"Harrow, Oct. 11, 1855.—No one is here (with the Vaughans) except Mr. Munro, whom I find to be the author of 'Basil the Schoolboy,' which he declares to be a true picture of Harrow life in his time. A Mr. Gordon has called, who gave a most curious account of his adventures after having been at school here three days, and how his companions, having stoned their master's lapdog to death, forced him to eat it uncooked!"[107]
"Portishead, Nov. 10.—How often I have thought of my mother when sitting here in the little bow-window, surrounded by the quaint pictures and china, and the old furniture. Miss Boyle[108] is in her great chair, her white hair brushed back over her forehead. The Channel is a dull lead-colour, and the Welsh mountains are half shrouded in clouds, but every now and then comes out one of those long gleams and lines of light which are so characteristic of this place. The day I arrived, a worn-out clockmaker and a retired architect came to spend the evening and read Shakspeare, and Miss Boyle made herself quite as charming to them as she has doubtless been all summer to the archduchesses and princesses with whom she has been staying in Germany. The next day we went to Clevedon, and saw the old cruciform church above the sea, celebrated in 'In Memoriam,' where Arthur Hallam and his brothers and sisters are buried. From the knoll above was a lovely view of the church—immediately below was a precipice with the white breakers at the bottom, which beyond the church ripple up into two little sandy bays: in the distance, the Welsh mountains, instead of blue, were the most delicate green. We returned by Clapton, where, beside an ancient manor-house, is a little church upon a hill, with a group of old yew-trees."
"Oxford, Nov. 15.—On Monday, Miss Boyle came in my fly to Bristol, her mission being to break a man she had met with of drunkenness, having made a promise to his wife that she would save him. She said that she had shut herself up for hours in prayer about it, and that, though she did not know in the least how it was to be done, she was on her way to Bristol to do it. One day, as we were walking, we met a woman who knew that she had seen her in a drunken state. 'You will never speak to me again, ma'am,' said the woman; 'I can never dare see you again.'—'God forbid,' answered Miss Boyle. 'I've been as great a sinner myself in my time, and I can never forsake you because you've done wrong: it is more reason why I should try to lead you to do right.' I had an interesting day at Bath with dear old Mr. Landor, who sent his best remembrances to you—'the best and kindest creature he ever knew.'"
"Oxford, Nov. 21.—I have been dining at New College and drinking out of a silver cup inscribed—'Ex dono Socii Augustus Hare.'
"Yesterday I went to luncheon at Iffley with Miss Sydney Warburton, authoress of 'Letters to my Unknown Friends,' and sister of the Rector—a most remarkable and interesting person. She had been speaking of the study of life, when the door opened and a young lady entered. Miss Warburton had just time to whisper 'Watch her—she is a study indeed.' It was Mrs. Eliot Warburton, uninteresting in her first aspect, but marvellously original and powerful in all she said."
"Nov. 26.—I have been a long drive to Boarstall Tower, which is like an old Border castle, with a moat and bridge. It was defended during the Civil Wars by a Royalist lady, who, when starved out after some months' siege, made her escape by a subterranean passage, carrying off everything with her. Afterwards it was always in the hands of the Aubreys, till, in the last century, Sir Edward Aubrey accidentally poisoned his only and idolised son there. The old nurse imagined that no one knew what had happened but herself, and she spent her whole life in trying to prevent Sir Edward from finding out what he had done, and succeeded so well, that it was years before he discovered it. At last, at a contested election, a man in the opposition called out, 'Who murdered his own son?' which led to inquiries, and when Sir Edward found out the truth, he died of the shock.
"Mrs. Eliot Warburton and her sister-in-law have just been to luncheon with me in college, and I am as much charmed with them as before."
"Dec. 3.—I have been to spend Sunday at Iffley with the Warburtons."
I have inserted these notices of my first acquaintance with the Warburtons, because for some years after this they bore so large a share in all my interests and thoughts. Mrs. Eliot Warburton at that time chiefly lived at Oxford or Iffley with her two little boys. Her brother, Dr. Cradock, was Principal of Brazenose, and had married Miss Lister, the maid of honour, with whom I became very intimate, scarcely passing a day without going to Dr. Cradock's house. Miss Warburton died not long afterwards, but Mrs. Eliot Warburton became one of my dearest friends, and not mine only, but that of my college circle; for she lived with us in singular, probably unique intimacy, as if she had been an undergraduate herself. Scarcely a morning passed without her coming to our rooms, scarcely an afternoon without our walking with her or going with her on the river. It was a friendship of the very best kind, with a constant interchange of the best and highest thoughts, and her one object was to stimulate us onwards to the noblest aims and ambitions, though I believe she overrated us, and was mistaken in her great desire that her two boys should grow up like Sheffield and me. We gave her a little dog, which she called "Sheffie" after him. We often went to a distant wood together, where we spent whole hours amongst the primroses and bluebells or wandered amongst "the warm green muffled Cumnor hills," as Matthew Arnold calls them; in the evenings we frequently acted charades in Mrs. Cradock's house. Our intimacy was never broken while I stayed at Oxford. But I never saw my dear friend afterwards. In 1857 I heard with a shock of what it is strange that I had never for an instant anticipated—her engagement to make a second marriage. She wrote to tell me of it herself, but I never heard from her again. She had other children, girls, and a few years afterwards she died. Her death was the first great sorrow I had ever felt from death out of my own family. Her memory will always be a possession to me. I often saw her husband afterwards in London, but as I had never seen him with her, it is difficult for me to associate him with her in my mind.
JOURNAL.