“——Here I am at Hastings, and here I have been the better part of two days. At twelve at noon, however, on Wednesday I was compelled to doubt whether I should have ever been here at all. In coming down a hill, one mile on this side Sevenoaks, one of the horses nearest the carriage set up a desperate kicking, and broke the splinter bar in two, and we were detained above an hour, while we sent to Sevenoaks for a mechanic to come and repair it as well as he could.
“This loss, however, of an hour, or an hour and a half, decided the before doubtful question that I must take something by way of dinner on the road, if I intended to have any. We stopped for that purpose at Tunbridge Wells, which place I once visited before, in the year 1773, fifty-five years ago.
“I found the little trio of this family looking out
for me, and we speedily sat down to a comfortable dish of tea at No. 6 Meadow
| 300 | WILLIAM GODWIN |
“Mary yesterday received here her first letter from Trelawney, who desires her to come to town immediately; but she has written an answer, telling him he must come here. How the contest will end I know not. . . .
“I see but little comparatively to admire here, though we have the finest weather in the world. The shore is at best but the counterpart of Bognor, which had the advantage with me of coming first, about fifteen years ago, when I visited Mr Hayley and the Isle of Wight, and when I sojourned one night at Bognor, when the harvest moon was at full, and I sat viewing it quivering on the sea at twelve o’clock at night, with all the best company of the place.
“Mary desires me to give her best love to you, and to express her earnest wishes that the travellers may arrive safe.
“How is Anne Burroughes? How is her mistress? Dead, I am afraid, with fatigue and cares. . . . .”
