1827–1829

The letters that Lady Beaumont writes to the Wordsworths in her widowhood are richly detailed. Part V brings into focus two major interests that she pursues in defiance of her grief: gardening (both practical and theoretical) and religious meditation. Lady Beaumont also takes comfort from the 1827 edition of Wordsworth’s Poetical Works. She comments with feeling on the fraught issues of the Corn Laws and the Catholic Relief Act. Knowing that Wordsworth disagreed with her support for Catholic Emancipation, her comments on Wordsworth’s poems ‘The Egyptain Maid’, ‘Incident at Bruges’, and ‘A Jewish Family’ may be read as a subtle critique of Anglican prejudice. The sequence of letters ends with Sir George Howland Willoughby’s announcement of Lady Beaumont’s death in July 1829.