“My dear Miss
Edgeworth,—I found your most kind note on my arrival here
last night, in attendance with my son on the remains of our lost friend, who had to me been through life a
brother, and to whom I had always looked with confidence for care of my
children in case of my own death. His poor widow came to my house on reaching London, and she accompanied
me in the steamer to Edinburgh, where I left her with her mother. She exerts
great control over very acute feelings. No woman ever worshipped a husband more
than she, and his late letters all overflowed with tender gratefulness for her
unwearied attention to him in his illness. It was only his very last letter to
me, written the day before he sailed from Madras, that expressed serious
apprehensions, and I learn that he continued under such feelings during the
voyage, though he mentioned them only to some brother officers, not to
Jane, and exerted himself so far as to dine till the
last fortnight at table, and occasionally go on deck. I have not yet the
post-mortem examination, but am assured in general by the ship doctor, that the
right lung was
| 296 | LIFE OF J. G. LOCKHART. |
“I shall have a good deal of business, and may be detained here for some little time, but my boy will rejoin his corps at Canterbury this week. Charlotte is still my Charlotte. She is with some kind relations in Surrey till I reclaim my housekeeper and constant companion and comfort.
“I find Sir Walter had named me his executor, but have not seen as yet the entail of his lands which his will mentions. I suppose my boy will hereafter add Scott to his name, but I greatly doubt whether he will gain anything in a worldly sense from his dear uncle’s death, at least during Lady Scott’s lifetime. I will, however, tell you how matters clear up by-and-by in that respect.
“You, my dear friend, can imagine with what a heart I
have re-entered this house, which I had not seen since the morning after your
old friend’s funeral in September 1832. Everything in perfect
order—every chair and table where it was then left, and I alone to walk a
ghost in a sepulchre amidst
| ABBOTSFORD DEBTS | 297 |
