Miss Eden's Letters Part 42

MY DEAREST THERESA, Your letter has come in at an odd time of day, not leaving much time to answer it; but that is as well, as I cannot make out a long letter. Lady Ashburton[540] is undoubtedly dead after twelve hours' illness; but n.o.body seems to know much about it, and that family always forget to advertise their own deaths, so that one keeps thinking they may recover long after they are buried. The Miss Barings went to Longleat the day after their mother's death, and the Ashburtons[541]

came to town for two nights, and then went to the Grange. I have written twice to her but have had no answer, and I never know exactly how she will take grief; but I should think she must feel all those rapid deaths of friends and relations very much.

C. Buller[542] is such a loss to her society as well as to herself, and it will make a great difference in her parties. He is so very much missed by those who knew him well. We had seen a great deal of him this year, and it was impossible not to be fond of him--he was so amiable and good-natured and so light in hand.

I always felt Lady Ashburton would not long outlive Lord Ashburton; she never cared much for anybody else, and was just the woman to fret herself to death. Your affectionate

E. E.

_Miss Eden to Lady Theresa Lewis._

_Tuesday evening_ [1851].

MY DEAREST THERESA, I was very glad to see your hand of write again, though you might have given a better account of yourself and Therese if you had wished to please. And then poor Bully! That was melancholy; but however, he has been a pleasure to you for years, and that is something, as life goes. I am glad you are up to Lord John's tricks, because in a general way that very artful young man takes you in in a manner that astonishes me, who sees through him with wonderful perspicacity, and when the Duke[543] told me he was going to Harpton[544] _on his way to Knowsley_, I thought he was going to try to seduce my boy Sir George [Lewis] from the paths of rect.i.tude.

I wrote so much to your brother of all the Duke of Bedford said of the old statesman being of use to the young one, and the young statesman taking to the old one (words on which he rings the changes till he makes me sick), that I can't write it all over again; but by dint of positively declining to understand, and by being so intensely stupid as to ask which Lord Stanley he meant (perhaps _he_ of Alderley), and by writing him short, savage notes in the intervals of the weekly luncheons he takes here, I hope I have rather enlightened that slightly damaged article--his mind. It is a good old mind, too, in its little bald sh.e.l.l; but Lord John had evidently persuaded him that new combination of parties was necessary, and that Lord Stanley was, as he always calls him, the young statesman of the age. William Russell has succeeded Lord John at Woburn, and had evidently snubbed the Duke about this alliance, as his tone was quite changed about it, and he was anxious to prove that the friendship began here. Your affectionate

E. E.

_Miss Eden to Lady Theresa Lewis._

ADMIRALTY, _Sunday_ [1851].

MY DEAREST THERESA, I may as well write a line while I can, just in the stages that intervene between the pains of my illness and the pains of my cure; the last being decidedly the worst and the most destructive; my courage has gone for pain.

How are you and yours, and what do you hear from Dublin? I have heard nothing about them since they went. London is this week entirely empty; otherwise there has always been an allowance of a visitor a day--Lord Grey, Lord Palmerston, Lord Cowper, pa.s.sing through, and so on; and while Lord Auckland and f.a.n.n.y were at Bowood, my sister, Mrs. Colvile, abandoned in the handsomest manner her husband and children in the wilds of Eaton Place, and came and lived here. I was very unwell at the time, and she is the quietest and best nurse in the world. Poor thing! she well may be.

The report of Lord G.o.dolphin's[545] marriage to Lady Laura gains ground, and though I feel it is not true, it is too amusing to dispute. Ditto, C. Greville's to Mrs. H. Baring.[546] I see his stepchildren playfully jumping on his feet when gout is beginning. Henry Eden is so happy about his marriage, and so utterly oblivious of the fact that he is fifty, that I begin to think that is the best time for being in love. Miss Beresford has 20,000 down now, more hereafter; and as the attachment has lasted twelve years, only waiting for the cruel Uncle's consent, which was wrung from him by Henry's appointment to Woolwich, they ought to know what they are about, and luckily when they meet they seem to have liked each other better than ever. But twelve years is rather an awful gap....

Macaulay's book has unbounded success.[547] Not a copy to be had, and everybody satisfied that _their_ copy is _the_ cleverest book in the world. Don't tell anybody, but I can't read it--not the fault of the book, but I can't take the trouble, and had rather leave it till I can enjoy it, if that time ever comes.

Good-bye, dearest Theresa. Love to Mrs. V. When do you come to town? How goes on your book?[548] Yours affectionately,

E. E.

CHAPTER XIV

1849-1863

_Miss Eden to Lady Campbell._

EDEN LODGE, KENSINGTON GORE, _Tuesday evening, 1849_.

MY OWN DEAREST PAM, I hear to-day that you too are bereaved of what was most dear to you;[549] and it has roused me to write, for if any one has a right to feel for and with you, through my old, deep, unchanged affection, early ties, a.s.sociation in happy days, and now through calamity,--it is I. Dearest, how kindly you wrote to me in my first bitter hours,[550] when I hardly understood what comfort could mean, and yet, your warm affection did seem to comfort me, and I wish I could now say to you anything that could help you.

You have children, to love and to tend, and yet again, they may be fresh sources of anxiety. I have heard nothing but that there was a long previous illness; and though you may have had the anxiety of much watching, still I think that it is better than a sudden rending of the ties of life.... We came here Friday, but I have not been able to go out of my own room. This reminds me of you as well as of him. Your ever affectionate

E. E.

_Miss Eden to Lady Theresa Lewis._

EDEN LODGE, _Sat.u.r.day, December 1849_.

Thank you very much, my dear old friend, for thinking of me and my sorrows in the midst of all your gladsome family, and your happy Christmas. I earnestly hope and trust you will have many as happy, and even more so as your children grow up around you, and become what you have tried to make them.

The paper-knife is beautiful, and if it were not so I should have been pleased at your thinking of me; and considering how long I have tried the patience of my friends, it is marvellous how little it has failed.

It was a twelvemonth yesterday since he left me to go to the Grange. I had got out of bed and was settled on the sofa, that he might go off with a cheerful impression of me, and we had our luncheon together; and he came in again in his fine cloak to say good-bye, and I thought how well he was looking. And that was the close of a long life of intense affection. I do not know why I should feel additionally sad as these anniversaries come round, for I never think less or more on the subject on any day. It is always there. But still this week is so burnt in on my mind that I seem to be living it all dreamily over again.

I wish at all events to be able to keep (however cold and crushed I feel myself) the power of entering into the happiness of others, and I like to think of you, dear Theresa.... Your ever affectionate

E. E.

_Miss Eden to Lady Theresa Lewis._

[VILLETTE], BROADSTAIRS, _Wednesday_ [1853].

MY DEAREST THERESA ...I do not know whether you have heard of dear little Mary Drummond's marriage to Mr. Wellesley.[551] He is a really good, sensible young man, the greatest friend her brothers and sisters have, much looked up to in his office; and though he might have been a little richer, they will not be ill off, and there is a tangible sum to settle on her, and altogether I think it is a cheerful event. Their _young_ happiness will do good to all our old unhappinesses, and I think Mrs. Drummond's letters are already much more cheerful from her having all the love-making, trousseau, etc., to write about instead of her health. Little Mary is such a darling--so bright and useful and unselfish, and so buoyantly happy, that I do not see how they are to get on without her. Her letters make me feel almost youthful again. She is so thoroughly pleased with her lot in life.

Maurice[552] and Addy are taking their holiday at Broadstairs. I had never seen them in this sort of intimate way, and I did not expect to be so pleased as I am with both of them. His manner to her is perfect--not only full of tenderness and attention, but he is very sensible in his precautions about her health, and takes great care of her in every way.

She looks fearfully delicate. He is very attentive to me too, and as they came in this direction partly to see if they could be of use to me, I am glad it has all turned out so well. My health is in a very poor state, and I am obliged to give up going down to the Baths, but a cottage always has room for everything; and we are turning what is by courtesy called a Green-house, into a bath-room, opening out of my sitting-room. I like the place, and its quiet and bracing air and its busy sea. It is always covered with ships, and I do not regret the move.

Your ever affectionate

E. E.

_Miss Eden to Lady Dover._[553]

BROADSTAIRS, 1851.

Your letter, dearest, was by some accident delayed on the road, and when I received it the life you were all watching so anxiously was then only to be numbered by hours, and I did not like to break in on you. Your poor sister![554] From my heart I grieve for her, and from the very beginning of this severe trial I have had almost daily accounts of her.

I would have written to you sooner about your own child's[555]

happiness, but I was very ill when I heard of it. It is one of the marriages that seems to please everybody, and as I do not think anybody would have been satisfied with a moderately good son-in-law for you, or a commonplace husband for Di, I am quite convinced that all that is said of Mr. c.o.ke must be true.

I sometimes hope that when your child is married, and your poor sister can spare you, that you and Lucia[556] might be tempted to come here for a few days. The journey is only three hours, and it is such a quiet little place to stay in. The hotel is only a little village inn. I do so long to see you.

Lord Carlisle talked of coming here for a day or two, but then I was not allowed to see anybody. I wish you would tell him with my love how much I should like to see him at any time, when he can leave his family and his public duties.

Lady Grey kindly came here on Sat.u.r.day, and is gone back to-day, and I had a visit from the Ellesmeres last week, for which I had been anxiously looking, as I was obliged once to put them off, and I wanted much to see her. She is looking very thin, and is much depressed; but still it always does me good to be with her, and to see such a well-regulated Christian heart as hers. The second day she talked constantly of her boy,[557] and as it was her own volunteering I hope the exertion may have done her good. Lord E. is particularly well. The suddenness of the poor boy's death preys on her, and much as your sister has witnessed of pain and illness, I still think that it is the sudden grief which breaks the heart-strings. It is the difference between the avalanche which crushes and the stream which swells gradually and has time to find its level. But perhaps every one that is tried finds the readiest excuse for their own especial want of resignation.