Cowper used to work in a little summer-house (which is still standing, or was a few years since) of his own construction, where there were two chairs indeed, but Lady Hesketh did not often intrude. He says of himself about this time, that he was happier than he had been for years. But there are some excellent people in the world, who consider peace unwholesome, and like to throw stones into their neighbours’ lakes, as schoolboys do, for the pleasure of ruffling the surface. Cowper writes to William Unwin: ‘Your mother has received a letter from Mr. Newton, which she has not answered, and is not likely to answer. It gave us both much concern; but it vexed her more than me, because I am so much occupied with my work that I have less leisure to browse on the wormwood. It contains an implied accusation, that she and I have deviated into forbidden paths, and lead a life unbecoming the Gospel; that many of our friends in London are grieved; that many of our poor neighbours are shocked; in short, I converse with people of the world, and take pleasure therein. Mr. Newton reminds us that there is still intercourse between Olney and London, implying that he hears of our doings. We do not doubt it; there never was a lie hatched in Olney that waited long for a bearer. We do not wonder at the lies; we only wonder he believes them. That your mother should be suspected (and by Mr. Newton, of all people) of irregularities is indeed wonderful.’
The extent of their crimes, the head and front of their offending, were drives with Lady Hesketh in her carriage, and visits to the Throckmortons. We suspect that was an unpardonable offence (on account of their being Roman Catholics) in Mr. Newton’s eyes.
‘Sometimes, not often, we go as far as Gayhurst, or to the turnpike and back; we have been known to reach as far as the cabinetmaker’s at Newport!’ And, O crowning horror! Cowper confesses to having once or twice taken a Sunday walk in the fields with his cousin, for Mrs. Unwin had never been led so far into temptation. Speaking of Lady Hesketh, who came in for her share of censure, he says: ‘Her only crime in Olney has been to feed the hungry, clothe the naked, and nurse the sick.’ The letters to Mr. Newton were in the same strain, but modified in their expressions; for it was evident Cowper feared his spiritual adviser, and, like some of our Roman Catholic friends, subscribed to the infallibility of his Pope, even while harbouring some secret misgivings on the subject. He ventures to observe: ‘As to the opinion of our poorer neighbours, uneducated people are seldom well employed when judging one another, but when they undertake to scan the motives, and estimate the behaviour, of those whom Providence has placed a little above them, they are utterly out of their depth.’
Gentle-hearted, generous-hearted Cowper; he not only forgave, but continued his friendship and intercourse with his severe censor. Mr. and Mrs. Newton were his guests after he had left Olney, and was settled in his new house; and though the correspondence between the two men slackened in some measure, and lost some of its unreserved character, it was not discontinued. Neither did the poet refer to the difference which had arisen, unless we accept such a passage as this, as an allusion to Mr. Newton’s censoriousness. Speaking of the narrow escape which Mrs. Unwin had run of being burned to death, he says: ‘Had I been bereft of her, I should have had nothing left to lean on, for all my other spiritual props have long since broken down under me.’ It did indeed seem strange and cruel, that the only hand found to throw a stone at the marble shrine of Cowper, and his Mary, should be that of his own familiar friend.
When Lady Hesketh came to investigate the resources of Olney, she decided in her own mind that it was a most unfit place for her cousin to inhabit,—cold, damp, and dreary; and she was not long in arranging that her two friends should change their abode for a pretty little house called Weston, belonging to Sir John Throckmorton, and standing in a picturesque neighbourhood on the skirts of his park. Lady Hesketh took all the trouble and expense of the removal on herself; furnished and embellished the little house; and on the day she left Olney for London, Cowper and Mrs. Unwin drove over to settle at Weston. But they had not been there above a fortnight, before a sad blow fell upon them both. News came that William Unwin was no more,—‘the only son of his mother, and she was a widow;’ the dearly loved friend and constant correspondent of Cowper. William Unwin was travelling with a friend, whom he nursed to recovery through a dangerous attack of typhus; but, catching the disease himself, he died in the hotel at Winchester. The mother bore her irreparable loss, ‘with her accustomed submission to the Divine will.’ Cowper dared not give way to emotion, but the shock was none the less severe. His letters began to show signs of returning illness and dejection; he marks down for his intimate friends all the variations of the mental barometer. Alas! the storm signal was already hoisted, and the tempest was at hand. He complained of sleeplessness: ‘It is impossible, dear cousin,’ he writes, after explaining how heavily the task of translation (he was busy on Homer) weighed on his mind, ‘for a man who cannot sleep, to fight Homer’s battles.’ Religious despondency once more took possession of his distracted mind. Speaking of a visit to his old home at Olney, he says: ‘Dreary, dark, cold, empty—it seemed a fit emblem of a God-forgotten, God-forsaken creature.’ Insanity returned in all its distressing symptoms; he again attempted self-destruction. Poor Mrs. Unwin came into the room one day, just in time to cut him down. He would scarcely let her out of his sight for a moment, and would allow no other person to enter his presence.
It is not our intention to dwell longer than necessary on these dark passages in the sufferer’s life; suffice it to say, that, as on a former occasion, the cure was instantaneous; and, after an interval of several months, he once more took up the thread of his work and correspondence. He tells Lady Hesketh he is mending in health and spirits, speaks enthusiastically of the Throckmortons’ kindness, and says that he has promised them she will soon be at Weston. ‘Come then; thou art always welcome; all that is here is thine, together with the hearts of those who dwell here.’ Alluding to her father’s declining health, he ‘is happy not to have grown old before his time. Trouble and anguish do that for some, which longevity alone does for others. A few months ago I was older than he is now; and though I have lately recovered, as Falstaff says, “some snatch of my youth,” I have but little confidence, and expect, when I least expect it, to wither again.’ In the midst of some melancholy reflections he breaks out with: ‘Oh how I wish you could see the gambols of my kitten! They are indescribable; but time, that spoils all, will, I fear, sooner or later, make a cat of her.’ Then he relates, for his cousin’s amusement, how a lady in Hampshire had invited him to her house, bribing him with the promise of erecting a temple in her grounds ‘to the best man in the world.’ Not only that, but, would she believe it, a Welsh attorney has sent him his verses to revise and criticise! a lady had stolen his poem of
‘A rose had been washed, just washed by a shower,
Which Mary (Mrs. Unwin) to Anna (Lady Austen) conveyed.’
‘You must excuse it, if you find me a little vain, for the poet whose works are stolen, and who can charm an attorney, and a Welsh one into the bargain, must be an Orpheus, if not something greater.’ He was at work again on Homer, and, when urged not to overtax his mind in so doing, says he considers employment essential to his wellbeing. But writing was irksome to him, and he found innumerable volunteers for the office of secretary,—Lady Hesketh, Mrs. Throckmorton, young Mr. Rose—a new but true friend,—and his favourite kinsman John, or Johnny, Johnson, of Norfolk.
Cowper and Mrs. Unwin had a succession of guests at The Hermitage, as he sometimes called Weston; among others, Mr. Rose, an agreeable young man, a great admirer of the poet’s, who writes his sister an account of their life, and speaks of Lady Hesketh, ‘A pleasant and agreeable woman, polite without ceremony;’ of Mrs. Unwin, ‘A kind angel;’ of their amusing breakfasts, ‘which take an hour or more, to satisfy the sentiment, not the appetite, for we talk, O heavens! how we talk!’