Augustus John Cuthbert Hare

“ Truth is the cornerstone of all virtues: never let a child think it can deceive you; they are cunning little creatures, and reason before they can speak; secure this, and the chief part of your work is done, and so ends my sermon.”
It was in the summer of 1833, following upon her mother’s death, that a plan was first arranged by which my aunt Eleanor Paul became an inmate of my father’s household—the kind and excellent aunt whose devotion in all times of trouble was afterwards such a blessing to her sister and her children. ”

“ Hare-Naylor made for the children whom she left at Bologna would be deemed a very strange one by many: but gifted, beautiful, and accomplished, our grandmother was never accustomed either to seek or to take advice: she always acted upon her own impulses, guided by her own observation. An aged Spanish Jesuit was living in Bologna, who, when his order was suppressed in Spain, had come to reside in Italy upon his little pension, and, being skilled in languages, particularly in Greek, had taken great pains to revive the love of it in Bologna. ”

“ Dashwood wrote to Miss Paul that Francis had “too much feeling in principle to marry without feeling that he could make the woman who was sincerely attached to him happy,” and that “though he has a great many faults, still, when one considers the sort of wild education he had, that he has been a sort of pet pupil of the famous or infamous Lord Bristol, one feels very certain that he must have a more than uncommonly large amount of original goodness (not sin, though it is the fashion to say so much on that head) to save him from having many more.” ”

“ Equally strange was his announcement of his engagement to his brother Augustus at Rome, casually observing, in the midst of antiquarian queries about the temples—“Apropos of columns, I am going to rest my old age on a column. Anne Paul and I are to be married on the 28th of April,”—and proceeding at once, as if he had said nothing unusual—“Have you made acquaintance yet with my excellent friend Luigi Vescovali,” &c. ”

“ At twenty, he had not only all the knowledge, but more than all the experiences, of most men of forty. Such training was not a good preparation for his late entrance at an English University. The pupil of Mezzofanti and Lehmann also went to Christ Church at Oxford knowing far too much. He was so far ahead of his companions, and felt such a profound contempt for the learning of Oxford compared with that to which he had been accustomed at the Italian and German universities, that he neglected the Oxford course of study altogether, and did little except hunt whilst he was at college. ”

“ Hare-Naylor of my own childhood, who was less and less liked by her stepsons as years went on. She became the mother of three children, Georgiana, Gustavus, and Reginald—my half aunt and uncles. In 1815, Mr. Hare-Naylor died at Tours, and was buried at Hurstmonceaux.
The breaking up of their home, the loss of their beloved mother, and still more their father’s second marriage, made the four Hare brothers turn henceforward for all that they sought of sympathy or affection to their Shipley relations. The house of their mother’s eldest sister, Lady Jones, was henceforward the only home they knew. ”

“ Landor adored her, and rejoiced to bring his friend Francis Hare into her society. The daughters were clever, lively and animated; but the mother was the great attraction to the house.
Defoe says that “people who boast of their ancestors are like potatoes, in that their best part is in underground.” ”

“ In the summer of 1832 all the family went to Baden-Baden, to meet Lady Paul and her daughter Eleanor, Sir John, the FitzGeralds, and the Bankheads. All the branches of Mrs. Hare’s family lived in different houses, but they met daily for dinner, and were very merry. Before the autumn, my fahter returned to Italy, to the Villa Cittadella near Lucca, which was taken for two months for Mrs. Hare’s confinement, and there, on the 9th of October, my sister was born. ”

“ Nothing is more extraordinary than the history of her eldest brother’s widow, Mary-Eleanor Bowes, 9th Countess of Strathmore, who, in her second marriage with Mr. Stoney, underwent sufferings which have scarcely ever been surpassed, and whose marvellous escapes and adventures are still the subject of a hundred story-books. ”

“ She did this because she was jealous of the sons of the predecessor, and wished to build a large new house, which she persuaded her husband to settle upon her own children, who were numerous, though only two daughters lived to any great age. But she was justly punished, for when Robert Hare died, it was discovered that the great house which Wyatt had built for Mrs. Hare, and which is now known as Hurstmonceaux Place, was erected upon entailed land, so that the house stripped of furniture, and the property shorn of its most valuable farms, passed to Frances Hare-Naylor, son of Miss Selman. ”

“ If Francis liked England for the sake of being with old friends, he might live here very comfortably, but if he will live as those who can afford to make a show, for one year of parade in England he must be a banished man for many years. ”

“ You do indeed understand a Paradisaical life. Well do I remeber the dear Lucca baths, where we spent morning and evening in riding about the country—the most prolific place in the world for all manner of reptiles. ”

“ Hare-Naylor’s struggling life in Italy is told in “Memorials of a Quiet Life,” and how, when the Canon of Winchester died, and she hurried home with her husband to take possession of Hurstmonceaux Place, she brought only her little Augustus with her, placing him under the care of her eldest sister Anna Maria, widow of the celebrated Sir William Jones, whom he ever afterwards regarded as a second mother. ”

“ It was not till long after that Victoire found out that my father had known for years that François had been robbing him, and yet had retained him in his service. He said that it was always his plan to weigh the good qualities of any of his dependants against their defects. If the defects outweighed the virtues, “il faudrait les renvoyer de suite—si non, il faudrait les laisser aller.” When he was in his “colère” he never allowed his wife to come near him—“il avait peur de lui faire aucun mal.” ”

“ The families on both sides renounced them with fury. The Canon of Winchester never saw his son again, and I believe that Bishop Shipley never saw his daughter. Our grandparents went to Carlsruhe, and then to Italy, where in those days it was quite possible to live upon the £200 a year which was allowed them by the Duchess of Devonshire, and where their four sons—Francis, Augustus, Julius, and Marcus—were born. ”

“ Very welcome therefore was the change when Lady Paul determined to go abroad with her daughters, and the society of Florence, in which Anne Paul’s great musical talents made her a general favourite, Was the more delightful from being contrasted with the confinement of Sir John Paul’s house over his bank in the Strand. During her Italian travels also, Anne Paul made three friends whose intimacy influenced all her after life. These were our cousin, the clever widowed Anna Maria Dashwood, daughter of Dean Shipley; Walter Savage Landor; and Francis Hare ”

“ Hurstmonceaux Place was then, and is still, a large but ugly house. It forms a massy square, with projecting circular bows at the corners, the appearance of which (due to Wyatt) produces a frightful effect outside, but is exceedingly comfortable within. The staircase, the floors, and the handsome doors, were brought from the castle. The west side of the house, decorated with some Ionic columns, is part of an older manor-house, which existed before the castle was dismantled. ”

“ So the property of Hurstmonceaux went to his half-brother Robert, son of the Bishop’s second marriage with Mary-Margaret Alston, heiress of the Vatche in Buckinghamshire, and of several other places besides. Sir Robert Walpole had been the godfather of Robert Hare-Naylor, and presented him with a valuable sinecure office as a christening present, and he further made the Bishop urge the Church as the profession in which father and godfather could best aid the boy’s advancement. Accordingly Robert took orders, obtained a living, and was made a Canon of Winchester. ”

“ Goaded to fury by his stepmother, the eldest son, Francis, became reckless and recklessly extravagant. He raised money at an enormous rate of interest upon his prospects from the Hurstmonceaux estates, and he would have been utterly ruined, morally as well as outwardly, if he had not fallen in with Georgiana, Duchess of Devonshire, who was captivated by his good looks, charmed by his boldness and wit, and who made him the hero of a living romance. By the Duchess he was introduced to her cousin, another even more beautiful Georgiana, daughter of Jonathan Shipley, Bishop of St. ”

“ But, in return, the sternness of republican demeanour refuses the outward token of submission—even to Almighty power: a Dutchman always remains in church with his hat unmoved from his head.”
The year 1818 was chiefly passed by Francis Hare in Bavaria, where he became very intimate with the King and Prince Eugene. The latter gave him the miniature of himself which I still have at Holmhurst. For the next seven years he was almost entirely in Italy—chiefly at Florence or Pisa. ”

“ The responsibility is great, and if you feel it such, there cannot be a better means of withdrawing your mind from unavailing sorrow, than the hope of seeing them beloved and respected, and feeling that your own watchfulness of their early years, has, by the blessing of God, caused them to be so. ”

“ GLAMIS CASTLE.
quartered the royal arms and claimed royal descent from Robert II. king of Scotland, grandson of the famous Robert Bruce: the king’s youngest daughter Lady Jane Stuart having married Sir John Lyon, first Baron Kinghorn, and the king’s grand-daughter Elizabeth Graham (through Euphemia Stuart, Countess of Strathern) having married his son Sir John Lyon of Glamis. Eight barons and eight earls of Kinghorn and Strathmore (which title was added 1677) lived in Glamis Castle before Lady Anne was born. The family history had been of the most eventful kind. ”

“ The widow of John, 6th Lord Glamis, was burnt as a witch on the Castle Hill at Edinburgh, for attempting to poison King James V., and her second husband, Archibald Campbell, was dashed to pieces while trying to escape down the rocks which form the foundation of the castle. ”

“ He had, however, a really good friend in John Nicholas Fazakerley, with whom his intimacy was never broken, and in 1814, whilst watching his dying father at Tours, he began a friendship with Walter Savage Landor, with whom he ever afterwards kept up an affectionate correspondence. ”

“ Hare-Naylor could never bear to return to Hurstmonceaux, and sold the remnant of his ancestral estate for £60,000, to the great sorrow of his children. They were almost more distressed, however, by his second marriage to a Mrs. ”