ad been much
agitated by a dream which happened the night before, Sunday, July
19. She saw Her and asked 'when shall I be with you?' the reply was,
'Dearest, in five years,' whereupon Arabella woke. She knew in her dream
that it was not to the living she spoke."--In five years, within a
month of their completion--I had forgotten the date of the dream, and
supposed it was only three years ago, and that two had still to run.
Only a coincidence, but noticeable. . . .'

In August he writes again from Audierne, Finisterre (Brittany).

'. . . You never heard of this place, I daresay. After staying a
few days at Paris we started for Rennes,--reached Caen and halted a
little--thence made for Auray, where we made excursions to Carnac,
Lokmariaker, and Ste.-Anne d'Auray; all very interesting of their kind;
then saw Brest, Morlaix, St.-Pol de Leon, and the sea-port Roscoff,--our
intended bathing place--it was full of folk, however, and otherwise
impracticable, so we had nothing for it, but to "rebrousser chemin" and
get to the south-west again. At Quimper we heard (for a second time)
that Audierne would suit us exactly, and to it we came--happily, for
"suit" it certainly does. Look on the map for the most westerly point
of Bretagne--and of the mainland of Europe--there is niched Audierne, a
delightful quite unspoiled little fishing-town, with the open ocean in
front, and beautiful woods, hills and dales, meadows and lanes behind
and around,--sprinkled here and there with villages each with its fine
old Church. Sarianna and I have just returned from a four hours' walk
in the course of which we visited a town, Pont Croix, with a beautiful
cathedral-like building amid the cluster of clean bright Breton
houses,--and a little farther is another church, "Notre Dame de
Comfort", with only a hovel or two round it, worth the journey from
England to see; we are therefore very well off--at an inn, I should say,
with singularly good, kind, and liberal people, so have no cares for the
moment. May you be doing as well! The weather has been most propitious,
and to-day is perfect to a wish. We bathe, but somewhat ingloriously, in
a smooth creek of mill-pond quietude, (there being no cabins on the bay
itself,) unlike the great rushing waves of Croisic--the water is much
colder. . . .'

The tribute contained in this letter to the merits of le Pere
Batifoulier and his wife would not, I think, be endorsed by the few
other English travellers