11th.—After I had written yesterday, I went out to walk with my aunt and uncle—my cousins did not come. In the hot-house I saw many plants, nursed with great care, which I had been accustomed to see growing wild and unheeded, such as our beautiful pink and blue passion-flower, the coffee-plant, jessamines, the many-flowered gloxinia, which ornaments our rocks with its beautiful blue flowers, and several others.
In this sheltered place many plants grow wild in the open ground, which do not live in more exposed places in England. The tigridia, a native of Mexico, grows here in great profusion; having heard that the Mexicans eat its roots, or bulbs, my uncle tried them, and found them almost as good as chestnuts.
The little lawn into which the library opens is well defended from all winds, and there the most delicate plants are placed. A miniature grove of orange trees in tubs stands there during the summer—they have fruit and flowers on them, and smell delightfully; but, though healthy, they look stunted to my eyes, accustomed to those of our favourite valley at the foot of the Corcorada—I mean the Laranjeros, where the orange trees are so numerous at each side of the little stream along which we used to have such delightful walks. When shall I walk there again with you, or wander about the pretty green plain, at the entrance of the valley? How often Marianne and I have made you loiter there, while we looked at the rivulet dashing over its stony bed, or at the grotesque war-horsemen, in all their various dresses!
In my aunt’s flower-garden are hedges of Chinese rose and sweet-brier, with pyrus japonica intermixed. They are very pretty, but not equal to ours of acacia and mimosa, with the passion-flower twining through them, and the bignonia and maranta forming such beautiful garlands, particularly on our favourite green plain. How unequal, too, in strength to those fences that we saw at Pernambuco, made of woven palm leaves, and covered with our brilliant creeping plants; or to those of yucca and prickly pear, through which neither dog nor sheep can penetrate. Her garden is on a bank, which slopes from the conservatory to a little stream that runs through the grounds—the flower-beds are intermixed with smooth grass-plats—and a walk extends a little way from the conservatory, covered by a sort of trellice-work made of thin oak-laths bent and crossed, with roses and climbing plants twisted into it. The bramble-flowered rose is particularly suited to this purpose, and covers it with wreaths of pretty little pink flowers. It is curious to observe the effect of even the small degree of shade caused by the trellice on the young autumn shoots, which hang within from the rose-trees. They are pale and tender, appearing as if in a house, and not in the open air.
We spend the finest part of the evenings out of doors—walking, sauntering, or sitting—then comes tea; and once or twice we have been tempted to go out again afterwards. Some evenings we read to ourselves, but now and then my uncle is so good as to read aloud, and that is very delightful, he reads so well.
He likes to see us employed while he reads, for he says it is a useful exercise of the attention to listen, and at the same time to employ the fingers. Last night he read, at Mary’s request, “The Midsummer Night’s Dream,” while his audience employed themselves in needle-work or drawing. As I had not any work in the room, my aunt said she would supply me. I find that she has always a little store of things to be made for the poor, in readiness to employ those who wish for work—caps, aprons, bedgowns, and baby-linen. By these means she has always some useful article of clothing ready to give the distressed people who apply to her; and, besides, she likes that young people should acquire the habit of employing some of their time for the benefit of others.
My aunt truly practises what she advises—to be useful is her great object; but she mixes usefulness and domestic pleasures so well, as my uncle says, that one is scarcely aware of all she effects.
12th.—When I was in the library to-day, looking at some books of prints, and Wentworth and Frederick engaged in their algebra, my uncle coming to the window said, “Bertha, my dear, are you a good arithmetician?”
“No, uncle, I am not; Mamma has always found it difficult to get arithmetic into my head—I do not know why, but I cannot learn it.”
“Perhaps you mean, will not attend to it.”