lustrated edition of the work.

And as we are talking of bragging, and I am on my travels, can I
forget one mighty republic--one--two mighty republics, where people are
notoriously fond of passing off their claret for port? I am very glad,
for the sake of a kind friend, that there is a great and influential
party in the United, and, I trust, in the Confederate States,* who
believe that Catawba wine is better than the best Champagne. Opposite
that famous old White House at Washington, whereof I shall ever have
a grateful memory, they have set up an equestrian statue of General
Jackson, by a self-taught American artist of no inconsiderable genius
and skill. At an evening-party a member of Congress seized me in a
corner of the room, and asked me if I did not think this was THE FINEST
EQUESTRIAN STATUE IN THE WORLD? How was I to deal with this plain
question, put to me in a corner? I was bound to reply, and accordingly
said that I did NOT think it was the finest statue in the world. "Well,
sir," says the Member of Congress, "but you must remember that Mr. M----
had never seen a statue when he made this!" I suggested that to see
other statues might do Mr. M---- no harm. Nor was any man more willing
to own his defects, or more modest regarding his merits, than the
sculptor himself, whom I met subsequently. But oh! what a charming
article there was in a Washington paper next day about the impertinence
of criticism and offensive tone of arrogance which Englishmen adopted
towards men and works of genius in America! "Who was this man, who" &c.
&c.? The Washington writer was angry because I would not accept this
American claret as the finest port-wine in the world. Ah me! It is about
blood and not wine that the quarrel now is, and who shall foretell its
end?

* Written in July, 1861.

How much claret that would be port if it could is handed about in every
society! In the House of Commons what small-beer orators try to pass for
strong? Stay: have I a spite against any one? It is a fact that the wife
of the Member for Bungay has left off asking me and Mrs. Roundabout to
her evening-parties. Now is the time to have a slap at him. I will say
that he was always overrated, and that now he is lamentably falling
off even from what he has been. I will back the Member for Stoke Poges
against him; and show that the dashing young Member for Islington is a
far sounder man than either. Have I any little literary animosities? Of
course n