HANNAH MORE, calumnies, a report that her patroness was about to buy an estate with the fund raised. Hannah More and Mrs. Montagu, her coadjutor in this work of charity, ultimately withdrew, mildly yet firmly, from further interference ; and Mrs. Yearsley at length, by her harassing importunities, obtained the sum subscribed from the Bristol merchant in whose hands the matter had been finally entrusted. One by one, Hannah's friends had been departing and at length she had to mourn the loss of that " virtuous and most revered friend," Dr. Johnson, who died December 13, 1784. About this period she purchased, with the view of passing a portion of her time in retirement and meditation, a little estate named Cowslip Green, at Wrington, ten miles on the Exeter road from Bristol ; and here, for some months, her leisure was spent, as she states, " in raising dejected pinks and reforming disorderly honeysuckles." Shortly after, her sisters retired in affluent circumstances, and built for themselves a house in Great Pulteney Street, Bath, where they henceforth resided, paying occasional visits to Cow- slip Green. Wrington was then one of the loveliest vales in Somersetshire, possessing fine pastures, richly wooded slopes, picturesque scenery, and a beautiful barrier of downs that stretched from Bristol to the Channel. Almost in the heart of this valley nestled the delightful, modest " little thatched hermi- tage," whither Hannah More, at the age of forty, 29
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