Note 40 — Chapter II · ToC

Warnford Cottage, Bishop's Waltham.

My dear Mr. Leighton,—I was very sorry indeed when I returned to Park Place on Sunday evening and found that you had been so kind as to call upon me.

I have not ventured to intrude upon you in your late affliction with the expression of a sympathy which cannot have much value for you, but had I seen you when you called I should hardly have refrained from telling you how sincerely I feel for your sorrow.—Pray believe me, yours always most truly,

Fanny Kemble.

Warnford, Thursday, 2nd.

Forest Bank, Lyndhurst.

My dear Leighton,—I cannot let the post go out without offering you my sincere sympathy on your loss. I know how deeply attached you were to your mother, and am very sure the bereavement is a heavy grief to you. You are right in saying that to me your sorrow comes especially home. My mother sends you her affectionate love, and we both beg you to remember that, whenever you have a few spare days and want quiet, you must consider this home as a temporary home.—Believe me always, in all affection, yours,

Hamilton Aïdé.

My dear Leighton,—I must write to you to express the grief both myself and my wife felt on hearing of the loss which has befallen you. I am well aware that no words can afford consolation against such afflictions, but I should be sorry if you had construed silence into want of sympathy. If you have time I should be glad to hear from you, and to know how may be your father, from whom I have received on every occasion so much kindness. You have much distress to go through, for death has recently touched you in many ways by striking your own family, your friends, and imperilling others to a degree that must have inspired every pain it can produce.

Good-bye, my dear Leighton; remember me to your father, and express to him my deep sympathy with him in his misfortune.—Yours ever affectionately,

W.C. Cartwright.

Palazzi Giorgi, Rome, January 31.

13 Eaton Place (West), Tuesday, January 17, 1865.

My dear Leighton,—I heard at the Marqs', on Sunday, of your late bereavement; and, as perhaps the one of all your many friends whose mind the most habitually dwells among thoughts of loss and deprivation, I can assure you of thought of it with sincere concern and sympathy, and just write a line to say so. There is nothing to be said, I well know, which is of any immediate good or alleviation, and time only strengthens affectionate recollection: but after a time, among gentler thoughts which will come, I hope you will, as you may justly, find comfort in thinking that your mother's life was spared so as to permit her to be cheered by the certainty of your success. This is much—especially to a woman's heart.—Faithfully and sincerely yours,

Henry J. Chorley.