ollen, where Lady Eleanor Butler and Miss
Ponsonby passed their peaceful days in long, uninterrupted friendship.
Of course the haunts of Burns, the home of Scott, the whole region made
sacred by Wordsworth and the group to which he belongs would be so many
shrines to which I should make pilgrimages.

I own, also, to having something of the melodramatic taste so notable in
Victor Hugo. I admired the noble facade of Wells cathedral and the grand
old episcopal palace, but I begged the bishop to show me the place where
his predecessor, Bishop Kidder, and his wife, were killed by the falling
chimney in the "Great Storm."--I wanted to go to Devizes, and see the
monument in the market-place, where Ruth Pierce was struck dead with a
lie in her mouth,--about all which I had read in early boyhood. I
contented myself with a photograph of it which my friend, Mr. Willett,
went to Devizes and bought for me.

There are twenty different Englands, every one of which it would be a
delight to visit, and I should hardly know with which of them to begin.

The few remarks I have to make on what I saw and heard have nothing
beyond the value of first impressions; but as I have already said, if
these are simply given, without pretending to be anything more, they are
not worthless. At least they can do little harm, and may sometimes amuse
a reader whom they fail to instruct. But we must all beware of hasty
conclusions. If a foreigner of limited intelligence were whirled through
England on the railways, he would naturally come to the conclusion that
the chief product of that country is _mustard_, and that its most
celebrated people are Mr. Keen and Mr. Colman, whose great advertising
boards, yellow letters on a black ground, and black letters on a yellow
ground, stare the traveller in the face at every station.

Of the climate, as I knew it in May and the summer months, I will only
say that if I had any illusions about May and June in England, my
fireplace would have been ample evidence that I was entirely
disenchanted. The Derby day, the 26th of May, was most chilly and
uncomfortable; at the garden-party at Kensington Palace, on the 4th of
June, it was cold enough to make hot drinks and warm wraps a comfort, if
not a necessity. I was thankful to have passed through these two ordeals
without ill consequences. Drizzly, or damp, or cold, cloudy days were
the rule rather than the exception, while we were in London. We had some
few hot days, espec