The house in which Carlyle lived whilst teaching at Kirkcaldy school
see page [11]
It was at Kirkcaldy that Carlyle first met Edward Irving, the master of a rival school in the town. They became intimate friends. “But for Irving,” he says, “I had never known what the communion of man with man means.” It was here, too, that he made the acquaintance of Miss Margaret Gordon, the “Blumine” of Sartor Resartus. Carlyle describes the town in the Reminiscences: “Kirkcaldy itself ... was a solidly diligent, yet by no means a panting, puffing, or in any way gambling ‘Lang Toun.’ I, in particular, always rather liked the people—though from the distance, chiefly; chagrined and discouraged by the sad trade one had!”
Mainhill Farm
see page [4]
Hoddam Hill
see page [4]
In 1815 the Carlyles moved to Mainhill Farm, and here he “first learned German, studied Faust in a dry ditch, and completed his translation of Wilhelm Meister!” Ten years later Carlyle took possession of Hoddam Hill Farm, his mother going with him as housekeeper, and his brother Alick as practical farmer. Here they remained until 1826. “With all its manifold petty troubles,” says Carlyle, in the Reminiscences, “this year at Hoddam Hill has a rustic beauty and dignity to me; and lies now like a not ignoble russet-coated idyll in my memory.”
Scotsbrig
see page [12]