d looks like a poet's child,
and a poet. It has something "doomed" (what the Germans call
"fatal") in its appearance--such a preternaturally thoughtful,
mournful expression for a little child, such a marked brow over the
heavy blue eyes, such a transparent skin, such pale-golden hair.
John says the little creature is an elf-child. I think it is the
prophecy of a poet. [And so, indeed, it was, as all who know
Adelaide Procter's writings will agree--a poet who died too early
for the world, though not before she had achieved a poet's fame,
and proved herself her father's worthy daughter.] ... In the
afternoon, I found my mother deep in her French novel, from which
she read me two very striking passages--the description of
Esmeralda, which was like a fine painting, and extremely beautiful,
and the sketch of Quasimodo's life, ending with his riding on the
great bell of the cathedral. Very powerful and very insane--a sort
of mental nightmare, giving one as much the idea of disorder of
intellect as such an image occurring to one in a dream would of a
disordered stomach. Harmony, order, the beauty of goodness and the
justice of God, are alike ignored in such works. How sad it is for
the future as well as for the present!

_Monday, 30th._--King Charles' martyrdom gives me a holiday
to-night. Excellent martyr! Victor Hugo has set my mother raving.
She didn't sleep all night, and says the book is bad in its
tendency and shocking in its details; nevertheless, she goes on
reading it....

_Tuesday, January 31st._-- ... Went to Turnerelli's. He is making a
bust of me, that will perhaps be like--the man in the moon. Dall
was kind enough to read to me Mrs. Jameson's "Christina" while I
sat. I like it extremely. After I came home, read Shirley's play of
"The Two Sisters." I didn't like it much. It is neither very
interesting, very witty, nor very poetical, and might almost be a
modern work for its general want of power and character. The women
appear to me a little exaggerated--the one is mad and the other
silly. At the theater in the evening the house was very good
indeed--the play, "Katharine of Cleves;" but poor Mr. Warde was so
ill he could hardly stand.

_Wednesday, February 1st._-- ... Drove out with Henry in the new
carriage. It is very handsome,