when all had proved unavailing, he was coming home to die amongst his
family, in his thirty-ninth year. My mother had gone to await his
arrival at the port (whatever port) to which the West India packet
should bring him; and amongst the deepest recollections which I connect
with that period, is one derived from the night of his arrival at
Greenhay.

It was a summer evening of unusual solemnity. The servants, and four
of us children, were gathered for hours, on the lawn before the house,
listening for the sound of wheels. Sunset came--nine, ten, eleven
o'clock, and nearly another hour had passed--without a warning sound;
for Greenhay, being so solitary a house, formed a _terminus ad quem_,
beyond which was nothing but a cluster of cottages, composing the
little hamlet of Greenhill; so that any sound of wheels coming from
the winding lane which then connected us with the Rusholme Road, carried
with it, of necessity, a warning summons to prepare for visitors at
Greenhay. No such summons had yet reached us; it was nearly midnight;
and, for the last time, it was determined that we should move in a
body out of the grounds, on the chance of meeting the travelling party,
if, at so late an hour, it could yet be expected to arrive. In fact,
to our general surprise, we met it almost immediately, but coming at
so slow a pace, that the fall of the horses' feet was not audible until
we were close upon them. I mention the case for the sake of the undying
impressions which connected themselves with the circumstances. The
first notice of the approach was the sudden emerging of horses' heads
from the deep gloom of the shady lane; the next was the mass of white
pillows against which the dying patient was reclining. The hearse-like
pace at which the carriage moved recalled the overwhelming spectacle
of that funeral which had so lately formed part in the most memorable
event of my life. But these elements of awe, that might at any rate