Blenheim Hotel, London,
Saturday.
As we were coming yesterday Edward looked at the wind and decided that if Donald was not in the Thames then, he would have no chance of being here this week. We had not been here an hour when in he walked in high feather and gave me more reasons than I can remember for leaving his sisters and going with us....
I have been to Waterloo[106] and in Buonaparte's carriage. He has given an alarm by writing to France in spite of all their precautions.... We[249] have got our passports and arranged our going. Edward came back from the city with three plans—the steamboat, the packet, or a coach to ourselves to Ramsgate. We debated the three some time, at last, on the strength of hearing that the steamboat had been out two nights on its passage once, we decided on the coach, and the places were just secured when Mr. Foljambe came in and told us he was going to Ramsgate on Tuesday with some other friends of Edward's, and that it was the nicest vessel ever seen and more punctual than any coach, which made us all very angry as you may guess.... We set out to-morrow morning and get into the packet at Ramsgate at 7 in the evening. Let me find a nice folio at Paris, care of Perrigaux, Banquier, and I shall not feel your handwriting the least interesting thing I have to see there.
Rev. E. Stanley to his niece, Louisa Dorothea Stanley.
Ramsgate, June 11th.
Rapidly went the coach from Canterbury, 17 miles in an hour and a half. Fair blows the wind over the azure blue billow. "You will breakfast at Ostend," says the Captain, "to-morrow." "Oh, that Louisa were here!" says Donald. "She would die of delight," says Uncle, "and does not Uncle say true?" Conceive the view from Nottingham Castle on the evening we [250]left Alderley ... a noble precipice, frowning over a magnificent plain, from the terraces of which we beheld immediately at our feet almost numberless—for I counted in a second 54—little pets of gardens, each adorned with a love of a summerhouse to suit; in the corners of the rocks many excavations and caverns fancifully cut out and carved, into which each of the proprietors of the above-mentioned gardens might at leisure retire and become his own hermit. Then how shall I touch upon the delights of Cambridge? How shall I speak of Edward's beauty in his cap, all covered with little bows, and a smart black gown? And how shall I speak of his dinner and his party? Such merriment! Such hospitality! Only think, Louisa, of dining, breakfasting and supping day after day with 14 or 15 most accomplished, beautiful, and entertaining young gentlemen! But no more, lest you expire at the thought! As for London, I cannot well tell you what I did or saw, such a confused multiplicity of sights and succession of business have seldom been experienced. At 6 this morning we started in the stage coach, the interior of which we took, excluding all intruders, and from hence at 3 o'clock on a lovely night, with an elegant moon, we embarked for Ostend.
(Continued by Mrs. Stanley.)
I have persuaded Uncle to carry his letter over the water that you may not have the anxiety of thinking for 2 days about the passage, which a gentleman who dined with us to-day informed us[251] was the most precarious, dangerous, and uncertain known.
But I consoled myself with not believing the gentleman in the first place, and by thinking with Aunt Clinton that as Mrs. Carleton was drowned so lately at Ostend, it is not likely another accident should happen at present.
Here we are, waiting for the awful moment of embarkation, which I consider something like having a tooth out, but I live in hopes that, having been up early this morning and had 10 hours' jumbling, I may be sleepy enough to forget that I am on a shelf instead of a bed; so I have been just to admire the moon as we sail out of harbour, and then go to bed and find myself in sight of Ostend when I awake.