CHAPTER X.

A.D. 1842. EET. 47.

Return to London-Sees the House of Commons-Yachting trip to Ostend-Bathing adventure-Church at Bruges-Hotel at GhentReflections on modern music-Walk through the town-A lace girlAn old soldier-Artisans at dinner-The Vigilant and her crewVisit from Owen-Ride in the Eastern counties-Ely CathedralSt. Ives-Past and Present.

THE season was not over when Carlyle was again at home after his long absence, but the sad occupations of the spring, and the sad thoughts which they had brought with them, disinclined him for society. The summer opened with heat. He had a room arranged for him at the top of his house at the back, looking over gardens and red roofs and trees, with the river and its barges on his right hand, and the Abbey in the distance. There he sate and smoked, and read books on Cromwell, the sight of Naseby having brought the subject back out of the abysses.' Forster's volumes were not sent back to him. Visitors were not admitted, or were left to be entertained in the drawing-room.

June 17.

I sit here (he wrote to his mother), and think of you many a time and of all imaginable things. I say to myself, "Why should'st thou not be thankful? God is good; all

this life is a heavenly miracle, great, though stern and sad.' Poor Jane and her cousin sit in the low room which extends through the whole breadth of the house, and has windows on both sides. There they sew, read, see company, and keep it out of my way. Poor Jane is still very sad, takes fits of crying, and is perhaps still more sorrowful when she does not cry. I try to get her advised out as much as possible. John Sterling is come to London for these two weeks, home from Italy. He will be a new resource to her; she seems to get no good of anything but the sympathy of her friends.

Of these friends the most actively anxious to be kind were Mr. and Mrs. Charles Buller, with whom Carlyle had been at Kinnaird. Their eldest son, Charles, who had been his pupil, was now in the front rank in the House of Commons. Reginald, the youngest, had a living at Troston, in Suffolk, with a roomy parsonage. His father and mother had arranged to spend July and August there, and they pressed Mrs. Carlyle to go with them for change of scene. Mrs. Carlyle gratefully consented. She liked Mrs. Buller, and the Bullers' ways suited her. It was settled that they were to go first, and she was to follow. Carlyle's own movements were left doubtful. He, after so long an interruption of his work, did not wish to move again immediately; but he was very grateful to Mrs. Buller for her kindness to his wife, and when she asked him in return to go to the House of Commons to hear her son speak, he could not refuse. He had never been there befcre; I believe he never went again; but it was a thing to see once, and though the sight did not inspire him with reverence, he was amused, and wrote an account of it to his mother.

Mrs. Buller made me go the other night to the House of Commons to hear Charles speak on the Scotch Church question. The Scotch Church question was found to be in a wrong condition as to form, and could not come on till the 5th of July. It struck me as the strangest place I had ever sat in, that same house. There was a humming and bustling, so that you could hear nothing for the most part; the members all sitting with their hats on talking to one another, coming and going. You only saw the Speaker, a man in an immense powdered wig, in an old-fashioned elevated chair; and half heard him mumbling Say Aye, Say No. The Ayes have it;' passing Bills which nobody except one or two specially concerned cared a fig about, or was at pains to listen to. When a good speaker rose, or an important man, they grew a little more silent, and you could hear. Peel was there and on his feet. Poor Peel! he is really a clever-looking man-large substantial head, Roman nose, massive cheeks with a wrinkle, half smile, half sorrow on them, considerable trunk and stomach, sufficient stubborn-looking short legs; altogether an honest figure of a man. He had a dark-coloured surtout on, and cotton trousers of blue striped jean. A curious man to behold under the summer twilight.

This single glance into the legislative sanctuary satisfied Carlyle's curiosity. Once, in after years, on some invitation from a northern borough, he did for a few moments contemplate the possibility of himself belonging to it; but it was for a moment only, and then with no more than a purpose of telling Parliament his opinion of its merits. For it was his fixed conviction that in that place lay not the strength of England, but the weakness of England, and that in time it would become a question which of the two would strangle the life out of the other. Of the debating department in the management of the affairs of this country he never spoke without contempt. In

the administration of them there was still vigour inherited through the traditions of a great past, and kept alive in the spirit of the public service. The navy especially continued a reality. Having seen the House of Commons and the Anarchies, he was next to have a sight of a Queen's ship on a small scale, and of naval discipline.

The thing came about in this way. He could not work in the hot weather, and doubtless lamented as loud as usual about it. Stephen Spring Rice, Commissioner of Customs, was going in an Admiralty yacht to Ostend on public business. The days of steam were not yet. The yacht, a cutter of the largest size, was lying in Margate roads. Spring Rice and his younger brother were to join her by a Thames steamer on August 5, and the night before they invited Carlyle to go with them. Had there been time to consider, he would have answered impossible.' But the proposal came suddenly. Mrs. Carlyle, who was herself going to Troston, strongly urged its acceptance. The expedition was not to occupy more than four or five days. Carlyle was always well at sea. In short, he agreed, and the result was summed up in a narrative, written in his very best style, which he termed 'The Shortest Tour on Record.' He was well, he was in good humour; he was flung suddenly among scenes and people entirely new. Of all men whom I have ever known, he had the greatest power of taking in and remembering the minute particulars of what he saw and heard, and of then reproducing them in language. The tour, if one of the shortest, is also therefore one of the most vivid. It opens with an account of the run down the river, the steamer, the

passengers, Herne Bay, Margate, &c. The yacht was waiting at anchor with her long pennon flying. As the steamer stopped the yacht's galley came alongside. The Spring Rices and Carlyle stepped into it and were rowed on board, and he made his first experience of an English cruiser, of a type which is now extinct.

The cutter Vigilant,' which rocked here upon the waters, is a smart little trim ship of some 250 tons, rigged, fitted, kept and navigated in the highest style of English seacraft; made every way for sailing fast, that she may catch smugglers. Outside and inside, in furniture, equipment, action, and look, she seemed a model-clean all as a lady's workbox.

The party dined on board. They were not to sail till the morning tide. The lights of Margate looked inviting in the height of its season, and they went on shore to stroll about and look at the sights. Nor look at them only, for they were tempted into the ball-room, when the Master of Ceremonies came instantly with offers of fair partners. Carlyle looked on grimly; but Stephen Spring Rice whirled away into waltzes, quadrilles, country-dances-not to be moved from the place till the rooms were to be closed. Auld Robin Gray' was sung as a finale by 'a very ill-looking woman.' It was by this time midnight. They went back to the yacht and turned in. The anchor was up shortly after, and before dawn they were far on their way. My sleep,' Carlyle says, 'was a sleep as of hospitals, of men in a state of asphyxia, a confused tumult, a shifting from headache to headache.' After three hours he gave it up and went on deck, when he found the cutter flying through the water. By breakfast they had run down the land

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