LXXXVIII.
Mr. Belford, To Robert Lovelace, Esq;
Sunday Evening, Sept. 3.
I wonder not at the impatience your servant tells me you express to hear from me. I was designing to write you a long Letter, and was just returned from Smith's for that purpose; but, since you are so urgent, you must be contented with a short one.
I attended the Lady this morning, just before I set
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out for Edgware. She was so ill over-night, that she was obliged to leave unfinished her Letter to Miss Howe. But early this morning she made an end of it, and had just sealed it up as I came. She was so fatigued with writing, that she told me she would lie down after I was gone, and endeavour to recruit her spirits.
They had sent for Mr. Goddard, when she was so ill last night; and not being able to see him out of her own chamber, he, for the first time, saw her House, as she calls it. He was extremely shocked and concerned at it; and chid Mrs. Smith and Mrs. Lovick for not persuading her to have such an object removed from her bedchamber: And when they excused themselves on the little authority it was reasonable to suppose they must have with a Lady so much their superior, he reflected warmly on those who had more authority, and who left her to proceed with such a shocking and solemn whimsy, as he called it.
It is placed near the window, like a harpsichord, tho' covered over to the ground: And when she is so ill, that she cannot well go to her closet, she writes and reads upon it, as others would upon a desk or table. But (only as she was so ill last night) she chuses not to see any-body in that apartment.
I went to Edgware; and, returning in the evening, attended her again. She had a Letter brought her from Mrs. Norton (a long one, as it seems by its bulk) just before I came. But she had not opened it; and said, That as she was pretty calm and composed, she was afraid to look into the contents, lest she should be ruffled; expecting, now, to hear of nothing that could do her good or give her pleasure from that good woman's dear hard-hearted neighbours, as she called her own relations.
Seeing her so weak and ill, I withdrew; nor did she desire me to tarry, as sometimes she does, when I make a motion to depart.
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I had some hints, as I went away, from Mrs. Smith, that she had appropriated that evening to some offices, that were to save trouble, as she called it, after her departure; and had been giving orders to her Nurse, and to Mrs. Lovick, and Mrs. Smith, about what she would have done when she was gone; and I believe they were of a very delicate and affecting nature; but Mrs. Smith descended not to particulars.
The Doctor had been with her, as well as Mr. Goddard; and they both joined with great earnestness to persuade her to have her House removed out of her sight: But she assured them, that it gave her pleasure and spirits; and, being a necessary preparation, she wondered they should be surprised at it, when she had not any of her family about her, or any old acquaintance, on whose care and exactness in these punctilio's, as she called them, she could rely.
The Doctor told Mrs. Smith, That he believed she would hold out long enough for any of her friends to have notice of her state, and to see her, and hardly longer; and since he could not find, that she had any certainty of seeing her Cousin Morden (which made it plain that her relations continued inflexible) he would go home, and write a Letter to her Father, take it as she would.
She had spent great part of the day in intense devotions; and to-morrow morning she is to have with her the same clergyman who has often attended her; from whose hands she will again receive the Sacrament.
Thou seest, Lovelace, that all is preparing, that all will be ready; and I am to attend her to-morrow afternoon, to take some instructions from her in relation to my part in the office to be performed for her. And thus, omitting the particulars of a fine conversation between her and Mrs. Lovick, which the latter acquainted me with, as well as another between her
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and the Doctor and Apothecary, which I had a design this evening to give you, they being of a very affecting nature, I have yielded to your impatience.
I shall dispatch Harry to-morrow morning early with her Letter to Miss Howe: An offer she took very kindly; as she is extremely solicitous to lessen that young Lady's apprehensions for her on not hearing from her by Saturday's post: And yet, if she write truth, as no doubt but she will, how can her apprehensions be lessened?