I fear Dorothea may be injured in the opinion of many by the
truth--which, nevertheless, has to be told--that her recovery was
helped not a little by sentiment. What? Is a poor lady's heart to be
in combustion for a while and then--pf!--the flame expelled at a
blast, with all that fed it? That is the heroic cure, no doubt: but
either it kills or leaves a room swept and garnished, inviting devils.
In short it is the way of tragedy, and for tragedy Dorothea had no
aptitude at all. She did what she could--tidied up.
For an instance.--She owned a small book which had once belonged to a
namesake of hers--a Dorothea Westcote who had lived at the close of
the seventeenth and opening of the eighteenth centuries, a grand-
daughter of the first Westcote of Bayfield, married (so said the family
history) in 1704 to a squire from across the Devonshire border. The
book was a slender one, bound in calf, gilt-edged, and stamped with a
gold wreath in the centre of each cover. Dorothea called it an album;
but the original owner had simply written in, "Dorothea Westcote, her
book," on the first page, with the date 1687 below, and filled four-and-
twenty of its blank pages with poetry (presumably her favourite pieces),
copied in a highly ornate hand. Presumably also she had wearied of the
work, let the book lie, and coming to it later, turned it upside down
and started with a more useful purpose: for three pages at the end
contained several household recipes in the same writing grown severer,
including "Garland Wine (Mrs.
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