so longing for the flesh-pots of dear dirty old
London"; and then one knew that her return to Charles Street would
not be long delayed. She was very fond indeed of country life, for
a short time, and she was interested in gardens, but she really
preferred streets. "Eridge is such a paradise--especially the
quadrupeds," she once wrote to me from a house in which she found
peculiar happiness. But she liked bipeds best.

However one may postpone the question, sooner or later it is
necessary to consider the quality of Lady Dorothy Nevill's wit,
since all things converge in her to that. But her wit is so
difficult to define that it is not surprising that one avoids, as
long as possible, coming actually to grips with it. We may lay the
foundation of a formula, perhaps, by saying that it was a compound
of solid good sense and an almost reckless whimsicality of speech.
The curious thing about it was that it was not markedly
intellectual, and still less literary. It had not the finish of
such wit as is preserved in anthologies of humour. Every one who
enjoyed the conversation of Lady Dorothy must have perceived with
annoyance how little he could take away with him. Her phrases did
not often recur to please that inward ear, "which is the bliss of
solitude." What she said seemed at the time to be eminently right
and sane; it was exhilarating to a high degree; it was lighted up
by merriment, and piquancy, and salt; but it was the result of a
kind of magic which needed the wand of the magician; it could not
be reproduced by an imitator. It is very unfortunate, but the fact
has to be faced. When we tell our grandchildren that Lady Dorothy
Nevill was the finest female wit of her age, they will ask us for
examples of her talent, and we shall have very few to give.

She liked to discuss people better than books or politics or
principles, although she never shrank from these. But it was what
she said about human beings that kept her interlocutors hanging on
her lips. She made extraordinarily searching strictures on persons,
without malice, but without nonsense of any kind. Her own
favourites were treated with reserve in this respect: it was as
though they were put in a pen by themselves, not to be criticised
so long as they remained in favour; and she was not capric