Lady Campbell to Miss Eden
December 6, 1828.
I believe in this world it is always surest and safest to write to those we love best, when life weighs heavy on our spirits; we have many more chances of hitting the right string. Alas, how often I delayed writing to you when I felt low and anxious, and had fears and fits of depression because I would not darken your page; and when I felt lighter I wrote a letter which, after all must have jarred upon you Dearest, when you were still in the slough!315 … I like your Greenwich plan much. I think it will suit you and do you good. I know I shall live to see you a real saint. Then where we are to put Lord Auckland I cannot well make out, unless he ripens into a sort of Wilberforce, but my imagination does not yet carry me so far.
I have been reading Jebb’s Sacred Literature. I like it although one is obliged to hop over a good deal of Greek etymology.
Oh, how I want you to talk to, for it is such an age since we really cleared our minds, and you know, Emmy, we do belong to one another upon some Geometrical System of fitness that we cannot well describe. But my idea is that by finding out what E.E. is to P.C., you ascertain what P.C. is to E.E.
CHAPTER VII
1829-1830
Miss Eden to Miss Villiers
GROSVENOR STREET,Wednesday, April 30, 1829.
MY DEAREST THERESA, How attentive we become! frightened to death at the idea of our near meeting, unwritten to. I had your Genoa letter three days ago in the leisure of Hertingfordbury, where I have been Eastering, and could have drawn my pen on the spot to answer you, but I thought some account of the Hatfield theatricals would be more diverting than pure unadulterated daffy-down-dillies and cowslips.
Robert and I went over to Hatfield on Monday, which was the second repetition of the plays. The 1st piece was “A Short Reign and a Merry One.” Mr. Phipps the chief performer; Major Keppel very good; Mr. Egerton clever; Lady Salisbury316 herself I thought the only failure, but some people thought her good, so perhaps I was wrong. Her dress disfigured her cruelly. The second piece was Lady Dacre’s317 translation of the Demoiselle à Marier– Lady F. Leveson, Mr. J. Wortley, and Lord Morpeth the chief performers; and it was impossible anything could be better. In short, the whole evening has lowered my opinion of the merits of professional people. I went expecting to find the gentlefolk all tolerable sticks on the stage, awkward, affected, and only helped through by an indulgent public, and I found I never had laughed more heartily, never had seen a play really well acted in all its parts before, and Lady S., whom I thought the least good, was only objectionable because she was like an actress on the real stage.
The singing was very pretty. Mr. Ashley, Mr. Wortley, Lady F. Leveson, all distinguished themselves. At the end of the first piece, each of the performers sung a little Vaudeville couplet, and Jim Wortley sang one to the Duke of Wellington, who was in the front row, that was applauded and encored and applauded again, and chorussed with great noise. It turned, of course, upon the hero, and the double crown, and Waterloo, and Catholics – you know how these little ideas are dished up – and there was an allusion to the same effect in the Prologue, also received with acclamations.
The Duke seemed very much pleased, and told George to-day the Hatfield theatricals were very good fun. I meant to make this only a half sheet, but I see a long stream of untouched topics before me, so here goes for a whole sheet and rather wider lines… The Duke of Norfolk, Lord Clifford, etc., took their seats yesterday under the auspices of Julia, Lady Petre,318 and the two Miss Petres,319 and several Catholic ladies grouped under our Protestant throne, and now there only remains to come the introduction of that wily dangerous Edward Petre into the House of Commons, and England must fall, and then, I suppose, will get up and begin again.
Poor Lady Derby320 died on Friday after great sufferings and a very long illness. I think it ought to be made a rule of the odd game we all play here that those old attached couples should die together Baucis and Philemon fashion. The survivor’s is a hard place.
Fanny has been, of course, very anxious and unhappy, and has certainly lost a very kind friend in Lady Derby, who expressed the greatest affection for her to the last.
We shall not be the least settled at Greenwich, or near it, when you come back. A fortnight ago when we went there the workmen said they thought they would be out of the house in ten days. George went there yesterday, and they said they thought in about a fortnight more they should have done! A month hence, perhaps, they will ask six weeks more – that is the way painters generally go on. However, our wonderful weather excuses them. It is colder than Christmas and rains eternally. As far as we are concerned it has done its worst. We could not let this house till we find another to go into, and we shall not easily find a tenant after this week, so you will find us here, and here we shall probably stay till the 1st of June.
I only came to town yesterday, so I know little London news. People are dying rather than otherwise. I do not know whether there is much else going on. There is the Drawing-room to-morrow. Malibran has been rather a disappointment to the musical world, I hear, but I have not seen her. F. Robinson pays unremitting court to Lady Emily Cowper. I cannot conceive anything so tiresome, particularly at her age, when, as I remember, the pride of one’s life was to be distinguished by older people than oneself.321 Moreover, that dear good-looking bore, G. Cole, holds it to be his duty to stick by Frederick and flirt en tiers as well as he can. We have grown to be a very depraved set of incendiaries, and it makes me perfectly miserable to think of the peril of our beautiful cathedrals. York Minster gone, and two days ago an attempt was made to set Westminster Abbey on fire. The fire was put out without much harm being done, but no clue has been found to the man. The country is too full; a great deal of distress; great national debt; a redundancy of Spitalfields weavers; and in the course of a good hanging they might hit on these incendiaries, and no sacrifice would be too great for Westminster Abbey.
You know I let your house for three weeks, and the Vansittarts liked it. It seemed odd and unpleasant visiting anybody but you there. Come home soon. God bless you. Love to Mrs. V. Your ever affectionate
E. E.
Miss Eden to Miss Villiers
PARK LODGE, GREENWICH,322Monday evening, July 8, 1829.
MY DEAREST THERESA, There never was such provocation, such a combination of untoward events. I was in town to-day, went up to return Maria Copley to her home, could have brought you back with me; and Lady Buckinghamshire’s carriage which goes up to town to-morrow morning would have taken you home again. I just ask you, “Did you ever?” Songez-y un peu! Such a plain path so entirely missed. I like you to know the worst, because there is no use in my ranting and raving about as I have this evening, if you do not do your share. I wonder when you wrote to me. If only last night, the thing could not have been helped. You never could have had an answer in time, but if you wrote on Saturday, which I should think was more probable, I just ask you if it is not a little provoking? Now we shall have no talk at all, ever again, our minds must be so over-loaded that writing will be of no earthly use, and you will not see our home while it is new and pretty – in short, there never was such a misfortuneable occurrence. I went on hoping till eight you would come. If it had happened yesterday I should not have wondered. Till that unfortunate day we had all been happier here than we ever had been in our lives, but yesterday was “a day of misfortunes,” like Rosamond’s day in Miss Edgeworth’s book. The footman was suddenly laid up by a violent attack of gout; one of the maid-servants was taken dangerously ill; one of the horses took to kicking itself, of all the things in the world! and hurt itself very much, which it deserves, but it is very inconvenient to us; the cream was sour at breakfast; we got quite wet through going to church, and again coming back; the puppy and kitten fought; there was no mint sauce to the lamb at dinner; – in short, “it was a sight worthy of the gods to see a great man (or, as in my case, a great woman) struggling with such calamities.”
We preserved our cheerfulness wonderfully. I wish you had seen our house; we are all so fond of it. My friends have exhausted themselves in presents with their names, and have now begun again anonymously. I brought from Grosvenor Street a box to-day directed to me, containing a lamp for the drawing-room, and now it is hung up I should be glad to know who sent it.
I went to wish Lady Bath joy a week ago.323 I never was so pleased with any marriage as that. Is Lord Henry324 settled or not? I understood he went down to the Grange meaning to propose, and on Wednesday I heard a long account of his visit, of Mrs. Baring’s agonies of fidget because he did not speak out, and of Harriet’s confidence in his intentions, and how they both grew hourly more shy and more silent. But he had let all the rest of the party disperse, and was staying on alone at the Grange, and was expected to have stayed with the purpose of proposing without so many witnesses. Poor fellow! He seems to have been shyer than ever. I know you will again think it odd of me, and I am sure I cannot explain it, but by dint of hearing so much of their anxieties, and knowing what his must have been, I grow fidgetty as one does reading a story, that the catastrophe should be happy.
It will be a shame if he makes her unhappy. Otherwise, I do not know that they will suit very well. Lady Bath asked me about it, and did not seem very anxious for it, – said he required animation. I hardly knew what to say when she said she was afraid by what she heard of Miss Baring that was not the line, etc. I rode off on her amiability, good sense, £50,000, etc. I hope Lady Bath may take a fancy to her; she will want something to replace Char, but I rather doubt it.
Where am I to direct to you? I could be at home all the week in case any of your other engagements should fail, only come in time to prevent my dining at Eastcombe or elsewhere. Your ever affectionate
E. E.Miss Eden to Miss Villiers.August 1829.
I took a solemn oath that if the post brought me any letter this morning I would, on the first sight of Bidgood with the silver waiter orné de lettres, tear myself from my drawing and give up the rest of the morning to this detestable writing employment; and, you brute, there is a letter from you, and a good letter too, and I must answer it. And yet if you were to see my drawing! I got up at half-past eight this morning that I might have a long enjoyment of it, and of course have been interrupted every five minutes, though I was drapering a red velvet cloak with all sorts of beautiful catching lights and carmine and ultra marine and all the lovely colours in the world mixed up in it. My black heads are framed and hung up in George’s room. I do not like to say how they look, but the room is evidently improved within the last week. I have been at Putney from a Saturday to a Wednesday, my dear – “a procédé,” as Mr. de Roos would call it, a friendly attention, but extremely inconvenient, and moreover I think it bored me ever so little – not much – but it did not amuse me. I like the girls, of all things, and wish for nothing better than a talk with Anne, but there is a want of sense about Lady Grantham which becomes wearisome in a very long tête-à-tête, and we had several. Lord Henry stayed a whole week at the Grange, but nothing came of it. Let us fondly hope the discouragement came from her side. I do not fancy the woman ever being made the victim; and perhaps she found him duller than she expected, and Mr. Baring probably found him poorer. Anyhow, it might not have answered, and I daresay it will all do very well as it is; or he may, in a thoroughly manly spirit (by which I mean the usual conduct of a man) have settled that though he could propose any day, he could go out grouse shooting only on the 12th of August, and that the grouse might grow wild, while she would remain tame (I have only put that in for the love of antithesis, not from pique or attraction), and so that he had better attend to the grouse first, and come back to the Grange afterwards. Lady Bath said he met her and the Buccleughs at Longleat and was in great spirits, and she believed did not care a straw for Miss Baring, but she knew nothing from him of it…
I passed all Wednesday afternoon with Lady Bath, who was in the highest good-humour, and the whole family resplendent with happiness, except dear old Bath, who handsomely avows his joy was a mistake, and he has not the least idea what is to become of him. I saw Char, and the Duke too; and after they all went out riding Lady Bath and I went poking all over the house, looking for the presents he had given her. Such quantities of pretty things! And these were only his little daily gifts, for the jewels were not finished. “The diamonds and emeralds will both be superb,” Lady Bath said; “but I think the pearls the handsomest set I ever saw.”
Think of that little Char with all those things! And she looks as simple and unaffected as ever, – very shy and very happy.
Miss Eden to Miss Villiers
[PARK LODGE, GREENWICH,]October 19, 1829.
MY DEAREST THERESA, Lady Harriet [Baring] says she wrote to you yesterday to announce that we were going to talk you over. I think it my duty to write to-day to announce that we have talked you over, – done our devoirs bravely. The substance of our comments you would not of course be curious to hear. Having thus obviously made you thoroughly uncomfortable, and this being Sunday evening and consequently to be devoted to works of charity, I add from pure benevolence that Lady Harriet has said nothing that is not in your praise, confirms the remarkable fact that the heads of the Baring Clan are all turned by you, and if it were not for that circumstance, which, as she says, must be provoking to her, it appears to me she is as fond of you and Mrs. Villiers as it is possible to be. She is very charitable and very pleasant to-day.
I was not the least taken in by all your paltry evasions about not writing to me. You never care a straw for me when you can have Louisa Baring.325 I am constrained to avow that Harriet Baring and the Red Rover have always been my successful rivals with you and everybody else. Please the Fates, I will set up some new friends for myself, and occupy myself so exclusively with them that you shall not be able to get a word from me for a month.
Well, I have no doubt Harriet Baring has every merit under the sun, only you never will persuade me she is amusing. There is no merit in being amusing, so that is not against her. I am glad she is in good spirits; and it seems that neither she, nor her family, nor Lord Henry Thynne, nor his family, wished for the marriage. It is rather lucky than otherwise that they did not marry, though as the Barings want connection, and he wants money, it was a natural marriage for all the world to insist upon, – a clever idea, though it did not work well.
I passed such a nice morning yesterday, though my ulterior object was to go to town to try on some gowns. But George and I began the day early, and went to visit Chantrey,326 who showed us quantities of beautiful things, amongst others a monument to Bishop Heber327 that is quite beautiful, is not it? I tried to sketch it for you and failed, but he is blessing two kneeling Hindus who, to the best of my recollections, have not a stitch of clothes on (the climate is warm, you know), but the dearest bald head you ever saw, with one long lock from the top. They are so graceful – I mean seriously. Then we saw the Colossal statue of Mr. Pitt, he has just cast in Bronze, and he gave up a whole hour, in which he could have chipped a bit of covering to those poor Hindus, to explaining to me, who am fussy and dull if anybody begins an entirely new subject, how a bronze statue is cast, and how the weight of the least moisture in the cast is ascertained even to the 1000th part of a grain, and how the original cast is made. In short, I was quite learned about it yesterday, and as his clay models disgusted me with mine, I had some thoughts of turning the library into a foundery, and of melting down all the saucepans, and casting a statue of George in his shooting jacket, 14 feet high; but I have forgotten to-day how to do it. Chantrey was so good-natured, and gave me excellent advice about modelling, and is having some tools made for me, and I am always to have as much clay from him as I like, which will be a vast advantage, for his clay must have a habit of twisting itself into good shapes, and probably the raw material I obtain from him will be more like a human figure than anything I shall ever build myself.
I had some luncheon with Lady Harriet, met a considerable quantity of acquaintances all prowling about the quiet streets, finished up my wardrobe, bought some company work, paid a few bills, – in short, bored myself as much as was good for me. Miss Kemble’s328 reputation goes on increasing, which delights me. I have not seen anybody that does not think her very superior to anything we have had for years, and if they will leave her alone, and all the Magnates of the land will not insist upon marrying her instantly, she will be a great treasure. C. Kemble was giving a very touching account of her the other day to some cousins of mine. Her resolution to go on the stage was taken only a month before, at the time of his great difficulties, and he had never seen her rehearse but twice. He says there never was such a daughter, and he thinks her very clever.
I wish you had not done your Longleat. I had always meant you to be there with us – quite reckoned on it. Can you insinuate to Lady Bath that it is possible we may come two or three days sooner than I said at first, if she lets us. The Lansdownes are going to Brighton for a month, and want us to make Bowood on our return, instead of the time we mentioned. I shall be very glad to see Lady Bath, but if I might be excused the trouble of moving from home, I should not fret much. I gave Mr. Hibbert329 Lady Bath’s invitation, but he fears he must now stick to his business, though as it cost him ten shillings a day in hackney-coaches to transport his lame self to the city, I have proved to him that it would be an economy to the firm of Hibbert, if he went by the stage to Longleat. I always wonder what those West Indians do up in Leadenhall street. What is the use of their going from the west to the east of London to write about a plantation in Jamaica. If you were to go from Longleat to Newcastle to write directions about your garden at Knightsbridge it would be as sensible. I have often tried to make Mr. Colvile tell me what he does in Leadenhall Street. I believe they eat tamarinds and cashew nuts (I do not know how they are spelt) and ginger all day there. Good-bye. Your ever affectionate
E. E.
Miss Eden to Miss Villiers
[GREENWICH.]
(Friday). I began this two days ago, and you see how far I went. I have a passion at the moment for modelling in clay, an accomplishment I am trying to acquire from an old German who lives on Blackheath. The interest of the pursuit it is impossible to describe. I cannot imagine why I ever did anything else; it is the worst engouement I ever had, and so entirely past all regulating, that I think the best way now is to tire it out, so I model from morning to night. I wish I were not obliged to write to you, you uninteresting, unfinished lump of clay. George interests himself in the art, and with his usual amiability stepped up to town and brought me some tools. Think of our going to sit down to dinner the other day, in our accustomed domestic manner, soup and a mutton-pie; and Lord and Lady Jersey, F. Villiers, and Lord Castlereagh arrived at seven for dinner. No entrées, no fish, no nothing, and the cook ill. However, it turned out very pleasant.
I believe Lady E. Cowper will end by marrying Lord Ashley. She says she never has felt a preference for anybody, and will do just what her mother wishes. Lady Cowper is sorely puzzled, and he is in a regular high-flown Ashley state, wishing he had never proposed, that he might have watched over and adored her in silence.
Miss Eden to Miss Villiers
NORMAN COURT,Monday [October 1829].
MY DEAREST THERESA, I do not find this visiting system good for the growth of letters. I have less to say when I see fresh people and fresh houses constantly, than at home, where I see the same every day. Your last letter, too, gave me an inspiration to answer it on the spot, but I had not time then, and so it subsided. You poor dear! Are you still liable to be haunted by recollections and tormented by the ghosts of past pleasures – youthful but weak? I have had so many feelings of the sort you mean, that your letter interested me particularly; but then it must be at least five years since the last ghost of the last pleasure visited me, so imagine the date of the pleasure by the date of the ghost – and the remains of youthful interests do not disturb me any longer. It is always childhood I return to, and exclusively the sight of Eden Farm330 and aught connected therewith that swells my heart to bursting, and that I never see now. Everything else is mended up again, and for the life of me I cannot understand how I ever could have been so sentimental and foolish as it appears I must have been.331 I say no more; but my old extract book has thrown me into fits of laughter. Calculate from that fact the horrid and complete extinction of sentiment that has taken place. You will come to it, and be surprised to see what a happy invention life is. I am afraid I like it too much. We have been at Shottesbrook. Caroline Vansittart is so uncommonly well; there are hardly any traces of her illness. The dear children will be children till they die of old age.
Then we went to Ewehurst which the Drummonds have rented from the Duke of Wellington. It is a very fine place, but an old house, and so cold. All the children had colds, and all the Aunts caught them, of course; only, instead of catching one cold I caught six, and have done nothing but sneeze ever since.
We stayed there a week and came here this day sen’night, found the house more luxurious and comfortable than ever after the cold of Ewehurst, and Mr. Wall in great felicity. Old Mrs. Wall I think much the most delightful old lady I ever knew. Lady Harriet we found here, and the Sturts, and the Poodles,332 and Mr. Pierpont, and latterly we have had a Doctor Daltrey, a very clever man who has thrown a pinch of sense into the very frivolous giggling conversation we have sunk into.
It has been rather amusing. Lady C. Sturt333 and Lady Harriet are rather in the same style of repartee. We all meant to dislike the former, but found her, on the contrary, very pleasant. She amused George very much, and Mr. Sturt was an old friend of ours. We should have gone on to Crichel,334 but our time and theirs could not be brought together. Lady Harriet is in her very best mood, and I always think it is a very pleasant incident, such excessive buoyancy of spirits. She is full as fidgety about Bingham as any wife would be, even any of my own sisters, who have a system of fidgeting about their husbands. I think he will arrive to-day. In fact he could hardly have come sooner if he set off even the very day he meant to. She insists upon it he is naturalized in Russia and has taken the name of Potemkin, and she is teaching the child335 to call him so: – “Come, dear; say Potemkin. Come, out with it like a man! Potty, Potty, Potty – come Baby!”
To-day we are to have a dinner of neighbours, chiefly clergy; two Chancellors of different dioceses and various attendant clergy, besides dear little Arundell who dines here every day. We flatter ourselves there will be great difficulties of precedence when we go into dinner, and have at last settled that the two Chancellors go in hand in hand like the Kings of Brentford, and that we must divide the inferior clergy amongst us – take two apiece.
Mr. Wall sometimes gets frightened at our levities and fancies we shall really say to his guests all that we propose for them.
George still gets into hysterical fits of laughter when I mention your idea of his being in love with Lady Harriet, which was unlucky at that time, for it did so happen that he could not endure her then, and he went up to town the day she came to stay at Greenwich, because he thought her so ill-natured. She happened to abuse, in her ignorance, the lady of the hour. But even he likes her here, thinks her very amusing, and much better-hearted than he expected, and he, like you, no longer wonders why I like her. Altogether this visit has answered.
Sister has been to Wrest, where the old stories are going on: – doctors sent for the middle of the night. In her last letter she said she believed that the Goderichs were going off at an hour’s notice, and that she should be left alone at Wrest, till she could alter all her plans. In the meantime there is nothing really the matter with the child.
You never tell me where to direct. I shall try Saltram.336 Love to Mrs. Villiers. Ever your most affectionate
E. E.
Miss Eden to Lady Charlotte Greville. 337
Melbury, 1829.
I am sorry to write to you on paper that has evidently been in bad health for some time, but I cannot find any without this bilious tinge. Lady Bath told me that you were the giver of that pretty lamp in the drawing-room at Greenwich Park. I am so glad to know who it is I am to thank, and very glad that “who” is “you.” I tried a little of gratitude on two other friends who seemed obtuse about it. The pride of my life is the quantity of pretty things that my friends gave me when we settled. I like your name to be found in the list.
I suppose you are still in Ireland, and I direct my letter on that supposition. I have not written to any of your family for a long time. I cannot write while I am travelling about, as I hold it “stuff of the conscience” to comment on the owners of the houses I am in, and it would not be the least amusing to hear they were all charming people.
However, I must say that about Lord Ilchester, as I believe you do not know him, so it is news to you; and he certainly is the most amiable being I ever beheld. He has given up his own happiness as a lost case since the death of his wife,338 and his whole life is spent in trying to make other people happy. I never saw so gentle a character, and am no longer surprised at George’s attachment to him. It has lasted ever since they were at school together; and as I had never seen much of Lord Ilchester at home, and he was nothing shining in society, I used to wonder why George was so very fond of him. But I see how it is now.
To be sure, an inch of amiability is worth yards of cleverness for the real wear and tear of life. Lord Ilchester’s spirits have been thoroughly bent down once by the loss of his wife, and though he has mended himself up again to a certain degree, yet he is all over chinks and cracks, that shake on the slightest touch. I could not bear to allude before him to the possibility of any husband liking his wife, or any mother educating her children. The quantity of célibataires that I bring forward in conversation is incredible. I hope he is quite convinced that there is not such a thing as a married man left in creation.
Mr. Corry, who is here, does not intend that the race shall be extinct. He is desperately in love with Lady H. Ashley,339 so desperately that he can think of nothing else, and I believe talks of little else; but between his brogue and the confusion of his ideas I am not always sure what he is talking about. He never sleeps, but writes half the night – whether sonnets to her, or pamphlets on the state of Ireland, he will not tell me. But he is in a constant state of composition, writing notes all the evening to be arranged into sense at night. From the dark romantic hints he throws out for our information, I imagine he has hopes of marrying her in the course of next year. I hope he will not be disappointed. I like anybody who is so really in earnest as he is.
We paid a long visit at Longleat – very successful, inasmuch as Lady Bath was in the highest of good humour, and Tom Bath is dearer to my heart than ever. Lord Edward was at Longleat the latter part of our visit, and a great addition. He is totally unlike all the Thynnes I ever saw – full of fun and dashes out everything that comes into his head, astonishes them all, but governs the whole house. They all laugh the instant he opens his lips.