After The Ceremony There Were A Crowd Of Visitors At The Dean's, And
I Met Many Old Acquaintances, And Made Many New Ones, Among Whom
Were Lady Chantrey, A Nice Person.
After the crowd cleared off, we
sat down to a long table at lunch, always an important meal here,
and afterward the Dean took me on his arm and showed me everything
within the Abbey precincts.
He took us first to the Percy Chapel to
see the vault of the Percys. . . . From thence the Dean took us to
the Jerusalem chamber where Henry IV died, then all over the
Westminster school. We first went to the hall where the young men
were eating their dinner. . . . We then went to the school-room,
where every inch of the wall and benches is covered with names, some
of them most illustrious, as Dryden's. There were two bunches of
rods, which the Dean assured me were not mere symbols of power, but
were daily used, as, indeed, the broken twigs scattered upon the
floor plainly showed. Our ferules are thought rather barbarous, but
a gentle touch from a slender twig not at all so. These young men
looked to me as old as our collegians. We then went to their study-
rooms, play-rooms, and sleeping-rooms. The whole forty sleep in one
long and well-ventilated room, the walls of which were also covered
with names. At the foot of each bed was a large chest covered with
leather, as mouldering and time-worn as the Abbey itself. Here are
educated the sons of some of the noblest families, and the
Archbishop of York has had six sons here, and all of them were in
succession the Captain of the school. . . .
On Wednesday evening we went first to our friends, the Bunsens,
where we were invited to meet the Duchess of Sutherland with a few
other persons. Bunsen is very popular here. He is learned and
accomplished, and was so much praised in the Biography of Dr.
Arnold, the late historian of Rome, that he has great reputation in
the world of letters. . . . Although we have great pleasure in the
society of Chevalier and Madam Bunsen, and in those whom we meet at
their house. On this occasion we only stayed half an hour, which I
passed in talking with the Bishop of Norwich and his wife, Mrs.
Stanley, and went to Lady Morgan's without waiting till the Duchess
of Sutherland came. There we found her little rooms full of
agreeable people. . . . The next day, Thursday, there was a grand
opera for the benefit of the Irish, and all the Diplomatic Corps
were obliged to take boxes. Lady Palmerston, who was one of the
three patronesses, secured a very good box for us, directly opposite
the Queen, and only three from the stage.
We took with us Mrs. Milman and W.T. Davis, to whom it gave a grand
opportunity of seeing the Queen and the assembled aristocracy, at
least all who are now in London. "God save the Queen," sung with
the whole audience standing, was a noble sight. The Queen also
stood, and at the end gave three curtsies. On Friday Captain and
Mrs. Wormeley, with Miss Wormeley, dined with us, with Mr. and Mrs.
Carlyle, Miss Murray, the Maid of Honor, Mr. and Mrs. Pell of New
York, with William T. and Mr. Brodhead. William was very glad to
see Carlyle, who showed himself off to perfection, uttering his
paradoxes in broad Scotch.
Last evening we dined at Mr. Thomas Baring's, and a most agreeable
dinner it was. The company consisted of twelve persons, Lord and
Lady Ashburton, etc. I like Lady Ashburton extremely. She is full
of intelligence, reads everything, talks most agreeably, and still
loves America. She is by no means one of those who abjure their
country. I have seen few persons in England whom I should esteem a
more delightful friend or companion than Lady Ashburton, and I do
not know why, but I had received a different impression of her.
Lord Ashburton, by whom I sat at dinner, struck me as still one of
the wisest men I have seen in England. Lady Ashburton, who was
sitting by Mr. Bancroft, leant forward and said to her husband, "WE
can bring bushels of corn this year to England." "Who do you mean
by WE?" said he. "Why, we Americans, to be sure."
Monday Evening
Yesterday we dined at Count St. Aulair's, the French Ambassador, who
is a charming old man of the old French school, at a sort of
amicable dinner given to Lord and Lady Palmerston. Lord John
Russell was of the party, with the Russian Ambassador and lady, Mr.
and Madam Van de Weyer, the Prussian and Turkish Ministers. The
house of the French Embassy is fine, but these formal grand dinners
are not so charming as the small ones. The present state of feeling
between Lord Palmerston and the French Government gave it a kind of
interest, however, and it certainly went off in a much better spirit
than Lady Normanby's famous party, which Guizot would not attend.
It seems very odd to me to be in the midst of these European
affairs, which I have all my life looked upon from so great a
distance.
LETTER: To Mrs. W.W. Story
LONDON, March 23, 1847
My dear Mrs. Story: I should have thanked you by the last steamer
for your note and the charming volume which accompanied it, but my
thoughts and feelings were so much occupied by the sad tidings I
heard from my own family that I wrote to no one out of it. The
poems, which would at all times have given me great pleasure, gave
me still more here than they would if I were with you on the other
side of the Atlantic. I am not cosmopolitan enough to love any
nature so well as our American nature, and in addition to the charm
of its poetry, every piece brought up to me the scenes amidst which
it had been written.
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