Monk's Folly, 19th November

Darling Elizabeth:

Simply couldn't endure it in town in November by myself, so came home to-day. Yesterday, after Blanche left, I counted up the things I could do by myself in order to kill time. In spite of London being so big, there are so few things one can do by oneself to amuse oneself. The early post brought me the proofs from Alice Hughes; Paquin comes out splendidly, but I look silly in the one in which I am standing near a balustrade, holding a sheaf of wheat. I have ordered a dozen of myself in a garden, under a lovely old tree, with a stuffed greyhound at my side. It looks awfully natural, and you would never dream I was more than twenty. I thought the proofs had been sent me by mistake, till I recognised my frock, and then when you look at them a long time, you see how really like you they are. They are just the thing to send one's acquaintances.

The morning was so foggy that I couldn't go out, so I put on a very chic costume, and sat in the glass-roof place which they call a "garden," and read Lady Sophia Dashton's novel. It is all about the Roman Emperors and the catacombs, and the love of a princess and a slave. The language is so beautiful, and the descriptions are wonderful: they seem as if they would never end, and you forget all about the story. The book has been well reviewed, and Lady Sophia has taken up literature seriously. I have heard she is making a great deal of money out of it. Mr. Beake will publish anything she writes—all the illustrated papers have got her portrait this week—and there are stories of hers now running in two of the leading Society papers. She began to write for pleasure, but has received such encouragement that she decided to win the laurel. Everybody in Society has bought her book. The whole family are talented. Her father's speeches in the House of Lords on the London drains have been edited at 7s. 6d., with the family arms on the cover; the Times said they had the "ring of Burke in them," and Lady Sophia's brother's "Poems in odd Moments," which have appeared in the "Temple of Folly," are to be brought out in book form. I forget the name of Lady Sophia's novel; Mrs. Jack Strawe, in recommending it to me the day of Miss Parker's wedding, said she didn't know the name, and that very few people did, but when ordering it, it was only necessary to mention Lady Sophia Dashton's name, and the bookseller would know what you meant.

I sent ThÉrÈse to Mudie's for it, and told her to ask for any other books that were being widely read, as I like to be posted on what is being talked of. She brought back somebody's work on Aristotle, with an introduction by the Duke of Mauve, and Mrs. Katurah P. Glob's "There is no Death." Mrs. Glob is a Christian Scientist, and states in her preface that she is the seventh daughter of a seventh son. I could only get as far as what she had to say on vaccination; I make out that she preferred to "render unto CÆsar the things that are CÆsar's," rather than to incur the penalty of the law.

After struggling the whole morning with Glob and Aristotle and Lady Sophia, and wondering how learned people were, and how they found time to acquire so much knowledge, I had lunch. CrÊme velours, sole princesse, noisettes Souvaroff, pommes nouvelles, etc., with FÉlix Boubel, carte d'or, took the dry taste of the books completely out of my mouth.

Having spent such a morning improving my mind at the Carlton, I thought I deserved some relaxation in the afternoon.

Que faire? Should I consult Salambo, the well-known Oriental lady in Bond Street, as to the future? Should I go to Exeter Hall and observe the Ranter on his native heath? Should I go to St. James Hall and revel in Alice Gome's superb voice? I did none of these things; I took ThÉrÈse with me and drove to that popular place of amusement, the Aquarium, as I had never been there, and I wanted to see the fishes. Alas! How sadly we English take our pleasures! The only fish at the Aquarium are some monsters of papier machÉ and a lonely piscis vulgaris condemned to solitary confinement in a slimy tank. ThÉrÈse thought she would like to see the sword-swallowers, so I took seats, and while we waited, such a funny man told us he would impersonate celebrities in quick change. He did a lot of men with beards and long hair, and held up bits of cardboard to let us know who they were, and he called himself Meyerbeer and Rossini, and, as ThÉrÈse said, without the cardboard you wouldn't have known which was which. Then he did Lord Roberts and Baden-Powell and the Prince of Wales; and when I saw him put on his Lord Roberts' wig and jerk the antimacassar off an arm-chair, I knew that he would impersonate the Queen. And he did, and you can have no idea how grotesque it was, and the curtain dropped and nobody applauded.

The sword-swallower did some amazing things, and smacked his lips, as if the swords tasted nice. His wife swallowed an electric light, and then he told us of a trick he could do which no one had ever done before in England, namely, to swallow a sword and hang weights on to the hilt, but he didn't do it, as he said he had a sore throat. I wouldn't wait for the lady who dives from a trapeze into a tank, or drop pennies into slots, or have my photo taken while I waited, though I let ThÉrÈse have six shots at a Boer behind a kopje in the shooting gallery, but she nearly killed the attendant after the third shot.

ThÉrÈse was so frightened, and began to scream in French, that we had a crowd round us in no time, and a policeman came up and took our names. After that I decided the Carlton was the best place for me, till I could get my things packed and go home. When I got back to the hotel, I found some letters and a ten of diamonds on the table in my room. At a loss to know what significance it could have, I asked the porter how it came into my room. He said it had been left by a footman, but I was none the wiser till this morning, when I received a note from the Honourable Mrs. Maxolme, explaining that her footman was a simple honest rustic whom she had brought up from the country with her, and who was new to his duties. She had spent the afternoon paying calls, and before starting had explained that it was merely a case of leaving cards, and she told the youth to take charge of them and bring a sufficient number. She had paid all the calls, when she suddenly remembered I was stopping at the Carlton and she drove there. The footman gave the card to the porter, and then Mrs. Maxolme drove to a house where she wished to leave two cards, and called the footman and told him. But it seems he had exhausted all he had brought, and horrified Mrs. Maxolme by saying that he had none left, as he had only brought from the ace to the king of diamonds. Poor Mrs. Maxolme has been writing to everybody since to explain, and as she simply could not write personally so many letters, she wrote one and had the rest type-written.

Now, darling, I want you to come home at once and tell Valmond to bring you, as I wish to see him. I don't want to frighten you, but the fogs and the dissipation of attempting the London season in November have made me ill. I arrived here with a sore throat and a backache, and sent at once for Dr. Smart. As I write, I have a mustard-plaster on my chest and my feet in hot water, and I have just swallowed a dose of ammoniated quinine. I think I am in for influenza. I feel a perfect wreck.—Your dearest Mamma.

P. S.—Dr. Smart has just left; he says if I will go to bed for forty-eight hours, he will try to let me go to Lady Beatrice's big dinner on Saturday. He is such a dear, and has such white teeth and soft hands, he drove all my fears away with such a pooh, pooh! But when he had gone, I heard ThÉrÈse tell the maid that I was threatened with pleuro-pneumonia and had a chill on the liver. So exaggerative these French! I cannot write any more; my hand is trembling so I can hardly hold the pen, and I believe I am roasting with fever. Bring the tea-gown I ordered at Paquin's when you come. I am longing to see you and Valmond. Don't alarm yourself about me; I am really as hard as nails—and influenza is À la mode.