Story of My Life Part 42

"He said he was in the house talking to her maid, having gone in to visit one of her servants, when she came downstairs with the bank-note in her hand, and that he could not say what tempted him, but that he had seized a knife and hidden himself behind a door till she pa.s.sed on her way upstairs again. Then he found his way to her room and concealed himself under her bed. There he had heard her come in and put the child to bed and leave it, and then, amazed at the strangeness of his situation, he turned round. She came back, and he heard the child tell her that there was a man under the bed, and if at that moment she had looked under, he should have sprung out and murdered her. She did not, and afterwards hearing a noise downstairs, he thought it was better to make his escape, which he did by the window, leaving it open behind him."

"_Wallington, Sept. 24._--On the way here I stopped to see Belsay, the finest of the Border fortresses, a grand old gothic tower, standing in a beautiful garden and amongst fine trees.

"Opening from the enclosed courtyard, which now forms a great frescoed hall in the centre of this house of Wallington, are endless suites of huge rooms, only partly carpeted and thinly furnished with ugly last-century furniture, partly covered with faded tapestry. The last of these is 'the ghost-room,' and Wallington is still a haunted house: awful noises are heard all through the night; footsteps rush up and down the untrodden pa.s.sages; wings flap and beat against the windows; bodiless people unpack and put away their things all night long, and invisible beings are felt to breathe over you as you lie in bed. I think my room quite horrid, and it opens into a long suite of desolate rooms by a door which has no fastening, so I have pushed the heavy dressing-table with its weighty mirror, &c., against it to keep out all the nasty things that might try to come in. Old Lady Trevelyan was a very wicked woman and a miser: she lived here for many years, and is believed to wander here still: her son, Sir Walter, has never been known to laugh.

"Sir Walter is a strange-looking being, with long hair and moustache, and an odd careless dress. He also has the reputation of being a miser.[219] He is a great teetotaller, and inveighs everywhere against wine and beer: I trembled as I ran the gauntlet of public opinion yesterday in accepting a gla.s.s of sherry. Lady Trevelyan is a great artist. She is a pleasant, bright little woman, with sparkling black eyes, who paints beautifully, is intimately acquainted with all the princ.i.p.al artists, imports baskets from Madeira and lace from Honiton, and sells them in Northumberland, and always sits upon the rug by preference.

"There is another strange being in the house. It is Mr. Wooster, who came to arrange the collection of sh.e.l.ls four years ago, and has never gone away. He looks like a church-bra.s.s incarnated, and turns up his eyes when he speaks to you, till you see nothing but the whites. He also has a long trailing moustache, and in all things imitates, but caricatures, Sir Walter. What he does here n.o.body seems to know; the Trevelyans say he puts the sh.e.l.ls to rights, but the sh.e.l.ls cannot take four years to dust."

"_Sept. 26._--Such a curious place this is! and such curious people! I get on better with them now, and even Sir Walter is gruffly kind and grumpily amiable. As to information, he is a perfect mine, and he knows every book and ballad that ever was written, every story of local interest that ever was told, and every flower and fossil that ever was found--besides the great-grandfathers and great-grandmothers of everybody dead or alive. His conversation is so curious that I follow him about everywhere, and take notes under his nose, which he does not seem to mind in the least, but only says something more quaint and astonis.h.i.+ng the next minute. Lady Trevelyan is equally unusual. She is abrupt to a degree, and contradicts everything. Her little black eyes twinkle with mirth all day long, though she says she is ill and has 'the most extraordinary _feels_;' she is 'sure no one ever had such extraordinary feels as she has.' She never appears to attend to her house a bit, which is like the great desert with one or two little oases in it, where by good management you may possibly make yourself comfortable. She paints foxgloves in fresco and makes little sketches ? la Ruskin in the tiniest of books--chiefly of pollard willows, which she declares are the most beautiful things in nature. To see pollard willows in perfection she spent six weeks last spring in the flattest parts of Holland, and thought it lovely--'the willows so fine and the boat-life so healthy.' 'Well, you _will_ go to the bad,' she said to me yesterday, because I did not admire a miserable little drawing of Ruskin: my own sketches she thinks quite monstrous.

"We went the day before yesterday to Capheaton, the home of the Swinburnes, a very curious old house, and Sir John Swinburne, a very pleasing young miser, is coming to dinner to-day. Yesterday we went through fog and rain to Camphoe, Kirk Whelpington, and Little Harle, a fine inhabited castle. Sir Walter made me wade through the Wansbeck as we came back!"

"_Sept. 28._--The more one knows Sir Walter and Lady Trevelyan, the more one finds how, through all their peculiarities, they are to be liked and respected. Everything either of them says is worth hearing, and they are so full of information of every kind, that the time here has been all too short for hearing them talk.[220] On Thursday, Miss Ogle, the auth.o.r.ess of that charming novel 'A Lost Love,' came. She has lived here a great deal, and says the Wallington ghost is a lady with her head under her arm, who walks about at night. She has heard all the extraordinary rappings very often, and says they cannot be accounted for in any way, but she has never seen the lady.

"The library here is delightful, full of old topographical books and pamphlets; and sleek Mr. Wooster, with whites of his eyes turned up to the skies, is always at hand to find for you anything you want.

"On Friday Sir Walter took me a long drive through the beautiful forest-land called the Trench, and by Rothley Crags to Netherwitton, where the Raleigh Trevelyans live. Mrs. Raleigh Trevelyan, a stately and beautiful old lady, is the direct descendant of the Witherington who fought upon his stumps. She has pictures of Lord Derwent.w.a.ter and his brother, and one of her ancestors concealed Simon, Lord Lovat, in his house for months: the closet where he was hidden is still to be seen, and very curious.

Then we went to Long Witton, to Mrs. Spencer Trevelyan, a great botanist and eccentric person, who breakfasts at six, dines at twelve, teas at four, and goes to bed at seven o'clock.

"Yesterday Miss Ogle and I went to Harnham, where Mrs. Catherine Babington, a famous Puritan lady who was excommunicated, is buried in the rock; to Shortflat Tower, the old peel castle of the Dents; and to the Poind and his Man, Druidical antiquities, and Shaftoe Crag, a beautiful wild cliff overgrown with heather. The country round this is singularly interesting--the view from the church (Cambo), where we have just been, quite beautiful over the endless waves of distant hill."

[Ill.u.s.tration: WARKWORTH, FROM THE COQUET.]

"_Warkworth, Oct. 2._--My mother will like to think of me with the Clutterbucks in this charming sunny old house, the most perfect contrast to Wellington; but if Sir Walter saw his house papered and furnished like those of other people's, he would certainly pine away from excess of luxury. I have spent two days with the Ogles, whom we have often met abroad, with their dark handsome daughters--dark, people say, because their grandmother was a Spaniard. They are proud of their supposed Spanish blood, and when Isabel Ogle married George Clayton, all her sisters followed in long _black_ lace veils. Near their modern house is the old moated family castle of Ogle."

"_St. Michael's Vicarage, Alnwick, Oct. 4._--I have been kindly received here by the Court Granvilles: he is a fiery, impetuous little man; she (Lady Charlotte) a sister of the Duke of Athole.

The Duke of Northumberland sent for me to his hot room at the castle, where he sits almost immovable, fingers and toes swollen with gout, and talked a great deal about the importance of my work, the difficulty of getting accurate information, &c.; but I do not think he heard a word that I said in reply, for when he has the gout he is almost quite deaf. Then he sent for the d.u.c.h.ess, who good-naturedly knotted her pocket-handkerchief round her throat, and went through all the rooms to show me the pictures. We went again to dinner--only Sir Cresswell Cresswell, the famous judge, there, and Lady Alvanley, sister of the Duke of Cleveland. Sir Cresswell was most amusing in describing how, when a lady was being conveyed in a sedan-chair to a party at Northumberland House, the bottom fell out, and, as she shouted in vain to make her bearers hear, she was obliged to run as fast as she could all the way through the mire inside the sh.e.l.l of the chair."

"_Blenkinsopp Castle, Oct. 11._--This is the castellated house of the Coulsons, in the upper part of South Tyne Valley--very large and comfortable. The owner, Colonel Coulson, is a great invalid, and his daughter-in-law, a daughter of Lord Byron, does the honours. We have made pleasant excursions to Gilsland Spa, and to Llanercost and Naworth, the latter--externally a magnificent feudal castle--the home of Belted Will Howard in mosstrooping times."

"_Bamborough Castle, Oct. 17._--How enchanting it is in this grand old castle looking out on the sea, with all the Farne Islands stretched out as on a map. I think even the Mediterranean is scarcely such a beautiful sea as this, the waves are so enormous and have such gorgeous colouring. I have had delightful walks with the dear old cousin on the sands, and to Spindleston, where the famous dragon lived."

"_Winton Castle, Tranent, Oct. 17, Evening._--As my mother will see, I have come here for holidays, and shall be glad of a day or two in which the mind is not kept in perpetual tension. I heard from Lady Ruthven that I was to meet Lord Belhaven at Prestonpans station, and had no doubt which was he--an old gentleman in a white hat with white hair and hooked nose. We drove here together, and very pleasant it was to exchange the pouring rain without for the large, low, old-fas.h.i.+oned drawing-room, with a splendid ceiling and sculptured chimney, thick Indian carpets, and fine old pictures and china. Soon Lady Ruthven and Lady Belhaven came in, calling out 'welcome' as they entered the room. The other guests are Lady Arthur Lennox and her youngest daughter, who looks, as Lady Ruthven says, 'just like a Watteau;' also Lord Leven, cousin of our hostess, and Miss Fletcher of Saltoun."

[Ill.u.s.tration: WINTON CASTLE.]

"_Winton Castle, Oct. 20._--When I awoke on Sat.u.r.day, I was surprised to see a fine old tower opposite my windows, with high turrets and richly-carved chimneys and windows; but the castle has been miserably added to. Lady Ruthven is most original, with a wonderfully poetical mind, and is very different from her regal-looking sister, Lady Belhaven, who, still very handsome, sweeps about the long rooms, and for whom 'gracious' is the only befitting expression. All the guests are pushed together by Lady Ruthven in a way which makes it impossible that they should not be intimate. For instance, as we went in to breakfast on Sat.u.r.day, she said, 'Now, Mr. Hare, you are to sit next to Lord Leven, for you will not see any more of him; so mind you devote yourselves to one another all breakfast time.'

"On Sat.u.r.day we all went to luncheon at Saltoun, the great place of the neighbourhood, where Mr. Fletcher lives, whose wife, Lady Charlotte, is one of Lady Ruthven's nieces. It is a large, stately, modern castle, containing a fine library and curious MSS. The tables were loaded with 'loot' from the Summer Palace in China.

"Yesterday we all went at twelve o'clock to the Presbyterian church at Pencaitland, one of the oldest in Scotland. The singing was beautiful, and we had an admirable sermon from the minister, Mr.

Rioch, who came in the evening and made a very long 'exposition' to the servants."

"_Oct. 21._--The Mount-Edgec.u.mbes and I went to-day with Lady Ruthven to Gosford--her nephew Lord Wemyss's place, near the sea. I walked for some time in the shrubberies with Lady Mount-Edgec.u.mbe, till we were sent for into the house. There we found old Lady Wemyss with her daughter, Lady Louisa Wells, and her daughter-in-law, Lady Elcho. The last is a celebrated beauty, and has been celebrated also for fulfilling the part of 'Justice' in a famous tableau. In ordinary life she is perfectly statuesque, with a frigid manner. She was very kind, however, and took us over the house, full of works of art, of which we had not time to see a tenth part, but there is a grand Pordenone."

"_North Berwick, Oct. 23._--It has been charming to be here again with dear Mrs. Dalzel.... What a quaint place it is. Formerly every one who lived in North Berwick was a Dalrymple: there were nine families of Dalrymples, and seventeen Miss Dalrymples, old maids: the only street in the town was Quality Street, and all its houses were occupied by Dalrymples. North Berwick supported itself formerly upon its herring-fishery, and it is sadly conducive to strict Sabbatarianism that the herrings have totally disappeared, and the place become poverty-stricken, since an occasion in the spring when the fishers went out on a Sunday."

"_Kings Meadows, Oct. 25._--This comfortable house of kind old Sir Adam Hay is close to Peebles. 'As quiet as Peebles or the grave,'

is a proverb. The Baillie, however, does not think so. He went to Paris, and when he came back, all his neighbours were longing to know his impressions. 'Eh, it's just a grand place, but Peebles for pleasure,' he said. Ultra-Sabbatarianism reigns supreme. An old woman's son whistled on a Sunday. 'Eh, I could just put up wi' a wee swearing, but I canna thole whistling on the Sabbath,' she lamented. Another woman, being invited to have some more at a dinner given to some of the poor, answered, 'No, thank ye, mum, I won't have any more, mum; the sufficiency that I have had is enough for me.'"

"_Wishaw House, Motherwell, Oct. 27._--When I came here, I found Lord and Lady Belhaven alone, but a large party arrived soon afterwards, who have since been admirably shaken together by their hostess. The place is almost in the Black Country, but is charming nevertheless. A rus.h.i.+ng river, the Calder, dashes through the rocky glen below the castle, under a tall ivy-covered bridge, and through woods now perfectly gorgeous with the crimson and golden tints of autumn. Above, on either side, are hanging walks, and in the depth of the glen an old-fas.h.i.+oned garden with a stone fountain, clipped yew-trees, and long straight gra.s.s walks.

"We have been taken to Brainscleugh, a wonderful little place belonging to Lady Ruthven--a sort of Louis XIV. villa, overhanging the river Avon by a series of quaint terraces, with moss-grown staircases and fountains--more like something at Albano than in Scotland. Miss Melita Ponsonby, Sir Charles Cuffe, and I walked on hence to the old Hamilton Chase, full of oaks which have stood there since the Conquest, and part of the forest which once extended across Scotland from one sea to the other. It poured with rain, but we reached the place where the eighty wild milk-white cattle were feeding together. Then we pursued the rest of the party to Hamilton Palace, which is like a monster London house--Belgrave Square covered in and brought into the country. There are endless pictures, amongst them an awful representation of Daniel in an agony of prayer in the lions' den. 'It is no wonder the lions were afraid of him,' the d.u.c.h.ess of Hamilton overheard one of the crowd say as they were being shown round. In the park is a huge domed edifice something like the tomb of Theodoric at Ravenna. It was erected by the last Duke for himself, his son, grandson, and his nine predecessors. 'What a grand sight it will be,' he said, 'when twelve Dukes of Hamilton rise together here at the Resurrection!'

He lies himself just under the dome, upon a pavement of coloured marbles and inside the sarcophagus of an Egyptian queen, with _her_ image painted and sculptured outside. He had this sarcophagus brought from Thebes, and used frequently to lie down in it to see how it fitted. It is made of Egyptian syenite, the hardest of all stones, and could not be altered; but when dying he was so haunted by the idea that his body might be too long to go inside the queen, that his last words were, 'Double me up! double me up!' The last drive he took had been to buy spices for his own embalming. After he was dead, no amount of doubling could get him into the mummy-case, and they had to cut off his feet to do it![221] The mausoleum is a most strange place, and as you enter mysterious voices seem to be whispering and clamouring together in the height of the dome; and when the door bangs, it is as if all the demons in the Inferno were let loose, and the shriekings and screamings around you are perfectly terrific. Beneath lie all the house of Hamilton in their crimson coffins, which you survey by the light of a single tallow candle.

"Yesterday I went to Dalzell, the old fortified house of the Hamiltons, and we have also been taken to the Falls of the Clyde at Stonebyres, which were magnificent, the river tossing wildly through woods which now have all the gorgeous colouring of an Indian autumn."

"_Ford Cottage, Nov. 5._--This is a charming little house, nestling at the foot of the castle-hill, and it has been an amus.e.m.e.nt to Lady Waterford to fit it up temporarily with the most interesting contents of the castle. The walls are hung with beautiful pictures and the rooms furnished with ivory and ebony cabinets, quant.i.ties of old china, tall gla.s.ses piled with ferns and flowers, old-fas.h.i.+oned tables and deep velvet arm-chairs. She will be here for another year probably, and thoroughly enjoys the life, saying that she never knew what it was to have a garden before.

"Dear old Lady Stuart is here in her deep mourning, and Lady Waterford, now her only remaining child, has been more closely united to her mother than ever since Lady Canning's death.[222]

"Lady Waterford is indeed perfectly delightful--br.i.m.m.i.n.g with originality and enthusiasm, and with the power--which so few people have--of putting all her wonderfully poetical thoughts into words, and so letting others have the benefit of them. Sometimes she will sit down to the pianoforte and sing in the most thrilling way--Handel or Beethoven, or old Spanish ballads--without having the music or words before her. At others she will draw, suddenly and at once, the beautiful inspirations which come to her. Last night it was a lovely child crowned and sporting with flowers, and four other sweet little maidens dancing round her with garlands; it was from the childhood of Mary Queen of Scots and her four Maries.

She is never tired of hearing of _people_; she says she sees so few and knows so little of them now--_places_ she does not care to hear about.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE CHEVIOTS, FROM FORD.[223]]

"In the afternoon we went up to the castle, which is entirely changed since I saw it last, having gone back from a gingerbread gothic house to the appearance of an ancient building. The drawing-room is beautiful, with its ceiling and ornaments copied from that at Winton. Lord Durham was drilling his volunteer corps before the castle, and a mock siege was got up, with a storming of the new bridge over the dene. Then we walked to a new lodge which is building. All around are improvements--church restored, schools built, cottages renewed, gardens made, and then the castle."

"_Nov. 5_ (_Evening_).--The hard frost last night preluded a bright beautiful day. Lady Waterford let me have the pony-carriage with two white ponies to go where I liked, and I went to a ruined peel at Howtell Grange, and then through hollows in the Cheviots to Kirk-Newton, where Paulinus baptized his Northumbrian converts.

'Oh! if my Lady were only here, for it is quite lovely!' exclaimed the coachman, as we turned the corner of the mountains. He told me about Lord Waterford's death, how he was riding by his side over the mountain when his horse stumbled. He got up safely, and then somehow overbalanced himself and fell from the saddle upon his head. They could not believe that he was hurt at first, for he lay in his hunting-coat quite unbruised and beautiful; but when they raised him up, his head fell down, for his neck was broken and he was dead. 'Then there was an awful wail,' said the man, 'though we could none of us believe it. Dr. Jephson rode on to break it to my Lady, and he met her driving her two white ponies up to the door, all gay and happy, and told her at first that my Lord had broken his thigh-bone and was very much hurt; but she saw by his face that it was worse than that, and said so, and he could not speak to her.

Then she went away to her own room and locked herself in. When my Lord had been brought home and night came on, she ordered every one away from her, and she looked on his face once more, but what my Lady did that night we none of us knew.'

"She cannot bear a horse now: she has only this little pony-carriage.

"This afternoon I have been with her to her school. She is covering it with large pictures which have the effect of frescoes. All the subjects are Bible stories from the lives of good children. In the first, of Cain and Abel, the devout Abel is earnestly offering his sacrifice of the lamb; while careless Cain, attracted by the flight of some pigeons, looks away and lets his apples fall from the altar. All the children are portraits, and it was interesting to see the originals sitting beneath the frescoes, slates and pencils in hand.

"It seems to me as if Lady Waterford had become strangely spiritualised this year since Lady Canning's death. She is just what she herself describes Miss Boyle to have become, 'A calm seeker after good, in whatever way she may find it.'"

"_Falloden, Nov. 7, 1862._--I have been most kindly received by Sir George and Lady Grey.... He has the reputation of being the most agreeable 'gentleman' in England, and certainly is charming, so cordial and kind and winning in manner.... We have been this evening to Dunstanborough--most lovely, the tall tower in the evening light rising rosy-pink against a blue sea."

"_Roddam, Nov. 13._--I have been with Mrs. Roddam at Eslington, a large grey stone house on a terrace, with a French garden and fine trees. Hedworth Liddell received us, and then his many sisters came trooping in to luncheon from walking and driving. 'We are sure this is our cousin Augustus Hare: we saw you through the window, and were sure it was you, you are so like your sister.' ... They were much amused at my delight over the portraits of our ancestors."