AFRICA

Before Froude had written the last chapter of The English in Ireland
he was visited by the greatest sorrow of his life. Mrs. Froude died
suddenly in February, 1874. It had been a perfect marriage, and he
never enjoyed the same happiness afterwards. Carlyle and his
faithful friend Fitzjames Stephen were the only persons he could see
at first, though he manfully completed the book on which he was
engaged. It was long before he rallied from the shock, and he felt
as if he could never write again. He dreaded "the length of years
which might yet lie ahead of him before he could have his discharge
from service." He took a melancholy pride in noting that none of the
reviewers discovered any special defects in those final pages of his
book which had been written under such terrible conditions. Mrs.
Froude had thoroughly understood all her husband's moods, and her
quiet humour always cheered him in those hours of gloom from which a
man of his sensitive nature could not escape. She could use a gentle
mockery which was always effective, along with her common sense, in
bringing out the true proportions of things. Conscious as she was of
his social brilliancy and success, she would often tell the children
that they lost nothing by not going out with him, because their
father talked better at home than he talked anywhere else. Her deep
personal religion was the form of belief with which he had most
sympathy, and which he best understood, regarding it as the
foundation of virtue and conduct and honour and truth. He attended
with her the services of the Church, which satisfied him whenever
they were performed with the reverent simplicity familiar to his
boyhood. Happily he was not left alone. He had two young children to
love, and his eldest daughter was able to take her stepmother's
place as mistress of his house. With the children he left London as
soon as he could, and tried to occupy his mind by reading to them
from Don Quixote, or, on a Sunday, from The Pilgrim's Progress. To
the end of his life he felt his loss; and when he was offered,
fifteen years later, the chance of going back to his beloved
Derreen, he shrank from the associations it would have recalled.

He took a house for his family in Wales, which he described in the
following letter to Lady Derby:

"CROGAN HOUSE, Corwen, June 3rd, 1874.

"I do not know if I told you upon what a curious and interesting old
place we have fallen for our retirement. The walls