"Paris."—Miss Susan Hamerton's Death.—Burnley revisited.—Hellifield
Peel.—"Landscape" planned.—Voyage to Marseilles.
In May, Richard went away to Paris to study from the antique in the
Louvre, and Mary read English to her father for an hour every afternoon.
In the summer Mr. Hamerton received the decoration and title of Officier d'Académie, but so little did he care for public marks of distinction that the fact is barely mentioned in the diary.
In August he received the following interesting letter from Mr.
Browning:—
"HOTEL VIRARD, ST. PIERRE DE CHARTREUSE ISÈRS.
"August 17, 1882.
"DEAR MR. HAMERTON,—When I got, a month ago, your very pleasant letter, I felt that, full as it was of influences from Autun, the Saône between Chalon and Lyons, speeded by '330 square feet of canvas,' my little word of thanks in reply would never get well under weigh from the banks of our sluggish canal; so reserved launching it till I should reach this point of vantage: and now, forth with it, that, wherever it may find you, I may assure your kindness that it would indeed have gratified me to see you, had circumstances enabled you to come my way; and that the amends you promise for failing to do so will be duly counted upon; tho' whether that will happen at Warwick Crescent is unlikely rather than merely uncertain—since the Bill which is to abolish my house, among many more notable erections, has 'passed the Lords'' a fortnight ago, and I must look about for another lodging—much against my will. I dropped into it with all the indifference possible, some twenty-one years ago—meaning to slip out again soon as this happened, and that happened—and they all did happen, and yet found me with a sufficient reason for staying longer, till, only last year while abroad, the extraordinary thought occurred—'what need of removing at all?'—to which was no answer: so I took certain steps toward permanent comfort, which never before seemed worth taking—and, on my return, was saluted by a notice to the effect that a Railway Company wanted my 'House, forecourt, and garden,' and wished to know if I objected—I who, a month or two before, had painted the house and improved the garden. Go I must—but I shall endeavor to go somewhere near, and your visit, if you pay me one, will begin the good associations with the place. And this place; you may be acquainted with it, not unlikely. It is a hamlet on a hilltop, surrounded by mountains covered with fir—being the ancient Cartusia whence our neighbors the monks took their name; the Great Chartreuse lies close by, an hour's walk perhaps: this hamlet is in their district, 'the Desert,' as they call it; their walks are confined to it, and you meet on a certain day a procession of white-clothed shavelings, absolved from their vow of silence, and chattering like magpies, while vigorously engaged in butterfly-hunting. We have not a single shop in the whole handful of houses—excepting the 'tabac et timbres' establishment—where jalap and lollipops are sold likewise—and one hovel, the owner of which calls himself, on its outside, 'Cordonnier': yet there is this 'Hôtel' and an auberge or two—serving to house travellers who are dismissed from the Convent at times inconvenient for reaching Grenoble; or so I suppose.
"The beauty and quiet of the scenery, the purity of the air, the variety of the wild-flowers—these are incomparable in our eyes (those of my sister and myself), and make all roughnesses smooth: we spent five weeks here last season; will do the like now, and then are bound for Ischia, where a friend entertains us for a month in a seaside villa he inhabits: afterwards to London, with what appetite we may, though London has its abundant worth too. Utterly peaceful as this country appears—and you may walk in its main roads for hours without meeting any one but a herdsman or wood-cutter—I shall tell you a little experience I have had of its possibilities. On the last day of our sojourn last year, we took a final look at and leave of a valley, a few miles off; and as I stood thinking of the utter innocency of the little spot and its surroundings, the odd fancy entered my head, 'Suppose you discovered a corpse in this solitude, would you think it your duty to go and apprise the authorities, incurring all the risks and certain hindrance to to- morrow's departure which such an act entails in France—or would you simply hold your tongue?' And I concluded, 'I ought to run those risks.' Well, that night a man was found murdered, just there where I had been looking down, and the owner of the field was at once arrested and shut up in the Mairie of the village of St. Pierre d'Entremont, close by. The victim was an Italian mason, had received seven mortal wounds, and lay in a potato-patch with a sack containing potatoes: 'he had probably been caught stealing these by the owner, who had killed him,'—so, the owner was taken into custody. We heard this—and were inconvenienced enough by it next day, for our journey was delayed by the Judge (d'Instruction) from Grenoble possessing himself of the mule which was to carry our luggage, in order to report on the spot; but we got away at last. On returning, last week, I inquired about the result. 'The accused man, who was plainly innocent, being altogether boulversé by the charge coming upon him just in his distress at losing a daughter a fortnight before, had taken advantage of the negligence of the gendarmes to throw himself from the window. He survived three hours, protesting his innocence to the last, which was confirmed by good evidence: the likelihood being that the murder had been committed by the Italian's companions at a little distance, and the body carried thro' the woods and laid there to divert suspicions.' Well might my genius warn me of the danger of being a victim's neighbor. But how I have victimized you, if you have borne with me! Forgive, and believe me ever,
"Yours truly,