the Royal Society against the election
of a certain Professor whose glory lies in vivisection.

For an appropriate end to these discursive sentences, let me add this
poetic morsel in my own vein. Mr. Butler of Philadelphia was quite right
in his judgment of my _indoles_: I "write by impulse on occasion." Here
is a very recent instance in point. I had lately visited Mr. Barraud's
painted-window works near Seven Dials, and when I told Mr. Herbert Rix,
our Assistant-Secretary, of what you may read below, he exhorted me to
put it into verse, which I did impromptu, and sent it to him: now thus
first printed:--

"I saw the artist in a colour-shop
Staining some bits of glass variously shaped
To map the painted window of a church,
And marvelled that the tintings all seemed wrong;
Red, green, and brown should have been interchanged
To show the colours right. Why did he use
His brush so carelessly, my folly asked.
'Wait for the fire,--the fire will make all right,
The reds and greens and browns will change again,
Fusing harmoniously,' so Knowledge spake;
And thus a thought of wisdom came to me
Touching the truth, how kindly curative
Must be the pains and cares and griefs of life,
For that the furnace of adversity,
Melts to its proper good each seeming ill.
Again, I noticed how the artist chose
Not clear good glass, whether of plate or crown,
But common-looking stuff, bubbled and flawed,
As if selected for its blemishes
Rather than for transparent purity.
'Why not choose better glass to paint upon?'
To this he answered, 'Wouldn't do at all.
My faces mustn't look lifeless and dull,
But, as instinct with motion, light and life,
Not in enamelled uniformity:
The sunshine cannot sparkle where all's smooth;
I choose the most imperfect panes to make
A perfect, vigorous picture.'--Then I learnt
How wonderfully Providence is pleased
To cause all evil things to help the good;
Nay, deeper, to ordain that good itself
Can scarcely be discerned without the harm
Of some companion-ill; even as gold
Is useless unalloyed; and Very Light
Unshadowed kills, as unapproachable;
And absolute unmitigated good
Alone is Godhead. Every creature here
(In this our human trial-world at least)
Is full of faults and spots and blemishes,
If only to set off his better self,
His talents, g