“I heard such a capital story of Bishop Magee the other day. He was in a carriage on the Great Western with two young clergymen, one of whom began, and went on violently abusing the Bishop of Peterborough by name, without observing who he was. At Swindon the Bishop got out to have some soup. When he was gone, the other curate said, ‘How could you go on like that? couldn’t you see that was the Bishop of Peterborough?’—‘Why didn’t you stop me?’—‘Well, I did all I could; I’m sure I kicked you hard enough.’—‘What can I do?’—‘Well, if I was you, I should apologise.’ So, when the Bishop came back, the young man said, ‘I’m very sorry, my Lord, to have said all I did in your presence. I am sure I had not an idea who you were, and if there is anything you especially objected to, I should be very glad to withdraw it and apologise.’—‘Well,’ said the Bishop, ‘there was one thing, there certainly was one thing which annoyed me very much: you would call me Majee; now my name is Magee!”
Alas! the shadows which I had observed during my last visit to my dear friend Lady Waterford were now gathering very thickly around her. She had failed rapidly from the time of her removal from Highcliffe to her Northumbrian home, and was no longer able to answer me; but I still wrote to her.
To Louisa, Marchioness of Waterford.
“Athenaeum Club, March 1, 1891.—I am thankful still to hear of you from many common friends, and quite satisfied without hearing from yourself, and rejoice to think of you as able to enjoy drives. I think you will often find out, by carriage, points which will be almost new to you, and I can imagine how lovely the effects must have been in the hazy hollows of the Cheviots in these last days, when even here sunshine has broken through the fog in which London was shrouded for a week. It is Sunday, and I am just going to Curzon Street Chapel. I would not miss one of Mr. Bennett’s sermons on any account.... The one which struck me most was on the brief text ‘Nothing but leaves!’—so many bear those, quite a great growth of them, and no more: I am sure I do.”
“March 16.—Two days ago I ran in from this Club to luncheon at the Brownlows’ close by, and had such a pleasant visit.
“I went first into the large room they call the library on the ground floor—the most enchanting of rooms, hung all round with noble Italian pictures, some of them bequeathed by Miss Talbot, and bright with many flowers; some of your prettiest drawings on the table; Westminster Abbey, faint, grey, and impressive, beyond the leafless trees outside the window. Here I found Lord Pembroke, always as genial, pleasant, and charming as he is handsome.
“The staircase is quite beautiful, chiefly designed by Lord Brownlow, but partly taken from the old palace-inn at Parma, with friezes and alcoves, and lighted by a copy of Michelangelo’s lanthorn. In the wide gallery above we found Lady Brownlow. Her two sisters came in, and then we had luncheon.
“Afterwards we went to the pretty little sitting-room, full of beautiful things, which is called Lady Lothian’s. What an attractive group the sisters made—the pale, spiritual, abstracted Lady Lothian, the very type of refined gentleness: Lady Brownlow, with her noble Bronzino-like head and colouring, and the figure of a classic caryatide: Lady Pembroke, less interesting at first, but so intensely grande dame; and then the two husbands leaning over them, on such happy, devoted terms with all three, were such noble specimens of humanity. The conversation there is delightful—so un-Londony, so original, so high-minded and high-meaning.
“To-day I have been to Edward Clifford’s studio to see his drawings and his Burne-Jones’s—all of the usual lean, limp, scared-woman kind. What was more interesting was the handsome, radiant, bright-eyed elderly woman who was looking over the drawings: it was the famous Madame Novikoff. I had much talk with her, and found her most simple and attractive, and not the least an alarming person.”
It was on the day after writing this that I first truly realised that my dearest Lady’s illness must be fatal. Our Lady was told that it must be so, that the end might come any day, any hour. At first she shed a few natural tears, and said, “I thought I should have lived to seventy-seven, as my mother did,” and then added sweetly, “But why should I mind, since God so wills it? tell me how it will be.”—“Perhaps in your chair, just as you are sitting now.”—“Oh, that will be well—so quiet, so well.” One day soon afterwards she wished to go out into the garden when it was not thought good for her. “Perhaps you might die when you are out.”—“And why should it not be like that? If God called me in the garden, it would be as well as in any other place.” I could not go to Ford, because Lady Waterford was not allowed to see any one unnecessarily, but for many weeks succeeding my whole heart was there with the faithful friend, the kind sympathiser, the constant correspondent of thirty years. One heard of the gradual increase of the disease: of her laying aside all painting and writing: of her reading prayers to her servants for the last time; but still talking in her wise and beautiful way of all things “lovely and of good report,” laughing brightly over old recollections: then of her lying constantly on a sofa, always rejoicing to see those she loved, but mistaking her younger relations for their mothers, dear to her in the long ago. Often also others, those dearest to her, who had gone before, appeared to be present with her as angel ministrants to cheer and comfort. The sweet face of old Lady Stuart, her mother, seemed visibly present: she imagined her old governess to be in the house, and bade Miss Lindsay to be sure to arrange for the drives which she knew the old lady liked. Through the flowers upon her table she constantly saw her sister Charlotte, Lady Canning, in all her loveliness. Her sense of the companionship of this beloved sister was so vivid, and she spoke of her so often, that at last one of those present thought it necessary to say to her, “Dear lady, Lady Canning died very many years ago.” “Oh, did she? How delightful! then I shall soon be able to talk to her. I see her now, but soon we shall talk as we used to do.” One evening there was a beautiful sunset. Our dear Lady sat watching it. “It is like the coming of the Lord,” she said. Surely the watchers at Ford realised General Gordon’s words—“Any one to whom God gives to be much with Him, cannot even suffer a pang at the approach of death. For what is death to a believer? It is a closer approach to Him whom, even through the veil, he is ever with.”