upplanted by Irish or worse, if
any worse there be at turning neatness into dirty disorder.

That older American population was deeply English, with a thousand rural
English traditions religiously preserved; and the chief of these is clean
_neatness_, which, when fully carried out, always results in simple,
unaffected beauty. This was very strongly shown in the Quaker gardens,
once so common in Philadelphia--and in the people.

We arrived in London, and went directly to the Trubners', No. 29 Upper
Hamilton Terrace, N.W. The first person who welcomed me was Mr.
Delepierre, an idol of mine for years; and the first thing I did was to
borrow half-a-crown of him to pay the cab, having only French money with
me. It was a charming house, with a large garden, so redolent of roses
that it might have served Chriemhilda of old for a romance. For twenty
years that house was destined to be an occasional home and a dwelling
where we were ever welcome, and where every Sunday evening I had always
an appointed place at dinner, and a special arm-chair for the
never-failing Havannah. Mrs. Trubner had, in later years, two boxes of
Havannahs of the best, which had belonged to G. H. Lewes, and which
George Eliot gave her after his death. I have kept two _en souvenir_. I
knew a man once who had formed a large collection of such relics. There
was a cigar which he had received from Louis Napoleon, and one from
Bismarck, and so forth. But, alas! once while away on his travels, the
whole museum was smoked up by a reckless under-graduate younger brother.
_In fumo exit_.

How many people well known to the world--or rather how few who were
not--have I met there--Edwin Arnold, G. H. Lewes, H. Dixon, M. Van der
Weyer, Frith the artist, Mrs. Trubner's uncle Lord Napier of Magdala,
Pigott, Norman Lockyer, Bret Harte, "and full many more," scholars,
poets, editors, and, withal, lady writers of every good shade, grade, and
quality. How many of them all have passed since then full silently into
the Silent Land, where we may follow, but return no more! How many a
pleasant smile and friendly voice and firm alliances and genial
acquaintances, often carried out in other lands, date their beginning in
my memory to the house in Hamilton Terrace! How often have I heard by
land or sea the familiar greeting, "I think I met you once at the
Trubners'!" For it was a salon, a centre or sun with many bright and
cheering rays--a civilising institution!