Page:Maria Edgeworth (Zimmern 1883).djvu/221

Rh There is an evident kindness of heart, and care to avoid everything that could hurt any of our feelings, and at the same time a warmth of affectionate feeling unaffectedly expressed, that we all like it in spite of our dislike to that sort of thing.

Early in 1843, Miss Edgeworth was taken seriously ill with a bilious fever, from the effects of which she recovered but slowly. In late autumn she once more went to London to pass the winter with her sister. It was to be her last visit. She enjoyed it with all the freshness of youth, sight-seeing and visiting without fatigue, even attending an opening of Parliament, which she protested had not tired her more than if she had been eighteen. Her prayer and hope was, as it had been her father's, that her body might not survive her mind, and that she might leave a tender and not unpleasing recollection of herself in the hearts of her friends. Her letters certainly showed no falling-off in power, as is amply proved by one written during this visit to her Boston friends:—

London, 1, North Audley Street,
 * Grosvenor Square, January 1st, 1844.

— I cannot begin this new year better, or more to my own heartfelt satisfaction, than by greeting you with my best wishes for many many happy years to you of your domestic felicity and public estimation — estimation superior to celebrity, jon know, Mr. Ticknor, disdaining notoriety, which all low minds run after and all high minds despise. How I see this every day in this London world, and hear it from all other worlds — loudly from your new world across the great Atlantic, where those who make their boast of independence and equality are struggling and quarreling for petty pre-eminence and " vile trash."

I have been here with my sister, Mrs. Wilson, in a peaceful happy home these six weeks, and the rattle of Grosvenor Square, at the corner of which her house is, never disturbs the quiet of her little library, which is at the back of the house, and looks out upon gardens and trees (such as they are ! )

Among the pleasantest days I have enjoyed in London society, among friends of old standing and acquaintance of distinguished