第15章

Lady Russell showed us the tranquil green place, and told us its story, and how the old church had once been doomed to destruction when Kingsley came over by chance, and pleaded that it should be spared; and how, when rubbish and outward signs of decay had been cleared away, the restorers were rewarded for their piety, by coming upon noble beams of oak, untouched by time, upon some fine old buried monuments and brasses and inions, among which the people still say their prayers in the shrine where their fathers knelt, and of which the tradition is not yet swept away. The present Lady of the Manor, who loves old traditions, has done her part to preserve the records for her children.

So Miss Mitford walked from Three Mile Cross to Swallowfield to end her days, with these kind friends to cheer and to comfort her. Sir Henry Russell was alive when she first established herself, but he was already suffering from some sudden seizure, which she, with her usual impetuosity, describes in her letters as a chronic state of things. After his death, his widow, the Lady Russell of those days, was her kindest friend and comforter.

The little Swallowfield cottage at the meeting of the three roads, to which Mary Mitford came when she left Three Mile Cross, has thrown out a room or two, as cottages do, but otherwise I think it can be little changed. It was here Miss Mitford was visited by so many interesting people, here she used to sit writing at her big table under the 'tassels of her acacia tree.' When the present Lady of the Manor brought us to the gate, the acacia flowers were over, but a balmy breath of summer was everywhere; a beautiful rose was hanging upon the wall beneath the window (it must have taken many years to grow to such a height), and beyond the palings of the garden spread the fields, ripening in the late July, and turning to gold. The farmer and his son were at work with their scythes; the birds were still flying, the sweet scents were in the air.

From a lady who had known her, 'my own Miss Anne' of the letters, we heard something more that day of the author of 'Our Village'; of her charming intellect, her gift of talk, her impulsiveness, her essential sociability, and rapid grace of mind. She had the faults of her qualities; she jumped too easily to conclusions; she was too much under the influence of those with whom she lived. She was born to be a victim,--even after her old tyrant father's death, she was more or less over-ridden by her servants. Neighbours looked somewhat doubtfully on K. and Ben, but they were good to her, on the whole, and tended her carefully. Miss Russell said that when she and her brother took refuge in the cottage, one morning from a storm, while they dried themselves by the fire, they saw the careful meal carried up to the old lady, the kidneys, the custard, for her dejeuner a la fourchette.

When Miss Mitford died, she left everything she had to her beloved K. and to Ben, except that she said she wished that one book from her well-stocked library should be given to each of her friends.

The old Doctor, with all his faults, had loved books, and bought handsome and valuable first editions of good authors. K. and Ben also seem to have loved books and first editions. To the Russells, who had nursed Miss Mitford, comforted her, by whose gates she dwelt, in whose arms she died, Ben brought, as a token of remembrance, an old shilling volume of one of G. P. R. James's novels, which was all he could bear to part with. A prettier incident was told me by Miss Russell, who once went to visit Miss Mitford's grave. She found a young man standing there whom she did not know. 'Don't you know me?' said he; 'I am Henry, ma'am. I have just come back from Australia.' He was one of the children of the couple who had lived in the cottage, and his first visit on his return from abroad had been to the tomb of his old protectress.

I also heard a friend who knew Miss Mitford in her latest days, describe going to see her within a very few months of her death; she was still bright and responding as ever, though very ill. The young visitor had herself been laid up and absent from the invalid's bedside for some time. They talked over many things,--an authoress among the rest, concerning whose power of writing a book Miss Mitford seems to have been very doubtful. After her visitor was gone, the sick woman wrote one of her delicate pretty little notes and despatched it with its tiny seal (there it is still unbroken, with its M. R. M. just as she stamped it), and this is the little letter:--

Thank you, dearest Miss . . . for once again showing me your fair face by the side of the dear, dear friend [Lady Russell] for whose goodness I have neither thanks nor words. To the end of my life I shall go on sinning and repenting. Heartily sorry have I been ever since you went away to have spoken so unkindly to Mrs . . . .

Heaven forgive me for it, and send her a happier conclusion to her life than the beginning might warrant. If you have an idle lover, my dear, present over to him my sermon, for those were words of worth.

God bless you all! Ever, most faithfully and affectionately yours, M. R. MITFORD.

Sunday Evening.