Came into dinner a little before 7. Had ordered George to have the gig ready a little before 9 in the morning to go to Huddersfield to speak to Ponty about coming over to plan our new road to the house, but finding my uncle against it, contrary to my expectations (I had always thought all he said against it in joke), immediately countermanded the order, quietly determining never to mention the thing again, nor to mention planting, or otherwise improving the place. I told my uncle very quietly I certainly would not tease him any more on the subject, & I shall indeed change my mind if I do. The thing absolutely did not annoy me at all. I immediately thought to myself, perhaps it is best as it is. I incur no responsibility. Perhaps I may save my money in future instead of laying it out on the place, & leave things as they are.
Saturday 9 August [Halifax]
At 4.50, off down the old bank to the library. Found Miss Pickford there, in spite of finding a note from her on my return home this morning to say she could not go there on account of walking with the children to Horley Green wood to botanize. Walked with them ½ way up the new bank… Told her how untidy the children were. She is sadly plagued with them & they are a disagreeable, vulgar set. She owned this very feelingly. I told her she did not enough keep up her dignity. Spoilt everybody about her, her sister &, as I begin to learn, Miss Threlfall too, who has some traits she knows I should not admire. She is whimmy.
Tuesday 12 August [Halifax]
Got to Haugh-end at 12¼. After luncheon, we all walked to Mill House… Lady Astley must surely have taken a fancy to me. She told me she talked to me as if I was a neighbour of theirs… In the evening, Lady Astley asked me 3 times to go to Everley. Begged I would go any time… Sir John was joking about his having to go to Bath to buy linen or they would have no sheets… Lady Astley… turning to me, said, ‘I assure [you] we shall always have a pair of sheets for you.’… [She] mentioned the Warnefords again (Lieutenant-Colonel of the Wiltshire Militia, of Warneford House, 31 miles from Everley, which latter is 33 miles from Bath). They had only 2 daughters, the oldest 31, the youngest, 24 or 25, very large. Would have £20,000 each. Spoke highly of the oldest. She is determined not to marry but to live like her maiden aunt Caroline; single & in good style, like hers. Would this Miss Warneford suit me? It struck me instantly & I would go to Everley if I had any chance of, seeing her there… Sat down to dinner at 6. Coffee at 8. Played (& lost) a hit at backgammon with Miss Astley after dinner. She played a little to me on the piano before dinner. Poor girl! She has not much in her, like the Miss Butlers. Likes dancing at Halifax quadrilles.
Thursday 14 August [Halifax]
Letter from M— (Lawton). Proposes leaving home on Monday or Tuesday. Can go no further than Manchester the 1st day on account of some private reasons of Lou’s, & must be in York the 2nd evening, & proceed immediately to Scarbro’, ‘for I have much health to seek & little time to do it in. For the last ten days I have been as bad as ever & very hysterical. I feel quite unequal to any exertion.’… Wishes me to spend the last fortnight with her at Scarbro’.7 She is to be there a month… ‘Meet me there’ – at Halifax – ‘if you can, tho’ it will be but a glimpse of each other.’ She would rather have had me in Micklegate… Wrote 2½ hurried pp. to M—. Told [her] I should make no remark upon her health save to bid her not be dispirited & that perhaps I was in better hope about it than while reading with fearful doubtfulness the wonder-working effects of blisters, etc.… I cannot endure the thoughts of her being ill. My affection returns. I first thought of seeing her at Manchester. I felt a little headache to say nothing of heartache on reading this letter.
Friday 15 August [Halifax]
Dined at 5. At 6.35, put Percy in the gig & drove to Lightcliffe. Mr W. Pearson not at home. Spent a pleasant evening… Very confidential sort of conversation. Speaking of my father as if I had never taken a meal at Northgate since he lived there – that he shone very provincially, & my manner shewed that I thought him vulgar. Speaking of our using a metal teapot, she said ours was the last house where she would have expected this sort of thing. She always fancied we had everything quite proper. I said my aunt would keep a house of mine very differently from one of my uncle’s. He was very amiable but sometimes a little nattering & required some management. ‘Ah,’ said she, ‘how little one knows people.’
Saturday 16 August [Halifax]
Called for Miss Pickford to return with me for breakfast… We came upstairs into my room while they laid the cloth for breakfast… When I at first said I had heard of Miss Threlfall, Pic said she knew there had been several reports… but that some of them were quite false. I asked if they affected her reception in society. She said no… Pic’s oldest sister did not smoke the nature of the connection… I always insist on its being all theory on my part & she says she believes it & I constantly observe that my manner & conversation would mislead her if she did not know me so well, to which she agrees. I said to her, ‘I am more commonplace than you are. The world is of one order; you of another; & I neither of them, but the connecting link between the two.’
On Tuesday 19 August 1823, M— set off from Lawton Hall, to begin her journey to Scarborough. Anne was to meet her in Halifax and join her on her journey, stay with her for one night in York and then return to Halifax while M— went on to Scarborough. Anne was to join her there later.
Anne’s enthusiasm at the thought of meeting M— again was such that she could not contain her impatience long enough to remain in Halifax and wait for the stage-coach to bring M— and her sister Lou, and perhaps a friend of M—’s, Miss Helen Pattison, into the town. Instead, she set off to walk over the moors to meet the coach on its way from Lancashire. This impulsive decision was to have fateful consequences for the relationship between the two women. Anne’s bizarre and wild appearance in the middle of nowhere, as it appeared to the more conventional M—, provoked her to respond in a way which Anne never forgave, and their love affair never really recovered from the emotional trauma into which Anne was plunged. The story is told in Anne’s journal entry for Tuesday 19 August which she wrote once the party of women had reached York.
Tuesday 19 August [York]
Having swallowed a draught of water & taking 3 small biscuits to eat as I walked along, set off to Halifax hoping (our clock being ¾ too soon) to be in time for the Manchester mail, to meet M— on whatever part of the road she might be… I had just got out of the town when I turned back, took my coat & green bag to Furniss, the sadler’s, thinking them not quite safe undirected in the Traveller’s at a 2nd rate inn, & at 7.50, set off again to walk till I met the carriage. Turned down Pye Nest lane but, having got ½ way down, the possibility of their missing me made me retrace my steps to the high road. Thought perhaps the coach might overtake me [the coach from Halifax] & I might get a lift if I felt inclined. A mile on this side of Ripponden a few drizzling drops of rain made me push on, meaning to wait at the turnpike. However, tho’ this threatening continued, it did not become worse & having houses (shelter) all along, I continued walking forward till I came to the 8th milestone & the turnpike 8 miles from Halifax & the same distance from Rochdale, & 4 from Littlebrough. Only one house (& that 2 miles off), the inn8 at the top of Blackstone Edge, looking down on Littlebrough & Rochdale. The drizzling went off, the prospect cleared & I walked forward, enjoying the clear mountain air. Between the 9th & 10th milestone, passed the division stone between the counties of York & Lancaster. A dreary mountain moor-scene, the river but a small stream murmuring on my left; the lake-like reservoir of the Rochdale canal on my right. A dreary prospect. A countryman observed in passing, ‘It’s but a wildish place, this.’ The inn soon came in view. Perhaps it is 200 yds from the 10th milestone (from Halifax).
I had just determined to go in & order a little boiled milk, was turning towards the door, when I spied the carriage winding up the hill. It was a nameless thrill that banished every thought but of M—, & every feeling but of fearful hope. It was just 11.50 as I reached the carriage, having walked about 10½ mil
es in 3 hours, 10 minutes, i.e. at the rate of a mile in 18 minutes to the very top of Blackstone Edge. Unconscious of any sensation but pleasure at the sight of M— who, with Lou, had been dozing, one in each corner of the carriage, the astonished, staring eyes of the man & maid behind & of the post-boys walking by the horses were lost to me &, in too hastily taking each step of the carriage & stretching over the pile of dressing-boxes, etc., that should have stopped such eager ingress, I unluckily seemed to M— to have taken 3 steps at once. I had still more unluckily exclaimed, while the petrified people were bungling about the steps, that I had walked all the way from Shibden. What with exclamation & with stride, the shock so completely wrapt round M—’s heart it left no avenue to any other feeling than joy that her friend, Miss Pattison, was not there! She would have been astonished & M— horror-struck. Why did I say I had walked from Shibden? Never saw John’s eyes so round with astonishment; the postboys, too; & how fast I talked! Thought to have met me at Halifax. Why did I come so far? Why walk? Why not come in the gig? I did talk fast. My words flew from me as tho’ disdaining to touch on utterance. I expected them an hour earlier. Must either walk forwards or stop at an alehouse or a cottage, when the suspense & anxiety of waiting would have been insupportable. The gig horse was taking diuretics. But the poisoned arrow had struck my heart & M—’s words of meeting welcome had fallen like some huge iceberg on my breast. In vain the assurance of my talking slower when agitation had gone by. In vain the endeavour to excuse myself; to say I was neither really become ungentle in my manners, nor at all changed since she had seen me last. In vain the gentle reproach that she was unused to me & had forgotten me & that this sort of reception was, at the best unwelcome. I had only just ceased to remember what she had said to me when we met last year at Chester & that when we met four years ago at Manchester. The agitation of my inmost soul was met, not with any female weakness of sympathy but with the stronger mien of shocked astonishment; the awkwardness of the cut & curl of my hair. M— began to excuse herself. Told Lou the fright I was at the time alluded to & would prove it was all her affection for me that made her so alive to my appearance. Said she was taken by surprise. In fact, she saw she had gone too far. ‘I shall take five minutes,’ said I, ‘to get right again. Let me lean back & sleep a little.’ I felt – yes – unutterable things. Roused again. We sparred a little. I pretended to laugh it off, say I was a little put out of temper. She offered to give me five minutes to recover in. I leaned back again. I scarce knew what my feelings were. They were in tumult. ‘Shame, shame,’ said I to myself, ‘to be so overcome.’ I talked as well as I could. Yet it was evident, as M— said, that I was not right. She said something to me about Scarbro’. ‘We will talk about it another time. Write to me about it. I meant to have gone with you… but now perhaps…’ ‘Now,’ said she, ‘you are going to vex me. Hold your tongue.’ How little she knows me. I uttered not for a minute or two, then turned to indifferent subjects, Miss Pickford, Miss Pattison… Miss Warneford, place Wiltshire, granddaughter of the late Viscount Ashbrook, aged thirty, twenty thousand pounds. Will just suit me, etc. M— began to look low. My heart relented. Paid her two or three affectionate compliments. Lou owned I had had a trial of temper. I laughed & said I was getting over it & by the time we had reached King Cross I felt myself more easily under my own control… We were now all quite right & merry. Alas! I had not forgotten. The heart has a memory of its own, but I had ceased to appear to remember save in occasional joking allusions to ‘the three steps’. I soon found my mind had been stronger than my body. I began to feel my headache accompanied by strong bilious symptoms & before we drove down upon Kirkstall Abbey, I had lost all power of expressing what I intended, yet joked it off, laughing at the blunders I had made. Just beginning to speak better when we alighted at the White Horse, Leeds, at 3p.m. Slank away into a lodging room. ¼ hour retying my neck handkerchief after the heat I had had in walking. Could not change my things. In driving so quickly past the White Lion, I had left my green bag at Furniss’s. It did not appear that M— had thought of looking for me but on entering the room, ‘Bless me,’ said she, ‘where have you been? I could not tell where you were.’ In fact, I had felt very unwell but of course said nothing of this & merely asked for a little dry toast & boiled milk (having had no breakfast) while M— & Lou had sandwiches & soda water. Ate 2 or 3 small bits of toast & drank 1½ basins of milk. Off from Leeds in about ¾ hour. 4 or 5 miles off began to feel very sick. M— blamed the milk. It was not that. I laughed & said it was the shock of ‘the three steps’. Ridentum dicere verum quid vetat?9 The truth was told with impunity. I do not think M— noticed it. A 3-fold relief to my stomach made me feel considerably better when we reached Tadcaster. Here, to prevent the bustle of dining in Petergate (York), M— ordered beefsteak, a roast chicken & vegetables, all very nicely done, in about ½ hour. I ate a little bit of beefsteak & 2 large pickled cucumbers to coax it down. There being an organ & plenty of music, Lou played & accompanied me in 3 or 4 songs till a minute or two before dinner, when M— & I went upstairs… Surprised to find me so unwell… She knew I had more discharge than she had & of my consulting Dr Simpson. It was she advised my being bled & blistered tho’ she never once remembered to – forgot to – inquire whether I had followed her advice, or whether it had answered or not. She said she was sorry but the expression of her sorrow, on this occasion, was tame indeed compared with the expression of her surprise on our meetmg this morning. I proposed sleeping in Petergate. She thought I had better not. She was afraid of doing harm. I promised to put this out of the question.
Wednesday 20 August [Halifax]
Soon began on the erotics last night. Her warmth encouraging… Both awoke at five in the morning & talked till seven. Asked if this was not better than my sleeping in Micklegate [at the Duffins’]. Yes, but it was prudence on her part. She had a feeling she could not describe. Would make any sacrifice rather than have our connection suspected. She seemed very affectionate & fond of me. Said I was her only comfort. She should be miserable without me… [I said] ‘This is adultery to all intents & purposes.’ ‘No, no,’ said she. ‘Oh, yes, M—. No casuistry can disguise it.’ ’Not this then, but the other.’ ‘Well,’ said I, choosing to let the thing turn her own way. ‘I always considered your marriage legal prostitution. We were both wrong. You to do it & I to consent to it. And, when I think of blaming others, I always remember nothing can at all excuse us but our prior connection.’ I did not pursue the subject, nor did M— seem to think much of it. The fear of discovery is strong. It rather increases, I think, but her conscience seems seared so long as concealment is secure… Told her she need not fear my conduct letting out our secret. I could deceive anyone. Then told her how completely I had deceived Miss Pickford & that the success of such deceit almost smote me, but I had done it all for her, M—’s, sake. ‘Why should it smite you? It is deceit that does none any harm.’ I made no reply but mused how sophistry might reign within the breast where none suspected it. How might the argument be stretched from one deceit to another. Mary, you have passion like the rest but your caution cheats the world out of its scandal, & your courage is weak rather than your principal [sic] strong. Yet, is it I who writes this? She is true to me, yes, but she has not that magnanimity of truth that satisfies a haughty spirit like mine. She is too tamely worldly & worldliness is her strength & weakness, her foible & her virtue. She loves me, I do believe her, as well as she is capable of loving, yet her marriage was worldly; her whole conduct is worldly to the farthest verge that craven love can bear. How often has it struck me that, years ago when once talking to Lou about this marriage & the powerful circumstances that almost compelled it, ‘Well,’ said she, ‘you do not know M—. She is worldly.’ And the match was worldly altogether. This did indeed strike me at the time but it never struck me as it does at this moment (Thursday 21 August, 3.55 p.m., 1823). It now opens upon me as the key of all, that all I have never yet been able to comprehend in her character. I have doubted her love.
I have doubted her sincerity. How often, with an almost bursting heart, have I laid aside my papers & my musings because I dared not pursue inconsistencies I could not unravel. I could not deem the dial true, I would not deem it false. The time, the manner of her marriage. To sink January, 1815, in oblivion!10 Oh, how it broke the magic of my faith forever. How, spite of love, it burst the spell that bound my very reason. Suppliant at her feet, I loathed consent but loathed the asking more. I would have given the ‘Yes’ she sought tho’ it had rent my heart into a hundred thousand shivers. It was enough to ask. It was a coward love that dared not brave the storm &, in desperate despair, my proud, indignant spirit watched it sculk [sic] away. How few the higher feelings we then could have in common! The chivalry of heart was gone. Hope’s brightest hues were brushed away. Yet still one melancholy point of union remained. She was unhappy. So was I. Love scorned to leave the ruin desolate; & Time & he have shaded it so sweetly, my heart still lingers in its old abiding place, thoughtless of its broken bowers, save when some sudden gust blows thro’, & screeching memory is disturbed. But oh! no more. ‘The heart knows its own bitterness’ & it is enough. ‘Je sens mon coeur, et je connais les hommes. Je ne suis fait comme aucun de ceux que j’ai vus; j’ose croire n’être fait comme aucun de ceux qui existent.’11 Rousseau’s Confessions, volume & page, first. She loves me, tho’ it is neither exactly as I wished nor as I too fondly persuaded myself ere years had taught me to weigh human nature in the balance, or unlock the loveliest of bosoms with the key of worldliness. Yes, she loves me. My own feelings shall descend to hers. They have done so, in part. How I could have adored her had she been more of that angelic being my fancy formed her. No thought, no word, no look had wandered then. Surely my every sentiment toward her had had less of earth in it than heaven. ‘How like the visions of romantic youth.’ I know she might have realized them. ‘Je sens mon coeur.’ But no more, no more. I seem unable to return to the dry detail of a journal.… Went downstairs at 8½. Breakfasted… took leave & off from the Belcombes… I never uttered all the way. Wrapt in musing. Thought of M— & the ‘three steps’ business. Then about my manners & appearance. Building castles about their improvement; elegance; engagingness, etc.; the good society I hope to get into.
The Secret Diaries Of Miss Anne Lister Page 30