The Diary and Letters of Madame D'Arblay Volume Iii Part 67

June 3.-This day, this 3rd of June, completes a calendar month since I lost the beloved object of all my tenderest affections, and all my views and hopes and even ideas of happiness on earth.

June 7.-The fifth sad Sunday this of earthly separation! oh heavy, heavy parting! I went again to church. I think

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it right, and I find it rather consolatory-rather only, for the effort against sudden risings of violent grief at peculiar pa.s.sages almost destroys me; and no prayers do me the service I receive from those I continually offer up in our apartment by the side of the bed on which he breathed forth his last blessing. Oh words for ever dear! for ever balsamic! "Je ne sais si ce sera le dernier mot--mais ce sera bien la derni?re pens?e--notre r?union."

VISITS RECEIVED AND LETTERS PENNED.

June 18.-My oldest friend to my knowledge living, Mrs. Frances Bowdler, made a point of admission this morning, and stayed with me two hours. She was friendly and good, and is ever sensible and deeply clever. Could I enjoy any society, she would enliven and enlighten it, but I now can only enjoy sympathy!--sympathy and pity!

Alex and I had both letters from M. de Lafayette.

June 23.-To-day I have written my first letter since my annihilated happiness-to my tenderly sympathising Charlotte. I covet a junction with that dear and partial sister for ending together our latter days. I hope we shall bring it to bear.

With Alex read part of St. Luke.

June 29.-To-day I sent a letter, long in writing and painfully finished, to my own dear Madame de Maisonneuve. She will be glad to see my hand, grieved as she will be at what it has written.

With Alex read part of St. Luke.

June 30-I wrote--with many sad struggles--to Madame Beckersdorff, my respectful devoirs to her majesty, with the melancholy apology for my silence during the royal nuptials of the Dukes of Clarence, Kent, and Cambridge; and upon the departure of dear Princess Eliza,' and upon her majesty's so frequent and alarming attacks of ill health.

With Alex read the Acts of the Apostles. . . .

July 8.-I have given to Alex the decision of where we shall dwell. Unhappy myself everywhere, why not leave unshackled his dawning life? To quit Bath--unhappy Bath!--he had long desired: and, finally, he has fixed his choice in the very capital itself.

I cannot hesitate to oblige him.

August 28.-My admirable old friend, Mrs. Frances Page 437

Bowdler, spent the afternoon with me. Probably we shall meet no more but judiciously, as suits her enlightened understanding, and kindly, as accords with her long partiality,- she forbore any hint on that point. Yet her eyes swam in tears, not ordinary to her, when she bade me adieu.

August 30.-The seventeenth week's sun rises on my deplorable change! A very kind, cordial, brotherly letter arrives from my dear James. An idea of comfort begins to steal its way to my mind, in renewing my intercourse with this worthy brother, who feels for me, I see, with sincerity and affection.

Sept. 5.-A letter from dowager Lady Harcourt, on the visibly approaching dissolution of my dear honoured royal mistress !

written by desire of my beloved Princess Mary, d.u.c.h.ess of Gloucester, to save me the shock of surprise, added to that of grief.

Sunday, Sept. 6.-A fresh renewal to me of woe is every returning week ! The eighteenth this of the dread solitude of my heart ; and miserably, has it pa.s.sed, augmenting sorrow weighing it in the approaching loss of my dear queen!

Again I took the Sacrament at the Octagon, probably for the last time. Oh, how earnest were my prayers for re-union in a purer world! Prayers were offered for a person lying dangerously ill. I thought of the queen, and prayed for her fervently.

Sunday, Sept. 27-This day, the twenty-first Sunday of my bereavement, Alexander, I trust, is ordained a deacon of the Church of England. Heaven propitiate his entrance! I wrote to the good Bishop of Salisbury to beseech his pious wishes on this opening of clerical life.

REMOVAL FROM BATH TO LONDON.

Sept. 28.-Still my preparations to depart from Bath take up all of time that grief does not seize irresistibly; for, oh! what anguish overwhelms my soul in quitting the place where last he saw and blessed me!--the room, the spot on which so softly, so holily, yet so tenderly, he embraced me and breathed his last!

Sept. 30.-This morning I left Bath with feelings of profound affliction - yet, reflecting that hope was ever open-- that future union may repay this laceration--oh, that my torn soul could more look forward with sacred aspiration! Then better would it support its weight of woe.

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My dear James received me with tender pity; so did his good wife, son, and daughter.

Oct. 6.-My dear Alexander left me this morning for Cambridge. How shall I do, thus parted from both! My kind brother, and his worthy house, have softened off the day much; yet I sigh for seclusion--my mind labours under the weight of a.s.sumed sociability.

Oct. 8. I came this evening to my new and probably last dwelling, No. 11, Bolton-street, Piccadilly. My kind James conducted me.

Oh, how heavy is my forlorn heart ! I have made myself very busy all day ; so only could I have supported this first opening to my baleful desolation ! No adored husband! No beloved son ! But the latter is only at Cambridge. Ah! let me struggle to think more of the other, the first, the chief, as also only removed from my sight by a transitory journey!

Oct. 14.-Wrote to my--erst--dearest friend, Mrs. Piozzi. I can never forget my long love for her, and many obligations to her friendship, strangely as she had been estranged since her marriage.

Oct. 30.-A letter from my loved Madame de Maisonneuve, full of feeling, sense, sweetness, information to beguile me back to life, and of sympathy to open my sad heart to friendship.

Nov. 7.-A visit from the excellent Harriet Bowdler, who gave me an hour of precious society, mingling her commiserating sympathy with hints sage and right of the duty of revival from every stroke of heaven.

Oh, my G.o.d, Saviour! To thee may I turn more and more.

DEATH OF THE QUEEN: SKETCH OF HER CHARACTER.(331)

Nov. 17-This day, at one o'clock, breathed her last the inestimable Queen of England.(332) Heaven rest and bless her soul!

Her understanding was of the best sort ; for while it endued her with powers to form a judgment of all around her, it pointed out to her the fallibility of appearances, and thence kept her always open to conviction where she had been led by circ.u.mstances into mistake.

>From the time of my first entrance into her household her manner to me was most kind and encouraging, for she had

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formed her previous opinion from the partial accounts of my beloved Mrs. Delany. She saw that, impressed with real respect for her character, and never-failing remembrance of her rank, she might honour me with confidence without an apprehension of imprudence, invite openness without incurring freedom, and manifest kindness without danger of encroachment. . . .

When I was alone with her she discarded all royal constraint, all stiffness, all formality, all pedantry of grandeur, to lead me to speak to her with openness and ease; but any inquiries which she made in our t?te-?-t?tes never awakened an idea of prying into affairs, diving into secrets, discovering views, intentions, or latent wishes, or amuses. No,. she was above all such minor resources for attaining intelligence; what she desired to know she asked openly, though cautiously if of grave matters, and playfully if of mere news or chit-chat, but always beginning with, "If there is any reason I should not be told, or any that you should not tell, don't answer me." Nor were these words of course, they were spoken with such visible sincerity, that I have availed myself of them fearlessly, though never without regret, as it was a delight to me to be explicit and confidential in return for her condescension. But whenever she saw a question painful, or that it occasioned even hesitation, she promptly and generously started some other subject.

Dec. 2.-The queen, the excellent exemplary queen, was this day interred in the vault of her royal husband's ancestors,(133) to moulder like his subjects, bodily into dust; but mentally, not so! She will live in the memory of those who knew her best, and be set up as an example even by those who only after her death know, or at least acknowledge her virtues.

I heard an admirable sermon on her departure and her character from Mr. Repton in St. James's church. I wept the whole time, as much from grat.i.tude and tenderness to hear her thus appreciated as from grief at her loss--to me a most heavy one! for she was faithfully, truly, and solidly attached to me, as I to her.

Dec. 12.-A letter from the d.u.c.h.ess of Gloucester,(134) to My equal gratification and surprise. She has deigned to answer my poor condolence the very moment, as she says, that she

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received it. Touched to the heart, but no longer with pleasure in any emotion, I wept abundantly.

MADAME D'ARBLAY'S SON IS ORDAINED.