Part 3 (2/2)
Otherwise my Aunt Lucy was also already a frequent trial to my child-life, as she was jealous for her little Marcus (born in 1836) of any attention shown to me or any kindness I received. I felt in those early days, and on looking back from middle life I know that I felt justly, that my mother would often pretend to care for me less than she did, and punish me far more frequently for very slight offences, in order not to offend Aunt Lucy, and this caused me many bitter moments, and outbursts of pa.s.sionate weeping, little understood at the time. In very early childhood, however, one pleasurable idea was connected with my Aunt Lucy. In her letters she would desire that ”Baby” might be allowed to gather three flowers in the garden, any three he liked: the extreme felicity of which permission that Baby recollects still--and the anxious questionings with himself as to which the flowers should be.
_From_ MY MOTHER'S JOURNAL.
”_Lime, July 24, 1837._--Augustus continually asks 'Why,' 'What is the reason.' If it be in reference to something he has been told to do, I never at the _time_ give him any other reason than simply that it is my will that he should do it. If it refers to something unconnected with practical obedience, it is right to satisfy his desire of knowledge as far as he can understand. Implicit faith and consequent obedience is the first duty to instil, and it behoves a parent to take care that a child may find full satisfaction for its instinctive moral sense of justice, in the consistency of conduct observed towards him; in the sure performance of every promise; in the firm but mild adherence to every command.
”He asks, 'Is G.o.d blue?'--having heard that He lived above the sky.”
”_Stoke Rectory, Jan. 1, 1838._--On Christmas Day Augustus went to church for the first time with me. He was perfectly good and kept a chrysanthemum in his hand the whole time, keeping his eyes fixed on it when sitting down. Afterwards he said, 'Grandpapa looked just like Uncle Jule: he had his s.h.i.+rt (surplice) on.'
”He has got on wonderfully in reading since I began to teach him words instead of syllables, and also learns German very quickly.
”Having been much indulged by Mrs. Feilden (Mrs. Leycester's sister), he has become lately what Mary (Lea) calls rather 'independent.' He is, however, easily knocked out of this self-importance by a little forbearance on my part not to indulge or amuse him, or allow him to have anything till he asks rightly.... There is a strong spirit of expecting to know the reason of a thing before he will obey or believe. This I am anxious to guard against, and often am reminded in dealing with him how a.n.a.logous it is to G.o.d's dealing with us--'What thou knowest not now, thou shalt know hereafter.' Now he is to walk by faith, not by sight, not by _reason_.”
”_Lime, May 14, 1838._--Yesterday being Good Friday, I read to Augustus all he could understand about the Crucifixion. He was a little naughty, and I told him of it afterwards. 'But I was good all yesterday, won't that goodness do?' His delight over the flowers is as excessive as ever, but it is very necessary to guard against greediness in this.”
”_August 10._--Being told that he was never alone, G.o.d and Jesus Christ saw him, he said, 'G.o.d sees me, but Jesus Christ does not.'--'But they are both one.'--'Then how did John the Baptist pour water on His head, and how could He be crucified?' How difficult to a child's simple faith is the union of the two natures![16]
”Two days ago at prayers he asked what I read to the servants, and being told the meaning of the Lord's Prayer, he said, 'I know what ”Amen” means. It means, ”It is done.”'
”_June 11._--Having knocked off a flower on a plant in the nursery, Lea asked how he could have done such a thing--'What tempted you to do such a thing?' He whispered--'I suppose it was Satan.'
”Yesterday he told us his dream, that a beast had come out of a wood and eat him and Lea up; and Susan came to look for them and could not find them; then Mama prayed to G.o.d to open the beast's mouth, and He opened it, and they both came out safe.
”One night, after being over-tired and excited by the Sterlings, he went to bed very naughty and screamed himself asleep. Next morning he woke crying, and being asked why he did so, sobbed out, 'Lea put me in bed and I could not finish last night: so I was obliged to finish this morning.'
”Going up to London he saw the Thames. 'It can't be a river, it must be a pond, it is so large.' He called the sun in the midst of the London fog 'a swimming sun:' asked if the soldiers in the Park were 'looking out for the enemy.' 'Does G.o.d look through the keyhole?'
”Two days ago, having been told to ask G.o.d to take away the naughtiness out of him, he said, ”May I ask Jesus Christ to take away the naughtiness out of Satan? then (colouring he said it, and whispering) perhaps He will take him out of h.e.l.l.'
”On my birthday he told Lea at night, 'They all drank her health but Uncle Jule, and he loved her so much he could not say it.'”
I was now four years old, and I have a vivid recollection of all that happened from this time--often a clearer remembrance than of things which occurred last year. From this time I never had any playthings, they were all banished to the loft, and, as I had no companions, I never recollect a game of any kind or ever having played at anything. There was a little boy of my own age called Philip Hunnisett, son of a respectable poor woman who lived close to our gate, and whom my mother often visited. I remember always longing to play with him, and once trying to do so in a hayfield, to Lea's supreme indignation, and my being punished for it, and never trying again. My mother now took me with her every day when she went to visit the cottages, in which she was ever a welcome guest, for it was not the lady, it was the woman who was dear to their inmates, and, when listening to their interminable histories and complaints, no one entered more into George Herbert's feeling that ”it is some relief to a poor body to be heard with patience.” Forty years afterwards a poor woman in Hurstmonceaux was recalling to me the sweetness of my mother's sympathy, and told the whole story when she said, ”Yes, many other people have tried to be kind to us; but then, you know, Mrs. Hare _loved_ us.” Truly it was as if--
”Christ had took in this piece of ground, And made a garden there for those Who want herbs for their wound.”[17]
Whilst my mother was in the cottages, I remained outside and played with the flowers in the ditches. There were three places whither I was always most anxious that she should go--to Mrs. Siggery, the potter's widow, where I had the delight of seeing all the different kinds of pots, and the wet clay of which they were made: to ”old Dame Cornford of the river,” by which name a tiny stream called ”the Five Bells” was dignified: and to a poor woman at ”Foul Mile,” where there was a ruined arch (the top of a drain, I believe!) which I thought most romantic. We had scarcely any visitors (”callers”), for there were scarcely any neighbours, but our old family home of Hurstmonceaux Place was let to Mr. Wagner (brother of the well-known ”Vicar of Brighton”), and his wife was always very kind to me, and gave me two little china mice, to which I was quite devoted. His daughters, Annie and Emily, were very clever, and played beautifully on the pianoforte and harp. The eldest son, George, whose Memoirs have since been written, was a pale ascetic youth, with the character of a medi?val saint, who used to have long religious conversations with my mother, and--being very really in earnest--was much and justly beloved by her. He was afterwards a most devoted clergyman, being one of those who really have a ”vocation,” and probably accomplished more practical good in his brief life than any other five hundred parish priests taken at random. Of him truly Chaucer might have said--
”This n.o.ble sample to his sheep he gave, That first he wrought, and afterwards he taught.”
From the earliest age I heartily detested Hurstmonceaux Rectory, because it took me away from Lime, to which I was devoted, and brought me into the presence of Uncle Julius, who frightened me out of my wits; but to all rational and unprejudiced people the Rectory was at this time a very delightful place. It is situated on a hill in a lonely situation two miles from the church and castle, and more than a mile from any of the five villages which were then included in the parish of Hurstmonceaux; but it was surrounded by large gardens with fine trees, had a wide distant view over levels and sea, and was in all respects externally more like the house of a squire than a clergyman. Inside it was lined with books from top to bottom: not only the living rooms, but the pa.s.sages and every available s.p.a.ce in the bedrooms were walled with bookcases from floor to ceiling, containing more than 14,000 works.
Most of these were German, but there were many very beautiful books upon art in all languages, and many which, even as a child, I thought it very delightful to look at. The only s.p.a.ces not filled by books were occupied by the beautiful pictures which my uncle had collected in Italy, including a most exquisite Perugino, and fine works of Giorgione, Luini, Giovanni da Udine, &c. I was especially attached to a large and glorious picture by Paris Bordone of the Madonna and Child throned in a sort of court of saints. I think my first intense love of colour came from the study of that picture, which is now in the Museum at Cambridge; but my uncle and mother did not care for this, preferring severer art. Uncle Julius used to say that he constantly entertained in his drawing-room seven Virgins, almost all of them more than three hundred years old. All the pictures were to me as intimate friends, and I studied every detail of their backgrounds, even of the dresses of the figures they portrayed: they were also my constant comforters in the many miserable hours I even then spent at the Rectory, where I was always utterly ignored, whilst taken away from all my home employments and interests.
Most unpleasant figures who held a prominent place in these childish years were my step-grandmother, Mrs. Hare Naylor, and her daughter Georgiana. Mrs. H. Naylor had been beautiful in her youth, and still, with snowwhite hair, was an extremely pretty _pet.i.te_ old lady. She was suspicious, exacting, and jealous to a degree. If she once took an impression of any one, it was impossible to eradicate, however utterly false it might be. She was very deaf, and only heard through a long trumpet. She would make the most frightful tirades against people, especially my mother and other members of the family, bring the most unpleasant accusations against them, and the instant they attempted to defend themselves, she took down her trumpet. Thus she retired into a social fortress, and heard no opinion but her own. I never recollect her taking the wisest turn--that of making the best of us all. I have been told that her daughter Georgiana was once a very pretty lively girl. I only remember her a sickly discontented petulant woman. When she was young, she was very fond of dancing, and once, at Bonn, she undertook to dance the clock round. She performed her feat, but it ruined her health, and she had to lie on her back for a year. From this time she defied the Italian proverb, ”Let well alone,” and dosed herself incessantly.
She had acquired ”l'habitude d'?tre malade;” she liked the sympathy she excited, and henceforth _preferred_ being ill. Once or twice every year she was dying, the family were summoned, every one was in tears, they knelt around her bed; it was the most delicious excitement.
Mrs. Hare Naylor had a house at St. Leonards, on Maize Hill, where there were only three houses then. We went annually to visit her for a day, and she and ”Aunt Georgiana” generally spent several months every year at Hurstmonceaux Rectory--employing themselves in general abuse of all the family. I offended Aunt Georgiana (who wore her hair down her back in two long plaits) mortally, at a very early age, by saying ”Chelu (the Rectory dog) has only one tail, but Aunt Georgie has two.”[18]
On the 28th of June 1838, the Coronation of Queen Victoria took place, when a great f?te was given in the ruins of Hurstmonceaux Castle, at which every person in the parish was provided with a dinner. It was in this summer that my father brought his family to England to visit Sir John Paul, who had then married his second wife, Mrs. Napier, and was living with her at her own place, Pennard House, in Somersets.h.i.+re. In the autumn my father came alone to Hurstmonceaux Rectory. I remember him then--tall and thin, and lying upon a sofa. Illness had made him very restless, and he would wander perpetually about the rooms, opening and shutting windows, and taking down one volume after another from the bookcase, but never reading anything consecutively. It was long debated whether his winter should be pa.s.sed at Hastings or Torquay, but it was eventually decided to spend it economically at West Woodhay House, near Newbury, which Mr. John Sloper (nephew of our great-uncle--the husband of Emilia s.h.i.+pley) offered to lend for the purpose. At this time my father's health was already exciting serious apprehensions. Mrs. Louisa s.h.i.+pley was especially alarmed about him, and wrote:--
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