I find I like this
sort of bathing very much, and I wish I had begun it before. It reminds
me of a kind of medicine for colds that you used to make for me, madam,
when I first came to the canal-boat. It had lemons and sugar in it, and
it was so good I remember I used to think that I would like to go into
a lingering consumption, so that I could have it three times a day,
until I finally passed away like a lily on a snowbank.
Jone's been going about a good deal in a bath-chair, and doesn't mind
my walking alongside of him. He says it makes him feel easier in his
mind, on the whole.
Mr. Poplington came two or three days ago, and he is stopping at our
hotel. We three have hired a carriage together two or three times and
have taken drives into, the country. Once we went to an inn, the Cat
and Fiddle, about five miles away, on a high bit of ground called Axe
Edge. It is said to be the highest tavern in England, and it's lucky
that it is, for that's the only recommendation it's got. The sign in
front of the house has on it a cat on its hind-legs playing a fiddle,
with a look on its face as if it was saying, "It's pretty poor, but
it's the best I can do for you."
Inside is another painting of a cat playing a fiddle, and truly that
one might be saying, "Ha! Ha! You thought that that picture on the sign
was the worst picture you ever saw in your life, but now you see how
you are mistaken."
Up on that high place you get the rain fresher than you do in Buxton,
because it hasn't gone so far through the air, and it's mixed with more
chilly winds than anywhere else in England, I should say. But everybody
is bound to go to the Cat and Fiddle at least once, and we are glad we
have been there, and that it is over. I like the places near the town a
great deal better, and some of them are very pretty. One day we two and
Mr. Poplington took a ride on top of a stage to see Haddon Hall and
Chatsworth.
Haddon Hall is to me like a dream of the past come true. Lots of other
old places have seemed like dreams, but this one was right before my
eyes, just as it always was. Of course, you must have read all about
it, madam, and I am not going to tell it over again.
