Chapter XII: English Pleasures and Roman Trials (5)

In June I went to Oxford to stay with my friend Henry Hood, and was charmed to make acquaintance with a young Oxford so different from the young Oxford of my days, that it seemed altogether another race--so much more cordial and amusing, though certainly very Bohemian. During this visit I cemented an acquaintance with Claude Delaval Cobham, then reading for the orders for which he soon felt himself unsuited. In some respects, he is one of the cleverest men I have met, especially from his unusual linguistic acquirements, combined with extreme correctness. I have frequently received kindness from him since and valuable advice and help in literary work, and though I have sometimes conceitedly rebelled against his opinion at the time, I have never failed to find that he was in the right.

_To_ MY MOTHER.

"_Oxford, June 1, 1867._--We went this morning in two
pony-carriages to Cuddesden, where Claude Cobham now is, and spent
the afternoon in walking and sitting in the Bishop's shady and
weedy garden.

"The other day, coming out of this garden, the Bishop heard two
navvies on the other side of the road talking. 'I zay, Bill, ain't
yon a Beeshop?' said one. 'Yees,' said Bill. 'Then oi'll have some
fun oot o' him.' So he crossed the road and said, 'I zay, zur, be
you a Beeshop?'--'Yes, at your service,' said the Bishop. 'Then can
you tell us which is the way to heaven?'--'Certainly,' said the
Bishop, not the least discomposed; 'turn to the right and go
straight on.'"

"_June 3._--I enjoy being at Oxford most intensely, and Hood is
kindness itself. A wet day cleared into a lovely evening for the
boat-race, which was a beautiful sight, the green of the
water-meadows in such rich fulness, and the crowd upon the barges
and walks so bright and gay."

"_6 Bury Street, June 12_.--The first persons I met in London were
Arthur and Augusta Stanley, who took me into their carriage, and
with them to the Park, whence we walked through Kensington Gardens,
and very pretty they looked. Arthur described his first sight of
the Queen on that spot, and Augusta was full of Princess Mary's
cleverness in being confined in the same house on the same day on
which the Queen was born.

"Then I went to Lady Wenlock, a most charming visit to that sweet
old lady, now much feebler, but so animated and lively, and her
life one long thanksgiving that her paralysis has left all her
powers unimpaired. She told me many old stories. I also called on
Lady Lothian, who is greatly disturbed at Madame de Trafford's
power over my sister. She says she quite considers her 'possessed,'
and that she ought to be exorcised. To-day I dined with Lady Grey.
She told me that as Charlie Grey was crossing to America, his
fellow-passengers were frightfully sea-sick, especially a man
opposite. At last an American sitting by him said, 'I guess,
stranger, if that man goes on much longer, he'll bring up his
boots.'"

"_June 15._--I have been sitting long with Lady Eastlake. She spoke
of how the great grief of her widowhood had taught her to sift the
dross from letters of condolence. She says that she lives upon
hope; prayer is given her in the meanwhile as a sustenance, not a
cure, for if it were a cure, one might be tempted to leave off
praying: still 'one could not live without it; it is like port wine
to a sick man.'

"She says she finds a great support in the letters of Sir Charles
to his mother--his most precious gift to her. She said touchingly
how she knew that even to her he had a slight reserve, but that to
his mother he poured out his whole soul. In those letters she had
learnt how, when he was absent, his mother hungered after him, and
perhaps, in all those blessed years when she had him, his mother
was hungering after him. In giving him up, she felt she gave him up
to her: he was with her now, and from those letters she knew what
their communion must be. 'I know he is with her now, for "I have
seen my mother, I have seen my mother," he twice rapturously
exclaimed when he was dying.' How touching and how consoling are
those visions on this side of the portal. Old Mr. Harford, when he
was dying, continually asked his wife if she did not hear the
music. 'Oh, it is so wonderful,' he said, 'bands upon bands.' She
did not understand it then but she knows now.

"'It was beautifully ordered,' said Lady Eastlake, 'that my
"History of Our Lord" was finished first: I could not have done it
now. And through it I learnt to know his library. My darling was
like a boy jumping up and down to find the references I wanted,
and, if possible, through the book I learnt to know him better.'

"She spoke of his wonderful diligence. When he was a boy he wrote
to his mother, 'London will be illuminated to-morrow, I shall draw
all night.'"

* * * * *

]

In July I spent a few days with the Alfords at the Deanery of Canterbury, which was always most enjoyable, the Dean so brimming with liveliness and information of every kind. In the delightful garden grows the old historic mulberry-tree,[342] about which it used to be said that the Deans of Canterbury sit under the mulberry till they turn purple, because those Deans were so frequently elevated to the episcopal bench, and bishops formerly, though it is rare now, always wore purple coats. I dined out with the Dean several times. I remember at one of the parties a son of Canon Blakesley saying to me--what I have often thought of since--"I find much the best way of getting on in society is never to be able to understand why anybody is to be disapproved of." Both the Dean's daughters were married now, and he cordially welcomed my companionship, always treating me as an intimate friend or relation. No one could be more sympathetic, for he had always the rare power of condemning the fault, but not the action of it.[343] I insert a few snatches from his table-talk, though they give but a faint idea of the man.

"We have been studying Butler's Analogy ever since we came back
from Rome, for we've had eight different butlers in the time. The
last butler said to me, 'It's not you who govern the Deanery, and
it's not Mrs. Alford, but it is the upper housemaid.'"

"Archbishop Harcourt was very fond of hunting, _so_ fond that he
was very near refusing the archbishopric because he thought if he
accepted he should have to give it up. He consulted a friend, who
said that he must take counsel with others. 'Of course I should
never join the meet,' said the Archbishop, 'but you know I might
fall in with the hounds by accident.' After some time the friend
came back and said that on the whole the party considered that the
Archbishop might hunt, provided he did not shout."

"Archbishop Manners Sutton had a wonderfully ready wit. One day a
blustering vulgar man came up to him and said, 'I believe,
Archbishop, that I am a relation of yours: my name is Sutton.' The
Archbishop quietly replied, 'Yes, but you want the Manners.'"

"When some one was abusing our font the other day, I could not help
saying that, for a font, I thought renaissance peculiarly
appropriate."

"I met Lady Mounteagle the other day: you know she was the sister--

'Of the woman tawny and tough[344]
Who married the Master rude and rough
Who lived in the house that Hope built.'

You know Hope gothicised the Master's Lodge at Trinity. At the
Whewells' 'perpendiculars,' as their large parties were called, no
one was allowed to sit down: if any one ventured to do so, a
servant came and requested him to move on."

"When Alice was a little girl, I was explaining the Apostles' Creed
to her. When we came to the point of our Saviour descending into
hell she said, 'Oh, that is where the devil is, isn't
it?'--'Yes.'--'Then why didn't the devil run at him and tear him
all to pieces?'"

In August we spent some time at the Deanery of Westminster, where Arthur and Augusta Stanley were always hospitality itself, and, with more than the usual kindness of hosts, always urged, and almost insisted, on our inviting our own friends to dinner and luncheon, making us, in fact, use their house and fortune as our own.

_From my_ JOURNAL.

"_July 28, 1867._--In the evening, from the gallery of the Deanery
which overhangs the abbey, Mother, Mrs. Hall, and I looked down
upon the last service. Luther's hymn was sung and the Hallelujah
chorus, and trumpets played: it was very grand indeed. The Bishop
of Chester and the Wordsworths dined. Yesterday Arthur showed
thirty working-men over the Abbey. He pointed out where Peel was
buried. One of them received it very gravely in silence, and then,
after several minutes, said, 'Well, it is very extraordinary. I've
lived all my life in the next county, and I never knew that before:
I always thought he was buried at Drayton. Now that's what I call
_information_.'"

"_August 3._--It has a weird effect at night to look down upon the
Abbey, and see the solitary watchman walking along the desolate
aisles and the long trail of light from the lantern he carries
flickering on each monument and death's-head in turn. Hugo Percy,
who was here the other evening, asked him about his nights in the
Abbey. 'The ghosts have been very cross lately,' he said.
'Palmerston was the last who came, but Mr. Cobden has not come
yet.'

"We have been to Buckingham Palace to see the rooms which were
arranged for the Sultan, which are dull and handsome. The chief
fact I derived from the housekeeper was that the Sultan never 'goes
to bed' and never lies down--in fact, he cannot, for a third of the
imperial bed at either end is taken up by a huge bolster, in the
middle of which he _sits_ all night, and reclines either way in
turn. There was a picture of the late Sultan in the room, and of
Frederick, Prince of Wales, sent from Windsor for the occasion. One
room was entirely hung with portraits of French kings and their
families."

From London I went to visit Bishop Jeune,[345] who was most wonderfully kind to me, really giving up his whole time to me whilst I was with him, and pouring forth such stores of information as I had not received since the days of Dr. Hawtrey; and it was a great pleasure to feel, to be quite sure--which one so seldom is--that he liked my visit as much as I liked being with him.

_From my_ JOURNAL.

"_August 10, 1867._--On the 8th I went to Peterborough, where I
have had a most agreeable visit at the Palace. When I arrived at
half-past seven, the family were all gone to dine with Dr. James,
an old Canon in the Close, whither I followed them. He was a
charming old-fashioned gentleman, most delightful to see.

"In the morning the Bishop, wearing his surplice and hood, read
prayers at a desk in the crypted hall of the Palace. Afterwards we
walked in the garden. I spoke of there being no monument in the
Cathedral to Catherine of Arragon. 'It is owing to that very
circumstance,' said the Bishop, 'that you are here to-day. If
Catherine of Arragon had had a tomb, I should never have been
Bishop of Peterborough. When people reproached Henry VIII. with
having erected no monument to his first wife, he said, "The Abbey
of Peterborough shall be a cathedral to her monument," and he
instituted the bishopric; the last abbot was the first bishop.' As
we passed the lavatory of the old convent, the Bishop said that a
touching description was still extant of its dedication and of the
number of cardinals, bishops, and priests who were present. 'How
few of them,' he said, 'would have believed that not only their
buildings, which they believed would last for ever, could become an
indefinite ruin, but that their Church, whose foundations they
believed to be even more eternally rooted in the soil, should be
cast out to make way for another Church, which is already tottering
on its base and divided against itself.' He said he 'firmly
believed that the ends both of the Church and monarchy were close
at hand, that the power of government was even now in the hands of
a few individuals, who were in their turn in the hands of a few
Irish priests.'

"While passing through the garden in returning to the Palace, the
Bishop showed me a white fig-tree growing out of the old wall of
the refectory and abundantly bearing fruit. 'This,' he said, 'I
believe to be the white fig-tree which is nearest to the Pole.'
Passing a fine mulberry-tree he said, 'We owe that to James I., as
he was so excessively anxious to promote the manufacture of silk,
that he recommended to every one the cultivation of the
mulberry-tree, but especially to the clergy, and those of the
clergy planted it who wished to stand well with him. Therefore it
is to be found in the neighbourhood of many of our cathedrals.'

"Afterwards the Bishop showed the old chronicle of the Abbey, which
he had had splendidly restored at Oxford. He read me some Latin
verses which had evidently been inserted by one of the monks
descriptive of his amours. 'Yet,' said the Bishop, 'these sins of
the monk were probably only sins of the imagination, quite as vivid
as real ones. You know,' he added, 'there are far more acted than
enacted sins, and the former are really far the more corrupting of
the two.'

"In the afternoon we drove to Croyland. The Bishop talked the whole
way. I spoke of his patronage, and envied the power it gave him; he
bitterly lamented it. He said, 'I have in my gift three canonries,
two archdeaconries, and sixty livings, and if any of these fell
vacant to-morrow, I should be at my wit's end whom to appoint. On
the average, two livings fall vacant every year, and then comes my
time of trouble. A bishop who would appoint the best man would be
most unpopular in his diocese, for every one of his clergy would be
offended at not being considered the best.' With regard to the
canonries, I suggested that he could find no difficulty, as he
might always choose men who were employed in some great literary
work. The Bishop allowed that this was exactly what he desired, but
that no such men were to be found in his diocese. There were many
very respectable clergy, but none more especially distinguished
than the rest. He said that when he was appointed bishop, Dr.
Vaughan advised him never to become what he called 'a carpet-bag
bishop,' but that this, in fact, was just what he had become: that
when he was going to preach in a village and sleep in a clergyman's
house, he did not like to trouble them by taking a man-servant, and
that he often arrived carrying his own carpet-bag. That
consequently he often never had his clothes brushed, or even his
boots blacked, but that he brushed his boots with his clothes-brush
as well as he could, as he was afraid of ringing his bell for fear
of mortifying his hosts by showing that he had not already got all
that he wanted. He said, however, that the work of a bishop was
vastly overrated, that there was nothing which did not come within
the easy powers of one man, yet that a proposition had already been
made to exclude the bishops from the House of Lords, to reduce
their incomes to £1500, and to double their number. He said that he
believed all Conservatives had better at once emigrate to New
Zealand, and that he wondered the Queen did not invest in foreign
funds; that it was utterly impossible the monarchy could last much
longer; that the end would be hastened by the debts of the two
Princes.

"When we reached Croyland we went into the Abbey Church, where the
Bishop pointed out the baptistery used for immersion, and several
curious epitaphs, one as late as 1729 asking prayers for the dead.
The drive was most curious over the fens, which are now drained,
but of which the soil is so light that they are obliged to marl it
all over to prevent its being blown away. The abbey itself is most
picturesque. It was built by St. Guthlac, a courtier, who retired
hither in a boat, but who came from no desire of seclusion and
prayer, but merely because he longed for the celebrity which must
accrue to him as a hermit. His sister, Pega, became the foundress
of Peakirk. The Bishop spoke much of the sublimity of the
conception under which these great abbeys were founded--'One God,
one Pope as God's interpreter, one Church, the servant of that
Pope, unity in everything.' He spoke of the Jesuit influence as
used to combat that of the Gallican Church, and he said that there
were now only three Gallican bishops.

"Coming home, the Bishop talked about Wales, and asked if I had
ever compared the military tactics of the Romans with regard to
Wales with those of Edward I. 'The Romans,' he said, 'built the
castle of Lincoln for the repression of the savage people of the
fens, and with the same idea built a line of fortresses between
England and Wales for the repression of the Welsh; but the
consummate skill of Edward I. saw a better plan than this, and he
built a line of fortresses along the coast, which could be
provisioned from the sea, so that if the Welsh made a raid into
England, he could bring them back by falling upon their wives and
children.

"In the evening the Bishop read aloud French poetry, a ballad of
the early part of the seventeenth century, on which Goldsmith had
evidently founded his 'Madame Blaise,' the powerful 'Malbrook,' and
many old hymns; also a beautiful hymn of Adolph Monod on the
Passion of Christ, which he said showed too much philosophy. He
described how he had preached in Westminster Abbey in French during
the great Exhibition, and the immense power of declamation that
French gave; that he had apostrophised those lying in the tombs,
the dead kings round about him, as he never should have ventured to
do in English. He spoke of the transitions of his life, that his
childhood had been passed amongst the rocks of Guernsey, and that
he had loved rocks and wild rolling seas ever since. That as a
child he was never allowed to speak French, as only the lower
orders spoke it, but that he went to the French college of S.
Servan, and there he learnt it. Then came his Oxford life, after
which, thinking that he was never likely to have any opening for
making his way in England, he went off to Canada in despair,
intending to become a settler in the backwoods. The rough life,
however, soon disgusted him, and in a year he returned to England,
where he became fellow and tutor of his college. Thence he was
appointed Dean of Jersey, and ruled there over the petty community.
Then he was made Master of Pembroke (where he remained twenty
years), Vice-Chancellor, Dean of Lincoln, and Bishop of
Peterborough. He spoke of the honour of Oxford men and the
consistency of the Hebdomadal Board, compared with others he had to
deal with. In Jersey, as a matter of course, all his subordinates
voted with their Dean. When he came to Oxford he expected the same
subserviency, and looked on all his colleagues with suspicion, but
he was soon convinced of their uprightness. He said touchingly
that, when near the grave, on looking back, it all seemed much the
same--the same pettiness of feeling, the same party strife, only he
did not worry himself about it; they were all in the hands of One
who died for all alike; that now there were changes in
everything--only One was unchanged.

"Speaking of the morality of Italy, he said that his friend Mr.
Hamilton, head of a clan, had met 'Sandy,' one of his men,
travelling between Rome and Naples. After expressing his surprise
at seeing him there, he asked what he thought of Rome and Naples.
'Wal,' said Sandy, 'I jist think that if naething happens to Rome
and Naples, Sodom and Gomorrah were very unjustly dealt with.'

"'I met Gioberti in Italy,' said the Bishop, 'and asked him about
the Pope. "C'est une femme vertueuse," he replied, "mais c'est
toujours une femme."'

"The Bishop said that, when younger, he wished to have written a
series of Bampton Lectures (and began them) on the History of the
Sacrament of the Lord's Supper. He intended to begin with a
description of three scenes--first, the supper in the upper chamber
at Jerusalem; then the Pope officiating at the altar of the
Lateran; then a simple Scotch meeting in the Highlands--and he
would proceed to describe what had led to the differences between
these; how the Agape was arranged as a point at which all divisions
and dissensions should be laid aside; how it was set aside after
sixty years by the Roman Emperor; then of the gradual growth of the
Eucharist, till oaths were taken on the wafer, and deeds were
sealed with it to give them a solemnity; and till, finally, it came
to be regarded as the actual body of Christ; then of the gradual
rise of all the different theories, the impanation, the invination
of the Saviour.

"This morning the Bishop asked if I knew what was the difference
between the entrance of a field in France and England. 'In
England,' he said, 'it is a _gate_ to let people in; in France a
_barrière_ to keep people out: from this you might proceed to
theorise that England was a country where sheep might stray, but
France not: England a country for milk and flesh, France for corn
and wine.'

"The Bishop said he knew our Roman acquaintance Mr. Goldsmid well.
'I met Nat Goldsmid in Paris about the time of the Immaculate
Conception affair, and I said to him, "Goldsmid, now why has your
Church done this? for you know you all worshipped the Virgin as
much as you could before, and what more can you do for her
now?"--"Yes," he said, "that is quite true; we all worshipped the
Virgin before, but we have done this as a stepping-stone to
declaring the infallibility of the Pope. A Pope who could take upon
himself to declare _such_ a dogma as this must be infallible!"'

From Peterborough I went to stay at Lincoln with Mrs. Nicholas Bacon, mother of the premier baronet, a very pretty old lady, who reminded me of the old lady in "David Copperfield," finding her chief occupation in rapping at her window and keeping the Minster green opposite free from intruding children, and unable to leave home for any time because then they would get beyond her--"so sacrilegious," she told them, it was to play there. Going with her to dine with that Mrs. Ellison of Sugbrooke who has bequeathed a fine collection of pictures to the nation, I met the very oldest party of people I ever saw in my life, and as one octogenarian tottered in after another, felt more amazed, till Mrs. Ellison laughingly explained that, as Mrs. Bacon had written that she was going to bring "a very old friend" of hers, she had supposed it would be agreeable to him to meet as many as possible of his contemporaries! Afterwards, when staying with Mr. Clements at Gainsborough, I saw Stowe, which, as an old cathedral, was the predecessor of Lincoln--very curious and interesting. Thence I went to Doncaster, arriving in time to help Kate[346] with a great tea-party to her old women. She asked one old woman how she was. "Well," she said, "I be middling _upwards_, but I be very bad _downwards_. I be troubled with such bad legs; downright dangerous legs they be." After visits at Durham, Cullercoats, and Ridley Hall, I went to stay with the Dixon-Brownes at Unthank in Northumberland.

_To_ MY MOTHER.

"_Unthank, August 27, 1867._--I spent yesterday morning in my
Northern home (at Ridley), which is in perfect beauty now--the
Allen water, full and clear, rushing in tiny waterfalls among the
mossy rocks, all the ferns in full luxuriance, and the rich heather
in bloom, hanging over the crags and edging the walks. At six
o'clock the flag was raised which stops all trains at the bottom of
the garden, and I came the wee journey of seven miles down the
lovely Tyne valley to Haltwhistle. Unthank is the old home of
Bishop Ridley, the house to which he wrote his last letter before
the stake, addressed to 'my deare sister of Unthanke,'--and it is a
beautiful spot in a green hollow, close under the purple slopes of
the grand moor called Plenmellor. The house is modern, but has an
old tower, and a garden splendid in gorgeous colouring sweeps up
the hill behind it. To-day we went up through a romantic gill
called 'The Heavenly Hole' to Plenmellor Tarn, a lovely blue lake
in the midst of the heather-clad hills. We spoke of it to an old
man there, 'Aye,' he said, 'it's jist a drap of water left by the
Fluid, and niver dried up.'"

"_Bonnyrigg, August 30._--This shooting lodge of Sir Edward
Blackett is quite in the uninhabited moorlands, but has lovely
views of a lake backed by craggy blue hills--just what my sweet
mother would delight to sketch. Lady Blackett is very clever and
agreeable.[347] We have been a fatiguing walk through the heather
to 'the Queen's Crag,' supposed to be Guinevere turned into stone."

"_Bamborough Castle, Sept. 7._--I always long especially for my
dearest mother in this grand old castle, to me perhaps the most
delightful place in the world, its wild scenery more congenial than
even beautiful Italy itself. Nothing too can be kinder than the
dear old cousins.[348] ... It was almost dark when we drove up the
links and under all the old gateways and through the rock entrance:
the light burning in Mrs. Liddell's recess in the court-room. And
it was pleasant to emerge from the damp into the brightly lighted
tapestried chamber with the dinner set out. All yesterday the
minute-gun was booming through the fog to warn ships off the
rocks--such a strangely solemn sound.

"Mr. Liddell was speaking to an old Northumbrian here about the
organ yesterday, and he said, 'I canna bear the loike o' that kist
o' whistles a buzzin' in my ears.'"

"_The Lodge, North Berwick, Sept. 9._--I find my sweet hostess,
Mrs. Dalzel,[349] little altered, except perhaps more entirely
heavenly than before in all her thoughts and words. 'I am very near
the last station now,' she says, 'and then I shall be at home. I am
the last of fifteen, and I can think of them all _there_--my
mother, my sisters, one after another, resting upon their Saviour
alone, and now with Him for ever!' 'When one is old, the wonderful
discoveries, the great works of man only bewilder one and tire one;
but the flowers and the unfolding of Nature, all the wonderful
works of God, refresh and interest as much as ever: and may not it
be because these interests and pleasures are to be immortal, amid
the flowers that never fade?'

"Mr. Dalzel does not look a day older, but he sat at dinner with a
green baize cloth before him to save his eyes. We dined at five,
and another Mrs. Dalzel came, who sang Scottish songs most
beautifully in the evening. Mr. Dalzel prayed aloud long extempore
prayers, and we dispersed at ten. Before dinner I went to the sands
with Mrs. Allen Dalzel,[350] who was very amusing:--

"'The old Dalzel house is at Binns near Linlithgow. The first
Dalzel was an attendant of one of the early Kenneths. The king's
favourite was taken by his enemies and hanged on a tree. "Who will
dare to cut him down?" said the king. "Dalzel," or "I dare," said
the attendant, who cut him down with his dagger. Hence came the
name, and hence the Dalzels bear a dagger as their crest, with the
motto "I dare," and on their arms a man hanging.

"'At Binns there are trees cut in the shape of men hanging. There
is also a picture of the "tyrannous Dalzel," who persecuted the
Covenanters, and who made a vow at the death of Charles I. that he
would never shave again or change his costume. He lived for fifty
years after that, but he never cut his beard, and he is represented
in his odd suit of chamois leather, with a high-peaked hat and his
hair down to his waist.

"'His comrade was Grierson of Lag, whose eye was the most terrible
ever seen. Long after the persecution was over, he was told that a
servant in the house had a great curiosity to see him. "Let him
bring me a glass of wine," said Grierson. The servant brought it in
upon a salver. Grierson waited till he came close up, and then,
fixing his eye on him, exclaimed, "Are there ony Whigs in Galloway
noo?" and the effect was so terrible, that the servant dropped the
salver, glass and all, and rushed out of the room.

"'I used to go and teach Betty O'Brien to read when we lived at
Seacliffe. Her mother was a clean tidy body, and, though she had
not a penny in the world, she was very proud, for she came from the
North of Ireland, and looked down upon all who came from the South.
I asked her why she did not make friends with her neighbours, and
she said, "D'ye think I'd consort wi' the loike o' them, just
Connaught folk?" So on this I changed the subject as quick as I
could, for I just came from Connaught myself.

"'Her daughter, however, married one of those very Connaught
Irish--what she called "the boy O'Flinn," and she would have
nothing to do with her afterwards; and she lay in wait for "the boy
O'Flinn," and threw a stone at him, which hit him in the chest so
badly that he was in bed for a week afterwards. When I heard of
this, I went to see her and said, "Well, Betty, you're Irish, and
I'm Irish, and I think we just ought to set a good example and show
how well Irishwomen can behave." But she soon cut short my little
sermon by saying, "They've been telling tales o' me, have they? and
it's not off you they keep their tongues neither: they say you're a
_Roman_!" I did not want to hear any more, and was going out of the
cottage, when she called after me in a fury, "_I_ know what you've
been staying so long in Edinburgh for; you just stay here to fast
and to pray, and then you go there to faast and drink tay."'"

"_Sept. 10._--I wish for my dearest mother every hour in this
sanctuary of peace and loving-kindness, with the sweet presence of
Mrs. Dalzel. What she is and says it is quite impossible to give an
idea of; but she is truly what Milton describes--

"Insphered
In regions mild of calm and air serene,
Above the smoke and stir of this dim spot
Which men call earth."

"Her constant communion with heaven makes all the world to her
only a gallery of heavenly pictures, creating a succession of
heavenly thoughts, and she has so sweet and gentle a manner of
giving these thoughts to others, that all, even those least in
unison with her, are equally impressed by them. Most striking of
all is her large-heartedness and admiration of all the good people
who disagree with her. Her daughter-in-law has quite given up
everything else in her devotion to her: it is really Ruth and Naomi
over again.

"This afternoon we drove to Tantallon and on to Seacliffe, a most
beautiful place on the coast, where Mrs. Dalzel lived formerly. A
delightful little walk under a ruined manor-house and through a
wood of old buckthorn trees led down to the sea, and a most grand
view of Tantallon rising on its red rocks. We walked afterwards to
'Canty Bay,' so called because the Covenanters sang Psalms there
when they were being embarked for the Bass.

"'How curious it would be,' Mrs. Dalzel has been saying, 'if all
the lines on people's faces had writing on them to say what brought
them there. What strange tales they would tell!'

"'Oh, what it is to be at peace! at perfect peace with God! in
perfect reliance on one's Saviour! I often think it is like a
person who has packed up for a journey. When all his work is
finished and all his boxes are packed, he can sit down in the last
hour before his departure and rest in peace, for all his
preparations are made. So in the last hours of life one may rest in
peace, if the work of preparation is already done.'

"'I used to count the future by years: now I only do it by months;
perhaps I can only do it by weeks.'

"'My eldest brother lived in a great world. He was very handsome
and much admired. As aide-de-camp to Sir Ralph Abercromby, George
IV. made him his friend, and many people paid court to him. At last
one day he came to my dear mother, who was still living in her
great age, and who had found her Saviour some years before, and
said to her, "Mother, I feel that my health is failing and that
this world is rapidly slipping away from me, and I have no certain
hope for the next: what would you advise me to do?" And my mother
said to him, "My dear son, I can only advise you to do what I have
done myself, take your Bible and read it with prayer upon your
knees, and God will send you light." And my brother did so, and God
granted him the perfect peace that passeth understanding. He lived
many years after that, but his health had failed, and his Bible was
his constant companion. When I went to see him, he used to lay his
hand on the Book and say, "_This_ is my comforter." A few years
before he died, a malady affected one of his legs which obliged him
to have the limb amputated. When the operation was about to
commence, the doctor who was standing by felt his pulse, and did
not find it varied in the least. "General Macmurdo," he said, "you
are a hero."--"No," said my brother solemnly, "but I hope I am a
Christian." And the doctor said he felt the power of Christianity
from that day.'

"'From the shore of another world all my past life seems like a
dream.'[351]

"I think if one stayed here long, one would quite feel the
necessity of sinning occasionally to avoid the danger of becoming
intolerant of petty faults and unsuitablenesses, from living with
those so entirely without them."

"_Carstairs, Sept. 18._--This is a large and comfortable house, and
Mr. Monteith is busied with various improvements in the grounds.
One improvement I should certainly make would be the destruction of
a horrible tomb of a former possessor of the place, an atheist
relation, with an inscription 'to the Infernal Deities.' No wonder
that the avenue leading to the tomb is said to be haunted."

It was during this summer that old Lady Webster died.[352] She had long been a conspicuous figure in our home neighbourhood, and had seemed to possess the secret of eternal youth. In my childhood she reigned like a queen at Battle, but the Websters had several years before been obliged to sell Battle to Lord Harry Vane (afterwards Duke of Cleveland), chiefly because there were five dowager Lady Websters at once, all drawing jointures from the already impoverished property. Of these ladies, three, usually known as "the good Lady Webster," "Grace, Lady Webster," and "the great Lady Webster," lived much at Hastings. When the great Lady Webster died, she left several sons, and it was a subject of much comment at the time that, when her will was opened, she was found to have left nothing to any of them. Her will was very short. She left everything she possessed in the world to her dear and faithful companion Madame Bergeret. It excited many unkind remarks, but those who learnt the real facts always admitted that, in the crowning act of her life, Lady Webster had only acted with that sense of justice and duty which had ever been her characteristic. The story is this:[353]--

Towards the latter part of the last century there lived at an old
manorial farm in Brittany a female farmer named Bergeret. Her
ancestors had owned the farm, and had cultivated their own land for
hundreds of years, and Madame Bergeret herself was well known and
highly respected through all the neighbouring country, charitable
to her poorer neighbours, frank, kind, and unfailingly hospitable
to those in her own rank of life. She lived bounteously, kept an
open house, and spent in beneficence and hospitality the ample
income which her lands brought her.

One day she was surprised by a visit from her next neighbour, a man
named Girard, in her own class of life, whose family had always
been known to her own, and who had possessed the neighbouring farm.
He told her that he felt she would be shocked to hear that he had
long been acting a part in making himself appear much better off
than he was; that he had lost a great deal of money in speculation;
that all was on the eve of being divulged; that if he could manage
to keeps things going till after the next harvest, he might tide
over his misfortunes, but that otherwise he must be totally ruined,
lose everything he had, and bring his wife and children to
destitution; and by the recollection of their old neighbourhood and
long intimacy he adjured Madame Bergeret to help him. Madame
Bergeret was very sorry--very sorry indeed, but she told him that
it was impossible; and it really was. She lived amply up to her
income, she had laid nothing by: she was well off, but all she had
came from her lands; her income depended upon her harvest; she
really had nothing to give to her poor neighbour, and she told him
so--told him so with a very heavy heart, and he went away terribly
crestfallen and miserable.

When Girard was gone, Madame Bergeret looked round her room, and
she saw there a collection of fine old gold plate, such as often
forms the source of pride to a Breton yeoman of old family, and
descends like a patent of nobility from one generation to another,
greatly reverenced and guarded. Madame Bergeret looked at her
plate, and she said to herself, "If this was sold, it would produce
a very large sum; and ought I, for the sake of mere family pride,
to allow an old and honourable family to go to destitution?" And
she called her neighbour back, and she gave Girard all her gold
plate. The sum for which he was able to sell it helped him through
till after the harvest; soon afterwards he found an opportunity of
disposing of his Breton lands to very great advantage, and removed
to another part of the country. He thanked Madame Bergeret, but he
did not seem to realise that she had made any great sacrifice in
his behalf; and she, resting satisfied in having done what she
believed to be right, expected no more.

Some years afterwards, Madame Bergeret, being an old woman, placed
her Breton lands in the hands of an agent, and removed with her two
children to Paris. The great French Revolution occurred while she
was there, and the Reign of Terror came on, and Madame Bergeret,
who belonged to a Royalist family of loyal Brittany, was arrested:
she was thrown into the prison of La Force, and she was condemned
to death.

The Madame Bergeret I knew in another generation recollected being
with her little brother in a room on the Rue St Honoré on the day
on which a hundred and twenty persons were to suffer in the Place
Louis XV. She saw them pass down the street to execution in
twenty-two tumbrils; but when the last tumbril came beneath the
window, the friends who were with her in the room drew down the
blinds; not, however, before she had recognised her own mother in
that tumbril, with all her hair cut off, that the head might come
off more easily.

All the way to the place of execution, Madame Bergeret consoled
and encouraged her companions, and she assented to their petition
that she should suffer last, that she would see them through the
dread portal before her. Therefore, when her turn at length came,
the ground around the scaffold was one sea of blood, for a hundred
and nineteen persons had perished that day. Thus, on descending the
steps of the cart, Madame Bergeret slipped and stumbled. This
arrested the attention of the deputy who was set to watch the
executions. He started, and then rushed forward saying, "This woman
has no business here. I know her very well; she is a most honest
citoyenne, or, if she is not, I know quite well how to make her so:
this woman is not one to be guillotined." It was Girard.

Now Madame Bergeret was quite prepared for death, but the sudden
revulsion of her deliverance overcame her and she fainted. Girard
carried her away in his arms, and when she came to herself she was
in bed in a house in a quiet back-street of Paris, and he was
watching over her. He had removed to Lyons, and, with the sudden
changes of the time, had risen to be deputy, and being set to watch
the executions, had recognised the woman who had saved him. By the
help of Girard, and after many hairbreadth escapes, Madame Bergeret
reached the coast, and eventually arrived in England. She then made
her way to the only person she knew, a lady who had once spent some
time in her Breton village, a Mrs. Adamson. Her daughter played
with and was brought up with the little Miss Adamson. When Miss
Adamson married Sir Godfrey Webster of Battle Abbey, Mademoiselle
Bergeret (her mother being dead) went with her and lived at Battle
as a sort of companion to Lady Webster and nursery-governess to her
boys. For fifty years she never received any salary, and having,
through the changes of things in France, inherited something of her
mother's Breton property, she twice sacrificed her little all to
pay the debts of the Webster family. Therefore it was that, in the
close of life, Lady Webster felt that her sons might provide for
themselves, but that, having very little to bequeath, the one
person she could not leave destitute was "her dear and faithful
companion and friend, Madame Bergeret."

Five months before her death, Lady Webster was very full of the
terrible deaths which had lately occurred from railway accidents,
and, on leaving home, she said to Madame Bergeret, "Here is this
paper, and if I should be killed by an accident or not live to come
home, you may read it; but at any rate keep it for me, and perhaps,
if I come back, some day I may want it again." Lady Webster came
back well and did not ask for the paper, and when she died, it was
so sudden, a few minutes after talking quite cheerfully to Madame
Bergeret, that in the shock she remembered nothing about it, and it
was only long afterwards, when they were making a great fuss about
there being no will, that she suddenly thought of the paper
entrusted to her, and, when it was read, found Lady Webster had
left her all she possessed.

Madame Bergeret dying herself about a year afterwards, left
everything back to the Webster family. She was a quiet primitive
old woman, who used to sit in the background at work in Lady
Webster's sitting-room.

After my return home in the autumn of 1867, my mother was terribly ill, so that our journey abroad was a very anxious one to look forward to. I tried, however, to face it quite cheerily. I have read in an American novel somewhere, "It is no use to pack up any worries to take with you; you can always pick up plenty on the way;" and I have always found it true.

_To_ MISS WRIGHT _and_ JOURNAL.

"_Nice, Nov. 17, 1867._--My dear Aunt Sophy will be delighted to
see this date. So far all our troubles and anxieties are past, and
the sweet Mother certainly not the worse, perhaps rather better for
all her fatigues. It is an extraordinary case, to be one day lying
in a sort of vision on the portals of another world, the next up
and travelling.

]

"When we reached Paris she was terribly exhausted, then slept for
thirty-six hours like a child, almost without waking. At the
Embassy we were urged to go on to Rome, all quiet and likely to
subside into a dead calm; but so much snow had fallen on Mont
Cenis, that in Mother's weak state we could not risk that passage,
and were obliged to decide upon coming round by the coast. On
Monday we reached Dijon, where twenty-four hours' sleep again
revived the Mother. It was fiercely cold, but Tuesday brightened
into a glorious winter's day, and I had a most enchanting walk
through sunshine and bracing air to Fontaines. It is picturesque
French country, a winding road with golden vines and old stone
crosses, and a distance of oddly-shaped purple hills. Fontaines
itself is a large village, full of mouldering mediæval fragments,
stretching up a hillside, which becomes steeper towards the top,
and is crowned by a fine old church, a lawn with groups of old
walnut-trees, and the remains of the château where St. Bernard was
born. Over the entrance is a statue of him, and within, the room of
his birth is preserved as a chapel. The view from the churchyard is
lovely, and the graves are marked by ancient stone crosses and
bordered with flowers. Within are old tombs and inscriptions--'Ce
git la très haute et très puissante dame,' &c.

"We came on to Arles by the quick night-train, and stayed there as
usual two days and a half--days of glaring white sirocco and no
colour, and at Arles we found ourselves at once in Southern heat,
panting, without fires and with windows wide open."

]

"_Pisa, Dec. 1._--We left Nice on the 21st, and slept at Mentone,
quite spoilt by building and by cutting down trees. I saw many
friends, especially the Comtesse d'Adhemar, who flung her arms
round me and kissed me on both cheeks. We spent the middle of the
next day at S. Remo and slept at Oneglia. The precipices are truly
appalling. I have visions still of the early morning drive from
Oneglia along dewy hillsides and amongst hoary olives, and through
the narrow gaily painted streets of the little fishing-towns, where
the arches meet overhead and the wares set out before the
shop-doors brush the carriage as it passes by.

]

"The second day, at Loiano, I was left behind. I went just outside
the hotel to draw, begging my mother and Lea to pick me up as they
went by. The carriage passed close by me and they did not see me.
At first I did not hurry myself, thinking, when they did not find
me, that they would stop for me a little farther on; but seeing the
carriage go on and on, I ran after it as hard as I could, shouting
at the pitch of my voice; but it never stopped, and I quite lost
sight of it in the narrow streets of one of the fishing-villages
before reaching Finale. At Finale I was in absolute despair at
their not stopping, which seemed inexplicable, and I pursued mile
after mile, footsore and weary, through the grand mountain coves in
that part of the Riviera and along the desolate shore to Noli,
where, just as night closed in, I was taken up by some people
driving in a little carriage, on the box of which, in a bitter cold
wind, I was carried to Savona, where I arrived just as our heavy
carriage with its inmates was driving into the hotel. It was one of
the odd instances of my dear mother's insouciance, of her
'happy-go-lucky' nature: 'they had not seen me, they had not looked
back; no, they supposed I should get on somehow; they knew I always
fell on my legs.' And I was perfectly conscious that if I had not
appeared for days, my mother would have said just the same. We
spent a pleasant Sunday at Savona, the views most beautiful of the
wonderfully picturesque tower, calm bay of sapphire water, and
delicate mountain distance.

"The landlord of the Croce di Malta at Genoa engaged a _vetturino_
to take us to La Spezia. The first day, it was late when we left
Sta. Margherita, where we stayed for luncheon. The driver lighted
his lamps at Chiavari. Soon both my companions fell asleep. I sat
up watching the foam of the sea at the bottom of the deep black
precipices without parapets as long as I could see it through the
gloom: then it became quite dark. Suddenly there was a frightful
bolt of the horses, scream after scream from the driver, an awful
crash, and we were hurled violently over and over into the black
darkness. A succession of shrieks from Lea showed me that she was
alive, but I thought at first my mother must be killed, for there
was no sound from her. Soon the great troop of navvies came up,
whose sudden appearance from the mouth of a tunnel, each with a
long iron torch in his hand, had made the horses bolt. One of them
let down his torch into the mired and broken carriage as it lay
bottom upwards. 'Povera, poveretta,' he exclaimed, as he saw Lea
sitting pouring with blood amongst the broken glass of the five
great windows of the carriage. Then Mother's voice from the depth
of the hood assured us that she was not hurt, only buried under the
cushions and bags, and she had courage to remain perfectly
motionless, while sheet after sheet of broken glass was taken from
off her (she would have been cut to pieces if she had moved) and
thrown out at the top of the carriage. Then there was a great
consultation as to _how_ we were to be got out, which ended in the
carriage being bodily lifted and part of the top taken off, making
an opening through which first Lea was dragged and afterwards the
Mother. Then my mother, who had not walked at all for many weeks,
was compelled to walk more than a mile to Sestri, in pitch darkness
and pouring rain, dragged by a navvy on one side and me on the
other. Another navvy supported Lea, who was in a fainting state,
and others carried torches. We excited much pity when we arrived at
the little inn at Sestri, and the people were most hospitable and
kind. I had always especially wished to draw a particular view of a
gaily painted church tower and some grand aloes on the road near
Sestri, and it was curious to be enabled to do so the next day by
our forcible detention there for want of a carriage.

]

"On the 29th we crossed once more the grand pass of Bracco, with
its glorious scenery of billowy mountains ending in the delicate
peaks of Carrara; and we baited at a wretched village where Mother
was able to walk in the sunny road. Yesterday we came here by the
exquisite railway under Massa Ducale, and were rapturously welcomed
by Victoire[358] and her daughter."

"_Palazzo Parisani, Rome, Dec. 10._--We had a wearisome journey
here on the 3rd, the train not attempting to keep any particular
time, and stopping more than an hour at Orbetello for the
'_discorso_' of the guard and engine-driver,[359] and at other
stations in proportion. However, Mother quite revived when the
great masses of the aqueducts began to show in the moonlight. They
had given up expecting us in the Palazzo, where my sister has lent
us her apartments, and it was long before we could get any one to
open the door.