“Mr. Bellairs, the Highcliffe agent, who is here, said—
“‘My grandfather was both at Trafalgar and Waterloo, for he was wounded as a middy at Trafalgar, and then went into the army. It was odd when, long afterwards, some one said about Trafalgar, “It was so and so” and he said, “No, it was not, for I was there,” and that the conversation then went on to Waterloo, “It was so and so.”—“No, I beg your pardon, but I was there.”
“‘Afterwards he fell in love with Miss Mackenzie, one of two heiress sisters. He had nothing to marry upon, and the father forbade him the house, but he was allowed one interview, and in that he found out that the butler was just leaving, and the family would be wanting another. He dressed up and came and applied for the place. He got it, and it was three weeks before he was found out, and then Mr. Mackenzie allowed that he was too much for him, and allowed that he should marry his daughter. But he insisted that my grandfather should leave the army. “Very well,” he said, “if you like I will go into the Church.” So that was agreed to, and in time he became a Canon. He was as earnest in the Church as everywhere else. Soon after his appointment to a country living, as he was crossing some fields on a Sunday, he found a number of miners crowding round some prize-fighters. “Come,” he said, “I can’t have this: I shall not allow this.” “But you can’t prevent it,” they cried. “Can’t prevent it! you’ll soon see if I can’t fight for my God as well as for my king: I’ll fight you all in turn,” and he polished off the two strongest miners in fair fight, and then the others were so pleased, they chaired him, and carried him through the village to his church, which they filled from that time forward.’
“Most delightful and full of holiest teaching have been the many quiet hours I have spent with the lady of the castle. There is a sentence of Confucius which says—‘If you would escape vexation, reprove yourself liberally and others sparingly.’ It is exactly her case. And there is another sentence of Confucius which applies to her—‘The wise have no doubts, the virtuous no sorrows, the brave no fears.’ Being here so quietly, I have seen even more of her than on other visits, and more than ever has she seemed to be a fountain of original, interesting, noble, and elevating words and thoughts. She is wonderfully well now, and able to walk, and take all her old energetic interest in the place and people, and oh! how we have talked!”
“Littlecote, Wilts, Dec. 3.—A charming visit to this beautiful old house, which mostly dates from Henry VII., and has a noble hall hung with armour and the yellow jerkins of the Commonwealth, a long gallery filled with fine Popham portraits, and a charming old pleasaunce with bowling-green and long grass walks. I sleep in the ghost-room, and just outside my door is the ante-chapel where Wild Darrell roasted the baby as described in the notes to ‘Rokeby,’ but the grandfather of the present possessor was so bored by inquiring visitors that he burnt the old hangings of the bed by which the nurse identified the room of the crime, and the bed itself, with much other old furniture, was sold to provide the fortunes of the younger children in the present generation. Nothing can be more delightfully comfortable, however, than the house as it now is, and my young host—Frank Popham—is most pleasant and genial. It has been a great pleasure to find Lady Sherborne domesticated here, and to listen once more on a Sunday evening to her exquisite singing of ‘Oh rest in the Lord’—so delicate and touching in its faintly vanishing cadences as to draw tears from her audience. Very pleasant too has it been to meet charming Mrs. Howard of Greystoke and her daughter again.”
“Dec. 11.—My old cousins, Mr. and Mrs. Thurlow, who had often invited me before to their house of Baynards, wrote that this week was my last chance of going, as Baynards was just sold, so I have been for one night. The house is partly modern, but the place was an ancient royal residence, and was part of the dower of Katherine Parr. A pretty statue of Edward VI. was discovered there walled up, and Margaret Roper lived there afterwards, and long kept her father’s head in a box, which still exists at the foot of the staircase. There are also numbers of fine portraits, the dressing-box and travelling trunk of Elizabeth, and I slept in a magnificent old tapestried room and in Henry VIII.’s bed.
“Mrs. Thurlow says that Cardinal Wiseman went to dine with some friends of hers. It was a Friday, but they had quite forgotten to provide a fast-day dinner. However, he was quite equal to the occasion, for he stretched out his hands in benediction over the table and said, ‘I pronounce all this to be fish,’ and forthwith enjoyed all the good things heartily.”
“Dec. 12.—Henry Lyte says that Porson was told to write a Latin theme as to whether Brutus did well or not in killing Cæsar—‘Si bene fecit aut male fecit.’ He wrote—‘Non bene fecit, nee male fecit, sed interfecit.’
“The Stuart Exhibition is most indescribably interesting. A glorious Vandyke hangs there representing Henrietta Maria in radiant youth and happiness, with husband and children. Close by hangs the most touching portrait in the gallery—Henrietta Maria, the same person exactly, with the same curls, only grey, the same features sunken and worn by sorrow, in her old age at Chaillot, by Le Fevre.”[481]
“Cobham, Jan. 3, 1889.—Drove with Lady Kathleen Bligh, Lady Mary, and Lady Lurgan to Rochester to see the interesting old hospice for ‘six poor travellers, not rogues or proctors,’ where that number are still daily received and cared for. They are given half a loaf, boiled beef, and porter for supper, have six small clean comfortable rooms lighted by a street gas-lamp outside, and are sent away with fourpence each in the morning. On Christmas Day a lady sends the travellers of the day some tobacco, a pipe, and a sixpence each, and quaint are their letters of thanks. ‘May you live for ever and a day after,’ was the good wish of one of them this year.