Juliana Horatia Ewing And Her Books Part 13

[_Fredericton_, 1867?]

... Talking of stories, if I only can get the full facts of his history, I think I shall send A.J.M. a short paper on a Fredericton Dog. Did I ever tell you of him? He has the loveliest face I ever saw, I think, _in any Christian_. He knows us quite well when we go up the High Street where he lives. When he gets two cents (1_d._) given him, he takes it in his mouth to the nearest store and buys himself buscuits. I have seen him do it. If you only give him _one_ cent he is dissatisfied, and tries to get the second. The Bishop told me he used to come to Church with his master at one time; he would come and behave very well--TILL the offertory. Then he rose and _walked after the alms-collectors_, wagging his tail as the money c.h.i.n.ked in, because he wanted his penny for his biscuits!!! He is a large dog--part St. Bernard, and has magnificent eyes. But (my _poor_!) they shaved him this summer like a poodle! There is a bear in the officers' quarters here--he belongs to the regiment. I have patted him, but he catches at one's clothes. To see him _patting_ at my skirts with his paw was delicious--but I don't like his _head_, he looks very sly!

January 2, 1868.

... Indeed it is hard not to be able to see each other at any moment and to be "parted" even for a time. But to us all, who all enjoy everything to be seen and heard, and heard of in new places and among other people; the fact that I have to lead a traveller's life gives us certain great pleasures we could not have had if Rex had been a curate at Worksop (we'll say), and we couldn't even afford a trip to the Continent! Also if I have any gift for writing it really _ought_ to improve under circ.u.mstances so much more favourable than the narrowing influence of a small horizon.... I only wish my gift were a little nearer _real_ genius!! As it is, I do hope to improve gradually; and as I _do_ work slowly and conscientiously, I may honestly look forward with satisfaction to the hope of being able to turn a few honest pennies to help us out: and it _is_ a satisfaction, and a blessing I am thankful for. I only wish I could please myself better! However, small writers are wanted as well as big ones, and there is no reason why donkey-carts shouldn't drive even if there are coaches on the road!...

[_Fredericton_.] February 3, 1868.

I am so infinitely obliged to you for your wisdom _in re_ Reka Dom, and very thankful for the criticisms, to which I shall attend. I mean to compress it very much. I will keep the river part, though that is really the shadow of some of my best writing, I think, in the _Dutch_ tale describing that scene at Topsham. I wrote a good bit last night, and was much wis.h.i.+ng for the returned MS. But the sight of the proof will help me more than anything. I lose all judgment of my own work in MS. I feel as if it must be as laborious to read as it has been to write. Whereas in print it comes freshly on me, and I can criticize it more fairly. It will not be very long when all is done, I think, and I am so anxious to make it good, I hope it will be satisfactory. A little praise really does help one to work, and I don't think makes one a bit less conscientious.

It has been a very jolly mail this time, though the Lexicon has not come. The Bishop's is getting worn with use, for Rex does his daily chapter with unfailing regularity, and is murmuring Hebrew at my elbow at this moment as usual. Mr. James McCombie, the uncle who lives in Aberdeen, the lawyer, has sent me such a pretty book of photographs of Aberdeen! with a kind message about my letter to the poor old Mother, and asking me to write to them. I had asked for a photo of the old Cathedral graveyard where Rex's parents and brother and sister are buried, and there is a lovely one of it, but it is a set of views of Aberdeen, very good photos, and a very pretty book. All Rex's old haunts. Isn't it nice?

[_Sketch of Old Machar Cathedral._]

[_Fredericton._] April 4, 1868.

I hoped to have sent you the whole of Reka Dom this mail. But a most unexpected fall of snow has made the travelling so insecure that it is considered a risk to wait till Monday, and I must send off what I can to-day. It is so nearly done that I am not now afraid to send off the first part (which will be more than you will want for May), and you may rely on the rest by next mail; and the remainder of Mrs. O. as rapidly as possible. It has certainly given me a wonderful amount of bother this time, and I was disappointed in the feeling that Rex did not think it quite up to my other things. But to-day in reading it all, and a lot that he had not seen before, I heard him laughing over it by himself, and he thinks it now one of my best, so I am in great spirits, and mean to finish it with a flourish if possible. I have cut and carved and clipped till I lost all sense of what was fit to remain, and Rex has insisted on a good deal being replaced.

_Fredericton._ April 17, 1868.

The Squaw has been making the blotting-case, and Peter brought it to-day, and I am very much pleased with it and hope M. will like it. I would like to have got an envelope case and a canoe, but they are so difficult to pack, and it would be so aggravating to have them broken, so we got a few flat things. The blotting-case and moccasins, and a cigar-case for F., and a tiny pair of snow-shoes. The blotting-case is a good specimen, as it is made of the lovely birch bark; and they were all got direct from Indians we know. A squaw with a sad face of rather a nigh type called to beg the other day. She could hardly speak English. She said, "Sister, me no ate to-day;" so I gave her some bread-and-b.u.t.ter, which she gave at once to the boy with her, and went away.

We have had some splendid Auroras lately. They are not _rosy_ here, but very beautiful otherwise, and very capricious in shape, long grand tongues of light shooting up into the sky.

We are beginning now to talk of "Mayflower expeditions." I think I shall give one to a few select friends. I had thought of a child's one, but a nice old school-mistress here gives one for children, and I think one raid of the united juvenile population on the poor lovely flowers is enough. The Mayflower is a lovely wax-like ground creeper with an exquisite perfume. It is the first flower, and is to be found before the snow has left the woods....

May 12, 1868.

... I have a wonderful lot of gardening on my shoulders, for we have no _gardener_--only get a soldier to work in the kitchen garden--so I have had to make my plans and arrange my crops for the kitchen garden, as well as look after my own. We have really two _charming_ bits--a little, hot, sunny, good soil, vegetable plot--and quite away from this--by the house, my flower garden. Two round beds and four borders, with a high fence and two little gates, I have nearly got this tidy.

The last occupant had never used it. It is a _great_ enjoyment to me, and does me great good, I think, by keeping me out of doors. Rexie has given me a dear little set of tools--French ones, like children's toys, but quite enough for me. They form the subject of one of the little rhymes that Hector and I make together, and that I croon to the bull-doge to his great satisfaction.

"The little Missus with the little spade Two little beds in the little garden has made.

The Bull-doge watches (for he can't work) How she turns up the earth with her little fork.

Then she takes up the little hoe And into the weeds doth bravely go, At last with the smallest of little rakes Quite smooth and tidy the beds she makes."

Another that was made in bed on the occasion of one of his _raids_ on my invalid breakfast was--

"'Tis the voice of the Bull-doge, I hear him complain, 'You have fed me but lately: I must grub again.'

As a pauper for pudding--so he for his meat-- Gapes his jaws, and there's nothing a Bull-doge can't eat."

We sing these little songs together--and then I let him look in the gla.s.s, when he gowly powls and barks dreadfully at the rival _doge_....

TO H.K.F.G.

May 18, 1868.

... I am awfully busy with my garden, and people are very kind in giving me things. To-morrow we go to the Rowans, and I am to ransack _his_ garden! I do think the exchange of herbaceous perennials is one of the joys of life. You can hardly think how delicious it feels to _garden_ after six months of frost and snow. Imagine my feelings when Mrs. Medley found a bed of seedling bee larkspurs in her garden, and gave me at least two dozen!!! I have got a whole row of them along a border, next to which I _think_ I shall have mignonette and scarlet geraniums alternately. It is rather odd after writing Reka Dom, that I should fall heir to a garden in which almost the only "fixture" is a south border of lilies of the valley!...

TO MISS E. LLOYD.

_Fredericton, N.B._ June 2, 1868.

MY DEAREST ELEANOR--

I can hardly tell you what a pleasure it is to me to have a garden.

The place has never felt so like a home before! I went into my little flower garden (a separate plat from the other--fenced round, and simply composed of two round beds, and four wooden-edged borders and one elm tree) [_sketch_] early this morning, and it seemed so jolly after the long winter. My jonquils are just coming out, and one or two other things. In the elm tree two bright yellow birds were cheeping. I mean to plant scarlet-runners to attract the humming birds. It is something to see fireflies and humming birds in the flesh, one must admit!

I cannot echo your severe remarks on the Queen, though I am _quite_ willing to second your praise of the Prince Consort. Her Most Gracious Majesty is--excuse me--a subject I feel rather strongly about. We are not--as an age--guilty of much weakness in the way of over loyalty to anything or any person, and I cannot help at times thinking that it must be a painful enough reflection to a woman like Queen Victoria, who at any rate is as well read in the history and const.i.tution of England as most of us, to know what harvests of love and loyalty have been reaped by Princes who lived for themselves and not for their people, who were fortunate in the accidents of more power and less conscience, and of living in times when you couldn't get your sovereign's portrait for a penny, or suggest to the loyal and well-behaved Commons that if the King's health was not equal to all that you thought fit, you would rather he abdicated. When one thinks of all that n.o.ble hearts bled and suffered and held their peace for--to prop up the throne of Stuart--of all the vices that have been forgiven, the weaknesses that have been covered, the injustice that has been endured from Kings--when one thinks--if _she_ thinks!--of all that has been suffered from successive mistresses and favourites of royalty a thousand times more easily than she can be forgiven for (grant it!) a weak and selfish grief for a n.o.ble husband--it is enough to make one wonder if nations are not like dogs--better for beating. If the Queen could cut off a few more heads, and subscribed to a few less charities, if she were a little less virtuous, and a little more tyrannical, if she borrowed her subjects'

plate and repudiated her debts, instead of reducing her household expenses, and regulating court mournings by the interests of trade, I am very much afraid we should be a more loyal people! If we had a slender-limbed Stuart who insisted upon travelling with his temporary favourite when the lives and livelihoods of the best blood of Britain were being staked for his throne whilst he amused himself, I suppose we should wear white favours, and believe in the divine right of Kings. It must be impossible for her to forget that the Prince, whom death has proved to be worthy of the praise most people now accord him, was far from popular in his lifetime, and the pet gibe and sport of _Punch_. I suppose when she is dead or abdicated we shall discover that England has had few better sovereigns--and one can only hope that the reflection may not be additionally stimulated by the recurrence of her successor to some of the more popular--if not beneficial--peculiarities of former reigns. It is true that then we might kick royalty overboard altogether, but, judging by the United States, I don't know that we should benefit even on the points where one might most expect to do so. In truth, I believe that the virtue of loyalty is extinct and must be--except under one or two conditions. Either more royal prerogative than we have--or in the subst.i.tution of a loyal affection that shall in each member of the commonwealth cover and be silent over the weak points which the publicity of the present day exposes to vulgar criticism--for the spirit which used to give the blood and possessions which are not exacted of us. This is why the Queen's books do not trouble _my_ feelings about her. She is no great writer certainly, and has perhaps made a mistake in thinking that they would do good. I think they will do good with a certain cla.s.s, perhaps they lower her in the eyes of others. I do think myself that the virtues she (and even her books incidentally) display are so great, and her weaknesses comparatively so small, that one's loyalty must be little indeed if one cannot honour her. "Them's my sentiments." I am ashamed to have bored you with them at such length.

I wonder whether you thought of us yesterday? But I know you did! We had planned a Johnny Gilpin out for the day, but it proved impossible.

So we spent it thus--A.M. Full Cathedral Service with the Holy Communion, which was very nice, though, as it was a Feast Day, the service was later than usual, so it took all our morning. Rex played the organ. We spent most of the afternoon in tuning the organ, and then R. went off to mesmerize a man for neuralgia, and I went up town to try and get something good for dinner!

I am very happy, though at times one _longs_ to see certain faces. But G.o.d is very good, and I have all that I can desire almost.

The Spring flowers are very lovely, some of them. I must go out.

Adieu.

_Best_ love to your Mother and all, to Lucy especially.