Wednesday. June 8th.
No letters again. The “something bad” is certain. Arabel wrote to Annie, enclosing a note to Miss Steers from Henrietta. A good pretext for writing! for writing her wonder at the silence, her disappointment at it, & her intention of no more recurring to the subject. This is the best way. Recurring to the subject can avail nothing: and five words explain everything—Annie does not love me. I wish she were not Mr. Boyd’s daughter: and I almost wish that I were not going to Malvern tomorrow. Oh no! not even almost! I meant, “I almost thought I wished it”! Why should I mind seeing Annie? Why should I feel embarrassed? What have I done to be embarrassed about? At any rate Mr. Boyd will be glad to see me: & nothing, except his not being so, could make me less glad to see him.
Bro dined at the Bartons.[1] Papa arrived at home, just before he did, from the Redmarley Bible meeting.[2] Papa’s account of the discussion between himself & Mr. Jackson the Wesleyan Minister.[3] I said as little as I could; thro’ a recollection of past circumstances: but when Bummy expressed a general dislike towards the Methodists, it would have been something worse than cowardice in me, to have said nothing. Read as usual.
1. Barton Court, the home of Mrs. Griffith and the Peyton family. It had been purchased in 1792 by Mrs. Griffith’s uncle, Henry Lambert, when he left Hope End after a dispute with his son-in-law, Sir Henry Vane Tempest. He rebuilt and enlarged the house, making the drawing-room the exact size of the one at Hope End, and decorating it in blue and gold, in order to display the blue Persian carpet he had brought with him from Hope End. The house, 1½ miles from Hope End, was on the road leading toward Malvern, and so would be passed by E.B.B. each time she journeyed to the Wyche or to Ruby Cottage.
2. Redmarley D’Abitot: a village about 8 miles S.E. of Hope End containing a Wesleyan-Methodist meeting-place.
3. Richard Jackson, the Wesleyan-Methodist minister stationed in Ledbury for 1830–31 (“The Stations of the Preachers for 1830–31,” Wesleyan-Methodist Magazine, September 1830, pp. 611–622).