HERO-WORSHIP
Before concluding this chapter, I must make mention of our governess, the last, and by far the favourite, for she had two or three predecessors. Miss Richardson, or “Lizzie Dickey,” as we children fondly called her, was the daughter of Joseph Richardson, a literary man, who, if I mistake not, had been a co-lessee with the celebrated Richard Brinsley Sheridan, of one of the principal London theatres. Lizzie was, in consequence, dramatically inclined, and fostered my early taste for the stage, as well as that for romantic fiction. How delightful were the afternoons that my brother Cavendish and I passed with this genial companion beneath the shade of the spreading ilex or flowering chestnuts in Bushey Park, sometimes armed with a small luncheon basket and a precious volume of Walter Scott. I could easily point out the spot now where I became convinced in my own mind that I could never be happy again, for Lizzie had just read aloud to us the passage in “Old Mortality” where Lord Evandale dropped lifeless from his horse. We were expecting the return of my father and mother that same evening, an event to which I had been looking forward for some time, yet what did it matter now? What consolation could I possibly find since the hero of my idolatry was “no more!”
CHAPTER IX
BRIGHTON—SCHOOLDAYS
Brighton was a favourite resort of my dear mother, both before and after I went to school there; not only on account of its healthy and invigorating air, but more especially because it was the home of her elder sister, Lady John Townshend, Lord John being the proprietor of two houses in the King’s Road, called Little and Great Bush. The smaller of the two was often lent to my mother for the winter months: there was a door of communication between the two houses, and the members of our family were as often in the one as in the other, both at meal and at other times.
We considered it great fun to be allowed to carry our dishes and plates into Great Bush at dinner time, and to turn that usually solemn banquet into a species of picnic, although the dinner in question could not always be considered solemn.
My uncle Lord John, who was already advanced in years when I first remember him, was a very peculiar person. As I have before said, he had been the friend of Fox, and was a Whig of the whiggest, a man of talent and education, a poet and a scholar. He was what of yore was called “a testy old gentleman,” but the children entertained a great affection for him, combined with a certain degree of dread. He approved of my love (now genuine) of Shakespeare, and liked to hear me read or recite passages, on which he would enlarge, criticising and correcting my pronunciation of classical terms.
Lord John was a gourmet, and very particular in the matter of cuisine. He would often call to the footman, in the middle of dinner, and say in a querulous tone: “Tell the cook to come to me this moment,” which occasioned rather an awkward pause. Then, on the entrance of the poor artiste, with very red face from the combined effects of the kitchen fire and mental confusion, he would address her in a voice of thunder: “Pray have the goodness to taste that dish, and tell me if you do not agree with me that it is beastly.”
TOWNSHENDS, AND MRS FITZHERBERT
In spite of all these eccentricities, I was very fond of my uncle, and used to sit for hours talking to him by the side of his chair, for he was a martyr to gout. Mrs Fitzherbert was a friend of the Townshends, and lived at Brighton at the same time; she gave many parties, and when charades and tableaux were the order of the day, or rather night, I was allowed to be of the party, while still a child.