Miss Eden to Mrs. Lister.

GREENWICH PARK,
[October or November] 1831.

MY DEAREST THERESA, I would take a larger sheet of paper, but it does so happen that ever since we have nominally had stationery for nothing, I have never been able to find anything in the nature of paper, pen, or sealing-wax; indeed, for some time one pen served the whole house. It never came to my turn to have it, as you perceived, and I scorned to buy one. The country may yet afford a quarter of a hundred of pens, at least I suppose so.

You were quite right, I really did look at the end of your letter for your signature. The date, and your beginning, “You must have forgotten who I am,” and your writing such a simple hand, put me out, and I said to George, “This must be some Carnegie or Elliot cousin, by the token of Edinbro’, whom I ought to remember.” I was so pleased when I found it was you; though your expecting an answer is odd, not to say troublesome. However, anything to please you.

What a delicious tour you have had. I cannot imagine anything much pleasanter. The two articles in your letter that disappoint me are, that it does not appear you are intensely bored by the Scotch, considered as members of society; nor that you are sufficiently mad about the beauty of Edinbro’. I think the old town so much the most picturesque thing I ever saw, and the scenery all about it so beautiful. In short, such a slow drawly people have no right to such a romantic capital. They are very tiresome, poor dears! but I suppose they cannot help it; else, if they would speak a thought quicker, and even catch even the glimmer of a joke, and give up all that old nonsense about Chiefs and plaids and pretenders and so on, I should grudge them that town less.

I have been living here very quietly nearly three months, I think—that is as quietly as is compatible with the times; but it has been an eventful summer. What with the opening of bridges, crowning Kings and Queens, and launching ships, I have seen more sights and greater masses of human creatures than usual; and then there has been some talk of a Reform in Parliament, a mere playful idea, which may not have reached you, but which has occasionally been alluded to in conversation here. What a business they all made of it last week.[367] They speak amazingly well, those dear Lords, but they are not so happy at voting....

I could quite understand those Tories if I could find one who would say the Bill is thrown out for good, but I have not seen one who does not say it must pass in three months, so why refuse to consider it now? London has been an ugly-looking sight. We drove up to it most days to see George, and to take him down to the House, because I like to see him safe thro’ the crowd.

Women in London have made themselves so extremely ridiculous and conspicuous, by their party violence, and I have no reason for thinking I should have been wiser than others, if I had been in the same state of excitement. Besides, it is such a bore to be very eager, it tires me to death, and yet one catches it, if other people have the same complaint.

The gardener has taken up all the geraniums. That is not a light grievance, it portends frost and spoils the garden. I wish you had seen it this year, I am certain there never were so many flowers in so small a space.

Anne Robinson[368] came here for three days, and took a fancy for gardening, but I am afraid it did not last. She paid us such a nice visit I asked Lord Morpeth to meet her, thinking that a proper procÈdÉ. Then somebody who had been dining at Putney[369] told me I was quite wrong, and that Mr. Villiers was the person to ask. So I driv up to town like mad and caught him before dinner-time. I thought as he had a Dawkins-Pennant to look to, it was rather hard to interfere with Lord Morpeth’s chance, but I need not have had that delicacy about a fair division of fortune.

Lord Morpeth came here for a longer visit the following week, and I do not think he has the remotest intention of making up to Anne, or any other person. He is absorbed in politics, and says it would bore him to change his situation. Your ever affect.

E. E.

Miss Eden to Mrs. Lister.

30 GROSVENOR STREET,
Thursday [January 1832].

MY DEAREST THERESA, Not the least affronted. It never crosses my mind to invent any other cause for anybody’s silence, but the simple fact that the bore of writing a letter is almost intolerable, and I never fancy anything, either that they are affronted or ill, or hurt (don’t you know how many people are delighted to feel hurt), or dead; but I simply suppose they are not in a writing humour....

I am glad you liked Bowood. I saw her on Monday on her way through town, quite enchanted with Paris and with the fuss that had been made with them. She likes your brother Edward[370] very much, and seemed to have seen a great deal of him. I have not seen Lord Lansdowne yet, but he is to stay on in town some days longer. I wish there were any chance of our meeting you at Bowood, but I fear it is not very likely. In the summer they said they hoped we would come in the winter, but I never go there without a renewed invitation for some special time, because it is always a doubt, I think, whether she likes all the visitors he asks, and I hate to go in uncertainty.

I have been passing a fortnight at Panshanger—went with George for three days, and then Lady Cowper made me stay on. It is a most difficult house to get away from, partly because it is so pleasant, and then that her dawdling way of saying, “Oh no, you can’t go, I always understood you were to stay till we go to Brighton,” is more unanswerable than all the cordiality of half the boisterous friends, who beg and pray, and say all the kind thoughts that they can think of.

We had heaps of people the first part of my visit: Lievens, Talleyrand, Madame de Dino, Lady Stanhope, Palmerston[371] and Mahon, George, Lionel Ashley, Fordwich, and William Cowper (who is a great dear), and heaps of people who acted and danced, and it was all very pleasant.

People are wonderfully clever, I think, and as for Talleyrand I doat upon him. I have been dining with him since at his own house, and elsewhere, and could listen to him for any number of hours. There are weak moments in which I think him handsome, just as it used to cross my mind sometimes whether the Chancellor was not good-looking—decidedly pleasanter to look at than that young Bagot, who walks up Regent Street quite miserable that it is not wide enough for the crowds that he thinks are looking at him.

My last week at Panshanger I was alone with the family, which is always pleasant. I do like Lady Cowper’s society so particularly; in short, I like her. She may have a great many faults, but I do not see them, and it is no business of mine anyhow; and so everybody may reproach me for it if they please, but I am very fond of her.

As for your plan for me—kind of you, but it won’t do at all. He was there all the time, and I left him there, and he always honours me with great attention, but by the blessing of Providence I do not take to him at all. I am too old to marry,[372] and that is the truth. Lady Cowper remained convinced of that fact, and told me one day that if I were younger I should be less quick-sighted to Lord M.’s[373] faults, which is true enough. I do not think him half so pleasant as Sir Frederick,[374] whom I met the time before, and probably just as wicked, and he frightens me and bewilders me, and he swears too much. However, we ended by being very good friends, which is creditable under the circumstances, and though I am sure it is very kind of my friends to wish me married, and particularly kind that anybody should wish to marry me, yet I think now they may give it up, and give me credit for knowing my own happiness. “We know what we are, but not what we may be,” as somebody says, Ophelia I believe; and I know that I am very happy now, and have been so for some years, and that I had rather not change. If I change my mind I shall say so without shame, but at present I am quite contented with my position in life and only wish it may last. If I were younger, or less spoiled than I have been at home, I daresay I could put up with the difficulties of a new place; but not now. I cannot be blind to the faults of the few men I know well, and though I know many more faults in myself, yet I am used to those, you know, and George is used to them, and it all does beautifully. But in a new scene it might fail.

I can derive but little vanity from Lord Melbourne’s admiration. I stand very low in the list of his loves, and as for his thinking well of my principles, it would be rather hard if he did not, considering the society he lives in. And he has found out that I am not clever. I like him for that, and for saying so.

Lord Alvanley is utterly ruined again, has given up everything, and his creditors allow him £1200 a year. Poor Colonel Russell[375] leaves £35,000 of debt. What horrid lives of difficulty those men must lead.

We settled in town a week ago, as the drives from Greenwich were becoming cold and dark for George. There are several people in town I know. Maria is looking very well and seems pleased and contented—neither in great spirits, nor otherwise.

We have seen Colonel Arden very often lately; he and Mr. Warrender having been kept in town for the hopeless purpose of arranging Lord Alvanley’s affairs. I suspect dear Alvanley is after all little better than a swindler. He writes beautiful letters to Lord Skelmersdale, one of his trustees, and says he feels he deserves all the misery he is suffering, which misery consists in sitting in an arm-chair from breakfast till dinner-time cracking his jokes without ceasing. He has taught his servant to come into the room and ask what time his Lordship would like the carriage, and what orders he has for his groom, because he thinks it sounds cheerful, though he has neither carriage nor horses. But it looks better. When Brooke Greville was describing to him the beautiful gilding of his house in Hill Street, which is a wonderful concern, Lord Alvanley said, “My dear Brooke, if you would carve a little more, and gild a little less, it would be a more hospitable way of going on.” Yours ever

E. E.

Miss Eden to Mrs. Lister.

GREENWICH PARK,
Thursday evening, April 18, 1832.

MY DEAREST THERESA, I should not much wonder if you were coming to the crisis; that feeling so well is suspicious. Never mind; “all things must have their end,” as Isabella says in the Tragedy, and “all things must have their beginnings,” as your child[376] will probably say if you will give it an opportunity. I quite forgot to mention to you to let it be a girl, I like girls best. I see Mrs. Keppel, to save all disputes, has brought both a boy and girl into the world; but that is such an expensive amusement, you would not like that. If it is a boy, you ought to call it Arlington[377] as a delicate attention to Mr. Lister. I mention these little elegant flatteries out of regard to your domestic peace, as from various observations I have lately been driven to make amongst my acquaintances, I do not think wives pay half enough attention to their husbands, though this does not apply to you.

Yes, as you say, that division is satisfactory to Lord Grey,[378] but still if there were a shadow of an excuse for making a dozen Peers without affronting two dozen who are made, I should be glad.

The division was a pleasing surprise to me. I had been awake since four that night, and at last had settled that George must have come home and gone to bed, and that nobody had voted for us but just the Cabinet Ministers, and then I heard the house-door bang, and knew by the way in which he rushed up stairs how it was. Now it is over, and that our enemies have not triumphed, I am left with a sort of wish—that is, not a wish, but an idea—that it might have ended (just for fun) the other way. I should so like to know what would have come next. It is all so like a game at chess, and I was anxious to know how Lord Grey would get out of check. However, I am delighted with the game as it is; only it would have been a curious speculation, wouldn’t it? I see we are to have longer holidays, which makes me dote upon them all, both Greys and Salisburys, for so arranging it, and George is enchanted with it. He comes to-morrow, which is good for my gardening tastes and bad for my church-going habits.

There are lectures at the church every evening by an excellent preacher, and when George is in town, Fanny and I dine early and go to them. But I behaved so ill last night. I was shown into a large pew, a voiture À huit places, where there were seven old ladies, highly respectable and attentive, and four of us sat opposite to the other four. The clergyman, the curate of the parish, made a slight allusion to his superior officer, the rector, who happens to be ill, and made a commonplace remark on his own inferiority, etc., whereupon one of the old ladies began to cry. The next, seeing that, began to cry too, and so it went all round the pew, but so slowly that the last did not begin to cry till a quarter of an hour at least after she had heard of the rector’s illness, and till the sermon was fairly directed against some of the difficulties of St. Paul. Their crying set me off laughing, and you know what a horrid convulsion that sort of suppressed laughter, which one feels to be wrong, turns into. I hope they thought I was crying.

Our hyacinths are too lovely; quite distressing to see how large and double they are, because they will die soon. If they were only single, poor little wretches, it would not signify their lasting so short a time. I think the great fault of the garden is the constant flurry the flowers are in. Perhaps you have not found that out, but fancied they were quiet amusements; but that is an error. They either won’t come up at all, or they come at the wrong time, and the frost and the sun and the rain and the drought all bother them. And then, the instant they look beautiful, they die. I observe that a genuine fancier, like George, does not care a straw for the flower itself, but merely for the cutting, or the root, or the seed. However, I must say he contrives always to have quantities of beautiful flowers, hurrying on one after the other.

God bless you, dearest. I have not much to say, but my sisters all tell me to write just before they lie-in—that anything does for an amusement then; so I suppose it is right. Shall I have “Arlington” to-morrow, do you think? Your most affectionate

E. E.

Miss Eden to Mrs. Lister.

GREENWICH,
Friday evening, 1832.

DEAREST THERESA, I shall be charmed to see you any day you like, the sooner the better. Two or three stray people have suggested themselves for various days next week, but I am not sure who are the people, or what days they mean to come. I do not mean anything pert to George, but if he has a fault, it happens to be a total disregard of all notes and messages confided to him. However, I do not know of anybody coming that you would think objectionable. I should have suggested Monday because, as Caroline Montagu (Lord Rokeby’s sister) is coming to pass the day with Fanny, she might have brought you, and returned you, which you would probably prefer; but then what is to become of Mr. Lister? George cannot be here, and though you and I going one way, and Fanny and her Caroline the other, and all meeting for dinner would do very nicely, Mr. Lister would be bored out of his life. But any day you please will suit me, so as you can let me know in time to cook a bit of vittals for you.

I went to town yesterday to see Maria[379] and do my congratulations, and I passed a long time with her, and am quite satisfied that she is unfeignedly happy and that she really likes him. Sir Joseph[380] cannot control his joy at all, and was very amusing with his account of his own manner to Lord Grey and of Lord Grey’s to him. That angel of a man Charles Greville[381] (quite a new light to see him in) gave himself a degree of trouble that astounded me to procure places for us to see Taglioni[382] last night, and he succeeded in fixing us in Devon’s box with the Harrowbys and found us a carriage—in short, there never was anything so good-natured. So we stayed and saw her, and drove down here after it was over.

What a wonderful invention she is. I am satisfied now that she is not a mere live woman; but probably she is, as she insinuated in the ballet La Sylphide. Monsieur de Voisins sat next to us, and his ecstacies and Bravos, and the rapturous soliloquies he indulged in, have left me with a strong impression of his domestic felicity. To be sure, it is a miracle in our favour, that there should be a man in the world, who is enchanted to see his wife flying about a theatre with no cloathes on, and that that individual should have married Taglioni! Your ever affect.

E. E.

Miss Eden to Mrs. Lister.

GREENWICH PARK,
Thursday evening, July 2, 1832.

DEAREST THERESA, I found your note when we came home late last night from Richmond, where we had been to pass the day and dine with the G. Lamb’s; consequently your party was dispersed and you were in a sweet sleep before I knew you had been “at home,” and I was in a sweet sleep too, five minutes after I got home, and shall be so again, I hope, as soon as I have sealed this note. These days in the country are wholesome in that respect. We came here very early this morning, did our Churches like good Christians, and have given a dinner like Ditto, for we have a highly conservative party down here, at least what would have been conservative if, as my housekeeper justly observed about the gooseberries, the season for conserving was not gone by.

We have had the Jerseys, Lord Villiers, Lord Carnarvon, and dear C. Baring-Wall, besides the smart tassel of young Jersey children. George was as happy as a King with all his old friends, so I am delighted they came, and after all Lady Jersey is very good-humoured.

Lord Carnarvon[383] has a pouting-pigeon way of talking, which is rather amusing, but upon the whole I find Tories rather less lively, or perhaps a shade more dull, than Whigs. They growl more, and do not snap in that lively way I should have expected. However, I am no judge: “man delights not me nor woman either,” as dear Hamlet had the candour to observe. He had seen something of society. I daresay he longed to be left to his flowers and his Chiswick, and a comfortable chair under the portico. To be sure his father made a bad business of sleeping in the garden, but then it could not have been so sweet or so full of flowers as ours.

We go back to town to-morrow afternoon, but I begin to see the time coming when we shall settle here. I wish you would take to treat yourself entirely as a sick person for a fortnight. But you won’t, so there is no use saying anything about it. Your ever affectionate

E. E.

Viscount Melbourne[384] to Miss Eden.

WHITEHALL,
August 13, 1832.

MY DEAR MISS EDEN, Many thanks for your kind enquiries. I have been laid up for a day or two, but am much better, and in tearing spirits, which is always the consequence of being laid up. Abstinence from wine and regularity of diet does me much more good than the malady does me harm.

I hope I shall get into the country soon, for I quite pine for it. Robert, I am told, is the only man in Hertingfordbury who has registered. Has Lady Francis written to him for theological arguments? I understand that she has been simply defeated in religious dispute by an Atheist of the neighbourhood—a shoemaker, or something of that sort—and has been seeking everywhere for assistance. The man argued for Natural Philosophy for so long, that she was not prepared to controvert.

Do not the Malignants pour somewhat less malignance, or are they more irritated than ever? Adieu. Yours faithfully,

MELBOURNE.

Miss Eden to Mrs. Lister.

Wednesday [December 1832].

DEAREST THERESA, I had meant to have written you a long letter, but have been interrupted in a thousand ways till it is too late; but perhaps a line will be better than nothing. I was so much obliged to you for writing me that long letter. It told me exactly all I wanted to know about you—your health, your feelings, and also the little particulars I have no means of ascertaining. I never had courage to ask Mr. Villiers even how you are. Don’t you know the difficulty there is of approaching even in the slightest degree the subject that one is most anxious about, and as the surface with him is quite calm, I am always careful not to venture even on a word that might disturb it. He and Mr. Edward Villiers dined here yesterday. George is very anxious to have your George here as much as possible, and thought they had better come for their Christmas dinner as their own family is away, so he asked them both, and I was very glad to renew my acquaintance with Edward, though in some respects, from likeness of voice and manner, which probably you would not be aware of, it was painful to see those two come into the room together.

However, they must be a great comfort to each other. I never saw my brother George so occupied with another person’s grief as he is in this instance. He is asking and thinking every day what can be done for Mr. Villiers.[385] God knows there is nothing; but still I always recollect that in those horrid times of trial, affection from anybody is soothing, if it is nothing more, so I am glad when it is shown.

I was at Oatlands when your letter came, and Lady Charlotte [Greville], who is a kind-hearted person I always think, was most anxious to know all about you and Mrs. Villiers. I thought her very well, all things considered. Lady F.[386] seemed to me particularly out of spirits, and all her letters have been so since her father’s death. I imagine, that in addition to any other trials, they are in some trouble about their affairs, or that Lord F. thinks so, and makes himself unhappy, which troubles her.

The Gowers have taken Bridgewater House off their hands. Maria Howick is come back from the North. Everybody talks of her low spirits and constrained manner. Though I do not think her in high spirits, I do not think I see much difference in her. She is probably timid with her new family and her new position, but whenever I see her alone I am quite convinced she does not think herself unhappy, and when she is quite at her ease again I think other people will think so too.

God bless you, my darling Theresa, I will write again in a few days. Your ever affectionate

E. E.

Miss Eden to Mrs. Lister.

GROSVENOR STREET,
Thursday, December 1832.

MY DEAREST THERESA, I fear that Lord Ribblesdale’s[387] death must be to you and Mr. Lister an additional grief, as I recollect you were fond of her, and she seems to have had not the slightest warning of this calamity. It was very kind of Mr. Lister to write to me, for I was in a state of great anxiety about your health and with no near means of hearing anything about you. What can I say to you, dearest? My love for you and my deep, deep pity for your bereavement you cannot doubt, and as for any attempt at consolation, who can be sure that even with the kindest intentions, they may not aggravate the grief they wish to soothe. I always felt in calamity that though I seemed to want kindness from everybody, yet that all they did was like the work of surgeons, the most skilful made the pain of the wound more evident; and I think I may hurt you if I dwell on your loss, or seem neglectful if I do not, and yet I know so well all you must be feeling.

I was reading yesterday a book of extracts, etc., that I wrote when I lost my own darling brother.[388] As there were several things in it that I thought you might like, and though I did not want anything to remind me of feelings that seem as true on that subject as they were years ago, yet it made me better able to follow you in your present hours of trial and to know what you are going through. With a mother, husband, and child with you, and all the rest of your family, whom you love so dearly, assembled about you, you have more earthly support than many can have to look to; and the consolations of religion none are more likely to find than yourself. Indeed, that is a subject on which I think a stranger intermeddleth not, for God alone can comfort the heart He has cast down, and He, I trust, forgives the repinings which He alone knows.

I wish you would make the exertion of writing one line to me. I love you very dearly, and never feel it more than when you are in grief. Your affectionate

E. E.

Miss Eden to Lady Charlotte Greville.

(At Oatlands, Weybridge),
December 24, 1832.

MY DEAR LADY CHARLOTTE, ...London is so particularly thick and sloppy that it would not surprise me if I slipped out of it again soon.

I have got that invitation to Panshanger I wanted, but as I would rather not go into Hertfordshire till the ball season is over, that will do later, and Eastcombe is open again now.

I am broken-hearted about the Essex election, and the only gleam of cheerfulness I have had has been occasioned by half a sheet of notepaper which I filled with the beginning of my new novel. I wrote nearly a sentence and a half which I composed in two days. Mr. Sale, the singer, called here this morning, which he often does, and used to give me lessons gratis, which was kind but tiresome. To-day he could not, because there is no pianoforte in the house, so we talked about Mrs. Arkwright’s[389] songs, which he says he teaches to numbers of his scholars (there is no end to his pupils). But there are great faults in the scientific parts of her compositions, which he could correct in five minutes—in short, he talks of a mistake in counterpoint as we do of breaking one of the Commandments, and when I said she was a great friend of mine, he said he should be quite delighted to correct anything she sent to the Press, and always without touching the “air,” and he was very polite about it. Do you think it would affront Mrs. Arkwright if I asked her, or that she would not take it as it was meant, as a kindness, from such a lump of science as Sale is? Shall I ask her? Yours affectionately,

E. E.

Hon. Mrs. Norton[390] to Lord Auckland.

[July 1833.]

DEAR LORD AUCKLAND, As you are the only person in your family who have not “cut” me, perhaps you will allow me to apologise through you, to your Sister, for my rudeness last night.

Say that, as far as concerns her, I consider my conduct on that occasion vulgar and unjustifiable, and that I beg her pardon. Yesterday was a day of great vexation and fatigue—which of course is no excuse in the eyes of strangers (whatever it may be in my own), for rudeness and want of temper. I am very sorry. My apology may be of no value to her; but it is a satisfaction to me to make it. Yours truly,

C. NORTON.

Lady Campbell to Miss Eden.

October 25, 1833.

DEAREST EMMY, Eleven years ago we were together. To-day is Edward’s birthday, and I still see that house in Cadogan Place, and the window at which I sat watching for you, my own dear Friend. I like to think how long we’ve loved each other without a shade of alteration between us; du reste, I need dwell on such things to smooth my mind after other rugged bits of life. Your godchild[391] is a good, peaceable, fat lump, with black eyelashes and a pretty mouth, which is all I can make out of her yet.

I recovered tolerably well the first fortnight, since that I have been but poorly. Anxiety and worry keep me back. However, it is all over now, for our matters are pretty nearly arranged. Sir Guy sells out; it is our only resource; it is the only way of paying what we owe, getting rid of debt....

I conclude you are now sitting with your own goldfish under your fig-tree, you who live under the shadow of your own old Men.[392] By the bye, with your blue pensioners, I am sure you will feel for us in the dispersion of our red pensioners. There was a great cry heard in the Hospital, Kilmainham weeping for her old men, because they are no longer to be! However, they are respited, for my enemy Ellice[393] put his pen through their existence, and Mr. Littleton[394] too, and ordered even the fashion of their dispersion, but forgot to enquire particulars, and they have stumbled upon an Act of Parliament, and so must wait till another Act breaks through it. Ellice dropped his pen, and was obliged to pick it up again. Your affectionate

PAMELA CAMPBELL.

Miss Eden to Mrs. Lister.

GREENWICH PARK,
Sunday, December 15, 1833.

DEAREST THERESA, I have just had a letter from your brother George,[395] and though probably you heard from him by the same opportunity, yet it is always a pleasure to know that one’s brothers are heard of by others as well as oneself. It makes assurance doubly sure, which that clever creature Shakespeare knew was not once more than enough, in this unsure world.

Mr. V. seems very happy and very well, and will probably be more personally comfortable when he is the owner of a few tables and chairs. It was such a relief off my mind (as a friend of mine says when anything is a relief to her mind) to find that he had received an enormous letter I wrote to him some time ago, a thing like the double sheet of the Times in private life, and which had been so long unacknowledged, that I felt sure that it had been captured, and that I should see a horrible garbled translation of it copied from a Carlist paper, and headed “Intercepted Correspondence,” whereupon I must simply have changed my religion, gone into a convent, and taken the veil. The propriety of my letters surpasses all belief, so I should not have been ashamed in that sense; but when I write to your brother, or to Lord Minto, or to that class of correspondents, I always rake together every possible anecdote and fact—or what is called a fact—and write them all down just like a string of paragraphs in a newspaper. I always suppose nonsense would bore them, so the horrid letters are made up of proper names, and if there is an unsafe thing in the world to meddle with it is a proper name, and that is the bother of a letter that goes abroad, particularly to such a country as Spain. I saw George was just as fussy about a letter he had written to your brother; but now we know our little manuscripts have found their way safely, we mean to write again—at least I do, the first time I find anything to say. At present I am out of that article.

We have been living here rather quietly, not very though,—at least I dined in town at several great dinners, at the Lievens, etc., that fortnight the Ministers were all in London, and we went up several times to the play with the Stanleys, and several of them came and dined here, and so on during November. Then, George has been frisking about the country at Woburn, Brocket, etc., shooting; and on Saturday he and I are going to run down to Bowood for a week. It is an expensive amusement and not worth the trouble, barring that it is worth while acknowledging the kindness of the Lansdownes. He rode down here from London to ask us, but I never go on his invitations. But, however, he wrote again as soon as he got back, and then Lady Lansdowne wrote to insist on our fixing a day. So, though I know she never wishes her invitations to be accepted, yet if she will write, she must take the consequences, and so we are going. I hear the Nortons[396] are to be there, which will be funny. I do not fancy her, but still she will be amusing to meet for once.

We settle in town after that, at least Fanny and I do. George is going to a great meeting of Ministers at Goodwood. I think it such a good thing, the Ministers have all taken to go shooting about in a body. It prevents their doing any other mischief. That is the way an enemy might state it. I, who am a friend, merely presume they must have brought the country to a flourishing state, since they seem to have so much leisure for amusing themselves.

We have two of Robert’s boys staying with us while Mrs. Eden is recovering from her sixth lying-in. The eldest of the five younger children is just five years old. Pleasant!

I send this to the Council Office as you desire, and have a vague idea that C. Greville will read it, and throw it into the fire—officially of course, I mean. Ever, dearest Theresa, your affect.

E. E.

Miss Eden to Lady Campbell.

GROSVENOR STREET,
Tuesday, [1837].

DEAREST PAM, Thank you just for giving me a push off—not that of all the days in the year I could have chosen this for answering you. I am in long correspondence with Louisa (Mrs. Colvile) about that flirtation,[397] that little interesting love story I imparted to you, and, as usual, the young people are to be very miserable, because that £100 a year which has been left out of everybody’s income, when incomes were created, is not forthcoming; and as usual again, I take the grand line of “all for love and my niece well lost.” Moreover, I think a small income in these days is as good as a large one twenty years ago; and that anything is to be preferred to a disappointment. But all this—together with due attention to dignity one side and love the other, and no two people ever understanding each other—keeps me writing at the rate of twelve pages a day. I am quite tired of the manual labour, and as I feel convinced that three months hence they will be married, I grudge these protocols.

What fun your visit was to me, and I shall always think that last sin of your drive to Greenwich and back was the best spent wickedest two hours we ever passed. I have been twice for a few days to Eastcombe. Saturday and Sunday we pass at Greenwich. George gardens for about fourteen hours on Sunday, which I suppose is wrong, only that is his way of resting himself. Your most affectionate

E. E.

Lady Campbell to Miss Eden.

March 26, 1834.

DEAREST EMMY, I daresay the very sight of a letter from me frights you. I was very sorry after I had written the nasty bitter letter. When I wrote that, I was ill-tempered too! and one always writes harder than one feels. However, my own Emmy, I had rather have written it to you than to any other, tho’ you may not thank me for la prÉfÉrence, if any one can bear with me it is you, however. You mistook me if you thought that I thought that either dear Lord Auckland or the Lansdownes had not done their utmost for us! God knows I feel far more sure of Lord Auckland’s kindness to me than of my own Brother’s. But there is much danger in our sort of distress of getting embittered, my Darling. I pray against this temptation, and strive against this most fervently, and I do trust my cheerfulness has never flagged, and that I blame no one. We have done all we can, and I will not fret....

Your little Godchild is a dear child, with immense eyes and four teeth. She is wise, clever and quiet, and all your Godchild ought to be, but not so pretty as some of her sisters. As they say the commodities are always in proportion to the demand for them, I expect a great cry for girls in a few years.

I have been to our Court but twice. I was told it was imposing, and I did think there was a good deal of imposition. He[398] is sharp and clever and does work like a horse, but I do think one man about him very dangerous, and that is Blake the Remembrancer. I cannot help thinking that man very double, nay, triple. There are no bounds to the gossip of our little Court; the master likes it and is fed with it. I do not think he is very popular, but that does not signify; here, the way of flesh and all parties seems to be discontent, and murmur and grumble. Think of the Wilt[399] being married,—Ciel!... Your own

PAMMY.

Lady Campbell to Miss Eden.

1834.

I am over head and ears in your affairs. I have so much the bump of speculation and lottery in my soul that I am decidedly of your opinion, and would at once keep Greenwich and the Thames, than put my head under that very excellent and comfortable extinguisher of the Exchequer, particularly if my head were as bien meublÉe and well arranged as your George’s small crop-eared shaven little crown. We always dressed our heads alike outside, no curls. I would most certainly take my chance and not dowager myself into the Exchequer....

I suppose Government, to hold together, must go upon the principle of each Minister bringing a certain quantity of sense and an alloy of folly. Now, surely, some of your colleagues bring a peck of dirt and very few grains of reason. Are you obliged to eat it all?... My dearest, tempt me not with the sound of pleasant books, I am all day at Latin and Greek with the boys, I very nearly wrote your name in Greek letters.

Write to me; it cheers me, and I want cheering often, dear Emmy. I grieve at your account of Lady Lansdowne.[400] She has not the constitution for the illness of being cured by the London physicians, I am very sure. Solomon, after he had taken all the physic in the world, exclaimed: “Vanity of vanities.”

Your Godchild has a mouthful of teeth. Tell me something of your Sisters, of William Osborne, of that marriage of your niece, and particularly of the fate of those orchises we took down that day we ran to Greenwich, did they ever come up?

Miss Eden to Lady Campbell.

GROSVENOR STREET.
[1837.]

...I do not really care about my position in this short life, but I like to be actually posished, don’t you? I believe we shall end by remaining at Greenwich, influenced chiefly by the enormous price of villas.

I am sorry Lady Lansdowne writes in bad spirits, for barring the melancholy circumstances attending Kerry’s marriage, I should not have thought this a troublesome year to her. The Wilt himself seems full of attention to her, and if she hates London society, this is a charming year, as such an article does not exist. You have no idea how odd it is. Except herself, no person ever thinks of giving either ball or party. I own I think it quite delightful; no hot rooms, no trouble of any sort, and a great economy of gowns and bores.

We thought much of the Unions[401] for ten days, but they are going by. There never was such luck as the Tailors starting by such ridiculous demands. The middle classes, even down to servants, took against them, and there seems to be very little doubt that, in a very few weeks, they will be totally beat and the whole Union fund exhausted.

It is rather amusing to see them wandering about the Parks, quite astonished at the green leaves and blackbirds. There were about fifty of them playing at leap-frog the other morning. Only conceive the luxury of going home after that unusual exercise, and after beating their wives for making such good waistcoats, sitting down cross-legged to rest themselves. They cost the Union £10,000 the first week, and £8,000 the second, and as the whole amount of the Union fund is £60,000, it is easy to guess how long it may last. It will end in frightful distress. The great tailors are getting foreigners over, and employing women with great success.

I have been in a state of agitation with a touch of bother added to it, which would have made my letters very hummocky. That giving up Greenwich was nearly the death of me, and our glorious promotion[402] was inflicted on us on a particular Thursday, Epsom race day, which George and I had set apart for a holiday, and a tÊte-À-tÊte dinner, and a whole afternoon in that good little garden. We went all the same; but, as for gardening, what was the good of cultivating flowers for other people’s nosegays! So there I sat under the verandah crying. What else could be done, with the roses all out, and the sweetpeas, and our orange-trees, and the whole garden looking perfectly lovely; and George was nearly as low as I was.

And then we had two or three days of bother for our future lives, because, though I now never mean to talk politics, and to hear as little of them as may be, yet I suppose there is no harm in imagining just the bare possibility that the Government may not last for ever.[403] However, he is assured now of a retiring pension. If he chooses to play at the game of politics, he must take his chance of winning or losing; and moreover, this would not have been a time for separating from poor Lansdowne, who has behaved beautifully all through these troubles. So now we are fairly in for it, and after the first troubles are over, I daresay it will do very well. It is the kind of office he likes, and he is, of course, flattered with the offer of it, and Lord Grey has been uncommonly kind to him.

We went on Tuesday to see the Admiralty, and I believe we shall be moving into it the end of next week. It is a vast undertaking. The kitchen is about the size of Grosvenor Square, and takes a cook and three kitchen-maids to keep it going, but the rest of the establishment is in proportion, which is distressing, as I look on every additional servant as an added calamity. I will trouble you with the idea of this house—your old acquaintance—with a bill stuck in its window, “To be sold,”—rather shocking! Looks ungrateful after we have passed our best days in it; but still I cannot fancy being much attached to any London house, so I do not mind about this. Our idea is to get a villa sufficiently small to be adapted to our income, whenever the day of dignified retirement comes; to move our plants and books to it, and gradually to furnish it, and then to make it our only home for the rest of our lives. I should like that better than any other life. Ever your affectionate

E. E.

Lady Campbell to Miss Eden.

Tuesday, June 10, 1834.

How do you do, and how do you feel? How does one feel when one becomes sister to the Admiralty?... Stanley[404] seems a terrible loss, but at this distance I cannot judge, of course. You will think me, of course, a Radical, but I think he is wrong, for the Irish Church always did strike me like a Hot-bed for raising Horse-Beans,—some would tell you for raising thistles, but I don’t go quite so far. I saw Mrs. Ellice, she is in such a Grey fermentation, it might be dangerous, but she foams it away in such long talk that it is very safe.

I saw Mrs. Foggy[405] as she is called; pleasant, merry, and going on very well; people begin to get accustomed to her ways, and, I think, like her on the whole! Darling dear Foggy is in good humour, and all seems right. She is amusing, certainly, but certainly elle parle gras, as the French say, when people speak improprieties. I always think part of her education must have been carried on in the Canal boat, like Vert Vert, when he got away from the nuns.

The Protestants are bristling all over this unfortunate country since the Reform. I have seen nothing like the excitement among them. The Catholics do not appear so excited. This is plain enough. The loss to 200,000 is immense, whereas the gain to 8,000,000 is comparatively small.

Miss Eden to Lady Campbell.
HAM COMMON,
Tuesday, July 23, 1834.

Yes, it is very odd—absolutely curious. But tho’ you and I live in two different islands—two different worlds—yet your letters always are just what I think, and know, and say, and they fit into my mood of mind, and you carry on the story I am telling—and you know all I did not tell you, and say all I did not know—and the whole thing amalgamates. That Littleton creature![406] Is not there an unity in that story of him with all I know? Let’s write his life. Did not I meet him at dinner the very week after the stramash, when everybody crossed the street if they saw him coming, they were so ashamed for him? It was at a dinner at the Chancellor’s, the first given after Lord Melbourne’s appointment,[407] and he was there, and Lord Lansdowne, and several others, and Charles Grey[408] as sulky as possible. And next to him sat Mr. Littleton—and the first thing he chose to begin talking about across the table was something about “one of the tustles that O’Connell and I have had.” It set all our teeth on edge, everybody being naturally with a predisposition to edge-ism, and none of the ferment of the change having had time to subside—and he the guilty author of it all! I really would not have alluded for his sake to the letter O. I said to Lord Lansdowne: “Well, I am surprised at him, for I have refrained from talking about him, from really expecting his mind must give way, and that there will be some horrid tragedy to make us all repent having abused him.” And he said, “That is exactly my feeling. I look at him with astonishment; I can hardly believe he is what he seems to be.” I suppose it really was true, and that he did not mind. We tried, for two or three days, I remember, to declare he looked very ill, but now you say he had not lost a night’s rest, I give up that point. It never was very tenable.

The young Greys have all been pre-eminently absurd, Lord Howick more than all the rest. He told me he had been to all the clubs, and calling at all the houses he knew, to spread every report against the Chancellor he could think of, and coming from him, of course, it was set down as coming from his father, who is as unlike his sons as he well can be. I do not wish to entrench on Mrs. E.’s[409] province—how tiresome she must be!—but she can say nothing of Lord Grey I don’t think. He is the only great man I ever had the good luck to see—consistent and magnanimous—two qualities that I never met with in any other politician. I have closed my political accounts with him.... I am sure I cannot tell you generally anything about the Government. Politics have answered so ill to me in my private capacity that I gave them quite up, and can only tell you these private gossipries of the time. I have not read a debate since last Easter, and can only wonder how I could be so foolish three years ago as to think politics and office the least amusing. I suppose to the end of our days we shall all wonder at ourselves three years ago. But I have had such a horrid uncomfortable year this year; I never was so tired, so out of breath, so bored. You may well ask where we lodge. At a little cottage on Ham Common, hired by the week, without a scrap of garden, but where by dint of hard labour, a doctor, and quantities of steel draughts, I have recovered a little of the health I lost entirely by being kept eight months in London, frying over the coals.

I declare I believe I have lived ten whole lives in the last ten months; we have been so unsettled, which is the only state I cannot abide. First George was to have that Exchequer place with Greenwich, and we made up our plans for that, and were to part with Grosvenor Street; then Greenwich was cut off from the Exchequer, and we prepared to give that up; then the Government found it convenient to make him keep the Board of Trade, and we went back to be as we were.

Then came the Stanley secession and we thought we were all to be out, and reverted to the Exchequer, and looked at every villa round London. Then came the Admiralty, and George sent me to Greenwich to pack up and sell and give up everything, (the only spot of ground I care about in the world).

Well! That was done, and as the goods were on their road, just turning into the Admiralty gate, and just after we had paid Sir James Graham for his goods, and stuck up a bill in Grosvenor St. “To Be Sold”—out went dear Grey.

Then for two or three weeks we did not know what to do. And then in all that hot weather, at last we settled to move, and the arrangement of that great Admiralty was enough to murder an elephant. Then, when George set off on his Tour of the Ports, we came here, and just as we got settled, a Mr. Brogden bought Grosvenor Street, so that I had to go up and pack that up, and rout out the accumulated rubbish of sixteen years, and move all the books, etc.

However they have done their worst now, we have parted with both our houses, and all our goods, and when we are turned out, must live in a tent under a hedge.

I have got a little black King Charles’s spaniel of my own, that I mean to boil down, and make into a comfortable “sup of broth” when we come to that particular hedge “where my tired mind may rest and call it home.”

I somehow feel as if I were sitting by watching George’s mad career, and wondering where it will end.

I never set eyes on him—you have no idea what the labour of the Admiralty is—he never writes less than 35 letters every day in his own hand, besides what the Secretary and all the others do.

Every LevÉe is a crowd of discontented men who would make an excellent crew for one ship, he says, but as they each want one, he is obliged to refuse 99 out of every 100. However he is as happy as a king, I believe, only he has not had time to mention it. He likes his office of all things.

The Admiralty is a splendid home to live in, but requires quantities of servants, and the more there are the more discontented they are. Everybody says what fortunate people we are, and I daresay George is, but my personal luck consists in having entirely lost his society and Greenwich, the two charms of my life; in being kept ten months of every year in London, which I loathe; and in being told to have people to dinner—without the means of dressing myself so as to be always in society. I wish Government would consider that, tho’ a man be raised high in office, yet that the unfortunate women remain just as poor as ever.

Louisa (Mrs. Colvile) has just had her seventeenth child; Mary (Mrs. Drummond) her ninth; and Mrs. Eden is going to have her seventh.

Lord Melbourne[410] made a good start in the House of Lords as far as speaking went. I do not know what ladies have hopes of him, but the “Fornarina,”[411] as he calls her himself, has him in greater thraldom than ever. I see him very often and confidentially, but both of us without any sinister designs.

Miss Eden to Lady Charlotte Greville.

HAM COMMON,
Friday [October 1834].

MY DEAR LADY CHARLOTTE, I sent a note to thank you for my beautiful purse down to Mr. Spring-Rice to frank, not knowing he was away from home, and now that is come back to me I may thank you also for your account of Lady F.[412] I am so glad the business is over at last; it was very hard upon her to have it hanging over her so long, and I congratulate you on being at ease about her. As for another grandchild—your grand quiver is so full of them already, that I suppose you hardly have room for any more. I think it would be such a good plan, if after people have as many children as they like, they were allowed to lie-in of any other article they fancied better; with the same pain and trouble, of course (if that is necessary), but the result to be more agreeable. A set of Walter Scott’s novels, or some fine china, or in the case of poor people, fire-irons and a coal skuttle, or two pieces of Irish linen. It would certainly be more amusing and more profitable, and then there would be such anxiety to know what was born. Now it can be only a boy or a girl.

I expect and hope that Lady F. in about ten days will be walking about looking younger and stronger than ever.

My purse is quite perfection, and I cannot thank you enough for it. I am only afraid it is still more attractive than the last you gave me, which so took the fancy of one of those men who sell oranges in the street, that he snatched it off the seat of the carriage in which I was sitting and ran away with it. Your ever affectionate

E. EDEN.

Lady Campbell to Miss Eden.

[1837.]

Tell me any old news you have by you, for I never see a newspaper by any chance, and live in the wilds,—woods I would have said, only we are scarce of trees. I hear news once a month from Mrs. Ellice. I think she seems Lord Wellesley’s Madame de Pompadour, and so happy! She is quick and lively, but furieusement intrigante I should imagine, from what I hear of her; and her vanity has such a maw that she swallows the rawest compliments. She was recommended to me by Mrs. Sullivan,—not merely introduced to my acquaintance, but fairly confided to my heart. Well, my dearest, I went with my friendship in my hand, ready to swear it before the first magistrate, expecting to find a warm-hearted Étourdie full of talent and genius. Well, we met, and I knocked my head against the hardest bit of worldly Board you ever met with. Full of business, with a great deal of the grey claw and accaparage. So I buttoned up my heart to my chin, and we talked good harsh worldly gab, and we are charming persons together.

Miss Eden to Mrs. Lister.

HAM COMMON,
Monday evening, October 28, 1834.

DEAREST THERESA, I am kind to write to-night, for Fanny and I poked out an old backgammon board of the General’s[413] and began to play, and I beat her two single games and a gammon, so that in coming to my letter I am probably leaving “fortune at the flood, and all my after life will be bound in flats and shallows.” All your fault.

Our cottage is a real little cottage, belonging to an old General Eden who, on the score of relationship, let us have it for almost nothing. It is very clean and old bachelorish, and he lets with it an old housemaid who scolds for half-an-hour if a grain of seed drops from the bird’s cage, or if Chance[414] whisks a hair out of his tail; we are grown so tidy and as she is otherwise an obliging old body, she has been an advantage to us. We took the house only by the week, and as my health has entirely recovered the complete break-up it came to, from our long detention in London, and as his Lordship is living alone at that Admiralty, we depart on Wednesday to settle ourselves there till the Government changes, or I am ill again. However, I do not mind London so much in cold weather. I have been very busy this last week setting up house, as the Ministers will be most of them in town next month without their families, and George has announced an intention to make the Admiralty pleasant to his colleagues. I have but one idea of the manner in which that is to be achieved, and hope the cook may turn out as well as Mr. Orby Hunter’s recommendation promises. Oh dear! I dread the sight of their dear old faces again, and of that “full of business” manner which they get into when they meet in any number.

I wish I could write like Mrs. Hannah More, and have money enough to build myself a Barley Wood,[415] and resolution to go and live there. I am so taken by that book and amazingly encouraged by it, for she was as dissipated and as wicked as any of us for the first half of our life, so there is no saying whether we may not turn out good for something at last.

We have been here eleven weeks, quite alone, but walking and driving eternally, and very few interruptions except an occasional visit from, or to, the F. Egertons and W. de Roos’s, and a royal dinner, luncheon, and party at the Studhouse, which always turns out amusing. The King is so good-natured that it does not signify his being a little ridiculous or so; it is impossible not to love him. The Albemarles[416] do the thing in the handsomest manner as far as the dinner, establishment, etc., goes, and I think the Studhouse a charming possession. She always gets all the King’s Ministers that she can find to meet him, and it charms me to hear her judgments of people:—How unlucky that the Spring-Rices should look less well at a dinner than the Stanleys; and what luck she was in in having such a showy person as Lady Bingham last year in the neighbourhood; not adverting to the possibility that one person may be pleasanter than the others, and admitting that, their position being changed, they do not amount to being persons at all.

I suppose that things are going on well, for I never saw people in greater glee than the Ministers are. Lord Melbourne is in the highest state of spirits, which seems to me odd for the Prime Minister of the country. They all went off from the last luncheon at the Studhouse early, leaving only the W. de Roos’s, Fanny and me and Lord Hill[417] to go round Hampton Court Palace with the King,—a long and curious process, as he shows it just like a housekeeper with a story for each picture. It was pitch dark, so it does not much matter if the pictures were as improper as the stories, for I saw none of them, but it lasted two hours, and in the meantime the Ministers, having had their dinner so early, had set fire to the two Houses of Parliament just for a ploy for the evening.[418] That is the sort of view the Tories take of it, and it sounds plausible, you see; and from Lord Hill’s staying to see the Palace it is clear he had not been let into that plot.

No, I did not see the fire,—wish I had—will trouble them to do it all over again when there are more people in town. Is Lord Fordwich the new Under Secretary? I asked George and he said he did not know, and I asked Lord Melbourne and he said he could not tell me—both very good answers in their way and such as I am used to, but it leaves the fact of Fordwich’s appointment doubtful, and I heard from Lady Cowper three days ago and she said nothing about it.

There was a great sough of India for about a fortnight, but I always said it was too bad to be true, which is a dangerous assertion to make in most cases, it only hastens the catastrophe. But this was such an extreme case, such a horrible supposition, that there was nothing for it but to bully it; and the danger is over now. Botany Bay would be a joke to it. There is a decent climate to begin with, and the fun of a little felony first. But to be sent to Calcutta for no cause at all!! At all events, I should hardly have got there before George got home again, for I should have walked across the country to join him, if I had gone at all. I think I see myself going into a ship for five months! I would not do it for £1000 per day.

Good-night, dearest Theresa. I see Ann Grey is out, and rather expect that will turn out to be yours too. Is it?[419] Your ever affectionat

E. E.

[In November 1834 the King dismissed Lord Melbourne, and sent for the Duke of Wellington, who advised that Sir Robert Peel should form a Government. Peel’s return from Italy did not take place till December 9, and the Duke in the meantime assumed control of various offices, thereby giving offence to the Whigs. He became Foreign Secretary under Peel.]

Miss Eden to Mrs. Lister.

ADMIRALTY,
Monday, November 23, 1834.

MY DEAREST THERESA, Yes,—you see it all just in the right light; but what will come of it nobody can say.... The truth is, till Sir Robert or his answer comes, they have not the least idea themselves what they are to do, or to say, or to think, and I should not be the least surprised if he were to refuse to come, and many people think that from the ridicule of the Duke’s position and conduct now, the whole thing may crumble away before Sir Robert can arrive.

The King is said to be very cross about it, and at the unconstitutional state of affairs. It has been the oddest want of courtesy on the Duke’s part insulting the Ministers for his own inconvenience. Mr. Spring-Rice’s[420] keys, besides his seals, were sent for two hours after the Duke kissed hands on Monday, so that he could not remove his private letters even, and has never been able to get them since. He is naturally the gentlest man I ever saw, but is in that state of exasperation that he would do anything to show his resentment.

On Friday the Duke sent to Lord Conyngham to say he begged he would dispose of no more patronage, to which Lord Conyngham answered very properly that he had resigned, and was keeping the office solely for the Duke’s convenience (it is a patent office), and that he would leave it with pleasure the next minute, but as long as he remained there he should certainly do what he thought best with his patronage. The Chancellor[421] was to have given up the seals on Saturday, when he would have cleared off all arrears and closed the courts, etc., and this was understood at the beginning of the week; but on Thursday the Duke wrote to him that he must give up the Great Seal on Friday morning. It appears that nobody but the King has a right to ask for the Great Seal, so the Chancellor wrote to tell the Duke what was the proper Étiquette, and at the same time wrote to Lord Lyndhurst, with whom he is on the most amicable terms, saying that the Duke, besides being three Secretaries of State, President of the Council, etc., was now going to be Lord Chancellor, so he should give notice to the Bar that the Duke would give judgment on Friday afternoon, and sit to hear Motions on Saturday morning. He came here quite enchanted with the serious answer from Lord Lyndhurst, saying the Duke had no such notion, etc.

I suppose anything equal to the ill-treatment of Lord Melbourne never was known.

The Tories go on asserting, in the teeth of his advertised contradiction (for he was driven to that), that he dissolved the Government, and advised the Duke, etc. There is not a shadow of foundation for that. He went down to Brighton to propose the new Chancellor of the Exchequer, not anticipating any difficulty. His colleagues were all dining here that day, and were expecting him back perhaps in the evening, as he had so little to do! He found everything he said met by objection, and at last the King asked for a night’s consideration, and on Friday put a letter into Lord Melbourne’s hand, very civil personally to him, but saying he meant to send for the Duke.

Lord Melbourne never expressed any difficulty about carrying on the government; never complained of difficulties in the Cabinet, which do not exist; never advised a successor,—in short, it was as great a surprise to him as to the rest of the world, and as the Court Party go on saying the contrary, I mention this.

The truth is that that party—Lady T. Sydney, Miss D’Este, the Howes, Brownlows, etc., have all been working on his, the King’s, fears, and exacted a promise that when Lord Spencer[422] died the King should try the Tories, which he has quite a right to do; but he should not have forced Lord Melbourne to take that office of great responsibility and then have dismissed him without any reason, or without Lord Melbourne’s making any difficulties, and he made none. I could convince you of this by several notes from him, besides the fact being now generally known. He says in one note: “I do not like to tell my story; I cannot. Besides, I hate to be considered ill-used; I have always thought complaints of ill-usage contemptible, whether from a seduced disappointed girl, or a turned out Prime Minister.” So like him! Our people have all been very cheerful this time, and it has been privately an amusing week.

Ours is the only official home left open, and as the poor things were all turned adrift, with nothing to do, and nowhere to go, they have dined here most days (I have found such a cook!), and several others have come in, in the evening.

Our plans are beautifully vague. We have no home, and no place, and no nothing; but as we have a right to a month’s residence after our successor is gazetted, and as he cannot be appointed for a fortnight, there is time enough to look about us. George leans to a place in the country large enough to give him some amusement, and that is cheaper than a small villa which I should rather prefer, but either would do very well. In short, I do not much care so as he pleases himself. We have esquivÉd India, a constant source of pleasure to me, though I keep it snug, as he is rather disappointed at having missed it, so I must not seem so thankful as I am. I should like to go abroad for a few months, but the session will probably be an interesting one and he would not like to be out of the way. Your ever affectionate

E. E.