The heat and dust are becoming insufferable, for we have had no rain, save in very homoeopathic doses, during the three weeks that we have been here. The shrubs and bushes by the roadside look so piteous under their weight of dust, that I feel half inclined to try the effect of a feather brush upon their drooping leaves; and Bernard, who is never prone to take cheerful views of anything, grows daily more gloomy when we inquire after the progress of the kitchen-garden. But, although we are sighing under the heat, it is nothing, we are told, to what the New Yorkers are now enduring, and our friends, Mrs. Acheson and Dr. Taylor, who came out yesterday from the city to spend the day with us, congratulated us upon the coolness of the temperature at Chappaqua.
The morning was passed out of doors playing croquet and walking
"Sotto i pini del boschetto,"
to use the words of the coquettish Countess and her arch waiting-maid in the "Marriage of Figaro" (that Letter Duo contains, I think, some of the most delicious music that the joyous Mozart ever wrote).
The sun was too hot after our early dinner, for us to find much pleasure in croquet; so we sat in the music-room, and upon the piazza, and listened to a few songs from Marguerite, and watched the skill of papa and the handsome blond doctor in the "Magic Rings,"—a very easy game, to all appearance, but one which really requires much dexterity of hand.
The music-room is, I think, the coolest and pleasantest room in the house. It is one of the additions built by uncle after he had purchased this house—a large, square room on the ground floor, with curtained windows opening upon the balcony, and upon the old apple-tree. It is singularly favorable for music, for it contains no heavy furniture, and the floor is uncarpeted. We had intended to remove all the pictures from the walls, that they might not deaden the sound of the music, but we could not resist an exquisite "Mary in the Desert," purchased by uncle in Florence, in 1851; so this painting is now hung over the piano.
Our sprightly brunette friend with the merry black eyes, Mrs. Acheson, looked unusually pretty and charming yesterday. I love to describe stylish toilettes as well as any fashion-writer; so here is hers in all its details: steel-colored silk trimmed with turquoise blue, demi-traine, her hair beautifully dressed (or coiffured, to use the fashionable newspaper word) in puffs and rolls, and finished with a little blue feather; while an elegant fan attached to half a yard of gold chain depended from her belt.
When the 4.45 train was at hand, Ida and I walked down to the station with our friends. Quite luckily there was a drawing-room car attached to the train, although such luxury is generally confined to the express, which does not stop here. I learnt, however, from the station-master, that this car had borne some happy pair as far as Albany the day before, had stayed there over-night for repairs, and was now returning in a leisurely manner to New York.
CHAPTER VII.
Midsummer Day—An Artist's Visit—Ida's Letter—Moonlight on Croton Lake—Morning Readings—Plato and Kohlrausch.
June 21.