beer, they will seek something else which they
may imagine will be those desired items of existence, and that is
what it may be difficult to give them. In the mean time party
spirit here has reached a tremendous pitch; old friendships are
broken up and old intimacies cease; former cordial acquaintances
refuse to meet each other, houses are divided, and the dearest
relations disturbed, if not destroyed. Society is become a sort of
battle-field, for every man (and woman too) is nothing if not
political. In fact, there really appears to be no middle or
moderating party, which I think strange and to be deplored. It
seems as if it were a mere struggle between the nobility and the
mobility, and the middle-class--that vast body of good sense,
education, and wealth, and efficient to hold the beam even between
the scales--throws itself man by man into one or the other of them,
and so only swells the adverse parties on each side.

Parliament meets again in a few days, and then comes the tug of
war. Lord John Russell was at Oatlands while we were there, and as
the Francis Egertons and their guests were all anti-Reformers, they
led him rather a hard life. He bore all their attacks with great
good humor, however, and with the well-satisfied smile of a man who
thinks himself on the right, and knows himself on the safe side,
and wisely forbore to reply to their sallies. Our visit there was
delightful.

As the distance is but one and twenty miles, my mother and I posted
down in the open carriage. The only guests we found on our arrival
were Mr. and Mrs. Sullivan (she is a daughter of Lady Dacre's, and
a charming person), Lord John Russell, and two of our _corps
dramatique_, Mr. Craven and Captain Shelley, son of Sir John
Shelley, a handsome, good-humored, pleasant young gentleman, who
acts Charles V. in "Hernani." I got up very early the first morning
I was there and went down before breakfast to our little old
cottage. In the lane leading to it I met a poor woman who lived
near us, and whom we used to employ. I spoke to her, but she did
not know me again. I wonder if these four years can have changed me
so much? The tiny house had not been inhabited since we lived
there.... My aunt Siddons is better, and Cecy very well.

Your affectionate
F. A. K.

[The beautiful domain of Oatlands was only rented at this time by Lord Francis Egerton, who delighted so much in it that he made overtures for the purchase of it. The house was by no means a good one, though it had been the abode of royalty; but the park was charming, and the whole neighborhood, especially the wooded ranges of St. George's Hill, extremely wild and picturesque.... Lord Francis Egerton bought St. George's Hill, at the foot of which he built Hatchford, Lady Ellesmere's charming dower house and residence after his death, and the house of Oatlands became a country inn, very pleasant to those who had never known it as the house of former friends, and therefore did not meet ghosts in all its rooms and garden walks; and the park was cut up into small villa residences and rascally inclined citizen's boxes. Hatchford, the widowed home of Lady Ellesmere and burial-place of her brother, to whose memory she erected there an elaborate mausoleum, has passed out of the family possessions and become the property of strangers. One son of the house lives on St. George's Hill, and has his home where I have so often drawn rein while riding with his father and mother to look over the wild, wooded slopes to the smiling landscape stretching in sunny beauty far below us.]

_Monday, May 30th._ ... The Francis Egertons called, and sat a long
time discussing "Hernani." ... I must record such a good pun of
his, which he only, alas, _dreamt_. He dreamt Lord W---- came up to
him, covered with gold chains and ornaments of all sorts, and that
he had called him the "Chain Pier." ... In the evening to
Bridgewater House. As soon as we arrived, I went to my own private
room, and looked over my part. We began at nine. Our audience was
larger than the last time. The play went off extremely well; we
were all improved. I was very anxious to play well, for the
Archbishop of York was in the front row, and he (poor gentleman!)
had never had the happiness of seeing me, the play-house being
forbidden ground to him. [This seems rather inconsistent, as all
the lesser clergy at this time frequented the theater without fear
or reproach. Dr. Hughes, the Very Reverend Prebend of St. Paul's,
Milman, Harness, among our own personal friends, were there
constantly, not to speak of my behind-the-scenes acquaintance, the
Rev. A.F.] I should like to seduce an old Archbishop into a liking
for the wickedness of my mystery, so I did my very best to edify
him, according to my kind and capacity.... At the end of the play,
as I lay dead on the stage, the king (Captain Shelley) was cutting
three great capers, like Bayard on his field of battle, for joy his
work was done, when his pretty dancing shoes attracted, in spite of
my decease, my attention, and I asked, with rapidly reviving
interest in existence, what they meant, on which I was informed
that the supper at Mrs. Cunliffe's was indeed a ball. I jumped up
from the dead, hurried off my stage robes, and hurried on my
private apparel, and followed my mother into the saloon. Here I had
delightful talk (though I believe I was dancing on my mind's feet
all the while) with Lord John Russell, Miss Berry, Lady Charlotte
Lindsay, and that charming person, James Wortley, and I got a
glimpse of Lord O----'s lovely face, who is a beautiful creature.
After being duly stared at by the crowds of my exalted
fellow-beings who filled the room, Lady Francis said she would send
them away, and we adjourned to Mrs. Cunliffe's, and had a very fine
ball; that is to say, we had neither room to dance, nor space to
sit, nor power to move.

"Oh, pleasure is a very pleasant thing," as Byron sings and H----
for ever says, and certainly a good ball is a pleasant thing, and
in spite of the above drawbacks I was enchanted with everything.
Such shoals of partners! such nice people! such perfect music! such
a delightful floor! Danced till the day had one eye wide open, and
then home to bed--what a good thing it is to have one under the
circumstances! I hope I have not been very tipsy to-night, but it
is difficult with so many stimulants to keep _quite_ sober. Broad
daylight! Six o'clock!

_Tuesday, May 21st._--My feet ache so with dancing that I can
hardly stand. Did not some traditional princesses of German
fairyland dance their shoes and stockings to pieces?

Going into the drawing-room I found my darling Dr. Combe there, and
if I had not been so tired I must have made a jump at his neck, I
was so very glad to see him. He brought me a letter from Mr. Combe,
whom I love only one step lower. He sat with us but a short time,
and leaves town to-morrow, which I am sorry for, first, because I
should like to have seen him again so very much, and next, because
I should have been glad that my mother became better acquainted
with the mental charms and seductions of the man whose outward
appearance seems to have allayed some of her apprehensions for the
safety of my heart and those of my Edinburgh cousins. Mrs. W----
called soon after. She is intent upon my acting Mlle. Mar's part in
"Henri Trois." I can do nothing with any French part in Covent
Garden. If they can find a theater of half that size to get it up
in, well and good; but seen from a distance, which defies
discrimination of objects, a thistle is as good as a rose, and in
that enormous frame refinement is mere platitude, and finish of
detail an unnecessary minutia.

We went to the theater to see a new piece, I believe by Mrs.
Norton. The pit and galleries were very indifferent; the dress
circle and private boxes full of fine folk. Lady St. Maur
(Georgiana Sheridan, Mrs. Norton's youngest sister, afterward
Duchess of Somerset and Queen of Beauty) and her husband, with
Corinne and Mr. Norton, in a box opposite ours. What a terrible
piece! what atrocious situations and ferocious circumstances!
tinkering, starving, hanging--like a chapter out of the Newgate
Calendar. But, after all, she's in the right; she has given the
public what they desire, given them what they like. Of course it
made one cry horribly; but then of course one cries when one hears
of people reduced by sheer craving to eat nettles and
cabbage-stalks. Destitution, absolute hunger, cold and nakedness,
are no more subjects for artistic representation than sickness,
disease, and the _real_ details of idiotcy, madness, and death. All
art should be an idealized; elevated representation (not imitation)
of nature; and when beggary and low vice are made the themes of the
dramatist, as in this piece, or of the poet, as in the works of
Crabbe, they seem to me to be clothing their inspirations in wood
or lead, or some base material, instead of gold or ivory. The clay
of the modeler is more _real_, but the marble of the sculptor is
the clay glorified. In Crabbe's writings one has at least the
comfort and consolation of a high moral sense, charming
versification, and an occasional tender, exquisite expression of
the beauties of nature. Our play to-night could not boast of these
_alleviations_.

_Wednesday, June 1st._--At the riding school saw Miss C----, who
wants me to get the play changed at Covent Garden _for this
evening_--"rien que cela!" What a fine thing it is to be "one of
those people!" They fancy that anybody's business of any sort can
be postponed to the first whim that enters their head. My mother
came with Dr. Combe in the carriage to fetch me from the riding
school. At home found a note from Lady Francis and the epilogue
Lord Francis has written to "Hernani," which I am certainly bound
to like, for it is highly complimentary to me.

I went to the real theater in the evening to do real work. The
house was good, but I played like a wretch--ranted, roared, and
acted altogether infamously. The fact was I was tired to death, and
of course violence always has to supply the place of strength.
Unluckily all the F----s were there, and I felt sorry for them. To
be sure, they had never seen "The Hunchback" before, and I should
think would heartily desire never to see it again; my performance
was shameful.

_Thursday, June 2d._--Mr. Hayter called. Lord Francis has spoken to
him about the picture he wishes him to do of me, and he came to
take the position, and I gave him his choice of three or four. I
dare say he will make a very pretty picture. As for my likeness,
that _I_ am not hopeful about. I have gone through the operation in
vain so very often. Murray has sent me some beautiful and
delightful books.... A third representation of "Hernani" is called
for, it seems, and, as far as I am concerned, they are welcome to
it; but Lady Francis came to say that the Duchess of Gloucester
wants it to be acted on the 23d, and I am afraid that will not do
for my theater arrangements; they must try and have it earlier, if
possible. Lady Francis has half bribed me with a ball. They want us
to go down to Oatlands for Saturday and Sunday, and I hope we may
be able to manage it.... After Lady F---- was gone, my mother had a
visit from Mrs. B----; her manner is bad, her matter is good. She
is clever and excellent, and I have a great respect for her. She
interested me immensely by her account of Mrs. Fry's visits to
Newgate. What a blessed, happy woman to do so much good; to be the
means of comfort and consolation, perhaps of salvation, to such
desolate souls! How I did honor and love what I heard of her. Mrs.
B---- said Mrs. Fry would be delighted to take me with her some day
when she went to the prison. My mother laughingly said she was
afraid Mrs. Fry would convert me--surely not to Quakerism. I do not
think I need a new faith, but power to act up to the one I profess.
I need no Quaker saint to tell me I do not do that.

[I had the great honor of accompanying Mrs. Fry in one of her visits to Newgate, but from various causes received rather a painful impression instead of the very different one I had anticipated. Her divine labor of love had become _famous_, and fine ladies of fashion pressed eagerly to accompany her, or be present at the Newgate exhortations. The unfortunate women she addressed were ranged opposite their less excusable sister sinners of the better class, and I hardly dared to look at them, so entirely did I feel out of my place by the side of Mrs. Fry, and so sick for their degraded attitude and position. If I had been alone with them and their noble teacher I would assuredly have gone and sat down among them. On the day I was there a poor creature sat in the midst of the congregation attired differently from all the others, who was pointed out to me as being under sentence of transportation for whatever crime she committed. Altogether I felt broken-hearted for _them_ and ashamed for _us_.]

My mother has had a letter from my father (he was acting in the
provinces), who says he has met and shaken hands with Mr. Harris
(his co-proprietor of Covent Garden, and antagonist in our ruinous
lawsuit about it). I wonder what benefit is to be expected from
that operation with--such a person.

_Sunday, June 5th._ ... On my return from afternoon service found
Mr. Walpole with my mother; they amused me extremely by a
conversation in which they ran over, as far as their memories would
stretch (near sixty years), the various fashions and absurd modes
of dress which have prevailed during that period. Toupees, fêtes,
toques, bouffantes, hoops, bell hoops, sacques, polonaises,
levites, and all the paraphernalia of horsehair, powder, pomatum,
and pins, in the days when court beauties had their heads dressed
over-night for the next day's drawing-room, and sat up in their
chairs for fear of destroying the edifice by lying down. No wonder
they were obliged to rouge themselves--the days when once in a
fortnight was considered often enough for ridding the hair of its
horrible paste of flour and grease. We are certainly cleaner than
our grandmothers, and much more comfortable, though it is not so
long since my own head was dressed _à la giraffe_, in three bows
over pins half a foot high, so that I could not sit upright in the
carriage without knocking against the top of it. My mother's and
Mr. Walpole's recollections and descriptions were like seeing a set
of historical caricatures pass before one.

_Monday, June 6th._--The house was very full at the theater this
evening, and Miss C---- sent me round a delicious fresh bouquet. I
acted well, I think; the play was "Romeo and Juliet." It is so very
pleasant to return to Shakespeare, after _reciting_ Bianca and
Isabella, etc. I reveled in the glorious poetry and the bright,
throbbing _reality_ of that Italian girl's existence; and yet
Juliet is nothing like as nice as Portia--_nobody_ is as nice as
Portia. But the oftener I act Juliet the oftener I think it ought
never to be acted at all, and the more absurd it seems to me to try
to act it. After the play my mother sent a note with the carriage
to say she would not go to the ball, so I dressed myself and drove
off with my father from the theater to the Countess de S----'s. At
half-past eleven the ball had not begun. Mrs. Norton was there in
splendid beauty; at about half-past twelve the dancing began, and
it was what is called a very fine ball. While I was dancing with
Mr. C----, I saw my father talking to a handsome and very
magnificent lady, who my partner told me was the Duchess of B----;
after our quadrille, when I rejoined my father, he said to me,
"Fanny, let me present you to ----" here he mumbled something
perfectly inaudible, and I made a courtesy, and the lady smiled
sweetly and said some civil things and went away. "Whose name did
you mention," said I to my father, with some wickedness, "just now
when you introduced me to that lady?" "Nobody's, my dear, nobody's;
I haven't the remotest idea who she is." "The Duchess of B----,"
said I, glibly, strong in the knowledge I had just acquired from my
partner. "Bless my soul!" cried the poor man, with a face of the
most ludicrous dismay, "so it was! I had quite forgotten her,
though she was good enough to remember me, and here I have been
talking cross-questions and crooked answers to her for the last
half-hour!"

Was ever any thing so terrible! I feared my poor father would go
home and remain awake all night, sobbing softly to himself, like
the eldest of the nine Miss Simmonses in the ridiculous novel,
because in her nervous flurry at a great dinner party she had
refused instead of accepting a gentleman's offer to drink wine with
her. Lady G---- then came up, whom he did remember, and who was
"truly gracious;" and I left him consoled, and, I hope, having
forgotten his dreadful duchess again. All the world, as the saying
is, was at this ball, and it certainly was a very fine assembly. We
danced in a splendid room hung with tapestry--a magnificent
apartment, though it seemed to me incongruous for the purpose; dim
burning lights and flitting ghosts and gusts of wind and distant
footfalls and sepulchral voices being the proper _furniture_ of the
"tapestried chamber," and not wax candles, to the tune of sunlight
and bright eyes and dancing feet and rustling silks and gauzes and
laughing voices, and all the shine and shimmer and flaunting
flutter of a modern ball....

At half-past two, though the carriage had been ordered at two, my
father told me he would not "spoil sport," and so angelically
stayed till past four. He is the best of fathers, the most
affectionate of parents, the most benevolent of men! There is a
great difference between being chaperoned by one's father instead
of one's mother: the latter, poor dear! never flirts, gets very
sleepy and tired, and wants to go home before she comes; the former
flirts and talks with all the pretty, pleasant women he meets, and
does not care till what hour in the morning--a frame of mind
favorable to much dancing for the _youngers_. After all, I had to
come away in the middle of a delightful mazurka.

_Tuesday, June 7th._-- ... We had a very pleasant dinner at Mr.
Harness's. Moore was there, but Paganini was the chief subject
discussed, and we harped upon the one miraculous string he fiddles
on without pauses.... After dinner I read one of Miss Mitford's
hawthorny sketches out of "Our Village," which was lying on the
table; they always carry one into fresh air and green fields, for
which I am grateful to them.

_Wednesday, June 8th._--While I was writing to H---- my mother came
in and told me that Mrs. Siddons was dead. I was not surprised; she
has been ill, and gradually failing for so long.... I could not be
much grieved for myself, for of course I had had but little
intercourse with her, though she was always very kind to me when I
saw her.... She died at eight o'clock this morning--peaceably, and
without suffering, and in full consciousness.... I wonder if she is
gone where Milton and Shakespeare are, to whose worship she was
priestess all her life--whose thoughts were her familiar thoughts,
whose words were her familiar words. I wonder how much more she is
allowed to know of all things now than she did while she was here.
As I looked up into the bright sky to-day, while my father and
mother were sadly recalling the splendor of her day of beauty and
great public power, I thought of the unlimited glory she perhaps
now beheld, of the greater holiness and happiness I trust she now
enjoys, and said in my heart, "It must be well to be as she is." I
had never thought it must be well to be as she _was_....

As soon as the news came my father went off to see what he could do
for Cecilia, poor thing, and to bring her here, if she can be
persuaded to leave Baker Street. He was not much shocked, though
naturally deeply grieved by the event; my aunt has now been ill so
long that any day might have brought the termination of the
protracted process of her death. When he returned he said Cecilia
was composed and quiet, but would not leave the house at present. I
have written to Lady Francis to decline going to Oatlands, which we
were to have done this week.