Sterling continued to reside at Herstmonceux through the spring and summer;holding by the peaceable retired house he still had there,till the vague future might more definitely shape itself,and better point out what place of abode would suit him in his new circumstances.
He made frequent brief visits to London;in which I,among other friends,frequently saw him,our acquaintance at each visit improving in all ways.Like a swift dashing meteor he came into our circle;coruscated among us,for a day or two,with sudden pleasant illumination;then again suddenly withdrew,--we hoped,not for long.
I suppose,he was full of uncertainties;but undoubtedly was gravitating towards London.Yet,on the whole,on the surface of him,you saw no uncertainties;far from that:it seemed always rather with peremptory resolutions,and swift express businesses,that he was charged.Sickly in body,the testimony said:but here always was a mind that gave you the impression of peremptory alertness,cheery swift decision,--of a _health_which you might have called exuberant.
I remember dialogues with him,of that year;one pleasant dialogue under the trees of the Park (where now,in 1851,is the thing called "Crystal Palace"),with the June sunset flinging long shadows for us;the last of the Quality just vanishing for dinner,and the great night beginning to prophesy of itself.Our talk (like that of the foregoing Letter)was of the faults of my style,of my way of thinking,of my &c.&c.;all which admonitions and remonstrances,so friendly and innocent,from this young junior-senior,I was willing to listen to,though unable,as usual,to get almost any practical hold of them.As usual,the garments do not fit you,you are lost in the garments,or you cannot get into them at all;this is not your suit of clothes,it must be another's:--alas,these are not your dimensions,these are only the optical angles you subtend;on the whole,you will never get measured in that way!--Another time,of date probably very contiguous,I remember hearing Sterling preach.It was in some new college-chapel in Somerset-house (I suppose,what is now called King's College);a very quiet small place,the audience student-looking youths,with a few elder people,perhaps mostly friends of the preacher's.The discourse,delivered with a grave sonorous composure,and far surpassing in talent the usual run of sermons,had withal an air of human veracity as I still recollect,and bespoke dignity and piety of mind:but gave me the impression rather of artistic excellence than of unction or inspiration in that kind.Sterling returned with us to Chelsea that day;--and in the afternoon we went on the Thames Putney-ward together,we two with my Wife;under the sunny skies,on the quiet water,and with copious cheery talk,the remembrance of which is still present enough to me.
This was properly my only specimen of Sterling's preaching.Another time,late in the same autumn,I did indeed attend him one evening to some Church in the City,--a big Church behind Cheapside,"built by Wren"as he carefully informed me;--but there,in my wearied mood,the chief subject of reflection was the almost total vacancy of the place,and how an eloquent soul was preaching to mere lamps and prayer-books;and of the sermon I retain no image.It came up in the way of banter,if he ever urged the duty of "Church extension,"which already he very seldom did and at length never,what a specimen we once had of bright lamps,gilt prayer-books,baize-lined pews,Wren-built architecture;and how,in almost all directions,you might have fired a musket through the church,and hit no Christian life.A terrible outlook indeed for the Apostolic laborer in the brick-and-mortar line!--In the Autumn of this same 1835,he removed permanently to London,whither all summer he had been evidently tending;took a house in Bayswater,an airy suburb,half town,half country,near his Father's,and within fair distance of his other friends and objects;and decided to await there what the ultimate developments of his course might be.
His house was in Orme Square,close by the corner of that little place (which has only _three_sides of houses);its windows looking to the east:the Number was,and I believe still is,No.5.A sufficiently commodious,by no means sumptuous,small mansion;where,with the means sure to him,he could calculate on finding adequate shelter for his family,his books and himself,and live in a decent manner,in no terror of debt,for one thing.His income,I suppose,was not large;but he lived generally a safe distance within it;and showed himself always as a man bountiful in money matters,and taking no thought that way.
His study-room in this house was perhaps mainly the drawing-room;looking out safe,over the little dingy grassplot in front,and the quiet little row of houses opposite,with the huge dust-whirl of Oxford Street and London far enough ahead of you as background,--as back-curtain,blotting out only _half_your blue hemisphere with dust and smoke.On the right,you had the continuous growl of the Uxbridge Road and its wheels,coming as lullaby not interruption.Leftward and rearward,after some thin belt of houses,lay mere country;bright sweeping green expanses,crowned by pleasant Hampstead,pleasant Harrow,with their rustic steeples rising against the sky.Here on winter evenings,the bustle of removal being all well ended,and family and books got planted in their new places,friends could find Sterling,as they often did,who was delighted to be found by them,and would give and take,vividly as few others,an hour's good talk at any time.
His outlooks,it must be admitted,were sufficiently vague and overshadowed;neither the past nor the future of a too joyful kind.
