Tuesday, March 7, 1837

1837

March

Tuesday 7

7 3/4

2 1/4

No kiss.  She fondled and came to me, but I would not try again last night.

Very fine morning – Fahrenheit 49° in the sun –Breakfast in 3/4 hour.  Ann read French –

Out at 9 3/4 – Mr. Husband here – told him how Nelson’s man had plugged up the Library passage stove with wood – Had Booth – saw the drawing of the west tower window that he got yesterday in the stable – With Ingham and his boy at the new coachhouse court wall –

Then with Robert Mann +3, who began the preparing for meer-tail or meer-end new clow this morning – undoing the insecure job done at 1st under Mr. Husband’s orders –

With Robert till near 12 – Then sauntered round the meer – Met Charles Howarth taking dimensions for the meer-head clow – Mr. Husband had told him to do the grate as he thought would be best, but ordered the clow too not high enough – told Charles Howarth what height to make it –

Came in about 12 1/2 – Wrote the above of today –

Ann wrong again at breakfast because had told Cookson to look after (stir up now and then) my fire in the north parlour.  What a temper Ann has, but I will master it some way or other or give up altogether –

For eighteen months to come, I shall have only about four or five hundred a year to spend, all owing five to keep up Shibden.  Then I shall have about eleven hundred, and afterwards as much more as the colliery will make, independent of the mill –

At 1, sat down to write to Lady Vere Cameron.  Called off to Ingham about the great main drain passing under his walk – then down with Robert Mann to the meer about stubbing, getting up a largeish Elm and bushy hazel intertwined –

Mr. and Mrs. Warburton called; came about 1 50/.. – I came in in about 1/4 hour from that time, and they staid 1/4 hour afterwards – Received them very civilly –

Resumed my letter at 2 1/2 –  had told Robert Mann my plan of strengthening the weak part of the meer-embankment by laying the middle band water drift stuff against it on the brook side –

Till 3 1/2, wrote page 3 and the 2 ends and finished my letter to Lady Vere Cameron, and wrote to Mr. Robert Walker to ask if the Morning Herald of Friday last was punctually sent off from his office – At any rate, to send me a Morning Herald of that day, as I have those bound and should be sorry to have this year incomplete –

Very kind letter to Lady Vere Cameron. 

Still tethered by the leg – cannot get off before May – Not sure of getting off even then  – Still hope to get off some time.  Will till her when as soon as I know myself – She will not run off to the Highlands without telling me that I may know when and direct to her –

‘Surely I shall write more amusingly by and by; and if I do not out-Herod Herod in postage, the rest may take its chance – Nothing shall ever put into my head to believe that you are not interested about me and all my concerns, at least 1/2 as much as I am interested about you and all yours – Half as much !  Some temperaments are more sanguine than others; and 1/2 a degree may be as much, in proportion, in our case, as a whole degree in another? Spite of all the pother I have (and really it is not a little ) my spirit seems as if it still had all its natural elasticity, and my heart as if the chilling influence of time and worldly selfishness had left it still its natural ardour unimpaired –

‘Buona notte!  Buona notte!  I still could fancy those sweet harmonies were sounding in my ears – I often think of your singing, and hope the little Vere will emulate mamma – You used to say, it was useless singing to me, for I never attended ! Where is your voice now?

I shall think of you at Rome, – I shall think of you wherever the vox humana is most powerful to ‘bend the knotted oak’ –

Have made my peace with Lady Harriet – ‘She answered my letter the day after receiving it with so much real, sterling kindness, that her pages 1/2 cured me of ‘La grippe’ which had kept me in bed 2 days’ – Shall write to her soon –

Ask after everybody. 

‘It will be quite charity, my dearest Vere, to write to me during the further term of my probation here – Never mind how much or how little you write – You cannot write one syllable that will not interest me; and if you wrote but one, I shall value it enough to satisfy you –’

Ask if the Stuart Mackenzies are to succeed the Wilmott Hortons at Ceylon – hope Mrs. Stuart Mackenzie would remember me –

Ask if Vere is interested in the question of Steam navigation to India – ‘How would you like a letter dated from the land of Goshen?’ . . . . . . . . .

I shall be off some time, and will tell you when as soon as know myself  –

Keep me in mind, and believe me always very faithfully and very affectionately yours,

A L’ –

Had just written so far, and went out at 4 and out from then to 6 55/.. –

A little while with Ingham at the new coachhouse court – Then with Robert Mann + 3 getting up Elm and holly in the old hedge-row between the upper and lower brook Ing, and getting them planted (left as safe as we had time) at the foot of the low-pool-East-embankment –

Ready in 5 minutes and dinner at 7 –

Sent off my letter to ‘The Lady Vere Cameron, Brafield house, Olney Bucks’ and my letter to ‘Mr. Robert Walker, 2 Jones Street, Berkeley Square, London, postage paid’ –

Coffee.  Read till 11 1/4 – Last Foreign Quarterly on steam navigation to India, tonight’s London paper, and article in the Gentleman’s Magazine (come tonight) on Toddington near Cheltenham Gloucestershire, the fine gothic modern seat of Hanbury Tracey, planned by himself and executed under his own direction – Timber grown on the Estate and some years in seasoning.

Very fine day – Fahrenheit 32° now at 11 40/.. p.m.  

WYAS Finding Numbers SH:7/ML/E/20/0030 and SH:7/ML/E/20/0031