Part 18 (2/2)
_10th April._
Brantwood looked so very nice this morning decorated by the coming into leaf of the larches. I wish you could have seen them in the distance as I did: the early suns.h.i.+ne had glanced upon them lighting up one side, and leaving the other in softest shade, and the tender green contrasted with the deep browns and grays stood out in a wonderful way, and the trees looked like spirits of the wood, which you might think would melt away like the White Lady of Avenel.
Dear sweet April still looks coldly upon us--the month you love so dearly. Little white lambs are in the fields now, and so much that is sweet is coming; but there is a shadow over this house _now_; and also, my dear kind friend is far away. The horse-chestnuts have thrown away the winter coverings of their buds, and given them to that dear economical mother earth, who makes such good use of everything, and works up old materials again in a wonderful way, and is delightfully unlike most economists,--the very soul of generous liberality. Now some of your own words, so powerful as they are,--you are speaking of the Alp and of the ”Great Builder”--of your own transientness, as of the gra.s.s upon its sides; and in this very sadness, a sense of strange companions.h.i.+p with past generations, in seeing what they saw. They have ceased to look upon it, you will soon cease to look also; and the granite wall will be for others, etc., etc.
My dear friend, was there ever any one so pathetic as you? And you have the power of bringing things before one, both to the eye and to the mind: you do indeed paint with your pen. Now I have a photograph of you--not a very satisfactory one, but still I am glad to have it, rather than none. It was done at Newcastle-on-Tyne. Were you in search of something of Bewick's?
I have just given the squirrel his little _loaf_; (so you see I am a lady,)[48] he has bounded away with it, full of joy and gladness. I wish that this were my case and _yours_, for whatever we may wish for, that we have not. We have a variety and abundance of loaves. I have asked Dr. J. Brown whether he would like photographs of your house and the picturesque breakwater. I do so wish that you and he and I did not suffer so much, but _could_ be at least moderately happy. I am sure you would be glad if you knew even in this time of sorrow, when all seems stale, flat, unprofitable, the pleasure and interest I have had in reading your Vol. 3 [”Modern Painters”]. I study your character in your writings, and I find so much to elevate, to love, to admire--a sort of education for my poor old self--and oh! such beauty of thought and word.
Even yet my birds want so much bread; I do believe the worms are sealed up in the dry earth, and they have many little mouths to fill just now--and there is one old blackbird whose devotion to his wife and children is lovely. I should like him never to die, he is _one_ of my heroes. And now a dog which calls upon me sometimes at the window, and I point kitchenwards and the creature knows what I mean, and goes and gets a good meal. So if I can only make a dog happy (as you do, only you take yours to live with you, and I cannot do that) it is a pleasant thing. I do so like to make things happier, and I should like to put bunches of hay in the fields for the poor horses, for there is very scant supply of gra.s.s, and too many for the supply.
[Footnote 48: See ”Fors Clavigera”, Letter XLV., and ”Sesame and Lilies.”]
_1st May._
I cannot longer refrain from writing to you, my dear kind friend, so often are you in my thoughts. Dearest Joanie has told you, I doubt not, and I know how sorry you are, and how truly you are feeling for your poor Susie. So _knowing that_ I will say no more about my sorrow.
There is no need for words. I am wis.h.i.+ng, oh, so much, to know how you are: quite safe and well, I hope, and able to have much real enjoyment in the many beautiful things by which you are surrounded. May you lay up a great stock of good health and receive much good in many ways, and then return to those who so much miss you, and by whom you are so greatly beloved.
Coniston would go into your heart if you could see it now--so very lovely, the oak trees so early, nearly in leaf already. Your beloved blue hyacinths will soon be out, and the cuckoo has come, but it is long since Susie has been out. She only stands at an open window, but she must try next week to go into the garden; and she is finding a real pleasure in making extracts from your writings, _for you_, often wondering ”will he let that remain?” and hoping that he will.
Do you ever send home orders about your Brantwood? I have been wis.h.i.+ng so much that your gardener might be told to mix quant.i.ties of old mortar and soil together, and to fill many crevices in your new walls with it; then the breezes will bring fern seeds and plant them, or rather sow them in such fas.h.i.+on as no human being can do. When time and the showers brought by the west wind have mellowed it a little, the tiny beginnings of mosses will be there. The sooner this can be done the better. Do not think Susie presumptuous.
We have hot sun and a _very_ cool air, which I do not at all like.
I hope your visit to Palermo and your lady have been all that you could wish. Please _do_ write to me; it would do me so much good and so greatly refresh me.
This poor little letter is scarcely worth sending, only it says that I am your loving Susie.
_14th May._
MY DEAREST FRIEND,--Your letter yesterday did me so much good, and though I answered it at once, yet here I am again. A kind woman from the other side has sent me the loveliest group of drooping and very tender ferns, soft as of some velvet belonging to the fairies, and of the most exquisite green, and primroses, and a slender stalked white flower, and so arranged, that they continually remind me of that enchanting group of yours in Vol. 3, which you said I might cut out.
What would you have thought of me if I had? Oh, that you would and could sketch this group--or even that your eye could rest upon it! Now you will laugh if I ask you whether harpies[49] ever increase in number? or whether they are only the ”old original.” They quite torment me when I open the window, and blow chaff at me. I suppose at this moment, dearest Joanie is steaming away to Liverpool; one always wants to know now whether people accomplish a journey safely. When the blackbirds come for soaked bread, they generally eat a nice little lot themselves, before carrying any away from the window for their little ones; but Bobbie, ”our little English Robin,” has just been twice, took none for himself, but carries beak-load after beak-load for his speckled infants. How curious the universal love of bread is; so many things like and eat it--even flies and snails!
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