I have enjoyed my first day, even though I have not been to meeting. It is sweet to know one is in a worshipping family!
(6th.) Sleet and snow abounding; made drawings of three of my friends, and rode out in a snow storm, and enjoyed it. * * * To bed latish, with pleasant recollections of the day, though burdened with the sin of having desired the accession of great wealth—that is, of power, and the means of self-gratification. Who is to be trusted with such a gift? Not I, I am sure; and ought I not to know that wishes are a species of murmurs, and that “nevertheless, Thy will not mine be done,” is the only proper language? (9th.) Reading Washington Irving’s Columbus—how interesting! As well satisfied as I can be, while doing nothing for the good of others. (10th.) Drove to Sheringham, and returned in a storm of sleet, just in time to keep my engagement at H. B.’s; and arrived there as the clock struck five, punctual, to my heart’s content. * * To bed grateful for much, but most, for having been able, in some instances, during the evening, to speak according to my own moral standard, whether vainly or not. (14th.) A good night; was dressed by eight, but so absorbed in the psalms, and in making extracts from Columbus, that I did not hear the reading bell, and lost the reading, which I regretted. * * After dinner we drove out; but previously I wrote a little account of cruelty to a dog. We had a most charming drive. It was a bright afternoon, and the sky over the sea was full of tints, and such a glorious setting sun, which clothed the church steeple, and many other prominent objects in sunshine, as we came down the road from Roughton! But, welcome were our home, and our smiling fire, and welcoming friend! (16th.) Drove out to D. B.’s, to see my epitaph on the stone. Thankful to have given pleasure to the son, by these lines. Oh that, like the epitaph named by Legh Richmond, in his Young Cottager, they may be made the means of good! A happy evening, to bed thankful for much, though not satisfied with my own conduct. (17th.) A good night to return thanks for. Drove to see that house, where I had so often been with those most dear, now in their graves—my husband, and my cousin Olyett Woodhouse! Dear O! when he went away and sold this estate, he hoped to repurchase it, and return; but he is in his Indian grave! What a trial his death was to me! but my last loss annihilated, in a great measure, the sense of every other. (18th, first day.) Grieved I could not get to meeting, but I must bear it as well as I can. My own sitting, a favoured and comforting one. After dinner, set off to see the poor widow Green, a blind woman of 89; read to her a long time, and gave her money. Went to the cliff; the sea and sky truly interesting. * * To bed with sabbath feelings. (19th.) Went to see the skaters. Lord Suffield came up to us; and, while we admired the tints of the sky,—which were pale green over the sea, melting into pale blue, and then gradually deepening, till they became the deepest, richest, indigo and purple, over our heads,—he observed, that he had often, but vainly, tried to convince distant friends that our skies in Norfolk, near the sea, have the finest tints he ever saw, and pale green particularly.
(22nd.) A most comfortable sitting of two hours in my own room. Thought of dear N. friends, and wished myself there, (at meeting,) but was thankful for my lonely opportunity. * * * If I were not so idle, and were nearer a meeting, my happiness could know no drawback; especially when we three are alone together. (23rd.) Such a good night! We read as usual; afterwards dear A. was dragged in her hand-chair, to visit the cottages and the sea. The cold, on going out, was intense; the snow in our faces; but I got warm with walking, and enjoyed the scene and the visits. Went to the cliff, and saw, on the shore, planks and baulks, which a most angry sea had washed up; a wreck, no doubt, somewhere, the fishermen said. Fresh barley had floated to land also, and we went to a farm yard near, to see a ladder, bearing the inscription of Exmouth, Hull. My dear friend ordered the men to be on the alert, and watch, lest any vessel should be in distress on the coast, that the mortar might be used. Happily, however, we heard of none being in sight. Drew three likenesses; two, reckoned very good. Alas! it was my last evening at the dear cottage! and it was one of love and interest; and, to me, of thankfulness that I have such friends.
Of this walk in the snow, Mrs. Opie afterwards wrote a pleasing account, part of which we subjoin:—
* * * Snow had continued to fall, and I to admire; but we became impatient of keeping the house, and resolved to go out in some way or other. Accordingly, as to use the horses was impossible, I equipped myself for walking, and one of my friends for going in a chair on wheels. But when the moment for our departure arrived, I felt very loth to leave the fire-side, and envied the dear companion, who, not daring to brave the cold, was left to enjoy its cheering precincts. However, though casting “a longing lingering look behind,” both on my friend and the fire, I sallied forth. The wind was a keen north-easter, and blew full in our faces, while I, though shuddering in the blast, ankle deep in snow, and with fingers in agony, romantically attempted to convince myself how delightful the walk was, by repeating a sonnet to winter, written in the days of my youth. But even my own fictions had not power to warm me; and as, with blue and quivering lip, I spouted my tuneful admiration of what was taking away my breath, and inflicting pain on me besides, I ended in a hearty laugh at my own absurdity; in which, as my companion was not sensible of what I was doing, since the wind blew my words away from her, she happily could not join, and I kept my own counsel.
I then tried to beguile my sense of cold, by admiring the group before me. Methought we should have made a figure in a landscape—not that there was aught picturesque in my dress; still, my full long cloak was blown by the wind into folds, which would, in a picture, have turned, I flatter myself, to some account; but my friend in her chair, the servants and the dogs who accompanied us, made a group which, as I said before, might have employed the pencil to advantage. Yes, we had three dogs with us, one of them was a fine black curly Newfoundland dog, called Charley; and his companion was a small terrier. The Marquise de Sevigné said of a friend of hers, that he abused the privilege which men have to be ugly—and I think poor Hefty has abused the privilege which terriers have to be so; au reste, he is a good dog, but, like his species, high-minded and aristocratic. Every one knows that dogs do not like the poor, or their houses; probably there is something in the smell of poverty which displeases their nice organs.
The terrier in question, when, to his great annoyance, one day, I forced him into a cottage, got under my chair, and would not stir from it while I staid, wrapping himself up meanwhile, in the train of my silk gown.
The servants were forced to keep a sharp look out after Hefty and Charley, because they knew there were plenty of pheasants and hares in the coverts, alongside of which we passed, and seemed to think a chase after them would be an agreeable pastime; while their bounding feet, ever and anon on the verge of trespassing, and the exemplary readiness with which, better taught than most children, they obeyed the calling voice to return, gave interest and cheerfulness to our walk.
The third dog was a short-legged, big-bodied, over-fed, tiny, pet spaniel, with brown ears, that almost swept the snow as he waddled along. Why he came out at all I know not, as he has no vocation for any exertion save that of eating, lapping, and barking; and, I believe, if Jackey could have spoken, he would have begged Charley and Hefty not to walk quite so fast, but wait for him. At last, the poor little body was so tired, that his mistress took him on her lap, and, while his really pretty head peeped over her arm, he added to the picturesqueness of our group.
We had some way to go, before we came to a habitation, and the “untrodden snow,” extending on all sides, made the scene appear unusually desolate. The Parish Church, too, which we passed, added to the desolation. The greater part of it, that is, the whole body, is a ruin; but part of the nave is still entire, and able to hold the population of O——. It is, perhaps, one of the smallest churches in England, but I doubt whether there be one, in which the service is performed with more exemplary zeal and heartfelt sincerity, or where the worshippers, (chiefly fishermen and their families,) are more truly and fervently devotional. Tradition says, that every evening, at twilight, the ghost of a dog is seen to pass under the wall of this churchyard, having begun its walk from the church at B——, a village between Cromer and Sheringham. It is known by the name of Old Shock, and is said to be very like Charley, the companion of our walk, by those who have seen, and felt him; for this four-footed ghost, unlike all human ones, is not only visible, but tangible. A worthy, sensible gamekeeper, now no more, declared, and believed, to the day of his death, that one evening it ran under his hand, and “though ready to face any earth-born poacher, four-legged or two-legged, at dawn or at dusk,” he owned he was so frightened, for he knew what it was he saw glide on before him in the moonlight! Its back, as he described it, was rough, hard, and shaggy.