I am so glad you felt you got so complete an idea of Wagner from my
letter. I was a little afraid I hadn't done the whole thing justice,
but I assure you there were many more people there than I thought of
suggesting, and the operas, tho' long, are very delightful.

Here in Munich the chief thing is the picture gallery, as of course at
this time of year all fashionable society is away and the theatres and
opera either closed or giving second-rate performances. There are more
musees than you really care to visit, and are full of masterpieces,
many quite as atrocious as masterpieces so often are. The principal
one--its name begins with a P--is the one we've been to.

I wish you could see the Rubens, or else it's the Van Dykes--I forget
which, but they are beautiful; and when one thinks how long ago they
were painted, it's wonderful, isn't it? One thing awfully interesting
about a picture gallery is to see the absurd difference in women's
dress now and in former times; don't you think so? And sometimes one
gets ideas for one's self.

This particular gallery is altogether one of the most satisfactory I've
ever been in. It wasn't crowded full of Baedeker people and that sort
of thing. In the second room we went in we met Lord and Lady Jenks and
the Countess of Towns. That was the room where we saw a portrait the
living image of Janet Cowther. We all shrieked with laughter! You know
how she has what my vulgar little brother calls an "ingrowing face"--it
sinks in instead of coming out, so that the poor creature can't know
what it seems like to have a real profile. It's extraordinary that
there should have been two such faces in the world--don't you think
so?--even with two or three hundred years between them. The portrait
was painted by--dear me! I can't remember, but it was some one we all
know. There's one thing I shouldn't mind, and that is knowing the
lady's corset maker; I'd like to give his address to Janet, because, my
dear, in spite of her face he had made the lady's figure beautiful. I
think that's really the nicest part of a picture gallery--seeing comic
likenesses to your friends.

Lady Jenks and I sat down on an uncomfortable bench without any back
and talked away for nearly an hour. What an amusing creature she is!
Has stories to tell about everybody under the sun. By the way, she
vowed you and your husband got on awfully, and only lived together as a
matter of form! I took up your cudgels, my dear, and told h