Although we are agreeably enough buried alive at this place,
perhaps you may expect me to give some signs of life. We are, it is said, not
above twenty-three miles from London, but, to all intents and purposes, if you
add one or two hundred more, you will be nearer the fact. My hairdresser makes
a circuit of eight miles every day to smooth my chin, and sometimes we are in
danger of wanting a dinner. It was with your usual kindness that you sent us
the ‘Heart of
Midlothian,’ which we return with our best thanks. All that
concerns the Deans family, David and Jeanie, is the
masterly production of the same genius, and I like the broad and natural humour
of many of the characters. Character-painting is his forte, and he is both pathetic and humorous. With all these
excellences there is too much alloy of modern romance-writing in the fourth
volume, where the incidents are heaped together with little more ability than
in Lane’s circulators. But the
first of
| STOKE-POGES. | 69 |
Mr. Stewart [Mr. Murray’s clerk] has been so attentive as to send me down the Observer, without which I should scarcely know that such a place as the Metropolis existed. We have here most elegant pleasure-grounds, with a good imitation of Lord Grenville’s Dropmore, which is not above two miles and a half from us, and our out-gardens and orchards; but, in consequence of the heavens refusing us a drop of water for three months, our two cows will give us no butter, and our vegetable gardens will not furnish us with a meal. So that the country has its disappointments as well as the town. . . .
P.S.—The most remarkable thing here is Mr. Penn’s house at Stoke. It has an air of magnificence in its architectural appearance, its library, and its ornamental grounds. He has raised a fine monument to the poet Gray, with a very fortunate inscription, for it stands in the midst of the scenery which is identified with his poetry. Gray resided at Stoke, and the churchyard, in the midst of Mr. Penn’s grounds, is the one which inspired the ‘Elegy.’ In the churchyard is the tombstone raised by the poet to his aunt and his mother—and there he lies, the spot unmarked by a stone! The yew-tree and the mouldering heaps, &c., are all before you.
