disqualifying influence of these circumstances will be comprehended without my opening the sanctuary of private griefs.

I was aware that our stayers-at-home had already something too much of churches, statues, and pictures, and yet that they cannot well imagine how much they make up the existence of tourists in the Old World. I have sedulously avoided this rock, and must trust for any little interest my book may possess to the honesty with which I have recorded my impressions, and to the fresh aspect of familiar things to the eye of a denizen of the New World. The fragmentary state in which my letters appear owing to my fear of wearying readers less interested than my own family by prolonged details or prosing reflections, or disgusting them with the egotism of personal experience.

is

One word to my English reader, rather of explanation than apology, which I trust the case does not require. I have unscrupulously mentioned the name of such distinguished English people as it was my good fortune to see. I could have screened myself from reproach by giving merely their initials; but, as they are too well known for this device to

afford them any shelter, it seemed to me but a paltry affectation of delicacy. I might plead the authority of English travellers in the United States; but if wrong, no authority justifies it; and if right, it needs none. I have confined my notices strictly to public characters-to gallery portraits; for so such persons as Mr. Rogers, and even that most refined and delicate of gentlewomen, Miss Joanna Baillie, may be strictly called, after the full exhibitions in Moore's Life of Byron and Lockhart's Life of Scott. I have violated no confidence, for none was reposed in me. My opportunities of social intercourse were few and brief; and I should have omitted these slight records of them, but for the wish to transmit to my friends at home my delightful impressions of those to whom we all owe many happy hours. Perhaps my anxiety is superfluous; the King of Ashantee was anxious to know what the English people said. of him, but I never heard that the English people cared to know what the King of Ashantee said of

and yet, methink i would be

of the English Heneral

minded what the King of Aphantae said

1939

しか

Lexington are

Yook! May K. Mathis deli's "Kabooe"

Inond to.

nov.

Captain S.'s cutter took us off the ship this morning at nine o'clock. It was at last a sad parting from our messmates, with whom we have been for a month separated from all the world, and involved in a common destiny; and from the ship, which seems like a bit of home, for the feet of the friends we have left there have trodden it.

When I touched English ground I could have fallen on my knees and kissed it; but a wharf is not quite the locale for such a demonstration, and spectators operate like strait-jackets upon enthu-/ siasm, so I contented myself with a mental salutation of the home of our fathers, the native land of one of our dearest friends, and the birthplace of "the bright, the immortal names" that we have venerated from our youth upward.

I forewarn you, my dear C., not to look for any statistics from me-any "valuable information." I shall try to tell you truly what I see and hear; to "chronicle," as our friend Mr. Dewey says, "while. they are fresh, my sensations." Everything looks novel and foreign to us: the quaint forms of the old, sad-coloured houses; the arched, antique gateways; VOL. I.-B.

the royal busts niched in an old wall; the very dark colouring of the foliage, and the mossy stems of the trees, We seem to have passed from the fresh, bright, youth to the old age of the world. The form and colouring of the people are different from those of ours. They are stouter, more erect, and more sanguine.

Our friends Dr. M. and his wife have decided to remain with us while we stay here, so we make eight in all; and as we stand in the bow-window of the George, staring, wondering, exclaiming, and laughing, we must make a group of "homespuns just come up to town" worthy Cruikshank's pencil. And, by-the-way, the passing equipages appear to us the originals of Cruikshank's illustrations, and the parties driving in them fac-similes of Pickwick (the modern Don Quixote) and his club.

Basil Hall is living here. We have had some discussion whether we should recall ourselves to his memory by sending to him Mr. A.'s letter and our cards. We have no individual claims on him, and, as Americans, there is no love lost between us. R. cited Scott's opinion that it is uncivil to both parties not to deliver promptly a letter of introduction; so, submitting to such sound authority, Dr. M. has gone off to leave ours at Captain Hall's door, and then he will leave his card at ours, and there the matter will end.

We have been walking over the town, over the ramparts, and through some fine gravelled avenues shaded with elms. Don't fancy our elms, with their drooping, embowering branches-no, nothing so