[And on the 28th he writes to Sir M. Foster:—]
I have been improving wonderfully in the last few days. Yesterday I walked to Bolton Abbey, the Strid, etc., and back, which is a matter of sixteen miles, without being particularly tired, though the afternoon sun was as hot as midsummer.
It is the old story—a case of candle-snuff—some infernal compound that won't get burnt up without more oxygenation than is to be had under ordinary conditions…
I want to be back and doing something, and yet have a notion that I should be wiser if I stopped here a few weeks and burnt up my rubbish effectually. A good deal will depend upon whether I can get my wife to join me or not. She has had a world of worry lately.
[As to his fortunate choice of an hotel,] "I made up my mind," [he writes,] "to come to this hotel merely because Bradshaw said it was on the edge of the moor—but for once acting on an advertisement turned out well." [The moor ran up six or seven hundred feet just outside the garden, and the hotel itself was well outside and above the town and the crowd of visitors. Here, with the exception of a day or two in May, and a fortnight at the beginning of June, he stayed till July, living as far as possible an outdoor life, and getting through a fair amount of correspondence.
It was not to be expected that he should long remain unknown, and he was sometimes touched, more often bored, by the forms which this recognition took. Thus two days after his arrival he writes home:—]
Sitting opposite to me at the table d'hote here is a nice old Scotch lady. People have found out my name here by this time, and yesterday she introduced herself to me, and expressed great gratitude for the advice I gave to a son of hers two or three years ago. I had great difficulty in recollecting anything at all about the matter, but it seems the youngster wanted to go to Africa, and I advised him not to, at any rate at present. However, the poor fellow went, and died, and they seem to have found a minute account of his interview with me in his diary.
[But all were not of this kind. On the 26th he writes:—]
I took a three hours' walk over the moors this morning with nothing but grouse and peewits for company, and it was perfectly delicious. I am beginning to forget that I have a liver, and even feel mildly disposed to the two fools of women between whom I have to sit every meal.
27th.