Year follows year, decay pursues decay,
Still drops from life some withering joy away.
It was to this conversation that the Duke of Wellington listened with smiling attention.] and "Le silence est l'antichambre de la mort."
Mr. Hope is altered, and he has in his whole appearance the marks of having suffered much. The contrast between his and Mrs. Hope's depression of spirits and the magnificence of everything about them speaks volumes of moral philosophy.
They were even more kind than I expected in their manner of receiving us. One large drawing-room Mr. Hope gave us for the reception of our friends. Mrs. Hope had not since her coming to town had a dinner party, but she assembled all the people she thought we might like to see. One day Miss Fanshawe; another day the Duke and Duchess of Bedford, Lord Palmerston, Lord and Lady Darnley, and Mr. Ellis; Lady Darnley was very kind, just what she was when I saw her before. Lady Jersey is particularly agreeable, and was particularly obliging to us, and gave us tickets for the French play, now one of the London objects of curiosity. The Duchess of Bedford talked much to me, and very agreeably of her travels.
Mrs. Hope was so exhausted by the effort of seeing all these people that she could not sleep, and looked wretchedly the next day, when nobody was at dinner but her own sister and Captain Beaufort. Next day, Lady Tankerville and her daughter, Lady Mary Bennet, came and sat half an hour.
To MRS. RUXTON.
KENSINGTON GORE, April 28, 1819.
We spent ten days delightfully with the kind Hopes at Deepdene, and a most beautiful place it is. The valley of Dorking is so beautiful that even Rasselas would not have desired to escape from that happy valley. Fanny was well enough to enjoy everything, especially some rides on a stumbling pony with Henry Hope, a fine boy of eleven, well informed, and very good-natured. We went to see Norbury Park, Mr. Locke's place, and Wotton, Mr. Evelyn's, and a beautiful cottage of Mrs. Hibbert's, of all which I shall have much to say to you on my own little stool at your feet.
We were received on our return here with affectionate kindness by Lady
Elizabeth Whitbread.
Remember that I don't forget to tell you of Lady Bredalbane's having been left in her carriage fast asleep, and rolled into the coach-house of an hotel at Florence and nobody missing her for some time, and how they went to look for her, and how ever so many carriages had been rolled in after hers, and how she wakened, and—I must sign and seal.