Tuesday 22nd July 1834

Up at 6 – dearest repacked things, put on clean linens – breakfasted & off about 11 –  at Geneva 20 to 4 – got money & letters at Bank – letters at Post Office from Mrs. Lister, Mrs. Lawton & my sister – dined at 6 – then wrote to my sister & part of a letter to Mrs. Lister – told my sister to direct to Paris “pour le retour” & advised her to get blue spectacles – bed at 12 –

Courtesy of West Yorkshire Archive Service, Calderdale WYC:1525/7/1/5/1/18

[up at] 8 40/..

[to bed at] 3 40/..

she came for an hour and half to me this morning quietly talking – Fine morning Fahrenheit 70 1/2° at 8 3/4 a.m. breakfast at 11 1/2 – had been repacking – Off from Bonneville at 12 20/.. – fine valley as far as Bonneville – from there the mountains wear out into rounded, beautiful, green, wooded hills and extensive valley – very good road – stop 3 or 4 minutes at 1 43/.. to water the horses – at 2 50/.. stopt at Amenas /Annemasse/ to shew passport the Douaniers very civil – would not take money – explained the trick the postillion Chaumantois from Geneva had played me in demanding money for them on the 3rd instant and they were vexed and promised to do what they could with him – thunder and forked lightning and rain in passing thro’ the nice little town of …. at 3 20/.. –At 3 50/.. stopt at Hentsch’s bank – sent up to them and they brought me down the money for two £25 circulars – alighted at the hotel des Bergues at 4 – full – only a double bedded room a 2nde and a little apartment au 3me – took the latter (salon and 1 double-bedded room) at 16/. a day – the 2 servants above at 2/. a day for both – siding – Adney and I out at 5 to 6 – at Baute’s – bought brooch for Mariana or Mrs. Sutherland? dinner at 6 20/.. to 8 1/2 – got at the bank letter from my aunt dated 27 June 3 pages and ends – she has a better day and a worse – Mr. Sunderland very attentive – on the whole good account – she writes on the 27th to Adney and on the 28th page 3 and ends and 2 lines under the seal to me ‘I may now [say] I am quite well, except this never-ceasing pain’ – all going on well – my father well and has ordered a little carriage to go about in – very sorry for Mariana – got at the Post[e] restante letter from my aunt Shibden dated 9th instant 3 pages and ends all to me – my father ‘tolerable, but very feeble, he does not appear to gain strength at all – he walks out a little every day, generally to the top of the bank, and in the course of the day 2 or 3 times a little in the garden – as to myself sometimes I have a very poorly day, and then better – Mr. Sunderland is very attentive, and upon the whole, I think I am much the same as when you went’ – very anxious about me – begs me not to hasten our return on her account – hopes there will be no occasion for me to be at home before the end of August as Marian will not got to Market Weighton until she can leave my father with more satisfaction – she had a letter that day (9th instant) from Mariana to make inquiries after me – said it was 5 weeks since she heard from me – had been very ill – did not know of my being abroad – my aunt begs me to write to Mariana immediately –

‘William Milne died rather suddenly during his mother’s absence in London’ – has received parcel for me Bibliotheca Hiber[n]iana – George Robinson had been at Shibden and paid £50 promising the rest the following week – Mr. Parker will deliver the notice to quit himself – has sent the one to John Pearson – the Staups purchase papers will not be ready before the end of August – Trades unions over – ministers very cautious and likely to keep in some time longer – all going well at home – Mr. Freeman wishes to see me on my return – Thomas Greenwood knows of a gentleman who wishes to ‘purchase Northgate house and a little of the land’ – Letter at the Poste Restante 1 1/2 page from Lady Gordon dated Saltzburgh 10 July – Henry Devereux (her nephew) ‘seems rather epris with you’ (I must have met him at Miss Berry’s) writes her that I am gone touring to Geneva for a month – she fancies this means Chamouni ‘perhaps Mont Blanc etc. etc.’ – wants me to join her at Munich where she will remain 7 or 8 weeks – country beautiful – walks long and fine views –they have seen the Hallein salt mines – will be in England in October – fidgetty to be very long and far from her mother – ‘What a sensation Charlotte Stuart seems to have produced in the world!’ – to write to Lady Gordon Poste restante à Munich – they go to the Cerf d’or – I ought to go to Munich if only to see the Egina marbles – Letter (at Hentsch’s bank) from Mariana Leamington 3 pages and ends dated ‘Leamington June’ – ‘For the 1st time in my life, my dearest Fred, 3 weeks have passed without my hearing from you; and for the 1st time in my life you are in England and Mary knows not where to find you; what can all this mean.’….. 3 weeks the day she wrote since she got my letter saying I was going for a few days to London – asks if I got her letter directed to Dover Street (yes! but she did not get mine sent to Warrens) – her journey to London put off from illness – the gaieties of the Oxford business more than she could well bear – very reluctant to give up London ‘as there were many inducements to prosecute my 1st intention; I might have seen you’ etc. etc. Mrs. Milne and Hamlyn there – Mr. Crewe and his boys spending their week in England in Hill Street etc. etc. … ‘I have been diligently trying to get well, and in due time hope to succeed, my complaint seems to be a low fever, which has pretty fast melted away all my fat; I am little more than skin and bone, and can neither coax appetite, nor rest, I have lived for the last fortnight on port wine and jellies, and have a bed to myself – …. on Monday I began with the shower bath, and hope in a few weeks to be allowed to ride, I cant walk much my chief exercise therefore is in a pony carriage’ – their going to Harrogate given up – they go to Worthing in August – ‘your happiness and comfort is very dear to me, and I am not the last of your friends to rejoice that you are satisfied of having secured both – may it be so! but for all our sakes perhaps it is best that at present I should tell you this on paper. An unsophisticated mind I think is more likely to secure your permanent happiness, than any such worldly one as that which falls to the lot of those who of late years have been your associates – one may live in the world, and have no traf[f]ic in hearts, but the quiet country fireside would be cruelly insipid had it none of this ingredient to flavour it, and God forbid that in yours it should be wanting – you have lived long enough on hope, dearest, now the desire has come I trust it brings with it all you have so often longed for – your friend will always be a source of interest to me, and I will never rob her of her due; But you can tell me about her, and I will believe all you say which at least will be much for her advantage, because I am by no means sure that I could be an impartial judge’ – Mrs. Milne tells her as they have not seen me in town, Mrs Norcliffe cannot believe I have been there – Adney found letter (good – all well and right) from her sister at the poste restante office – she wrote to her sister while I wrote 2 1/2 pages very small and close to my aunt and Adney wrote the rest of page 3 and the ends to my aunt while I wrote 3 pages to Mariana and we both sat up writing till 2 tonight – answered the business part of my aunt’s letter – glad George Robinsons prospects better – said he had a lease of the mill – sure Mr. Parker would do all right – begged him not to forget the Hipperholme fields in the notice – should not trouble myself about Northgate – not inclined to sell the house with a little of the land – glad of the so fair account of herself and hoped my father would be better – mentioned our tour of Mont Blanc and Adney and I being well – left her to tell the little particulars – said the weather had changed and driven us here from Chamouni – depended upon the weather whether we should go for a few days more to the mountains or not – will add a line or 2 tomorrow – wrote very kindly to Mariana – said we had been mutually disappointed – I had expected hearing from her in Paris – sorry she had not got my long letter left for her at Warrens – should have written from Paris but had not time – impossible to write from the mountains – assured her my thoughts could not play truant long – grieved at the bad account of herself – should be ill at ease until I heard she was better – beg her to write to Rue St. Victor no. 27 and to let me find a letter in Dover Street – very fine day Fahrenheit 70° at 2 tonight –

Courtesy of West Yorkshire Archive Service, Calderdale SH:7/ML/E/17/0061 & SH:7/ML/E/17/0062