Sydney Smith's Repartee

saddest thing in the world, except a defeat.” Now that Sydney Smith is gone, Rogers furnishes the nicest touches in the way of repartee. His conversation even in his dilapidated condition, on his back, is full of salt, not to say cayenne. I was praising somebody's good-nature very much. "Yes," he said, "so much good-nature, that there is no room for good-sense."

Of all the notabilities no one has struck me more than the Iron Duke. His face is as fresh as a young man's. He stoops much and is a little deaf. It is interesting to see with what an affectionate and respectful feeling he is regarded by all,—not least by the Queen.

With ever so much love to Anna, and Anika, and little Lizzie,

I remain, dear George,
Always affectionately yours,
WM. H. PRESCOTT

Bret Harte feels like a defunct English lord

(To his wife)

"THE MOLT," SALCOMBE, KINGSBRIDGE,

Y DEAR ANNA,

MY

day or two ago. Since then I came down here to visit Froude (the historian), who has treated me with very particular kindness. . . .

It is without exception, one of the most perfect country houses I ever beheld. Imagine, if you can, something between "Locksley Hall" and the "High Hall Garden,” where Maud used to walk, and you have some idea of this graceful English home. I look from my windows down upon exquisite lawns and terraces all sloping towards the

sea wall and then down upon the blue sea below. I walk out in the long high garden, past walls hanging with netted peaches and apricots, past terraces looking over the ruins of an old feudal castle, and I can scarcely believe I am not reading an English novel or that I am not myself a wandering ghost. To heighten the absurdity when I return to my room I am confronted by the inscription on the door, "Lord Devon" (for this is the property of the Earl of Devon, and I occupy his favorite room), and I seem to have died and to be resting under a gilded mausoleum that lies even more than the average tombstone does. Froude is a connection of the Earl's, and has hired the house for the summer.

He is a widower, with two daughters and a son. The eldest girl is not unlike a highly educated Boston girl, and the conversation sometimes reminds me of Boston. The youngest daughter, only ten years old, told her sister in reference to some conversation Froude and I had that "she feared" (this child) "that Mr. Bret Harte was inclined to be sceptical!" Doesn't this exceed any English story of the precocity of American children? The boy, scarcely fourteen, acts like a boy of eight (an American boy of eight) and talks like a man of thirty, as far as pure English and facility of expression goes. His manners are perfect, yet he is perfectly simple and boylike. The culture and breeding of some English children is really marvelous. But somehow — and here comes one of my “buts ” — there's always a suggestion of some repression, some discipline that I don't like. Everybody is carefully trained to their station, and seldom bursts out beyond it. The respect always shown towards me is something fine — and depressing. I can easily feel how this deference to superiors is ingrained in all.

But Froude - dear old noble fellow-is splendid. I

Walking and Talking

love him more than I ever did in America. He is great, broad, manly-democratic in the best sense of the word, scorning all sycophancy and meanness, accepting all that is around him, yet more proud of his literary profession than of his kinship with these people whom he quietly controls. There are only a few literary men like him here, but they are kings. I could not have had a better introduction to them than through Froude, who knows them all, who is Tennyson's best friend, and who is anxious to make my entrée among them a success. I had forgotten that Canon Kingsley, whom you liked so much, is Froude's brotherin-law, until Froude reminded me of it. So it is like being among friends here.

So far I've avoided seeing any company here; but Froude and I walk and walk, and talk and talk.

I'll write you from London. God bless you all. — Your affectionate

FRANK

"He killed the hare"

MY

(To T. Edgar Pemberton)

̈Y DEAR PEMBERTON, — Don't be alarmed if you should hear of my having nearly blown the top of my head off. Last Monday I had my face badly cut by the recoil of an overloaded gun. I do not know yet beneath these bandages whether I shall be permanently marked. At present I am invisible, and have tried to keep the accident secret.

When the surgeon was stitching me together the son of the house, a boy of twelve, came timidly to the door of my room. "Tell Mr. Bret Harte it's all right," he said;

"he killed the hare!" - Yours always,

BRET HARTE

For certain purposes Edwin Laurence Godkin prefers

England to America

ADHURST ST. MARY, PETERSFIELD, [ENGLAND]

Aug. 16, 1897

MY

Y DEAR SEDGWICK: — There are many things here which would reconcile me to America, but there is no country in the world today in which you can be very happy if you care about politics and the progress of mankind, while there are many in which you can be very comfortable, if you occupy yourself simply with gardening, lawn tennis and true religion. This is one of them. I think I could prepare for heaven far more easily here than in America.

Abigail Adams disapproves of Paris and Parisiennes, in short, prefers Boston

(To Miss Cranch)

́Y DEAR LUCY, . . . You inquire of me how I like

MY

...

Paris. Why, they tell me I am no judge, for that I have not seen it yet. One thing, I know, and that is that I have smelt it. If I was agreeably disappointed in London, I am as much disappointed in Paris. It is the very dirtiest place I ever saw. There are some buildings and some squares, which are tolerable; but in general the streets are narrow, the shops, the houses, inelegant and dirty, the streets full of lumber and stone, with which they build. Boston cannot boast so elegant public buildings; but, in every other respect, it is as much superior in my eyes to Paris, as London is to Boston. To have had Paris tolerable to me, I should not have gone to London. As to the people here, they are more given to hospitality

A Very Bad One

than in England, it is said. I have been in company with but one French lady since I arrived; for strangers here make the first visit, and nobody will know you until you have waited upon them in form.

This lady I dined with at Dr. Franklin's. She entered the room with a careless, jaunty air; upon seeing ladies who were strangers to her, she bawled out, “Ah! mon Dieu, where is Franklin? Why did you not tell me there were ladies here?" You must suppose her speaking all this in French. "How I look!" said she, taking hold of a chemise made of tiffany, which she had on over a blue lutestring, and which looked as much upon the decay as her beauty, for she was once a handsome woman; her hair was frizzled; over it she had a small straw hat, with a dirty gauze half-handkerchief round it, and a bit of dirtier gauze, than ever my maids wore, was bowed on behind. She had a black gauze scarf thrown over her shoulders. She ran out of the room; when she returned, the Doctor entered at one door, she at the other; upon which she ran forward to him, caught him by the hand, "Helas! Franklin "; then gave him a double kiss, one upon each cheek, and another upon his forehead.

When we went into the room to dine, she was placed between the Doctor and Mr. Adams. She carried on the chief of the conversation at dinner, frequently locking her hand into the Doctor's, and sometimes spreading her arms upon the backs of both the gentlemen's chairs, then throwing her arm carelessly upon the Doctor's neck.

I should have been greatly astonished at this conduct, if the good Doctor had not told me that in this lady I should see a genuine Frenchwoman, wholly free from affectation or stiffness of behaviour, and one of the best women in the world. For this I must take the Doctor's word; but I should have set her down for a very bad one, although