Chapter IX: Work in Southern Counties (1)

"How can a man learn to know himself? By reflection never, only by
action. In the measure in which thou seekest to do thy duty shalt
thou know what is in thee. But what is one's duty? The demand of
the hour."--GOETHE.

"Il est donné, de nos jours, à un bien petit nombre, même parmi les
plus délicats et ceux qui les apprécient le mieux, de recueillir,
d'ordonner sa vie selon ses admirations et selon ses goûts, avec
suite, avec noblesse."--SAINTE-BEUVE.

"Every man has a separate calling, an end peculiar to
himself."--FREDERICK SCHLEGEL.

"The old lord-treasurer Burleigh, if any one came to the Lords of
the Council for a licence to travel, he would first examine him of
England: if he found him ignorant, he would bid him stay at home
and know his own country first."--HENRY PEACHAM, 1622, _The
Compleat Gentleman_.

Upon returning to England in the winter of 1858, I felt more bitterly that ever the want of sympathy which had formerly oppressed me. Though I had the most idolatrous love for my dearest mother, and the most over-anxious wish to please her, there was then none of the perfect friendship between us, the easy interchange of every thought, which there was in later years; for she was still so entirely governed by her sisters-in-law as scarcely to have any individuality of her own. Often, often, did she pain me bitterly by suspecting my motives and questioning my actions, even when I was most desirous of doing right; and from the long habit of being _told_ that I was idle and ignorant, that I cared for nothing useful, and that I frittered away my life, she had grown to believe it, and constantly assumed that it was so. Thus all my studies were embittered to me. I was quite sure that nothing I did would be appreciated, so that it never seemed worth while to do anything, and I became utterly deficient in that cheerfulness of disposition which is the most important element in all private success.

As I write this, and remember the number of delightful intimates by whom my after years have been surrounded, I find it difficult to realise that I had at this time _no_ friends who, by mutual confidence, could help or cheer me. The best of them, Milligan, was now settled in London, being in full work in the Ecclesiastical Commission Office, and though always very kind to me, he had now fallen into a new set of acquaintances and surroundings, and had no time to bestow upon me individually. George Sheffield I seldom saw; and I had no other friends worth speaking of.

At this time all the intellectual impetus I received, and without which I should have fallen into a state of stagnation, came from the house of my aunt, Mrs. Stanley. Her grace, ease, and tact in society were unrivalled. At her house, and there alone, I met people of original ideas and liberal conversation. In this conversation, however, I was at that time far too shy to join, and I was so dreadfully afraid of my aunt, who, with the kindest intentions, had a very cold unsympathetic manner in private, that--while I always appreciated her--I was unable to reap much benefit from her society. Perhaps my chief friend was my cousin Arthur Stanley, whom I was not the least afraid of, and whom I believe to have been really fond of me at this time; also, though he had a very poor opinion of my present powers and abilities, he did not seem, like other people, utterly to despair of my future.

By my mother's desire, Archdeacon Moore (an old friend of the Hare family) had written to Sir Antonio Panizzi,[146] then the autocratic ruler of the British Museum Library, with a view to my standing for a clerkship there. But this idea was afterwards abandoned, and it was owing to the kindness of my cousin Arthur and that of Albert Way (our connection by his marriage with Emmeline Stanley) that I obtained from John Murray, the publisher, the employment of my next two years--the "Handbook of Berks, Bucks, and Oxfordshire."

The commission to undertake this Handbook was one which I hailed with rapture. The work was in every respect welcome to me. I had an inner consciousness that I could do it well, and that while I was doing it I should be acquiring information and advancing my own neglected education. Besides, the people with whom the work would necessarily bring me in contact were just those who were most congenial. My principal residence would be Oxford, associated with some of my happiest days, and where it was now a real pleasure to be near Arthur Stanley; while, if my mother were ill or needed me in any way, there was nothing in my work which would prevent my returning to her, and continuing it at home. Above all, the fact of my having the work to do would silence the ceaseless insinuations to my mother as to my desire for an idle life of self-indulgence. I knew nothing then of the mercantile value of my labour. I did not know (and I had no one to inform me) that I was giving away the earnest work of two years for a pitiful sum,[147] which was not a tenth of its value, and which was utterly insufficient to meet its expenses.

How well I remember my first sight of John Murray, when he came to dine at the Stanleys' house in Grosvenor Crescent--his hard, dry questions, his sharp, concise note afterwards, in which he announced the terms of our hardly-driven bargain, received by me as if it had been the greatest of favours. Perhaps, however, the very character of the man I had to deal with, and the rules he enjoined as to my work, were a corrective I was much the better for at this time. The style of my writing was to be as hard, dry, and incisive as my taskmaster. It was to be a mere catalogue of facts and dates, mingled with measurements of buildings, and irritating details as to the "E. E.," "Dec.," or "Perp." architecture even of the most insignificant churches, this being the peculiar hobby of the publisher. No sentiment, no expression of opinion were ever to be allowed; all description was to be reduced to its barest bones, dusty, dead, and colourless. In fact, I was to produce a book which I knew to be utterly unreadable, though correct and useful for reference. Many a paper struggle did I have with John Murray the third--for there has been a dynasty of John Murrays in Albemarle Street--as to the retention of paragraphs I had written. I remember how this was especially the case as to my description of Redesdale, which was one of the best things I have ever done. Murray, however, was never averse to a contribution from one whose name was _already_ distinguished either by rank or literature, and when Arthur Stanley contributed passages with his signature to my account of Oxford, they were gladly accepted, though antagonistic to all his rules.

Arthur Stanley had been made Professor of Ecclesiastical History at Oxford before we had gone abroad, and, while we were absent, a Canonry at Christ Church, attached to the professorship, had fallen in to him. The Canon's house was just inside the Peckwater Gate leading into Tom Quad, and had a stiff narrow walled garden behind, planted with apple-trees, in the centre of which Arthur made a fountain. It had been a trouble to the Canon that it was almost impossible in his position to make the acquaintance he wished with the young men around him, and in this I was able to be a help to him, and in some way to return the kindness which often gave me a second home in his house for many months together. His helpless untidiness, and utter inability to look after himself, were also troubles which I could at least ameliorate. I rapidly made acquaintances in Christ Church, several of which developed into friendships, and I was only too glad to accede to Arthur's wish that I should invite them to his house, where they became his acquaintances also. Of Christ Church men at this time I became most familiar with Brownlow,[148] Le Strange,[149] Edward Stanhope,[150] Stopford,[151] Addie Hay,[152] and my second cousin, Victor Williamson.[153] A little later, at the house of Mrs. Cradock, I was introduced to "Charlie Wood."[154] I did not think that I should like him at first; but we became intimate over an excursion to Watlington and Sherborne Castle, and he has ever since been the best and dearest of my friends. Very soon in constant companionship, we drew together in the Bodleian and Christ Church libraries, we read together at home, and many were the delightful excursions we made in home scenes, forerunners of after excursions in more striking scenes abroad. We also often shared in the little feasts in Mrs. Cradock's[155] garden, where we used to amuse ourselves and others by composing and reciting verses.

I frequently left Christ Church for a week or two upon exploring raids into the counties on which I was employed, and used to bring back materials to work up in Oxford, with the help of the Bodleian and other libraries. Very early, in this time of excursions, I received an invitation (often repeated) from Jane, Viscountess Barrington, a first cousin of my real mother, to visit her at Beckett near Shrivenham. I had seen so little then of any members of my real family, that I went to Beckett with more shyness and misgivings than I have ever taken to any other place; but I soon became deeply attached to my dear cousin Lady Barrington, who began from the first to show an interest in me, which was more that of a tenderly affectionate aunt than of any more distant relation. Lord Barrington, the very type of a courteous English nobleman, was also most kind. Of their daughters, two were unmarried--Augusta, who was exceedingly handsome, brimful of very accurate information, and rather alarming on first acquaintance; and Adelaide, who was of a much brighter, gentler nature. I thought at this time, however, that Lina, Lady Somerton, was more engaging than either of her sisters. I often found her at Beckett with her children, of whom the little Nina--afterwards Countess of Clarendon--used to be put into a large china pot upon the staircase when she was naughty. Beckett was a very large luxurious house in the Tudor style, with a great hall, built by Thomas Liddell, Lady Barrington's brother. The park was rather flat, but had a pretty piece of water with swans, and a picturesque summer-house built by Inigo Jones. Much of the family fortune came from Lord Barrington's uncle, Shute Barrington, Bishop of Durham, who used to say he was the only licensed poacher in England--"I Shute, by the grace of God," &c. This old bishop, when his nephew brought his bride to visit him--a wedding visit--at Mongewell, filled all the trees with rare cockatoos and parrots, in the hope that when she heard them scream, she would think they were the native birds of that district. Lord and Lady Barrington took me, amongst other places, to see Mr. Aitkens of Kingston Lyle--"the Squire" in Tom Hughes's "Scouring of the White Horse," and also to see the creature itself, which is far more like a weasel than a horse. The kindness of Lord Barrington also secured my favourable reception at every other house in the county, and many were the visits I paid in Berkshire at places described in my Handbook.

Much kindness was also shown me by old Lady Stanley of Alderley,[156] who was often very violent, indeed quite furious, about her own opinions; but full of the most sincere interest and kindness towards me for my mother's sake. Holmwood, near Henley, whither I went several times to visit her, was an enchanting place, with luxuriant lawn and flowers, fine trees, and beautiful distant views. A succession of grandchildren always filled the house, and found it most enjoyable, the two unmarried aunts--Rianette (Maria Margaret) and Louisa--being, as one of them (Lady Airlie) has often told me, "the good fairies of their childhood." Like most Stanleys, they were peculiarly subject to what that family calls "fits of righteous indignation" with all who differed from them; but nobody minded. Having had the most interesting youth themselves, during which their uncle (afterwards Bishop Stanley) and other relations were always inventing something for their amusement, they had a special gift for interesting others, so that those who went to visit them always felt that though they received many and often unmerited scoldings, their visit could never be dull. How well I remember still Louisa Stanley's graphic imitation of many people of her long-ago--especially of old Mr. Holland, the Knutsford doctor,[157] who would come in saying, "Well, Miss Louisa, and how are we to-day? We must take a little more rubbub and magnesia; and I would eat a leetle plain pudden with a leetle shugger over it!" and then, ringing the bell, "Would you send round my hearse, if you please?"

Lady Stanley herself had been the pupil of Gibbon at Lausanne, and had much to tell of past days; and the pertinacity with which she maintained her own opinions about them and everything else, rendered her recollections very vivid and amusing. All the family, including my mother, were so dreadfully afraid of Lady Stanley, that a visit to her always partook of the nature of an adventure; but it generally turned out to be a very charming adventure, and I always look back to her with affectionate gratitude, and feel that there was a great charm in the singleness, sincerity, and freshness of her character. When I was at Holmwood, I used to engage a little carriage and go out for long excursions of eight or ten hours into the country; and when I returned just before dinner, Lady Stanley was so anxious to hear my adventures, that she would not wait till I came down, but would insist upon the whole history through the bedroom door as I was dressing.

If people were not afraid of her, Lady Stanley liked them the better for it, and she always heartily enjoyed a joke. I remember hearing how one day at Alderley she raged and stormed because the gentlemen sat longer after dinner than she liked. Old Mr. Davenport was the first to come into the drawing-room. "Well now, what _have_ you been doing?" she exclaimed; "what _can_ you have found to talk about to keep you so long?"--"Would you really like to know what we've been talking about, my lady?" said Mr. Davenport. "Yes indeed," she stormed. "Well," said Mr. Davenport very deliberately, "we talked first about the depression in the salt (mines), and that led us on inadvertently to pepper, and that led us to cayenne, and that, my lady, led us ... to yourself,"--and she was vastly amused. One day her maid told her that there was a regular uproar downstairs about precedence, as to which of the maids was to come in first to prayers. "Oh, _that_ is very easily settled," said Lady Stanley; "the ugliest woman in the house must always, of course, have the precedence," and she heard no more about it.

Another house which I was frequently invited to use as a centre for my excursions was that of my father's first cousin, Penelope, Mrs. Warren, who was living in the old home of Lady Jones at Worting, near Basingstoke. It was in a most dreary, cold, wind-stricken district, and was especially selected on that account by Lady Jones, because of its extreme contrast to the India which she abominated. Internally, however, the old red-brick house was very comfortable and charming, and Mrs. Warren herself a very sweet and lovable old lady, tenderly cared for by her sons and daughters, many of whom were always about her, though only one of the latter, Anna, was unmarried. Mrs. Warren had been the eldest of the daughters of Dean Shipley, and the only one who never gave her family any trouble, and who was invariably loved and honoured by its other members. Her character through life had been that of a peacemaker, and in her old age she seemed almost glorified by the effulgence of the love which had emanated from her, no single member of the family having a recollection of her which was not connected with some kindly word or unselfish action.[158] That Lady Jones should bequeath Worting to her was felt by all the other nephews and nieces to have been most natural. "Who should it have been to, if not to Penelope?" She liked to talk of old times, and her reminiscences were most interesting. She was also very proud of her family, especially of the Mordaunts, and of our direct descent, through the Shipleys, from the youngest son of Edward I. It was on one of my early visits at Worting that I first made acquaintance with my cousin Harriet, Mrs. Thornton, niece of Mrs. Warren, and one of the daughters of Bishop Heber.[159] She described the second marriage of her mother to Count Valsamachi in the Greek church at Venice, and the fun she and her sister thought it to walk round the altar with huge wedding favours in their hands. She was full of amusing stories of India, from which she was just returned: would tell how one day she was sitting next a Rajah who was carving a pie, and when he lifted the crust a whole flock of little birds flew out--"Whir-r-r-r!" said the Rajah as they flew all over the room; how, one day, being surprised that an expected ham was not brought in to dinner, she went out and found it lying in the court, with all the native servants round it in a circle spitting at it; and how one day at the Cape she was told that a woman was bitten by a venomous snake, and going out, found her eating a toad as a remedy. One of Mrs. Thornton's stories, which I have often repeated since, is so curious as to deserve insertion here.

"M. de Sartines had been brought up by an old friend of his family
who lived in Picardy. The château of his old friend was the home of
his youth, and the only place where he felt sure that all his
failings would be overlooked and all his fancies and wishes would
be considered.

"While he was absent from France on diplomatic service, M. de
Sartines heard with great grief that his old friend was dead. In
losing him, he lost not only the friend who had been as a second
father, but the only home which remained to him in France. He felt
his loss very much--so much, indeed, that for many years he did not
return to France at all, but spent his time of leave in travelling
in Italy and elsewhere.

"Some years after, M. de Sartines, finding himself in Paris,
received a letter from the nephew of his old friend, who had
succeeded to the Picardy property. It was a very nice letter
indeed, saying how much he and his wife wished to keep up old
family ties and connections, and that though he was well aware that
it would cost M. de Sartines much to revisit the château so
tenderly connected with memories of the dead, still, if he could
make that effort, no guest would be more affectionately welcomed,
and that he and his wife would do their utmost to make him feel
that the friendship which had been held had not passed away, but
was continued to another generation. It was so nice a letter that
M. de Sartines felt that he ought not to reject the hand of
friendship stretched out in so considerate and touching a manner,
and though it certainly cost him a great effort, he went down to
the château in Picardy.

"His old friend's nephew and his wife received him on the doorstep.
Everything was prepared to welcome him. They had inquired of former
servants which room he had occupied and how he liked it arranged,
and all was ready accordingly. They had even inquired about and
provided his favourite dishes at dinner. Nothing was wanting which
the most disinterested solicitude could effect.

"When M. de Sartines retired to his room for the night, he was
filled with conflicting emotions. The blank which he felt in the
loss of his old friend was mingled with a grateful sense of the
kindness he had received from the nephew. He felt he could not
sleep, or would be long in doing so; but having made up a large
fire, for it was very cold weather, he went to bed.

"In process of time, as he lay wakefully with his head upon the
pillow, he became aware of the figure of a little wizened old man
hirpling towards the fire. He thought he must be dreaming, but, as
he listened, the old man spoke--'Il y a longtemps que je n'ai vu un
feu, il faut que je me chauffe.'

"The blood of M. de Sartines ran cold within him as the figure
turned slowly round towards the bed and continued in trembling
accents--'Il y a longtemps que je n'ai vu un lit, il faut que je me
couche.'

"But every fibre in M. de Sartines' body froze as the old man, on
reaching the bed, drew the curtains, and seeing him, exclaimed--'Il
y a longtemps que je n'ai vu M. de Sartines, il faut que je
l'embrasse.'

"M. de Sartines almost died of fright. But fortunately he did not
quite die. He lived to know that it was his old friend himself. The
nephew had got tired of waiting for the inheritance; he had
imprisoned his uncle in the cellar, and had given out his death,
and had a false funeral of a coffin filled with stones. The
invitation to his uncle's friend was a _coup de théâtre_: if any
suspicions had existed, they must have been lulled for ever by the
presence of such a guest in the château. But on the very day on
which M. de Sartines had arrived, the old gentleman had contrived
to escape from his cell, and wandering half imbecile about the
house, made his way to the room where he remembered having so often
been with his friend, and found there his friend himself.

"M. de Sartines saw the rightful owner of the castle reinstated,
and the villainy of the wicked nephew exposed; but the old man died
soon afterwards."

Here is another story which Mrs. Thornton told, apropos of the benefits of cousinship:--

"Frederick the Great was one day travelling incognito, when he met
a student on his way to Berlin, and asked him what he was going to
do there. 'Oh,' said the student, 'I am going to Berlin to look for
a cousin, for I have heard of so many people who have found cousins
in Berlin, and who have risen through their influence to rank and
power, that I am going to try if I cannot find one too.' Frederick
had much further conversation with him, and on parting said, 'Well,
if you trust to me, I believe that I shall be able to find a cousin
for you before you arrive at Berlin.' The student thanked his
unknown friend, and they parted.

"Soon after he reached Berlin, an officer of the court came to the
student, and said that he was his cousin, and that he had already
used influence for him with the King, who had desired that he
should preach before him on the following Sunday, but that he
should use the text which the King himself should send him, and no
other.

"The student was anxious to have the text, that he might consider
his sermon, but one day after another of the week passed, and at
last Sunday came and no text was sent. The time for going to church
came, and no text had arrived. The King and the court were seated,
and the unhappy student proceeded with the service, but still no
text was given. At last, just as he was going up into the pulpit, a
sealed paper was given to him. After the prayer he opened it, and
it was ... blank! He turned at once to the congregation, and
showing them the two sides of the paper, said, '_Here_ is nothing,
and _there_ is nothing, and out of nothing God made the world'--and
he preached the most striking sermon the court had ever heard."

Mrs. Thornton described how old Mr. Thornton had been staying in Somersetshire with Sir Thomas Acland, when he heard two countrymen talking together. One of them said to the other, who was trying to persuade him to do something, "Wal, noo, as they say, 'shake an ass and go.'" Mr. Thornton came back and said to Sir Thomas, "What very extraordinary proverbial expressions they have in these parts. Just now I heard a man say 'shake an ass and go'--such a _very_ extraordinary proverbial expression." "Well," said Sir Thomas, "the fact is there are a great many French expressions lingering in this neighbourhood: that meant 'Chacun à son goût!'"

Of the new acquaintances I made in Oxfordshire, those of whose hospitality I oftenest availed myself were the Cottrell Dormers, who lived at the curious old house of Rousham, above the Cherwell, near Heythrop. It is a beautiful place, with long evergreen shrubberies, green lawns with quaint old statues, and a long walk shaded by yews, with a clear stream running down a stone channel in the midst. Within, the house is full of old family portraits, and has a wonderful collection of MSS., and the pedigree of the family from Noah! Mr. and Mrs. Dormer were quaint characters: he always insisting that he was a Roman Catholic in disguise, chiefly to plague his wife, and always reading the whole of Pope's works, in the large quarto edition, through once a year; she full of kind-heartedness, riding by herself about the property to manage the estate and cottagers, always welcoming you with a hearty "Well, to be sure, and how do _you_ do?" She was a _maîtresse femme_, who ruled the house with a sunshiny success which utterly set at nought the old proverb--

"La maison est misérable et méchante
Où la Poule plus haut que le Coq chante."

Mrs. Dormer was somehow descended from one of the daughters of Sir Thomas More, and at Cokethorpe, the place of her brother, Mr. Strickland, was one of the three great pictures by Holbein of the family of Sir Thomas More, which was long in the possession of the Lenthalls.[160] Another place in the neighbourhood of Rousham which I visited was Fritwell Manor, a most picturesque old house, rented by the father of my college friend Forsyth Grant--"Kyrie." Fritwell is a haunted house, and was inhabited by two families. When the Edwardes lived there in the summer, no figure was seen, but stains of fresh blood were constantly found on the staircase. When the Grants lived there, for hunting, in the winter, there was no blood, but the servants who went down first in the morning would meet on the staircase an old man in a grey dressing-gown, bleeding from an open wound in the throat. It is said that Sir Baldwin Wake, a former proprietor, quarrelled with his brother about a lady of whom they were both enamoured, and, giving out that he was insane, imprisoned him till real madness ensued. His prison was at the top of the house, where a sort of large human dog-kennel still exists, to which the unfortunate man is said to have been chained.

I made a delightful excursion with "Kyrie" to Wroxton Abbey and Broughton Castle--Lord Saye and Sele's--where we were invited to luncheon by Mr. Fiennes and Lady Augusta, in the former of whom I most unexpectedly found 'Twisleton'[161]--an old hero boy-friend of my Harrow school-days, whom I regarded then much as David Copperfield did Steerforth. The old castle is very picturesque, and the church full of curious monuments.

_To_ MY MOTHER.

"_Christ Church, Oxford, April 25, 1859._--Arthur and I dined last
night at Canon Jelf's. He was for thirteen years tutor to the King
of Hanover, and while at the court fell in love with Countess
Schlippenbach, the Queen's lady-in-waiting, who married him.... Dr.
Jelf told a great deal that was interesting about the King: how, as
Prince George, he would insist upon playing at being his Eton fag,
brush his clothes, make his toast, &c.: that he was with the Prince
at the time of the fatal accident which caused his blindness, when,
in the garden at Kew, having just given half-a-crown to a beggar,
he was whisking his purse round and round, when the ring at the end
went into his eye. A fortnight's anxiety followed, and then came
the great grief of his dear Prince one day saying to him when out
shooting, 'Will you give me your arm, sir? I don't see quite so
well as I ought to do. I think we had better go home.' Afterwards,
instead of murmuring, the Prince only said, 'Those who will not
obey must suffer: you told me not to whisk my things about in that
way, and I disobeyed: it is right that I should suffer for it.'

"He gave many beautiful pictures of the King's after life: how the
dear blind King, who bears no outward mark of his misfortune,
always turns to the sun, as if seeking the light: of his marriage
with his cousin of Saxe-Altenbourg, a true love-match: that he, the
old tutor, was never forgotten, and that on his last birthday, when
he least expected it, a royal telegram announced--'The King, the
Queen, and the royal children of Hanover wish Dr. Jelf many happy
new years.' The King always writes to Dr. and Mrs. Jelf on their
wedding-day, which even their own family do not always remember,
and on their silver-wedding he sent them a beautiful portrait of
himself.

"Arthur, I imagine, rather likes having me here, though no
outsiders would imagine so; but he finds me useful after a fashion,
and is much annoyed if I allude to ever going into lodgings. He
certainly does _exactly_ what he likes when I am there, and is
quite as unreserved in his ways as if nobody whatever was present.
I am generally down first. He comes in pre-engrossed, and there is
seldom any morning salutation. At breakfast I sit (he wills it so)
at the end of the table, pour out his excessively weak tea, and put
the heavy buttered buns which he loves within his easy reach. When
we are alone, I eat my own bread and butter in silence; but if
undergraduates breakfast with us, it is my duty, if I know
anything about it, so to turn the conversation that he may learn
what their 'lines' are, and converse accordingly. Certainly the
merry nonsense and childlike buoyancy which cause his breakfast
parties to be so delightful, make the contrast of his silent
irresponsiveness rather trying when we are alone--it is such a
complete 'you are not worth talking to.' However, I have learnt to
enjoy the first, and to take no notice of the other; indeed, if I
can do so quite effectually, it generally ends in his becoming
pleasanter. In amiable moments he will sometimes glance at my MSS.,
and give them a sanction like that of Cardinal Richelieu--'Accepi,
legi, probavi.' After breakfast, he often has something for me to
do for him, great plans, maps, or drawings for his lectures, on
huge sheets of paper, which take a good deal of time, but which he
never notices except when the moment comes for using them. All
morning he stands at his desk by the study window (where I see him
sometimes from the garden, which he expects me to look after), and
he writes sheet after sheet, which he sometimes tears up and flings
to rejoin the letters of the morning, which cover the carpet in all
directions.[162] It would never do for him to marry, a wife would
be so annoyed at his hopelessly untidy ways; at his tearing every
new book to pieces, for instance, because he is too impatient to
cut it open (though I now do a good deal in this way). Meantime, as
Goethe says, 'it is the errors of men that make them amiable,' and
I believe he is all the better loved for his peculiarities.
Towards the middle of the day, I sometimes have an indication that
he has no one to walk with him, and would wish me to go, and he
likes me to be in the way then, in case I am wanted, but I am never
to expect to be talked to during the walk. If not required, I amuse
myself, or go on with my own work, and indeed I seldom see Arthur
till the evening, when, if any one dines for whom he thinks it
worth while to come out of himself, he is very pleasant, and
sometimes very entertaining."

My mother spent a great part of the spring of 1859 at Clifton, whither I went to visit her, afterwards making a _tourette_ by myself to Salisbury, Southampton, Beaulieu, and Winchester.

"_Salisbury, April 12, 1859._--At 8-1/2 I was out on bleak
Salisbury Plain, where, as the driver of my gig observed, 'it is a
whole coat colder than in the valley.' What an immense desert it
is! The day, so intensely grey, with great black clouds sweeping
across the sky, was quite in character with the long lines of
desolate country. At last we turned off the road over the turf, and
in the distance rose the gigantic temple, with the sun shining
through the apertures in the stones. It was most majestic and
impressive, not a creature in sight, except a quantity of rabbits
scampering about, and a distant shepherd."

The latter part of June 1859 I spent most happily in a pony-carriage tour in Buckinghamshire and Berkshire with my friend George Sheffield, who had just passed his examination at the Foreign Office. It was on this occasion that, as we were driving under a park wall in Buckinghamshire, I said to George, "Inside that park is a very fine old house, and inside the house is a very fine old sundial. We will go to see the house, and we will take away the sundial;" and we _did_, though at that moment I did not even know the name of the people who lived there. The old house was the Vatche, which had belonged to my great-great-grandfather, Bishop Hare, who married its heiress in the reign of George II., and I had heard of the sundial from the churchwarden of Chalfont, with whom I had had some correspondence about my ancestor's tomb. It was made on the marriage of Bishop Hare with Miss Alston and bore his arms. The family of Allen, then living at the Vatche, allowed us to see the house, and my enthusiasm at sight of the sundial, which was lying neglected in a corner, so worked upon the feelings of Mrs. Allen, that she gave it me. It is now in the garden at Holmhurst.

_To_ MY MOTHER.

"_June 16._--I have enjoyed a visit to the Henry Leycesters at
White Place, which lies low in the meadows, but has the charm of a
little creek full of luxuriant water-plants, down which Henry
Leycester punts his guests into the Thames opposite Clifden; and
how picturesque are the old yew-trees and winding walks of that
beautiful place. Henry Leycester, to look upon, is like one of the
magnificent Vandykes in the Brignole Palace at Genoa. Little Mrs.
Leycester is a timid shrinking creature, who daily becomes terribly
afraid of the domestic ghost (a lady carrying her head) as evening
comes on. 'Imagine my feelings, Mr. Hare,' she says, 'my awful
position as a wife and a mother, when my husband is away, and I am
left alone in the long evenings with _her_.'"

"_June 17, Christ Church._--Last week the Dean, with much
imprudence, punished two Christ Church men most severely for the
same offence, but _one more than the other_. The next night the
Deanery garden was broken into, the rose-trees torn up and
flower-beds destroyed, the children's swing cut down, and the name
of the injured man cut in large letters in the turf. It has created
great indignation.

"My chief work, now I am at Oxford, is in the Bodleian, where I
have much to look out and refer to, and where everything is made
delightful by Mr. Coxe, the librarian,[163] who is not only the
most accurate and learned person in the world, but also the most
sympathetic, lively, and lovable. 'Never mind, dear boy,' he
always says, the more trouble I give him. Anything more unlike the
cut-and-dried type of Oxford Dons cannot be imagined. He has given
me a plant (Linaria purpurea) from the tomb of Cicero.

"I should like to take my Master's degree, but the fees will be
about £20. I could then vote at the election. I should certainly
vote against Gladstone, though Arthur says he should vote for him
'with both hands and both feet.' ... I have great satisfaction in
being here now, in feeling that I can be useful to Arthur, in
preparing drawings for his lectures, &c., also that he really
prefers my presence to my absence."

"_July 4._--I sate up till twelve last night preparing 'the bidding
prayer' for Arthur (who was to preach the 'Act Sermon to-day at St.
Mary's)--immensely long, as the _whole_ of the founders and
benefactors have to be mentioned. Imagine my horror when, after the
service, the Vice-Chancellor came up to Arthur and demanded to know
why _he_ had not been prayed for! I had actually omitted his name
of all others! Arthur said it was all the fault of 'Silvanus.' In
his sermon on Deborah, Arthur described how the long vacation,
'like the ancient river, the river Kishon,' was about to form a
barrier, and might wash away all the past and supply a
halting-place from which to begin a new life: that the bondage
caused by concealment of faults or debts might now be broken: that
now, when undergraduates were literally 'going to their father,'
they might apply the story of the Prodigal Son, and obtain that
freedom which is truth."

In July I paid a first visit to my cousins, the Heber Percys, at Hodnet Hall, in order to meet Countess Valsamachi (Mrs. Heber Percy's mother).[164] The old Hodnet Hall was a long low two-storied house, like an immense cottage, or rather like a beehive, from the abundant family life which overcrowded it. The low dining-room was full of curious pictures of the Vernons, whose heiress married one of the Hebers, but when the pictures had been sent up to London to be cleaned, the cleaner had cut all their legs off. At this time a debt of £40,000 existed upon the Hodnet estate. Mr. Percy's father, the Bishop of Carlisle, had promised to pay it off when certain fees came in. At last the fees were paid, and the papers were in the house, only awaiting the signature of the Bishop. That day he fell down dead. When it was told to his children, they only said, "It is the will of God; we must not complain."

I had much conversation with Lady Valsamachi. Talking of religion, she spoke of an atheist who once grumbled at the dispensation of a gourd having such a slender stem, while an acorn was supported by an oak. "When he had done speaking, the acorn fell upon his nose; had it been the gourd, his nose would have been no more!"

We walked to where Stoke had been, so tenderly connected with past days. All was altered, except the Terne flowing through reedy meadows. It was less painful to me to see it than on my last visit, but cost me many pangs.

I joined my mother at Toft, where our dear cousin Charlotte Leycester was acting as mistress of the house, and gave us a cordial welcome to the old family home. Greatly did my mother enjoy being there, and the sight of familiar things and people. Especially was she welcomed by an old woman named Betty Strongitharm; I remember how this old woman said, "When I am alone, I think, and think, and think, and the end of all my thinking is that Christ is all in all ... but I do not want to go to heaven alone; I want to take a many others along with me."

JOURNAL.

"When we left Toft, we went to our cousins at Thornycroft. At
Thornycroft was a labourer named Rathbone. One winter day, when his
wife was in her confinement, she was in great want of something
from Macclesfield, which her husband undertook to get for her when
he went to his work in the town, but he said that he must take his
little girl of ten years old with him, that she might bring it back
to her mother. The woman entreated him not to take the child, as
the snow was very deep, and she feared that she might not find her
way home again. However, the father insisted, and set off, taking
his little girl with him. The purchase was made and the child set
off to return home with it, but she--never arrived.

"When Rathbone reached home in the evening, and found that his
child had not appeared, he was in an agony of terror, and set off
at once to search for her. He traced her to Monk's Heath. People
had seen her there, and directed her back to Henbury, but she
seemed to have lost her way again. Rathbone next traced her to a
farmhouse at Peover, where the people had had the barbarity to turn
her out at night and direct her back to Henbury. Then all trace of
her was lost.

"At last Rathbone was persuaded by his friends and neighbours to
apply to a woman whom they called 'the White Witch' at Manchester,
and to her he went. She told him to look into a glass and tell her
what he saw there. He looked into the glass and said, 'I see a man
holding up his hat.' 'Well,' she said, 'then go on with your
search, and when you meet a man holding up his hat, he will tell
you where your child is.' So he returned and went again to search,
taking another man with him. At length, as they were going down a
lane, Rathbone exclaimed, 'There he is!'--'Who?' said the
companion, for he only saw a man running and holding up his hat.
That man told them that he had just found the body of a child under
a tree, and there, near a pond, frozen to death, lay Rathbone's
little girl.

"When we were at Thornycroft, Rathbone was still overwhelmed with
contrition for what he considered the sin of having consulted the
witch."

From Cheshire we went to the English Lakes. The curious old King's Arms Inn at Lancaster, described by Dickens, was then in existence, and it was a pleasure to sleep there, and walk in the morning upon the high terrace in front of the church and castle. From Ambleside, we spent a delightful day in making the round by Dungeon Ghyll and Blea Tarn, where we drew the soft grey peaks of Langdale Pikes, framed in dark heather-covered rocks, and in the foreground the blue tarn sleeping amid the pastures. From Keswick I ascended Skiddaw, and had a glorious view across the billows of mountains to the sea and the faint outlines of the Isle of Man. Another delightful day was spent with the mother and Lea in Borrowdale. One of the most beautiful effects I have ever seen was in crossing to Buttermere by Borrowdale Hawse, a tremendous wild mountain chasm, into which the setting sun was pouring floods of crimson light as we descended, smiting into blood the waters of the little torrent which was struggling down beside us through the rocks. We arrived at Buttermere very late, and found not a single room unoccupied in the village, so had to return in the dark night to Keswick.

We were much interested in Dumfries, in many ways one of the most foreign-looking towns in Britain, where we remained several days, making excursions to the exquisitely graceful ruins of Lincluden Abbey; to New Abbey (glorious in colour), founded by Devorgilda to contain the heart of John Baliol; to the Irongray Church, where Helen Walker, the original of Jeannie Deans, is buried, and where, on a rocky knoll under some old oaks, is a desolate Covenanter's grave; to Ellisland, the primitive cottage-home of Burns, overlooking the purple hills and clear rushing Nith; and to the great desolate castle of Caerlaverock near Solway Firth. The old churchyard of Dumfries reminded us of Père la Chaise in its forest of tombs, but was far more picturesque. Burns is buried there, with all his family. The exaggerated worship which follows Burns in Scotland rather sets one against him, and shows how many a saint got into the Calendar; for there are many there whose private lives would as little bear inspection as his. His son, formerly a clerk in Somerset House, had long been living at Dumfries upon a pension, and died there three years before our visit. Many are the old red sandstone gravestones in Dumfries and its neighbourhood bearing inscriptions to Covenanters, telling how they were "martyrs for adhering to the word of God, Christ's kingly government in his house, and the covenanted work of Reformation against tyrannie, perjury, and prelacie."

Amongst our Roman friends had been Mrs. Fotheringham of Fotheringham, whom we visited at the so-called Fotheringham Castle, a comfortable modern house, in Forfarshire. We went with her to spend a day with the charming old Thomas Erskine,[165] author of the "Essays," and since well known from his "Letters." With him lived his two beautiful and venerable old sisters, Mrs. Stirling and Mrs. Paterson, and their home of Linlathen contained many noble Italian pictures. Another excursion was to visit Miss Stirling Graham at Duntrune, a beautiful place overlooking the blue firth and bay of St. Andrews. Miss Graham was the authoress and heroine of "Mystifications," intimately bound up with all the literary associations of Edinburgh in the first half of the nineteenth century. She was also the nearest surviving relation of Claverhouse, and Duntrune was filled with relics of him.[166] She was a great bee-fancier and bee-friend, and would allow the bees to settle all over her. "My dear, where can you have lived all your life not to know about bees?" she said to a young lady who asked her some simple questions about them. At Fotheringham, the principal relic is a portrait of "the Flower of Yarrow" (said by Sir Walter Scott to have been such an ugly old woman at seventy), singing from a piece of music. The last cannibals in Scotland lived in a glen near Fotheringham, where carters and ploughmen were perpetually disappearing. The glen was known to be the abode of robbers, and at last a strong force was sent against them, and they were all killed, except one little girl of ten years old, whom it was thought a shame to destroy. She had not been with her preservers many days before she said, "Why do you never eat man's flesh? for if you once ate that, you would never wish to eat anything else again." My mother made an excursion from Fotheringham to see Panmure, where the housekeeper said to her that her Lord[167] was "very bad, for he had not killed a single _beast_ that year."

_To_ MY MOTHER.

"_August 22._--I went early by rail to Stonehaven, and walked to
Dunottar. The sea was of the softest Mediterranean blue, and the
walk along the edge of the cliffs, through the cornfields, looking
down first on the old town and then on the different little coves
with their curiously twisted and richly coloured rocks, most
delightful. The castle is hidden by the uplands at first, but
crowns the ridge of a magnificent rock, which runs far out into the
sea, with a line of battered towers. In the depths are reefs
covered with seaweed, between which the sea flows up in deep green
pools.

"A narrow ledge of rock, of which you can scarcely make out whether
it is natural or artificial, connects the castle with the mainland,
and here through an arch in the wall you look down into a second
bay, where the precipices, crested by a huge red fragment of tower,
descend direct upon the water. High up in one of the turrets lives
the keeper, a girl, who said that she was so used to climbing, that
she could go anywhere where there was the least rest for the sole
of her foot; that she did not care to have anything to hold on by,
and had never known what it was to be giddy. The 'Whigs' Vault' is
shown, in which a hundred and twenty Covenanters were chained, and,
beneath it, the awfully close stifling dungeon in which forty-eight
were confined, and many of them suffocated. The place still remains
where they were let down from the more airy vault above, and also
the hole through which their food was transmitted to them. On one
side of the dungeon is the well of brackish water which is said (as
in the prison of St. Peter) to have sprung up in one night to
quench their thirst; on the other, the hole which, in their
agonised desperation, they scratched with their hands through the
wall, and by which five-and-twenty tried to escape, but were all
dashed to pieces against the rocks or taken, except two; while, if
the dark night had only allowed them to see it, there is a little
footpath near, by which they might all have passed in safety. In
the castle also are the chamber in which the Regalia of Scotland
were concealed, and the well once supplied by pipes, the cutting of
which by Cromwell caused the surrender of the garrison."

"_August 23, Eccles Greig, Montrose._--This is a charming place
belonging to Kyrie's[168] father, and of which he is the heir. Miss
Grant drove me to-day to Denfenella, a beautiful ravine of
tremendous depth, where a lovely burn dashes over a precipice, and
then rushes away to the sea through depths of rock and fern, amid
which it makes a succession of deep shadowy pools. Endless are the
Scottish stories about this place:

"That Queen Fenella--the fairy queen--first washed her clothes in
the bright shining Morne, and then walked on the tops of the trees,
by which means she escaped.

"That Queen Fenella, having murdered her husband, fled to
Denfenella, where she flung herself over the rocks to escape
justice.

"That Queen Fenella, widow of Kenneth III., after the death of her
husband and her own escape from the Castle of Kincardine, fled to
Denfenella, where she was taken and put to death.

"That Queen Fenella loved a beautiful youth, but that her enemies
tried to force her to marry another; and that, rather than do so,
she fled from her father's castle, which is at an immense distance
from this, but, on reaching Denfenella, she felt that farther
escape was hopeless, and let herself float down the stream and be
carried away over the waterfall into the sea.

"All the stories, however, agree in one fact, that at midnight the
beautiful Fenella still always walks in the braes where she died,
and still washes her clothes in the bright shining Morne.

"We went on to the 'Came of Mathers,' a wild cove on the seashore
with a ruined castle on the farthest point of an inaccessible
precipice, beneath which the green waves rush through deep rifts of
the rock, which is worn into caves and arches. The Sheriff of these
parts was once very unpopular, and the lairds complained to King
James, who said in a joke that it would be a very good thing if the
Sheriff were boiled and cut up and made into browse. When the
lairds heard this, they beguiled the Sheriff to Gavoch, where they
had a huge caldron prepared, into which they immediately popped
him, and boiled him, and cut him up. Then, literally to carry out
the King's words, they each ate a part of him. Having done this,
they were all so dreadfully afraid of King James, that they sought
every possible means of escape, and the Laird of Arbuthnot, who had
been one of the most forward in boiling the Sheriff, built this
impregnable castle, where he lived in defiance of the King.

"Beneath the castle is a deep cleft in the rock, which seems
endless. It is said to continue in a subterranean passage to
Lauriston. The drummer of Lauriston once went up it, and tried to
work his way through, but he never was seen again; and at night, it
is said, that the drummer of Lauriston is still heard beating his
drum in the cavern beneath."