Bad news recalled him: Barbara, the eldest little girl, was dangerously ill from the effects of a fall, and a month after his return she died. The loss fell heaviest on the mother, and it is noticeable that Moore was then the one to assume control. This seems natural enough, when one remembers that his wife was only three and twenty; but in later days, the relation was very different. The family moved for a while to Lady Donegal's house, 56 Davies Street, Berkeley Square, and thence Moore made an excursion to look for a new home. A great Whig peer, the Marquis of Lansdowne, had suggested that the poet's residence should be fixed near Bowood and its library; and three houses were offered for his inspection. Only one proved to be at all within the reach of his means, a little thatched cottage with a pretty garden. Bessy went down a week later, escorted by Power, to look at it, and returned delighted--very probably with its cheapness, for it was offered to them furnished at £40 a year. Under these rather sad circumstances, Moore and his wife moved into their definitive home. On November 19th, 1817, Moore wrote to Power from "Sloperton, Devizes," to say that they were in possession, and that he himself was just sallying out for his walk in the garden, with his head full of words for the Melodies. It was always his habit to compose out of doors, and pilgrims to Sloperton are still shown a little gravelled path round the garden, which keeps the name of Poet's Walk. Such pilgrims can easily enough imagine the house as Moore first knew it. The thatched roof has been replaced by slates, probably when the addition was built on for Moore's accommodation. This addition consisted of two rooms, a good-sized sitting-room with windows opening on to the green lawn and garden, and over it a bedroom to match--the room in which Moore died, and which, according to tradition, his ghost still inhabits. This addition has an ordinary sloping roof, joined on to the original front, which consists of three gables. All about are great elms and chestnut trees, and the whole countryside is rich in the beauty that Moore delighted in--"sunniness and leanness," to quote his own happy phrase. The quiet little country town of Devizes is three miles off to the north, and in that direction Bromham, the hamlet which gives its name to the parish, nestles among trees across a small valley. A roughly paved lane, deep sunk between profuse hedges, leads from Sloperton to the lovely fifteenth-century church in whose grave-yard Moore lies with his wife and children, among generations of squires and yokels of a race not his own.