"Possession
of property in Scotland evidence of stealing in England."

I was guilty of one piece of stupid folly. Mr. Hughes kindly
proposed to take me to see Carlyle. This was not very long
after our war, when our people were full of indignation at
Carlyle's bitter and contemptuous speech about us, especially
his "American Iliad in a Nutshell." I was a little doubtful
about what sort of a reception I should get, and declined
the invitation. I have bitterly regretted this ever since.
My brother visited Carlyle about 1846, bearing with him a
letter from Emerson. Carlyle was very civil to him, and liked
him very much, as appears by a letter from him to Mr. Emerson.

During the visit I heard a great debate between Gladstone
and Disraeli. A brief account of it will be found in the
chapter on "Some Famous Orators I have Heard."

A friend in Worcester gave me a letter to Mr. Wornum, the
Director of the National Gallery, with whom he had been a
fellow-pupil at Kensington. Mr. Wornum received me with great
cordiality. He asked me to come to the Gallery the next
day, when it would be closed to the public. He said he would
be glad to show it to me then, when we would be free of interruption.
He was the author of what I understand to be an excellent
history of painting, and was regarded as the most competent
judge in Europe of the value and merit of paintings. I suppose
Parliament would at any time, on his sole recommendation,
have given ten or twenty or perhaps fifty thousand guineas
for a masterpiece. I shall never forget the delight of that
day. He told me the history of the great paintings in the
National Gallery, some of which had belonged to monarchs,
popes, noblemen or famous merchants of almost all the countries
in Europe. He said that while there were many larger galleries,
the National Gallery was the best in the world as affording
the best and most characteristic examples of every school
of painting. I cannot remember much that was said in that
long day, interrupted only by a pleasant lunch together. But
it was a day full of romance. It was as if I had had in my
hand the crown jewels of every potentate in the world, and
somebody had told me the history of each gem. For this picture
Francis the First, or Charles V., or Henry VIII. had been
bidders. This had belonged to Lorenzo de Medici, or Pope
Leo X. This had come from the famous collection of Charles
I., scattered through Europe on his death;