e circle of readers. The narrative is concerned with persons and
events that have interested me during the busy hours of a lengthy life.
I have been deeply impressed by the changes wrought by time in the modes
of education, which are now so much at variance with those of my
childhood, and in the manners and customs of those with whom I have
mingled.

I should be guilty of an act of grave injustice if I failed to express
my grateful acknowledgments for the aid so unselfishly rendered, in a
score of ways, by my daughter, Mrs. Roswell Randall Hoes, without which
these pages would not, and could not, have been written.

M. GOUVERNEUR.

CONTENTS

CHAPTER PAGE

I.--EARLY LONG ISLAND DAYS 1

II.--NEW YORK AND SOME NEW YORKERS 21

III.--SCHOOL-DAYS AND EARLY FRIENDS 50

IV.--LIFE AND EXPERIENCES IN THE METROPOLIS 69

V.--LONG BRANCH, NEWPORT AND ELSEWHERE 96

VI.--SOME DISTINGUISHED ACQUAINTANCES 118

VII.--FASHION AND LETTERS 138

VIII.--WASHINGTON IN THE FORTIES 170

IX.--SOCIAL LEADERS IN WASHINGTON LIFE 194

X.--DIPLOMATIC CORPS AND OTHER CELEBRITIES 229

XI.--MARRIAGE AND CONTINUED LIFE IN WASHINGTON 256

XII.--SOJOURN IN CHINA AND RETURN 288

XIII.--THE CIVIL WAR AND LIFE IN MARYLAND 312

XIV.--VISIT TO THE FAR SOUTH AND RETURN TO WASHINGTON 335

XV.--TO THE PRESENT DAY 365

ILLUSTRATIONS

PAGE

Mrs. Gouverneur _Frontispiece_

Samuel L. Gouverneur, Junior 116

Mrs. John Still Winthrop, _nee_ Armistead, by Sully 146

Mrs. Charles Eames, _nee_ Campbell, by Gambadella 178

Brigadier General Winfield Scott, U.S.A., by Ingham 202

Mrs. James Munroe, _nee_ Kortright, by Benjamin West 258

Miniature of James Monroe, painted in Paris in 1794 by Seme 284

Mrs. Gouverneur's three daughters, Miss Gouve