Chapter XVI: Letter I: Clapton, October 3, 1769

From their agreeable excursion to Shrewsbury, my dearest friends are by this time returned to their thrice-beloved Lichfield. Once again have they beheld those fortunate _spires_, the constant witnesses of all their pains and pleasures. I can well conceive the emotions of joy which their first appearance, from the neighboring hills, excites after absence; they seem to welcome you home, and invite you to reiterate those hours of happiness, of which they are a species of monument. I shall have an eternal love and reverence for them. Never shall I forget the joy that danced in Honora's eyes, when she first showed them to me from Needwood Forest on our return with you from Buxton to Lichfield. I remember she called them the _Ladies of the Valley_--their lightness and elegance deserve the title. Oh, how I loved them from that instant! My enthusiasm concerning them is carried farther even than yours and Honora's, for every object that has a pyramidal form recalls them to my recollection, with a sensation that brings the tear of pleasure into my eyes.

How happy must you have been at Shrewsbury! only that you tell me, alas! that dear Honora was not so well as you wished during your stay there. I always hope the best. My impatient spirit rejects every obtruding idea which I have not fortitude to support. Dr. Darwin's skill and your tender care will remove that sad pain in her side, which makes writing troublesome and injurious to her; which robs her poor _cher Jean_[86] of those precious pages with which, he flatters himself, she would otherwise have indulged him. So your happiness at Shrewsbury scorned to be indebted to public amusements. Five virgins, united in the soft bonds of friendship! how I should have liked to have made the sixth! But you surprise me by such an absolute exclusion of the beaux. I certainly thought that when five wise virgins were watching at midnight, it must have been in expectation of the bridegroom's coming. _We_ are at this instant five virgins, writing round the same table--my three sisters, Mr. Ewer, and myself. I beg no reflections injurious to the honor of poor _cher Jean_. My mother is gone to pay a visit, and has left us in possession of the old coach; but as for nags, we can boast only of two long-tails, and my sisters say they are sorry cattle, being no other than my friend Ewer and myself, who, to say the truth, have enormous pig-tails.

My dear Boissier is come to town; he has brought a little of the soldier with him, but he is the same honest, warm, intelligent friend I always found him. He sacrifices the town diversions, since I will not partake of them.

We are jealous of your correspondents, who are so numerous. Yet, write to the Andrés often, my dear Julia, for who are they that will value your letters quite so much as we value them?

The least scrap of a letter will be received with the greatest joy. Write, therefore, though it were only to give us the comfort of having a piece of paper which has recently passed through your hands; Honora will put in a little postscript, were it only to tell me that she is _my very sincere friend_, who will neither give me love nor comfort--very short, indeed, Honora, was thy last postscript! But I am too presumptuous; I will not scratch out, but I _un_say. From the little there _was_ I received more joy than I deserve. This _cher Jean_ is an impertinent fellow, but he will grow discreet in time. You must consider him as a poor novice of _eighteen_, who, for all the sins he may commit, is sufficiently punished in the single evil of being one hundred and twenty miles from Lichfield.

My mother and sisters will go to Putney in a few days, to stay some time. We none of us like Clapton. _I_ need not care, for I am all day long in town, but it is avoiding Scylla to fall into Charybdis. You paint to me the pleasant vale of Stow in the richest autumnal coloring. In return, I must tell you that my zephyrs are wafted through cracks in the wainscot; for murmuring streams I have dirty kennels; for bleating flocks, grunting pigs; and squalling cats for birds that incessantly warble. I have said something of this sort in my letter to Miss Spearman, and am twinged with the idea of these epistles being confronted, and that I shall recall to your memory the fat knight's love-letters to Mrs. Ford and Mrs. Page.

Julia, perhaps thou fanciest I am merry--alas! But I do not wish to make you as doleful as myself; and besides, when I would express the tender feelings of my soul, I have no language which does them justice; if I had, I should regret that you could not have it fresher, and that whatever one communicates by letter must go such a roundabout way before it reaches one's correspondent--from the writer's heart, through his head, arm, hand, pen, ink, paper, over many a weary hill and dale, to the eye, head, and heart of the reader. I have often regretted our not possessing a sort of faculty which should enable our sensations, remarks, etc., to arise from their source in a sort of exaltations, and fall upon our paper in words and phrases properly adapted to express them, without passing through an imagination whose operations so often fail to second those of the heart. Then what a metamorphose should we see in people's style! How eloquent those who are truly attached! how stupid they who falsely profess affection! Perhaps the former had never been able to express half their regard; while the latter, by their flowers of rhetoric, had made us believe a thousand times more than they ever felt--but this is whimsical moralizing.

My sisters Penserosas were dispersed on their arrival in town, by the joy of seeing Louisa and their dear little brother Billy again, our kind and excellent Uncle Giradot, and Uncle Lewis André. I was glad to see them, but they complained, not without reason, of the gloom upon my countenance. Billy wept for joy that we were returned, while poor _cher Jean_ was ready to weep for sorrow. Louisa is grown still handsomer since we left her. Our sisters, Mary and Anne, knowing your partiality to beauty, are afraid that, when they introduce her to you, she will put their noses out of joint. Billy is not old enough for me to be afraid of in the rival-way, else I should keep him aloof, for his heart is formed of those affectionate materials so dear to the ingenuous taste of Julia and her Honora.

I sympathize in your resentment against the canonical dons who stumpify the heads of those good green[87] people, beneath whose friendly shade so many of your happiest hours have glided away--but they defy them; let them stumpify as much as they please, time will repair the mischief; their verdant arms will again extend and invite you to their shelter.

The evenings grow long. I hope your conversation round the fire will sometimes fall on the Andrés; it will be a great comfort that they are remembered. We chink our glasses to your healths at every meal. "Here's to our Lichfieldian friends," says Nanny. "Oh-h!" says Mary. "With all my soul, say I." "_Allons!_" cries my mother--and the draught seems nectar. The libation made, we begin our uncloying theme, and so beguile the gloomy evening.

Mr. and Mrs. Seward will accept my most affectionate respects. My male friend at Lichfield will join in your conversation on the Andrés. Among the numerous good qualities he is possessed of, he certainly has gratitude, and then he can not forget those who so sincerely love and esteem him. I, in particular, shall always recall with pleasure the happy hours I have passed in his company. My friendship for him, and for your family, has diffused itself, like the precious ointment from Aaron's beard, on everything which surrounds you; therefore I beg you would give my amities to the whole town. Persuade Honora to forgive the length and ardor of the enclosed, and believe me truly,

Your affectionate and faithful friend,
J. André.