Sunny Memories Of Foreign Lands, Volume 1Stowe, Harriet Beecher
History
Sunny Memories Of Foreign Lands, Volume 1
Stowe, Harriet Beecher
Europe -- Description and travel
There were also many members of the faculty of the university. I talked
a little with Dr. Guthrie, whom I described in a former letter. I told
him that one thing which had been an agreeable disappointment to me was,
the apparent cordiality between the members of the Free and the National
church. He seemed to think that the wounds of the old conflict were, to
a great extent, healed. He spoke in high terms of the Duchess of
Sutherland, her affability, kindness, and considerateness to the poor. I
forget from whom I received the anecdote, but somebody told me this of
her--that, one of her servants having lost a relative, she had left a
party where she was engaged, and gone in the plainest attire and
quietest way to attend the funeral. It was remarked upon as showing her
considerateness for the feelings of those in inferior positions.
About nine o'clock we left to go to the temperance _soirée_. It was in
the same place, and conducted in the same way, with the others which I
have described. The lord provost presided, and one or two of the working
men who spoke in the former _soirée_ made speeches, and very good ones
too. The meeting was greatly enlivened by the presence and speech of the
jovial Lord Conynghame, who amused us all by the gallant manner in which
he expressed the warmth of Scottish welcome towards "our American
guests." If it had been in the old times of Scottish hospitality, he
said, he should have proposed a _bumper_ three times three; but as that
could not be done in a temperance meeting, he proposed three cheers, in
which he led off with a hearty good will.
All that the Scotch people need now for the prosperity of their country
is the temperance reformation; and undoubtedly they will have it. They
have good sense and strength of mind enough to work out whatever they
choose.
We went home tired enough.
The next day we had a few calls to make, and an invitation from Lady
Drummond to visit "classic Hawthornden." Accordingly, in the forenoon,
Mr. S. and I called first on Lord and Lady Gainsborough; though, she is
one of the queen's household, she is staying here at Edinburgh, and the
queen at Osborne. I infer therefore that the appointment includes no
very onerous duties. The Earl of Gainsborough is the eldest brother of
Rev. Baptist W. Noel.
Lady Gainsborough is the daughter of the Earl of Roden, who is an Irish
lord of the very strictest Calvinistic persuasion: He is a devout man,
and for many years, we were told, maintained a Calvinistic church of the
English establishment in Paris. While Mr. S. talked with Lord
Gainsborough, I talked with his lady, and Lady Roden, who was present.
Lady Gainsborough inquired about our schools for the poor, and how they
were conducted. I reflected a moment, and then answered that we had no
schools for the poor as such, but the common school was open alike to
all classes.[K]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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