Complete Novels of Maria Edgeworth

by Maria Edgeworth

  We have just returned to dear Bowood. We went to Wimbledon, where Lady Spencer was very attentive and courteous: she is, I may say, the cleverest person I have seen since I came to England. At parting she “GOD blessed” me. We met there Lady Jones, widow of Sir William — thin, dried, tall old lady, nut-cracker chin, penetrating, benevolent, often — smiling, black eyes; and her nephew, young Mr. Hare; [Footnote: Augustus William Hare, one of the authors of Guesses on Truth.] and, the last day, Mr. Brunel. [Footnote: Afterwards Sir Mark Isambard Brunel, engineer of the Thames Tunnel, Woolwich Arsenal, etc., 1769-1849.]

  This moment Mrs. Dugald Stewart, who was out walking, has come in — the same dear woman! I have seen Mr. Stewart — very, very weak — he cannot walk without an arm to lean on.

  BOWOOD, Nov. 4, 1818.

  The newspapers have told you the dreadful catastrophe — the death, and the manner of the death, of that great and good man, Sir Samuel Romilly. My dearest mother, there seems no end of horrible calamities. There is no telling how it has been felt in this house. I did not know till now that Mr. Dugald Stewart had been so very intimate with Sir Samuel, and so very much attached to him — forty years his friend: he has been dreadfully shocked. He was just getting better, enjoyed seeing us, conversed quite happily with me the first evening, and I felt reassured about him; but what may be the consequence of this stroke none can tell. I rejoice that we came to meet him here: they say that I am of use conversing with him. Lord Lansdowne looks wretchedly, and can hardly speak on the subject without tears, notwithstanding all his efforts.

  To MISS WALLER. [Footnote: Miss Waller was aunt of Captain Beaufort and the fourth Mrs. Edgeworth.] BYRKELY LODGE, Nov. 24, 1818.

  In the gloom which the terrible and most unexpected loss of Sir Samuel Romilly cast over the whole society at Bowood during the last few days we spent there, I recollect some minutes of pleasure. When I was consulting Mrs. Dugald Stewart about my father’s MS., I mentioned Captain Beaufort’s opinion on some point; the moment his name had passed my lips, Mr. Stewart’s grave countenance lighted up, and he exclaimed, “Captain Beaufort! I have the very highest opinion of Captain Beaufort ever since I saw a letter of his, which I consider to be one of the best letters I ever read. It was to the father of a young gentleman who died at Malta, to whom Captain Beaufort had been the best of friends. The young man had excellent qualities, but some frailties. Captain Beaufort’s letter to the father threw a veil over the son’s frailties, and without departing from the truth, placed all his good qualities in the most amiable light. The old man told me,” continued Mr. Stewart, “that this letter was the only earthly consolation he ever felt for the loss of his son; he spoke of it with tears streaming from his eyes, and pointed in particular to the passage that recorded the warm affection with which his son used to speak of him.”

  It is delightful to find the effect of a friend’s goodness thus coming round to us at a great distance of time, and to see that it has raised him in the esteem of those we most admire.

  Mr. Stewart has not yet recovered his health; he is more alarmed, I think, than he need to be by the difficulty he finds in recollecting names and circumstances that passed immediately before and after his fever. This hesitation of memory, I believe, everybody has felt more or less after any painful event. In every other respect Mr. Stewart’s mind appears to me to be exactly what it ever was, and his kindness of heart even greater than we have for so many years known it to be.

  We are now happy in the quiet of Byrkely Lodge. We have not had any visitors since we came, and have paid only one visit to the Miss Jacksons. Miss Fanny is, you know, the author of Rhoda; Miss Maria, the author of a little book of advice about A Gay Garden. I like the Gay Garden lady best at first sight, but I will suspend my judgment prudently till I see more.

  I have just heard a true story worthy of a postscript even in the greatest haste. Two stout foxhunters in this neighbourhood who happened each to have as great a dread of a spider as ever fine lady had or pretended to have, chanced to be left together in a room where a spider appeared, crawling from under a table, at which they were sitting. Neither durst approach within arm’s length of it, or touch it even with a pair of tongs; at last one of the gentlemen proposed to the other, who was in thick boots, to get on the table and jump down upon his enemy, which was effected to their infinite satisfaction.

  To MRS. RUXTON. BYRKELY LODGE, Jan. 20, 1819.

  I see my little dog on your lap, and feel your hand patting his head, and hear your voice telling him that it is for Maria’s sake he is there. I wish I was in his place, or at least on the sofa beside you at this moment, that I might in five minutes tell you more than my letters could tell you in five hours.

  I have scarcely yet recovered from the joy of having Fanny actually with me, and with me just in time to go to Trentham, on which I had set my foolish heart. We met her at Lichfield. We spent that evening there — the children of four different marriages all united and happy together. Lovell took Francis [Footnote: Son of the fourth Mrs. Edgeworth, who was going to the Charter-house, and who had accompanied his sister Fanny, with Lovell, from Edgeworthstown.] on with him to Byrkely Lodge, and we went to Trentham.

  When Honora and I had Fanny in the chaise to ourselves, ye gods! how we did talk! We arrived at Trentham by moonlight, and could only just see outlines of wood and hills: silver light upon the broad water, and cheerful lights in the front of a large house, with wide-open hall door. Nothing could be more polite and cordial than the reception given to us by Lady Stafford, and by her good-natured, noblemanlike lord. During our whole visit, what particularly pleased me was the manner in which they treated my sisters: not as appendages to an authoress, not as young ladies merely permitted, or to fill up as personnages muets in society; on the contrary, Lady Stafford conversed with them a great deal, and repeatedly took opportunities of expressing to me how much she liked and valued them for their own sake. “That sister Fanny of yours has a most intelligent countenance: she is much more than pretty; and what I so like is her manner of answering when she is asked any question — so unlike the Missy style. They have both been admirably well educated.” Then she spoke in the handsomest manner of my father—”a master-mind: even in the short time I saw him that was apparent to me.”

  Lady Elizabeth Gower is a most engaging, sensible, unaffected, sweet, pretty creature. While Lady Stafford in the morning was in the library doing a drawing in water colours to show Honora her manner of finishing quickly, Fanny and I sat up in Lady Elizabeth’s darling little room at the top of the house, where she has all her drawings, and writing, and books, and harp. She and her brother, Lord Francis, have always been friends and companions: and on her table were bits of paper on which he had scribbled droll heads, and verses of his, very good, on the “Expulsion of the Moors from Spain” — Lady Elizabeth knew every line of these, and had all that quick feeling, and colouring apprehension, and slurring dexterity, which those who read out what is written by a dear friend so well understand.

  Large rooms filled with pictures, most of them modern — Reynolds, Moreland, Glover, Wilkie; but there are a few ancient: one of Titian’s, that struck me as beautiful—”Hermes teaching Cupid to read.” The chief part of the collection is in the house in town. After a happy week at Trentham we returned here.

  Mercy on my poor memory! I forgot to tell you that Lady Harrowby and her daughter were at Trentham, and an exquisite, or tiptop dandy, Mr. Standish, and young Mr. Sneyd, of Keil — very fashionable. Lady Harrowby deserves Madame de Staël’s good word, she calls her “compagne spirituelle” — a charming woman, and very quick in conversation.

  The morning after Mr. Standish’s arrival, Lady Stafford’s maid told her that she and all the ladies’ maids had been taken by his gentleman to see his toilette—”which, I assure you, my lady, is the thing best worth seeing in this house, all of gilt plate, and I wish, my lady, you had such a dressing box.” Though an exquisite, Mr. Standish is clever, entertaining, and agreeable. One d
ay that he sat beside me at dinner, we had a delightful battledore and shuttlecock conversation from grave to gay as quick as your heart could wish: from L’Almanac des Gourmandes and Le Respectable Porc, to Dorriforth and the Simple Story.

  Jan 22.

  My letter has been detained two days for a frank. My aunts [Footnote: The Miss Sneyds were now living for a time at Byrkely Lodge.] are pretty well, and we feel that we add to their cheerfulness. Honora plays cribbage with Aunt Mary, and I read Florence Macarthy; I like the Irish characters, and the Commodore, and Lord Adelm — that is Lord Byron; but Ireland is traduced in some of her representations. “Marriage” is delightful.

  To MRS. EDGEWORTH. BYRKELY LODGE, Feb 8, 1819.

  Mrs. Sneyd took me with her to-day to Lord Bagot’s to return Lady Dartmouth’s visit; she is a charming woman, and appears most amiable, taking care of all those grandchildren. Lord Bagot very melancholy, gentlemanlike, and interesting. Fine old cloistered house, galleries, painted glass, coats of arms, and family pictures everywhere. It was the first time Lord Bagot had seen Mrs. Sneyd since his wife’s death; he took both her hands and was as near bursting into tears as ever man was. He was very obliging to me, and showed me all over his house, and gave me a most sweet bunch of Daphne Indica.

  TETSWORTH INN, March 4.

  On Tuesday morning we left dear, happy, luxurious, warm Byrkely Lodge. At taking leave of me, Mr. Sneyd began thanking me as if I had been the person obliging instead of obliged, and when I got up from the breakfast table and went round to stop his thanks by mine, he took me in his arms and gave me a squeeze that left me as flat as a pancake, and then ran out of the room absolutely crying.

  We arrived at tea-time at Mrs. Moilliet’s, [Footnote: Daughter of Mr. Keir, Mrs. Edgeworth’s old friend.] Smethwick, near Birmingham, much pleased with our reception, and with Mr. Moilliet and their five children. He has purchased a delightful house on the banks of the Lake of Geneva, where they go next summer, and most earnestly pressed us to visit them there.

  Mr. Moilliet told us an anecdote of Madame la Comtesse de Rumford and her charming Count; he, one day in a fit of ill-humour, went to the porter and forbad him to let into his house any of the friends of Madame la Comtesse or of M. Lavoisier’s — all the society which you and I saw at her house: they had been invited to supper; the old porter, all disconsolate, went to tell the Countess the order he had received. “Well, you must obey your master, you must not let them into the house, but I will go down to your lodge, and as each carriage comes, you will let them know what has happened, and that I am there to receive them.”

  They all came; and by two or three at a time went into the porter’s lodge and spent the evening with her; their carriages lining the street all night to the Count’s infinite mortification.

  Mr. Moilliet also told Fanny of a Yorkshire farmer who went to the Bank of England, and producing a Bank of England note for £30,000, asked to have it changed. The clerk was surprised and hesitated, said that a note for so large a sum was very uncommon, and that he knew there never had been more than two £30,000 bank notes issued. “Oh yes!” said the farmer, “I have the other at home.”

  We went to see dear old Mr. Watt: eighty-four, and in perfect possession of eyes, ears, and all his comprehensive understanding and warm heart. Poor Mrs. Watt is almost crippled with rheumatism, but as good-natured and hospitable as ever, and both were heartily glad to see us. So many recollections, painful and pleasurable, crowded and pressed upon my heart during this half-hour. I had much ado to talk, but I did, [Footnote: Mr. Watt had been one of Mr. Edgeworth’s most intimate friends.] and so did he, — of forgeries on bank notes, no way can he invent of avoiding such but by having an inspecting clerk in every country town. Talked over the committee report — paper-marks, vain — Tilloch—”I have no great opinion of his abilities — Bramah — yes, he is a clever man, but set down this for truth; no man is so ingenious, but what another may be found equally ingenious. What one invents, another can detect and imitate.”

  Watt is at this moment himself the best encyclopedia extant; I dare not attempt to tell you half he said: it would be a volume. Chantrey has made a beautiful, mean an admirable, bust of him. Chantrey and Canova are now making rival busts of Washington.

  I must hop, skip, and jump as I can from subject to subject. Mr. and Mrs. Moilliet took us in the evening to a lecture on poetry, by Campbell, who has been invited by a Philosophical Society of Birmingham gentlemen to give lectures; they give tickets to their friends. Mr. Corrie, one of the heads of this society, was proud to introduce us. Excellent room, with gas spouting from tubes below the gallery. Lecture good enough. Mr. Campbell introduced to me after lecture; asked very kindly for Sneyd; many compliments. Mr. Corrie drank tea, after the lecture, at Mr. Moilliet’s — very agreeable benevolent countenance, most agreeable voice. We liked particularly his enthusiasm for Mr. Watt; he gave a history of his inventions, and instances of Watt’s superiority both in invention and magnanimity when in competition with others.

  Mr. and Mrs. Moilliet have pressed us to come again. Mr. and Mrs. Watt, ditto, ditto. Mr. Watt almost with tears in his eyes; and I was ashamed to see that venerable man standing bareheaded at his door to do us the last [Footnote: It was the last. Mr. Watt died a few months afterwards.] honour, till the carriage drove away.

  I beg your pardon for going backward and forward in this way in my hurry-skurry. I leave the Stratford-upon-Avon, and Blenheim, and Woodstock adventures, and Oxford to Honora and Fanny, whose pens have been going à l’envie l’une de l’autre; we are writing so comfortably. I at my desk with a table to myself, and the most comfortable little black stuffed arm-chair. Fanny and Ho. at their desks and table near the fire.

  “We must have two pairs of snuffers.”

  “Yes, my lady, directly.”

  So now, my lady, good-night; for I am tired, a little, just enough to pity the civilest and prettiest of Swiss-looking housemaids, who says in answer to my “We shall come to bed very soon,” “Oh dear, my lady, we bees no ways particular in this house about times o’ going to bed.”

  To MRS. RUXTON. GROVE HOUSE, KENSINGTON GORE, March 1819.

  We arrived here on Saturday last; found Lady Elizabeth Whitbread more kind and more agreeable than ever. Her kindness to us is indeed unbounded, and would quite overwhelm me but for the delicate and polite manner in which she confers favours, more as if she received than conferred them. Her house, her servants, her carriage, her horses, are not only entirely at my disposal, but she had the good-natured politeness to go down to the door to desire the coachman to have George Bristow always on the box with him, as the shaking would be too much for him behind.

  Yesterday we spent two hours at Lady Stafford’s. I had most agreeable conversation with her and Lord Stafford, while Lady Elizabeth Gower showed the pictures to Honora and Fanny.

  Mr. Talbot [Footnote: Son of Lady Talbot de Malahide, a lawyer] is often here, l’ami de la maison and very much ours. Lady Grey, Lady Elizabeth’s mother, is a fine amiable old lady. Mr. Ellice, the brother-in-law, very good-humoured and agreeable. Mr. and Mrs. Lefevre, the son-in-law and daughter, very agreeable, good, and happy. I am more and more convinced that happiness depends upon what is in the head and heart more than on what is in the purse or the bank, or on the back or in the stomach. There must be enough in the stomach, but the sauce is of little consequence. By the bye, Lady Elizabeth’s cook is said to be the best in England; lived with her in the days of her prosperity, as she says, and has followed her here.

  KENSINGTON CORE, March 24, 1819.

  I have a moment to write to you, and I will use it. We are going on just as when I last wrote to you. We began by steadily settling that we would not go out to any dinner or evening parties, because we could not do so without giving up Lady Elizabeth’s society; she never goes out but to her relations. The mornings she spends in her own apartments, and when we had refused all invitations to dinner our friends were so kind as to contrive to see us at our own ho
urs: to breakfast or luncheon. Twice with Lady Lansdowne — luncheon; found her with her children just the same as at Bowood. Miss Fanshawe’s — breakfast; Lord Glenbervie there, very agreeable; much French and Italian literature — beautiful drawings, full of genius — if there be such a thing allowed by practical education?

  Three breakfasts at dear Mrs. Marcet’s; the first quite private; the second literary, very agreeable; Dr. Holland, Mr. Wishaw, Captain Beaufort, Mr. Mallet, Lady Yonge; third, Mr. Mill — British India — was the chief figurante; not the least of a figurante though, excellent in sense and benevolence.

  Twice at Mr. Wilberforce’s; he lives next door to Lady Elizabeth

  Whitbread; there we met Mr. Buxton — admirable facts from him about

  Newgate and Spitalfields weavers. One fact I was very sorry to learn,

  that Mrs. Fry, that angel woman, was very ill.

  Breakfast with Mr. and Mrs. Hope — quite alone — he showed the house to

  Honora and Fanny while I sat with Mrs. Hope.

  On St. Patrick’s Day, by appointment to the Duchess of Wellington, nothing could be more like Kitty Pakenham; a plate of shamrocks on the table, and as she came forward to meet me, she gave a bunch to me, pressing my hand and saying in a low voice with her sweet smile, Vous en êtes digne. She asked individually for all her Irish friends. I showed to her what was said in my father’s life, and by me, of Lord Longford, and the drawing of his likeness, and asked if his family would be pleased; she spoke very kindly: “would do her father’s memory honour; could not but please every Pakenham.” She was obliging in directing her conversation easily to my sisters as well as to myself. She said she had purposely avoided being acquainted with Madame de Staël in England, not knowing how she might be received by the Bourbons, to whom the Duchess was to be Ambassadress. She found that Madame de Staël was well received at the Bourbon Court, and consequently she must be received at the Duke of Wellington’s. She arrived, and walking up in full assembly to the Duchess, with the fire of indignation flashing in her eyes.