The Ladies of Llangollen | Page 9

where we had recently passed so
many happy hours; from those bowers in Llangollen Vale, whence the
purest pleasures have so often flowed to my heart and mind, as from a
full and overflowing fountain."
From Lichfield, Nov. 9, 1802, Miss Seward discourses to Miss
Ponsonby on modern tragedy, and concludes with the following bit of
"blue-stocking gossip:"--
"Though I know her not, I am pleased that Mrs. Spencer has had the
good fortune to interest and delight you; for I am always desirous that
men of genius should not do what they are so prone to do, marry
every-day women.
"Naughty brook, for having behaved outrageously again! That little
stream of the mountain is a true spoiled child, whom we love the better
for its faults, and for all the trouble and alarm they occasion. You see I
presume to involve myself, as if, in some sort, the interesting little
virago belonged to me. Certainly it is my peculiar pet amongst your
scenic children, dear to my taste, as they are beautiful; to my heart as
being yours."
In a letter from Lichfield, June 13, 1805, Miss Seward begins:--
"'With a trembling hand, my beloved Miss Ponsonby, do I take up the
pen to thank you for a thrice kind letter. It had not remained several
weeks unacknowledged, but for this terrible malady of the head, which
has oppressed me with so much severity during the interim. I think it
must soon lay me low. Not at my time of life does the constitution,
pushed from its equipoise by long enduring disease, regain it amid the
struggles.

"Immediately on receiving your last, I sent for Madoc; by far the most
captivating work of its genuinely inspired author."
In the same letter the following passage occurs:--
"Our young friend Cary has published his translation of Dante's Inferno.
It is thought the best which has appeared, and the sale goes on well. He
presents a copy to yourself and Lady Eleanor, and I trust you will
receive it soon."
After some literary disquisitions on the Inferno, the Lay of the Last
Minstrel, and Madoc; and an allusion to King George's visit to
Lichfield, the letter thus concludes:--
"Present me devoutly to your beloved Lady Eleanor. Most interesting is
your description of that visit, mutually paid to that desolate and silent
Dinbren. How worthy of yourselves that hour of consecration, with all
its tributary sighs! Too happy were the days and weeks which I passed
beneath its roof, and in its beautiful and sublime environs, to permit
such revisitation from me.
"It would break my heart amid its present consciousness, spread over
with a dark and impervious pall, which can never be drawn away.
"Dear, and amiable Miss Ponsonby, farewell."
From Lichfield, October 31st, 1805, we have another letter to Miss
Ponsonby, with the following tremendous opening:--
"Nothing, my dear Madam, is so common as hypocrisy and treachery
where property is concerned; but a greater excess of them never poured
their dark currents from the vulgar heart, than in those circumstances
which your last letter narrates.
"Thus ever be extortionate villany baffled--and long unclouded be the
peace which succeeds to that attempted injury. I cannot express how
much I am obliged that you took the kind trouble of retracing the road
of peril, which had so nearly engulfed a scene, whose beauties rise

perpetually in my sleeping and waking dreams."
What ever could have happened at Plas Newydd to excite so grand a
burst of tragic passion: here _is_ matter for curious speculation! Then
Miss Seward runs into a not very wise dissertation on politics; then
reverts to literary subjects, of which Horace Walpole's genius is the
chief topic; bemoans her own dizziness of the head; has another touch
at Mr. Pitt; and finally ejaculates "Adieu, dearest Madam! Your
beloved Lady Eleanor will accept my affectionate devoirs!" Why did
not Miss Seward go to Llangollen, to end her days in peace?
In the lively Memoirs of that celebrated Comedian, the late Mr. Charles
Matthews, we have the following humourous letters, descriptive of the
"Ladies of Llangollen:"--
"Oswestry, Sept. 4th. 1820.
"The dear inseparable inimitables, Lady Butler and Miss Ponsonby,
were in the boxes here on Friday. They came twelve miles from
Llangollen, and returned, as they never sleep from home. Oh, such
curiosities! I was nearly convulsed. I could scarcely get on for the first
ten minutes after my eye caught them. Though I had never seen them, I
instantaneously knew them. As they are seated, there is not one point to
distinguish them from men: the dressing and powdering of the hair;
their well-starched neckcloths; the upper part of their habits, which they
always wear, even at a dinner-party, made precisely like men's coats;
and regular black beaver men's hats. They looked exactly