ct
of finding you at Minto--and of Bowhill likewise. I hope I am not
unworthy of the heart you gave me ... and I trust every day will
prove how grateful I am to you.

WILTON CRESCENT, _July_ 4, 1841

I got your little note yesterday, after I had sealed my letter....
My dearest Fanny, I am so happy at the thought of being soon at
Minto. If you believe that I feel the strongest devotion to you,
and am resolved to do all in my power to make you happy, you
believe what is true.... This will reach you soon after your
arrival. I can imagine how busy you will be ... and long to join
you.

A few days later he reached Minto himself. Lady Fanny, writing to her
sister Mary, describes their days together, and adds: "They are all except
Gibby so much too respectful to Lord John. Not to me, for they take their
revenge upon me, and I am unsparingly laughed at, which is a great comfort.
I shall write once before it happens. I dare not think what I shall be when
you receive this."

MINTO, _July_ 19, 1841

My last day as a child of Minto. How fast it flew. How quickly
good-night came--that sad, that dreaded good-night. But sadness may
be of such a kind as to give rise to the happiest, the purest
feelings--and such was this.... He and I sat in the Moss house.
Never saw the glen more beautiful; the birch glittering in the sun
and waving its feathery boughs; the burn murmuring more gently than
usual; the wood-pigeons answering one another from tree to tree.
Had not courage to be much with Mama.

They were married on July 20th in the drawing-room at Minto, and set off
for Bowhill, which had been lent them for the honeymoon by the Duke of
Buccleuch. Never did statesman on his wedding-day take away a bride more
whole-heartedly resolved to be all a wife can be to him in his career. Her
mother was now perfectly happy about the marriage, though the disparity of
age, and fears about the great responsibility her daughter was undertaking
in the care of a young family--one boy and five girls--had undoubtedly made
her anxious. Lady Minto felt very deeply the parting with her dearly-loved
child, and after the wedding she sent her the following little ballad:

A BORDER BALLAD

AIR: "_Saw ye my father_"

Oh saw ye the robber
That cam' o'er the border
To steal bonny Fanny away?
She's gane awa' frae me
And the bonny North Countrie
And has left m