CHAP.- iv.] Recollections written at Hanover. 135 



[A letter of eighteen pages would have been found along 

 with a will, if I had (as I then daily expected) died before my 

 brother. After the sad events of the succeeding two years, 

 I thought it necessary to destroy both the will and the 

 letter.] My thoughts were continually divided between my 

 brother's library, from which I was now on the point of being 

 severed for ever, and my own unfinished work at home 

 endeavouring to bring by degrees all into its proper place." 



DIARY (continued). 



May 13i/i. Lady Herschel and my nephew went to town : 

 I was left with my brother alone, but was counting every 

 hour till I should see them again, for I was momentarily 

 afraid of his dying in their absence. 



May 20f/i. * * * * 



The summer proved very hot ; my brother's feeble nerves 

 were very much affected, and there being in general much 

 company, added to the difficulty of choosing the most airy 

 rooms for his retirement. 



July Stk. I had a dawn of hope that my brother might 

 regain once more a little strength, for I have a memo- 

 randum in my almanac of his walking with a firmer step 

 than usual above three or four times the distance from the 

 dwelling-house to the library, in order to gather and eat 

 raspberries, in his garden, with me. But I never saw the 

 like again. 



The latter end of July I was seized by a bilious fever, 

 and I could for several days only rise for a few hours to go 

 to my brother about the time he was used to see me. But 

 one day I was entirely confined to my bed, which alarmed 

 Lady Herschel and the family on my brother's account. 

 Miss Baldwin* called and found me in despair about my 

 own confused affairs, which I never had had time to bring 



* A younger sister of Mrs. Beckwith, niece of Lady Herschel. 



