Charlotte, who was within the hut, joined our party, and told us that a poor man had just been expressing to her feelings which certainly are not common in any rank of life. She had said, "Tim., why are you not walking to-day; it is too fine weather to stay in the house?" and his answer was, "The finer the day, my dear miss, the more I'd covet not to be looking at it; ever since I buried her, I'd rather be to myself, and Sunday brings all the people out." What an artless expression of faithful affection! This man's wife, who is the "her" to be comprehended, he supposes, by every one, because there is no other to confound with the image in his own breast, has been dead for six years; and yet Memory is true to her trust. There is something very endearing in this tenderness, and we feel in good humour with our species, when an instance like what I have mentioned occurs, to prove that some of our best movements can spring from an uncultivated soil.
At dinner, after dinner, and all the evening, I am compelled in honesty to say, that not a moment passed heavily. We laughed and talked as usual. The interval between dinner and tea was spent in walking; that between tea and nine o'clock in listening to some of Handel's finest songs, very sweetly performed; and e'er "the close of the silent eve," the family group were once more assembled; and after prayers, and a short but impressive sermon, sent to their rest with an emphatic blessing.
You have now the panorama of Glenalta, and you are placed upon a platform in the midst, from which, turning yourself round the scene, you can form a just idea of every object which it includes within the circuit.
Thus have I brought (I believe with fidelity) the first part of my epistolary labours to a conclusion. From this time forth you will know all the ground-plan, and be enabled to allot its own place to each occurrence as it may chance to arise. As to the general impression made upon my mind, I own to you that I never was so happy anywhere as since I came to this lone and lovely spot; and I am powerfully struck with the truth of a remark which you once made to me, and which at that time though I had a vague idea of your being right, I had no actual experience that permitted me to confirm; namely, that society in its true sense consists not in the number of those persons with whom one converses, but in the number of ideas excited in one's own mind. Glenalta completely illustrates this observation. A family of five individuals, with the addition of two intimate friends, have furnished such variety and excitement in the flow of my thoughts, that I appear to have lived in a crowd; and through a long duration of time I was thinking of this circumstance before I got up this morning as a contradiction to the common notion, that when we are most happy time seems the fleetest; but I see how it is—both remarks are strictly true.
Stimulus of an agreeable diversified nature certainly prevents our taking note of time while present, and therefore it may be said to glide away rapidly; but when remembered, every circumstance which produced a change of pleasure, serves to distinguish one portion from another, and thus to afford a sense of progress, which the dullness of monotony is incapable of producing, just as a single acre of ground, animated by trees, houses, and living creatures, fills a much greater extent in imagination, when we recollect the landscape, than is occupied by a wide expanse of ocean, though the latter, when looked upon, appeared a boundless prospect; still, however, in the midst of this sunshine of the heart, I always bear in mind that its locality is the secret of its charm. You would not agree with me, but I am assured that the sort of thing that delights where one feels no responsibility, would cease to fascinate in the moment that the surrounding world came to call one to account for one's country cousins: and these dear souls, perhaps, might make one blush at the west end. I ought not to say so from any thing that I have seen here; but the whole course of our thoughts and feelings is so subject to join the tide of opinion, that I hardly dare to assert how far my present impressions, vivid as they are, would stand the test of a Bond-street jury.
As Mrs. Malaprop says, however, "let us not have any retrospections as to the future" Viva, viva. I am so much better, that I hardly remember how I came here in the high road to Charon's ferry.
I am longing to hear from you. Don't forget to let me know about Stanhope, as Mr. Otway will be anxious to learn whether you and he cement.
Adieu, dear Falkland. Am I not the very pine-apple, and quintessence of letter-writers? Huzza!
Yours, ever affectionately,
Arthur Howard.