Mrs. Hemans had three of her boys with her at Dove's Nest, and they enjoyed the place to perfection. It was just the place for boys to be turned loose in; and with fishing, sketching, and climbing the hill above the Nest, they were in elysium. Her own health, however, was so far undermined now, that she complains in her letter she can not follow them as she would, but that she is more a child in heart than any of them. Her own description of the Dove's Nest is this: "The house was originally meant for a small villa, though it has long passed into the hands of farmers; and there is in consequence an air of neglect about the little demesne, which does not at all approach desolation, and yet gives it something of attractive interest. You see everywhere traces of love and care beginning to be effaced; rose-trees spread into wildness; laurels darkening the windows with too luxuriant branches; and I can not help saying to myself, 'Perhaps some heart like my own in its feelings and suffering, has here sought refuge and repose.' The ground is laid out in rather an antiquated style, which, now that nature is beginning to reclaim it from art, I do not at all dislike. There is a little grassy terrace immediately under the window, descending to a small court with a circular grass plat, on which grows one tall white rose-tree. You can not imagine how I delight in that fair, solitary, neglected-looking tree. I am writing to you from an old-fashioned alcove in the little garden, round which the sweet-brier and moss-rose trees have completely run wild; and I look down from it upon lovely Windermere, which seems at this moment even like another sky, so truly is our summer cloud and tint of azure pictured in its transparent mirror."
This cottage is, in fact, a very simple affair. It is regularly let by the people, farmers, who live in one end of it, and who have now built another house near it with farm buildings. It stands, perhaps, at half the elevation of Professor Wilson's house at Elleray, and not at such a distance from Windermere, and nearer to Lowood inn than to Ambleside. A considerable wild wood ascends above it to the top of the rocky hills; and it seems, indeed, to have had its place cut out of the front of the wood for it. You can ascend from Lowood by a steep, straight carriage road, all bordered with laurels luxuriantly grown, and overshadowed by forest trees; or you may, if coming from Ambleside, ascend a foot-path, which is by far the most charming way. Yes, a very charming way it is—a regular wild wood walk, reminding you of many of those in Germany. It is narrow, and overhung with hazels; at the time of my visit full of nuts, in abundant and large clusters. Here water is running by the wayside, clear, and in fleet abundance. The wood opens its still solitudes, ever and anon; and far above you the rocks are seen lifting themselves into the heavens in a gray silence. This wood walk goes on and on, bordered with wild flowers, and odorous with the scent of meadow-sweet, till you arrive in about half-a-mile at the cottage.
This consists of but four rooms in front; two little sitting-rooms, and two bedrooms over them. It is a little white battlemented affair, with a glass door. The woman of the house pointed out to me the chamber, that on the right hand as you face the house, at which Mrs. Hemans, she said, used to write; and which commands a fine view of the lake and its encircling hills.
The woman is a regular character. She was very violent against steam, railroads, and all sorts of new-fangled things. She wondered what parliament was about that they did not stop the steam. "What are your Sir Robert Peels, your Grahams, and your Stanleys good for, if they can not stop the steam?" She would make them sit, if she could have her way, till they did some good; for they had done none yet. She almost preferred O'Connell to them, for he did get master of the queen!
"You seem to be a great radical," I said.
"Nay, nay!" she replied; "I'm naw radical. I stick fast to the church; but I am a great politic! And what will all those navies do when the railways are all made? What is to become of the poor boatmen when there are nothing but steamers?"
"Well, but has not Mr. Wordsworth written against the railroads?"
"Ay, he may write; but there's more nor Mister Wordsworth nowadays. People are got too clever now; and if he writes there's twenty ready to write against him."
All the time that the woman was getting on in this style, she had a sort of smile on her face as if she was merely talking for talking's sake; and, as she proceeded, she led the way to show me the garden, which is a very pleasant little retirement, looking down the hill, and toward Lowood upon the lake, and far across to its distant shores and mountains. We then passed into a second garden, at the top of which is the alcove mentioned by Mrs. Hemans. It is in the wall, arched above, and whitewashed within, and with seats set round, and a most luxuriant Ayrshire rose climbing and mantling it about, high and thick. Here, said the woman, Mrs. Hemans sat in fine weather, generally to write. At the lower end of the garden stood the tall white rose-tree which Mrs. Hemans so much admired. From this the landlady plucked a flower, and begged me to send it to my wife; as well as a number of moss-roses growing about, which she said Mrs. Hemans admired; but not so much as this white rose. The strange woman, unpolished, but evidently full of strong independent feeling, and keen spirit of observation, was also as evidently possessed of tender feelings too. She declared it often made her melancholy to see that rose-tree and that alcove.
"Ah, poor thing!" said she, "it was a pity she did not open her situation sooner; but she did not open her heart enough to her rich relations, who were very fond of her. It was anxiety, sir; it was anxiety, you may depend on it. To maintain five boys, and edicate 'em with one pen, it was too much, you are sure. Ay, I have thought a deal more of her since, than I did at the time; and so many ladies come here, and wished she had but opened her situation sooner, for when government did something for her, it was too late!"