Last words of Thomas Carlyle - Warburg Institute

!!132 WOTTON EEINFEEt)hours I have had too, and one always hopes theweather will mend*Of my childhood I can say little. Somethingwhispers me that in the earlier part of it I washappier, for I have faint recollections of a pleasanthome and kind nurses, and one that used to weepover me and kissme, perhaps she was my mother.But an obscure, confused period succeeds ; of whichI have no remembrance, except a certain vague impressionof tumult and distress ; and this first scenestands like some fair little island, divided by wildseas from my whole after life.I had lost my parents,how I have never known, some baleful mystery hangsover their fate, a gloomy secret, which when I haveinquired into I have been answered only in hints anddark warnings to forbear inquiring.Unhappy fatherItseems he must have died miserably, sometimes Ihave feared by his own hand.And she too, the goodmother, she that fondled me and laid me on herbosom, was for ever hid from my eyes. Alas ! wasshe my mother ? or is this also but a dream which Imistake for a reminiscence? Father or mother intruth I have never known.'You have seen my aunt, and something of hercharacter, which therefore I need not describe atlarge. Surely I owe her much, she was my solebenefactress ;herself a widow, she found me a helplessorphan, for with their ill-starred life the fortune ofmy parents had also gone to wreck, and had it not