THE A.F. MEMORIAL LIBRARY THE LIBRARY OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA DAVIS THE CORRESPONDENCE OF JOHN LOTHROP MOTLEY, D.C.L., ATJTHOB OF "THE HISTORY OF THE RISE OF THE DUTCH REPUBLIC," "THE HISTORY OF THE UNITED NETHERLANDS," ETC. EDITED BY GEORGE WILLIAM CURTIS. IN TWO VOLUMES. VOL. I. SECOND EDITION. WITH PORTRAIT. LONDON : JOHN MURRAY, ALBEMARLE STREET, 1889. LIBRARY UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA DAVIS LONDON: PRINTED BY WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, LIMITED, STAMFORD STBEET AND CHARING CROSS. PREFACE. THE admirable Memoir of Mr. Motley by his friend Oliver Wendell Holmes, renders the addition of any biographical notice to these volumes unnecessary. The letters now published were written mainly to members of his family, and have been collected by his daughters. In preparing them for publication, the editor has withheld whatever he believed that the writer's good judgment and thoughtful consideration for others would have omitted. This rule excludes comments upon persons and affairs which, however innocent or playful, might cause needless pain or misapprehension. It excludes, also, much of the repetition which naturally occurs in such letters, and a large part of the domestic and friendly messages and allusions, which although illustrating the writer's generous sympathy and affectionate disposition, are essentially private. If much of such matter is still left, it is because, with all his interest in literary pursuits and in public affairs, Mr. Motley was essen- tially a domestic man, and a more rigid exclusion could not have been made without injustice to his character. Otherwise the letters are printed as they were written. Occasional breaks in the series of letters especially after the death of Mr. Motley's mother, with whom he maintained a full and affectionate correspondence for forty years are due chiefly to the fact that, when surrounded by his family and engrossed by many cares, he had but little inclination or leisure for friendly letter- writing. This was the case in 1870 ; 88221 iy PREFACE. and the editor has been able to give but two letters written during that year one addressed to the Duchess of Argyll, and the other to Dr. Holmes. The circumstances of Mr. Motley's resignation of the mission to Austria, and of his retirement from the English mission, are told accurately and adequately in Dr. Holmes's Memoir. The publication of private correspondence upon the subject would add nothing to the facts as related by the biographer, and would needlessly re-open controversy. Mr. Motley's deep feeling upon the subject, however, which was well known to his friends, is expressed in a few brief allusions which have been retained in the letters now published, and for the facts the reader is referred to the Memoir. CONTENTS TO VOL. I. CHAPTER I. EARLY YEAES. PAG* Letters from school Studies and pastimes Death of Governor Brooks * Lionel Lincoln 'Goes to Round Hill SchoolCooper's novels * Hope Leslie' 1 CHAPTER II. GERMANY; UNIVERSITY LIFE. First voyage to Europe Cuxhaven The weather during the voyage Incidents of the voyage Gottingen Arrangements for his first Semester at the University Plans for the vacation The German language Account of journey from Hamburg to Gottingen Ger- man postilions The Hartz Mountains German university life Costume of the students Duelling customs " Briiderschaft " Plesse Castle George Washington's letter on the Humane Society Berlin Studying Law Public galleries and public money Daily routine at Berlin Amusements Taglioni Devrient Goetz von Berlichingen The " Vons and the not-Vons " Visit to Potsdam Plans for the future . 10 CHAPTER III. AUSTBIA FRANCE ITALY. Vienna Madame de Goethe Tieck and his works Journey from Vienna to Styria, Tyrol, etc. German postilions Styrian Alps Molk Amstetten Neubach St. Florian Salzburg An ancient hermitage Burial customs Hallein Salt mines Salzach Valley Bad-Gastein Nas sfeld "Old Testament scenery" A remote village Rome The Apollo Belvedere Naples Hadrian's villa Reviving old scenes Guide's Aurora Reflections on the art treasures yi CONTENTS. of Home Tour in Sicily Catania Taormina Classical associa- tions Etna An ascent under difficulties An arduous climb And a disappointment Girgenti A perilous voyage to Malta Keturn to Paris Salisbury Cathedral Comparison of English and foreign cathedrals Stonehenge . . . . . . . . 35 CHAPTER IV. BUSSIA. Mr. Motley's marriage Voyage to Europe Discomforts of steamers Manchester The MacLeod case London En route to St. Peters- burg Lord Lyndhurst Mr. Clarke Sir Charles Vaughan Prussia Her vicissitudes and her condition Konigsberg A local legend Tilsit Tauroggen Arrival at St. Petersburg Russian winter Official formalities Expenses of living The climate of Russia John Randolph's despatch Russian society The Winter Palace Pre- sentation at Court Court formalities The Czar A Court ball The Grand Duke Michael More presentations Count Levachoff's house Miss Porter Taglioni Resignation of Secretaryship of Legation Nesselrode Sir William Wylie Peter the Great St. Petersburg and its public institutions Casimir Perier Quarrel between French and Russian Courts Journey to Berlin Halle, a quizzical town Maurice church and its legend Weimar Madame de Goethe Frankfort-on-the-Main Paris Guizot Thiers as a speaker Brussels John van Eyck, the inventor of oil-painting Diary in Russia The Great Bazaar How it is guarded at night Russian taxes and Guilds Food supply Army Manufactures The Blessing of the Waters Peter the Great's house Military hospitals The Hermitage Gallery Orphan asylums . * .' . 62 CHAPTER V. COMMENCEMENT OF THE * HISTORY ' RESIDENCE AT DRESDEN. Commencement of the ' History of the Rise of the Dutch Republic ' Arrival in Europe The Rhine Holland The duel with the sea Polders The Dutch Masters Dresden Its climate The Opera Sontag A picnic excursion Prospects of the Presidential election The Madonna di San Sis to The Green Vaults Progress of the * History ' Prince John of Saxony Death of Daniel Webster * Uncle Tom's Cabin ' and the Slavery Question The King and Queen of Saxony The Court and its etiquette Marriage of Princess Vasa and Prince Albert Court festivities . ... 122 CONTENTS. VII CHAPTER VI. PUBLICATION OF * THE RISE OF THE DUTCH REPUBLIC.' PAGE The Hague Residence at Brussels Mr. Motley's daughters Letter to Dr. 0. W. Holmes Daily life at Brussels Companions of past generations The River Senne The Archives Literary silkworms Rubens and his art The Shakespeare of painting Arrival in London Mr. Forsy th Preliminaries of publication John Murray English and American politics compared Preparations for publi- cation Mr. Prescott Frankfort Basel Visit to Herr von Bismarck His character and career His family life Return to England An English hotel Florence Theodore S. Fay Paris under Louis Napoleon Americans in Florence Miss Alexander Thomas Ball Mr. Motley's constitutional mekncholy Description of Florence Her brilliant past Her achievements and her feuds Her present condition Publication of the * History of the Dutch Republic ' Mr. Prescott's praise of it Criticisms in the English and in the American press Sorrento Letters about the * History ' from Mr. T. S. Fay Dr. 0. W. Holmes Mr. C. C. Felton Letter to Dr. 0. W. Holmes on his poem Letters about the * History ' from Mr. G. Bancroft and Washington Irving ....... . .'" . .158 CHAPTER VII. BRUSSELS AT WORK ON 'THE UNITED NETHERLANDS.' Letter to Dr. 0. W. Holmes Access to the State Paper Office Nice in December Work on the ' History of the United Netherlands ' At Brussels, and in Holland M. Gachard M. Groen van Prinsterer Reception of the ' Dutch Republic ' in Holland Dutch society The Hague Work at the Archives in Brussels And in Paris Visit to the Bismarcks Frankfort 204 CHAPTER VIII. LONDON SOCIETY. Madame de Bismarck Journey down the Rhine And to London Letter to Dr. 0. W. Holmes Literary despondency The ' Autocrat of the Breakfast Table ' Stale metaphors Thackeray's praise of the ' Autocrat ' London Society The Cosmopolitan William Stirling Monckton Milnes Mr. A. H. Layard The State Paper Office Dinner at the Mackintoshes W. M. Thackeray Lord Carlisle The viii CONTENTS. PAGE Athenseum The Derby The Opera Alboni Piccolomini Lord and Lady Lyndhurst Mr. Henry Keeve Chiswick House Sir C. " Lyell Lady Byron Dinner at Thackeray's Lord Macaulay Clubs The Guild of Authors Dean Milman England's " delicious women of sixty " Thackeray's lecture at Lady Stanley's Mrs. Norton A dinner with Mr. Peabody "The Leviathan" Lady Stanley The Duchess of Somerset Breakfast party at Wimbledon Park Lord John Russell English politics The " Derby-Dizzies " Disraeli's speech at Slough The Grandmothers of England Marquis of Lansdowne Dinner at Lady Airlie's Henry Hallam The Charity Children in St. Paul's The Chapter Coffee-house The Temple Church Dinner with Lord Palmerston Lord Clarendon Baron Brunnow Abraham Hayward Sir R. Murchison Lady William Russell A Richmond dinner Lord Brougham and Lord Lyndhurst Lord Stratford de Redcliffe The House of Commons Dinner at Lansdowne House Mrs. Norton's description of Disraeli Lord Goderich Lord Brougham on the Slave Trade Breakfast and dinner parties Madame Mohl House of Lords Debate on Cuba . 220 CHAPTER IX. LONDON SOCIETY continued. London dinner parties Pembroke Lodge Lady J. Russell Sir H. Seymour Lord Gifford Dufferin Lodge Cliveden The Duchess of Sutherland Breakfast with Monckton Milnes Thackeray at work Danby Seymour Harrow speeches The Rothschilds Stafford House " An honest diner-out " Concert at Lansdowne House Lord Stanhope "Owen Meredith "" Tom Brown " Hatfield S. Wilberforce Lord Shaftesbury Lord Denbigh Dinner at Chis- wick House Holland House Stoke Park Gray's ' Elegy ' Dinner at Holland House Lord Macaulay Lord Clarendon Cassiobury Park A series of dinner parties Bath House Ball at Apsley House India Debate in House of Lords Lord Wensleydale Mount Felix East Horsley Towers Hayward Prince Frederick of Schleswig-Holstein Mr. Kinglake -Journey to the Hague . . 274 CHAPTER X. THE HAGUE. Work at the Hague The National Archives Presentation to the Queen of Holland "The House in the Wood" A Royal dinner-party- Prince Frederick The American Revivalists Lord Dunfermline CONTENTS. IX PAGE Family anniversaries A Dutch literary celebrity The King of Holland Court fetes Court ball in Amsterdam Prince Henry The Prince of Orange 303 CHAPTER XI. EOME PAETS. Rome Allibone's notice of the ' History ' Other letters of commenda- tionWork on the ' History of the United Netherlands ' Its diffi- culties Want of a hero Mr. Story Letter from M. Guizot about the ' Dutch Republic 'The Prince of Wales in Rome Outbreak of the War in Italy Mr. Motley and family go to Paris Causes and prospects of the War Return to England Gloomy prospects of European politics -- * . . . . . . . . 315 CHAPTER XII. RESIDENCE IN ENGLAND PUBLICATION OF 'THE UNITED NETHERLANDS.' Oatlands Park Difficulties of his work London in November William Stirling East Sheen Professor Owen Mr. and Mrs. Grote John Murray and the ' History of the United Netherlands ' Letter from M. Guizot proposing Mr. Motley a Corresponding Member of the French Academy Letter to Dr. 0. W. Holmes about the ' Autocrat ' International copyright Mr. Motley's affection for England American and European politics Letter from Mr. N. Hawthorne < The Marble Faun' Letter from Dr. 0. W. Holmes Political and literary affairs in the States Praise of the Dutch Republic ' The Royal Academy dinner D.C.L. at Oxford Oxford commemoration Letter from Lady Dufferin to Mrs. Norton Lady Dufferin and her > son Approaching completion of the ' United Netherlands ' Lord deGrey Studley Royal Fountains Abbey Sidney Herbert Visits in Scotland Keir Glen Quoich Mr. and Mrs. Ellice Inveraray The Duke of Argyll Taymouth Lord Breadalbane The Prince of Wales' visit to America Election of Abraham Lincoln Publica- tion of the first two volumes of the ' United Netherlands ' Letters of acknowledgment from M. St. Hilaire and from M. Guizot . . 329 CHAPTER XIII. THE CRISIS IN AMERICA. The Slavery Question in America A dangerous outlook Letter from Dr. 0. W. Holmes on the labours of an historian The gathering VOL. I. b .CONTENTS. PAGE storm Literary gossip from Boston Publication and reception of the * United Netherlands' in America The Secessionists and public . opinion in England Charles Dickens Mr. Wilkie Collins Letter from Mr. W. E. Forster on the crisis in America Letter to Dr. 0. W. Holmes ' Elsie Venner ' Letter to the Duchess of Argyll on the American crisis Mr. Motley goes to Boston State of public feeling Mr. Motley's letter to the Times Causes of the War Bitter feeling towards England A "war of principle" Unani- mous feeling throughout the North General Scott His supposed plans The army in camp Visit to Washington Evacuation of Harper's Ferry General McClellan Disposition of the army round Washington Lord Lyons The Four Articles of the Congress of Paris Mr. Seward's negotiations with England Abraham Lincoln England's policy The blockade and the cotton crop The Army of the Potomac Outpost skirmishes Massing of troops Arlington House Objects of the war misunderstood in England Mr. Chase Counter Revolution in Virginia and other States The Slavery Question England's attitude General McDowell General Scott and his subordinates Mr. Montgomery Blair Conversation with the President about England The President's Message. ; . . 357 LETTERS' OF JOHN LOTHBOP MOTLEY CHAPTER I. EARLY YEARS. Letters from school Studies and pastimes Death of Governor Brooks 'Lionel Lincoln' Goes to Round Hill School Cooper's novels 'Hope Leslie.' [At this time Motley was ten years old, and a pupil at the school of Charles W. Greene, near Boston.] To his Father. Jamaica Plain, May 13th, 1824. MY DEAR FATHER, I want to see you very much. I sup- pose you remember that it is my turn to come home on Saturday next ? This is Thursday, the day on which we speak. I was third best. The pieces which I spoke were Mr. Sprague's Prize Prologue and a most delectable comedy entitled and called 'The Cruel Tragedy of the Death of Pyramus and Thisbe,' in which I took the part of Thisbe. My nose has bled very often lately, but I believe it will not bleed much more. I have had a pain in my side once or twice. I hope you, mother, and all the family are well. Mr. Greene is very well. Mrs. Greene has a headache. I am, dear father, Your affectionate son, LOTHROP, VOL. I. B 2 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. I. "'*:{]> \ 3% tys Brother. Boston, /* S * f l v? '"Vf A " February 21st, 1825. MON CHER FRERE, J*espere'que vous etes bien ; je suis tres bien. Eduard a ete indispose, mais il est mieux. Nous repumes votre lettre aujourd'hui, et nous fumes bien aises d'apprendre que vous etes bien. Vous avez ete mepris, car Monsieur Adams est le President. Nous cappons maintenant, 1'examen doit avoir lieu le prochain Mercredi. Nous tous sommes tres bien et nous envoyons bien de 1'amour. Yotre affectueux frere, J. L. M. (N. B. This letter was lost, or it would have been sent before.) L'inauguration du President etait aujourd'hui : 1'ecole d'Eduard n'etait pas ouvert ; il n'allait pas. Eduard a repu les lettres. Ecriez-vous a me s'il vous plait le prochain fois que vous ecriez a eux. J. L. M. Edward is now writing you a letter, which he makes quite a business of. Our shop is an excellent one. We have made a drawer, a thing to wind twine on, exactly like those in grocers' shops. We have to write exercises now, and I have got used to them, so that I can write them without many mistakes. There is a report that a flood was to have been to-day, but I suppose that it was put off in deference to the President. Mr. Thos. K. Jones sent round a card saying that he would be at his house on the 4th of March (to-day), at any time after twelve o'clock, to congratulate each other on the election of John Quincy Adams to the Presidency of the United States, on which occasion he expects the favour of Mr. 's com- pany. Father and Uncle Edward received one of them, and went (his house is in Koxbury) and dined at Faneuil Hall. Messrs. Sprague, Percival, and Wells wrote an ode on the occasion, of which that of Mr. Percival was considered the best. I believe Mr. Labasse is going from Boston to New York, 1825.] SCHOOL DAYS. 3 to teach there during the summer. I have not told you that the flood is postponed till Monday next. A great many guns were fired this morning, and continued through the day. Mr. Leverett's father is very sick, for which reason he was not at school on Wednesday afternoon and Thursday. Governor Brooks died Monday morning, and was buried Thursday privately, as he made that request. I have read ' Lionel Lincoln,' which I think very interesting. There is a great deal about the Kevolutionary War in it, and it contains a full account of the Battle of Bunker's Hill. Lionel Lincoln is an English lord, and is the principal character in the book. When he comes to Boston, which he does in the beginning of the book, he goes to a near relation, called Madame Lechmere, who is very rich, and is another very principal character in the story. Mrs. Lechmere's house is in Tremont Street, which Governor Phillips now lives in. Good-night ! Yours affectionately, J. L. M. To his Mother. Northampton, 1 May 29th, 1825. DEAR MOTHER, I intend to have now the pleasure of writing you a few lines. I do not know when I have enjoyed myself so much as I did yesterday (Saturday). In the morning the gardens were distributed, and I worked in it an hour before school, and in the afternoon we worked a good while in them. After that we went to ride in a nutshell, otherwise a monster of a carryall, with five seats in it ; each seat holds five, so we had twenty-five in it ; and another carryall behind us as full as it could hold. After we came back we went into water, and it refreshed us very much. I wish you would send me up some nankeen pantaloons, as my woolenet ones are so tight that they are uncomfortable, and besides that woolenet is too 1 The Round Hill School at North- Mr. Joseph S. Cogswell, was at that ampton, Massachusetts, under the time well known throughout the United direction of Mr. George Bancroft and States. B 2 4 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. I. thick. I should like to have you send me up my French dictionary. I am reading Hume's * History of England/ which Mr. Cogswell lent me, and think it very interesting. I wish you would write as soon as you possibly can. I have commenced Spanish, which I like very much. I think this is a beautiful place. From my bed I can see a branch of the Green Mountains ; Mount Tom and Holyoke too I should like very much to go up them. Give my love to all at home, And believe me, Your affectionate son, J. L. MOTLEY. To Us Mother. Round Hill, Northampton, May 31st, 1825. MY DEAR MOTHER, I am going to keep a journal this week, and have begun to-day, Tuesday, as you will see by the date. Our gardens are excellent ones, being twenty feet broad and eighty long. Three other boys and myself own one together. We have made several beds and planted a good many things, such as corn, radishes, water and musk melons, etc. It is now about a quarter to one o'clock, so that, as we eat dinner at one, I shall not have time to write much, but I will continue it in the evening. A boy of the name of Barrett came to Bound Hill just now and into the school, where I am sitting now ; he is an old scholar and has cheeks as big as pumpkins. We have several new scholars, amongst whom is a boy by the name of Wilkinson, who owns a garden with me, and two Jews, by name Moses and Aaron David, and two Baltimore boys by the name of Treeze. I have been working in my garden this morning, and very hot work it is. We went into water yesterday, and last Saturday, so that we have been in three times this season. Mr. Bancroft said that the boys who pleased might go and work in their gardens, and that the rest might go in a swimming ; and I assure you that there was not one that did the former. 1826.] LIFE AT SCHOOL. 5 I study ' Charles XII.' in French, which I think very in- teresting, and it is much more by its being in French ; I can read French books very easily, which I do very often. Half-past one o'clock, I have just finished my dinner, and I have a half-hour to write you before school. You must certainly send me up some thinner clothes than woolenet. In the morning, from half-past five to seven, I study French ; after breakfast I study Spanish, from nine to half- past ten, when we go out and stay about ten or fifteen minutes ; and when we come in, I study Greek until twelve, when we are dismissed ; and in the afternoon I study Cicero and recite to Dr. Beck, a German. I think there is near sixty scholars in the school. We go down town to "meeting"; we go, Thomas and I, to Mr. Hall's. We had a blind man preach for us last Sunday ; he had got the hymns and his sermon by heart. Good-bye for this afternoon ! I have got acquainted with all the boys now. I translate a Spanish book, * Collections Espagnol,' with T. Bond. I wish you would send me up, if you can find it, my old French exercise book that I finished. I like Northampton every day more and more. I sleep in the same room with .Torn, W. Brewster, and a boy by the name of Forbes, a boy from South Carolina. Good-night ; it's about nine o'clock. J. L. MOTLEY. To his Father. Round Hill, April 29th, 1826. DEAK FATHER, I hope soon to receive a letter from you or mother. Almost all the boys are here now, a few from Balti- more and Philadelphia are wanting. Some of the Philadel- phia fellows came yesterday afternoon, and with these came a new boy, the smallest boy by far in school, I don't believe he is a bit bigger than Preble ; I suppose he is older though. I wish I had some marbles up here. It is what the boys 6 MOTLEY'S LETTEKS. [CHAP. I. principally have up here, but there are not many up here in all. I received my paint-box by Tom Appleton. I am in the upper school this term. There are not half so many this term as there were last. It is not very long before I shall come home in August, about four months. Mr. Cogswell says he should think I might enter Sopho- more, but I do not think I could, or at least if I should manage to shuffle in, I should always be the worst in my class, and should not be able to take any part at the end of my stay there, nor I don't believe that I shall be able to get a part in the Freshman class, but I will do my best. There have been very few new fellows this term, about ten, no more. All the Salem and Boston boys have come now. I never knew the Boston boys come so late some did not come till Thursday night ; some of the Salem boys did not come till Friday evening (day before yesterday). I study Virgil and Tacitus in Latin, 'Grseca Majora' in Greek, and Lacroix's < Arithmetic,' and Euler's * Algebra ' in Mathematics, besides which, out of school time, I review the * Greek Keader,' with Dr. Bode, and am going to study the Greek Testament. Good-bye ! Yours affectionately, JOHN L. MOTLEY. To Us Father. Bound Hill, May 13th, 1827. MY DEAR FATHER, I received mother's and Thomas's letter. I received mother's a week ago, and Thomas's two or three days ago, more than a week after it was written. The reason was that the boy to whom Mr. Cogswell gave the letters to give to the boys, lost it, and it was found about a week after. The apple and pear trees have all been in blossom for a good while ; the trees in the woods are beginning to have their leaves. 1827.] EAKLY BEADING. 7 There are six or seven boys going down in August besides myself. We had our gardens given us a week ago. I have got some radishes growing. We do not ride yet, but I heard we were going to ride to-morrow. I wish I had some books up here to read. I wish, when you send me up my paint brushes, you would send some. I do not want you to send me up anything to eat or drink, but I wish you would send me some books by the stage with the paint brushes. I guess you have some in the house that I have not read ; you may have some possibly. The drawing master has not come yet ; he comes to-morrow, I believe. I believe Charley Appleton is going to write to Edward to-day, he told me he was. Everything goes on the same as ever, and I close my letter with entreating you to send me up some books and paint brushes. Your affectionate son, J. L. MOTLEY. To his Father. Bound Hill, May 16th, 1827. MY DEAR FATHER, As I wrote you so lately, I of course can have nothing to say. I asked you for books. If Cooper's new novel is out, I wish you would send it to me but stop, I have thought of something. Mr. Cogswell has fixed a reading- room for us. That is a very good thing, and what the boys have long wanted. Mr. Cogswell told the boys that if they chose, he wished that they would put in their newspapers after they read them, and he said that he would)" put his own in too, so I wish you would send me up the paper regularly that you used to send me, that I may put it in after I have read it. There are also going to be books there too. Your affectionate son, JOHN LOTHROP MOTLEY. P.S. Cooper's novel was to be published on the 12th of May, I saw in a paper, so I suppose it is out, the name is ' The Prairie.' Don't forget to send some books by the stage. 8 MOTLEY'S LETTEKS. [CHAP. I. To his Brother. Bound Hill, July 26th, 1829. MY DEAK BKOTHEE, I have received yours of 24th this morning. We had not had another for nearly three weeks, except Edward's note in 'Hope Leslie/ which I received a week ago. Tell Edward my next shall be to him. I do not think I am bound at all to write you long letters, for I always write as long ones as you, and about three times as often. I wish your next would be as long as this, and do write at least once a week. I have had but two letters in six weeks, for your last was three weeks ago, and the last before that was three weeks before. I think ' Hope Leslie ' * is a great deal better than ' The Prairie.' It is the best new novel that I have read for two or three years, excepting Scott's. We ought to have gone to draw from nature the day before yesterday, but we did not because there was no time, and I am afraid we shall not go Saturday ; and it is so rainy to-day that I am afraid it will continue so for a week, and we have nothing at all to do in rainy weather. Perhaps you will ask me why we do not go to the reading-room ; there is never any papers in there but what are a hundred years old : the boys will not put them in now, and with reason, for they are all torn up before they have been in there an hour. Drawing is about the only thing to do now in rainy weather. Heading is not to be thought of, as there are no books in school. George Gardner came here last night, and some of the boys saw him. Bill Edgar, Bill Sturgis, and Sam May, and Wadsworth are coming up, too, I believe. I have finished Euler's ' Algebra/ and our class was partly examined in it yesterday, and is going to be examined more in a day or two, Mr. Walker says. Tell father and mother they must write to me. I will write them more to-day or to-morrow. Do send in your next a recipe for making good large T's ; I never can make a good 1 A tale by Miss C. M. Sedgwiok. 1829.] LEADING SCHOOL. 9 one. Tell father to do the same ; when I am in a hurry I always make very bad T's. I have just finished reciting geography, and in a few minutes shall go to breakfast. I believe there is to be an examination or exhibition in speaking before we go to college. I am going to speak * Antony's Funeral Oration/ the whole of it. There are several dialogues, both comic and serious, to be spoken at this exhibition. I hope it will be a good one. I have not decided, and I leave it to father, whether I shall study in Boston or go to college the first year. I do not want to come up here though any more. I have been here now two years and a half. Bill Edgar has been up here, and stayed two or three days, and has gone now. I shall be glad when the time comes to go. Tell father that I want him, if he pleases, to come up and bring me down about the middle of August. W. Gorham is going down in a little more than a week, but the boys will not go till the last of August, and then we shall not have a bit of vacation. I don't want to be examined the very day I get to Boston. If I do not have a vacation before commence- ment, I shall not have one till the middle of winter. I have to study a good deal now. Tell father to write to me directly, to tell me about this ; and tell him also that I had rather study in Boston the first year than go into college, if he is willing. I think that I have fulfilled my promise to write a long letter. Give my love to father and mother and all the family, and believe me % . Your affectionate brother, J. L. MOTLEY. 10 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. II. CHAPTER II. GERMANY; UNIVERSITY LIFE. First voyage to Europe Cuxhaven The weather during the voyage Incidents of the voyage Gottingen Arrangements for his first Semester at the University Plans for the vacation The German language Account of journey from Hamburg to Gottingen German postillions The Hartz Mountains German University life Costume of the students Duelling customs " Bruderschaft " Plesse castle George Washington's letter on the Humane Society Berlin Studying law Public galleries and public money Daily routine at Berlin Amusements Taglioni Devrient Goetz van Berlichingen The " Vons and the not-Vons" Visit to Potsdam Plans for the future. [Mr. Motley graduated at Harvard College in 1831, at the age of seventeen, and after a few months went to study in Germany.] To his Mother. Brig Cyclops, at anchor off Cuxhaven, mouth of Elbe, Thursday evening, May 2th, 1832. MY DEAR MOTHER, I hope by the time this letter reaches you, you will not have become anxious on my account, for although we have had a long, and in part rather a stormy passage, we have at last arrived at this place in safety. I hoped to have had a chance of writing to you in the English Channel, but although I had a thousand opportunities of sending a letter ashore, either to France or England, yet as I knew nobody in either country to direct it to, there was no possibility of its reaching you. It is now 12 o'clock at night, and y e brokers and y e doctors and " y e like " have just left us, and all hands have turned in, and I take the first moment of leisure to write you an account of my voyage. Of course, as we have not yet got to Hamburg nor left the ship, I can tell you nothing else. We are at anchor for the night off a small town called Cuxhaven, just at 1832.] FIRST VOYAGE TO EUROPE. 11 the mouth of the river, where the vessels are " cleared " before going to Hamburg, which is between fifty and sixty miles farther up. To-morrow morning, between two and three o'clock, we shall probably be under way again, and if we have a fair wind, shall be at the city early in the afternoon. It is just seven weeks to-day since we sailed making fifty days' passage, which is an exceedingly long one in any season of the year. We came out in half a gale of wind, and before we were out of the bay, it blew a whole one, and the wind very soon shifted to the east, where it continued to blow for about a month. We were about a week beating about the Grand Bank, in a north-easter, and were regaled with a series of rain storms and wind storms and all kinds of storms from the time we left Boston till we made the English coast. I have not been at all sea-sick (with the exception of the first few hours), but the weather for a long time was so excessively cold that I was below for the principal part of the time, and had plenty of time for reading and rumination although one is not able to study or reflect to much advantage in the cabin of a small brig in a gale of wind. The last day of April and the first of May we had a severe gale from the north-east, and were obliged to " lay to " under bare poles for forty-eight hours, and I had then an opportunity of seeing and feeling what the ocean is. I was on deck the greater part of the time, although it was impossible to stand or sit without being secured by a rope or two, and in the cabin I was able to realise what " King Corny," in one of Miss Edge- worth's stories, means by " not being able to lie on the ground without holding on" I should have been very sorry to have crossed the Atlantic (or the pond, as the sailors call it) without a single storm, but one every day in the week is rather too much. However, I enjoyed them well enough, and I con- sidered myself very fortunate in being neither sick nor nervous, as Mr. Grrund and his wife were generally. She was very anxious when the vessel leaned over on its side, and as the brig is built very narrow in proportion to its length, it did that all the time ; and she was not out of her berth eight-and- forty hours the whole passage from sea-sickness. I contrived, 12 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. II. however, in the course of the voyage to learn a good deal of German, by talking and reading and writing, and I have been talking all day with the German pilot (who speaks very little English), and have acted in some sort as an interpreter between him and the captain, as Mr. Grund a few days ago went ashore in the Straits of Dover, to proceed to Hamburg by land, on account of his wife's sickness, but of that I will write you presently, so that I think I shall not have much difficulty in speaking the language pretty soon. We made the English coast (Start Point) May 4th, and since that time the passage has been very pleasant, although until within these last three days we have not had a single fair wind. But the weather was very fine, arid we were sailing between France and England, in sight of both sometimes, and always between one and the other, and fishing boats were coming alongside twenty times a day, from which we had fresh news and fresh fish in plenty, and there were always fifty or seventy vessels in sight of all nations and all descriptions, and the shore was constantly offering something or other of interest (although the seaboard of England and France on the Chan- nel has not much of the picturesque), and the idea of being really in sight of those two countries was exciting and pleasing in itself. We were at anchor a whole day (to prevent drifting to leeward with the tide), in a dead calm, off Dover, and I amused myself with reconnoitring the old turrets of the castle with the glass ; but the town is built so low that I could not see much of it. Of course I can tell you in this letter nothing about my arrangements, as I am still at sea to all intents and purposes, although I expect to dine in Hamburg to-morrow ; but I shall write in a day or two to father, telling him about the whole, and both letters will probably reach you at the same time. I had nearly forgotten to tell you that I have become quite a sailor since I have been on board. I have been several times up to the top-gallant masthead, and my usual seat in fine weather is the "maintop," where I sit smoking, reading, and "chewing the cud of sweet and bitter fancies" for hours together. By the way, it was lucky that I did not forget my 1832.] ARRIVAL IN EUROPE. 13 cigars, for they have been of great service to me pour tuer le temps in disagreeable weather. " You know my old ward," as Falstaff says, and tell Edward that I am very much obliged to him for getting them for me the morning we sailed, and that I have thanked him in every puff. I hope by the time this letter reaches you that Tom will have safely arrived ; and do not be anxious if he overstays his time a little, for it seems to me now that one is as safe at sea as on land. In a gale of wind I can half join in the sailors' song " Lord help me, how I pities all Unhappy folks on shore now." And, by the way, that puts me in mind that my old friend, the ship Cor so, has kept us company for the last two or three days, and is now anchored close by. Good-night, my dear mother. Give my love to Edward and Preble and Emma, and give little Annie as many kisses as she will accept for me. I shall write to father to-morrow or next day, and tell him of all my own arrangements and expectations, and send him all the news in Europe, which, by the way, is somewhat surprising. There is no need of my asking you to write, for I am sure that you will do so by every opportunity. Kemember me to all who may recollect me ; and when you next write to Cousin Anne, tell her that I shall open the correspondence that we agreed upon very soon, although not exactly from the same place, and tell her she might send a letter to me enclosed in the very next she writes to you. Affectionately your son, LOTHKOP MOTLEY. P.S. I do not know that you will be able to read half, or understand a tittle of what I have been writing. My ideas are in such a whirl that I cannot string them together intelligibly, and I shall write more at length and more coherently from Hamburg. The hurry and confusion that we have been in for the last six to seven hours with doctors and pilots and merchants and brokers, etc., etc., has confused me, and this has been the only hour in which I have 14 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. II. been able to be alone. But good-night, I am going to turn in now, and hear for the last time the "gurgling noise of waters in mine ear," which has been my lullaby for the last forty-nine nights. To his Father. Gottingen, June 23rd, 1832. MY DEAE FATHEK, I have delayed writing to you during the fortnight I have been here, because I wished to wait till I could inform you of what I was about, and how I was settled. I have now got rooms, etc., etc., arranged what lectures and lessons I shall take this term, and provided in some degree for the next Semester. I got here about a fortnight since, just when the Pentecost holidays began, and consequently had to wait till they were ended before I could do anything except engage rooms. I found here, much to my satisfaction, two Americans, one Englishman, and one Scotchman. The Americans are both from Charleston one is Mitchell King, of exactly my own age ; and the other, Amory Coffin, about a year older, with both of whom I am very intimate, as also the Englishman and Scotchman, who, however, are going away very soon. I have got rooms in the Buchstrasse (Book Street), the next door to King's, and a few minutes' walk to the Library and to my lectures. I breakfast either at my own room or my neigh- bour's, and we all dine at the " Crown," the best hotel here. My room for the rest of this Semester, that is to say, from about the 1st of June to the 1st of September, costs me three louis d'or and a half, about fourteen dollars. Dinner at the " Crown," eight rix-dollars a month ; and then there is the house bill, for coffee, etc., etc. Each course of lectures costs from one to three louis d'or ; and I have a private lesson in German from Professor Benecke three times a week for the rest of this Semester, which will probably cost eight more. This term (about ten weeks are left) I intend to devote to German, for I have not enough of the language to understand 1832.] UNIVERSITY LIFE AT GOTTINGEN. 15 the lectures well, and so it is, of course, useless to take them. I, however, attend one lecture (five times a week), of Professor Hugo, as the introduction to a course of Civil Law of which I am able to understand the general drift, by taking the text- book with me to the lecture-room. Next term, however, I shall have a lecture in the Pandects, a lecture on the Institutes, a lecture on Natural Law, a lecture on the history of Koman law, which, with the introductory lecture of Hugo which I now attend, and which I shall hear again next Semester form a complete course of Civil Law. Besides which I shall pro- bably attend Heeren's lectures on History, Saalfeld's Political Lectures (he is a tremendous Liberal, and lately a member of the Diet), which altogether will be quite a sufficiency. The rooms which I have taken, I have engaged only for this Semester. Next Semester (which begins six weeks after Michaelmas), King and myself intend taking rooms in the same house, as we shall be the only Englishmen I mean Americans or Englishmen left in Gottingen. I cannot, of course, tell you what my expenses are likely to be, and of course they have been at first more than they will be. But I think that my necessary expenses will amount to between five or six hundred dollars at the most, probably to about five hundred and fifty dollars ; and if I travel about in the vacation, which everybody does, and principally on foot, which every- body does, my whole expenses will amount to between six or seven hundred dollars, probably not so much as seven hundred ; but I state the maximum rather than the minimum, that I may not in reality exceed what I say, and this is about the amount of credit you have given me with Mr. Gossler. I have not exactly determined what to do or where to go in September, when there are six weeks' holiday. But I think of going on foot to the Lake of Constance, and returning down the Ehine, and so home to Gottingen. This would take about six weeks, I should suppose, and I do not know how many louis d'or, but I suppose not more than thirty or forty, which, as I told you, I have left with the banker. Neither can I exactly tell how long I had best remain at Gottingen. It is seldom the custom with German students to 16 MOTLEY'S LETTEKS. [CHAP. II study more than one year at one university since, by staying on one or two Semesters at Gottingen, another at Berlin, another at Munich, another at Jena, and so on, they combine the advantages of all, because in each Semester a student may hear a course of lectures from each of the most eminent professors in each university, and a year studied in one university counts in another, and so on. But I shall certainly stay here this Semester and the next, and after that I do not know whether I shall go to Berlin or Munich, or remain in Gottingen, but I shall have time to decide and to advise. My first object at present, as I said, is to possess myself of the language, and I study it five or six hours a day, and, as I said, have a lesson from Professor Benecke from seven to eight every other morning. As soon as I have acquired enough of the language to write it and speak it and under- stand it, I shall feel at my ease and ready to begin my lectures, and that will undoubtedly be by the end of this Semester. This has been a long, stupid letter, about louis d'or and rix dollars, and in fact I hope you will not consider it a letter, but merely a necessary statement of statistics. To- morrow is Sunday, which is Feiertag (holiday) all over Germany, and I shall then write a voluminous letter to mother, telling her all about the miraculous things seen, heard, and acted in Germany by Your affectionate son, J. LOTHKOP MOTLEY. If you ever see Fred Brune, Tom Appleton, Hillard, or John Sullivan, or Mr. Snow, I wish you would tell them that they have all got to write to me too. I know that you will not excuse this writing, so I say nothing about it. 1832.] TRAVELLING IN GERMANY, 17 To his Mother. Gottingen, July 1st, 1832, MY DEAR MOTHER, I wrote you just before I left Ham- burg, and my journey to this place was as uninteresting as can well be imagined ; in fact, it surpassed my lean ideal of a bore. The first day was through the Liinenburger Haide (or heath), and the greatest rate of travelling a German mile an hour (4J English). The two next days (for it took me three days to come about 130 miles) were little better, except that I was a little amused by the coolness of the German postil- lions. I came from Hanover by extra post (as there was to be no diligence to Gottingen the day I arrived there), and being alone, was almost at the mercy of the postillions. These creatures are certainly the most phlegmatic specimens of mankind that exist. I recollect in particular one fellow who drove me out of Celle, who incontinently determined on first setting out to walk the whole way. He did go for about a mile, and at last I asked him if he could go no faster. " Oh, ja" he said, and continued the same pace for another ten minutes. I began to get incensed, and to re- monstrate in broken German, but he turned a deaf ear to my invectives, and instead of mending his pace, laid his whip on the top of the chaise, took out his bugle, and solaced himself with practising the overture to 'Tancredi.' At last I recollected a very convincing argument in all lan- guages, and took out a rix-dollar, and said to him, " Schwager " (Schwager means brother-in-law, and is a very pleasing title to a postillion), " if you go no faster you get no Trinkgeld " (drink-money, a regular item in every reckoning in Germany). The appeal was decisive, and he whipped his horses into a trot. Gottingen itself is an unpleasant town enough, and the country about it uninteresting. But the Hartz country (that El-dorado of superstition) is in sight, and there are some lesser hills nearer. You know how celebrated the Hartz Mountains are for goblins, etc. On May-day night they have from time immemorial kept carnival on the Brocken, although I have VOL. i. a 18 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. II. not seen a ghost yet, but mean some fine dark night to go there on a ghost hunt. There is nothing here to mark out the University, except the Library and the students that you meet in the streets, for there are no University buildings for the students, as with us, but the Professors lecture in their own houses, and the students lodge with the Philisters (trades- men) of the town. The Library is an immense collection of books, and all have been purchased in one hundred years ; the precise number is not known, but it is thought about 400,000. It contains, however, few rare books and manuscripts, and but few splendid editions of books. Everything is for use, and the students may have almost as many books out at a time as they wish by obtaining a number of cards from a Professor. I got here, as I told you in my last letter, in the Pentecost holidays, and had to wait a few days before I could be matriculated, which matriculation is simply this : I was summoned before the Senate of the University, and then wrote my name and my whences and whats, etc., etc., in a great book. I then gave the member of the Senate who officiated three rix-dollars for his trouble, and put another into the poor-box. I have signed an immense list of promises (which are, I believe, never in the slightest degree kept by any of the students, and, consequently, a very improper exac- tion), the principal of which were, to obey the laws in toto, to join no Landsmannscha.fi, drink no beer, fight no duels, etc., etc., etc. The next day I went to the Pro-Eector of the University (Herr Hofrath Goeschen), who gave me my matricle and legitimation cartes, observed that the laws were binding, and, shaking my hand, informed me that I was a member of the University. The next day I was introduced to Professor Hugo, who has been a very celebrated lawyer and professor, but is now "a noble wreck in ruinous perfection." His lectures now are dull and stupid, and his titles of Aulic Coun- sellor, Guelphic Knight, Hofrath, Professor, etc., etc., cannot bring more than three or four students into his class-room. He still lectures, however, on the Law, but his great peculiarity is an unbounded passion for thermometers. He has four or 1832.] GERMAN STUDENTS AND THEIR WAYS. 19 five hanging in every room of his house, and two on each side of his head in the lecture-room ; the window opposite him is raised and lowered by a cord which crosses the room, and is hitched just over his head, by means of which he very carefully regulates the temperature of the room at the conclusion of each paragraph of his lecture. He presented me with a book which had been lately published in England and dedicated to him, and I presented him with a louis d'or for a course of lectures on Roman Law. But I have said nothing yet of the students because I am afraid of attacking such a boundless and inexhaustible subject. The German students are certainly an original and peculiar race of beings, and can be compared to nothing. The University towns are the homes of "outre-ness" or rather, they are places where it is impossible to be outre, except by dressing or behaving like "a Christian or an ordinary man." You can hardly meet a student in the streets whose dress would not collect a mob anywhere else, and, at the same time, you hardly meet two in a day who are dressed alike, every man consulting his own taste, and fashioning himself according to his lean ideal. The most common outer garment is a red plaid or a blue velvet frock-coat, twenty of which you find to one of cloth. The head is covered with a very small cap with the colours of Landsmannseha/t to which the individual may belong. The boots are garnished with spurs universally, albeit innocent of horse-flesh ; the fore-finger of the left hand always with an immense seal ring (often of iron or brass) ; and the upper lip and chin fortified with an immense moustachio and beard (in fact, I have seen several students with a depending beard more than four inches long, and there is hardly one who does not wear moustachios). A long pipe in the mouth, a portfolio under the arm, a stick in the hand, and one or two bull-dogs at the heels, complete a picture not in the slightest degree exaggerated of a Gottingen student! The most promising article in the formation of a German student's room is the pipe. There are generally about twenty or thirty of different kinds hanging in his room of porcelain, meerschaum, and c 2 20 MOTLEY'S LETTEKS. [CHAP. II. stone, all ornamented with tassels, combining the colours of his Landsmannschaft ; and you have no idea how beautifully some of the pipes are painted with landscapes, portraits (there are often beautiful miniatures painted on them), or coats of arms. Pipes are a favourite present among the students (and you have anything you wish painted on one when you wish to give it away). Every one smokes, and smokes at all times, and in all occupations (except that they are not allowed to smoke in the streets), reading, writing, talking, or riding. I prefer a pipe now to a cigar, and I am hardly ever without one in my mouth (for instance, I have been smoking a great meerschaum all the time I have been writing this), and I always breakfast at half-past five o'clock (!) on a cup of coffee and a pipe, and continue the " cloud compelling " occupation through the day. I find I grow fat on it, for I never was in such health in my life. I find that I have said nothing as yet about the German duels. These things are such a common and every-day occurrence that I have ceased to think at all about them. I must, in the first place, tell you that the accounts you have read in Dwight, etc., of the frequency of these things is not in the slightest, degree exaggerated, in fact it is entirely impossible to exaggerate them. I have been here now about three weeks, and during that time as many as forty have been fought to my knowledge, and I know of as many as one hundred and fifty more that are to take place directly. I have seen a few of them, and though you have read accounts of them in D wight's * Travels in Germany,' I suppose you will be willing to hear a short description of them. The duels are not allowed to be fought in the town, and accord- ingly an inn, called the " Kaiser," just outside one of the gates, is a very celebrated rendezvous. As they generally take place between members of different Landsmannschafts (Lands- mannschaft means countrymen-club, or society ; there are as many of these as there are sets of students from the different States of Germany. The most prominent are the " Hanove- rian," the " Liinenburger," the " Bremensen," and " Westpha- lian" Landsmannschaften. Besides which there is a club called the " Borsenschafte," which is composed in reality of 1832.] DUELLING CUSTOMS. 21 the refuse of the whole University), the arms offensive and defensive required in the duel are provided for the duellists by their respective Landsmannscha/ts. These arms are a Schldger (or sabre) about four feet in length, blunt at the point, but very sharp-edged, and a suit of stuffed leather to protect all the vital parts, leaving only the face and breast exposed. The last time I was at the " Kaiser," about sixteen duels were fought in the course of the day, ten of which I saw ; and they are on the whole stupid affairs, and I think could exist nowhere but in Germany. It is not, however, a perfect trifle to fight one of these duels, although it is very seldom that any lives are lost, or even important wounds received. But the face is often most barbarously mangled, and indeed it is almost an impossibility to meet a student who has not at least one or two large scars in his visage. In the two that I saw the other day, one man was cut, not very severely, in the breast, and the other received a wound that laid his face open from the left eye to the mouth, and will probably enhance the beauty of his countenance for the rest of his life. Both these affairs were Landsmannschaft duels ; the Han- overians and the Bremensers and the Liinenburgers and the Westphalians being " los " that is to say, at variance ; in which case each Liinenburger has to fight with a West- phalian, each Hanoverian with a Bremenser, till every member of each Landsmannschaft has fought. In these four Lands- mannschaften, I suppose there are from eighty to one hundred students. So here, you see, are a pretty number of duels to be fought directly. Besides this, a single Westphalian has challenged every one of the Liinenburgers to fight him (which challenge has been accepted), and a single Liinenburger has challenged every one of the Westphalians. Here, you see, are two men, each of whom has about twenty-five duels to fight this term. This Liinenburger who has challenged all the Westphalians is somewhat noted for the number of his duels. He has already fought seventy-five, and has been second in about two hundred, and he has here twenty more to fight. Besides which he has yesterday challenged another 22 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. II. student, who had insulted his Landsmannschaft, to pistols at ten paces, to be reloaded till one is hit. This same fellow who is thus challenged is also challenged by each member of the insulted Landsmannsehaft to one " gang " of sabres. The meaning of this term is, a duel to be continued till one of the parties falls, or confesses himself unable to fight longer. These duels arise in every sort of way ; a very common one is the one which you have read in * D wight,' of pushing or being- pushed into the gutter. There is also a regular code by which the different offences are meted, and the degree of sabre satisfaction determined. The most common and slightest insult is the "Dummer Junge " (stupid boy), which demands a duel of twelve Gangs. (A " Gang " I cannot exactly describe. It is the closing of the two combatants and a certain number of blows and parries.) The parties have each a second at his side to strike up the swords the moment a wound is received. The doctor then steps in, examines the wound, and if it proves to be " An- sehiess " (a wound of a certain length and depth), the duel is discontinued. A more gross insult demands twenty-four Gangs, and a still more important one, forty-eight. But the most severe duel is that of one " Gang," in which, as I have said, the duel con- tinues until one drops. You need be under no apprehension about my returning with a disfigured visage, for as a foreigner is seldom or never insulted, and if he be, has the right of choosing his own weapons (which in my case would be pistols or rifles, and the Germans have an aversion to gunpowder), in which event the offender generally makes an apology and backs out of the business. I assure you I have not at all exaggerated this duel] ing business. If you cannot have faith in it, you have only to say "Travellers ne'er did lie, Though folks at home condemn them." And though it is beyond all contradiction, a brutal state of things, yet I cannot help thinking it is not without its uses. For instance, some of the students are perfect knights-errant, 1832.] " BRUDERSCHAFT." 23 and if they hear of a lady being insulted (for it is not un- common for a German student, who wishes to manifest his independence, to push a lady off the side-walk), are sure to seek out the offender and salute him with " Dummer Junge," in which case twelve G-angs of the Schlager must necessarily ensue. You will probably not have imbibed a very exalted opinion of the character of German students from the picture I have sketched, but I have found a few friends here whom I admire very much, and with whom I have already drunk " Bruder- schaft " ; and here, I suppose, an explanatory note is needed. The usual way of addressing a person in German, as perhaps you know, is in the third person plural ; the second, as with us is seldom or never used. But between brothers and sisters, paients and children, and very old and intimate friends, the secnd person singular, " Du" thou, is used. The students hav a way of cementing a friendship by dropping the third persn plural in conversation and substituting for ever the " Du" in which case they drink a glass of wine together, ringiig the glass, crossing their arms and kissing, after which cerenony the parties can never fight a duel together, or speak to ea6. other otherwise than with " Du" in which case they are sal to be " Du " together. The Germans are certainly the most musical nation on earth. It is almost impossible to meet a student who cannot sing a uousand songs and play at least one instrument. We have at dinner a full band of music playing, and there are concert&in the public gardens here as often as once a week. The Genans appear to me the most affectionate and (but you will notthink it) the most enthusiastic people on earth. Certainhjthey are infinitely the most industrious and studious. Almost U. the students study somewhat, and the greatest part of tlm immensely, besides writing off at the lectures nearly evcy word the professor says. But the character of these stucbts is a labyrinth out of which I cannot find my way, and ust snap the thread at once if this letter is ever to cross the Aantic, and it is now of unconscionable length and weight. Your affectionate son, J. L. M. 24 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. II. To his Parents. Gottingen, August 12th, 1882. MY DEAR PARENTS, I believe that it is a longer time than it ought to be since I have written home, and I am now so much pressed for time that I shall almost be ashamed to send the letter. The vacation begins in two or three weeks, and my lessons and the one lecture that I had is ended, and to-day at one o'clock I am going off with a party of three students on a foot journey to the Tyrol, a part of Switzerland, and through the Ehine Valley. I have no doubt you will be very glad that I have had the opportunity of travelling through this part of the country in the manner in which I shall now do it that is to say, as a German student and with German students, and on foot the principal part of the way. The expense of thy journey will be very small, considering the time we are to hi absent and the length we are to go ; and by the arrangemeit that Mr. Gossler has made about my money, I shall nit throughout the year spend a groschen more than you ha/e allowed me, including the expenses of the journey. You mist not think that I am neglecting my business to amuse mysef ; the vacation begins in two or three weeks, and we retrn before the beginning of the next Semester. But of cours I shall be back in time to arrange my lectures and lessons the rooms which I have now I shall retain). This term I caftot pretend to have done much in the way of studying (aw, because it was impossible for me to attend lectures withany profit before I knew enough of the language to under and them perfectly.' But I have studied German a great deajthis term, and by mixing a good deal with the students d all occasions, I have made some progress in speaking and nder- standing the language. By reading a great deal of Gpnan every day, too, I have become able to read it almost asfasily as English. Next term I shall remain here, and attend a co :e of lectures on the ' Institutes ' and the * History of tW Civil Law,' which I think I shall be able entirely to undeltand ; 1832.] PLESSE CASTLE. 25 and after next term I shall go either to Munich or Berlin to continue. I shall advise with some of the Professors to know which is the best University for the summer term and which for the winter term, and arrange my plans accordingly. It is at all events not worth one's while to remain long at Got- tingen, because most of the Professors who were ornaments of the University are dead or decayed, and the town itself is excessively dull. I am, however, myself very pleasantly situated here. I have formed very agreeable acquaintances among the German students, and I have mixed with them on all occasions and in all places, like one of them. I believe I told you in my last letter about the ceremony of drinking " Schmollets " or Brotherhood. It is a very pleasant way of sealing a friendship, and I have drunk it with several of the best students here. There are five or six ruined castles near Gottingen, the finest of which are the Hardenburg and the Plesse Castles, both complete and deserted ruins, but very well preserved. The Plesse is much the finest of the two. Large parts of the walls are standing, and two turrets ; but the moat is choked up with shrubs and bushes of a century's growth, and there are great oaks growing in the midst of the hall. It is probably near a thousand years old, and has been a ruin for centuries. It was, as all these German robber knights' castles were, built upon a very high and steep hill, and surrounded by a deep moat with a drawbridge. The hill still remains in its primeval steepness, as my muscles could vouch for many days after my visit ; but the moat is now a thicket, and only the ruins of the portal, to which the drawbridge conducted, remains. The deep cellar vaults are also still perfect, where plenty of Ehenish wine has ripened, and the part of the donjon and the watch- towers, with their deep shot holes and broken staircases, still remain. The great hall, too, is marked out by its broken and weed- covered walls, and a huge stone fireplace is hanging on the wall, half covered by the branches of the trees that have taken quiet possession of the banqueting room of the Grafs von Plesse. I could not help thinking that the last party who sat 26 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. II. round that fireplace would be somewhat surprised if they could come into their old premises again, and see what a fresh supply of firewood was close at hand. I have been giving a very tame description of a ruin, and I shall undoubtedly see many a thousand times more interesting on the Khine, but the effect which this first antiquity had upon my brain was so turbulent that it effervesced for some time, and at last evaporated in a disagreeably long ode in the German taste, which, however, I will not increase the postage of this letter with. There are two or three things which I have yet to describe, and which illustrate well the character of the students, such as the " Landsmannschaft Kneipen," or drinking parties, and the ceremony of the " Landsvater." I will, however, on the whole postpone them till I can give a fuller account of them, which will not be till after I return. With best love to all my brothers and sisters, I am Your affectionate son, J. LOTHROP MOTLEY. P.S. Do write, write, write. I have had no letters for an age. To his Parents. Gottingen, November 25th, 1832. MY DEAR FATHER AND MOTHER, .... With respect to my local habitation after this term, my intentions are somewhat altered. I think after Easter of removing to Munich, which has now become one of the most eminent Universities in Germany, and where are several very useful and wise expounders of the laws, and which, moreover, is a much more agreeable tarrying-place in the summer (be- sides, my friend King and another American friend of mine, Amory Coffin, who was here last summer, are both going to Munich next summer), and then of passing the winter in 1832.] GEORGE WASHINGTON'S LETTER. 27 Berlin, because it is only in winter Savigny, the most cele- brated jurist of Germany, reads, and him I have been advised by everybody by all means to hear. By the time I have done with Berlin, I think I shall have the ' Civil Law ' tolerably perfectly, that is in a year from April next, and then but we \ton't cast so many " retrospections on the future," as Mrs. Malaprop says; but some day, when I am in a very philosophical mood, I will write you as practical and wise a letter as I can about the way and means I must find to open what ancient Pistol calls " this oyster world," being a setting forth of the praiseworthy ideas which every young gentleman is oppressed with at the time of life when he leaves off writing bad verses, and discovers that immortality is not seated in every goose quill. Thank Heaven! and I am sure you will join in the thanksgiving I have quite done with Pegasus, and begin to affect the " beauty of utility." But till such time as my philosophical humour cometh, we will leave all reflections on future destinations. Will you indulge me in one request ? Don't wait always to send your letters direct to Hamburg ; they seldom come one bit sooner, if the vessel sails the moment the letter is sealed, than if they came by England or France ; and if you write to me once in two or three weeks, and drop the letters into the post-office, via Havre or Liverpool, they will be always in my hands in seven or eight weeks. Here am I now with my direct letters (I ought to have thanked you before for all those pleasant letters) in the end of November knowing nothing at all about you since the end of July. And King has plenty of September letters, because they come by the packets, and through France. I am very much obliged to you for Washington's letter, 1 and 1 From George Washington to Motley's has within a few days past been put grandfather, the Rev. John Lothrop. into my hands. Mount Vernon, I observe with w&* satisfaction r 9<> ,7 T7QQ tne cases in wnic h vour benevolent institution has been instrumental in REVERED AND RESPECTED SIB, Your recalling some of our fellow-creaturea acceptable favour of the 16th of May, as it were from beyond the gates of covering a recent publication of the eternity, and has given occasion for the Proceedings of the Humane Society, hearts of parents and friends to leap 28 MOTLEY'S LETTEKS. [CHAP. II. you may be quite sure I shall keep it very religiously, and should like very much to have Franklin's letters, which mother speaks of, and can certainly very easily send. I have also received your ' Morris/ which was a very agreeable present. I am, Your most affectionate son, J. LOTHROP MOTLEY. To his Mother. Berlin, Friedrich's Strasse, No. 161, up one pair of stairs, September, 1833. MY DEAE MOTHER, I am settled in this most right-angled of cities, in very comfortable lodgings. I dine in a neighbour- ing hotel. Every morning my expounder of the divine science of LAW comes to my room for a hour and a half. I have an abonnement at a circulating library in the neighbourhood, and for joy. The provision made for ship- wrecked mariners is also highly estim- able in the view of every philanthropic mind, and greatly consolatory to that suffering part of the community. These things will draw upon you the bless- ings of those who were nigh to perish. These works of charity and goodwill towards men reflect, in my estimation, great lustre upon the authors, and presage an era of still further improve- ment. How pitiful in the eye of reason and religion is that false ambition which desolates the world with fire and sword for the purposes of conquest and fame, while compared to the minor virtues of making our neighbours and our fellow- men as happy as their frail conditions and perishable natures will permit them to be! I am happy to find that the proposed General Government meets with your approbation as, indeed, it does with that of most disinterested and discern- ing men. The Convention of this State is now in session, and I cannot but hope that the Constitution will be adopted by it though not without considerable opposition. I trust, however, that the commendable example exhibited by the minority in your State will not be with- out its salutary influence on this. In truth it appears to me that should the proposed Government be generally harmoniously adopted, it will be a new phenomenon in the political and moral world, and an astonishing vic- tory gained by enlightened reason over brutal force. I have the honour to be, With very great consideration, Revered and respected sir, Your most obedient and humble servant, G. WASHINGTON. 1833.] THE USE OF PUBLIC GALLERIES. 29 as soon as the term begins (I forgot to tell you in what good season I got here, for the holidays are not finished till after two or three weeks), I shall have myself matriculated at the University. In the winter, there is generally a good deal of society here. I have a letter to Mr. von Savigny, a celebrated professor, who sees a good deal of company, I believe, which I intend to deliver in the course of a week or two ; and with the help of one or two old acquaintances whom I have met here, I shall see as much of society as I wish. I suppose I ought to describe the wonders and sights of Berlin, and I shall take the first opportunity to drive to Potsdam, and see the Palace Sans Souci, of which you have heard. When I see here in Europe such sums of money spent by the Government upon every branch of the fine arts, I cannot help asking why we at home have no picture galleries or statue galleries or libraries. I cannot see at all that such things are only fit for monarchies, and I cannot give myself any reason why our Government should not spend some of its surplus money upon them. They have certainly money enough, and in many respects the United States may be called the richest country in the world ; at least, if we may reason, as Lovelace in the play does, who calculated his wife's fortune, not by the definite number of pounds, shillings, and pence which she has for she had nothing but by the many possible species of extravagance which she has not thus, 500 a year because she does not play ; 500 more because she has no passion for dress, etc., etc. So we may say of America, $50,000 a year because we have no army; $50,000 more because we have no debts, and so on to the end of the chapter. Now, why cannot the "good and senseless" men (as Dogberry tells them) in Congress vote a sum for a library or a gallery or anything of the kind, instead of going to logger- heads about surplus dollars which are lying so comfortably in the treasury ? In every possible improvement that is strictly utilitarian, 30 MOTLEY'S LETTEES. [CHAP. II. America is taking the lead of Europe. One finds nowhere better railroads and steamboats, warehouses or ships than at home ; but there is not a library worthy of the name in the whole territory of the United States, from Passamaquoddy Bay to Okafonoke Swamp; and in Germany alone there are dozens of public libraries, any single one of which would weigh up all that we have put together ; and so there are in England, France, Italy, Spain, etc., etc. I shall fold up this letter now, that it may be ready for the post to-night. I shall write again in the course of the next week or two, and I hope you will be as liberal to me. I have heard nothing yet from home since I left. Why can't you write regularly by the New York packets, which sail to Havre or Liverpool half-a-dozen times a month ? With love to all at home, Your affectionate son, J. LOTHROP MOTLEY. To his Parents. Berlin, November 1th, 1833. MY DEAR FATHER AND MOTHER, I told you in my last that Berlin had no great menagerie of lions, and I have since seen very little to alter my opinion. My " way of life " is very regular. After tea and the newspaper every morning, comes my Rezensent, that is, a Doctor of Laws, who reads and expounds to me for a couple of hours the Institutes and Pandects of the corpus juris ; and I then spend another couple of hours in "stuffing noting" books with the wisdom I have gained. Savigny, whose lectures on the Pandects I intend to hear, does not begin to read for a few days. His lecture will probably be the only judicial one I shall hear, and I have not determined on the other. My principal study is, of course, the Eoman law and its history, and this I hope to have learned tolerably, with the assistance of the above -mentioned "learned Theban," by the end of the Semester, that is to say, somewhere in March, 1833.] THE THEATRE IN BERLIN. 31 and then I shall have done with Berlin and with Germany as a residence. There are three theatres the Royal Opera, the Eoyal Playhouse, and the City Theatre all equally good. The first is, however, the finest house, in which all the fashionable operas and theatres are given. In the Playhouse is an excel- lent French drama ; and in the City Theatre an Italian opera and a very good comic company. The ballets are particu- larly good in the Opera House. The Terpsichore of Berlin is Taglioni, not the Taglioni of London and Paris celebrity, but her sister-in-law. The great tragedy star of Berlin and of Germany, Devrient, is dead. He was particularly celebrated in Shakesperean characters, Shylock, Lear, Eichard, and others, and, singu- larly enough, the study of Lear's character was the cause of his death. In order to perfect himself in the character of the crazy king, he spent daily many hours in different mad- houses, observing and imitating all possible kinds of madness ; the consequence of which was, that after a short time he became raving mad himself, and died a victim to Melpomene. At present they have no one to supply his place. Shake- speare's tragedies are seldom given, and notwithstanding the richness of the modern German literature, they have very few fine-acting tragedies. The chefs-d'oeuvre of Goethe and Schiller are not adapted to the stage. Some of them are occasionally given, but seldom with success. The other even- ing the drama of 'Goetz von Berlichingen with the Iron Hand,' a magnificent picture of the old time in Germany, and one of Goethe's masterpieces, was given, but with so many stage alterations, that from a serious martial tragedy it was metamorphosed into a farce or a sort of Tom Thumb melo- drama, full of scenes excellently fitted " to amuse the ears of the groundlings," and to disgust everybody who had read a line of the original. The character of Goetz von Berlich- ingen, the best possible portrait of a knight of the middle ages, part robber, part soldier, and part preux chevalier, was given by a thickset, periwig-pated fellow, whose sole effort was to represent Goetz as a lusty knight " most potent at potting," who could never keep his fingers from the flask of 32 MOTLEY'S LETTEKS. [CHAP. II. Khenish, except when he was slaughtering legions and com- mitting unheard-of exploits with his iron fist. And this same Mr. Kott, as I believe they call him, had the other day the impertinence to play Shylock, which I was so lucky not to see. A favourite author of mine, Lichtenberg, in his lifetime a celebrated wit and professor at Gottingen, said that he never knew his own language until he had learned another. The opinions in Germany concerning America are singularly con- tradictory. The Germans generally may be divided very conveniently into two great classes the Vons and the not- Vons. Those who are lucky enough to have the three magical letters VON before their names belong to the nobility, and are of course aristocratic to the last degree. Those who have not these three may have all the other letters of the alphabet in all possible combinations, and are still nothing but ple- beians. This proud class are all ne plus ultra radicals. It is as impossible to persuade one of the first class that in the United States anything exists but democracy and demagogues as it is to convince the others, particularly those of the lowest and emigrating class, that they will not find the streets paved with dollars and their pockets stuffed with bank-notes as soon as they arrive in New York that El Dorado of their expectations. Your affectionate son, J. L. M. To his Father. Berlin, January I7th, 1834. MY DEAR FATHEK, Day before yesterday I took a drive to Potsdam which I had not before seen. You know it was the favourite residence of Frederick the Great, and it is only on his account that it is interesting. It is about twenty English miles from here, and looks like a continuation of Berlin, having the same right-angled streets and yellow-stuccoed houses. We drove there in the diligence, after having first 1834.] POTSDAM. 33 " legitimated " ourselves, as the German phrase is that is to say, informed the post-office what our names, characters, religion, etc., etc., were. (How amusing it would be if one should be obliged always to take a passport with him when he went in the stage coach, for example, from Boston to Salem ! and yet the Prussian police is as strict as that would be.) The first thing we looked at was the Palace Sans Souci, which was built by the famous Fritz. Here everything has been left in the same state as at his death. You are shown into his study, where his table stands covered with ink-blots, into his bed- room, etc. The whole house is very simple, and the gardens around it in the French style. You know he was a passionate admirer of everything French, which he spoke and wrote much better than anything German (in fact, he knew very little of his own language, and all his works are written in French). Near the house are the tombs of his favourite dogs, and not far from them the white horse which he rode so often in the Seven Years' War lies buried. There are two other palaces here one of which is a fine building, and the only splendid residence which the King of Prussia has, the palaces in Berlin being all very simple, private-looking houses. Here is also a very elegant and tasteful villa in the Italian style, belonging to the present Crown Prince. In the evening we were invited to a kind of military ball, where, as is proper and fitting in Prussia, all the ladies were of ice-gray nobility, and all the gentlemen were officers, with a profusion of gold lace and orders, or civilians with most portentous stars on their breasts. It was rather dull, but it must be confessed that the Germans are very polite to strangers, and I have experienced nothing but kindness and civility in every town that I have been in. The most impor- tant part of my letter is to come, although I have already nearly finished my paper. You remember I was to stay in Berlin for the winter, that is to say, about six months. I now write to tell you my plans for leaving, and I beg of you to answer me as soon as possible, and by the way of London or Havre, because your letter VOL. I. D 34 MOTLEY'S LETTEKS. [CHAP. II. cannot reach at soonest before I am ready to leave Berlin. I shall not give you a long compte rendu of what I have done since I have been here ; you must examine for yourself when I return. I think I could bear a tolerable examination in the Civil Law in a few weeks, at which time I shall have finished the study of it. I hope in the course of two months to have some knowledge of the German Common Law and of the Law of Nations, which I have also been studying. Of my other studies, which have been merely for myself, I shall say nothing. As soon as your answer to this reaches me, which I hope will be early in April, I should wish to leave this for Weimar from thence to Leipzig, Dresden, and Vienna, and so to Paris, where I should not wish to stay long, but rather spend the summer in the South of France. I wish to stay long enough to perfect myself in speaking and writing the language and to see the country, which I could do I think in the course of four or five months no longer. (With the Italian language I hope to do the same afterwards.) My plans for the winter are not fully arranged, as I said, but before that I have time enough to send them for your approval. Those for the next summer are so, and I hope that you will consent to them. Your affectionate son, J. L. M. ( 35 ) CHAPTER III. AUSTRIA FRANCE ITALY. Vienna Madame de Goethe Tieck and his works Journey from Vienna to Styria, Tyrol, etc. German postillions Styrian Alps Molk Amstetten Neubach St. Florian Salzburg An ancient hermitage Burial customs Hallein Salt mines Salzach Valley -Bad-Gastein Nassield " Old Testament scenery" A remote village Home The Apollo Belvedere Naples Hadrian's villa Reviving old scenes Guide's Aurora Reflections on the art treasures of Rome Tour in Sicily Catania Taormina Classical associations Etna An ascent under difficulties An arduous climb And a disappointment Girgenti A perilous voyage to Malta Return to Paris Salisbury Cathedral Comparison of English and Foreign cathedrals Stonehenge. To his Mother. Vienna, June 2nd, 1834. MY DEAR MOTHER, ***** Madame de Goethe, of whom I spoke in my last letter, gave me a letter to a Countess Finkenstein of Dresden, an old lady who lives in Tieck's family, and by whom I was introduced to this author. I had been very much disappointed, as you know, in not having been in Germany before Goethe's death, that I might have seen that Nestor of literature, and this has been in some sort a compensation. I do not know if many of Tieck's works have been translated into English. If they have, you will get them at the Athenaeum. Inquire for * Fantasas ' or ' Puss in Boots ' or the ' World upside down/ or Tieck's novels (which last are a set of exquisite little tales, novels in the original meaning of the word), full of old German legends and superstitions, and the authorship of which will entitle him to the title of German 'Boccaccio.' The other works are the old nursery tales of ' Fortunatus,' ' Puss in Boots,' ' Blue Beard,' etc., etc., done into plays (not for the stage), and as full of playful and sharp satire, poetry D 2 36 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. III. and plain sense as they can hold. If they have not been translated we shall have a chance of reading them together one of these days. I was invited by Tieck to tea on Sunday evening, when there was a small party. He is at present just about finishing his translation of Shakespeare (in company with Schlegel), and is in the habit of reading a play aloud to a party of select auditors. I did not hear him, and rather regret it, because he seems to be rather vain of his elocution. His head and bust are fine, and it was not till he got up from his chair that I observed he was slightly deformed (hump- backed). His conversation was like his books, playful, full of bonhomie, good-natured sort of satire, and perhaps a little childish vanity. He spoke of Cooper, Irving (whom he knew in Dresden, and whom he admired very much), steamboats, hoinoeopathism, himself, elocution, with Shakespeare and the musical glasses. His conversation was pleasing and quiet, but without any great show or brilliancy ; " and so much for Buckingham." Extract from Diary sent to Ms Parents. Paris, July 8th, 1834. June llth. Leave Vienna for Styria, Salzburg, and the Tyrol, meaning to go afterwards by the way of Munich tc Strasbourg, and so to Paris. An old caTeche (a Vienna ac- quisition), drawn by two post horses tied by ropes to the carriage and driven by a postillion with gold lace, cocked hat, feathers and spurs enough to set out a whole dozen militia generals, is our conveyance for the present, because in Austria two together can post cheaper than they can go in the diligence. The postillions all over the Continent are certainly the most perfect race of caricatures in existence, arid the -Austrian was the most absurd of all. Eoad up the Danube misty, moisty morning, and hills covered with clouds. Clears up towards noon, and shows us the chain of Styrian Alps on the left, but not quite near enough, except 1834.] STYRIA SALZBURG. 37 one fine broad-shouldered old mountain (the Eschenberg), with ribands of snow hanging about his head. Pity we took the upper instead of the lower road, and so missed seeing the best part of Styria. Dine at Molk, where we revisit the glimpses of the Danube. Molk monastery, a pretty old abbey on the edge of the river and in the very midst of the fattest and sleekest part of Austria. Road continues through an ocean of wheat and rye, with snug cottages, white villages, distant Alps, and occasionally the Danube, the mother of German rivers. Sleep at a little town called Amstetten. June 12th. Drive out at four. Mountains more gaunt and grim. Styrian and in part Salzburg Alps. Pass another sleek abbey with two hunting lodges appertaining and wide fields and farms. These are your true monks none of your bare-footed, rosaried and roped friars, but jovial old gentle- men, living complacently on the fat of the land and the peasants' expense to whom " They show the steep and thorny way to heaven, While they the primrose path of dalliance tread, And reck not their own rede." Weather all day perfect. Fields all waving with wheat and corn and clover, and in this carnival season of the year the old earth looked as if dressed for a planet's ball and deter- mined to eclipse all other stars. Alps all day on the left, with Traunstein, black, shag-eared, beetle-browed old mountain, tallest of the clan. This mountain is near Ischl, is the highest in Upper Austria, and was our companion all day. Dine at Neubach, wide, dry, unfruitful-looking plain for two or three German miles, cross the railroad, which, wonder- ful to relate for Germany, is actually begun, and is to go from Gmunden to Linz on the Danube, and thence to Prague, opening the communication, in conjunction with the Danube, between the salt mines in Salzburg in the south and the interior of Bohemia in the north with Vienna, owned by a company of which Rothschild and houses in Hamburg and Vienna are the principal, but is to revert to the Government in fifty years. Houses becoming more Swiss-like, wooden, with porticoes 38 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. III. and large stones on the roof, which last is universal in Switzerland and Tyrol. Among other Catholic images which are strewed all along the roadside, one in particular puzzled me for a long time the figure of a saint in armour with a sword in the right hand and a bucket of water in the left, which he is emptying on a burning house. I have found that it is St. Florian, the patron saint of burning houses and firemen, and also, according to the popular legends, of innkeepers and brewers, to whom he always sends a sufficient quantity of water to temper their wine and other potations, and who in gratitude, as I have observed, have always his figure over their doorways. Night at Frankenmarkt, twenty German miles from Amstet- ten, where we stopped last night. All day weather as perfect as if sent express from Eden. June 13th. Two posts through better and better mountains to Salzburg on the Salzach, a town too beautiful for reality. A rapid river and the greenest valley. On one side an old cloister, on the other a magnificent impregnable-looking old castle. Streets and houses all white and Italian looking, and the whole in the richest little valley (just large enough to hold it), where summer is eternally smiling, while around and above are immense ice mountains, where everlasting winter sits shivering on his throne. In this town, where we stayed but six hours, and would have been content to have stayed as many weeks, besides its natural beauties, which are beyond those of any town I ever saw, there are a great many curious things worthy of note ; as, for instance, a very handsome gateway to the town, cut 400 feet through the solid rock of one of the enclosing mountains, projected and accomplished in ten years by an ambitious archbishop, Sigismund. There also still exists a curious and very ancient hermitage, consisting of a cell and little chapel, cut in the very heart of the mountains, originally belonging, according to tradition, to the holy Maximus, a Roman monk of the 5th century, who with his brother were pitched over a precipice by Odoacer the Goth as a reward for their labours. This little chapel hangs over the church of St. Peter, an ancient hut of a later date than 1834.] HALLEIN SALT MINES. 39 itself. I amused myself for some time in the churchyard here in looking at a few queer old family tombs, which are adorned with some rude and fantastic paintings representing Death's doings, with queer explanatory inscriptions, for instance, the figure of Death playing at skittles with nine cross bones and a skull for a ball. Another, Death shuffling off the body of a courtier into the grave in a very unceremonious manner. On most of the tombs I observed the singular custom of preserving the skulls of the deceased in a little open case. I took up one which the inscription informed me belonged to a "beautiful and accomplished young lady, who spoke four languages," I suppose, as Sir Toby says, " word for word without book," and I daresay too " played the viol de Gramba and had all the good gifts of nature." Just above it was one of old Death's doings, pictures of a much earlier date, in which the old gentleman is making very merry with a scholar, whom he is tumbling with all his library into the grave, with an inscription which is rather too long for quotation. Pass through the mountains one post to Hallein, where are the celebrated salt mines, which we visited, formerly belong- ing to the sovereign archbishops of Salzburg, and furnishing for them a very comfortable revenue of some millions of florins. They are now a monopoly of the Austrian Emperor, and, like all the Austrian monopolies, are so dear that they do not produce half as much as they should. After enduing ourselves at the entrance in the graceful and picturesque costume of a miner, viz., a yellow canvas jacket and brown leather breeches and a red woollen night-cap to keep out the damp air, we entered the principal shaft (which is for a considerable distance cut through the solid marble) in order to descend to the principal receiver, " Behalter," or basin, which is 1500 feet below the surface of the earth. The descent is principally made in a peculiar kind of slide, on which you lay yourself almost horizontally, feet foremost, and taking hold of a rope made fast above and below in one hand and holding a torch in the other hand (which answers no earthly purpose that I could discover except to make darkness visible), you slip down as mechanically and almost as fast as a weaver's 40 MOTLEY'S LETTERS (Out*. 1IL shuttle, in which operation you may belieTe that the above- mentioned brown breeches; were of no small advantage. Here we go, swift as lightning: the picture is enough to make one's blood run cold, is it not ? We soon arrived at the basin, which, as I said, is about 1500 feet below the earth, and had leisure to look about us. Such a basin or receiver (of which there are thirty-two in the mines) is a part of a shaft or gang- way enlarged on all sides into an artificial cavern of perhaps a hundred yards in diameter, and some ten or twelve feet in height. Fresh water is conducted by wooden pipes into the cavern till it is nearly half full. The salt of which the inside of the mountain is almost entirely composed is then dissolved and mixed with water, which, after becoming sufficiently impreg^ nated, is conducted out of the mines into the valley, where it is boiled, etc. While the water remains standing, which of course it is suffered to do for a considerable time, the whole cavern appears or is in fact a gloomy subterraneous lake. The miners employed there row about it in little canoes ; the whole appearance is most surprising, and when the cavern is lighted up, as it was when we were there, and the little lighted boats flitting across in all directions like fire spectres, you might believe that you were assisting at the carnival of the cobolds and gnomes and all sorts of sprites, such a strange, bewildering, unholy aspect as the whole scene was. We emerged through another shaft, and after resuming our earthly habiliments, we returned to our ea&eft^ and our journey. 7 to 10 PJII. Drive through the narrow pass of the moun- tain towards Werfen, got out to look at the opening of the Eiver Salzach, where the stream makes its way apparently through the rock, and where the hills are jammed so closely together that nothing but a river could get through. Drive continues through the dark, deep valley of the Salzach, faint moonlight, black gloomy mountains with glittering snow- tops, fire-flies, cascades, pine forests, an attempt at a thunder shower, a precipitous road, and a postilion fast asleep the whole way, altogether romantic enough to have enchanted the whole Fudge family. At 11 PJIL reach Werfen, where we stop 1834.J HAP (,AMT1\ \A-MT.l.P. 11 for the night, tiivil enough, having been on the road since lour in the morning. June 14th, 4 A.M. Two posts to little town of Lend. Morning, as usual, cold and foggy. Summits of the moun- tains covered with snow, and clouds in so singular a mixture that it was impossible to separate the one from the other, and it looked as if the scene were all sky or all mountain. Lend, a cascade and a fine rainbow. Detained two hours by a broken bridge. Drive through the Kleinme, a narrow pass, much resembling, though I think not quite so magnificent as, the Scotch and White Mountains. Road built along the side of the mountain, tor there is no valley, and the immense masses of rock rtach from the region of clouds and ice down into the bed of the River Acha, far beneath us in the smooth, unbroken perfect precipice. The bridge over the river, \\ith St. Melchior story on the roadside. Continue a few miles to Bad-Gastein, a wild and primitive- looking village with a mineral spring on a plain nearly 4000 feet above the sea. Mountains all round, cascades in great number, and the fine fall of the Acha in three separate leaps, all foam and thunder. Walk in the afternoon to Nassfeld, a little valley about a thousand feet higher than Gastein, three waterfalls, two toler- able but rather commonplace cascades, but the third, the Sddeierfall, very beautiful and singular. A thin narrow un- broken snow brook, falling from the tiptop of an iced mountain, uith the bed of a river below, and so blue and clear and trans- parent that it looks, as it is called, like a veil for a giantess, for Queen Cunegunde or for the Spirit of Solitude who is at home in this valley. A strange, silent-looking valley, with snow 1\ ing unmelted in large patches in the middle of June, no signs of life excepting a few goats, all shut in by immense mountains, and looking like a very fortress of solitude. Walk back by another path through the same patriarchal, Old 'Ltttnntiit I'hnl of set iit-ri/, to (uistein. 1,V// June. 1 suppose that no transatlantic travellers ever happened upon this little place before, for as soon as we had \\ ritten our names down in the Travellers' Book as Americans, 42 MOTLEY'S LETTEKS. [CHAP. III. a most prodigious sensation took place among the bath com- pany. I never was such a lion in my life. Everybody, the ladies and all, were determined to make our acquaintance, and a jovial old Austrian Field-Marshal (whom I afterwards found out was no less a personage than the Governor-General of Bohemia) patronised us particularly, and we were pressed to stay on all hands. But fearing that some Sandwich Island ladies or New Zealanders might arrive if we stayed too long, and strip us entirely of our lionship, we determined to vanish while we were in our zenith, and such exchanging of cards and such tender farewells among acquaintances of twenty- four hours standing I never saw before. I expected that on our departure the children would come out in procession and strew flowers in our path, but it was very early in the morning there was nobody stirring, so we went off quietly. To his Parents. Rome, November 21th, 1834. MY DEAR PARENTS, * # # * # The common casts, prints, etc., had given me no better idea of the Apollo Belvedere than they had of the Venus de Medici. I have heard of persons being disappointed in both. This term " disappointment " is a cant and favourite phrase which I don't profess to understand. If a person expected an elephant and found an Apollo, I can conceive of his being disappointed, but if he was looking for a divinity when he saw the Apollo, and was then " disappointed," I can only say that the fault was in him. The whole figure of the Apollo is slight almost to spareness, but at a little distance the nose is a thousand times more scornful than I expected, and the whole face has almost a chilling repulsiveness. But on approaching nearer, this expression melts away, all the anger concentrates in the nostril, and the eternal beauty of the face and figure dissolves itself and floats almost like a drapery around the 1834.] THE APOLLO BELVEDERE. 43 whole statue. The god, the divinity speaks, breathes, moves in every line, limb, muscle. Every deity of the ancient temple has lent this face his brightest attributes. The forehead of Jupiter, when it was pregnant with the Goddess of Wisdom, the eye of Juno, the lips of Venus, and the hair floating on the shoulders and bound on the forehead as if by the very fingers of the Graces. The very first sight of the statue transports you to Delos. The Muses in their hallowed vales rise around you, and in the midst of them, and presiding over them, and over everything which makes life lovely, stands the god of eternal youth, and light, and beauty and poetry in his full divinity before you. It is no longer a piece of chiselled marble which enchains your eyes, the figure expands into life, into immortality while you are gazing the ground seems to sink away before his lofty godlike steps you see the glittering chariot of fire, and hear the snorting steeds, and you start lest the god of the sun shall have already sprung into his car, and be already rolling in light and glory and divinity above the earth. There is on the whole more divinity, more of the godhead, in the Apollo than in any ancient statue, at least that I have seen. One may have more loveliness (as for instance in Meleager) and another more nature, but the Apollo is not flesh, is not marble there is nothing earthly about him. It is a being to whom none but Ganymede or Hebe have ad- ministered. He has never been fed but with nectar and ambrosia ; there are no protruding veins, no swelling muscles all is perfect, godlike, beautiful repose. He is the embodi- ment of the ethereal essence which is the being of gods, and there is not a particle of materiality about his whole system. It seems impossible that labour and time should have created such a statue. It seems to have waked into existence like a single thought, a single impulse. It seems the sudden and startling realization of the brightest dream which the genius of its artist had ever conceived. It is impossible to imagine that it could have been produced by degrees, that the sculptor could have seen the future divinity concealed in the heart of the shapeless marble, that he could have watched his own 44 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. Ill: bright original thought gradually unfolding itself from the bosom of the stone, breathing upon him slowly and mysteri- ously like the birth of day and night, and bursting at last from its marble chaos in full, perfect, immortal loveliness of his first burning conception. It seems impossible ; it seems to be the thought itself waked into immortal existence by the stroke of a wand, so ethereal, so immaterial, so godlike is the statue. There, I have prosed so long about this same Apollo, this Dandy of the Vatican, that I have left myself no room to speak of the other treasures of this Museum. As I may as well have a little method in my madness, and a little system in my letters, I will discourse in my next of St. Peter's, the Capitol, and some of the endless villas, palaces, and churches stuffed full of pictures and statues which occupy our mornings and will occupy them for some time to come. Very affectionately your son, LOTHROP MOTLEY. To his Parents. Naples, December 28th, 1834. MY DEAR PARENTS, ***** Two miles beyond are the vast remains of the Emperor Hadrian's famous villa. This is an immense heap of ruins, and as in most buildings of this kind (see the baths of Cara- cal la, Titus, Diocletian, etc., in Rome) little remains to testify of their former magnificence but their extent. This villa is supposed to have been seven miles in circum- ference, and contained besides the Imperial palace, baths, temples, theatres, libraries, barracks of the Praetorian Guard, and, in short, everything necessary to constitute that counter- part to a cockney's paradise, the urbs in rure, always supposing the latter to be the much-coveted rus in urbe. It was built under the direction of Hadrian on his return from his seven years' tour in the East, and seems to have been a sort of embodied epitome of his voyage. The "Canope" 1834.] HADRIAN'S VILLA. 45 was in imitation of that near Alexandria ; the Lyceum, Poecile, etc., were copied from those at Athens, and the vale of Tempe was made in imitation of the famous happy valley of Thessaly. The cicerone conducts you round to several different por- tions of ruins, to which names, but in general most arbitrary ones, have been given, and the giro commenced with the " Grecian Theatre." Here the forms of the Proscenium and the seats of the spectators are still distinctly to be traced, and in the neigh- bourhood are the ruins of the porticoes, etc. The next is the Poecile, in imitation of that of Athens ; and next the library. Afterwards an immense heap of rubbish with one entire wall, dignified with the name of the Imperial Palace ; next the barracks of the Praetorian Guard ; next the Canope, near it the remains of another theatre, other baths at the entrance to the vale of Tempe. The ruins are generally of brick sometimes a vault, sometimes a portico, sometimes a wall remains entire, but it is generally a con- fused mass of rubbish, from which the most interesting remains, such as statues, vases, etc., have been extracted and carried to Kome. And thus is repeated for the thousandth time the often-told and dull catalogue raisonne of the ruins of Hadrian's villa. If you will allow me to mount my hobby, as Tristram Shandy would say, and call fancy to the side of history, the scene will be different, and at least more lively. The shattered columns rise, the mouldering walls, the fallen arches, the broken statues, the faded pictures, and all the pomp, pride, and circumstance of the luxurious abode of the most glorious Roman Emperor start again to life and grace and beauty. The palaces, the temples, the theatres, the baths, the halls of sports, the fields of military exercise, the haunts of the poets and philosophers revive and appear as they were thousands of years ago. The scene becomes alive and animate, and is re peopled with the dust which has long since floated and vanished on the wind. The forms and voices of the long-forgotten dead 46 MOTLEY'S LETTEKS. [CHAP. IIL rise again to being, and the halls and courts of the stately villa swarm with their shades, and in the gay phantasmagoria of a dream, and ring again as they were wont to the mirth and laughter of the crowd. Here rises the proud, command- ing form of the imperial Hadrian, there lounges the graceful Antinous, from the neighbouring courtyard is heard the steady, martial tramp of the Praetorians. In yonder theatre rises a buzz of admiration or a shout of laughter at a gay comedy of Terence or Plautus. In the neighbouring and stately library are seen the dignified forms of the old philosophers and poets, they saunter leisurely through the lofty alcoves or descend through the luxurious mazes of the gardens, and the voices of wit and wisdom fall again upon your ear as they join in sweet com- munion together. From yonder Palaestro the roar of merri- ment rises on the wind and proclaims the assembly engaged in the light-hearted games of the baths. A serious crowd in the distance are bending their steps to the temples, the priests in the splendid array of their office are administering the rites of the altar. Farther off a careless crowd are thronging to the luxurious baths. All around the voices of command, of mirth, of admi- ration, of discussion, of devotion, float through the air and mingle in strange variety together. Everywhere is life, cheerful, busy, bustling, noisy, impatient life. Baths, halls, temples, theatres are all swarming with human figures, and resounding with human voices. The stately fabrics of Imperial grandeur are around you, the masterpieces of Koman and foreign genius decorate the apart- ments ; the porticoes, the gardens, all look as if for eternity, strong, stately, durable, magnificent. The day before we determined to leave Kome for Naples I had taken my last look at the Apollo and Meleager and the rooms of Kaphael, and at midnight I had walked to the ruins of the Palace of the Caesars, and taken from thence my last look at the Forum, and the Curia, and the temples, and the Coliseum ; and the next day, having a call to make in the vicinity of the Capuchin church, I paid a farewell visit to 1834.] GUIDO'S AUROKA. 47 Guide's wonderful archangel (which is the Apollo of canvas in spite of all gainsay ers), and then, as it was not far off, I thought I might look once more at the wonderful Aurora. This is painted in fresco on the ceiling of a garden house in the Palace Rospigliosi. The ceiling of a private nobleman's garden pavilion adorned with one of the most immortal pictures of the immortal Guido may be a fair offset to a niche in the basement story of an emperor's palace filled with a group of the Laocoon ; but search through the world out of Italy and you will scarcely find in all the palaces and pavilions of all the emperors and noblemen of all the world such a refinement of luxury. The design of this painting is one of matchless poetry, and executed by the hand of a magician. The chariot of the sun is just rolling over the first grey cloud of morning, preceded by Aurora, who drops flowers and dew over the still-sleeping land and sea, and by Light, in the figure of a boy, whose torch is just beginning to touch the cloud with the brightness of daylight ; and surrounded by the train of Hours, every one of whom is a being of eternal youth and grace and beauty. The whole is wonderful there is not a stroke of the pencil that does not breathe of morning and daylight ; all is fresh, brisk, and startling, in the step of Aurora, and the individual and different beauty of each figure is almost incredible. If I should find a fault it would be with the figure of Apollo, who is in fact no Apollo, and furnishes the only exception to the vivid and godlike beauty of all the other figures. He has, in fact, no business in the clouds, being a most earthly figure a red- haired, clownish-looking bumpkin, who looks as if taken from an ox cart, and is totally unfit to drive the four-in-hand of Phoabus, whose place he is clumsily usurping. Generation after generation shall throng these places, and still the pile shall endure the delight and wonder of Home and of the world. Alas ! throw down the wand of imagina- tion and look around you. What meets your eye ? Heaps of confused and shapeless ruins a dreary and desolate mass of decay and corruption, overgrown with weeds and ivy, and choked with rubbish. The theatres, temples, porticoes, palaces, 48 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. III. lie alike in one mighty and indistinguishable mass of ruin and desolation ; and not a voice is heard through the vast and dreary silence to testify the existence of humanity. After indulging in all these heroics, which you will perhaps think excusable when one is "putting his foot on such a reverend history " as this villa of Hadrian, we continued our route up the hills, and through a forest of olives to Tivoli. To Ms Parents. Naples, April '60th, 1835. MY DEAK PARENTS, I sent off a very short letter yesterday to let you know where I was and whither I was going, and intended writing you a very long one to-day. I have, how- ever, already taken my passage in the steamboat from this to Genoa, whence I shall go directly to Paris, and I shall accord- ingly hardly have time to give you the whole of my tour in Sicily ; for I find, on looking at my notes about it, that it is the most voluminous one I have made. Besides, as I shall see you all in a few months, I may as well leave something to be told viva voce. We came down, as I believe I have told you in a former letter, through Calabria to Keggio, and so crossed over to Messina. From Messina we went down along the eastern coast of Sicily to Catania ; from Catania we ascended Etna ; afterwards came to Syracuse ; from Syracuse to Girgenti, the site of the ancient Agrigentum ; and from Girgenti we crossed in a small vessel to Malta. From Malta, as I have already told you, I returned in a brig to Naples. 24.th March. Left Messina for Catania in a carriage, for this distance, about 120 miles, is the only part of Sicily where one can travel in any way but on mules. The two days we were coming, the weather squally, rainy, wretched, and the road, which should have presented different and constant views of Mount Etna, presented nothing. But the island is so beyond all description lovely such a wild, fabulous, overflowing 1835.] SICILY AND ITS ASSOCIATIONS. 49 vegetation; such millions of flowers and fruits; lemon trees and oranges springing again into blossom, while the boughs are still golden with fruit; grain bursting ripe and ready bearded from the ground, for all the fields are at this moment in full ear, the banks all gaudy with anemones, marigolds, daisies, violets, and a thousand garden flowers, springing wildly and spontaneously into existence at the first breath of spriDg. And then, as one draws near Catania and the base of Etna, such wild, wonderful contrasts a boundless ocean of lava, black, dismal, awful ; and yet, such is the eternal and ever- vivid quality of the atmosphere, that the gaudiest flowers and the most luxuriant vegetation, springing in the very bosom of the lava before it is hardly cold all this together makes a drive in Sicily, although not under the most favourable sky, a thing to be remembered. Half-way between Messina and Catania is Taormina, the ancient Taurominium, and here are the beautiful ruins of an ancient theatre ; and the second day we passed the pretty and finical town of Aci, which is immortally associated with one or two exquisite fables of the Greeks. The river which runs by the town is the Acis, the liquid lover of Galatea, for it was here that the jealous Titan crushed the unfortunate shepherd as he sat by his beloved sea-nymph, and the river into which he was changed by his mistress still rushes impetuously to the ocean, as if to seek and console the sorrowing sea-nymph. Two or three miles from the town brought us to the beach, to look for seven small islands or rocks close to the shore, and which are said to be the rocks of the Cyclops the rocks which the same ill-tempered Polyphemus threw down upon Ulysses and his companions. According to accurate people, they were thrown into the sea by Etna and not by the Titans ; but the long point of Cape Mollini on the left, the seven mysterious rocks on the right, the sea black and angry in front, and Etna, which ought to have been smoking, behind, made up together a very epical picture, and so I resisted the volcanic theory, and in the midst of the scene I recollected the adventures which occurred on the spot to ^Eneas. I saw the ancient VOL. i. E 50 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. III. Anchises grasp the hand of the unfortunate and defeated Achsemenides. I listened with him to his tale of distress, and was startled in the midst by the appearance of the truculent Titan. I saw the grim, ungainly form of Polyphemus striding from his cave, and beheld -ZEneas and his companions scamper- ing into the boats to escape him, and I heard the disappointed roar of the infuriated giant, which shook the sea and the earth, and even Etna itself, to the centre but I will spare you the rest of the description. I see that although I have carefully left out the description of the two days' journey to Catania, I am already loitering on the way, but I have no time to spare, for we have got Etna to ascend, countless ruins to explore, and a shipwreck to outlive, before we get to Malta. And so let us hasten at once to Catania. Catania is just at the base of Etna, and is the most volcanic town possible, literally built on its own ruins, whole foundation in land made from water by fire. The sea formerly reached beyond the Porte di Ulysse, now considerably beyond the city on the outside, for the ocean has been filled with lava, and on that stands the town. The harbour is the most sin- gular spectacle in the world, high rocks and cliffs, in as wild and fantastic shapes as those of Nahant, but all lava, which in 1669 swept from the top of Etna, over and nearly destroying the town, and ran far into the sea, thus forming a breakwater, and thus a safe harbour which subsequent eruptions destroyed. Catania's history is all earthquake leaving ancient history out of the question and beginning with comparatively modern times. In 1160 every house and every inhabitant was de- stroyed ; in 1348 it was devastated by the plague ; in 1669 the lava overwhelmed and destroyed it; in 1693 it was again destroyed by an earthquake, and still, at this moment, it is a gay, flourishing and, for Sicily or Italy, a neat and thriving town; and even now its light-hearted inhabitants live and laugh and dance and sing with an abyss of fire yawning beneath them, Etna thundering over their heads, and in danger every moment to see striding back upon them the ancient awful chaos. There are no human battle-fields here no places celebrated by the wars of the Greeks or the Romans 1835.] ETNA. 51 the Romans or the Hohenstaufen, as are to be seen in most parts of Sicily and Italy, but other and far more imposing battle-fields. Two great elements have been on this spot con- tinually at war fire and ocean. The plains and places of this terrible encounter are distinctly, awfully visible, and of the wrecks and ruins which have attended them, the least are man's ; and even now, when one sits on the rocks of fire and hears the sea foaming and howling around them, old Ocean seems to be sounding his defiance to the god of fire and daring him to another conflict. March 28th. Start from Catania at 11 A.M. to Mount Etna. My most exquisite reason for joining in the party I should be puzzled to say, probably because Abbate's and my own opinion were decidedly against it. Mules from Niccolosi, twelve miles, through the first region, or Eeggio Coltivato, of the mountain. The greatest peculiarity in the appearance of Etna, and one which renders him the most striking mountain I have ever seen, not excepting even Mont Blanc, is his single and solitary situation. Other high mountains are usually the highest of a chain of mountains, and generally the vicinity of a multitude of hills detracts from the effect of the highest peak. But Etna rises all alone from a dead plain ; suddenly and singly with one stride he is in heaven, and there he stands and stood to-day, with the sunshine wasting itself on his icy forehead all alone the whole sky and the whole earth to himself, and looking like the god and ruling spirit of the island. The three regions into which naturalists divide the mountain are the Eeggio Primo or Fecondo, Eeggio Secundo or Selvoso, Eeggio Terzo or Nevoso the fruitful, the woody, the snowy, and desolate. They are in fact paradise, purgatory, and hell. Nothing can surpass the overflowing wonderful fertility of the first, the mystic gloom of the second, nor the wholly infernal, hideous, sulphureous sights and smells of the last. Gradual ascent towards Niccolosi. Soil of the side of the mountain all ancient lava, which in the course of centuries becomes the richest mould, and is covered with a prurient and fabulous vegetation. Thus here nature is cradled in fire and nursed by earthquakes, and a new Sicily 52 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. III. seems constantly springing from the ashes of the old one, for the hackneyed phoenix is no trope here, but reality. Wide base of Etna, which is nearly one hundred miles round. Life and laughing with plenty cornfields, vineyards, flower- gardens, fields of flax in flower, Indian figs, mulberries, lemons, oranges, golden with fruit and fragrant with flower ; in fact, wherever one looks one sees Ceres, who was anciently, with justice, the presiding deity of the island, sitting in beneficent majesty with the boy Bacchus laughing in her lap. At Niccolosi finishes the first region ; here are the Monti Kossi, two tolerable hills thrown up in the tremendous eruption of 1669, and the course of the lava down the side of the mountain to the sea is still darkly and awfully distinct. This side is girt round with a line of bocce or craters, and the whole scene is black with lava and ashes. The previous sight of Vesuvius had not enabled me to conceive of such a scene of horrible and unearthly desolation as I saw here. The black broad line of lava looks like the wake of a ship of fire. It seems as if the ancient Chaos had strode from Etna to the sea and left the trace of his footsteps and desolation behind him. At Niccolosi, which is a little village about a sixth of the way up Etna, we dismounted and ate a dinner brought with us from Catania. A certain Dr. Gemmalaro, a fat old professor and a kind of second Empedocles, lives up in the clouds here, apparently to study the mountain and make notes thereof. This seeming to be his only occupation, Abbate, our landlord at Catania, had advised us to hold converse with the learned Theban, and we did, but to no purpose except that he sent us our guides. At 8 P.M. mount mules again, for, as if the diffi- culty of ascending the mountain at this season of the year were not great enough, we must needs increase them by going up in the night, in order to enjoy the cool breezes of March at midnight among the snows of Etna. From Niccolosi to the Casa della Neve is about ten miles, the second stage of the journey, and comprehends the second or woody region. Night pitch dark but starry guides with lanterns. In an hour commence patches of snow, increasing, and night cold. Arrive 1835.] ASCENT OF ETNA. 53 at Casa della Neve at half-past eleven, expecting to find a tolerably comfortable hut with a dry floor and perhaps the Sybaritish luxury of a chair and table ; have the inexpressible satisfaction to find the house of snow well deserving its name a stone hut, minus its roof, and filled with snow about two feet deep. Make a fire of branches before it, and cower shivering over it in a most melancholy state, listening to the wind soughing through the trees and howling hideously on the still distant and icy top of the mountain. After indulging for half-an-hour in pleasing anticipations of our night's walk, leave the paradisaical house of snow at about midnight to perform the third and principal stage of the journey. At midsummer the ascent from the Casa della Neve to the Casa degli Inglesi at the foot of the cone is practicable to mules, the distance nine miles, and then there remains only the ascent of the cone, which is, how- ever, for a mile nearly perpendicular, to be made on foot, consequently in warm weather and by daylight it is an easy comparatively easy affair. At present from the Casa della Neve to the top is all deep, hard-frozen snow. The guides had told us we must leave the mules here and make the whole ten miles' ascent on foot. Attempt riding a little farther through the thrilling regions of thick-ribbed ice. Mule and I flounder about a few hundred yards through the snow, until at last he tumbles fairly over, and we roll together most amicably head over heels some dozen yards down the snow bank, till we are stopped by a thicket of ilexes. Get up and shake myself, and finding myself unharmed, saving a few bruises, proceed, with' the help of the guides, to assist the amiable companion of my misfortunes to his legs again. Finding that the girths and bridle are broken all to pieces, and experience showing that the slippery side of an iced volcano is not the best place to show off one's horse- or rather mule-manship, determined to accede to the prayers of the guide, and all leave the mules and commence the ascent on foot. The ascent to the Casa Inglese lasted from a little after midnight to 5 A.M. Cold gradually increased, the ascent 54 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. TIL excessively steep, the ice intolerably slippery, the wind piercing. The remainder of the journey and the ascent of the cone, which must be always performed on foot, is difficult. Difficult on a warm summer's day, and after dismounting, fresh, comfortably warm and untired from our mule's back, and taking repose and refreshment in the Casa Inglese before com- mencing the ascent, eceo la differenza! On a cold piercing night in March, in the coldest part of the twenty-four hours, viz., an hour before dawn, arriving at the base of the cone, fagged, half-frozen, and worn out from a nine miles' and five hours' walk up the steep, slippery ice of the mountain, through the whole night, too, instead of dismounting from an agreeable ride, finding the Casa Inglese buried deep in snow, and with nothing for it but to commence the last and closing scene of the momentous history without resting, with the addition to our misfortunes that the guides had neglected to take up water or even an orange, so that there was nothing to slake our constant thirst but the ice which we had been so much warned against that it seemed like swallowing poison to attempt it. On my arriving at the Casa degli Inglesi, one of the party was a little ahead, and the other was half-an-hour behind. My guide was an old man, quite unequal to his office, and being very much fatigued himself, advised me to stay and see the sun rise from thence instead of from the summit, adding coolly that any farther ascent was quite im- possible. Spur him on, and, both nearly exhausted, commence crawling up through the ice and knee-deep ashes which form the almost perpendicular and almost mile-long ascent of the cone. Both drop with fatigue every dozen yards, till at last the guide fairly tumbles over in the ashes and refuses to budge another step. Leave him to his fate and scramble and creep through clouds of hideously smelling sulphur to the top ; see the sun rise just as I reach the top of the ridge, and such a lame and impotent conclusion to the night's labour was intolerable. The night had been clear and bright, but towards morning mists had begun to collect in the south, and at last the sun rose red and lurid above the sea, and after glaring a few 1835.] THE VIEW FROM ETNA. 55 seconds like a culprit from a barred prison window through the long dun vapoury mists which stretched all across the horizon, hid himself from the day in a dark heavy mass of clouds, which almost filled the whole heaven. I was in no favour with Apollo certainly, and looking down towards the islands, which was the only part of the vaunted prospect not quite obscured by the vapours, I found that the king of the winds was not in a bit better humour ; he seemed to have unchained every one of his tempests, and they came sweeping coldly and dismally across the top of the mountain, and had nearly blown me into the sea. Struggle against them a little while, and look about me. The objects to be gained by our ascent were first, to see the sun rise ; second, to see the cele- brated pyramidal shadow of the cone formed on the southern side of the island ; third, the extensive view of the island ; fourth, a sight of the crater. Of these only the last were attained. The sunrise was anything but brilliant, the clouds prevented the phenomenon of the shadow, and the darkness and mistiness of the atmosphere towards the south obscured a great part of the view. In fact, the Lipari Islands, the ex- tremity of Calabria, and the coast of Messina were almost all that could be seen. All that I got was a look at the crater ; but that was, after all, worth all the trouble. Such a hideous, horrible, infernal sight I had never conceived of. The yawn- ing and almost fathomless gulf, its sides formed of precipitous cliffs of ancient ice and brimstone and lava and ashes, the dull heavy sulphurous vapours rising along the sides and suf- focating all who attempt to inhale the atmosphere, and seeming like the breath of the rebel giant who lies chained and howl- ing and writhing in agony beneath the mountain, altogether gave me an idea of the Inferno which I could never have conceived of : the fumes of Vulcan's workshop, the breath of the demons who infest the mountain, the cradle of Chaos, nothing is too vile, hideous, and ghastly to be associated with the place. Forgot to mention what was one of the most striking circumstances of the whole expedition. At about two hours after midnight,, when we had gotten about a third of the way 56 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. III. up, and were toiling through the snow half tired and half frozen, we descried what seemed a black ridge of lava above the snow, and promised a deal of satisfaction in resting there. It seemed about five minutes' walk. We hastened towards it. Five minutes passed, and it seemed still five minutes ; another five minutes, still the same. Another half-hour, another hour, still it receded before us, and I got nervous. It was as if some of the demons with which the caves of Mount Etna are peopled were mopping and mowing at us from that black and ghastly mass of lava, as it still fled in silent mockery before us. At last morning broke, and lo ! the ledge of rocks where we were to have reposed ourselves when about a third of the way up the mountain now hung still high above us, and was the summit, the black, awful summit itself of Mount Etna. After five minutes spent in gaping and gasping at the crater and endeavouring to make something of the view, return to the base of the cone, seat ourselves and warm ourselves by the sulphurous and stinking fumes of a bocca, and thaw some of our hard-frozen food in the steam, and in that moment I think I never saw six more unearthly and devilish-looking individuals than we three, with the three guides, as haggard with the want of sleep and the night's fatigue, half famished and half frozen, we hung over the deep, sulphurous fumes of that infernal bocea, gnawing our frozen victuals. Descend from the Casa Inglese to Casa della Neve in about two hours, which in ascending occupied five, fold cloak under me like a sledge, and slide down comfortably and quickly. Beach Casa della Neve at eight, devour a cold chicken and a bottle of wine, and resume the mules. Jog down to Niccolosi, falling asleep on the mule two or three times, and reach Niccolosi at half-past eleven. Kest until 3.30, and then proceed through the paradisaical region to Catania again. As we approach the base, weather fine again. Sunday, and the peasants in holiday suits, air full of perfume and earth full of flowers, butterflies swarming, bees humming, lizards creeping, etc., etc. Keach at last Catania and the most excellent Albergo della Corona, and rejoice in a good dinner and a good bed. The latter, you may be sure, was 1835.] A PEEILOUS VOYAGE. 57 acceptable after having ridden on mules fifty miles and walked twenty without sleeping. On the 9th of April, having been the day before rolled and half drowned, mules and all, in a river, we arrived at Girgenti. After having admired the beautiful temples here for two or three days, we joined a party of English, who had hired a small vessel to take them across to Malta. The distance is about one hundred miles, and we hoped to get there in about twenty-four hours. The vessel was not quite thirty tons burthen, and besides ten passengers and seven sailors, had been loaded with brimstone, contrary to our express con- tract. We got on well enough the first night. We set sail at nine in the evening, but as there was nothing like a cabin, and the hold would only contain two or three at a time, the night, which was an excessively cold one, was anything but pleasant. Towards morning, however, the wind, which had been pretty strong all night, increased to a hurricane. One of our sails, not taken in in time, was blown to pieces, and the others being furled, we drifted under bare poles quite at the mercy of the wind. The sea rose to a height which I think I never saw in the Atlantic, and our vessel, which in calm weather was hardly a foot above water, was now washed over by every wave. She was heavily laden, and laboured excessively, and strained to every wave almost to cracking. We were drenched through by every wave and expecting every moment to be swamped The captain lay in a comer, crying like a child, and calling on St. Joseph ; the crew were praying to the Madonna ; and at last all the passengers, at the request of the captain, by a sudden impulse commenced discharging the cargo in a very summary manner. After having thus presented Mr. Graset's brimstone to the fishes, the vessel rode lighter, and the wind lulling a little, we became encouraged. The captain and crew resumed com- mand of the vessel. And we all lay drenched, shivering, and miserable on the deck. At last we made land, and then commenced a violent dispute among the sailors whether it was Sicily or Malta. Conceive of these sages, men who have spent their whole lives in navigating between these two 58 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. III. islands, and not able to distinguish one coast from the other ! At last the wind, which luckily was in our favour, blew us about twenty past twelve of the second night into Malta ; and there we had the inexpressible satisfaction of waiting close to shore in our wet boat till morning, no vessel being allowed to discharge its passengers after sundown. When the sun at last rose I think it never shone on a dozen more forlorn and wretched-looking individuals. Sick, pale, haggard faces, be- grimed with brimstone, clothes torn and drenched and water- logged, we looked altogether more like a deputation of the devils of ' Dei Freischiitz ' than like human creatures. At last we were let out, and the first thing I did on reaching the hotel at eight in the morning was to jump into bed and sleep until nine the next morning. My letter of the 15th of April has informed you of my dis- appointment at Malta, and you may believe that the eight or nine days which I was allowed to spend there waiting for a vessel to the Continent, instead of going with my companions with the steamer to Greece, where I should have been the third day after leaving Malta, were anything but pleasant. The English fleet was there, and as I had acquaintances in some of the officers, I went on board most of the vessels. My voyage from Malta to Naples hardly contained much of interest. The first five days were my usual luck, constant head winds ; so that on the close of the fifth day we were not fifty miles from Malta. At last, however, we got a fair wind, and came through the Straits of Messina and past the Lipari Islands and made the coast of Naples the sixth morning, thus having seen Etna, Stromboli, and Vesuvius, the three celebrated volcanoes of the world, in one and the same day. On arriving I find to my great disappointment that I have lost a great eruption of Vesuvius which has taken place since I have been gone, and this is almost as mortifying as my other disappointment. I have taken my passage to Genoa in the steamer which sails day after to-morrow. I should have taken it as far as Marseilles, but the cholera at that place and the consequent quarantine at Naples prevent the boats from running thither. I shall probably consequently go by land from Genoa to Marseilles, 1835.] SALISBURY CATHEDRAL. 59 and from thence to Paris. At Paris I shall wait until I hear from you in reply to my last letter ; you will think me to blame, but I cannot feel that I have anything to reproach myself with the miscalculating the expense of my journey, and having been almost in sight of Athens without going there is a disappointment which cannot be forgotten. I remain your most affectionate son, J. L. MOTLEY. To Ms Mother. Dublin, July VHh, 1835. MY DEAE MOTHER, The last time I wrote I was, I think, on the point of leaving London for a tour in England, Scot- land, and Ireland. This is the first time we have been stationary in any place for as much as twelve hours, and, con- sequently, the first time I have had any chance of writing. As it is, I am afraid I shall send you but a short letter ; we stay here only till to-morrow (having arrived yesterday), and during this time we wish of course to see as much of the town as possible. We cannot of course help returning to Dublin on our way back to England, and shall stop here another day or two to see what we leave unseen now. The day I left London I reached Salisbury, after a drive in a stage-coach of five or six hours. Here, as I daresay you know, is one of the finest cathedrals in England, and decidedly the finest speci- men I have yet seen, not only of what is called in architectural technology the Early English, but generally of English archi- tecture. The evening I arrived I strolled out with my pocket stuffed full of cigars to see the lions of Salisbury (or rather the lion, for the cathedral is the only thing of interest). This was the first specimen of English Gothic I was to see, and as I walked thither my head was full of the Continental Gothic, which was as yet all I knew. I thought of the Cathe- drals of Cologne, of Vienna, of Kouen, of strange, unfinished, unfinishable buildings, built according to no plan, or rather according to a dozen different ones, and rising helter-skelter 60 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. III. from the midst of a multitude of old, sharp-gabled, red-tiled, ten-storey houses, all looking as if built in the time of the Crusades. The idea of a Gothic cathedral was associated^ in my mind with hundreds of tumble-down hovels, booths, and shops, mixed grotesquely here and there with a magnificent palace of half a dozen centuries, and with groups of amiable ragamuffins and lazzaroni, which on the Continent form such a constant and indispensable ingredient of every picture. Although I knew I was in England, I could not help thinking of the filth and misery, squalor and magnificence, neglect and decay which usually makes up in equal portions every scene of the Continent, so that on the whole, when I came to look on Salisbury Cathedral, I was most ridiculously half disappointed. It was my own fault or my own stupidity. The church is of beautiful proportions, of the most beautiful (at any rate the most regular) of the Gothic styles (namely, the Early English), is built of a fair coloured stone, which looks as fresh as if of yesterday, and with its light and graceful and very high spire, its long lancet-headed windows, its massive walls and stately buttresses, is certainly one of the finest cathedrals I know. Influenced by the associations I have mentioned, I thought the whole scene at first too tidy, too notable, too housewifish, but, as I said before, this was only my own dulness ; on second thoughts I acknowledged to myself that filth and poverty and ugliness were not necessary concomitants of a cathedral, and I confessed that I had rarely seen a more lovely picture than this same church presents. The scene is so softly and sweetly English. The stately and graceful cathedral with its green and smooth-shaven lawn in front, the surrounding elm trees in their magnificently massive foliage, the tidy cottages half covered with honeysuckles and rose-bushes, the hawthorn hedges, and the green meadows with their sleek cattle (to say nothing of the macadamised turnpike and the new hotel), altogether made up a scene purely and exclusively English, and perhaps, after all, as pleasing a one as you can find any- where. From Salisbury I made a short detour to see the celebrated Stonehenge, of which I daresay Preble will give 1835.] STONEHENGE. 61 you a more vivid description out of Worcester's Geography than I can do, although I have seen it so lately. In fact, a very barbarous monument (in the matter of the fine arts at least) has no particular interest when one has seen the much older monuments of much older nations, which preceding ages have only been able to gape at and admire without even being able to imitate, much less to equal. Stonehenge is merely a rude and rather awkward grouping together of about a score of huge and shapeless stones. It may have been a Druid's temple or Queen Boadicea's drawing-room for aught that I (or I believe any one else) know to the contrary, and I can't find enough interest in the grotesque monuments of a parcel of barbarians to detain me from the continuation of my tour. I shall turn it over to the antiquaries. Your affectionate son, J. L. M. 62 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. IV. CHAPTEE IT. RUSSIA. Mr. Motley's marriage Voyage to Europe Discomforts of steamers Manchester The MacLeod case London En route to St. Petersburg Lord Lynd- hurst Mr. Clarke Sir Charles Vaughan Prussia, her vicissitudes and her condition Konigsberg A local legend Tilsit Tauroggen Arrival at St. Petersburg Russian winter Official formalities Expenses of living The climate of Russia John Randolph's despatch Russian Society The Winter Palace Presentation at Court Court formalities The Czar A Court ball The Grand Duke Michael More presentations Count Leva- chofFs house Miss Porter Taglioni Resignation of Secretaryship of Legation Nesselrode Sir William Wylie Peter the Great St. Petersburg and its public institutions Casimir Perier Quarrel between French and Russian Courts Journey to Berlin Halle, a quizzical town Maurice church and its legend Weimar Madame de Goethe Frankfort-on-the- Main Paris Guizot Thiers as a speaker Brussels John Van Eyck, the inventor of oil painting Diary in Russia The Great Bazaar How it is guarded at night Russian taxes and guilds Food supply Army Manu- factures The Blessing of the Waters Peter the Great's house Military hospitals The Hermitage Gallery Orphan asylums. [In 1837 Mr. Motley was married. In 1839 appeared his first novel, ' Morton's Hope.' In the autumn of 1841 he was appointed Secretary of Legation to the Eussian Mission.] To Us Wife. Halifax, Friday morning, October 8th, 1841. MY DEAREST MARY, I write again this morning in order that there may be a double chance of your hearing from me. I wrote yesterday by the brig Arcadian, which sailed this morning for Boston, and you will probably have got that letter "before this reaches you. I told you in that that we had experienced very rough weather and heavy gales from the north-east which delayed our arrival here three days beyond 1841.] DISCOMFORTS OF STEAMERS. 63 the usual time. I flatter myself that nobody can beat me in long passages, go whither or how I will. However, we have every reason to be thankful that we arrived at last in safety, and I make no complaint at the length of the passage. Of the accommodations of the boat I do make complaint, and I may as well tell you now, if you come out in the spring, by all means come in one of the best and largest New York packet ships. The average gain by taking a steamer is only a week, and the loss in comfort no, not comfort, for there is no such thing at sea, but the loss in those appliances which make existence endurable at sea is immense. Everything is dirty, disorderly and disgusting. There is no room in the state rooms to put so much as a tooth-pick, not a drawer nor a shelf, but everything is left to knock about on the floor at its own sweet will. There is no cabin to sit in, the narrow piggery in which we are fed being entirely filled up with the troughs and benches. There is no deck to walk on, as the whole or nearly the whole of the space is occupied by the upper cabin, the state rooms being below. As for the ladies' cabin, I have not been in it, but I am told that they are much worse off than the gentlemen. Kecollect, my dearest Mary, that I am not painting this disagreeable picture because I have been myself so uncomfortable, but only to prevent you from being exposed to the same evils. It has been my greatest consolation thus far, that you and my little darlings were not on board the Caledonia with me. I believe you would have been driven to despair, and I am very sure that if you had been with me, we should have all stopped in Halifax and gone home as soon as possible. Neither do I know that a great many of the discomforts of these ships can be avoided. They are mail boats, intended for speed, and so carry the greatest number of passengers in the least possible space. We are accordingly packed down like salt fish, com- pressed into nothing, and are of course uncomfortable. Now this is worth bearing in going to America, where the saving averages two or three weeks, but in going to England it is most " tolerable and not to be endured." The captain seems to be a thorough seaman, and always at 64 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. IV. his post, and inspires us with perfect confidence. The boat has proved herself a staunch and admirable sea-boat. These are the great essentials before which everything else is as nothing ; but you can unite all in a first-rate packet ship from New York, and if ever I should go to Europe again but no, upon that point my resolution is taken most decidedly. If I get home in safety I shall never leave it again. I knew I should be home-sick enough, but did not anticipate the reality ; I can hardly bear to think of you and all at home for an instant without being sick at heart, and as I cannot say a word upon the subject without becoming very foolish, I shall say nothing. I shall say nothing now upon the point of your coming. I intend to keep an exact account of the expense and of every- thing else bearing upon the subject, so that in the course of the winter you will have the whole matter before you, all the pros and cons, and then I shall trust you to decide for your- self; you know I have often told you, my dearest, that you always decide right and that I always repent not taking your advice ; I tell you so still, that in order that you should decide upon this point you must have everything before you, and look fairly at both sides. Above all things, do not be governed by your feelings, but by your judgment. If we are to be separated till my return, of course my return will be so much the sooner. If you join me, the pleasure of being together will be embittered by the length of the journey and the great fatigues which you and the little ones will have to endure, to say nothing of the expense, which will of course be great. However, it is premature to attempt to form an opinion now. Good-bye. We sail from here at three o'clock this afternoon. Ever your own J. L. M. 1841.] ARRIVAL IN ENGLAND. 65 To his Wife. Manchester, of all places in the world, October 20th, 1841. MY DEAREST, I have just opened this letter to add a word or two. I came round this way, having nothing to do in Liverpool, and because Tom was coming to this place. I dine here, and go up to London to-night. I saw the Mackintoshes in Liverpool, whom you will see very soon, as they go in the Britannia. The Macleod case causes an inconceivable fuss and anxiety throughout Her Majesty's dominions. The first question asked at Halifax was about it, and in Liverpool we had hardly got into the hotel coffee-room, reeking from the Caledonia, when several stout elderly gentlemen rushed frantically across the room, leaving their beer untasted, to inquire concerning the Macleod case. In short, everybody in the house scented us and came upon a point at once. I thought that the ferocity on the subject was confined to the provinces provincial patriotism is always ferocious, but the excitement was very great in London. God bless you. To his Wife. London, October 21st, 1841. MY DEAREST MARY, I arrived here this morning by the railroad between five and six o'clock, having left Manchester at seven the evening before. The whole tour being in the dark, you will hardly expect a description of the journey. I left Tom at Manchester, who, after stopping there some days, intended to go to Scotland. Contrary to my expectations I found Colonel Todd * still in London. He had a passage of twenty-five days, so that 1 United States Minister to St. Petersburg. VOL. I. F 66 MOTLEY'S LETTEKS. [CHAP. IV. after all I did better than he. Our steamer, however, was beaten by several of the packets; that of the 1st October from New York arrived before us ; and the Great Western (unquestionably, from all I hear, the best steamer between England and America), which sailed some few days before us, made her passage in thirteen days. Mr. Frank Gray goes out in her the day after to-morrow. He is here at the same hotel with me (Long's in Bond Street). He will see you probably on his arrival ; and if it gives you half as much pleasure to see him as it would me to see any one who had lately seen you, it will certainly be a satisfaction to you. I cannot tell you how much I long for letters, and yet I must leave England without any. Augustus Thorndike is also at this house ; his family are in Paris. Mr. Stevenson leaves in the Great Western; Mr. Everett has not arrived, so that ridiculously enough, at the present critical period of our English relations, there is nobody in London accredited to the Court, the Secretary of Legation having left some time ago. I am not yet decided upon my route. Colonel Todd had made up his mind to go by the Hamburg and Lubeck line, but is somewhat inclined to adopt my plan of going by way of Stockholm. There is some difficulty in getting information about several points. It is plain sailing enough as far as Stockholm, but some question whether there be a steamer run- ning at present between that place and Abo in Finland. London is such an immense place that nobody knows any- thing about anything. I am going with Colonel Todd to- morrow morning to see Baron Brunnow, the Kussian Ambas- sador here, who will give more information probably than any one else can do, and I shall be guided a good deal by what he says. It is unfortunate, my dear Mary, that I am obliged to write thus a second time without having anything to say to you, except . . . how heart-sick I am at being separated from you. It is indeed " to drag at each remove a lengthening chain " to be thus pushing onwards towards the Finns and Calmucks, while my heart and my eyes are ever turning backwards over 1841.] EN ROUTE TO ST. PETERSBURG. 67 the thousands of miles which separate me from all I love in the world : " But where my rude hut by the Danube lay, There are my young barbarians all at play, There is their Dacian mother." Tell me all about the rude hut on the river when you write. I suppose it is nearly finished by this time. Be sure and attend to it in all its details, for I hope it will be our home for many years, and I shall never be happy till I see it again. Tell me all about little Lily and Lottie, and mother and father and all of them. Tell mother I shall certainly write to her from St. Petersburg. I am so hurried now, and shall be till I get there, that I have hardly time to scrawl these jejune and most unmeaning lines to you. Ever yours, J. L. M. To his Wife. Hamburg, November 1st, 1841. MY DEAREST MARY, I have again a roosting-place for a few hours, and hasten to employ it by writing to you. I reached this place an hour or two ago in the steamer from London. We sailed last Wednesday morning, and ought to have made the passage by Friday noon, from fifty-five to sixty hours being the average passage, instead of which we were six days about it. We had a head wind and very heavy weather the whole voyage, so that it seems that I have only to form a resolution, however secretly, to go by sea to any given place for the wind instantly to make a point of blowing a gale exactly from that direction. I found here a couple of notes from Colonel Todd, who has been expecting me at Liibeck every day according to our agreement, but this most unconscionable passage has kept me beyond the day of sailing of the Liibeck packet, in which we were to have gone together, and as it is the last boat which goes all the way to Petersburg this season, he was obliged to go without me, and I have F 2 68 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. IV. to make the journey by land. This is nobody's fault but the steamer John BulTs; and on the whole I do not much regret it, as a November voyage up the Baltic is not a very desirable amusement, and, from my experience of steamboating lately, I daresay it would prove quite as tedious and fatiguing as the journey by land. Let me see, I wrote you last, I think, by the Great Western, a day or two after my arrival in London. After that I left my letter and card at Lord Lyndhurst's, and also at Mr. Clarke's, his cousin, to whom Copley Greene, or rather Mrs. Greene, was kind enough to send me letters. Mr. Clarke called upon me immediately, and was particularly attentive to me. I dined with him once, and received another invita- tion from a friend of his during my short stay there. Lord Lyndhurst was in the country when I arrived, and came to town only the day upon which I left. He however wrote me a very polite note, hoping to see me when his family returned from the country the next week, and, upon my informing him that I was leaving that day, he sent me a letter of introduc- tion to Lord Stuart de Rothesay, the British Ambassador at Petersburg, and hoped to see me when I returned to London. Mr. Clarke is a very agreeable gentlemanlike person, and I feel much obliged to the Greenes for their introduction, for which I wish you would make a point of calling upon Mrs. Greene and expressing thanks. Tell Sumner that I left his letter and my card at Sir Charles Vaughan's door ; the servant, however, told me he was leaving town the next day, so that I expected to hear nothing from him. However, he came round to my hotel within an hour, and sat some time in my room with me, expressed great regard for Sumner and great regret that his departure from town and mine for St. Petersburg, etc., etc. In fact, everybody is out of town as a matter of course ; the end of October and the beginning of November is the hanging season in London and the com- mencement (I believe) of the hunting season in the country, so that of course everybody is supposed to be hanging them- selves or hunting, and I was very lucky to find as much as I 1841.J JOURNEY TO ST. PETERSBURG. 69 did in London. Sir Charles is a plain, unaffected, agreeable man, and I hope to have the pleasure of seeing him again in London some time or other. I leave this to-morrow (at noon) I believe, for Berlin, and shall stop one day there and then push on for Konigsberg. I expect to meet a fellow-passenger on board the John Bull, a young man L (son of Lord Minto) who is attached to the British Legation at Petersburg, and who left in the diligence for Berlin to-night. Being both upon the same expedition, we have agreed 4o rough it together in the diligence, and I hope we shall reach Petersburg by this day fortnight. Colonel Hamilton of New York stopped at the same hotel with me in London. He came out in the Kamschatka, which arrived two or three days after us, having made a very long passage, delayed originally by the same severe gale which attacked us between Boston and Halifax. Schuyler did not come up to London, but stayed at Southampton with the frigate. I shall find them there undoubtedly, as they were to sail again on Tuesday for Cronstadt, the day before the one I left London for this place. To his Wife. St. Petersburg, November 18th, 1841. I wrote to you last from Hamburg ; the next day I went in an abominable diligence to Berlin. Stayed there two days. Saw Mrs. Kirkland and George Cabot constantly, they were both perfectly well and perfectly tired of Berlin, but uncertain whether they should leave this winter or remain. Staying in the same house was young Welch, who has joined the univer- sity, I believe. I went with Cabot to the Fay's one evening (the Secretary of Legation) ; he and his wife are very agreeable people. Mr. Wheaton 2 I called upon, and he upon me, but I did not see him, both being out. The next night left 1 Now Sir Henry Elliot. ternational Law,' then United Status 2 The distinguished writer on ' In- Minister to Prussia. 70 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. IV. with my travelling companion, Mr. Elliot, for Konigsberg, a long pull of fifty-eight hours in a diligence. We had the cabriolet or front part, where one is very comfortable. The roads are excellent in Prussia, but the country most un- interesting, our whole route in fact, from Berlin to Petersburg, traversing a portion of that immense plain which reaches from the Netherlands to the Ural Mountains. It is a good country to travel at night in, because there is nothing to see, and the roads having all the smoothness and directness of a railroad without its rapidity, you are able to sleep in the well- cushioned diligences very comfortably. Prussia has no history the reigning family is an ancient one ; but the State is new, and an artificial patchwork, without natural coherence, mosaiced out of bought, stolen and plundered provinces, and only kept together by compres- sion. A Prince of Hohenzollern-something-or-other-ingen bought the Mark of Brandenburg with the dignity of Elector of the Empire, and his successors, after having in the course of two or three centuries subjugated the barbarous Prussia Proper (already well hammered by the Teutonic Knights and the Polish kings), helped themselves to a slice of Poland, and stolen Silesia, had the pleasure at the beginning of the present century of seeing their ingeniously-contrived kingdom completely sponged out of existence by Napoleon, and then repaired and put together again by the Cabinet- making of Vienna. Since then, Prussia is a camp, and its whole population drilled to the bayonet. It is the fashion to praise its good administration ; but I have no sympathy with your good administrations. Prussia is a mild despotism to be sure. 'Tis the homoeo- pathic tyranny small doses, constantly administered, and strict diet and regimen. But what annoys you most is this constant dosing, this succession of infinitesimal Government pills which the patient subject bolts every instant. Everything, in fact, is regulated by the Government ; the royal colours are black and white, and Government is written in black and white all over the kingdom. The turnpike-gates are black and white ; the railings of the bridges are black and white, and so 1841.] KONIGSBERG. 71 are the signs of the taverns, post-houses, etc., etc. In every inn a royal ordonnance stuck up against the wall informs you how much you have to pay for everything for your dinner, your bed, your schnaps, or your glass of sugar-and-water. This is well enough for the traveller; but a sort of arrangement neither complimentary nor gratifying to the inhabitants. But what nonsense it is for me to be wasting all this time in such a tirade. I believe it is because I was annoyed at having to go back (after having walked down to the Berlin Post-office to take my place in the diligence) for the sake of having my passport put in order ; for unless the American Minister, the Prussian Minister for Foreign Affairs, the police inspector, the Kussian Minister, and the Lord knows who beside, all signify in writing their perfect approval of your taking a seat in the Schnell Post, the said seat in the Schnell Post is refused to you by the prigs of the Post-office. At Konigsberg we waited a day " A town, whose greatest vaunt Besides some mines of zinc aud lead and copper Has lately been the great Professor Kant ; But we, who cared not a tobacco-stopper For metaphysics, still pursued our jaunt Through Germany, whose somewhat tardy millions Have princes who spur more than their postilions " like the respectable Don Juan, who went to Petersburg by the same route that we did. We, however, Jdlled one lion there, and the only one worth killing the old cathedral, a building five hundred years old, as the sexton said : built by the Grand Master of the Teutonic Knights, and containing several tombs, monuments, and rude portraits of the old Grand Masters by whom Konigsberg and " Prussia Proper " (I like that expression, because all Prussia is so extremely proper) was governed in old times. One of the monuments, rudely representing a knight in a reclining position and dying, with some singular devices scattered about, attracted my attention, and the old sexton insisted upon giving me a long legend about it, which had a strong resemblance to the story of the maid and the magpie. This story, in three words, was that 72 MOTLEY'S LETTEKS. [CHAP. IV. the knight lost a favourite ring from his finger circumstances convinced him that his favourite servant had stolen it, and so he incontinently cut off his head ; afterwards, a raven's nest was found with the ring in it, and the dead servant's innocence being thus demonstrated, the knight had nothing for it but to die himself. So, upon Tristram Shandy's principle, " that man bears pain best in a horizontal position," he threw himself at length upon his elbow with his toes to heaven and so died. " So Johnny Pringle he laid down and died." A device of a raven with a ring in his mouth, and a servant with his head cut off, and other quaint devices, decorate the monument. The church itself is venerable from its age, but very plain. The windows are the narrow lancet-shaped ones, without tracery, which in England are called the Early English ; but there is very little of ornament in any part of the building none of that elaborate carving, that needlework in stone, that sculptured Brussels lace, which is the charm and the wonder of the more splendid Gothic cathedrals. The same night we went to Tilsit, twelve hours from Ko- nigsberg (if you take any post map of Europe or even any common map, you may easily trace our route), a place where Napoleon dictated peace upon a raft in the river Memel to the Emperors of Eussia and Austria and remarkable for no- thing else, where we stopped a day and night these stoppages by the way were owing to our having neglected to inform ourselves at Berlin about the diligence hours of starting from the different places. If we had used due diligence in using the diligence we might have shortened the time four or five days. However as that would not have shortened the road, and as our fatigue was the less, it was of no great consequence. From Tilsit, we went to Tauroggen on the Kussian frontier, passing through the custom-house so much dreaded by travellers unscathed and untouched, thanks to our diplomatic capacity (which, by the way, has carried us through every custom-house with flying colours). At Tauroggen we stopped a day and night, the inn or post-house most comfortable, giving one an agreeable impression of Eussian arrangements. The next morning at ten, we took our seats in the Eussian 1841.] ARRIVAL IN ST. PETERSBURG. 73 mail for Petersburg ; these carriages are without exception the best public conveyances in Europe ; they carry four per- sons only, and the vehicle consists of two coupes or chariots, one placed behind the other, and each containing two persons ; they were filled with spring cushions, leather padded pillows, lamps to read by in the night, and in fact as comfortable as a private carriage. The road from Tauroggen to Petersburg is 1400 wersts, and half of it is what is called in Europe very bad, and what we should call pretty good in America. We got stuck in the mud regularly every night, but as we were only passengers we did not mind, and slept comfortably until they lifted us out ; this lasted only two or three nights. At Riga, the capital of Livonia, we got our first snow storm, after which the weather became very cold (13 of Eeaumur one night (the 12th of November), equal to about zero of Fahren- heit, but " it was fine times for those who were well wrapped up, as the ice bear said when he met the gentleman a skating," and I was uncommonly well wrapped up. I was immersed to the hips in a pair of fur boots (furred on both sides), without which an attempt to make such a journey would have been a bootless undertaking, and had a pelisse lined with fur reaching from my eyelashes to my heels : thus attired I was independent of the weather. It was, however, not very cold long. The weather in fact, since the 12th of November, has been like our average weather in January and February. How it will be later you shall know as soon as I do. I have nothing more to say of the journey. The country is dull and uninteresting beyond all description, and as we had sixteen hours of dark to eight of daylight, " the whole of its tediousness was not inflicted on us." I had provided myself at Berlin with some new novels of Balzac and Paul de Kock, and passed most of the time in reading, slept very well every night, and breakfasted, dined and supped very comfortably at the stations or post-houses along the road, which are in general very well regulated establishments. The villages through which we pass are all of wood, generally log huts thatched ; 74 MOTLEY'S LETTEKS. [CHAP. IV. the houses in the towns are mostly of wood, painted of a dark colour and sometimes stuccoed, and the people dirty, long- haired, long-bearded, sheepskin-shirted savages. We reached St. Petersburg, the 17th of November, at half-past two in the morning. This letter I consider both entertaining and instructive, unfortunately it is illegible. It will puzzle the spies at the post office, if they undertake to read it. J. L. M. To his Wife. St. Petersburg, November 19^/i, 1841. I am about moving to-morrow, from the hotel where I am just now, to apartments in the house which Colonel Todd has taken. Lodgings are very high in St. Petersburg, and I am assured by Mr. Gibson, the Consul here, that these are very cheap compared with other lodgings, and that though more elegant than I should care for, they cost actually less than many much more ordinary ones elsewhere. They are well situated in the Admiralty quarter, large and handsomely furnished, and when you come, if you conclude it best that you should, there are additional rooms sufficient to accommodate us comfortably, for a very small additional rent. You ask about Colonel Todd. I cannot say anything farther at present, but that he seems to me a very amiable, kind-hearted man, and disposed to make things agreeable to me. We shall probably make a common table together this winter. He is undecided yet whether his family will join him or not. Colonel Todd has not yet had his audience of the Emperor, who is in the country. He is expected, I believe, to-morrow. I daresay I may be presented next week, but know nothing yet. As soon as I am settled in my quarters, I shall make my calls of ceremony which the etiquette prescribes. I hope before long I may be able to send you something amusing in my letters. Thus far I have hardly looked about 1841.] RUSSIAN WINTER. 75 me at all. The weather has been cold, though not dis- agreeable, since the 12th November; good sleighing since that time, with the thermometer in the daytime a degree or two below the freezing point. The Neva has been some time filled with ice and the bridges taken up, although the ice still floats slowly, so that there is no crossing at all at present, and everybody is waiting for the ice to fix, which is expected every day. Tell me about the weather you have, when you write. I should like to compare it with this, and besides it gives an additional touch to the picture of home. I was delighted with your description of Kiverdale at that delicious season (the middle of October). There is nothing in the whole world besides like an American autumn. How absurd it is in you to call your letters dull. You know they are not. I only hope you will write me thousands just such dull letters as your last. They had the effect of enchantment upon me, and while I was reading I heard the voice of my darling little Lotty, and saw my little Lily's bright eyes, and for a moment was transported quite across the dreary waste of land and sea which separate us, and was at home again. You are very right in agreeing with me that I have the worst of the sepa- ration. New scenes and new faces, what are they to home scenes and home faces ? Besides, new scenes and new faces are to me no novelties. I do not know how much to ascribe to the lonely feelings I experience, how much to my having already travelled a good deal, and how much to the character of the place I am in, but I actually feel at present a perfect want of curiosity, and the lions of St. Petersburg are likely to remain a long time unkilled in their cages for all me. I shall, however, make a business of it soon, and I hope to be able to entertain you a little, if not myself, with the process. God bless you ! Your own J. L. M. 76 MOTLEY'S LETTEKS. [CHAP. IV. To his Mother. St. Petersburg, November 28 ' , ^-Thermometer 18 . Drive at 12 o'clock to the annual sitting of the Academy of Sciences, to which we received cards of invitation. Went in uniform. Members of Academy, behind a horse-shoe table, all in uniform (something between a military and diplomatic dress). Hand- some hall, portraits of Alexander and Nicholas, Catherine I. and II., Elizabeth and Paul. Bust of Peter the Great on granite pedestal. Brazilian Minister and Sir K. Porter only diplo- mats present. Archbishop of Moscow sat in front of me blue caftan with a white napkin on the head, grizzled beard, altogether as reverend a figure as any of those most venerable individuals the Russian coachmen. All his acquaintances kissed his hand. Ceremonies consisted in the reading of the 'Compte Eendu,' by the perpetual Secretary, Dr. Frys, in French, and by an oration or memoir in Eussian by the Vice- President, Prince Dondoukoff Korsakoff. Introduced to Admiral Eicard and the Vice-President. As we were coming away, Prince Dondoukoff gave us each a copy of the printed Acts of the Academy of last year. Thursday, January 1/13, 1842. Thermometer 10 all day. A frozen fog filled the air, the trees were frosted all over with silver, ditto the beards of the venerable coachmen and the manes of the horses. The effect on crossing the Isaac's Place through the mist, as I took my noonday walk, was singular. Peter's colossal statue dilated through the mist into gigantic and spectral proportions. The towers and domes of the Isaac's Church behind him, loomed up in shadowy grandeur, and the sun hung like a globe of half-extinguished fire, round and rayless in the centre of its low arch, and apparently but a half-hour above the rim of the horizon. The day was cold, but one did not feel it through one's furs because it was so still. It has been judiciously said that at St. Petersburg " on voit le froid mais on ne le sent pas" Still this is not what is i 2 116 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. IV. called cold weather. Everybody says that 25 degrees, day and night, for a week or ten days together, is the usual state of the weather at this season. Dine with Colonel Todd. In the evening go to the ball at Woronzow's. Observe for the first time the Duke of Leuchten- berg, Josephine's grandson, who is son-in-law to the Czar a tall, slender, common-place looking man, in a Hussar's uni- form. The only other members of the Imperial family present were the Grand Duke Michael, and the Hereditary, "the Perpetual Grand," as Dick Swiveller would call him, for he is at all the parties perpetually, and perpetually dancing the mazurka. Tuesday, January 6/18. This being the fete of the bless- ing of the waters, go by appointment of Count Woronzow to the apartments of Prince Wolkowsky at the Winter Palace, where one of the Palace servants conducts us into the great banqueting-room, filled with military, at one of the windows of which we took our station, directly opposite the pavilion where the ceremony takes place. As to effect, it makes no difference in a procession whether the material be velvet, satin, or fustian; the arrangement of the colours, grouping, drapery, etc., may be equally produced in coarse materials. Here go two or three notes to serve as memoranda. 1. Square space in the ice of the Neva, lined and thronged with multitudes of spectators, say fifty thousand. Their bearded faces agitated like a strong sea, particularly when they crossed themselves all in a mass at the appearance of the procession. 2. The pavilion, a gaudy affair of wood, painted and gilded, open all round, and carpeted with red cloth, on a platform ascended by some dozen steps. 3. The procession, which was of course not very large, coming only from the Palace gate across the quay to the edge of the Neva, where the pavilion stood. First, a double line of popes, in yellow satin and white robes, their long hair streaming on their shoulders (bareheaded), and their long beards, three deep ; behind them a row of pages, all bareheaded. Between this open line of clergy, the procession of archbishops, bishops, in rich embroidered cloth of gold robes, bearing 1842.] MILITAKY HOSPITALS. 117 banners and emblems, marched ; then the principal archbishop, then the Emperor, followed by his suite of great embroidered functionaries, all bareheaded, walk up the steps, and then descend the interior ones leading to the hole cut in the ice. Then the archbishop blesses the water, which of course we could not see, and then a salute of artillery from the fortress announces the fact. Then they return, the archbishop with a little mop or swab twirling water on all the dignitaries from the Emperor down. As soon as they have left the place, general rush from the ice to dip into the water. Came home, and was raised to fever-heat of happiness by finding dear, dear Mary's letter. I shall now begin a letter to her to thank her, although it can't go until next Tuesday. Thursday, January 8/20. Passed out of the citadel and went a few rods farther to the house of Peter the Great. This foetus of St. Petersburg is a one-storey log hut, painted red, and enclosed lately for protection in a brick case. The interior consists in a small room on each side of the entrance (low studded, so that you may touch the rafters of the ceiling with your hat or hand), and a smaller 'bedroom. One of these is now consecrated as a church, and filled with frippery of all sorts, gold and silver pictures, arms and legs tied up with satin ribbons, and other votive offerings from devout invalids cured of every bodily ailment by the virtues of the throne. In the other room, which was Peter's audience-room, is an old wooden armchair, upon which throne Peter received the foreign ambassadors. Wednesday, January 14/25. Thermometer 8 10. Dr. Cavill came and we went a round of military hospitals. It is certain that the soldier is taken good care of in Eussia. We visited four hospitals The first that of the Ismaisoffsky regiment small, 120 patients very clean polished floors about ten or twelve in a ward well dressed and with clean bedding over the head of each patient is a board containing his name, regiment, disease, and diet. . . . There are 3000 men in each regiment and three physicians. There is a physician night and day in the hospital, and the patients are visited morning and evening. It is reckoned that the food 118 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. IV. costs about eleven silver kopecks for each inmate of the hos- pitals, the medicine two or three, making about thirteen, and the cost of wood, attendance, etc., etc., make it up to about thirty silver kopecks per diem for each patient. The food is pretty good white bread for the sick, rye bread for the con- valescents. They are allowed two pounds of bread, and one pound of meat per diem, but Wednesdays and Fridays are always fast days, when they get cabbage soup. They have quassia and a sort of drink made of rye and meal and small beer. It is not known exactly what all these hospitals (of which there are seven in St. Petersburg for the thirteen regiments, and a proportionate number of equally good ones all over the Empire) cost the Government, at whose expense they all are, but an approximation may be made out of the cost of each patient. They are economically arranged, for the overseer told me there was no waste, everything was consumed. From the Ismaisoffsky we went to one occupied by three regiments here were 283 patients, a very small number for 9000 men. The arrangements were similar to the last. Thence to the Prebazensky Hospital this the oldest hospital, having been founded by Peter the Great very clean, pure, and regular, but no difference between it and the others. The officers of the regiment have a library in the same building, which they showed us a good collection of history and travels about 6000 volumes, and they subscribe a fund of about 1500 roubles per annum to add to it. There were two Eussian newspapers. They showed also the collection of MS., including a book full of the notes, orders, etc., of Peter the Great, Catherine, and Alexander all written in Eussian. From this we went lastly to what is called the great hos- pital, not appropriated by any one regiment, but receiving patients from several. This was built by Nicholas. Nothing peculiar, except being on an immense scale. There were 800 patients in it there are beds for 1300, besides 20 for officers. There are three stories, and water forced up to reservoir on top, and let into various washing places for the patients along the corridor. There is an internal and external corridor opening to each ward. Each ward contains eighteen 1842.] THE HERMITAGE GALLERY. 119 beds. Good ventilators. Fire-places, as well as an equal warmth all over the building by Kussian stoves. . . . Thursday, January 15/27. Thermometer 10 12. Visit the Hermitage Gallery. This is one of the best collections in Europe. I know of none which has fewer bad pictures. . . . One room is full of exquisite Wouvermans battle pieces, hunting and hawking pieces fights of banditti and all the favourite equestrian subjects of that great painter of life in action of wild, tumultuous, thrilling action. Another room is full of Teniers boors, banquets, village dances, cottage interiors many of them masterpieces. Strewed about here and there are several most delicious Kuysdaels with their dark masses of wood and bubbling brooks, cool valleys, and embowered church spires. One of these pictures, representing a grove with the trees up to their knees in water, was a perfect portrait of a maple swamp in Massachusetts. Several fine Breughels and Berghems Paul Potters and Cuyps, and one room full of Eembrandts. Unfortunately the sun was shining so powerfully upon the best of these that I could not see them, and only remember one or two grim portraits in his very best and strongest manner. There are two or three Raphaels in his early Perugino manner. ... In one room are the pictures forming part of the Houghton Collection, em- bracing some of the best Vandykes in the world Charles I., his Queen portrait of Sir J. Wharton and the Earl of Danby, and a most delicious picture of William II., Prince of Orange, at the age of twelve, in which I think the flesh and blood has been put upon canvas more perfectly than I remember in any picture one of the most difficult things in painting is to hit the exact colour of the human face. The rich olive of the boy's cheek with an undertone of vermilion is the ne plus ultra of complexion painting. . . . Monday, January 19/31. Thermometer 10 4. Visit the institution for the education of female orphans of officers. Large, splendid building, of course, connected with the Enfants Trouves. The two institutions together are well endowed, so that although the expense exceeds eight millions per annum. they lay by something every year. In the orphan institute 120 MOTLEY'S LETTEKS. [CHAP. IV. there are 1123 pupils, divided into six classes. They are taught all the " humanities," reading, writing, history, music, three or four languages, in short, everything, and the institu- tion constitutes a great manufactory of governesses which supplies the whole Empire as far as it can but the demand is so great that every scholar of good capacity is certain, on completing her education, to obtain a situation as governess. Those whose want of capacity condemns them to a humbler sphere are finished off as ouvrieres, Irodeuses, sempstresses, washerwomen, servants, and some of the enfants trouves are at present among them, but it is not intended in future that they should mingle with the others. We went through all the class rooms examined the best class in Kussian, much to their edification and ours saw their kitchen, dormitories (iron bedsteads and clean bedding, but too many in a room), and saw them come into their dining-hall. They marched in two by two, with merry little faces trying hard to look sedate, but with smiles stealing out of all the corners of their mouths and seeming very happy, into the hall, where they all sung (as is the universal custom of all the institutions) a Kussian hymn, devoutly crossing and sometimes prostrating them- selves the while and then all sat down to table chattering and laughing. The effect of the chorus of small, sweet voices, piping out a thanksgiving was delicious, and they certainly ought to be thankful for how many young ravens are fed who but for this institution would necessarily drag through a life of misery and starvation ! This, like all the noblest charitable institutions of Kussia, was originated by the late Empress-mother. Baron Stachel- berg, the Director of the Enfants Trouves, was with us a very gentlemanlike and intelligent man of whom the children were evidently excessively fond thronging round him with smiles and all sorts of caresses, " and plucked his gown to share the good man's smile." The "Enfants Trouves " has been so often described that there is nothing for me to add. There are about 18,000 at present belonging to it. and 30,000 to the one in Moscow. There are in the house at St. Petersburg about 1000 infants and a nurse to 1842.] ORPHAN ASYLUMS. 121 each. They keep them here six weeks, and then if well send them with their nurses to the country where they are brought up to trades, etc. There are received 3000 or 4000 per annum. Two or three had already been brought in the morning that we were there. We met, in fact, two well-dressed women, each bringing in a child. The mothers, if they choose, can come in as nurses. The children are brought openly and deposited in a little room below stairs. After the depositor is gone, the child is washed, ticketed, and delivered to a nurse the food of the nurses is good each child has its cradle, which is clean and good about one-third of the whole number die. 122 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. V. CHAPTER V. COMMENCEMENT OF THE * HISTORY ' RESIDENCE AT DRESDEN. Commencement of the * History of the Rise of the Butch Republic ' Arrival in Europe The Rhine Holland The duel with the sea Polders The Dutch Masters Dresden Its climate The Opera Sontag A picnic excursion Prospects of the Presidential Election The Madonna di San Sisto The Green Vaults Progress of the ' History ' Prince John of Saxony Death of Daniel Webster' Uncle Tom's Cabin ' and the Slavery Question The King and Queen of Saxony The Court and its etiquette Marriage of Princess Vasa and Prince Albert Court festivities. [Mr. Motley returned to America in 1842, and in 1844 lie took an active interest in politics. In 1845-47 he contributed historical and literary papers to the ' North American Review/ and began to collect materials for a history of Holland. In 1849 he served for one term in the Massachusetts Legislature, and in the same year he published his second novel, * Merry- Mount.' In 1851, finding that he could not properly write a history of the Dutch Republic without consulting archives and libraries in Europe, he threw aside all that he had written, and sailed with his family for Europe.] To his Mother. Ship Parliament, off Point Lynas, July 1th, 1851. 1 A.M. MY DEAREST MOTHER, Mary has just been writing a hurried line to Susan to announce our safe arrival at the pilot ground, and I thought you would like a single line from me at the same time. They have just been burning blue lights and firing off rockets on board the ship to celebrate 4th July, and the pilot has come on board. We expect to reach Liverpool 1851.] THE RHINE. 128 by six or seven o'clock in the morning. Our plans are still indistinct ; but I am afraid we shall find it difficult to avoid London, as all the roads seem to tend in that direction. We shall, perhaps, remain there for a few days, a very few, and then cross to Holland. I shall, however, write to you again very soon, and the only reason for my sending this most unsatisfactory scrawl is, that I am unwilling that the first steamer after our arrival should sail without taking to you an expression of my affectionate remembrance. I am deter- mined, however, not to allow myself to be home-sick yet, although it is very hard to think of Eiverdale and all which it contains with anything like composure. I feel, however, very grateful that the children have been so well. Susie * has never acknowledged any difference between ship and shore, proved herself the best sailor from the very first, has exchanged locks of hair with the captain, and has been the especial favourite of both the mates. Good-night, my dearest mother. You will hardly derive much satisfaction from this note, except that it assures you that we are well and that our first thought on reaching a foreign coast is of you and of home. Ever your affectionate son, J. L. M. To his Mother. Konigswinter, August llth, 1851. MY DEAREST MOTHER, I write from a little village some half-dozen miles above Bonn, with the castled crag of Drachen- fels over my head, and the wide and winding Ehine under my nose, so that the situation is as romantic as nature and art, history and poetry can make any spot in the world. Much to my satisfaction, Mary decided to give up visiting Paris this year. I was very glad, for the idea was anything but agreeable to me, and we are now (having left the bulk of our luggage at Cologne) making a slow and easy tour on the 1 His youngest daughter, now Mrs. Herbert St. John Mildmay. 124 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP V. Khine. We came to this place from Cologne three days ago, and shall leave to-morrow for Coblenz. We could loiter away a much longer time here, for it is a quiet, dreamy place, lying at the gateway of the Rhine glories and full of natural beauty and romantic associations. I am glad to have Mary wait a little while here till she can form a definite and clear idea of the stream which we are about to ascend. It is striking enough for me, having just come from Holland, where I saw the noble river in its feeble old age dribbling languidly by Leyden, and suffocated at last on its dull Dutch death-bed on the Katwyk sands, to witness the copious and exulting flow of its waters here. It was a melancholy sight enough in Holland. The river, after having commenced its career by a magnificent summersault over the precipices of Schaffhausen, and having pursued its winding and fertilising course through so many romantic regions in Germany, subsides into the most stagnant imbecility in the Netherlands, hiding itself in quicksands and miseries, and forgetting its identity and even its time-honoured name, which is changed and extinguished before its waters are lost in the sea. I believe I alluded in my last letter to this inglorious termination of its career. The river actually becomes too feeble even to die, and is pumped out of existence by artificial means at Katwyk. It had lain strang- ling there one thousand years, its mouth having been choked with a vast mass of sand driven up by a tempest in 840, till at the commencement of the present century it was helped into the ocean of eternity or the eternity of ocean by means of windmills. Up to that period it was lost in nameless bogs and quagmires. What a dreary termination to its Swiss childhood and its picturesque and impetuous career through the Land of Song ! Here the stream is beautiful. Probably no river in the world has been so lavishly endowed by nature and by art, by poetry and truth. Its written history extends with unbroken links from Csesar to Napoleon, the two notorious individuals whose names are the two greatest epochs of recorded time. Across that chasm of two thousand years, the embroidered belt of the Ehine is flung, emblazoned all over with historical emblems and hieroglyphics. 1851.] THE RHINE HOLLAND. 125 How different from the silent and solitary course of our own beautiful but deaf and dumb rivers ! Great events, thick as the stars of heaven, have illuminated almost every day of its existence, and ten thousand charming fables from the misty and legendary mythology of the middle ages have lent a charm to every rock on its banks and to every brook that mingles with its waters. Here, where we are at present, is the first but one of the most enchanting spots which engage your attention as you ascend the stream. This village is at the foot of the Drachenfels, and one of the renowned seven mountains. These hills are all of volcanic origin, having been spouted up by craters long since extinguished, and consist of basaltic crags broken into fantastic and jagged outlines. Cornfields and vineyards grow now in deep hollows, which are very visibly volcanic craters whose lips were closed long before those of history were opened. Each one of these crags has its vineyards on its lap, its crumbling baronial ruin on its brow, and a little white village at its feet. The Drachenfels, or Dragon's rock, is the most picturesque although not the highest of these cliffs. . . . To his Mother. August 6th, 1851. MY DEAKEST MOTHER, . . . Holland is a stranger and more wonderful country than I had imagined. I did not think that you would so plainly observe how it has been scooped out of the bottom of the sea. But when travelling there you see how the never-ending, still-beginning duel, which this people has so long been waging with the ocean, remains still their natural condition, and the only means by which their physical existence as a nation can be protracted a year. They are always below high-water mark, and the ocean is only kept out by the most prodigious system of dykes and pumps which the heart of man ever conceived. It is like a leaking ship at sea after a tempest, the people are pumping 126 MOTLEY'S LETTEKS. [CHAP. V. night and day for their lives. Tell the governor that the low land at Kiverdale would be an excellent miniature Holland. He has only to dyke out the Charles as the Dutch do the Rhine and the Meuse, cut twelve or fifteen canals at right angles, and keep them dry by a series of mighty pumps worked by twenty or thirty windmills. Such an apparatus would add very much to the picturesqueness of your place, and would improve the value of the land incalculably. We could cut up an immense quantity of English grass and pasture the cows afterwards. By the way, this is the universal system in Holland. The country is one meadow, and it is strange enough to witness thousands of cattle grazing quietly as it were in the bottom of the sea, usurping the ancient feeding ground of the cods and haddocks. I visited the great polder of all. A polder is the designation of a drained lake or pond converted into arable land. The one I mean is Haarlem lake, which, within the last two years, has been nearly drained. The task, which seemed Herculean, has been talked about for centuries, but at last the danger of inundation which seemed impending over the whole of Holland caused the job to be seriously under- taken. The lake is about seventy square miles in extent, and about sixteen feet deep. By means of three colossal suction pumps, worked by three engines of 350 horse-power, they have drained three-fourths of the depth. They expect to finish it in another year. I doubt it, however, for the hardest seems yet to come. Still, the wonderful feat will be accomplished within a very short time. I had, of course, but little time to see the pictures in Holland. The collections at the Hague and Amsterdam contain some of the most wonderful paintings of the Dutch and Flemish schools. I could only, of course, look at them for a little while and see how much one loses by travelling in a hurry. It is strange that those two amphibious, half-submerged re- publics, Venice and Holland, should have instructed the world in colour. Nothing certainly can exceed the brilliancy and profound mastery of colour possessed by Eubens, Rem- brandt, and Van Der Heist. You see these masters nowhere 1851.] THE ACHIEVEMENTS OF THE DUTCH. 127 in such profusion as in their native land. The landscapes, too, the Kuysdaels and Berghems, you would be delighted with. After your eyes have been put out by the effulgence of their great historical pieces and dazzling portraits, such as Eembrandt and Van Der Heist and Kubens only could paint, they are refreshed by those cool, calm, rural scenes, with shady groves and gurgling brooks, such as only their land- scape painters could produce. They seem to have had a deeper sentiment for landscape, and a greater power in reproducing natural beauties, than any people. How strange that this genius should have risen out of the very bottom of the sea, that a people should have so faithfully and poetically represented on canvas those charming pastoral scenes, of which they could have only dreamed among their native dykes and ditches, without ever seeing them in their own land ! The Dutch have certainly done many great things. They have had to contend with two of the mightiest powers in the world, the ocean and Spanish tyranny, and they con- quered both. Neither the Inquisition nor the Zuyder Zee was able to engulf them, and yet it is very funny to see a people after having achieved such triumphs seat themselves so contentedly in their summer-houses over their very ill- savoured canals. Every country house has its garden, every garden its canal, and every canal is always creaming and mantling like no other standing pool in the world out of Holland. Nobody knows how stagnant water can be till he has visited this country. The canals smell of anything but Araby the Blest, and yet every summer-house is always planted directly over it. There sit the placid burghers, pipe in mouth, and inhale the odours, hanging over them as if increase of appetite did grow by what it feeds on. Ever your most affectionate son, J. L. M. 128 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. V. To his Mother. '>' Dresden, November lltli, 1851. We live in the most profound solitude. We have exchanged calls with the British Minister and his sister, and with this ceremony our acquaintance with the society of Dresden is likely to have begun and ended. I certainly do not regret this on my own account, nor much upon Mary's, because I think that we have become so very much addicted to solitude that we adorn it more than we should society. We should feel like Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego if we should ever venture into the fiery furnace of fashionable life, and mightn't get out of the scrape as respectably as those excellent and unsinged individuals are said to have done. Our autumn is drawing to a conclusion, but everything is very deliberate in this paternal government. I suppose the weather is regulated, like the price of meat, by the police, in consequence of which we have never very good or very bad weather, as we certainly have never anything but most indifferent beef and mutton. The first frost was, I think, about ten days ago, or say about the 10th of November. The month of September was very cold and rainy. The sun hardly shone once, and the rain was not omitted in more than three out of the whole thirty days. The glass was never so high as 70, and generally was at about 58. The month of October was very fine, and fine nearly all the time, as our best October, which is saying a great deal, as that is the month we brag the most of. Even till the last week of that month the glass was for many days in succession as high as 67, and was hardly ever 20 lower. Since the beginning of this month it has not been higher than 40, and rarely lower than 30, although for the last two or three nights it may have been as low as 26. I talk by the thermometer on purpose because all other talk about the weather means but little. Figures in this respect don't lie, for they have no interest to do so, that I know of. The horse-chestnut trees in our garden were full of leaves, which were almost green 1852.] WINTER IN DRESDEN. 129 until about a week since, when the first sharp frost stripped them. The acacias (rose acacias) under my window and the other shrubbery in the garden are not yet leafless or yellow. The dahlias and roses have been dead about ten days, the grape vines were laid down last week. The grapes here are Sweetwater, and are plentiful, but this year they were not sweet. They are cheaper than Isabellas, but I think not much better. We have already had two trifling snow-storms. Good-bye, my dearest mother. Love to all, for I am closing in great haste. Ever your affectionate son, J. L. M. To his Mother. Dresden, April 13ta, 1852. MY DEAREST MOTHER, ... As for Mary, 1 she will of course write, but the serious labour of selection will probably devolve upon me. She continues to retain her epistolary mania, which she sometimes wreaks upon me, not rarely addressing upon me billets and even lengthy letters while I am in the same room with her. Poor little thing, both she and Lily have had a somewhat severe illness, a kind of catarrhal fever or influenza, which kept them in bed and their mother in a worry for a few days. They have now recovered, but have not yet been out of doors, and will not if the sun declines to show his face so resolutely. I don't know where he is, probably engaged elsewhere, starring it in some more profitable region ; at any rate he is rarely visible here now-a-days, not at home to company at all events. Still the season is about three weeks in advance of our spring, and there is at least much more tacked to autumn's skirts, so that the vegetable year is from six weeks to two months longer. Nature, death and resurrection being brought just so much the nearer. Your accounts of winter, however, remind me that in the American, that is New England, sense there is no such thing as winter here. We have had an absence of warmth rather than the presence 1 His second daughter, now Mrs. Sheridan. VOL. I. K 130 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. V. of cold. Once or twice, but that very rarely, we had the glass as low as 10 or 15 Fahrenheit above zero, but generally the temperature in the coldest months hovered about the freezing point, not going much up or down. The grass has been green two or three weeks, and the shrubbery is now in leaf. We have no blossom yet, however, and as the cherry and plum trees are usually in bloom with you by the last week of April (if I am not mistaken), you see that there is no very great difference after all. Thus far I am disappointed in the spring. We have had one or two warm days, and thought spring, that genial season of which you read, and of which we considered ourselves to have been defrauded in America, had arrived. We get occasionally a bright shiny, silvery spring day, fine as fourpence, but we are sure to have to take the change for it afterwards in at least six coppery and cloudy ones. Still the blackbirds whistle away under my windows every morning as merrily as any other little niggers, in spite of the fog and general grimness of the landscape, and there is a " glory in the grass," and our gardener has dug up his half-hardy roses, multifloras, and monthlies from their temporary graves and erected them again on their respective Ebenezers, and lettuce is already two cents a head, while asparagus, owing to the sunless atmosphere, remains obsti- nately at a groschen a spear. Strange to say, however, the east wind seems as natural here as if it blew from the end of Long Wharf, and it has as bad a character almost as with us. It's very odd, but entirely true, that in spring an east wind is detestable and disreputable in every part of the world where I have ever been. As the Englishman discovered in Paris, that although the French had no Iread, they had a substitute called " pain " which could be used in the same way and which answered the purpose, so I have always found almost everywhere a very good imitation of Boston east wind ; not quite equal to the original, but sufficient to answer the piirppse, a fact I leave to the meteorologists, at the same time boldly affirming that a Boston winter cannot be equalled anywhere in Europe so far as I know, and out of Kussia not even imitated. 1852.] THE OPERA AT DRESDEN SONTAG. 131 Since Sontag departed we have had nothing at the Opera. She played seven nights here, of which we went six, the seventh being a repetition of a part in which we did not admire her the most (Kosina). The best tickets, the best places (and we had always the best seats in the house, owing to a small douceur judiciously administered to the box-keeper) cost three thalers (two dollars and fifty cents) each. You will probably pay much more. It was rather an extravagance, but Mary has not much amusement here and she is very fond of music. I think you cannot help being pleased with Sontag, and advise you to go very often. La Fille du Begiment is her best part, but she is quite charming in all. She is very pretty at forty-seven, looks twenty-seven, is an uncommonly good and graceful actress in light parts, and her voice, although it is of course faded, and indeed effaced as to some of the notes, is exceedingly sweet, and she possesses to perfection the flowery, arabesque, decorated style of singing, which is so rarely heard. Of course it is not equal to the passionate and tempestuous style of the Italians, of Malibran, Pasta, Grisi, but it comes next to that, and is at least perfect of its kind. She was much admired here, and the house was always brimming over, a thing which I have not seen before or since, although the prices of the seats were tripled. She is to go to America this summer. Lady Adelaide Forbes told me the other day that she had informed her, she should be afraid to say what immense offers she had received from America, for fear she should not be believed. This reminds me that we had a dinner-party at Mr. Forbes's, the British Minister, a few days ago. The party was in a manner given for us, I believe, at any rate he led Mary into the dining-room while his sister Lady Adelaide and I brought up the rear. The dinner was very elegant, and Mr. Forbes and his sisters were very atten- tive and polite to Mary, but they receive company very seldom. My dear mother, I have now come to the end of my paper. Good-bye, and God bless you, dear mother, Your affectionate son, J. L. M. K 2 132 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. V. To Us Mother. Dretdun, June 22nd, 1852. MY DEAREST MOTHER, I really believe that your letter of May 10th has not been answered. I am sure you will soon write again and not punish me for my negligence by silence. In truth the time, now that our course of life has subsided into a monotonous current, goes by so quickly that I forget one post day after another. I can't say " how happily the days of Thalaba went by " as an excuse for negligence ; rather flows the stream of time so muddily, that but little gold seems to sparkle in the sand as it goes by. At any rate, when I try to sift out a few events that may be worth the postage (fortu- nately, however, you don't have to pay it), nothing seems to turn up but copper and lead. Spring has gone by and summer has come. The spring was very like an American one, and at the end of May we were surprised by a week of full- blown summer weather, just as you seem to have been at home. It was not quite so hot here, the glass hardly rising much above -80 or 81 Fahrenheit in the shade. Since the month of June came in, it has rarely been much above 70, and there has been rain very frequently. I am afraid a cold and rainy summer is the rule here, because I find that those who have been long resident, complained bitterly of the heat, during the few days of summer weather, as something they were not used to, and didn't intend to put up with. In con- sequence it has been frigid enough ever since to satisfy an Esquimaux. The summer is generally improved, by people who remain in town here, in making excursions into the country in small squads. We have been on one or two. The Noels got up one a little while since, a picnic to an unin- habited chateau on the banks of the Elbe. I am not much of a hand at chronicling this sort of small beer, which is apt to get veiy stale when it has been once uncorked, and I had hoped that it would furnish Lily or Mary with a topic for a letter or two, seeing that we all complain so much of the want of topics. 1852.] RESIDENCE AT DRESDEN A PICNIC. 133 The excursion had been projected for a long time, and at last on the day when it was finally to come off, it naturally rained in torrents, so of course it was countermanded, and as soon as that was done the weather naturally began to clear. So Lily's friend, 0. Paget, who did duty as an aide-de- camp, general and chief clerk to the weather, department, after one or two missions, again announced that the Gesell- schaft's wagen or company's waggon would soon be at the door. Accordingly an enormous and wonderful Noah's Ark soon appeared at the corner of the street. " Six doors off the carriage staid," not so much for fear that men should say that we were proud, as because our street was narrow, and the machine could by no possibility be insinuated therein. It had places inside for eighteen human beings, and outside for three quadrupeds rather a liberal allowance of humanity you will think. The precious souls all agog to dash through thick and thin, but who were obliged to dash rather mode- rately, as you may suppose, consisted generally, besides ourselves, of the Forbes^, the Noels, the Pagets, and her daughter-in-law and husband, Countess and Count Bethlen from Hungary, and an English family. On reaching the old cliatee (as Mary used to pronounce the word), we were joined there by some young ladies of the family to which it belongs, the daughters of an old General von Miltitz, whose ancestors have inhabited the spot for nine centuries, as stated in a tablet on the courtyard. Their present re- sidence is a few miles further down the river, where they have a very beautifully situated and baronial residence. The young ladies were very pretty and agreeable, as agreeable as they could be considering that there were none but middle- aged beaux provided for them, and those all married. The table for a miscellaneous entertainment was spread in the courtyard of the castle, and just as each of the company held a potato on his or her respective fork, down came a mag- nificent thunder-storm, which had been saving up for us all that time. Everybody clasped his potato and plate in agony and rushed upstairs. In moins de rien, as we say in French, the tables were spread in " the banquet hall deserted " of the 134 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. V. old chateau. Everybody having held on to his own plate as aforesaid, was reinstated in his original rights on taking up the new position, which in my opinion it would have been much better to occupy at first. I don't know that anything else very remarkable has occurred. We met one evening at the Forbes's Lord Wynford and his daughter. The next day they were kind enough to call upon us. A few days afterwards they invited us to dinner, when besides his family there were nobody but the Lady Paulett, the Secretary of the English Legation, and another youth belonging to some Spanish Embassy. Lord Wynford is an uncommonly agreeable and unaffected person, and Miss Best is also very agreeable and intelligent. They have cer- tainly been very friendly to us, and insist that we shall visit them at their country place as soon as we come to England. I believe these are the only new acquaintances we have made of late. The Forbes, I fear me, will go before long. We shall certainly go to Scotland some time or other merely to visit them. Good-bye, my dearest mother. Excuse this hurried scrawl. I will write soon again. Love to all, and believe me Most affectionately your son, J. L. M. To his Mother. Dresden, September 13th, 1852. MY DEAREST MOTHER, I have not answered your very kind and acceptable letter of 3rd August, the last letter which we have received from anybody. I take it for granted that General Pierce is destined to win next November in a canter ; at any rate, to my unsophisticated judgment out here in the Teutonic wilderness, I don't see how it is to be prevented. I shall look anxiously, however, for the next intelligence to see whether there is anything in the contemplated Southern movements for Webster. When, however, I remember that the Southern aristocracy is always democratic, with the ex- 1852.] RESIDENCE AT DRESDEN THE GALLERY. .135 ception of one or two States, I confess I don't see much room for hope. Perhaps the governor will enlighten me on the subject. Our general life here is very calm and solitary, infinitely more so than yours in Dedham. Our acquaintances are almost all departed, some few to return, others for good. Our garden is very beautiful, and I wish daily that you could see it once in a while, for you would appreciate it. We have had a constant succession and profusion of every flower known to horticulture I mean to hardy horticulture. The roses in their season were uncommonly fine, and now there is a wilder- ness of dahlias, asters, gladioli, and day lilies, geraniums, fuchsias, and countless others. In the midst of the garden is a sandbank, and in the midst of the sandbank may be seen burrowing, at any hour between noon and night, Susie and Mary, with their friends Adolf and Lulu, children of Madame de Rumohr, the lady who occupies the other part of our house. I regret to say that she leaves Dresden before the winter. Our young Prince is going to Prussia to enter the army, and Captain de Rumohr accompanies him to Berlin. We shall miss them all very much, for they are very amiable, kind- hearted people. The Prince is quite a nice-looking, good- tempered young man of twenty, with very agreeable manners. The Captain is a very intelligent and amiable man about my age. The eldest brother of the Prince has just assumed the government of his principality on attaining his majority. Waldeck is the name. The gallery remains as much a resource as ever. I find that I have (and Mary also) a most sincere and unlimited love for the fine arts, and particularly for painting. I am pretty well persuaded that the ' Madonna di San Sisto ' is the first picture in the world. I don't think any painter has ever so well hit the exact combination of the supernatural with the natural which is always attempted in the face of the Infant Saviour. The expression, without ceasing to be that of an infant, has still something infinitely imposing and majestic. The Madonna is faultlessly beautiful and very human, yet there is an expression beyond humanity ; not elevated, for it is humble ; not trium- 136 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. V. phant, for it is sad ; but prophetic and wondering, as of a face gazing vaguely but earnestly into the depths of the future, and dimly conscious of the coming struggles of humanity. There is a sentiment that the child in her arms is the Saviour and the Judge of unborn millions ; there is the submission of a mortal to a superhuman destiny ; there are tenderness, patience, pathos, and transfiguration above the clouds of common emotions ; everything, in short, which painters have from the beginning of Christian art endeavoured to typify by that mys- terious image, the Madonna. I don't think that it is possible to exaggerate the beauties of this picture with regard to its suggestive effects. It has no fault as a composition, which is a great virtue, for even Raphael often has something which jars upon the mind, even in his most harmonious pictures. But here there is nothing discordant everything is musical. The Madonna and Child are inexpressibly beautiful and lofty, the venerable figure of the kneeling pope is full of piety and fervour. The Barbara is a model of grace and modesty, and the two cherubs at the base of the picture are exquisite expressions of innocence and infantine devotion. As you are perfectly familiar with the composition by the engraving, I do not apologise for speaking of the picture, otherwise I should do so, for I hold that to have to listen to the description of a painting of which you have never seen any copy or sketch is an infinite nuisance. I said that this picture was the best in the world, and I have tried to explain why I think so. Because it is the highest flight into the regions of the sublime and beautiful to which the mind of Eaphael ever attained. I never wish to criticise it. It hushes criticism. It is the only picture which awes me into silence. When I go away I readily admit that there are many paintings much superior as works of art. It does not compare to the * Trans- figuration,' nor to Titian's ' Ascension,' nor to llubens' ' Descent from the Cross,' as a finished exhibition of colour and handling and technical power. There is in truth but little colour, and that is fading. It looks almost like a fresco already. The body of the Child is a mere smooch of lamp- black, the shadows are generally without transparency, except 1852.] THE MADONNA DI SAN SISTO. 137 in the drapery, which has been retouched. The face of the Virgin, however, is exquisitely coloured, and that of the Child, although by no means strongly painted, has still warm, life-like tints. The truth is, the picture is a sketch wholly from the hand of Kaphael, and dashed off in a moment of enthusiasm. It is thought that it was painted for a banner to be carried in a procession. Only imagine a wonder of the world originating in such a way. Of course a standard is only a peg above a sign. Nothing is known of its history. Contemporary writers don't speak of it. I don't know that there is any historical proof that Raphael painted it. Ten or fifteen years ago they found that the top of the picture behind the frame was closely rolled, and the canvas cut into such a shape as to make it probable that it had been fastened on a pole. This idea seems to explain the thin, sketchy, and slight manner in which the whole was executed Raphael, having dashed it off at a few heats (some people talk most ridiculously of eighteen hours as the whole time occupied upon it), probably thought it good enough for a banner, and gave it to the monks of Piacenza without thinking more of the matter. And in the refectory of the jolly friars it re- mained till the middle of the last century, when it was purchased for $20,000. I suppose it would be worth a king's ransom now if offered for sale, and kings have risen lately as well as Raphaels. The engraving by Miiller gives a very good idea of the composition. Even that old thing which we left at home, which you have often seen, an impression taken after the plate had been retouched over and over again, and was almost worn through, is worth looking at. It is, perhaps, the best engraving which was ever made of any picture. Of course you can form no idea of the- value by looking at one of these worn-out impressions. Ours has nothing left of the original power or beauty of the engraving, it serves only as a memorandum of the composition. It cost $5. The value of a copy before the letter, when it can be found, is 1000 thalers, say $750. I don't mean to purchase one even if I find it,. 138 MOTLEY'S LETTEKS. [CiiAr. V. The King has got six, but I have not heard that he thinks of sending one to me ! Muller's engraving is really a work of genius. Yet one would think the engraver's profession must make a man of genius frantic. To work upside down, scratching away upon a half-covered plate of copper with a kind of cobbler's awl, producing no effect from day to day, being obliged to wait so long before an opinion as to the result can be formed, must be a severe trial to the nerves, and seems enough to drive an impatient person mad. And by the way Miiller did go mad over this very engraving. Poor fellow ! he was so excited, exhausted, and used up after finishing it that his brain was turned. He jumped off a precipice and broke his neck. Besides the gallery, there are a great many other remark- able collections in Dresden. These and the beautiful en- virons of the city have made its fame. The engraving cabinet is perhaps the best in the world. It contains four hundred thousand prints, comprising a full history and exem- plification of the progress of the art, and of course a large supply of all that is most masterly and curious and celebrated among its achievements. Then there is the collection of rarities and objets de gout and jewellery, called the Green Vault, the name given to a series of rooms in the royal palace where the remarkable museum of trinkets is kept. All sorts of beautiful toys, statuettes, drinking cups, carved in ivory ; exquisite cabinets and caskets of every age, of mother- of-pearl, agate, amber, ivory, buhl and ormolu, adorned with topazes, emeralds, rubies, carbuncles, sometimes of very con- siderable value; magnificent goblets and basins of silver, carved, engraved, embossed by the hands of the most eminent jewellers of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries ; beautiful paintings in enamel, splendid vases, clocks in Louis XIV. style, and in style much earlier and much richer than that of Louis XIV., with numerous puppets once bobbing about and performing all sorts of antics in obedience to the same machinery which moved the hands, but now silent and motionless, run down and worn out, used up for ever ; splendid tables of Florentine mosaics, jars and obelisks of jasper, sar- 1852.] DKESDEN THE GREEN VAULTS. 139 doiiyx and chalcedon ; drinking horns, baptismal fonts, lavers and wine coolers, all of beaten gold ; caskets of elaborate workmanship crusted all over with beryls, sapphires, diamonds, and rubies as thickly as Aaron's breastplate or ephod, or whatever you call it, which contained all the precious stones in the world, besides others ; bushels of intaglios and cameos, both antique and modern ; curious cuttings in wood and ala- baster, two small and very singular landscapes or hunting pieces in waxwork, so minutely done that the leaves on the trees, the nails in the horses' shoes, the lace on the riders' ruffles are distinctly finished. Perhaps, however, the most remarkable part of the col- lection is the complete department of the works of Dinglinger, the Saxon Benvenuto Cellini, a man who wasted a good deal of real genius and the whole of his life in the production of these curious and exquisite, but, after all, somewhat taste- less toys. There are whole rows of monster pearls, some of them as large as a pullet's egg, but so mis-shapen and imbedded in their shells as to be inseparable from them. These, according to the taste of the seventeenth century, have been made use of as caricatures, legs and arms, heads and wings having been ingeniously fitted to them, so that they furnish counterfeit presentiments of little niggers, Dutch women skating, cobblers and pedlars, humpbacks and cripples, dragons, goblins, and chimeras dire with tails and without, and a whole wilderness of monkeys, lizards, toads, and other oddities, as curious and expensive a collection of gew-gaws as could well be found in Christendom, and a most wonderful baby house, not without beauty, and even utility, in its way, but one not likely to be formed again by anybody. Perhaps the most curious thing in the whole museum is a representation of the Court of the Grand Mogul Aurengzeb, who sits on his throne in the centre, and is surrounded by hundreds of figures in every variety of costume known to that region as described by travellers. This is Dinglinger 's master- piece. It occupied him seven years (from A.D. 1701-1708), and he received for it 59,000 thalers, about $45,000. Certainly an expensive toy. Ask the governor to calculate how much 140 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. V. the money would have come to if kept in the savings bank to this day. For his behoof I have given the date as above. The ' Madonna di San Sisto ' was a better speculation viewed in that ignoble light, but I doubt if Dinglinger's chef d'oeuvre would bring much if offered for sale now. The old Electors of Saxony had a turn for the magnificent. I could fill a dozen more sheets by telling you of the different museums which they have here. The armour collection is re- markably fine, for example one of the first in Europe. The Elector Christian II., who died at the close of the sixteenth century, had no less than ten suits of armour, of which one was by the most celebrated armourer of Germany, Holman of Augsburg, and another was by the world-renowned Benvenuto Cellini. This last is a most interesting object of art, and stamped throughout with the genius of that remarkable per- sonage. It is a complete panoply for the horse and rider, is of hammered steel, and is covered all over with the most exquisite sculpture or alto relievo, representing the wars of the gods, the combats of centaurs, and other mythological battles, all pour- trayed with the boldness, accuracy, and beauty which always distinguishes the hand of the man who made the statue of Perseus at Florence. After all, it is a luxury to have your toys by Dinglinger, your Madonnas by Kaphael, and your coats of armour by Benvenuto Cellini. Those Saxon princes, obscure as they were, except in the Lutheranism which they have since repudiated, certainly knew how to spend their money like gentlemen. And now add to the advantages here enumerated a magni- ficent library of 450,000 volumes, and very excellent oppor- tunities for education, besides a very beautiful and picturesque country surrounding the city in all directions, and you will understand why Dresden is so often selected as a residence. It is a dull little place no doubt, but I like it the better for that. It is better for dull little people like ourselves. If I could, get the hang of it, I could live as well for $2500 as in Boston for $5000. Unfortunately it always takes as much time as you can spare for a place to learn to live in it. The children and 3\fary are all well, and send much love to you 1852.] RESIDENCE AT DRESDEN 141 and the governor, and to all. Susie's mind is beginning to expand. She told me last night that when she was a thousand millions years old she should know how to sew, and should be as big as the washerwoman. Kather a commonplace result to contemplate through so long a vista. Good-bye, my dear mother. My paper is exhausted, and your patience. Ever affectionately your son, J. L. M. To his Father. Dresden, May Wh, 1852. MY DEAR FATHER, My last despatch was, I think, about a month ago, and included a letter to Tom, and another to mother. Since that time we have had the pleasure of receiv- ing a letter from Susan and another from Lodge. There has literally been nothing on our side of the world to communi- cate. Political events and general news reach you from the great centres of intelligence quite as soon as they do us. There is so little active existence, and so little interest felt, or allowed to be felt, in what is going on in the world around, that one soon finds the old-fashioned drowsy Kip Van Winkle feeling coming over him, and begins to think on the whole that it is better to be governed than to govern, to accept a paternal government as ordained from heaven, and to behave as good boys should, go to bed at ten, shut the door after you, smoke a pipe, drink a pot of beer, listen every day to a groschen-worth of instrumental music, never allude to politics, nor to anything which interests grown-up men, but leave all that to your betters, and rely for your personal and political rights on the Emperor of Kussia, and Austria, and the police, and so " easy live and quiet die," as comfortable burghers should. There is something almost refreshing in the utter inanity which seems to form the atmosphere of these peoples' lives, which is refreshing for a time, after the noisy splutter- ing politics which constitute our vital elements. I don't 142 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. V. think I should like it always, but now occupied as I am ten hours a day, with folks who lived three centuries ago, it is rather a convenience than otherwise not to have my attention taken off by anything that is going on about me. It is a comfort, as I can't make speeches or write articles in the newspapers (if I wished) against General Haynau, or Emperor Nicholas, or President Bonaparte, to be able to pitch into the Duke of Alva and Philip the Second to my heart's content. It is quite satisfactory to express sentiments, which if I had the advantage of living three hundred years ago, and had had the audacity to express myself as freely, would have entitled me to be burned alive on an average twice a day, and to know that the only martyrdom I am likely to experience is that of not finding a publisher for my treason, for fear that it won't pay ; the only rack that of being roasted on the gridiron of some singeing, scorching, red-hot review. I have just finished volume No. 2, begun since I was esta- blished here, that is about a seven months' child. A year more will carry me as far as I mean to go alone, particularly as the expense of publishing three volumes at my own risk, which perhaps I shall be obliged to do, will be as much as I shall choose to venture. I don't fear much of a loss, although I shan't stand much chance of making a fortune. At the same time I don't care to venture much more. Money is a thing of which I haven't quite as much to spare as time and labour. These I am very profuse with. Time they say is money. No doubt of it, only I never could get mine into active circulation. Labour is the foundation of all value. Equally certain it is, then, that I have been digging a cellar big enough, and lay- ing a foundation extensive enough, for a most valuable edifice, if one would only brings his pigs to market. Still there is something very healing in these portable maxims. You can always stick one like a piece of court plaster over the wounds of your vanity. Moreover it should never be forgotten that Milton's ' Paradise Lost ' was sold for 5, that Samuel Johnson's * Dictionary ' brought him in about as much for his labour as if he had been sawing wood or sweeping a crossing. Further- more Galileo confessed before the Inquisition that the earth 1852.] PROGRESS OF THE HISTORY. 143 didn't move, and Harvey was laughed at for circulating a story about the circulation of the blood ; so whenever a char- latan can't find any to believe in his tricks of mesmerism or biologism, or whatever may be the latest neologism, when a literary blockhead can't sell a book, he has only to call from the vasty deep the spirits of Milton and Galileo and Harvey, Dr. Johnson and Dr. Jenner, and all the rest. They are sure to come when called for, being no doubt by this time quite used to the business ; though they probably think that their last condition is worse than their first, being thus obliged to console and sanction so much mediocrity. So if a man can't make anything of his writings, it proves nothing but that he is probably a second Milton in disguise. I wish you would say to Mr. Ticknor, with my particular regards, that I should have written to him before this, as a slight acknowledgment of the friendly interest he took in providing me with introductions and advice before starting, but that I was really ashamed to write so very uninteresting a letter from Europe as mine must necessarily be at present. To one's immediate family one can write about oneself, but it is a most disagreeable and barren topic to me, and we live so retired, and see so little, that beyond the incidents of our family circle there is nothing to state. We might as well be on the Charles as on the Elbe ; at the same time I have enough time to do my work, and the children, particularly Lily, who is really making progress, are very well disposed of. I have not (as Mr. Ticknor knows, I be- lieve), presented myself at Court. Mr. Forbes and his sisters, owing to the letters given by Mr. Ticknor and Mrs. Eitchie, have been very friendly, invited us to a dinner, and offered all that we can require whenever we wish to go into general society. Moreover please say to Mr. Ticknor, that after the Court festivities were finished, I thought it proper to pay my respects to Prince John of Saxony, 1 who is a regular correspondent and friend of Mr. Ticknor. I called in com- pany with my friend Noel on Baron O'Bryan (not an Irishman, but of Irish distraction), the head chamberlain of the Prince. 1 Subsequently King of Saxony, father of the present King. 144 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. V. A few days afterwards the said Baron called on me in a friendly way, and said the Prince would be happy to receive me the next day informally. I went accordingly, and had an interview of half an hour with his Highness, who re- ceived me with great kindness. Mr. Ticknor had been good enough to mention me to him, and he hoped therefore, as I purposed staying another year, to cultivate my acquaintance, etc., etc. He spoke with much affection and respect of Mr. Ticknor, and alluded in terms of high praise to his History. He also spoke of Prescott's works, particularly the * Conquest of Mexico,' with admiration. Please also by the way to inform Prescott, that if I meet with anybody, prince or plebeian, who don't ask me about him, I will be sure to write and let him know. It will be rather refreshing than otherwise. I find by the way that his Highness had just that morning received a fresh letter from Mr. Ticknor, which he had not had time to read, but of these matters of course there is no need of my writing. As Mr. Ticknor by the way has so good a corre- spondent at Dresden, it would hardly be necessary for me to apologise for not troubling him. You are perhaps aware that the said Prince John would have been a distinguished pro- fessor, if he had not happened to be born in the purple. It is not as a Prince merely, that his acquaintance was worth culti- vating. Mr. Ticknor might have said to him, as Voltaire did to Congreve when he was disposed to sink the shop and put on the fine gentleman, " If you had only your genteel birth, it would have been long before I should have sought your acquaintance." Prince John's translation of Dante's * Divina Commedia ' has really great merit. The notes and illustra- tions, furnishing a running commentary on that great poem, have been translated and are much esteemed in Italy. He certainly received me with great politeness, and I beg you to express my thanks to Mr. Ticknor for having taken so much trouble about us, which our inclination for retirement and obscurity has prevented our turning to so much account as we should have done. Our society consists principally of the persons already introduced to you in previous letters. The Noels (Mrs. N. 1852.] LIFE AT DRESDEN. 145 by the way is a near relation and friend of Mr. Ticknor's friends, the Counts Thun, she is a Bohemian and a very amiable person), the Pagets, the Mellys (Americans) and the Forbes's. These last, a mother and two daughters, are distant relations, and intimate acquaintances of the Minister here. They are the most affectionate people in the world. Lily speaks French certainly as well as I do, and begins to speak German very tolerably, and in general matters she is in quite a satisfactory condition of mental health and improvement. Mary has not yet found a school. We have sent her to a kindergarten (child's garden), but this is nothing more than an infant's school, and she already reads German better than the little children there. Speaking, too, she can prac- tise with her little Kumohr friends and neighbours, and the bonne is quite competent to give her lessons. As for Susie she is as sweet and saucy as ever, much the most amiable of all the children, and therefore much the more spoiled. She takes a great deal of spoiling, which I consider high praise. Lily and I took a long walk yesterday in the Grosser Garten, or Park. When we got back about seven in the afternoon she said : " This is just the time I used to go and sit with grandmamma on the piazza, I wish I could go to- night." You may be sure I echoed the wish most heartily, though hopelessly. Most affectionately your son, J. L. M. To his Father. Dresden, December 23rd, 1852. MY DEAR FATHER, Our life is as usual monotonous, fur- nishing few topics for letters. I am working as hard as a wood sawyer, and am of course as independent as his clerk. I find the atmosphere congenial to literary labour, or perhaps because my time is so wholly my own, I have it more in my power to make long pulls without getting out of the traces. I dare say, like the remarkable cab horse immor- VOL. I. L 146 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. V. talised by Pickwick, I should' fall flat if taken out of the shafts, and I only keep up because I keep a-going. That you may see that this is not an idle brag so far as work goes, I will state that I have written a volume since the 13th July of this year, one which will make rather a large printed octavo, and which is the second that I have written since I came to Dresden. As this labour includes of course the digging out of raw material out of subterranean depths of black-letter folios in half a dozen different languages, all which works are dark, grimy, and cheerless as coal pits, you may suppose that I am not likely to be a very agreeable customer when I come out of my diggings. The worst of it is when a man is smashing quartz with a sledge hammer he gets paid for his pains ; but here am I working away with my pick-axe or sifting painfully the sand of buried ages over which the river of Time has so long been flowing, and yet I don't know whether I shall at last find a few grains of pure gold in my cradle, to reward me for my labours. Metaphorically, of course, not literally, for I don't employ myself in writing and studying history to make money out of it. " Base " as the " slave who pays " is the slave who pursues money and not truth in any scientific field. But I confess that I have not been working under ground for so long without hoping that I may make some few people in the world wiser and better by my labour. This must be the case whenever a man honestly " seeks the truths in ages past " to furnish light for the present and future track. And if you only get enough oil to feed a very small lamp it is better than nothing. A little lantern may help you to find an honest man or so in the dark corridor of history ; but not if you look for them in the spirit of Diogenes. It is always much harder to find commendable than accusable characters in the world, partly perhaps because the world likes better to censure than to commend. I flatter myself that I have found one great, virtuous and heroic character, William the First of Orange, founder of the Dutch Ee- public. This man, who did the work of a thousand men every year of his life, who was never inspired by any personal 1852.] DEATH OF DANIEL WEBSTER. 147 ambition, but who performed good and lofty actions because he was born to do them, just as other men have been born to do nasty ones, deserves to be better understood than I believe him to have been by the world at large. He is one of the very few men who have a right to be mentioned in the same page with Washington. Christmas, Saturday. I was interrupted the day before yesterday, and my letter has lain unfinished in my drawer till now. ... I have the greatest sympathy for you and the country for the loss of Daniel Webster. It is one which can never be made good to us. He was not only the greatest living statesman, but the greatest whom we ever produced in America, so much beyond all of them past and present in intellectual force, that it is hardly a compliment to speak of him as first among the political men of the country. Very little is known of him in Europe. On the Continent few have ever heard his name. One literary old maid, who has written and published books, asked me if he was not one of our principal poets, and then when I laughed, confessed she had never heard of him. Yet she had lived fifteen years in England. The English had of course heard of him, and he was known to the statesmen ; but nobody imagines that he was a personage to be compared to their great men, and probably not one hundred men on the continent of Europe has ever read a line of his speeches, if indeed there be as many who knew that he ever made any. The fact is, no interest is felt in America or American institutions among the European public. America is as isolated as China. Nobody knows or cares any- thing about its men, or its politics, or its conditions. It is, however, known and felt among the lower classes, that it is a place to get to out of the monotonous prison house of Philis- tines, in which the great unwashed of Europe continue to grind eternally. Very little is known of the country, and very little respect is felt for it, but the fact remains that Europe is decanting itself into America, a great deal more rapidly than is to be wished by us. When I say that nothing is known about America, I am wrong. Everybody knows that slavery exists there, lor every- L 2 148 MOTLEY'S LETTEES. [CHAP. V. body in Germany has read ' Uncle Tom's Cabin.' I am glad of it, because I believe the only way the curse is ever to be taken from the nation is by creating such an atmo- sphere all round the Slave States, that a slaveholder may not be able to thrust his nose outside his own door without scenting that the rankness of his offence is tainting every wind of heaven. The only way in which the system can ease to exist is, it seems to me, by working the children of the present slaveholders. The coming generation in each of the fifteen Slave States are the people who must grapple with this question ; but the question won't be staved off for a third. It is all up for your generation or for mine. If one or two States, like Kentucky and Tennessee, should come to abolish the system and should succeed, well ; afterwards the great obstacles would be removed. Of course, the black race is not by nature capable of social or intellectual equality with the white ; nor have they ever desired it so far as I know. But it is begging the question to say they will be insolent, and that they won't work after emancipation. Certainly they are orderly enough and industrious in Massachusetts. Besides slavery is an immense crime, while refusing social equality is a matter of taste, and is only denying to the blacks that which does not exist, and never did exist anywhere with regard to the whites. But here in Europe nobody knows anything about the matter, saving only that slavery exists. They have no idea that America is a confederation of States, each of which States is competent to establish and abolish slavery at its pleasure, and that the general government has no power to do one or the other. I believe everybody in Europe thinks, so far as he thinks at all, most of them contenting themselves with bragging, that the President of the United States could abolish slavery to-morrow by an edict, just as the Emperor of the French abolished the Kepublic by half a dozen lines of proclamation, or if that can't be, nobody goes so deep as to conceive a doubt that the Congress could abolish it as easily as it could pass a tariff law. To revert to Webster. I hope you will send me Hillard's eulogy, and also his and the other speeches which were made 1853.J LIFE AT DRESDEN. 149 formally. I always take great interest in everything Hillard writes or says, for I have great respect and regard for him. As for thinking of America without Webster, it seems like thinking of her without Niagara, or the Mississippi or any other of the magnificent natural features which had belonged to her since I grew up, and seemed likely to endure for ever. You see now why I don't write oftener. It is absolutely im- possible to amuse or edify under my circumstances, and there- fore I have no self-reproach to make for being silent longer than I should be if I had anything to say. Here I have written three or four pages of stuff which would have been bad enough if uttered between sleep and wake at the fireside corner, but which deliberately put upon paper " is enough," as Mr. Macaulay says of Bob Southey's printed pleasantries, " to make a man ashamed of his species." Therefore I will now pause for a reply. Very affectionately your son, J. L. M. P.S. Up to this time we have had no more snow nor cold weather than we often have at home in October. The grass is perfectly green in the fields, which stretch out before my study window as far as Saxon Switzerland. Please to say to Mr. Cabot that his young friend and kinsman, Mr. Higginson, presented himself not long ago to us. He is a very honest, ingenuous, intelligent lad, who is taking a vacation on account of his eyes. He comes and dines whenever he chooses, which is generally once a week, and he dines with us to-day, Christmas. Please tell his father I am happy to have made his son's acquaintance. To his Mother. Dresden, February 3rd, 1853. MY DEAREST MOTHER. We jog on as usual, the days and nights succeeding and certifying each other with the regu- larity of your kitchen clock. The monotony of our life was interrupted a little while ago by our going to Court, and 150 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. V. perhaps you will think that 1 ought to send you a minute description of the ceremony. But to tell you the truth, these things are to me so insipid that I am unable to extract juice enough out of them to flavour a letter with. I wish I could tell you anything that would entertain you concerning our presentation on New Year's Day, and the Court ball which followed the succeeding week. But I do lack something of the gamesome spirit which enables one to be amusing on such topics. Besides I prefer to leave the details to Mary, who will wake from her slumbers one of these days and send, either to you or to S or A L , an account of her achievements. The palace here is a rambling old barrack externally, but within, the rooms are spacious and sufficiently elegant. The principal apartments have been recently painted in fresco by an artist called Bendemann, who is thought by the Germans to be inferior only to Raphael and Rubens. The frescoes have certainly considerable merit as far as drawing and grouping are concerned, but in grace and colour they are not above mediocrity. The King and Queen receive masculine friends on New Year's morning. His Majesty is a mild old gentleman, wadded and bolstered into very harmonious proportions. He has a single tooth worn carelessly on one side, which some- what interferes with his eloquence. I do not think that I took notes enough of his conversation to be able to give you a report. He was glad to hear in answer to a question that I proposed passing the winter here. And as I felt how much unalloyed satisfaction the circumstance must really cause to his bosom, I internally resolved not to change my plan. The Queen is very tall and very queenly. Nothing can be more elegant or more winning than her manner. She is, I believe, very benignant in character, and certainly her address is perfectly in accordance therewith. I am not at liberty to mention her conversation with myself. Indeed I did not understand a single word she said, and was entirely ignorant in what language she was speaking, but I have since ascertained that it was probably French. This is a general observation. She speaks in so low a tone and with such a 1853.] THE SAXON COURT. 151 kind of gentle roucoulement that it is almost impossible to catch her words with any distinctness except after considerable practice. The King and Queen have no children. The heir to the throne is Prince John, whom I have already described to you. He made many inquiries of me again about Mr. Ticknor, for whom he certainly entertains a sincere friendship. He is more fortunate as a pere de famille than his brother, his progeny sing, " We are seven." Two of the princesses (Anna and Sidonie) are very pretty. The ball was not particularly brilliant. The costumes of the gentlemen were slightly shabby. Those of the ladies were not remark- able. The royal party were of course well dressed. The Queen wore a magnificent tiara of diamonds. The Princess Augusta was in a green blaze, being covered with the most gorgeous emeralds I ever saw. Some few of the high Court ladies were well jewelled also, but the rank and file were rather ill-dressed so far as I could judge. Turning from the fair women to the brave men, it was funny to observe the profusion of orders and decorations with which every other person was covered. There were the states- men of world-wide reputation, the sages and law-givers on whose accents the world hangs with enthusiasm, the generals of a hundred stricken fields in which the fate of empires has been decided, whose names I cannot yet give you, because I have not ascertained them, but they must all be as eminent as Metternich or Talleyrand, Wellington or Blucher, Marshal Ney or King Murat, to judge from the trophies on their bosoms. Each manly chest, like the spacious firmament on high, was covered with stars innumerable. I am quite satisfied that they are all destined for immortality. As I before observed, there is something like constraint in the general atmosphere of one of the balls. The etiquette is perhaps more formal since the reaction after '48. I suppose it is thought necessary to effect thorough repairs in the divinity which hedges kings, the said hedge having had so many gaps made in it by irreverent poachers in latter days. So the good people all fall back, opening to the right and left, standing (not at ease) on both sides of the ball-room, when 12 MOTLEY'S LETTERS: [CHAP. v. it is understood that their Majesties and the august family are approaching. After a little preliminary flourish and flutter, you hear two or three mysterious raps (something like your spiritual knockings, I suppose), and then enters the royal cortege, headed by an old chamberlain with a gold stick in his hand, the personage who, from his high rank or great services or his imposing bald head, is supposed to be the most " fit and desartless man " for Court Constable. After this Dogberry in high life come a few Court cards, whose costumes look a deal like those of Tommy Crehore's after the pack has seen a little service. Then come their Majesties with the rest of the family, bowing to the right and left with great benignity, and making happy "the upturned wondering looks " of the mortals who fell back to gaze on them. They pass, and the solemn hush is succeeded by a chatter of relief. The ducks, who have been rolling their eyes as the thunder- storm was passing (as is their well-known nature), now begin to quack again and to waddle about and to expatiate gene- rally, till another rap and another gathering cloud in the distance makes all silent once more. This is thought very good fun in Dresden and in many other places, and no doubt some amusement may be extracted from such scenes, but then you must have more inclination and more time to make acquaintances than I have. I work like a mule all day long, and I am therefore not equal to the fatigue of requesting introductions and making myself agree- able to the big-wigs. You will naturally ask why, having these dispositions or indispositions, we take the trouble to go out at all. My reasons are twain one furnished by Lord Bacon, the other by some anonymous philosopher of almost equal wisdom. The sage of Verulam enumerates among the things for a traveller to see and study, " the courts of kings and princes." As Mary has never been in Europe before, and as we could go through the kindness of Mr. Forbes with very .little trouble, I thought it best that she should take the opportunity. Your most affectionate son, J. L. M. 1853.] MAKRIAGE OF PRINCESS VASA. 153 Tell Uncle Edward that my next letter will be to him. I am ashamed that I have not written to him for so long, because I know it gives him pleasure, and I should like to give him all the amusement in my power. I have been so dull myself, and at the same time working so hard, that I have let a long time slip by without writing anything but my book, which will be finished this week, that is to say Part L, in three or four volumes, and all perhaps that will ever be written, unless its publication gives me encouragement to continue. Part I. is a complete whole in itself, therefore posterity will not be injured by a total stoppage. Affectionately your son, J. L. M. To his Mother. Dresden, June 30th, 1853. MY DEAREST MOTHER, We have, contrary to my expecta- tions, been obliged once more to turn out at Court. We have been marrying the Princess Vasa to the eldest son of Prince John, and heir eventually to the Saxon crown, or throne rather, for there is no crown. This young lady w r as, as you may have read in the papers, the object of Louis Napoleon's aspirations. The Princess Vasa is of a family which was sovereign for three centuries, having risen from obscurity in the early part of the 16th century, in the person of Gustavus Yasa, a man of great talents and very humble birth. This is but a brief pedigree to brag of, particularly as the be-all of the end-all is already arrived at, and it must be confessed that in any historical or philosophical sense the house of Bonaparte is more illustrious per se, according to the common notions of illustrations, than that of Vasa. The Swedish family is however connected by numerous alliances with all the potentates of Europe, and is a recognised party to the family compact which unites all the Lord's anointed into a band of brethren and sisters. The present 154 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. V. marriage was one of affection, a rare thing among people in their line of life. Prince Albert, a fine, manly young man, fell in love with the young lady, a pretty, pleasing, gentle young damsel of eighteen. The reception in the town was early in the forenoon of the 18th of this month by a cavalcade of burghers, peasants, and military. The streets were very prettily decorated, the houses being hung with garlands, and triumphal arches as smart as paint and gilding could make them, and the citizens all putting on their best attire and culling forth a holiday in the most approved fashion. The nuptials were solemnised in the Catholic church. All persons who had been presented at Court were invited to the wedding. It was also intimated that the ladies were to go in trains, and be presented to the bride afterwards at a drawing- room to be held at the palace, between which and the church adjoining there is a gallery of communication. Mary had however already turned her train into a gown, and was not inclined to buy another, and you may suppose that I was most happy to escape the drawing-room. It was well known that many people would go to the marriage and to the ball a few days afterwards without going to the presentation. We sent an excuse therefore, like many others, and received tickets for the body of the church instead of the gallery, where the ladies in full dress were accommodated. In the nave below, the ladies, all much dressed, of course, but in morning costume, were arranged on one side, and the gentlemen, all in uniform, military, civil, or diplomatic, on the other. The day was fine, the hour about noon. The church is spacious but modern, and of no great beauty of architecture or richness in decora- tion. The grand altar was a blaze of light. Numerous candles, glittering sacramental furniture, and the splendid robes of the priests made a very effective show, at the end of a long vista, formed by a vast tulip bed of gaily dressed ladies thickly planted in rows upon one side, and by a noble army of fine gentlemen, gorgeous as hollyhocks, on the other. At the appointed moment, the bishop, with his mitre on his head, his crozier in his hand, an effulgent gown of brocade embroidered with gold on his back, and a lackadaisical simper, 1853.] MARRIAGE OF PRINCE ALBERT AND PRINCESS VASA. 155 intended to be a general benediction for the world at large, heretics excepted, upon his pumpkin lace, set forth from the high altar, followed by a string of highly-bedizened eccle- siastics. The procession passed close to me. as I was fortunate enough to have a place at the end of one of the benches or pews directly upon the principal nave. (Mary on her side of the church was equally fortunate.) The clerical procession went forth to the main door in order to meet the bridal party, which was now advancing through the gallery above, and which, though invisible to us, was sufficiently manifest in its effect upon the serried ranks of the ladies in the galleries. A general rustle and flutter of the whole throng, a simultaneous bending of feathered heads like the swaying of a field of ripe corn when the summer breeze passes over it (my similes seem to be very agricultural this morning), made it obvious that the glorious presence was revealing itself to them, although it was yet hidden to the upturned eyes of mortals who were gazing from below. Directly afterwards the two streams mingled at the church door. The bishop received the royal party and coun- termarched them all to the altar. So the whole procession advanced through the aisle for our gratification. First came the said bishop, his head bobbing from side to side with an expression of " goneness." Then came the mob of ecclesiastics. They were followed by a long train of menials in brand-new clothes. The royal livery being a most intense yellow, this swarm of lackeys looked like a flock of gigantic canary birds. After these came a troop of underlings in sky-blue habili- ments, a set of officials occupying a middle position between servants and gentlemen, household divinities of one kind or another, ushers, inspectors, or what not. Then the grand dignitaries of the kingdom, in fullest fig, made their appear- ance, chief marshals, lord chamberlains, ministers of state, gold sticks and silver sticks, equerries and cup bearers, all " fine " as Adam, Kalph, and Gregory. Thus heralded came the King and Queen, followed by the young and pretty bride, wearing a wreath of diamonds and orange flowers on her head, and walking between her mother and her future father-in-law, Prince John. Her train was 15(5 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. V. held up by her future sister-in-law, young Princess Sidonie, who is very good and very handsome. Her train again was held up by her lady of honour who came behind her. Various princesses and grand duchesses followed in like manner, all staggering under loads of diamonds and all strung together by their long satin tails. Then came the bridegroom with his friends and relations of the masculine gender, looking as little sheepish as could have been expected under such trying circumstances. In due time the party were arranged round the altar, the two sufferers got themselves comfort- ably on their knees, and the ceremony began. The good bishop, thinking it necessary in compliment to his company to be as "tedious as a king," held forth at a most un- merciful length. But as all things come to an end, so did his exhortation, and at last the booming of cannon and the rattle of musketry outside, with a magnificent Te Deum thundered forth by the organ within, announced to the world that the marriage was complete. Soon afterwards, the same procession again moved down the aisle, and up through the galleries into the palace. Those who had chosen to go to the drawing-room went upstairs after them. The rest of us went home to dinner. On the following evening there was a very general and effective illumination of the town. On the next evening there was an opera at the theatre, to which no tickets were sold, all being distributed by the Court. To this " theatre pare" as it is called, because everybody must go in full Court dress, we received tickets, but could not go as it was on Sunday. On the next was the Court ball, at which we made our appearance, and which was a particularly brilliant one by reason of the numerous foreign princes and dignitaries who were present. Among these the observed of all observers was the Duke of G-enoa, brother of the King of Sardinia. He is very handsome and picturesque in appearance, looking like a knight of old, such as Titian might have painted, having the chevaleresque air which befits a man who has fought well in the field for Italian nationality against Austrian tyranny, as becomes a son of Charles Albert, and a scion of a house 1853.] COUKT FESTIVITIES. 157 which, almost alone in Europe, recognises the possession of political liberty by its subjects. I had hoped that Mary would have mustered up energy to send you a description of these fine doings. It would have been a topic which she would have described with much more vivacity and emotion. I am not good at these gauds. In truth, they weary me beyond measure, but I think Mary would have made a grand mistake not to have improved the opportunity of seeing what she could for once in a way of the humours of a Court. This ceremony of a royal marriage too (and a Catholic one) does not often turn up for outsiders, and she was very much pleased and interested. As for me, I am Mackintoshed into impermeability and such things all descend upon me, and run off leaving me as dry as ever. Ever your affectionate son, J. L. M. 158 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. VI. CHAPTEK VI. PUBLICATION OF THE ' RISE OF THE DUTCH REPUBLIC.' The Hague Residence at Brussels Mr. Motley's daughters Letter to O. W. Holmes Daily life at Brussels Companions of past generations The River Senne The Archives Literary silkworms Rubens and his art The Shakespeare of painting Arrival in London Mr. Forsyth Prelimi- naries of publication John Murray English and American politics com- pared Preparations for publication Mr. Prescott Frankfort Basel Visit toHerrvon Bismarck His character and career His family life Return to England An English hotel Florence Theodore S. Fay Paris under Louis Napoleon Americans in Florence Miss Alexander Thomas Ball Mr. Motley's constitutional melancholy Description of Florence Her brilliant past Her achievements and her feuds Her present condition Publication of the ' History of the Dutch Republic ' Mr. Prescott's praise of it Criticisms in the English and in the American press Sorrento Letters about the History from T. S. Fay O. W. Holmes C. C. Felton Letter to O. W. Holmes on his poem Letters about the History from G. Bancroft and Washington Irving. To his Mother. Brussels, November 20ta, 1853. MY DEAREST MOTHER, The six weeks we passed at the Hague were pleasant for Mary and the children, and useful for me. The children were ducked in the North Sea, and I was buried in the deep bosom of the Dutch Archives, much to the invigoration of all. The Hague is a mild, stagnant, elegant, drowsy, tranquil, clean, umbrageous little capital smothered in foliage, buried in an ancient forest, with the downs thrown up by the North Sea surging all round it, and the ocean rolling beyond. We made a good many pleasant acquaintances at the Tables d'hote, where Susie was the observed of all observers. The hotel where we stayed had its dinner at 5 P.M., and as there were not many foreigners staying there, the company were principally of the natives and of the very best class. Many members of the Chamber 1853.] RESIDENCE AT BRUSSELS. 159 of Deputies and of the Senate, Ex- Ambassadors, and Cabinet Ministers were constantly there and all were exceedingly cordial, affable and agreeable. A very warm attachment sprang up between Susie and an old gentleman named Donker Curtius, the Minister of Justice, who was exceedingly diverted with her talk and her comicalities at table. Our Charge d'affaires there, Mr. Folsom, and his wife, were very polite to us. Mary drove out with them almost daily, and the children were all very intimate with each other, and got on very well together. Since we have been here they passed through the town, where they dined with us and spent the evening. They have now gone to Italy to spend the winter. Our friends, the Forbes's, of whom you have heard us speak so often and with whom we have been intimate so long in Dresden, came here as much as anything to visit us, and have just terminated their stay here, having left for England by the way of Antwerp two or three days ago. We are now entirely alone, and we do not wish to make any acquaintances. Of course I came here to study in the Library and Archives. It is, however, as good a place as we could find for the children to learn French. Paris would be out of the question from its dearness, but we have found a most excellent little day school, kept by a lady from Paris. You asked me to tell you of the children when I wrote. To begin with Lily. She is improving very much in character and is much more willing to be gentle than she used to be. Mary is constitutionally irritable, but she is one of the most single-hearted and disinterested children that ever lived. She is always thinking of something to do for other people. She is singularly industrious, I never saw her a moment idle. She is, like her mother, very handy with her fingers, and is already very distinguished in rugs, and crotchets, or whatever you call them, and furnishes all her friends in parlour or kitchen with caps and pinafores. Moreover she has long since constituted herself almoner-general of the establishment, and for years has always confiscated every piece of copper money that her mother or I may be in possession of for the benefit of the poor of the parish. And as the poor we have always with us, 160 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. VI. you may suppose that she has always recipients for her bounty. If her means were as large as her heart she would feed and clothe the whole continent. She often thinks and talks of home, and has a most tender remembrance of her dear grandpapa. I am sorry to say that she is about as feeble as ever. She is complaining, and has been for some days, of a pain in her side. Sometimes she has a cough. At the same time I don't believe but that she may turn out right after all. I don't want to go to a doctor and have him tap her all over and hint suspicions of tubercles, for then we should never dare to look her in the face again, for fear of reading confirmation of his doubts. Moreover I really believe that she will yet conquer a constitution for herself. As for Susie, she is the light of our eyes and the sunshine of our lives; she is perfectly good, amiable and gentle. Coming so recently from the hand of God she has lost nothing yet of her innocence and happiness, and has all the freshness of daybreak still about her. I never saw such insolent happiness, as if she had been put into this prison house for no other purpose but to sing and chatter all day long. She has brought a good phial full from the fountain of perpetual youth, and she means it to bubble and sparkle as long as possible. Poor creature ! she will find out soon enough that the world was not made for singing and laughing, but in the meantime she is happy. She speaks German quite as fluently and correctly as she does English. Of course she makes mistakes, as she does, and all children do, in whatever language they speak, but it is quite the same as her mother tongue to her, and nothing can exceed the swiftness of her jabber in either language. She observed this morning at breakfast, " that very few people had seen so much of the world as she had," and then began to enumerate the places she had visited, beginning with Dedham, and ending with Briissel, as she always calls Brussels. Your affectionate son, J. L. M. 1853.] LIFE AT BRUSSELS. 161 To Dr. 0. W. Holmes. Brussels, November 20th, 1853. MY DEAR HOLMES, Most certainly both Mary and myself felt deeply your kindness in writing to us, for although your letter was addressed, to me personally, she assumes a joint and several character with regard to it in all respects except in the responsibility of responding, and if I could have merely taken up my pen (style of the earlier part of this century in which you and I began to nourish) and acknowledged the kindness, and so rendered you my debtor instantly for another letter, you may be very sure that you would at this moment be writing to me your sixth or seventh. Honestly and most warmly I asseverate that my delay in answering was only because I felt unable to write anything that would be worth your reading. I was too conscientious to think that one sheet of paper with a post-mark was equal to another sheet of paper with a post-mark, and I hoped not to be forced, as I am at last, to tender a pound of lead in payment for a pound of gold. Do, however, be merciful, take your pen and write four score as if I had really discharged the debt. If you knew how often we have read your letter, and how much pleasure it has given us, and how often Mary has been goading me into answering in the mere sordid expectation of getting a second, till at last even the incrustations of time and self-conscious stupidity have penetrated, you would I am sure be willing once more to write to us. You may be sure even if I have myself " no more wit than a Christian or an ordinary man," that I am quite able to appreciate and to treasure yours. I do not really know what to say to you. I am in a town which for aught I know may be very gay. I do not know a living soul in it. We have not a single acquaintance in the place, and we glory in the fact. There is something rather sublime in thus floating on a single spar in the wide sea of a populous, busy, fuming, fussy, little world like this. At any rate it is consonant to both our tastes. You may suppose, how- ever, that I find it rather difficult to amuse my friends out of the VOL. L * M 162 MOTLEY'S LETT KKS. [CHAP. VI. incidents of so isolated an existence. Our life is as stagnant as a Dutch canal ; not that I complain of it, on the contrary the canal may be richly freighted with merchandise, and be a short cut to the ocean of abundant and perpetual knowledge, but at the same time few points rise above the level of so regular a life, to be worthy of your notice. You must there- fore allow me to meander along through the meadows of common-place. Do not expect anything in the impetuous and boiling style. I do not know whether you ever were in Brussels. It is a striking, picturesque town, built up a steep promontory, the old part at the bottom, very dingy and mouldy, the new part at the top, very showy and elegant. Nothing can be more exquisite in its way than the Grande Place in the very heart of the city, surrounded with those toppling, zig-zag, ten-storied buildings, bedizened all over with ornaments and emblems so peculiar to the Netherlands, with the brocaded Hotel de Yille on one side, with its impossible spire, rising some three hundred and seventy feet into the air, and embroidered on the top with the delicacy of needlework, sugarwork, spiderwork, or what you will. I haunt this place because it is my scene, my theatre. Here were enacted so many deep tragedies, so many stately dramas, and even so many farces, which have been so familiar to me so long, that I have got to imagine myself invested with a kind of property in the place, and look at it as if it were merely the theatre with the coulisses, machinery, drapery, etc., for representing scenes which have long since vanished, and which no more enter the minds of men and women who are actually mpving across its pavements than if they had occurred in the moon. When I say that I know no soul in Brussels I am perhaps wrong. With the present generation I am not familiar. En revanche the dead men of the place are my inti- mate friends. I am at home in any cemetery. With the fel- lows of the sixteenth century I am on the most familiar terms. Any. ghost that ever flits by night across the moonlight square is at once hailed by me as a man and a brother. I call him by his Christian name at once. When you come out of this place, however, which, as I said, 1853.] WOKK AMONG MUSTY ARCHIVES. 163 is exactly in the heart of the town, the antique town in the modern setting, you may go either up or down; if you go down you will find yourself in the very nastiest and most dismal complications of lanes and culs de sac possible, a dark entanglement of gin shops, beer houses, and hovels, through which charming valley dribbles the river Senne (whence I suppose is derived senna) the most nauseous little river in the world, which receives all the outpourings of all the drains and houses, and is then converted into beer for the inhabitants all the way, breweries being directly upon its edge. If you go up the hill instead of down you come to an arrangement of squares, palaces, and gardens, as trim and fashionable as you will find in Europe. Thus you see that our Cybele sits with her head crowned with very stately towers, and her feet in a tub of very dirty water. My habits here for the present are very regular. I came here, having, as I thought, finished my work, or rather the first part (something like three or four volumes octavo), but I find so much original matter here, and so many emendations to make, that I am ready to despair. However, there is nothing for it but to penelopise, pull to pieces and stitch away again. What- ever may be the result of my labours, nobody can say that I have not worked hard like a brute beast ; but I do not care for the result. The labour is in itself its own reward and all I want. I go day after day to the Archives here (as I went all summer at the Hague), studying the old letters and docu- ments of the sixteenth century. Here I remain among my fellow worms, feeding on those musty mulberry leaves of which we are afterwards to spin our silk. How can you expect any- thing interesting from such a cocoon? It is, however, not without its amusement in a mouldy sort of way, this reading of dead letters. It is something to read the real bond fide signs manual of such fellows as William of Orange, Count Egmont, Alexander Farnese, Philip the Second, Cardinal Granvelle, and the rest of them. It gives a " realising sense," as the Americans have it. However, you see how insensibly I fall into talking about myself, and yet no topic is more dis- tasteful to me. I hate myself, and am bored by myself, and I M 2 164 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. VI. rarely commit the sin of egotism. Yet I feel as if it were in writing to so old and kind a friend as you, whose good opinion I so highly value, and to whom I feel grateful for thinking that I am really industrious and capable of being useful. I feel, I say, bound to say something of my occupations, and - feel that it would be affectation to be altogether silent on the subject. At the same time I am, in German slang, rather objective than subjective, and would rather entertain my friends with anything than with myself. There are not many public resources of amusement in this place if we wanted them, which we do not. I miss the Dresden Gallery very much, and it makes me sad to think that I shall never look at the face of the ' Sistine Madonna ' again, that picture beyond all pictures in the world, in which the artist certainly did get to heaven and painted a face which man never saw on earth, so pathetic, so gentle, so passionless, so prophetic, " half of earth, and half of heaven " you see I cannot break myself of quoting you to your face. There are a few good Kubens here, but the great wealth of that master is in Antwerp. The great picture of the * Descent from the Cross ' is free again, after having been two years in the repairing room. It has come out again in very good condition. What a picture ! It seems to me as if I had really stood at the Cross, and seen Mary weeping on John's shoulder, and Magdalen receiving the dead body of the Saviour in her arms. Never was the grand tragedy repre- sented in so profound and dramatic a manner. For it is not only his colour, in which this man so easily surpasses the world, but in his life-like flesh and blood action, the tragic power of his composition. And is it not appalling to think of the large constitution of this man, when you reflect on the acres of canvas which he has covered ? How inspiriting to see with what muscular masculine vigour this splendid Fleming rushed in and plucked up drowning Art by the locks, when it was sinking in the washy sea of such creatures as Luca Giordanos and Pietro Cortonas and the like. Well might Guido exclaim, " The fellow mixes blood with his colours ! " 1853.] THE SHAKESPEARE OF PAINTING. 165 He is certainly the Shakespeare of painting. I did not say that originally: I wish I had. It is worthy to have been said by you. How providentially did the man come in and invoke living, breathing, moving men and women out of his canvas ! sometimes he is ranting and exaggerated as are all men of great genius, who wrestle with Nature so boldly. No doubt his heroines are more expansively endowed than would be thought genteel in our country, where cryp- togams are so much in fashion; nevertheless with all his exaggerations there is always something very tremendous about him, and very often much that is sublime, pathetic, and moving. I defy any one of the average amount of imagination and sentiment to stand long before the ' Descent from the Cross ' without being moved more nearly to tears than he would care to acknowledge. As for colour, his effects are as sure as those of the sun rising in a tropical landscape. There is some- thing quite genial in the cheerful sense of his own omnipotence which always inspired him. There are a few fine pictures of his here, and I go in some- times of a raw foggy morning merely to warm myself in the blaze of their beauty. I have just read over your letter again, rather well thumbed by this time, in order to see whether there was anything espe- cially requiring an answer. I find no interrogations, but you speak of Thackeray and his lectures. Of course I know nothing of them, but I heard here that he was very much delighted with you not the citizens of the U.S.A., but with O.W.H. Mary sends you an infinite deal of the kindest remem- brances. I wish you could come in and enliven our silent fireside (silent after the children have been got to bed) for one evening. My children are all very well and none the worse for their European experience. Most affectionately yours, J. L. M. 166 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. VI. To his Wife. Long's Hotel, New Bond Street, London, Monday morning, May 8th, 1854. MY DEAREST MARY, You see I have arrived at my desti- nation safe and sound. I reached the hotel last night about 11 P.M. The journey was not fatiguing to me. The trains were not crowded, so that I was able to sit in a corner and read quietly all day. We got to Calais at about 2.30, 1 think. It blew pretty fresh, and there was a nasty chopping sea, so that the deck was very wet. Almost every passenger was sick. I was not, but should have been much better if I had been. My head was so twisted about, that it will take another four-and-twenty hours to put it straight again. If I had been turned inside out, I should have been all right to-day. Instead of which, I am sorry to tell you I am suffering from one of my worst headaches at this moment, so that I feel almost unable to write coherently. I knew you would wish to hear of my safe arrival, and as my first and last thought is you, I could not set about anything to-day till I had sent you a line. I have a decentish kind of room here, and I think I shall stop. I was certainly very fortunate in the weather yesterday. The day was perfect for travelling no rain nor dust, nor too much sun. There was no rain in crossing, so that I was able to go on deck the whole time. If I had gone into the hospital below, I don't believe I should have emerged alive. The groans which occasionally ascended seemed as from a Gehenna. The vessel shipped so many seas, however, that I was completely drenched ; but as I never catch cold, you know, that was of no consequence. You will be sorry to hear that my great-coat, which you think shabby, was almost entirely ruined with dust and salt-water commingled, so that I bashfully requested the porter of this hotel this morning to accept it, and was afraid that he would answer that he did not like to deprive me of it. However, he thanked me and took it. I am afraid when he looks at it he will return it. My dear, dear Mary, I can't tell you how forlorn I am at 1854.] PRELIMINARIES OF PUBLICATION. 167 being separated from you. It seems to me that I can't go along through the day without seeing you. I have become, I fear, altogether too dependent upon you. I hope that you will not be melancholy. My company is not very lively ; but in the evenings it is better than nothing, perhaps. You have the dear children, however. I hate to think of them now. Dear little Susie, she looked so wild yesterday morning sitting up in bed half-awake, wondering at my going. Kiss her twenty-one times for me, and give as many to my dear Lily and to my dear little Mary. I hope they will all be good children, and not give you any trouble while I am gone. Ever thine, J. L. M. To his Wife. Long's Hotel, Bond Street, May lOtfi, 1854. MY DEAREST MARY, I wrote to you day before yesterday under the influence of a most ferocious headache, the natural consequence of my journey. That letter was all that I was capable of accomplishing that day. I called at the Sturgis's to-day, but all were out. Gardiner Hubbard and his wife are staying there. Gardiner called to-day upon me, but 1 was not at home. Yesterday I made an ineffectual attempt to see Mr. Forsyth. To-day I was more fortunate. I found him at his chambers in the Temple a most intelligent, agreeable, gentleman-like barrister, about my own age I should guess. He was kind enough to look up for me all the English law of copyright as regards foreigners, and there is no doubt that the property of the American author is protected if he pub- lishes first, by however small an interval, in England. We talked over the whole matter very thoroughly. He decidedly recommended my trying Murray first ; gave me a note to him, with which, and with that from Dr. Thompson, I forthwith proceeded to the renowned publisher's door. Murray received me most civilly, and impressed me very agreeably. He seemed interested in my subject, and entertained the question of 168 MOTLEY'S LETTEKS. [CHAP. VI. publishing as favourably as I could expect. When I went away, his porter accompanied me to my hotel, which is only one street from Albemarle Street, where Murray resides, took away the whole of the MS. in his bag, and it is at present in the publisher's possession. Murray is to give me an answer in a fortnight at farthest. So, at any rate, I have made one step forward, and I don't see that I can take another. If Murray refuses it after all, there will not be time to offer it to another, and to wait for the decision. Therefore I shall in that event try to make some arrangement to have it offered, and have the answer sent me by letter. If Murray declines, however, I shall doubt very much whether anybody will accept, because history is very much in his line, and as I have been particularly recommended to him, he would be more likely to treat with me than anybody else. I must, therefore, pause for a reply. Of course, I shall let you know as soon as I hear from him. Meantime, Mr. Forsyth came to see me here to-day ; invited me to dine next Monday ; and is going to take me to the Courts to-morrow, and to the House of Lords, before a Com- mittee of which he is to argue a case. In the evening I mean to go, if I can get a ticket, to the Opera * Don Giovanni,' and Bosio as Zerlina. But it makes me so sad to think that you will not be at my side, that it will destroy all my pleasure. I went at four o'clock to-day to the Noels' found Mrs. Noel at home. She received me in such a warm-hearted, affectionate manner that I felt very much delighted. I called yesterday at the Legation, and was introduced by Bigelow Lawrence to Mr. Buchanan. He has obviously no intention of returning my call, but he hoped I would call again. I shall probably omit " calling round," however. I went to-day to see Bigelow Lawrence's new wife. She is very pretty and pleasing. By the way, I forgot to tell you that Arthur Forbes called on me yesterday. I had called on him in the morning, found him out, but was fortunate enough to be at home when he called. He is just like them all frank, agreeable, kind- hearted. There, my dearest Mary, I have said all I have to say. The amount is meagre enough. I am dreadfully home- 1854.] LONDON. 169 sick, and long to be in your arms. My dear children it seems impossible for me to exist the rest of the month without them and you. To-day the weather has been fine but cold. Monday and Tuesday it poured pitilessly all the time. Ever thine, J. L. M. To his Wife. Long's Hotel, Bond Street, Wednesday morning, May I8th, 1854. MY DEAREST MARY, As it is three days since I wrote last, I am sitting down in my den before going down to the coffee- room for breakfast, in order to scratch you hurriedly a few lines merely to say that I am very well, and to thank you for your dear letter, which I found upon the table the day before yesterday morning. I like Mr. Forsyth very much. He is a very good advocate. I heard him argue an appeal case yesterday before the House of Lords, that is to say before the Lord Chancellor, two ex-Chancellors, and one or two other peers, sitting as a High Court of Appeal. He spoke very well, as did his colleagues in the case, although they are sure to lose it. By the way, I had also an opportunity of hearing the Lord Chancellor, Lord Brougham, and Lord St. Leonards deliver judgment successfully upon another case, and that was about the most interesting thing I have seen in London. Brougham is much flattered in Punch, the actual phy- siognomy being much more quizzical, but his manner is impressive, and the old man has still much blood in him. The present Chancellor, Lord Cranworth, is charming, pre- siding with most unaffected grace and suavity of manner, courteous, smiling, gentle, with a constant attention to every- thing said by the counsel, and making all his interlocutory observations in a most musical voice. I dined on Sunday at the Sturgis's. She is certainly extremely handsome, much more so than she ever was. Mrs. Hubbard and Gardiner made a thousand most affec- tionate inquiries about you. After dinner. Mr. Cabot's health 170 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. VI. was proposed by Sturgis. Yesterday, in Bond Street, I came plump upon Lord Wynford. He was passing, but half looked at me. When I accosted him and told him my name, he was extremely cordial, shook me warmly by both hands, hoped I could come to see him, etc., etc. We talked five or six minutes in the street, and separated affectionately. He made the most earnest inquiries after you, for whom I am sure he has a sincere liking. Ever your own J. L. M. To his Mother. ... I went last Friday night and heard a long and dull debate in the House of Commons. Such speakers as Webster and Choate are not to be scared up in England just now. I don't say this in glorification of our free and enlightened Eepublic. Don't suspect me of too much patriotism. I have vastly more respect for the Government of England than for our own the nation I can't help considering governed by higher prin- ciples of action, by loftier motives. They at least try to reform abuses and admit their existence. We love our dis- eases, and cling to them as the only source of health and strength. When you look at America from a distance, you see that it is a great machine for constantly extending the growth of cotton and expanding the area of negro slavery. This is the real motive power of our whole political existence, and such a principle can only carry us over a precipice ; yet all who lift their tongues and voices against the course, or who express their disgust at the hypocrisy of a nation prating of freedom when its whole aim is to perpetuate slavery, are esteemed mischievous and malignant. England is just now, with the most tremendous naval armament which ever .existed in tke world, engaging reluctantly in a war of duty to oppose the encroachments of the Eastern despotism ; and we are playing the part of Eussia in the West, and seizing the opportunity, while France and Great Britain are otherwise occupied, to 1855.] PREPARATIONS FOR PUBLICATION. 171 pick a quarrel with Spain, and so steal Cuba, and annex half a million more negroes. However, I don't see the use of my boring you with all these profound reflections. If the governor abuses me for want of patriotism, he ought to recol- lect that his patriotism took root and grew up when General Washington, Alexander Hamilton, John Jay, George Cabot, and others, were the guiding spirits of the country. We are now in the epoch of .... and it is hard to revere such creatures, or the country which looks to them for guidance. To Us Father. Vevey, March 3rd, 1855. MY DEAR FATHER, In answer to your P.S. to Susie's letter received yesterday, I would say that I am quite aware of the dictum of Lord Cranworth to which Mr. Prescott alluded. I am not able to take advantage of it, however, as the expense of going a second time to England would be more than the copyright is worth. I suppose the time of publication will be about Christmas, at which season I should be in Italy. To leave my family and go to England and return again, would be very expensive, and hardly worth while to secure a copy- right which I could not sell for 100. It may be very well for Mr. Prescott to do so, as he can sell his books for 1000 a volume or more. Please tell him, by the way, with my par- ticular regards, that I have been upon the point of writing to him every day for the last four, years, that I have not done so is because I cannot overcome my repugnance to writing and talking about myself, and I have nothing else to talk about, leading such a recluse and obscure existence. We had a perfect understanding about our respective plans before I went away. I remember that he thought that it might be better if we should arrange to publish at somewhat different times, as the w r orks are a good deal upon the same subject. As this is a consideration, however, which only affects me, as my work can't interfere with the sale of his, I have never thought it a 172 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. VI. matter of great consequence, particularly as I don't know, and never shall know, when I ought to publish. Now I am on the subject, however, I wish you would add that my work (that is to say the portion of it which is really for publication) stops at the year 1584, with the death of the Prince of Orange. This was unavoidable, as it was quite im- possible for me to speculate in more than three volumes at once ; and although I have cut away at my MS. with a broad axe in order to reduce it, I can't squeeze it into less. If I receive enough encouragement, which I don't expect, to finish this work, I shall write three more volumes, in order to bring my history down to the Peace of Westphalia, 1648. Philip the Second, although he is, of course, the Deus ex machina in much of my present work, is not my head devil, and he will have still less, and almost nothing, to do in the continuation. I still mean to write to Mr. Prescott, but I thought I would send him this message through you, for I would not have him think me forgetful of the many acts of kindness and friendship which I have received at his hands, and it is possible that he might wish to hear my plans. With regard to my time of publication, I am inclined to leave that to you. 1 You, in the most generous manner, have con- stituted yourself my fellow-victim, and you shall choose the time of immolation. I suppose by the time this reaches you, or very soon afterwards, the two copies of Volume I. will be received. I have already mentioned in my letter to Annie 2 all that I have to say thereanent. I should not like Mr. Cabot to see it till it is finished, because I know he would feel an interest in it, and it will seem so flat taken in piecemeal. The same principle applies to Uncle Edward. I should not like him to read it till he can do it all at once, and make a job of it. At the same time it is, of course, quite at his service if he chooses to do so. I am afraid that he will be a good deal of the opinion of the old gentleman to whom Jedediah Cleishbotham showed the first series of the ' Tales of My Landlord.' The friendly critic informed the author, you 1 Mr. Motley's first historic work, was published in 1856. ' The Rise of the Dutch Republic,' 2 His sister, Mrs. Alfred Rodman. 1855.] FRANKFORT BASEL. 173 know, that he has lately been reading a work which gave him no peace at all, that he had not been able, however desirous, to lay it down till he had read every line of it. On the other hand, he congratulated Jedediah that his work had no such defect, but that it was one which could be laid down at any moment with the utmost tranquillity. This would be rather a reason for the sage of Fort Hill l to begin upon the ponderous task at the earliest opportunity. At the same time I advise him not to do so. I shall write again before long, before it will be necessary to square our accounts, which won't be till the autumn, I suppose, when the job will have to be paid for. My love, and all our loves, to my dear mother, as well as yourself. Ever yours affectionately, J. L. M. To his Wife. Frankfort, July 27th, 1855. MY DEAKEST MAKY, The waiters have brought me a tre- mendously large sheet of paper, but I am afraid that I shall hardly be able to fill it up in a very interesting manner. My journey to Basel, notwithstanding the rain, was pleasant enough. The road is not at all interesting, all the beauty being in the Minster Thai, in the other direction. My com- panion in the coupe was an old epicier, or something of the kind, from Berlin, who appeared to have been making the first journey of his life. He had been up the Kigi, the Wen- gern Alp, etc., and although he seemed about seventy-five, he assured me he had suffered no fatigue. He had no teeth, but, en revanche, had a bouquet of Alpine roses in his hatband. His artless prattle was very refreshing for a little while, but when he began to put the usual questions about my intentions, objects in life, occupations, etc., he became a bore, and I took refuge in a novel. . . .The journey to Basel only occupied ten hours, the last hour on the railway, so that you get to the hotel soon after five. . . . The next morning I started from the 1 His uncle, Edward Motley, a most kind friend. 174 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. VI. railway terminus (the railroad is finished to Basel) at 7.30, and reached Frankfort at 4 . 30. As soon as I was dressed 1 started for Bismarck's house, having previously learned that Keyserling, 1 to my great regret, had not arrived. When I called, Bismarck was at dinner, so I left my card, and said I would come back in half an hour. As soon as my card had been carried to him (as I learned afterwards) he sent a servant after me to the hotel, but I had gone another way. When I came back I was received with open arms. I can't express to you how cordially he received me. 2 If I had been his brother, instead of an old friend, he could not have shown more warmth and affectionate delight in seeing me. I find I like him even better than I thought I did, and you know how high an opinion I always expressed of his talents and disposition. He is a man of very noble character, and of very great powers of mind. The prominent place which he now occupies as a statesman sought him. He did not seek it, or any other office. The stand which he took in the Assembly from conviction, on the occasion of the outbreak of 1848, marked him at once to all parties as one of the leading characters of Prussia. Of course I don't now go into the rights and wrongs of the matter, but I listened with great interest, as you may suppose, to his detailed history of the revolutionary events of that year, and his share in them, which he narrated to me in a long conversation which we had last night. He wanted me to stay entirely in his house, but as he has his wife's father and mother with him, and as I saw that it was necessary to put up a bed in a room where there was none, I decidedly begged off. I breakfasted there this morning, and am to dine there, with a party, to-day. To- morrow, I suppose, I shall dine there en famille. I am only afraid that the landlord here will turn me into the streets for being such a poor eonsommateur for him, and all I can do is to order vast quantities of seltzer water. The principal change in Bismarck is that he has grown 1 Count Hermann Keyserling, a fel- since leaving the Universities of Got- low-student at Gottingen. tingen and Berlin. 2 It was the first time they had met 1855.] BARON BISMARCK, CHARACTER AND CAREER. 175 stouter, but, being over six feet, this is an improvement. His voice and manner are singularly unchanged. His wife I like very much indeed very friendly, intelligent, and per- fectly unaffected, and treats me like an old friend. In short, I can't better describe the couple than by saying that they are as unlike M. and Madame de as it is possible to be. In the summer of 1851, he told me that the Minister, Manteuffel, asked him one day abruptly, if he would accept the post of Ambassador at Frankfort, to which (although the proposition was as unexpected a one to him as if I should hear by the next mail that I had been chosen Governor of Massachusetts) he answered, after a moment's deliberation, yes, without another word. The King, the same day, sent for him, and asked him if he would accept the place, to which he made the same brief answer, " Ja." His Majesty expressed a little / surprise that he made no inquiries or conditions, when Bismarck replied that anything which the King felt strong enough to propose to him, he felt strong enough to accept. I only write these details that you may have an idea of the man. Strict integrity and courage of character, a high sense of honour, a firm religious belief, united with remarkable talents, make up necessarily a combination which cannot be found any day in any Court ; and I have no doubt that he is destined to be Prime Minister, unless his obstinate truth- fulness, which is -apt to be a stumbling-block for politicians, stands in his way. . . . Well, he accepted the post and wrote to his wife next day, who was preparing for a summer's residence in a small house they had taken on the sea coast, that he could not come because he was already established in Frankfort as Minister. The result, he said, was three days of tears on her part. He had previously been leading the life of a plain country squire with a moderate income, had never held any position in the Government or in diplomacy, and had hardly ever been to Court. He went into the office with a holy horror of the mysterious nothings of diplomacy, but soon found how little there was in the whole " galimatias." Of course my politics are very different from his, although not so antipodal as you 176 MOTLEY'S LETTEKS. [CHAP. VI. might suppose, but I can talk with him as frankly as I could with you, and I am glad of an opportunity of hearing the other side put by a man whose talents and character I esteem, and who so well knows le dessous des cartes. M. de Veh is here, but goes back to Vevey, I believe, to-morrow. Bismarck has invited him to dinner to-day. He is as surprised as I not to find Keyserling, and can't account for his absence. Good-bye, my dearest Mary, I have got to the end of the sheet without saying a word about you and my darlings .... To his Wife. Frankfort, Saturday, July 28th, 1855. I have just consented to wait here until Wednesday morn- ing. ... I send the despatch from Bismarck's house, and I have just come back to write you this hurried line, as I must go back to dine with him at four. Madame de Bismarck begs me to convey the kindest messages on her part to you, and to say that she depends upon the pleasure of making your acquaintance here this autumn or the end of the summer, and I have promised that we will stop a day or two in Frankfort on our way to Paris. I am perfectly sure that you will like her you could not help it. She is so amiable, gentle and agreeable in every way, that I feel as if we had been ten years acquainted. She and her mother have both assured me over and over again that Bismarck was nearly out of his wits with delight when he saw my card. I should certainly not say such a thing to anybody but you, but you and I are not so overburdened with self-esteem but that we may afford to tell each other the truth in such matters, and it really gives me pleasure to know that a man of whom I think so highly has such a warm and sincere friendship for me.- I am sure that you will like him, and I only regret that we can see so little or nothing of each other for the rest of our lives. There are three children a little girl named Marie, as sweet as Susie, to whom I gave this morning a little locket in 1855.] BISMARCK'S HOME. 177 Susie's name, and told her that Susie would give her a lock of red hair to put in it when she saw her. She put her arms round my neck and kissed me, and trotted off in the greatest glee to show it to her grandpapa and grandmamma. I feel as much at home already as at Mr. Cabot's, and I should have almost as little fear of wearing out my welcome here as there. At the dinner yesterday were some strangers Prus- sians Count Eoedern, brother of the Prussian Minister in Dresden, and his wife and sister. M. de Yeh was there, and as friendly and agreeable as ever. He is off this morning to Schwalbach, and to-morrow returns to Vevey. After dinner, Bismarck and his wife, myself, and a youthful attache with the terrific name of Baron Schreckenstein, took a long ride on horseback in a beautiful forest on the other side of the Main, and on our return found M. de Veh and the father-in- law still deeply absorbed at the chess-table where we had left them. At eleven o'clock we tried very hard to eat supper, but nobody succeeded very well, and at twelve I came home. To his Wife. Frankfort, Monday, July 30th, 1855. .... The Bismarcks are as kind as ever nothing can be more frank and cordial than her manners. I am there all day long. It is one of those houses where every one does what one likes. The show apartments where they receive formal company are on the front of the house. Their living rooms, however, are a salon and dining room at the back, opening upon the garden. Here there are young and old, grand- parents and children and dogs all at once, eating, drinking, smoking, piano-playing, and pistol-firing (in the garden), all going on at the same time. It is one of those establishments where every earthly thing that can be eaten or drunk is offered you, porter, soda water, small beer, champagne, burgundy or claret are about all the time, and everybody is smoking the best Havana cigars every minute. Last night we went to the VOL. I. N 178 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. VI. theatre to see the first part of * Henry IV.' The Falstaff was tolerable, the others very indifferent. By the way I was glad to find that both Bismarck and his wife agree with me that Emil Devrient was a very second-rate actor. I must go out directly and buy a brooch for my dear little Mary. Little Bill, as the Bismarcks call their youngest boy of two years, was born on the same day, and I am going to buy him a trumpet. A thousand kisses to Lily, Mary and Susie, and accept for yourself the fondest and deepest affection of Your own J. L. M. To his Wife. Long's Hotel, Thursday morning, October 18/ft, 1855. MY DEAREST MARY, I write these few lines merely to tell you that I arrived sain et sauf in London yesterday forenoon at half-past ten. I crossed the Channel at three. The weather was very good, and the sea very smooth. The ladies on board were all desperately sea-sick, much to my astonishment, such demonstrations being entirely unauthorised by any of the circumstances. I stopped at Dover for the night, finding it very ridiculous to hurry up to London at midnight, as every- body in that metropolis was likely to get on very well without me till the following morning. The inn, the " Lord Warden Hotel," is one of the best in England. My washing-stand in itself was enough to inspire one with veneration for the whole British nation ; two great water jugs as big as those in the 'Marriage of Cana,' by Paolo Veronese, a wash basin big enough to swim in, celestial slop jars, heaps of clean towels, etc., and more water than was ever seen in one place in Paris, except in the Ecoles de Natation, all made one feel very comfortable. A Frenchman would have been wretched, however, for there were, not two clocks or even four mirrors in the chamber, but I solaced myself with the remembrance of the splendour I had left in Paris, and with the potentiality of being clean a few brief days in England. I am sorry, however, to say that I am 1855.] THE FORTHCOMING 'HISTORY.' 179 not as well off here. I have a good enough bachelor chamber, but it looks like a hospital for invalided or incurable furniture. The bed is as wide as Oxford Street, it is also quite as hard, the mattresses being evidently stuffed with paving stones from that classic and stony-hearted step-mother. I stopped at Chapman's on my way up from the railroad, so commenced business sooner than if I had not slept at Dover, filled up the form of application for the copyright, and in short did all that was necessary before coming to Long's. We have decided of course to defer actual publication till the other (American edition) is ready. . . v Ever your own J. L. M. To his Mother. Florence, November 18th, 1855. MY DEAREST MOTHEE, We have arrived at the only stop- ping place which we shall have for a long time to come, having taken lodgings for three months in a quiet house with the southern sun upon it. ... You have been aware of our whereabouts by the letters which Mary has occasionally written, and by the notes which have been dropping between the governor and me from time to time. I can't omit this opportunity of expressing my deep gratitude to him for his most efficient and generous assistance in the matter of my history. I am highly gratified with the pleasure which the work seems to have afforded to him, to you, to Uncle Edward, and other members of the family, and I beg you to thank Tom for the great trouble he has taken in regard to the matter. I fear very much, however, that the governor and the rest are doomed to much disappointment in regard to its success. It cannot take in England, and moreover the war, Macaulay's new volumes, and Prescott's, will entirely absorb the public attention. I am extremely gratified that Hillard has been so kind as to write an article upon the book. I think that the governor quoted his opinion, as upon the N 2 180 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. VI. whole favourable, and certainly nobody could be more compe- tent to review it, or can write more brilliantly. I think some- thing was said about his only having time to write a short article. I would rather he should take time and defer it to the April number, than not have ample room and verge enough allowed him. The book is so ponderous that it ought to sustain a weighty article. Of course the governor will pay heed to this suggestion, and so no more of this subject. We left Vevey after more than a year's residence (very profitably employed for the children) towards the end of July. We passed some little time in Berne, at which place I left my family in charge of the Fays, in order to make a visit to an old University friend of mine, Baron Bismarck, with whom I was very intimate twenty years ago in Gottingen and Berlin, and who is now almost the most important statesman in Prussia. During my absence, Mary and the children have passed the time very agreeably in Berne, owing to the constant and unremitting attentions of Fay l (our Minister to Switzerland) and his wife. I believe I have mentioned them often in my letters. If not, I will only say that he is almost the best man I ever knew, one who is never thoroughly happy unless he is -conferring a favour upon some one else. You may judge of the pain which was caused to all of us a few weeks afterwards, by our hearing at Interlaken of Mrs. Fay's death. Fay wrote to me repeatedly during her illness, and telegraphed to me at its melancholy termination, and I went immediately to Berne, and was with him till after the funeral. She was a very honest, frank, kind-hearted, devoted person, and is an irrepar- able loss to her husband and her only child. They came afterwards to Interlaken for a little while. He bears the loss very well, being, fortunately for himself, the most believing and devout Christian I ever knew. I have not heard from him since we left Switzerland, but I shall write to him to-morrow. Upon leaving Switzerland, we passed a month in Paris. I don't like to say much about that episode in our history, because the immense fatigue and expense of passing four 1 Theodore S. Fay. 1855.] PAEIS UNDER THE EMPIRE. 181 weeks in that place so entirely counter-balances all satis- faction which can be derived from it, that I cannot speak upon the subject without injustice and exaggeration. At the same time, there is no doubt that the city itself is the most beautiful in the world. Most of the works of im- provement going on there now are very extensive and ex- pensive, and many of them have been carried on at a sacri- fice of much that was striking and picturesque in ancient Paris. They are occasioning vast outlay, for which a heavy debt has been created, partly by the State, partly by the Municipality, to defray the interest of which the taxes are rising daily. It is also very difficult for small tradesmen and mechanics to get houses and shops, all having been pulled down in many quarters to make room for lengthening lines of palaces and arcades, which yield no lodgings for poor devils. Yet it is the custom to say that Louis Napoleon is doing wonders in providing work for the poor people. I suppose if the Massachusetts Legislature and the Boston City Govern- ment should create a debt of $40,000,000, in order to build a palace, reaching from the old State House to Eoxbury Line, for Governor Armstrong and his descendants to live in, and if they should create a further debt, in order to knock down all the town between Park Street Church and Copp's Hill, and put up in the place of the demolished buildings a series of granite, eight-storey palaces with continuous arcades, it would be considered an act of great wisdom and benevolence, con- sidering the number of Irish hodmen and other labourers who would be sure to get employment, and yet this is pretty much what is going on in Paris. After leaving Paris, we took the train to Lyons, stopping one night in Dijon. At Lyons, we found by appointment an Italian vetturino, with whom we had made many journeys in Switzer- land, and who has four very good horses and a comfortable carriage. With him we went to Chambery, over the Mont Cenis to Turin, and then by rail to Genoa, where we resumed our vetturino, and came with him to Florence, for a vetturino's horses are like " the pampered jades of Asia," which, accord- ing to Ancient "Pistol," cannot go but "forty miles a day." 182 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. VI. We found Frank Boott here, who had kindly saved us much trouble by looking over the vacant lodgings, so that our work was much simplified. . . . We spent an evening with Mr. and Mrs. Putnam last week. The Alexanders were there, and we saw a large quantity of Fanny Alexander's drawings, and I assure you they are really wonderful. 1 She draws entirely with pen and ink, composing out of her own imagination or from her recollection. But her facility and grace and purity of style are unequalled by any modern drawings which I ever saw. She has the good taste to form her artistic education in the school of the wonderful Quattro Centisti of Florence, the painters, I mean, of the fifteenth century, whose works have spread such a halo of glory around this city, and which heralded the extraordinary effulgence which was to illumine the world in the early part of the fifteenth century. In these pre-Kaphaelite productions Florence is very rich. Miss Alexander has not tried her hand at painting yet, although she believes herself to have more feeling for colour than for any other department of Art. She draws outlines, human figures, Madonnas, peasant girls, saints in endless variety, and illustrates old Italian songs, of which she furnishes herself very pretty translations. She is a young person of unquestionable genius, and as simple and unaffected as she is clever. There is also a sculptor here named Thomas Ball, who came out here a year and a half ago, and who is now going home again. He has modelled a very admirable statuette of Washington Allston, and would like very much to have an order to execute it in marble. I wish you would go with the governor to see it when he arrives, which will be in spring or early summer. Ask Mr. Frank Gray to look at it. I should not have written you to-day, my dear mother, feeling that I have nothing to say which can possibly amuse you, had I not received a letter from Chapman yesterday, in which he says he is to publish my History forthwith. .., ' Ever your affectionate son, J. L. M. 1 Miss Alexander still lives at Florence. 1855.] FLORENCE. 183 To his Uncle, Edward Motley. Florence, December I3th, 1855. MY DEAR UNCLE EDWARD, I have been intending day after day and week after week to write to you. I am sorry that your last generous present of 100 arrived before I had written, because it looks almost now as if I proposed to make payment by a few sheets of notepaper, and I am afraid that even your indulgence would hardly consider my letters as cheap at such a price. I don't pretend to thank you for all your generosity. I have already told you that your constant kindness has made me a bankrupt in the means of repaying you even in words just now ; I feel as it were over- whelmed by the liberality with which I have been treated both by you and the governor. I am sure I don't know how I should have extricated myself from my printing and pub- lishing difficulties but for the timely and most generous assistance which I have received. I wish I knew how I could make a letter interesting or amusing to you. The truth is that I am so oppressed by a constitutional melancholy, which grows upon me very rapidly, as to be almost incapacitated from making myself agreeable. You know how to sympathise with this frame of mind, and I should apologise to you for talking about my blue devils, when I know that you are yourself haunted, except that I thought by sending a swarm of them across the Atlantic, they might have an encounter with the legions there, and mutually destroy each other. Florence is thought in many respects to be the most beau- tiful town in Europe, yet I suppose few people ever look about them at first without astonishment that it should ever have attained such a reputation. The reason is that the city itself is but the central point of a vast periphery of palaces, villas, castles and villages, which extend over the large basin of the Arno. The city itself is compact the gates are narrow ; the houses vast, massive, and sombre, with fortress-like walls, narrow windows, and huge butting cornices; the churches 184 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. VI. heavy, stern, and gloomy. The territory in the midst of which the town has been standing one or two thousand years (to be precise) is singularly beautiful. The City of Flowers (for that is its fragrant appellation) is built upon a garden. A flat, verdant, luxuriant plain of three or four miles in width is encircled by a chain of gently flowing mountains ; and if there ever were any little hills which " clapped their hands and skipped like lambs " according to the Psalmist, these are the ones to do it. The character of the environs is as jocund as that of the city is sombre. All the hills are sown broadcast with palaces and castellated mansions, monasteries and villages gleaming whitely through silvery forests of olives, luxuriant vines and solemn cypresses. The town itself, with the towers and belfries in its centre, is but the heart of the vast flower ; the stamens and pistils and inner petals are here, while the beautiful and vast corolla unfolds itself far and wide as far as the eye can reach. To feel this, one has but to ascend any steeple of any height outside the town, and see how Florence is wrapped up and encircled by a series of little Florences. The Arno is not much of a river in appearance, yellow and shallow and full of gravel banks, yet it serves to keep green the velvet cushions upon which the luxurious city lies ex- tended like Cleopatra on a couch. The river is however capable of much mischief, and in times past has produced inundations very like the deluge. Five hundred years ago the whole town was laid under water to the depth of ten feet. Since the canalisation of the river to Leghorn, however, such pranks have become impossible; but even last year the whole country round was overflowed, and it was almost as bad this autumn. It is not used, I need not say, for purposes of navigation, and it would be quite impossible now for a city placed as this is to attain to a tithe of the commercial and political importance which it enjoyed in the 14th and 15th centuries. If one subtracts from the list of articles of commerce such trifles as tea and coffee, sugar, tobacco and cotton, which make up pretty much the whole bulk of the world's merchandise just now, one can understand how a city which from its position could take no part in such traffic, could rise to eminence at a 1855.] THE GLOKIES OF FLORENCE. 185 time when those necessaries of life had not been invented. Before compasses, Capes of Good Hope and Horn, Californias and Hong Kongs came into fashion, it was easy for a few cities to monopolise the business of the world's little inter- changes of commodities. Genoa had its factories in the Crimea and received the caravans from the North and East ; Venice, its colonies in the Levant, and Florence, with its great banking houses and manufactories, its large capital, its sound metallic currency, its corn and oil, received the golden streams as they flowed from the urns of its sister cities, and conducted them northward through the marble aqueduct of a few splendid cities in Germany and the Netherlands. All this is changed now. Moreover the trade and the enterprise of the city nourished only during its republican organisation. I think the advo- cates of a democratic system had better rest their case on the achievements of two cities, Athens and Florence. I doubt if either, in the day of their greatness, were very comfortable places to live in, but there can be no question that the amount of intellectual vigour displayed by both at the epoch of their utmost turbulence, was superior to anything ever heard of in history. The fierce rivalries and passions of Florence the constant conflicts of mind with mind, man with man, and mass with mass the never-ceasing human attrition, brought out intellectual electricity enough to make the whole world vibrate so long that its throbs are still distinctly felt and traceable to their cause intellectual flame enough to light the torches of civilisation over the earth after they had been extinguished in the Gothic deluge intellectual names brilliant and numerous enough to people the whole firmament with immortal constellations. We are proud of Boston as the Athens of America, but we shall be prouder when she has produced, even with Portland and Newburyport to back her, such names as Dante, Petrarch, Boccaccio, Cimabue, Giotto, Arnolfo, Brunelleschi, Leonardo da Vinci, Michel Angelo, Macchiavelli, and Galileo ; and I only mention names such as rise spontaneously like spirits when the magic name of Florence is pronounced names which have echoed for centuries everywhere in the world MOTLEY'S LETTEKS. [CHAP. VI. where the progress and the triumphs of the human intellect in the various fields of the Arts and Sciences are looked upon with sympathy. Hundreds of other names might be mentioned, known not only to scholars but to the world at large ; and it must be confessed that no satisfactory reason can be given for such splendid corruscations of genius around one single spot but the vivifying presence of political liberty. The period of this liberty was a short one and a turbulent one. It was coincident, however, with the revival of letters and of civilisation. It was in Italy that the spirit of municipal liberty first roused itself, after it had been crushed by Eome, and buried under Roman ruins by the brutal, blundering but juvenile energies of the German races. Five centuries after the fall of the Western Empire until nearly a thousand years from the birth of Christ lasted the syncope, the coma- tose trance of Europe, and with her first struggles after awaking from her lethargy, the little, now almost forgotten Eepublics of Amalfi and Naples became visible. Here the elements of Greek, Eoman, Byzantine, and Saracen civilisa- tion are preserved and combined and transferred to the more vigorous municipalities of Pisa and Florence. A couple of centuries of fighting between the Emperors of Germany and the Popes of Eome succeed, during which the cities of Italy seek a shield against imperial oppression in the assistance of the Church. Here was the fatal flaw by which the vase of Italian liberty was cracked when it was first moulded. To go for liberty, human progress, intellectual development, and to expect these things by fighting under the banner of the Church was a delusion to be sure, but it was a fiction which, like many other poetical fables, did good work. The Church party, the Guelphs, were in reality a phalanx of intellectual opposition to imperial and brutal dominion. Papal Eome, even while inventing the Inquisition and the mendicant orders, was the champion of Cities against Kaisers ; and this is the principal good that the Church has ever accomplished. With the downfall of the Suabian dynasty, at the close of the thirteenth century, Florence, which has long had a republican but aristocratic organisation, while alternatively 1855.] THE VICISSITUDES OF FLORENCE. 187 resisting and acknowledging the sovereignty of the Em- perors, is strong enough to set up for itself. Thirty years the noble families of the place have been at feud, fighting like Kilkenny cats till nothing is left but their tails, calling themselves Guelphs and Ghibellines, but ranging themselves on one side or the other solely according to their relationship to one of two families which had been set by the ears in consequence of a young gentleman jilting a young lady whom he was to marry thirty or forty years previously. Thirty years of this kind of work have weakened the pugna- cious capabilities of these families, and their result is that the tails as aforesaid all that is left of this very quarrelsome species are thrown out of the place altogether. It is a curious fact that not only were the nobles deprived of poli- tical power, entirely disfranchised by the Florentine Eepublic, when at this epoch it first "made the people," as its early statutes express it, but it became a mode of punishment, and one often inflicted, to degrade individuals and families by making them noble. In a single year five or six hundred persons have been chastised for political offences by seeing their names enrolled in the lists of the nobility ; and this example was followed by the municipal authorities of other cities governed or controlled by Florence. No doubt this was a stupid as well as a virulent proceed- ing. It kept an organised band of powerful, disaffected, and dangerous brigands ever ready to pounce upon the democratic city which had provoked their hatred and their vengeance, while it established in time a second class of nobility, an office-holding oligarchy of mere vulgar origin, without purer motives, by which the liberty of Florence was eventually overthrown. The duration of this liberty was, after all, wonderfully short. The democracy was established at the close of the thirteenth century, and at the beginning of the fifteenth the Medician oligarchy had succeeded. By the middle of the sixteenth the Medici were made into Grand Dukes of Tuscany, and there is an end of Florence. That family died out before the middle of the eighteenth century ; and as .there happened to be a poor king going about at that 188 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. VI time without a crown to his back one Stanislaus Lecszinski, whose daughter had married the respectable Louis XV. of France it was thought desirable to make him Duke of Lorraine. There being, however, a Duke of Lorraine, who objected to being unduked, he was pitchforked into Florence, . much to his disgust, and was very much astonished afterwards to find that the degrading step had ended in making him Emperor of Germany. Francis of Lorraine, Duke of Tuscany, married with the Empress Maria Theresa, and saw himself and family established on the throne of the Caesars. Thus Tuscany is a sort of appanage for the younger sons of the Hapsburg family. One reigning Grand Duke has already succeeded to the imperial throne, and transferred the duchy to a younger son ; and the present Grand Duke, who has reigned for many years, was naturally set up in business again, after the general smash in 1848, by his powerful relations at Vienna. Florence is, however, freed at present from the Austrian occu- pation, and things seem to go on peaceably. Provided a man does not talk politics or read the Bible, he gets on well enough. This would be somewhat of a deduction from the daily habits of New Englanders, but the Tuscans have been so long having their skins taken off that they like it. Of the present aspect of the place, therefore, in a political point of view, I shall not discourse. Florence is a dead city a splendid tortoise shell, from which the living animal has long since disappeared. The shell will, however, be long an object of wonder. There is no town in the world of its size which contains such a profusion of works of art. There are three large galleries of pictures. All of them together would, perhaps, be equal to the gallery at Dresden, which singly, however, surpasses any one of them. The best gallery, that of the Pitti Palace, is exactly opposite our doors, so that it is easy for us to look at the finest pictures in the world from 9 A.M. to 3 P.M., quite enough to satisfy any reasonable person. I shall not begin to you about pictures, however, because nothing could be more jejune than any description of masterpieces which I could send. A catalogue is an extremely convenient thing to have in one's pocket when in a gallery, but the dullest of 1855.] PRESENT CONDITION OF FLORENCE. 189 literary performances would be a running commentary from me to you about pictures which you never saw, and never intend to see. At the same time I feel sure that if you were here you would enjoy them as much as I do. Hillard has written the best book upon Italy which I have ever read. The charms of style and of word-painting can go no further, and his pages have the effect of finely coloured photographs of the scenes he has visited. It is so difficult to fix the fleeting impression produced in one's mental camera obscura by an object seen but for a moment, that I quite wonder at his success. I have saved reading the book till on the spot, and am glad of having done so. At the same time it indis- poses me to send home Italian descriptions. Nothing can be more scholarly and elegant than the whole expression of his book ; and, although I should occasionally dissent from some of his criticisms upon the old masters, yet I admire it on the whole very much. I shall say no more, because, as I have already had the pleasure of receiving a kind word of approval from him in a postscript to the governor's kind letter, you will think I am trying to get into the Mutual Admiration Society. Perhaps you would like to know a little of prices, if I have not already bored you sufficiently by my historical and political disquisitions. Before you condemn me, however, for lengthiness on those topics, think what you have escaped. Florence, according to one of its oldest chroniclers, was built by the great-grandson of Noah, who came to Tuscany "to escape the confusion growing out of the Tower of Babel." That being the case, it has probably grown up, little by little, to its present size, just as Calais did, according to the theory of Tristram Shandy ; and I might have given you a much larger dose of history if I had taken up matters at the fountain head, that is, at the Deluge. A good house, or lodging as large as a house, without furni- ture, and on a lease of two or three years, could be had for $300 a year. Beef and bread, the two staves of life, are 10 and 5 cents a pound respectively. A respectable turkey, such as would not be ashamed to see himself roasted on 190 MOTLEY'S LETTEKS. [CHAP. VI. Thanksgiving Day in Portland, costs 50 cents. A pair of fowls, 30 to 40 cents. A cauliflower, as big as your head, 3 cents. Celery, and such things, pretty much nothing at all. Groceries, however, are comparatively dear. Tea, coffee, and other colonials, as they call them, rather dearer than with us. Cotton is dearer ; ladies' apparel dearer ; men's clothing much cheaper. Lessons of all kinds (except first-rate musical instruction, which is $1 a lesson) average about 30 cents an hour, whether for one or half a dozen pupils. You see that for a resident Florence is, as compared to Boston, fabulously cheap. A passing stranger gets no great advantage, however. I hope to be able to write you again very soon, if you have not had enough of this. Meantime Mary and the children desire to be most affectionately remembered to you. Believe me, yours affectionately, J. L. M. To Ms Mother. Florence, April 1st, 1856. MY DEAKEST MOTHEK, We decided to pass the winter in Florence, principally because the children would have the benefits of instruction at a cheaper rate. We shall probably go from Kome to Naples early in May, and return by steamer either to Genoa, and thence over the Simplon, or direct to Marseilles, a voyage which I dread, and hope not to make. Our plans, however, are somewhat foggy. I have heard nothing from Chapman touching the sale of my book, and suppose that very few copies have been sold. 1 It has been very favourably received in the Aihenseum, the Press, and some other papers, and Mr. Froude's article in the Westminster Review for April is uncommonly well written and extremely flattering. I have heard of nothing more, and if the edition is eventually sold, it must be a long time first. It takes a good time to read such a long work. We parted with Frank Boott and 1 Seventeen thousand copies were sold in England during the first year of publication. 1856.] EECEPTION OF THE 'DUTCH KEPUBLIC.' 191 L with great regret. We have seen them constantly since our arrival here, and have passed much time very agreeably together. He has the same excellent and sterling qualities and truthful character which he always had, and she is a very interesting and intelligent child. Your affectionate son, J. L. M. From Mr. W. H. Prescott. Boston, April 28th, 1856. MY DEAK MOTLEY, I -am much obliged to you for the copy of the * History of the Dutch Kepublic ' which you have been so kind as to send me. A work of that kind is not to be run through in a few days, particularly by one who does his read- ing chiefly through his ears. I shall take my own time there- fore for going thoroughly through the book, which I certainly shall do from beginning to end, notes inclusive. Meantime I have yielded to my impatience of seeing what sort of stuff it is made of by pitching here and there into various places, particularly those with which I am most familiar myself and which would be most likely to try your power as a writer. The result of a considerable amount of reading in this way has satisfied me that you have more than fulfilled the pre- diction which I had made respecting your labours to the public. Everywhere you seem to have gone into the subject with a scholar-like thoroughness of research, furnishing me on my own beaten track with a quantity of new facts and views, which I was not aware it could present to the reader. In one passage I remember, the sack of St. Quentin, you give a variety of startling and very interesting particulars, and when 1 envied you the resources at your command for supplying them to you, I found they were all got from a number of the * Documentos Ineditos ' which slept harmlessly on my shelves from my own unconsciousness that it contained anything gerrnain to the matter. Your descriptions are every- where graphic and picturesque. One familiar with your 192 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. VI. romances, will not be surprised at your powers in this way. But yet after all the style for history is as different from what is required for romance as that of a great historical picture is from a scene-painting for a theatre. You prove that you possess both. Your portraiture of character is vigorous and animated, full of characteristic touches, from a pencil that is dipped in the colours of the old masters. You have laid it on Philip rather hard. Indeed you have whittled him down to such an imperceptible point that there is hardly enough of him left to hang a newspaper paragraph on, much less five or six volumes of solid history as I propose to do. But then you make it up with your own hero, William of Orange, and I comfort myself with the reflection that you are looking through a pair of Dutch spectacles after all. As to the backbone of the work, the unfolding of the great revolution, I am not in a condition to criticise that, as no one can be who has not read the work carefully through. But I have conversed with several, not merely your personal friends, who have done so, and they bear emphatic testimony to the power you have exhibited, in presenting the subject in an original and piquant way to the reader. Indeed you have seen enough of criticism probably from the presses of this country and of England, to satisfy you that the book has made a strong impression upon the public mind and that it must be entirely successful. There is one little matter which I have heard quarrelled with, and which I must say I think is a mistake, but which relates to the form not to the fonds of the work that is the headings of the chapters, and the running titles of the pages. They are so contrived as to show the author's wit, but nothing of the contents of the book, and have the disadvantage of giving a romantic air which is out of place in history. But this sort of criticism you may very well think is like praising one for his intellectual, his moral, and all that, and then taking exception to the cut of his waistcoat. You -have good reason to be pleased with the reception the book has had from the English press, considering that you had no one particularly to stand godfather to your bantling, but that it tumbled into the world almost without the aid of 1856.] ENGLISH CRITICS. 19J a midwife. Under these circumstances success is a great triumph. . . . With my kindest regards to your wife, believe me, dear Motley, Very sincerely yours, WM. H. PBESCOTT. To his Father. Borne, May 13th, 1856. MY DEAR FATHER, I perceive that the Harpers have pub- lished the ' Dutch Kepublic ' at last. No doubt they are the correct judges of the correct time ; but I must say that I should have liked to have had it published in time to allow a review in the April number of the North American. You say nothing of this in your letter. Have you observed in one of Mary's letters a request to send a copy to Sam Hooper and to E. P. Whipple ? The latter is one of the most brilliant writers in the country, as well as one of the most experienced reviewers. I am glad you received the Press. Some of the papers have been decidedly disagreeable ; a weekly, called the Saturday Review, and the Literary Gazette, for example. The Examiner, too, is very censorious as well as patronising. The warmest article is in a weekly called the Nonconformist, date April 30th, and if Chapman has not sent it to you or to Harper, I wish you would send for it, as it would be desirable to have it repub- lished. I don't know who the editor of the paper is, nor the author of the article. The Forbes also sent me a very nat- tering notice of the book from the Edinburgh paper, The Scotsman. On the whole, it has been treated as well as an unknown production could expect in England, where success belongs to those only who have already succeeded. I have heard nothing from Chapman since the book was published, but I feel sure from the silence that very few copies have been sold. I shall be surprised if a hundred copies are sold at the end of a year. I directed that a copy should be sent to Mr. Bates with VOL. I. O 194 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. VI. your regards. I suppose you have retained the list of persons to whom I wished copies sent. One person in particular I beg may receive one, if he has not already done so, Thomas G. Bradford. Have the kindness when you next write to look over this letter, and answer these various matters propounded. I repeat that the greatest satisfaction which I have derived from the writing of the History is the pleasure and occupation which it has given you, and were it not such a very expensive matter to both our pockets, I should like nothing better than to write another immediately ; but I think it safer to pause upon the road to ruin. I remain, yours affectionately, J. L. M. P.S. I am glad you sent a copy to Mr. Deblois. My regards to him as well as to his "guide, philosopher, and friend," the sage of Fort Hill. To his Father. Castellamare, near Naples, June 6th, 1856. MY DEAR FATHER, I repeat what I have more than once said already, that the principal pleasure I have received in publishing my History is the great satisfaction which you and my dear mother have derived from it, and the warm expressions of sympathy which I have met with from my friends. I always knew that Mr. Cabot and William Amory were my friends, but I confess that I had not expected even from them such enthusiastic approbation, the echo of which from beyond the Atlantic has touched Mary and me most deeply. I shall be most grateful to them as long as I live. I was, of course, much pleased with Tom's last letter containing a copy of that article from Harper's. I ascribe the necessity of printing the second edition to Cabot's and Amory's tremendous cornering opera- tions in the first. I have received Mr. Prescott's very kind and hearty letter, and will answer it at my first moment of leisure. Mr. Ticknor's I cannot answei because he is already in Europe. Please to thank Hillard most warmlv for his article in the 1856.] RECEPTION OF THE ' HISTORY ' IN AMERICA. 1 95 Courier. I could not be otherwise than extremely grateful to be made the subject of such very high and elegantly expressed commendation, although I feel at the same time that I am far from deserving such praise. Will you take an opportunity to present my compliments to the editors of the Boston Post, and thank them sincerely for the handsome and very flattering friendly manner in which they have noticed my labours ? I feel very sensibly any commendation coming from my native place now r that I have been so long resident in foreign lands. Don't forget, too, to give my regards to Epes Sargent, and to thank him for the warm and friendly interest which according to the extracts sent me he has manifested so constantly in the work. By the way, will you tell me what arrangement has been made about the North American Review? I suppose, as a matter of course, that Hillard has not written two reviews of the book ; but I should be very sorry to lose a regular article in the North American Review, to which I think the book is fairly entitled, and it would be a pity to leave it to the chance mercy of the editor whom I don't know and who may be unfriendly. I read the article in the Tribune, and was satisfied with it. It is curious that everybody who has censured me severely either in England or America has attacked the headings of the chapters, and it would be amusing if my letters to Chapman could be found and printed, to see how vigorously I remonstrated against, and how reluctantly I consented to making these kind of titles, thinking the summary at the head of each chapter quite sufficient. If I had the opportunity, which I have not at present, of making alterations, perhaps I should do so on this point, although it looks rather sneaking to back out in consequence of criticisms. We made a very pleasant excursion to Sorrento yesterday. An old friend of mine, Baron Canitz, who is Prussian Minister here, and whom I knew twenty years ago in Germany, has been extremely cordial. He came down here with his Secretary of Legation yesterday, and we all went together. He invited me to dine to-day with him with the Prince of Saxe Meinin- o 2 196 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. VI. gen, and a dozen bigwigs of the corps diplomatique, but the weather is too warm for such efforts on my part, and I insisted on declining. I shall write as soon as we have crossed the Simplon, and Mary will probably write next week from Genoa. Meantime, with the best love of all of us to my dear mother and yourself, and with kindest remembrances to every member of the family, never forgetting Uncle Edward, of whose health I wish you would give me a little better account, I remain Most affectionately your son, J. L. M. From Mr. Theodore Fay. United States Legation, Berne, June 18th, 1856. MY DEAR MOTLEY, I am afraid to tell you what I think of your History ! It is one of the finest I ever read. You need be under no apprehension. It is destined to immortality. It is a noble painting largely done, the delineations of character not only by a master hand but from a heart that sees right through the souls of men and means to speak the truth. I do not know that there could be found a period of grander interest, or a historian more able to represent it with all the force of truth. The drama is opened and conducted with superior power. The figures rise upon the mind in fearfully vivid colours but without exaggeration. There is a rare union of simplicity and strength, of poetry and truth. The style is limpid, forcible, unaffected, and eloquent. Many of the descriptions eminently beautiful, as, for instance, that of the cathedrals. The author has received from nature a high historic power, and the marks of conscientious study and reflection are felt in all the details. No library will be com- plete without your work. I congratulate you upon what must prove a complete success, and I only hope all men may read, mark, learn, and inwardly digest the meaning of such a character as Philip Egmont, and the grand and noble William of Orange. For my part I shall consider forwarding your manuscript as one of the honourable distinctions of my life. It 1857.] OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES. 197 was a higher act than you supposed, for I did not suspect how proud I should be of it. We are well. My daughter, who is my reader, as my beloved wife would have been, owes her first ideas of history to your pen, and joins in all my praise and kind regards to you and yours. As ever your friend, THEO. S. FAY. From Dr. 0. W. Holmes. September 23rd, 1856. 1 MY DEAR MOTLEY, I welcome you and all yours back to your country and your. friends, among whom I know you count me as not the newest or the least attached. I should have been to see you before this, but for reasons of little conse- quence in themselves, but just enough to keep me at home for some days, and perhaps for the rest of this week. There are many things I should love to talk over with you, but chiefly your own labours and experiences in the pursuit of your noble object, the fruit of which it is not too much to say is spoken of everywhere among us with admiration rather than common praise. Your wife and children, too have I not known one from girlhood, and the others from infancy, and shall I not have a prattle with them as soon as may be ? So you expect my bodily presence shortly for an hour's talk this week if I can, but next week whether I can or cannot. Until then, and always thenceforth, Believe me, truthfully yours, 0. W. HOLMES. From the same old habitat, 8, Montgomery Place, Septem- ber 23rd. \ From 0. W. Holmes. 8, Montgomery Place, January 9th, 1857. MY DEAR MOTLEY, I promised you a glass of wine one day, and you must let me redeem my promise by sending you 1 Mr. Motley passed the winter of 1856-7 in Boston. 198 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. VI. these half a dozen bottles. They are marked in Judge Jack- son's catalogue " Essex Madeira, bought and imported through Mr. Isaac P. Davis in 1818," and have been commonly called " Essex Junior." Mr. Parker (of P. & Codman) says the wine is well thought of, and I remember Mr. Isaac P. wanted to purchase all the Judge had in his cellar at one time. But good or bad, there is a bouquet of old friendship under every cork, and to borrow the words of a poet of the nine- teenth century, an admirer of your genius, and a near relation in the ascending line of the youth who brings you the friendly tribute (or would have brought it if not too heavy) " It is not the sunset that glows in the wine, But the smile that beams over it makes it divine." Don't answer this note, but nod your acknowledgments over the next glass of wine we drink together. Yours faithfully, 0. W. HOLMES. P.S. Washington Irving 1 says "reliable," and Worcester credits the word to Sir Robert Peel. From Mr. C. C. Felton. Cambridge, April 17th, 1857. MY DEAR MOTLEY, Some days ago I received a copy of your 'Dutch Republic/ which you have the great kindness to send me. I assure you there are few things which could have given me so much gratification. Instead of acknow- ledging your kindness immediately I sat down to read the book, and have occupied myself with it all my leisure moments since. Fast-day was thus converted into a most delightful feast-day, and I am still under the magician's spell. It so happens that I have before only had time to read here and there a chapter enough to form an idea of its characteristic merits. I had intended to take it up in the summer vaca- 1 ' Life of Washington,' iL, 240. 1*57.1 FRIENDLY CRITICS. 199 tion and study it carefully ; but, having it on my table, I cannot resist the temptation nor postpone the gratification so long. I congratulate you very sincerely on your good fortune in having added a permanent and precious contribution to the historical literature of our age. I consider him the happiest of mankind who, having a taste for letters and the genius re- quisite to accomplish great work, is so favoured by his outward fortunes that he can follow his tastes and give free scope to his genius. This happiness you have, and you have shown yourself to be worthy of it by the great achievement you have accomplished with the freshness of glowing and vigorous early manhood still upon your spirit. May your future career in letters correspond to the auspices of the present, and may I live to refresh my mind, wearied with daily labours, by many a brilliant page of picturesque eloquence, sustained by love of truth and ethical justice, fear- lessly and forcibly expressed, from you. Ever, my dear Motley, your obliged friend, C. C. FELTON. To Dr. 0. W. Holmes. 18, Boylston Place, May 3rd, 1857. MY DEAR HOLMES, I do not believe that my affection for you has led me astray while endeavouring to form an im- partial judgment upon your poem. I have read it a great many times, and I have admired it more at each successive reading. Each of the episodes has freshness, strength and beauty, and the whole fabric is simple and noble. What gives me particular pleasure is, that the more lofty the strain, the better and grander becomes the poetry. The episode of the young Eoman is handled with much classic elegance, as well as with great tenderness and truth. The best portion, however, is that which embodies the mother's secret. The pictures are finished with an artistic delicacy of touch, and a piety of feeling, which remind me of the Florentine painters 200 MOTLEY'S LETTEKS. [CHAP. VI. of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. The Webster photograph is bold, shadowy and imposing, but would pro- bably elicit more hearty applause from a public audience than from some of us who have perhaps pondered too much the unheroic and the unpoetical elements which constituted so much of that golden-headed and clay-footed image. The same remark I should be inclined to make upon the fraudulent banker. You have painted a very vigorous picture, but there is something in the details which are too inhar- monious with the ideal. I suppose that you will not agree with me, and very likely it is some narrowness on my part, or over squeamishness, but the particulars of a modern dinner- party will refuse to make poetry to my imagination. The more lifelike they are (and nothing can be more vivid than your sketch), the more does my mind rebel at them. At the same time, I beg you to believe that I feel as warmly as any- one can do the genial glow of the atmosphere, and the genuine ring of the verse, even in the passages which I put below the other parts of the poem in comparison. Indeed, the descrip- tion of the ruined home on Apple Island is almost the best thing in the poem. I have taken the liberty to say exactly what I think, because, although you may not accept my criticisms, I am sure you will accept the spirit in which they are written. If I thought that you had said your dernier mot, and that you were not likely in future to excel yourself, I should then, as one of your warmest admirers, as well as one of your oldest friends, have poured out for you, what Miss Edgworth says will alone satisfy an author, "large draughts of un- qualified praise." I could have done that, too, with a clear conscience. But as I believe you to have it in you to write a great poem, and as I consider everything which you have hitherto written only as stray nuggets, golden pledges of the unfathomed and unsunned ore below, I am the more inclined to be critical. As I said before, the loftiest passages in this, as in your other poems, are much the best. One of your tendencies, not a bad one if properly understood by you, is to rise above your subject. Therefore, if you will select a grand, 1857.] MR. BANCROFT. 201 earnest, heroic theme, and put your whole soul and strength into it, I believe that you can accomplish what has not yet been done in this country. You have strength of mind enough to rise to the highest imaginative regions, and to sustain a long and measured flight therein. You have at your absolute command the difficult but noble measure which will always ring in our ears with the true heroic clang until Dryden and Pope are forgotten. But you cannot do what I wish you to do except upon two conditions : one, devotion of your faculties and of your time to the one great object ; the other, cotton-wooling your ears absolutely to all hand-clapping and greasy mob applause of mercantile lecture-rooms. Discard from your verse every word and every thought that has not the ring of the pure metal. To the morally pure and noble there is no need of my exhorting you. To that you are always instinctively and unerringly true. To the intellectually beautiful and sublime you are equally loyal. I have marked with parallel lines (as Channing used to do our themes) the passages which please me most. You will see that I have marked a very large part of the poem. I have also ventured several criticisms, generally verbal ones, on the margin. Do not be vexed with me if you think them stupid, and reject or accept just as many of them as you think proper. Meantime, I remain, as ever, Sincerely your friend, J. L. M. From Mr. George Bancroft. Newport, R.I., July Uth, 1857. MY DEAR MOTLEY, You can make me but one compensa- tion for having missed your visit in New York. Come down and pass a day, or two days, or three or more as your time may warrant. Come next Friday in the morning train and boat ; you will be here at eleven. On Thursday I may possibly run 202 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. VI. up to hear Mr. Everett, though I doubt. Next week I may go to New York to work, for work here is impossible. Yours of the 9th I received yesterday morning. I shall value very highly, I assure you, the copy of your History from its author. You send it at least to a house where it is valued. Mrs. Bancroft has read every word of Harper's three volumes, and was among the earliest to take her place as one who does full justice to the work ; and, of course, my self love is pleased with this, for you may suppose I have trained her to good judgment on such matters. Indeed there is but one opinion on what you have achieved. My friend Kipley, whose judg- ment in this case was unbiassed by personal friendship or acquaintance, and whose judgment under such circumstances I think the best of any one in New York, has always in private conversation and in public given you the tribute you deserve, and I believe thinks in his heart that you have excelled us all. But come on Friday in the morning train and stay as long as you can, and we will talk of all sorts of things before you put an ocean between us. Ever yours, (TEO. BANCROFT. From Mr. Washington Irving. Sunnyside, July 17th, 1857. MY DEAR SIR, Mr. Cogswell apprises me of his having received at the Astor Library a copy of your work which you have done me the honour to send to his care for me. A short time since on reading the first volume of your History I was so much struck by its merit that I was on the point of writing to you to express my admiration of this great literary achievement and my delight at such a noble accession to our national literature ; but I checked the impulse, lest it should be deemed an intrusive assumption on my part. You may judge therefore how sincerely and deeply I appreciate the proof you give me of your favourable consideration. I am now 1857.] WASHINGTON IRVING. 203 on the third volume of your History, reading it with unflagging interest and increasing deference for its author. The minute and unwearied research, the scrupulous fidelity and impartial justice with which you execute your task, prove to me that you are properly sensible of the high calling of the American press that rising tribunal before which the whole world is to be summoned, its history to be revised and rewritten, and the judgment of past ages to be cancelled or confirmed. I am happy to learn that you are about to return to the field of your labours an ample field it is and the three teeming volumes you have so suddenly laid before the public show how well you know where to put in your sickle. With warmest wishes for your continued success, I am, my dear sir, Most truly your obliged friend and servant, WASHINGTON IRVING. J. L. Motley, Esq. 204 MOTLEY'S LETTEES. [CHAP. VII. CHAPTEE VII. BKUSSELS AT WORK ON ' THE UNITED NETHERLANDS.' Letter to O. W. Holmes Access to the State Paper Office Nice in December Work on the 'History of the United Netherlands' At Brussels and in Holland M. Gachard M. Groen van Prinsterer Keception of the ' Dutch Kepublic' in Holland Dutch Society The Hague Work at the Ar- chives in Brussels And in Paris Visit to the Bismarcks Frankfort. To Dr. 0. W. Holmes. Walton-on-Thames, September 16th, 1857. MY DEAR WENDELL, This is not a letter, not even an apology for one. I only wish to say to you that I intend to write very soon, and that I hope to hear from you as often as you can overcome your avaricious tendencies. I am myself excessively miserly at this moment, for I am almost distraught at the circumlocution and circumvolutions of London. To try to do anything in a hurry here is to " hew down oaks with rushes." Sisyphus with his rock was an idle, loafing individual compared to the martyr who is doomed to work up the pre- cipice of English routine. I have been in London a month, and my rock has just come down upon my toes for the fourth or fifth time. I have not yet got into the State Paper Office, where I expected to have effected my entrance after the first day or two succeeding my arrival. I thought to have done a great deal of work there this time. But the American Minister, and the Minister of Foreign Affairs, and the Minister of the Interior, and the Master of the Rolls (who by the way is not a baker, as Lowell would probably suggest), and various other dignitaries have all to be made aware (in a Pickwickian sense) that an insignificant individual like myself is desirous of reading some musty and forgotten old letters which not one of them could read or would wish to if they could. A friend 1857.] THE STATE PAPER OFFICE. 205 of mine once went into a soda-water shop in Boston on a very hot day, and was told by an elderly individual behind the counter that his son John, proprietor of the establishment, had gone to Portland, but that upon his return he would undoubtedly be very happy to prepare him a glass. This is exactly my case. The Earl of Clarendon is absent with the Queen at Balmoral. Panizzi of the British Museum is in Turin. Dallas is at the Isle of Wight, and others are hiding themselves in other corners or pretending to be absent, even if actually here, because in September it is disreputable to be in London. No moral or religious person therefore would acknowledge himself to be here. When these illustrious per- sonages all get back, they will unite to prepare my glass of soda-water. By that time I shall be in Paris. I have also had time during the last two or three weeks to go over a mass of MS. in the British Museum. Mais ilfaut casser des oeufs pour faire une omelette. Eoutledge tells me that your poems (particularly the Punch- Bowl), are familiar to everybody in England. I have been a recluse till now. We are at present staying at this magni- ficent place, Mount Felix, near Walton-on-Thames, enjoying the princely hospitality of our friends, Kussell Sturgis and his wife. I wish you were here too. Kemember me kindly to Lowell and Agassiz and Felton, Longfellow, Tom Appleton, and all the members of our Club, which I hope you have regularly joined by this time. My wife joins me in warmest remembrances to you and your wife and children. I am provoked that I have been writing all about myself. I shall write to you ere long again, and will not use this horrible paper. Nee tenui penna is a good motto, but Nee tenui charta shall henceforth be mine. Do write me occasionally, if only a single sheet of notepaper, and pardon the detestable stupidity of this. Ever most sincerely your friend, J. L. M. An English admirer of yours, Mr. Synge, attache in Her Majesty's Foreign Office, who is staying in this house and who has heard much in your praise from Thackeray, asks to send you his respects. 206 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. VII. To his Mother. Nice, December 13th, 1857. MY DEAEEST MOTHEK, Mary and Susie were charmed with your letters to them, and with your account of your Eiverdale wedding festivities. I tell them I hope you will celebrate your one hundredth jubilee in the same way and place, although I suppose it is rather a longer prospect than any of us would care to look forward to just at present. As I have never been in the tropics, I cannot get used to this constant flood of warm sun- shine, cloudless and almost oppressive day after day, in what certainly are not generally considered the genial last weeks of the year. We have been here about six weeks, and there have been but two or three cloudy days, and those were warm rainy ones, all the rest as warm and as fine as our best days in early October. Warmer than those, because there is always a lump of ice stirred in at night into the American Indian summer. Here we have had no signs of frost as yet ; green peas are about as cheap as in July in Boston, and red roses are as plenty out of doors at Christmas as red noses are in Winter Street at the same season. The consequence of this satis- factory condition of the atmosphere is that Lily is almost growing fat. She has improved during six weeks more than we had dared to hope, though I am sorry to say her condition is far from being completely satisfactory. She is still languid, and unable to take much exercise, but she can breathe the fresh air and sunshine all day long, by merely opening the window and going out on the balcony. Nice is in itself an insignificant little town, with about 40,000 inhabitants. The chief productions of the place, as the school geography would say, are oil, perfumery, and beggars; the latter article being rather too strong a combination of the two first. It is placed along a crescent-shaped bay, formed by beautifully and boldly outlined mountainous headlands, with a little lighthouse at the tip of each horn, and with a background of high, solid, warm rocks, with orange and olive groves crammed into all the interstices. It unfolds itself to the sunny Mediterranean on the south, and shelters itself under the 1857.] PROGRESS ' THE UNITED NETHERLANDS.' 207 mountains from the north wind. For these reasons it has, perhaps, the best and brightest climate in Italy. Our apart- ment fronts the sea, having as bold a marine view as the Nahant hotel. The murmurs of the tideless ocean upon the shingly beach are never silent under our balcony, the profiles of the mountains which encircle the place are always seen through a golden and purple haze, which is peculiar to Italy, and the windows on the opposite side look over whole acres of orange orchards, just now golden with fruit, and fragrant with blossoms, in addition to which three miles of shirts and chemises can be seen drying any day upon the beach in front, gracefully flutter- ing and displaying their raggedness along the whole sinuosity of the bay. You must not suppose that I am idle. I certainly should not have chosen Nice for a family residence, except on Lily's account. Nevertheless, being here, I can occupy myself for a long time with several hundredweight of books, which I have brought with me, and which I must devour and turn into chyle before I can do much in the way of writing. My time in London was not lost for a single day, and I have now two persons employed there in copying for me, according to my mapping out when personally in the State Paper Office and British Museum. I was also hard at work in the Archives in Paris during the few weeks that we were there. I have, however, much to do in the subterranean way in Brussels, the Hague, London, and Paris. I do not write at all as yet, but am diving deep and staying under very long, but hoping not to come up too dry. My task is a very large and hard one. My canvas is very broad, and the massing and the com- position of the picture will give me more trouble than the more compact one which I have already painted. Then I have not got a grand central heroic figure, like William the Silent, to give unity and flesh and blood interest to the scene. The history will, I fear, be duller and less dramatic than the other. Nevertheless, there are many grand events and striking cha- racters, if I can do justice to them. If I could write half a dozen volumes, with a cheerful confidence that people would read them as easily as I write them, my task would be a com- 208 MOTLEY'S LETTEKS. [CHAP. VII. paratively easy one. But I do not know where all the books are to go that are written now-a-days. And then my pub- lishers have failed, and Heaven knows what may be the condition of the market when I take my next pigs there. In short, I cannot write at all, except by entirely forgetting for the time that there is such a thing as printing and publishing. Nice, I am very much disappointed to say, is very dear, being a kind of watering-place, where the six lean months of winter are made to swallow the six fat ones of summer. If you should stay a year, and get the fat and lean both, the average would be respectably low. To his Wife. Hotel du Rhin, Paris, January 15th, 1858. MY DEAREST MARY, I wrote you a brief n*>te from Mar- seilles just before leaving that place for Paris. I made the journey comfortably enough, getting about as much sleep out of the coupe of the railroad as I usually do out of a bedstead, arrived here about seven o'clock of a dismal sloppy morning, and installed in a garret on the courtyard of the inside house. When I got home I found that old had been looking for me, and wished much to see me before I departed. So I went to the " Hotel du Louvre " and found him. Mrs. was of course on hand, mending her stockings, and the children were bivouacking as usual upon the floor and skirmishing about the room. She informed me that the atmosphere of Nice was very cold and foggy ; which statement was so very like that respecting the Correggio in the Manchester Exhibition that I could only bow meekly in deference to her superior wisdom. Poor seemed more oppressed by her than ever. We got into a corner, and I tried to make him forget his misery. But Mrs. was constantly hovering over us like a vulture, and at last pounced upon him bodily, insisted on discussing the point whether she might go and make her visits in a fiacre with one horse, or whether she ought to have two. She then screwed herself up to asking me to dinner, and looked radiant 1858.] WORK IN BRUSSELS. 209 when I told her I was engaged. I did not tell her I never dined in the dark, and as there is a very brilliant row of gas-lights in the street opposite their windows, I suppose they never indulge in candles. I think I have chronicled small beer enough for you for the present. I leave to-morrow morning at eight for Brussels. I have not yet heard from Van de Weyer, but I have written to him to send his letters to Brussels. I can do nothing here. Kiss my darlings a thousand times. Tell Susie I hope she has begun to miss me a little bit, even in spite of my scoldings. Tell Lily that when she has finished what she is reading, I recommend her to get Sismondi's ' Precis de 1'Histoire de France,' which is very readable and in but three volumes. If it is not in the Library, I think she will be able to buy it at Visconti's ; I should like her also to read Lingard's ' History of England.' He is a Koman Catholic, but honest enough, and at any rate more respectable than Hume. She had better read also Bancroft's ' History of the United States,' and Thierry's ' Conquete de 1'Angleterre.' All these books are in the Library. I wish she would find time, too, to study Italian a little. If she wants a teacher no doubt plenty are to be found at Nice. As for my little Saint Mary, I only wish I had her always with me to take advice and example from. I have none to give her. You see I do not bore you with the Attentat, for I know nothing that is not in the newspapers. I have made no call either upon Guizot or Madame Mohl or anybody. As I am only passing through, it would be nonsense. Ever affectionately yours, J. L. M. To his Father. Brussels, January 24th, 1858. MY DEAR FATHER, Finding my family so well and com- fortably established at Nice for the winter, and Lily's health so much improved as to be no longer a source of anxiety, VOL. I. p 210 MOTLEY'S LETTEKS. [CHAP. VII. I was unwilling to delay any longer making a move towards the land of my labours. Although the books that I took with me would have given me employment for several months at Nice, yet I wanted to set about as soon as possible the work which can only be accomplished here and at the Hague. I came to this place intending to make an effort to see the MS. copies made long ago by order of the Belgian Govern- ment of a very important correspondence of Philip the Second and his Ministers with the governors and other important personages in the Low Countries. This correspondence is in course of publication by Mr. Gachard, Archivist of the King- dom, and an acquaintance of mine. At the rate at which the publication proceeds, however, I shall be dead and buried before it reaches the epoch at which I wish to use it. M. Yan de Weyer, with whom I spent a day and night at his house at Windsor, when I was last in England, promised me to use his best efforts to obtain the permission for me to read the correspondence in MS. We agreed that when I was ready to proceed to Brussels, he should write letters to Mr. Gachard, to the Minister of the Interior, and others, urging my claims, etc. Accordingly the other day before leaving Nice, I wrote to M. Van de Weyer, asking for those friendly offices. I did not reflect, however, that I had stumbled exactly upon the moment of the marriage of the Princess Koyal, when the whole Belgian royal family were on Van de Weyer's hands, and when he could hardly be expected to think of anything else. In consequence of that, I hardly expect to hear from him at all at present ; but as I shall be here again in the summer, I shall have plenty of time to attend to the matter then. Mean- while, as I had come so far, I thought I had better make a slight invasion of Holland, and so a week ago to-day I went to the Hague. My reception there was very cordial. All the newspapers announced my arrival with a good deal of flourish. The two gentlemen whose opinion I most value (as they are themselves leading authorities in all matters of Netherland history), Mr. Groen van Prinsterer, who has the charge of the private or family archives of the House of Orange-Nassau, and who is well known as an author, besides being a promi- 1858.] RECEPTION OF 'DUTCH REPUBLIC' IN HOLLAND. 211 nent member of the States-General, and Mr. Bakhuysen van der Brink, the Archivist-general of the Kingdom, the most learned man and the cleverest writer in the country, both spoke of my work in the strongest terms of approbation. They assured me that almost everybody in Holland had read it, and that there was but one opinion about it, that it had made a very deep and general sensation. A great many things were said to me which it would not be becoming to repeat. The book very soon after its appearance was reprinted at Amster- dam, and has had a large sale, not to the benefit of the author's pocket, however, but I am very glad to have it circulated. The edition is quite a pretty one, and sells for about three- and-a-half dollars. I think that you are already aware that a French translation is preparing under the auspices of the distinguished Mr. Guizot. I had a kind invitation to visit him in a few days when I return to Paris, and I suppose the translation will appear before long, but have no recent news on the subject. The whole work has also been translated into German, and has been published at Leipzig and Dresden. I have not yet seen the translation, but I mean to get a copy in Paris. But the most satisfactory thing on the whole to me is that a translation into Dutch is now appearing (published in numbers), under the superintendence of Mr. Bakhuysen, of whom I have already spoken. He has written a preface, and adds a good many notes and comments. The book is very handsomely printed, and I regard its publication as a very satisfactory testimonial to the permanent value of the work. I think it is something better than vanity which causes me to take an honest pleasure in finding my labours appreciated and commended by the persons most fit to sit in judgment upon them. I own that I should have been deeply mortified on arriving in Holland to find that nobody had heard of my book. Yet previously to last week I had no reason to suppose that it had obtained any currency. Nobody had ever told me of the translations and republications, so that I was quite taken by surprise at finding myself so well-known here. The best results of these favourable views regarding my work is the p 2 212 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. VII. facility which it gives me for the one with which I am at present occupied. Mr. Groen and Mr. Bakhuysen both take the greatest pleasure in aiding my researches in every possible way, and a great mass of unpublished documents will be laid before me when I come back in June. I shall doubtless find letters to-morrow at my bankers here. Lily, thank God, is so much better that we are no longer anxious about her. Mary and the other two children are very well. There was never anything like the atmosphere of Nice. We came to that place in the first week in November, and till the 12th of January, when I left, there had been but three days when there had not been cloudless sunshine and balmy airs. The windows of our apartment were open all day long, and sometimes it was even necessary to shut the green blinds just as if it were mid-summer instead of mid-winter. Here in the Netherlands we have generally lowering and rainy skies, and great-coats and fires are indispensable. Still there is neither frost nor snow, nothing like winter as we understand the word in America. Give my love to my dear mother. I do hope and trust that she will send me with her own hand a better account of herself. In order to gain time and to lighten my labours, I have already engaged a very competent person to make certain pre- liminary researches and copies during all the time I am absent from the Hague. I expect on my return thither in June to find a considerable progress made. The same is doing for me in the State Paper Office and the British Museum of London. Alas ! I am not making much money by such operations ; but I believe in the long run that even in a pecuniary point of view I am doing right to make thorough work. It will be impos- sible for anybody to deny a permanent value to labours which have been conscientiously carried out, and have obtained the unqualified approbation of those most competent to pronounce upon them. When my two works are both finished, I cannot help -thinking that they will have a considerable value even in the money market. But at the same time it is impossible for me to do anything at all unless I discard all such ideas from my mind when I am writing. The moment a man begins 1858.] THE HAGUE. 213 to write for money, it is apt to be all over with his true repu- tation. Meantime, with my love to all both great and small at home, I am Affectionately your son, J. L. M. To his Wife. Brussels, January 24th, 1858. I have been working pretty hard in the short time I was at the Hague, and I feel that I have made a good deal of pro- gress. I should have stayed a little longer, but for a reason which seems a ridiculous one enough to state, but you know me well enough to acquit me of affectation I could hardly have remained longer without going to see the Queen. Our old friend, Count Louis Bylandt, told me she was the first person to speak to him of my book, telling him that he must read it, and using very complimentary language on the subject. He told me that I ought to send to Count Kandwyk (from whom, by the way, you remember that I received a very civil message through Sir Charles Lyell), and be presented to her at once, that she would be much pleased to see me, etc., etc., and that he should tell her that I was in the Hague as soon as he saw her, that her small tea-parties are extremely agreeable. There is also a great ball at the English Am- bassador's, and Count Bylandt wanted to send word to him that I was there, saying that he had had a great deal to say to him about me, and would at once send me an invitation. The Groen van Prinsterers were also very urgent that I should go into society, telling me that I should find that everybody was acquainted with me already. Under these circumstances, finding that I should be obliged to abandon my beloved solitude, you will think it very natural that I should decamp. If I had been twenty-three instead of forty- three I daresay it would have been very jolly to go to the Queen's tea-parties and get a few sugar-plums, but my 214 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. VII. appetite for such diet is gone. I enjoyed my twilight walks under the leafless branches of the magnificent oaks and beeches of the great wood, musing and moralising like the melancholy Jacques in the forest of Arden, and once I took a long stroll on the sands at Scheveningen. The winter sky was wild and lowering, and for miles seaward the waves of the stormy North Sea were rolling in vast sheets of foam over the breakers. It was a grand and gloomy Kuysdael, a good counterpart to the golden Claudes which you have daily from your windows at Nice. I had not much time to enjoy the " rapture of the lonely shore," but I remain of the opinion that the Hague is in winter the prettiest town in Europe. It is so clean, and orderly, and elegant, and so embowered in foliage. I could not well have remained longer without making visits, etc. The newspapers, both of the Hague and Eotterdam had announced my arrival with a great flourish of trumpets (for- tunately not till the day before my departure), so upon Saturday morning (day before yesterday) I returned to this place. Count Bylandt has sold the Murillo to Mr. Aspinwall for something less than the price he asked when we were at the Hague ($ 1 6,000), Mr. Aspinwall had also bought the Claudes, and I am glad that one rich American has bought some good pictures as a set off to the Leonardos and Titians of the 's gallery and other similar collections. I am quite disgusted. I have been writing two sheets and a half about myself. But how can I help it ? You will want to know about my visit to the Hague, and it would be a silly affectation not to say what I had to say, and what I suppose will interest you to hear. Nor is it as if I had been talking from the house- tops or in the newspapers. Still if I had any other topic to entertain you with I would do it with pleasure, but I have been completely alone ever since I left Paris, and I dread going back, there where there are such a lot of people. This is Sunday, and I have therefore not been able to get my letters, which I ordered Monroe to send to my bankers here. To-morrow I shall of course have news of you, dear Mary, and 1858.] THE ARCHIVES IN BRUSSELS. 215 of my little darlings. Tell Lily I think she may find the stories of Henri Conscience interesting. I bought two or three to read while travelling, but as they are in Flemish, they would be of little use to anybody else. They have all been translated into French, however, and I suspect you will find them at Visconti's. They are something like Auerbach's stories, generally of the Flemish peasants and artisans, and contain many pleasing quiet Gerard Dow-ish incidents and quiet, gentle unfoldings of sentiments and affection very different from the highly charged romances of the Satanic schools. The moral tone is unexceptionable, but they are perhaps a little flat, too little cayenne for your taste, but still you might fancy them. Has Susie begun to miss me yet? How is her handwriting ? I am in daily expectation of seeing some remarkable result of the method so much approved by Tomkins of London. Has she curled the pere C.'s hair as she proposed? What is my little angel Mary doing? Taking care of everybody but herself, as usual, I suppose. It seems to me as if I had been gone a year, and that nobody would know me if I should walk into the Maison Donaudy. I shall write soon again. Affectionately your own, J. L. M. To his Wife. Brussels, March 2nd, 1858. MY DEAR MARY, I hardly know whether I have written to you within the last few days or not. My days and nights succeed each other and certify each other so monotonously that they seem to be all stuck together in one piece. It is like one long sentence without punctuation, like the inter- minable Spanish despatches which I am reading every day, and which run sometimes for fifty pages without a period or even a comma. I am at the Archives every day before ten, and generally till five, as Gachard, when he stops, invites me into his cabinet after the regular hour of closing, which is 216 MOTLEY'S LETTEKS. [CHAP. VII. three. Then, la nuit tombante, I take a grim crepuscular walk round the shabby little boulevards, after which I go to the reading-room for an hour. At half-past seven I dine alone in the large salle a manger, lighted by one candle, with two waiters looking at me, so that I always feel like Warren in the farce which we saw at the Museum. After this I work till twelve or one o'clock, burning a good deal of midnight spermaceti, which, at the rate charged for it, comes, according to my calculation, to about one whale a month. Thus you see that I have always a pickaxe in hand, and am working my way pretty steadily into the bowels of the land. At the same time I do not see that I have anything amusing to communicate to you. I have a fine opportunity for cultivating my talent for silence, but that does not enable me to be very agreeable in conversation, even by letter. I am attacked by very frequent fits of the a quoi bon disease, and am constantly asking myself why I should condemn myself in this absurd way to travaux forces a perpetuite. Here I go trainant ma boule, and it does not do me any good, or anybody else. I am getting disgusted with the word " history," and yet I go boring on merely because it seems to be my destiny faute de mieux. I went again to see Madame Metivie yesterday, and found her at home, together with the other one. Miss le Strange ; x was there, too, with her father, and was delighted to hear of Lily and Mary, whom she recollects very well, and begged to be kindly remembered. She is quite a pretty, pleasing girl. March 15th. I have pretty nearly finished in Brussels for the present. I have gone through nearly the whole of the Simancas correspondence, twelve hundred letters, many of them sixty pages in length, and after all they are rather a seccatura. I suppose I shall go to Paris by the end of the week. Ever yours, J. L. M. 1 Now Mrs. Waller, who, with her phant, had been fellow-pupils and slater, afterwards Mrs. Laurence Oli- friends of his daughter. ED. 1858.] THE ARCHIVES IN PARIS. 217 To his Daughter. Paris, March 26th, 1858. MY DEAR LITTLE MARY, Your sweet, beautifully-written letter- of February 26th gave me a great deal of pleasure, and I did not intend to have left it so long unanswered. But I am always very hard at work, and besides, I have usually at least a dozen letters on hand, generally to persons I care very little about, which is the most disagreeable labour of all to me. It would be a great pleasure to me to write to you now if I could say anything that would interest or amuse you. My darling child, you have always been a blessing and a conso- lation ever since you were born. I never can express the tenderness and gratitude I feel towards you. Your mamma gives me a much longer period for staying in Paris than I intend to spend here. I am rather tired of work, and not very well. After I have got through a little job at the Archives, which will not take me a great many days, I wish to come and see you all once more. As for Paris, " c'est la mer a loire " in respect of work, and I do not like to look at the Archives or the Library, for they show me how much labour there would be for me if I stayed longer. I have been to see Mrs. Crowninshield, but did not find her, and shall go again to-day. I went to see Mrs. Brooks last evening. She made many kind inquiries after mamma and Lily. I have seen Mrs. Arnory and S , who seem satisfied with their winter's work. Mr. Frank Lowell goes to-day to Italy. Good- bye, my dear little Mary. Give my love to mamma, Lily, and Susie, and believe me, Your affectionate little PAPA. MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. VII. To Us Wife. Frankfort, Monday night, May 3rd, 1858. MY DEAEEST MARY, According to my promise I write you a single line before I go to bed that I may inform you of my safe arrival in this place, notwithstanding the numerous dangers of flood and field which beset the venturer on such unfrequented paths. I slept the first night at Yverdun, an unsophisticated place, where they have not yet learned how much to charge for their indifferent accommodation, an igno- rance which will soon fade before the advancing railroad system. The next day I left by the boat at eight, and crossing the two lakes of Neufchatel and Brienne, took the rail at 6 A.M. There is a tunnel eight minutes long on this road, which had just been opened the day before yesterday. From Bale to Frankfort I came to-day, and reached this place at half-past four. After dinner I went to the Bismarcks, and received as affectionate a welcome from them both as I knew I should, and like them if possible better than ever. Keyserling and Wanda were there, and are staying at this hotel. His wife died in Venice in March, after much suffering. Behr, his brother-in-law, is also here, but goes to Curland to-morrow. I suppose I shall stay through the week. The Bismarcks, however, are in great confusion, as they are exactly in all the agonies of changing their residence. The house which they have inhabited for the last six years they have been obliged to give up to the owner thereof, who has just inherited seven million guldens, and is disposed to go into his house on the strength of it. They are therefore just now sitting on two stools, and as comfortable as people generally are in such a position. May 4th. I wrote you a short note the night of my arrival. Since then the Bismarcks have got pretty well established in their new house. I have dined there every day, and spent most of my time with them. They are entirely unchanged, frank, cordial, and affectionate as ever, both of them. Their new house has a large garden, as large as Eichlers' in Dresden, 1858.] FRANKFORT. 219 with a magnificent view into the country, and the Taunus Mountains. I shall leave to-morrow for Cologne, and the next day go to Calais, and the third to London. I am urged to stay, but I must get to work or I shall get rusted irre- vocably, and as so considerable a part of our revenue has to come out of the inkstand, I have not much time to lose. The weather is horrible cold, windy, and dusty, with occa- sional snow squalls by way of variety. The genial month of May is always atrocious anywhere on this side the Alps. It makes me shiver to think of the dismal voyage down the Khine, and across the Channel, where there is no keeping tolerably comfortable, except by going down into those diabolical cabins, where perpetual eating is being perpetrated by the ever-hungry Germans. I am sorry that the weather is still so disagreeable with you. I feel very anxious about you all but, as you say, I can always be with you very soon in case of necessity. Do keep well yourself, dear Mary, and keep my darlings well also. I am very glad to hear my sweet little Mary is well again. Believe me always Most affectionately yours, J. L. M. 220 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. VIII. CHAPTER VIII. LONDON SOCIETY. Madame do Bismarck Journey down the Rhine And to London Letter to O. W . Holmes Literary despondency The * Autocrat of the Breakfast Table ' Stale metaphors Thackeray's praise of the * Autocrat ' London Society The Cosmopolitan William Stirling Monckton Milnes A. H. Layard The State Paper Office Dinner at the Mackintoshes W. M. Thackeray Lord Carlisle The Athenaeum The Derby The Opera Alboni Piccolomini Lord and Lady Lyndhurst Mr. Henry Reeve Chiswick House Sir 0. Lyell Lady Byron Dinner at Thackeray's Lord Macaulay Clubs The Guild of Authors Dean Milman England's " delicious women of sixty " Thackeray's lecture at Lady Stanley's Mrs. Norton A dinner with Mr. Peabody " The Leviathan " Lady Stanley The Duchess of Somerset Breakfast party at Wimbledon Park Lord John Russell English politics The " Derby-Dizzies " Disraeli's speech at Slough The grandmothers of England Marquis of Lansdowne Dinner at Lady Airlie's Henry Hallam The Charity children in St. Paul's The Chapter Coffee House The Temple Church Dinner with Lord Palmerston Lord Clarendon Baron Brunnow Abraham Hay ward Sir R. Murchison Lady William Russell A Richmond dinner Lord Brougham and Lord Lyndhurst Lord Stratford de Redclifie The House of Commons Dinner at Lansdowne House Mrs. Norton's description of Disraeli Lord Goderich Lord Brougham on the Slave Trade Breakfast and dinner parties Madame Mohl House of Lords Debate on Cuba. To Ms Wife. London, May 13th, 1858. I reached this place this morning, Tuesday. I was just ready to start from the " Hotel d'Angleterre at Frankfort," at about 9 A.M. My luggage was all packed into a fiacre, and I was just getting into that vehicle myself, when Madame de Bismarck made her appearance, and as I was bidding her good-bye, she insisted upon it that I should not go that my room was quite ready at their house, and that I must proceed there instead of to the railroad. While I was expostulating, she gave a sudden nod to the 1858.] LONDON SOCIETY. 221 cocker of my fiacre, and before I could stop him he was on his way to her house with my trunks. She then whisked me off in her carriage to the embarcadere to see Keyserling and Wanda, who were taking their departure in another direction. After we had seen them safely started, we proceeded to her house. ... I was, however, considerably indisposed, and did not care about being invalided in their house. I remonstrated so earnestly therefore, that she agreed to let me go to the Bureau to make inquiries. I only mention this incident to you to show the perfectly frank and cordial way in which they treat me, and would treat you if you had accompanied me. She is so kind-hearted, amiable, and jolly. She is very desirous that you should spend a winter at Frankfort, and wishes to bring Lily out. Bismarck is unchanged to me ; his wife says he seems twenty years younger when I am there, which is the real reason why she likes my society so much. She is devotedly attached to him and he to her. It seems ridiculous to me that any one should be enlivened by my company, but this is a very good reason. His time is so much occupied with that most tedious of all seccaturas the politics of the German Confederation, that it is no wonder when a middle-aged gentleman is transformed temporarily into a stripling of eighteen, with deportment conformable, his family are satisfied. I make these remarks exclusively that you may not suppose that it is my important individuality which makes my presence agreeable to them, but that I am important only as her husband's friend. . . . I came accordingly, as above remarked, to Cologne on Tuesday. The day was a fine one the only fine one for many days, and the voyage down the river was not so tedious as I had anticipated. I enjoyed not so much the ruins and the river as I did looking at the spot where we were together so long ago. The " Hotel du Lis " at St. Goar, where the waiter threw down the dishes to look at the steamboat, the old " chatee " at Braubach, and the house at Konigswinter, from whence dear little Mary's letter of " We are now at Khine " was composed were all visible before the mists settled down upon the landscape, and made it dimmer than the memory of it, which is still so fresh. It was ten in the evening when 222 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. VIII. we got to Cologne, and on the following morning at eight I was on my way in a pelting rain to Ostend. The weather, however, very civilly cleared up at sunset. I decided to cross from Ostend because it saved nine hours of rail, and only gave three and a half hours more of boat. The sea also was not very rough, and I had no sea sickness, but, as you may suppose, was rather bored. I reached Dover at one in the morning, slept there, and took the eight o'clock train for London. I had the pleasure of getting your kind, affectionate letter on my arrival. To Dr. 0. W. Holmes. London, May IQth, 1858. MY DEAR WENDELL, Your most agreeable and affectionate letter ought not to have remained so long unanswered. That such has been the case is not the fault of my heart, but my head. You, whose reservoir is always filled from the perennial fountains thousands of feet above the heads of nous autres, so that you have only to turn the plug to get a perpendicular jet straight into the clouds, must have compassion on those condemned to the forcing-pump. I do not mean, God forbid, that I have not written because I despaired of being witty or amusing. Certainly I do not look upon a friendship such as ours as requiring any demonstrations beyond those of sincerity and steadfastness. At the same time, I have got of late to be affected " but why I know not," as Hamlet says with such a constant and chronic blue devilry, that I am ashamed to write to any one. Unfortunately, the disease with me takes the form of pure and unmitigated stupidity, so that it is not in the least interesting or romantic. You do not know what it is to re-echo daily poor Sir Andrew Aguecheek's pathetic complaint, " Sometimes I have no more wit than a Christian or an ordinary man." All this is intended, not as an apology for my silence, but an explanation thereof. I have been doing my best. I bought six months ago a memorandum- book, as big as a ledger, to take notes of my own conversation, in the manner recommended by the original autocrat who 1858.] LONDON. 223 reigned over us, consule Planco, and I have been patiently hoping to catch myself saying or even thinking a good thing, in which case down it would have gone in black and white for your benefit. In vain I have placed myself in the attitude of Sterne's portraits, with my forefinger on the bump of ideality, in which attitude, he says, he verily believes he has often intercepted ideas which were intended for somebody else's brain. It is all no go. By the way, your letter had various adventures before reaching me. I was then in Brussels. My address was, and always is, Baring Brothers and Co., London. You had the original conception of addressing me to the care of Brown Brothers and Co., London. Now it is rather a remarkable fact, that although there are several persons rejoicing in that name in London, the only Browns who have anything fraternal about them in the whole town are some chairmakers in Picca- dilly. They declined receiving your letter, and then it some- how went back to Liverpool. Some weeks later I heard from home that you had sent the letter, and I wrote to Russell Sturgis (of the Barings) to help me if possible to it. He very kindly wrote to the General Post Office, and also to Brown, Shipley and Co., Liverpool, and eventually the letter was ex- tricated and sent to me, covered all over with very funny hiero- glyphics illustrating its various adventures. I might have used this as an excuse for my delay in answering, had I not preferred making a confession rather than an apology. Your letters, fortunately, are not like eggs, telegrams, and things of that nature, good for nothing except fresh, and therefore I enjoyed it the more in consequence of the difficulty in getting it. I was much obliged for your kindness in mentioning the favour- able opinion concerning me expressed by Mr. Dorsheimer, and the fact gave me great pleasure. I regret to say that I have seen of the Atlantic Magazine only the first two numbers. The reason for this is that I have been for the last six months, with hardly an interval, in very out-of-the-way and obscure places, where light never comes that comes at all. Nice at first, and Brussels afterwards. I took my family in November to the former place on account of Lily, whose 224 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. VIII. health was very delicate, but I rejoice to say she has very much improved, and after establishing them there, I departed to spend the most solitary winter I ever spent in my life in Brussels. I was all day in the Archives, and nearly all night in my chamber. I hardly ever spoke except to exchange a few brief signals with my fellow worms, who were feeding like myself on the carcase of the buried centuries, and the con- sequences of such a solitary and Ghoul-like existence, was to subdue my nature to the condition of the carrion I had been consuming. I find your ' Autocrat ' (the first two numbers of which, as stated, are all I have yet seen) as fresh and poignant in flavour as those of twenty years since, which is sufficiently high praise as to manner. As to matter, the substance is unquestionably stronger, sterner stuff than in those days, and will endure long. You must always have an eye to their subsequent appearance in volumes by themselves, when of course you can leave out what you think of transitory interest, and give them the last polish. I have but just arrived in London, but as this is Sunday and I shall be immersed in hard work from to-morrow forward, in the State Paper Office and British Museum, I thought I had better sit down and have a little talk with you when I was sure of perfect solitude. To-morrow I shall get all the numbers of the Atlantic and devour with immense greedi- ness first the ' Autocrats,' and then Lowell and Emerson and Longfellow and others, as doubtless I shall know them all by the " twinkling of their eyes." If I meet any literary men, I shall not fail to call their attention to it, as unquestionably the best magazine in the language. I hope when I next write I may have something amusing to tell you. As I said before, I have but just arrived. A young friend of mine who is in Parliament is going to take me to his club to-night, where I hope to hear not logic chopped but politics discussed, as they are at the very culminating point of a crisis ; the debate of Friday having been adjourned over till to-morrow. A propos of the Atlantic, not the magazine, but the ocean, I happened to find this paragraph the other day in the commencement of articles on some subject, I forget what, in 1858.] STALE METAPHORS. 225 the Allgemeine Zeitung, and since you have become a German scholar, I hope you will laugh at it as heartily as I did. " Seit der Entdeckung Amerika's ist die Geschichte nicht mehr thalassisch sondern oceanisch." I could read no more of the article. I was already washed out of existence by such a world of water. I suppose you sometimes are glad of a suggestion or two of topics for your ukases at the breakfast table. I think you might handle the subject of stale meta- phors for a page or two with much effect. Take for example the ship of state from the time of Horace's " navis referent in mare," etc., down to the last speech of the member for Milwaukie, there has perhaps never been an oration delivered, or a poem perpetrated, without some reference to that unlucky ship of state, which always will be getting on breakers, and to the pilot who always will be weathering the storm as freshly as if no such allusion had ever been made" . The best of it is the satisfaction with which these metaphors are produced as if perfectly fresh and choice, and the conscientious manner in which they are polished up for exhibition. Then there is the deadly upas tree, which has so long poisoned everybody's young existence, the phoanix, the dying dolphin, and many such fools and fishes, and do say something about that un- pleasant Spartan boy, who has been following us about, with the fox biting away his nether integuments from time immortal. Then you may write an imaginary puff on some body's hair dye, or still better get some living barber to pay you handsomely for it by merely changing a few words in Goldsmith's " when lovely woman stoops to folly," ending of course with " is to dye." There, I consider I have given you at least $20, for if you cannot beat those golden thoughts into a platitude of two magazine pages, you are not the gold-beater I took you for. Pray take all the credit and all the money yourself. I do not ask a commission. Do not say, " An eminent historian, now running to seed in a foreign land, has sug- gested the following very brilliant, and at the same time profound thoughts." If you should ever hint at my existence again in the magazine, I will never forgive you. I prefer VOL. I. Q 226 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. VIII. to rest upon the verses in the first number, of which both for the affection, and the generous over-appreciation re- vealed, I shall be proud all the days of my life, and my children after me, and I do not wish anything to disturb that impression. I have been running on with a most intolerable skimble-skamble. I wish I had anything better to say. Pray forgive my dulness, and prove it by writing to me very soon. Give my kindest regards to your wife and children. Also remember me particularly to Lowell, Longfellow, Agassiz, Felton, Whipple, and others who may remember me, and believe me always, Most sincerely your friend, J. L. M. P.S. This letter was written yesterday, but was not sent. Meantime, last evening, I dined with a small party at the Mackintoshes. Thackeray was there, and suddenly in the middle of dinner he made the following observation, not to me, but to his neighbour on the other side of the table : " Have you read the * Autocrat of the Breakfast Table,' by Holmes, in the new Atlantic Magazine ? " He then went on to observe that no man in England could now write with that charming mixture of wit, pathos, and imagination, that your papers were better by far than anything in their magazines. I expressed my delight at his warm language, and told him I knew you would be pleased to hear that he had thus spoken of you. He said that he had been so much interested, that he had been about to write to you, and I begged him urgently to do so. The opening observation had been made by Thackeray, en- tirely a propos des lottes. Not a word had been said by me, or any one else at table, of the magazine, or of you. After dinner I had a good deal of talk with him about you, and he spoke with much warmth and appreciation of your poems ; he praised particularly the * Last Leaf ' and ' The Punch Bowl.' I cannot help thinking that it will please you to hear this, so I have gone to the expense of a new envelope (price one penny), in order to mention it, my letter having been already sealed and directed before I went to dinner. Always affectionately yours, J. L. M. 1858.] LONDON SOCIETY. 227 To Us Wife. London, May 280k, 1858. MY DEAREST MARY, I wrote to you last Sunday, and according to my promise I am now going to send you a few lines to tell you what I have been about, although it is nothing very wonderful. The place is so large as to be an intolerable nuisance to any one who puts the least value on time, money, or shoe leather. You live in half a dozen towns at once, and pass ever so many hours daily in going from one of them to another. Last Sunday, after writing to you, I went and dined with the Sturgis's, and found them as cordial and agreeable as ever. There was no company except I and S . Late in the evening I went with Arthur Kussell to the Cosmopolitan. This is not a club house, but only a club which meets late in the evenings twice a week, Sundays and Wednesdays, in a large room which is the studio of the painter Phillips, in Charles Street, leading from Berkeley Square. The object seems to be to collect noted people and smoke very bad cigars. This evening I found Mackintosh there, and among other men was Higgins, a gi- gantic individual who writes in the Times under the name of " Jacob Omnium," Layard the Ninevite, Stirling, the author of the ' Cloister Life of Charles V.,' Monckton Milnes, besides various other personages connected with literature and politics. I was introduced to a good many of them, and they all said civil things to me, nothing worth repeating to you, or in fact which I remember. It is not considered good taste here, as you know, to throw a man's writings very hard in his face. The formula is, " We know you very well in England," " Your name is very familiar to us," " Your fame has preceded you," or words to that effect. It is however a convenience to observe that one's name is more or less known, whether they have read a word of you or not, because, as Tristram Shandy observes, a man is always puzzled if asked to say who he is. I liked Stirling, with whom I had a long talk. He is mild, amiable, bald-headed, scholarlike, a Member of Parliament Q 2 228 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. VIII. and a man of fortune. He is at present engaged, he told me, in a work upon Don John of Austria. He is a great friend of Prescott's, but we both agreed that his Philip was alto- gether too mild and flattered a portraiture of that odious personage. Milnes is a good speaker in Parliament, a good writer of poems, which have been praised by critics who have roosted on his mahogany tree, a man of fashion, and altogether a swell of the first class. Layard is short, square, hirsute and taurine of aspect, as befits the Nineveh bull, but he is the bull without the wings. Not that he is slow in reality, for the world knows well enough the indomitable energy and rapid intelligence of the man. Moreover he has rushed all over India in an impromptu manner and incredibly short time, for the sake of investigating matters there and tossing the Ministers with his horns when he returns, and he is now delivering lectures upon the subject. He told me that he came from Alexandria with a countryman of mine, Mr. Sturgis. This is a brother of Russell, who has just arrived (yesterday) in Southampton. Monday I passed at the State Paper Office, and I made my first dive this season into the dead sea, in which I have so long laved my youthful limbs. I find my secretary (I have three secretaries for foreign affairs, you know one resident at Her Majesty's State Paper Office, one established at the British Museum, and one in the King- dom of Holland ; and when the salaries of all three are paid, the balance for the Home Department will be somewhat diminished) I find, I say, my secretary quite satisfactory ; he is intelligent and writes a good hand. The price paid is 4cZ. for what is called a folio, which is seventy-two words. This makes exactly nine words for one cent, which is the highest price paid for copying anywhere. I have just consoled myself by writing out a page of the Atlantic Magazine in folios, and I find that to copy that amount would be worth about eighty cents. Therefore, if I am forced to penny-a-lining, I can get about thirteen times as much for writing a page as for copying one. There is an enormous lot of documents both in the S. P. O. and the British Museum ; but I shall soon begin to see land. However, I will not bore you with these details, which are 1858.] W. M. THACKERAY. 229 about as interesting to an outsider as it is to look at the paddies digging the cellar, the cartloads of bricks, and the great puddles of mortar out of which somebody or other is going to build a house. When it is finished, and you can walk in at the front door, and the hod-carriers and carpenters have all vanished, it is time enough for your friends and the public. In the evening I dined at Mackintosh's. The party con- sisted of the Sturgis's, a Mrs. , of whom I know nothing, except that Thackeray kept saying, as I learned afterwards, all dinner-time to Sturgis, " I hate that woman ! " why she was so odious I have not yet been informed, as she seemed as harm- less as a dove if not as wise as a serpent. The others were Thackeray, Lord Carlisle, and myself. I believe you have never seen Thackeray. He has the appearance of a colossal infant, smooth, white, shiny ringlety hair, flaxen, alas, with advancing years, a roundish face, with a little dab of a nose upon which it is a perpetual wonder how he keeps his spectacles, a sweet but rather piping voice, with something of the childish treble about it, and a very tall, slightly stooping figure such are the characteristics of the great " snob " of England. His manner is like that of everybody else in England nothing original, all planed down into perfect uniformity with that of his fellow-creatures. There was not much more distinction in his talk than in his white choker or black coat and waistcoat. As you like detail, however, I shall endeavour to Boswellise him a little, but it is very hard work. Something was said of Carlyle the author. Thackeray said, " Carlyle hates everybody that has arrived if they are on the road, he may perhaps treat them civilly." Mackintosh praised the description in the * French Kevolution ' of the flight of the King and Queen (which is certainly one of the most living pictures ever painted with ink), and Thackeray agreed with him, and spoke of the passages very heartily. Of the Cosmo- politan Club, Thackeray said, " Everybody is or is supposed to be a celebrity ; nobody ever says anything worth hearing ; and every one goes there with his white choker at midnight, to appear as if he had just been dining with the aristocracy. I have no doubt," he added, " that half of us put on the white 230 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. VIU. cravat after a solitary dinner at home or at our club, and so go down among the Cosmopolitans." I have strung these things together, not with the idea that the observations are worth sending (except for peculiar reasons, the last one), but because in your solitude I think that both you and Lily may be as easily amused as the friends of Mr. Peter Magnus were. This is what mainly occupies me when I go out ; the thought that perhaps I may suck out something out of the somewhat flat and gravelly soil of London society, which may flower into a letter for your gratification, is about the only one which gives me much satisfaction. Therefore I beg you to find the bouquets very fragrant and very brilliant, although they are in truth about as rare as dandelions. Thackeray invited me to dine next Sunday (that is to-day), and he went off very soon, as he confessed, to work at the ' Virginians.' Lord Carlisle was excessively civil to me. I think you have seen him, although I never did. He is tall, awkwardly heavy featured, but much better looking now than as a young man. His hair is snow white, parted over a pro- digious bump of benevolence. He has been Lord Lieutenant of Ireland for the last three years, having just gone out with the advent of the Derby Administration. He begged me to give him my address, saying that he was at present absent from town, but hoped to have the pleasure of cultivating my acquaintance on his return. On Tuesday I worked at the State Paper Office. After my return, Sir Charles Lyell called on me, and sat a good while. He is the eminent geologist, you know, and has been often in America. He was very agree- able, and as Mackintosh came in while he was there, who knows him very well, we got on comfortably. By the way, they have had me admitted to the Athenaeum Club during my stay in London. This is a fine building on the corner of Pall Mall and lower Kegent Street, and you get all the papers and journals, and have the run of a library of thirty thousand volumes, and can breakfast or lunch and dine there, very well, and at a cheaper rate than at any hotel. In the evening I dined again at the Sturgis's. There was a large party of 1858.] THE DEKBY. 231 Americans. Afterwards I went very late to a small party at Mrs. Warre's. It was a kind of bridal party, and there was a great lot of very pretty girls in bridesmaid costumes. I was introduced to about twenty-five of them. But I am unable to inform you of the name of one of them. The party was about breaking up when I arrived. Froude (whose wife, you know, is Mrs. Warre's sister) is not in town, and I am sorry to say has got an alarming affection of the eyes. I am going to write to him to beg him to come up while I am here. Wednesday morning Mackintosh came to my quarters again. I never saw such a fellow it seems as if he could not do enough for me. He is half the time apparently in a brown study and oblivious of your existence, when he suddenly wakes up and you find he has been turning over in his mind what he can do to oblige you. I hardly knew him in America, never met him but once or twice, and that a hundred years ago, so 1 never knew what a good fellow he is, full of humour and a great deal of talent and character. Well, he came down to persuade me to go down to the Derby that day. This, you know, is the most famous race in England or the world. The Derby stake is the prize for which once a year the best trained three-year-olds in the country contend, and the horse who wins it is for ever famous, is worth no end of money, and puts fabulous amounts of it into the pocket of his owner. The races are on the Epsom downs, about fifteen miles from London, and the Derby day is the one holiday which is religiously kept by every one great and small, from peers to pickpockets, throughout London and its neighbourhood. No better proof of its precedence over all other sublunary affairs could be given than by the spectacle which was presented by the House of Commons adjourning over two days on account of the Derby, in the very midst of a Ministerial crisis and of an unfinished debate, the result of which was to determine whether the Government should be overthrown, and if over- thrown, whether it would dissolve Parliament. The funniest thing was that the leading favourite for the race was Lord Derby's horse, Toxophilite, and it was very generally believed 232 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. VIII. that the Premier was much more anxious to win the " Derby," which Dizzy long ago termed "the blue riband" of the turf, than to keep his post at the head of the Empire. I shall not bore you with a description of the race. We had a very good position, and saw it very well. The scene was sufficiently amusing the horses for the Derby Cup all ran so close that you might have covered them with a handkerchief, and it was only by the signal at the winning post that the spectators could be sure that Beadsman had won, and that Toxophilite was done, coming in only second ; but I was told that the owner of Beadsman, Sir Joseph Hawley, pocketed 30,000 as the result of that race. We came up to town and went to the Opera together. I did not care much to go particularly, as the price of a stall is only one guinea, but I did not like to refuse, and was willing enough to see the opera-house, which I had never seen. The opera was the i Barber,' and it was very mysterious to know where and how Alboni as Kosina had been able to bestow her mountainous masses of flesh within the bodice and the vest of the costume oblige of the young maiden of Seville. She did not look exactly monstrous, and she sang mag- nificently. There was afterwards an act of the 'Fille du Kegiment,' Piccolomini as the heroine. She is pretty, petite, piquante, and with most exquisite hands and arms, vindicates her rights to the illustrious name she bears. She is rather too fond of looking captivating and winning, and grinning in front of the foot-lights, and her style is altogether, I should say, petit genre. After the Opera we went to the Cosmo- politans, it being Wednesday night. There I had some talk with Layard, Thackeray, Milnes, and also with Kingsley, who seems to have a stuttering way with him which one would think would interfere with that eloquence of preaching for which he is celebrated. He is tall, rather thin, with common- place features, neither handsome nor the reverse, but seems a good fellow, and entirely unparsonical. He had not heard of Froude's attack of ophthalmia, or whatever it may be, as he is only passing through town. Another young man of some eminence was introduced to me Lord Goderich, a rising 1858.] LORD AND LADY LYNDHURST. 233 member of the House of Commons, who made the night before last a very neat and telling speech against the Government. He was very civil to me, and paid me some very handsome compliments on the D. E. On Thursday, according to express and very urgent invi- tation, I went with Mrs. Amory and S to call at the Lyndhursts'. As soon as I got into the room Lady L. opened upon me such a torrent of civilities that I was nearly washed away. I certainly should not repeat, even to you, and even if I remembered it, the particular phraseology. Once for all, too, let me say that I only mention such things as these in conformity to your urgent request. I would no more write such things to any one else, even to my mother, than I would go and stand on my head in the middle of Pall Mall. I feel like a donkey, and am even now blushing unseen, like a peony or any other delicate flower, at the very idea of writing such trash, and I beg that you will thrust my letter into the fire at once. Moreover, I assure you, with perfect honesty, that if you had not been so very desirous that I should put my head a little while out of my shell, I should certainly keep it in and pass all my time at work, which, by the way, is getting these few days past somewhat behindhand. She then took me in and presented me to Lord Lyndhurst. I liked him very much. Although he is eighty-six years of age, his intellect is un- dimmed. He has almost lost the use of his legs, and is wheeled about in a chair ; but he goes down to the House every day, and he occasionally makes a speech, which is neater, more concise, and more elegant than any that are delivered there. He must have been very handsome, with a decided resemblance to his sister, Mrs. Greene. He wears a brown wig; has regular features; is not very unlike Mr. Otis 1 in appearance. His manner is very gentle and winning. He said some very kind things to me about my book, and talked very agreeably on other topics. They urged me to dine there that day, but I was engaged at Mr. Keeve's. Keeve, you know, is the editor of the Edinburgh Review a good-humoured, tall, large Englishman ; Mrs. Keeve is intelligent and literary. There were one or two 1 Harrison Gray Otis. 234 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. VIII. Members of Parliament present, but none known to fame, unless Mr. Lowe l be an exception. Friday I made a call at the Kussells'. Lady William Kussell, a high-bred dame, among other things, informed me that she was very intimate with the Queen of Holland, and that she wished to give me a letter of introduction to her. I dined this day at the Mackintoshes, with the Amorys, two Englishmen Mr. Dar- win and Mr. Phillips and Felton, who has suddenly turned up here on his way to Greece. Saturday I went down with Felton by rail to Chiswick House to lunch, by invitation, with Lord Carlisle. He is going, I believe, into Yorkshire for some days ; but as Felton was only passing through London, he was desirous that we should make a brief visit to Chiswick. This is a very beautiful Italian villa, with fine grounds, trees, gardens, and conserva- tories, which was lately bequeathed to Lord Carlisle's mother by her brother, the Duke of Devonshire. There was no company there; but we passed a few hours very agreeably, looking at the house and grounds, and talking wisdom. Lord C. is excessively amiable and friendly, and says he wishes when he returns to London to cultivate my acquaint- ance, which he is at liberty to do if he chooses ; but as I again repeat to you, if it were not for your particular request, I would go nowhere, for my time is frittered away into nothing. By the way, I dined by myself at the Athenaeum Club, and rather enjoyed my own company. Sunday, I lunched with Sir Charles Lyell, who invited me and W. Greenough of Boston, who brought him a letter, I believe, to the Zoological Gardens. I have done my duty to that eminent institution, and although when one has plenty of leisure no better morning lounge could be found, yet as I have, unhappily, no turn for zoology, and more work to do than I could accomplish if every day had forty-eight hours, I could have dispensed with the beasts on this occasion. I was glad, however, to improve my acquaintance with the Lyells. He is a most distinguished man of science, and very companionable; and she is an 1 Lord Sherbrooke. 1858.] LADY BYRON, THACKERAY, ETC. 235 extremely pleasing and just ceasing to be a very pretty woman. Afterwards, I went to call at Lady Byron's, who is living at her house near Primrose Hill, in Kegent's Park. She is still very delicate in health, but has got through the winter tolerably well. She is as kind and earnest as ever, and seemed very glad to see me. I was much pleased to hear that the Noels were in town for a few days, although they had at that moment gone out. In the evening I dined at Thackeray's. There were fifteen or sixteen people. I do not know any of their names. I sat between Thackeray's two daughters. They are both intelligent and agreeable. The youngest told me she liked * Esmond ' better than any of her father's books. Thackeray, by the way, evidently considers that kind of thing his forte. He told me that he hated the * Book of Snobs,' and could not read a word of it. ' The Virginians,' he said, was devilish stupid, but at the same time most admirable ; but that he intended to write a novel of the time of Henry V., which would be his capo a" opera, in which the ancestors of all his present characters, Warringtons, Pendennis's, and the rest should be introduced. It would be a most magnificent per- formance, he said, and nobody would read it. After the ladies had left the house, we went downstairs and smoked cigars till into the small hours. One of the company I discovered to be Blackwood, the present proprietor of Blackivood 's Magazine ; another was the (Secretary of the English Legation at Frank- fort. He knew Bismarck, of course, and said there was no doubt he was the cleverest man in Germany, and that every- body hated him in consequence, and was afraid of him. The Thackerays are to have what they call a " drum " or a tea-fight to-night (Monday). I accepted an invitation to it, but I do not think I shall go, for I am to dine late to-day at Mackintosh's, to meet Lord Carlisle and Milman. This letter, begun yesterday (Sunday), has been concluded to-day (Monday). I shall write again next Sunday. I do not think, dear Mary, you can complain of a scarcity of details in this epistle. I only hope you may not be bored by them. My next will be very different ; for although you may think from this that I am a good deal in society, it is not at all the case, 236 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. VITI. and after a day or two, I shall be entirely alone again, which. I shall only regret on your account, and rejoice for on my own. God bless you, dearest Mary ; kiss my darling children, and believe in the love of Your affectionate J. L. M. To Us Wife. London, May 30th, 1858. MY DEAREST MARY, On Monday I dined with the Mackin- toshes. Macaulay, Dean Milman, and Mr. and Mrs. Farrar composed the party. Of course you would like a photograph of Macaulay, as faithfully as I can give it. He impressed me on the whole agreeably. To me, personally, he spoke cour- teously, respectfully, showed by allusion to the subject in various ways that he was quite aware of my book and its subject, although I doubt whether he had read it. He may have done so, but he manifested no special interest in me. I believe that he is troubled about his health (having a kind of bronchial or asthmatic cough), and that he rarely dines out now-a-days, so that it is perhaps a good deal of a compliment that he came on this occasion on purpose to meet me. His general appearance is singularly commonplace. I cannot describe him better than by saying he has exactly that kind of face and figure which by no possibility would be selected, out of even a very small number of persons, as those of a remarkable personage. He is of the middle height, neither above nor below it. The outline of his face in profile is rather good. The nose, very slightly aquiline, is well cut, and the expression of the mouth and chin agreeable. His hair is thin and silvery, and he looks a good deal older than many men of his years for, if I am not mistaken, he is just as old- as his century, like Cromwell, Balzac, Charles V., and other notorious individuals. Now those two impostors, so far as appearances go, Prescott and Mignet, who are sixty-two, look young enough, in comparison, to be Macaulay's sons. 1858.] LORD MACAULAY. 237 The face, to resume my description, seen in front, is blank, and as it were badly lighted. There is nothing luminous in the eye, nothing impressive in the brow. The forehead is spacious, but it is scooped entirely away in the region where benevolence ought to be, while beyond rise reverence, firm- ness and self-esteem, like Alps on Alps. The under eyelids are so swollen as almost to close the eyes, and it would be quite impossible to tell the colour of those orbs, and equally so, from the neutral tint of his hair and face, to say of what complexion he had originally been. His voice is agreeable, and its intonations delightful, although that is so common a gift with Englishmen as to be almost a national characteristic. As usual, he took up the ribands of the conversation, and kept them in his own hand, driving wherever it suited him. I believe he is thought by many people a bore, and you re- member that Sydney Smith spoke of him as " our Tom, the greatest engine of social oppression in England." I should think he might be to those who wanted to talk also. I can imagine no better fun than to have Carlyle and himself meet accidentally at the same dinner-table with a small company. It would be like two locomotives, each with a long train, coming against each other at express speed. Both, I have no doubt, could be smashed into silence at the first collision. Macaulay, however, is not so dogmatic, or so outrageously absurd as Carlyle often is, neither is he half so grotesque or amusing. His whole manner has the smoothness and polished surface of the man of the world, the politician, and the new peer, spread over the man of letters within. I do not know that I can repeat any of his conversation, for there was nothing to excite very particular attention in its even flow. There was not a touch of Holmes's ever bubbling wit, imagination, enthusiasm, and arabesqueness. It is the perfection of the commonplace, without sparkle or flash, but at the same time always interesting and agreeable. I could listen to him with pleasure for an hour or two every day, and I have no doubt I should thence grow wiser every day, for his brain is full, as hardly any man's ever was, and his way of delivering himself is easy and fluent. 238 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. VIII. At first, in deference to me, there was a good deal of talk about Holland, Maurice of Orange, Olden barne veld, the Archives of the Hague, the State Paper Office, on all which subjects I spoke myself as little as I could, because I wished to hear Macaulay and Milman converse, to both of whom I listened with great pleasure, although neither said anything very new or striking, or which would in the least interest you. Then Macaulay talked of an old acquaintance of his, Basil Montagu, who was a commissioner of bankruptcy, before whom he argued cases when very young, and also an editor of Bacon's works. " Bankruptcy and Bacon," said Macaulay, " were the only things which Montagu cared for in the world." This was the nearest approach to an epigram which he made. Then there was a talk about the clubs, and he said that Burke, when these were first instituted in London, denounced them solemnly as pernicious in their tendency. Having his head full of the Jacobin clubs of Paris, he fore- told the subversion of the English institutions as a conse- quence of such establishments. A club house still existing, said Macaulay, inspired Burke with especial horror. It was set up by some returned East Indians, was called the Oriental Club, and may still be seen, " a gaunt, yellow, bilious, mulli- gatawny-looking building, now in the last stage of decrepi- tude," yet this concern has been considered, by so great a statesman, as brimful of danger to English liberty. Something was said of Bulwer Lytton's project for a guild of authors. Macaulay ridiculed it. Lytton, he said, has constantly wished to interest him in it, but he had been obstinate. Why, he asked, should there be a society, or guild, to support and pension authors who were unsuccessful? It was offering a premium for dulness. If a man wrote a book which nobody would read, why should he be rewarded, there- fore, with a maintenance for life? The most extraordinary part of the scheme, too, was that Lytton had given lands in his own grounds at Knebworth for these destitute literati, so that he was always surrounded, when at home in the country, with a transplanted Grub Street. Moreover, said Macaulay, these people, if they have merit, are very apt to get 1858.] DEAN MILMAN. 239 some place or pension. There is James, for instance ; he has a consulship, has he not ? I do not know how deserving he may be ; I never read but one of his novels. " He never wrote but one," said Mackintosh, in his dry way, which was the best thing said that day at table. Milman I liked very much. I had always been told by Sir Charles Lyell that he had read and approved my book very much, and desired to make my acquaintance, so that I felt quite at ease with him. He is the Dean of St. Paul's (which is the next thing to being a bishop), the author of the ' History of Latin Christianity,' but better known to you as the author of the famous tragedy of * Fazio,' with a good deal more poetry of merit. He is now about sixty-five, or even seventy. He is singularly bent, but not, I think, with age, so as to give, at the first glance, the appearance of extreme decrepitude. This seems, however, purely a local affection, for his manner is bright, and youthful, and genial. He has a long, large, rather regular face, with thick hair, and very black, bushy eyebrows, under which his eyes flash like living coals. Mrs. Milman is a tall, handsome and has been very hand- some woman, very cordial and agreeable in her manner. They invited me to go, Thursday of this week, to a famous anniversary in St. Paul's the singing of the charity children, several thousands in number a ceremony which Thackeray declares in one of his lectures to be the most interesting spectacle which Christianity can furnish, far more impressive than any of the sights and shows of Holy Week at Kome. A ticket of admission into the Dean's pew will give me a very good facility of witnessing the affair. Afterwards the invited guests are to have luncheon at the Deanery. After dinner Macaulay had a pretty severe attack of coughing, and went home early. The Thackerays had a " drum " in the evening, and as the Milmans were going, as well as myself, they kindly gave me a lift in their carriage, I found at the party, of my acquaintance, Mrs. Eeeve, the Synges, Mrs. Sturgis, Eussell and Colonel Hamley. I was also introduced to Mrs. Procter (alias Barry Cornwall). I do not know whether the illustrious Barry was there himself or 240 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CiiAP. VIII. not. Mr. and Mrs. Blackwood, whom I met the day before at dinner, were also of the party, and there was a tremendous screeching lady, who stunned the company with Italian music, with a voice which wanted elbow room as much as it did melody. Thackeray introduced me to Lady Stanley of Alderley, at whose house he is to read the lecture to-morrow of which I told you, I think, in my last letter. She is a tall, fair, agreeable dame, with blonde hair and handsome features, apparently thirty-five, yet one of those wonderful grand- mothers of which England can boast so many, and who make one almost a convert to the " delicious women of sixty." l Not that she is in any proximity to that famous epoch, but she astonished me by suddenly saying that her daughter, the Countess of Airlie, wished very much to make my acquaint- ance, for I had taken the mother for quite a young woman. The daughter, Lady Airlie, is a very pretty woman, with a rosy face. Both of them overwhelmed me with compliments about my book, which, they said, every one of their family had read with delight from beginning to end. Lady Stanley begged me to be sure not to fail to come the next day to the lecture. There were also the two girls, who visit at Walton, of whom you heard Tom Appleton and the Sturgises speak. I was introduced to them, and they seem lively young things enough. The Sturgises brought me home. Next morning I went up to Lady Byron's, to lunch with her and the Noels, and we had a long, quiet talk about Dresden times. They all made very kind inquiries about you and Lily. The Noels left London the same day, but are to return after a week. I believe Lady Byron is rather feeble, -but no worse, I should say, than two years ago. By the way, it will amuse you to hear that Noel told me she had talked a great deal more about that likeness, 2 which 1 Mrs. Harrison Gray Otis said that Europe she had known " delicious while comparatively young women women of sixty." were socially neglected in America, in 2 Mr. Motley's resemblance to Lord Byron. 1858.] THACKERAY'S LECTURE. 241 she speaks of as "most wonderful." At five o'clock I met Thackeray by appointment at the Athenaeum Club, and we went together to Lady Stanley's. The lecture was in the back drawing-room of a very large and elegant house, and the company not more than fifty or sixty in number were all comfortably seated. It was on George III. -one of the set of the four Georges, first delivered in America, and which have often been read in England, but have never been printed. I was much impressed with the quiet, graceful ease with which he read just a few notes above the conversational level but never rising into the declamatory. This light-in- hand manner suits well the delicate, hovering rather than superficial, style of the composition. He skims lightly over the surface of the long epoch, throwing out a sketch here, exhibiting a characteristic trait there, and sprinkling about a few anecdotes, portraits, and historical allusions, running along from grave to gay, from lively to severe, moving and mocking the sensibilities in a breath, in a way which I should say was the perfection of lecturing to high-bred audiences. I suppose his manner, and his stuff also, are somewhat stronger for larger and more heterogeneous assemblies, for I have no doubt he left out a good deal which might jar upon the ears polite of his audience on this occasion. Still, I was somewhat surprised at the coolness with which he showed up the foibles and absurdities of kings, and court, and court folks in a former but not remote reign, before a small company, which consisted of the cream of London cream. They seemed to enjoy it, and to laugh heartily at all the points without wincing. If he had shown up Democracy or Southern chivalry thus before an assemblage of the free and enlightened, he would have been tarred and feathered on the spot. After the lecture was over, I expected to slip away un- noticed, but Lady Stanley came to me, and talked with great kindness, and introduced me to several persons, all of whom said I was no stranger, or words to that effect. One of the persons was the Marchioness of Londonderry, a tall, fair, very handsome woman, apparently young, but having a son, VOL. I. K 242 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. VIII. just of age, by a previous husband, Lord Powerscourt. Then Lady Airlie said to me, Mrs. Norton wishes to make your acquaintance. I turned and bowed, and there she was, looking to-day almost as handsome as she has always been described as being. I know that you will like a sketch. She is rather above middle height. In her shawl and crinoline, of course I could not pronounce upon her figure. Her face is certainly extremely beautiful. The hair is raven black violet black without a thread of silver. The eyes very large, with dark lashes, and black as death ; the nose straight ; the mouth flexible and changing ; with teeth which in them- selves would make the fortune of an ordinary face such is her physiognomy; and when you add to this extraordinary poetic genius, descent from that famous Sheridan who has made talent hereditary in his family, a low, sweet voice and a flattering manner, you can understand how she twisted men's heads off and hearts out, we will not be particular how many years ago. She said to me, as I made my bow on introduction, " Your name is upon every lip." I blushed and looked as much like a donkey as usual when such things are said. Then she added, " It is agreeable, is it not ? " I then had grace enough to reply, " You ought to know if any one ; " and then we talked of other things. There was no time for much con- versation, however. Presently it appeared that a Miss , a young lady belonging, I believe, to the fashionable world, but who rejoices in a talent for the stage, was to recite ; so she recited. It was a passage from ' Phedre ' (I believe). Her accent was very good, and she certainly declaimed very well. Afterwards she recited Tennyson's ' Charge of Balaclava.' As I was going away, Lady Airlie invited me to a dinner for the following Tuesday (which is now the day after to-morrow). Mrs. Norton told me she should be happy to see more of me. A day or two afterwards accordingly I went to call on her. She received me with great kindness, and was very agreeable. She has a ready, rapid way of talking alludes with perfect aplomb to her interminable quarrels with 1858.] MKS. NORTON ME. PEABODY. 243 Mr. Norton. She spoke of her two sons, one of whom is heir to a peerage, and the other to beggary. She showed me a photograph of this second one, who is evidently her darling, and who, by way of improving his prospects in life, married a year ago a peasant girl of the island of Capri. Mrs. Norton does not even think her very handsome, but says that he imagines her perfection, particularly in her fancy costume. She knew Webster when he was here, and admired him very much. She is also very intimate with the Queen of Holland. I do not know that I have much more to chronicle of her conversation. She was always animated and interesting. My impressions of what she must have been were confirmed ; certainly it was a most dangerous, terrible, beautiful face in its prime, and is very handsome still. Her two sisters, the Duchess of Somerset and Lady Dufferin, were equally cele- brated for their beauty, and the latter for her talent also. Mrs. Norton told me that she wished me to dine with her, and to ask some people to meet me, and is to appoint the day very soon. She wishes me particularly to know Lady Dufferin. On Saturday, along with fifty of my compatriots, I was Peabodied. The good old gentleman, according to his wont, had made a razzia among all the Americans now in London, and swept them all off down the river in a small steamboat to see the Leviathan, and afterwards to dine at Blackwall. I was glad of the opportunity, for I am sure that I should never have had energy enough without assistance "to put a hook in the nose of the Leviathan," and I rather wished to see it. The company was of course as miscellaneous and as unin- teresting as might be expected. The Leviathan was visited, and is certainly a most astonishing object. I suspect, however, that the shareholders say with Christopher Sly, " A most ex- cellent piece of work, would it were done," for I believe they are at a standstill for want of funds ; and if it cannot be finished till the sale of tickets to visitors can float it on to fortune, she is likely to remain a torso as many centuries as the Cologne Cathedral, and the one just now looks as likely to make a voyage to Australia as the other. I shall not describe R 2 244 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. VIII. the ship. You have only to imagine a Cunarder doubled, or trebled for aught I know, in all its proportions, and you have the vessel. Nothing is finished of the state rooms or cabins. It is all in a clutter, the engines are not in, and in short you get not a much better idea of it from a visit than from reading a description in the newspapers. The dinner was at the hotel at Blackwall. Mr. Peabody had organised his dinner very well, having arranged the way in which his company should pair off, and having sent the men into the dining-room beforehand to find out where each name, together with that of the partner of his toil, was inscribed. He assigned to me a nice English girl, who knew the Sturgis's, Thackeray, Dickens, and others, who was lively and disposed to make herself gene- rally agreeable, so it was much better than the rather dreary festival which I had anticipated. On my other flank was Mrs. Charles Amory. She and S came into the hotel at the last moment from the country, where they had been staying a few days at Lord Hatherton's with no end of swells, and find everything as rose-coloured as usual. They are very jolly, and desirous of pleasing everybody and being pleased. S promised me faithfully to write immediately to Lily, and I think she will keep her promise. She is a very good girl, frank and unaffected, and very good- humoured. Joshua Fisher and his wife and daughters were also of this party. Hurlbert has turned up here. He was at this dinner. He is staying in the country with Hughes, the author of * Tom Brown's Schooldays,' a book which has had a great run. He informed me that Hughes wished to make my acquaintance very much, that he was about, with other literati, to establish a new review, in the first number of which an article on my book was to appear, etc. I go to a party at Lady Lyell's to-morrow. Tuesday I dine at the Airlies' ; Wednesday, at the Warr'es'. Thursday I go to a luncheon with the Dean of St. Paul's. P.S. Monday, 31s?. I broke off here yesterday, dear Mary, not as my angelic little Mary used to say, because I wished to 1858.] LONDON SOCIETY. 245 add a postscript, but because I had promised to make a call at Lady Stanley's. I went, and had a very pleasant visit. She is an agreeable person, with plenty of talk and fond of literary people and literature. Her youngest daughter 1 was there, and was very glad to speak to me, because she had read every word of the ' Dutch Kepublic,' not from compulsion, but from choice. I said I considered it one of the highest compliments I had received, because if so young a person could read it, I felt that I was not a bore. She said, Oh ! no, it is just like a novel ; and the others said the same. I feel that if old Lord Lyndhurst, who was eighty-six day before yesterday, and a very young girl, can both read three solid volumes without being bored, they cannot be so very heavy, for two such individuals may be considered representative persons. I do not say excuse this egotism, because I write it on purpose to please you. To utter such things to any one else would be the height of absurdity. Lady Stanley, as I went away, asked me if I knew Lady Palmerston. I said " no ;" and she told me she would inform her that I was in town, and would see that I was invited to her next party. Good-bye, dearest Mary. If I have bored you unmercifully, at least you will admit that it is with the best intentions of amusing you. I know you like details, so there are a lot for you. Kiss my dear, dear, darling children a thousand times, and accept the love of Yours most affectionately, J. L. M. To his Wife. London, June 6th, 1858. MY DEAKEST MARY, It is a great pleasure to me to sit down and try to amuse you every Sunday morning with a record of what I see, for I most sincerely assure you that it is almost the only real satisfaction which I derive from this 1 Now Hon. Mrs. George Howard. 246 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. VIII. going up and down like Beelzebub in the world of London. I must retract what I said in my last letter of not being in society. My only difficulty now is in keeping out of it a little, so that I may not entirely neglect my business in the Archives. On Monday evening I went to a small party at Lady Ly ell's. The Amorys were there, and Mackintosh, and the Mrs. - , hated of Thackeray, of whom I spoke to you in my last. Beyond these and Dean Milman and Mrs. Milman, I do not think that there was anybody that I knew by sight, and we came off before 12 o'clock. Just before going to this party I received a very kind note from Lady W. Eussell, of which this is an extract " Lord and Lady Palmerston are anxious to make your acquaintance, and I have taken upon myself the responsibility of venturing a short notice of an invitation to dinner, as they have but that day disengaged and do not like to delay the meeting." The day then proposed by them was Wednesday, and Lady William Kussell was to call for me to take me to Cambridge House. Unluckily, I was engaged to dine at ten days' previous notice with , so of course I was obliged to decline, which was a disappointment to me, because I knew it would be one to you. I had never mentioned the name of the Palmerstons anywhere, nor have I in any case since I have been here gone one inch forward to any one, so that when civilities are offered me, I can at least have the satisfaction of knowing that they are spontaneous, and that if I prove a bore, people have nobody to blame but themselves. Tuesday morning early I received a very nice note from Mrs. Norton, enclosing a card from her sister the Duchess of Somerset, inviting me to a breakfast party at her villa at Wimbledon Park. The breakfast hour was from 1 till 7 P.M. The occasion of the party, as Mrs. Norton informed me, was " the marriage of the second daughter of the Duchess with the brother of the Marquis of Bath, Lord Henry Thynne." As I know you are fond of "high life, with pictures, taste, Shakespeare, and the musical glasses," I thought I would put in this statement. I took the rail accordingly from the 1858.] PARTY AT WIMBLEDON PARK, 247 Waterloo Station at two, and after twenty minutes stopped at Wimbledon, where a fly conveyed me to the Villa. The house is a modern, not very extensive building, placed in the midst of a little garden of Eden, brimful of flowering plants, with a spacious lawn dotted with magnificent cedars of Lebanon, ilexes, and other trees, while a stately park encloses the whole domain. Beyond and from every point there are views of the lovely pastoral scenery of English wood and dale and hill, like which there is nothing in the world, the very perfection of the commonplace. The day was cloudless, and would have been hot for August even in America. You may judge if the English complained of the heat, and whether or not I was satisfied with the temperature. I found Mrs. Norton looking out for me to introduce me to the Duchess of Somerset. This lady was, as you may recollect, the famous " Queen of Beauty " at the Eglinton tournament a good many years ago. Her daughter, Lady Ulrica St. Maur, is a very beautiful girl, closely resembling her mother, and obviously repro- ducing, perhaps in an inferior degree, what the Queen of Beauty of the tournament must have been in the blaze of her beauty. Lady Dufferin I hardly saw, although I was pre- sented to her, for at the same moment the two sons of the house came up to me and began to talk. One of them, apparently about twenty, had just returned from India, where he had been, not with the army exactly, but a kind of spectator or volunteer. He seemed intelligent and very handsome. The other, Lord Edward St. Maur, was a very bright, good- humoured lad of about fourteen. He said he had never tra- velled, but the very first tour he made he was determined should be to America. I then went with Mrs. Norton into the salle a manger, and while we were there, a plain, quiet, smallish individual in a green cutaway coat, large yellow waistcoat, and plaid trousers, came in for some luncheon, and Mrs. Norton instantly presented me to him. It was Lord John Kussell. He was very civil to me, and we talked toge- ther for some time over the drum-stick of a chicken. His face is not the least like the pictures one sees of him. No one would suppose him the man of large intellect and indomitable 248 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. VIII. ambition, which he unquestionably is, by looking at him or hearing him talk in a breakfast room. I do not mean of course that a statesman is always to emulate Burke, of whom Dr. Johnson said a man could not accidentally stop under a shed with him to escape a shower, without discovering that he was in the presence of a great man. There is also something preferable in this easy nonchalant, commonplace manner to the portentous aspect on the commonest occasions of many of the " most remarkable men in our country, sir," which is apt to characterise transatlanticism as much as the customary suit of solemn black " in which they are pleased to array themselves." I can hardly report to you much of Lord John's conver- sation. He talked a good deal of Dizzy's famous speech at Slough. You ask me by the way to give you occasionally a touch of politics. I would gladly do so ; but if I chronicle, what I know you will like better, the little details of persons and things that I purchase with my own pennyworth of obser- vation, I know you will be better satisfied. And I really should not have time to go into what after all you can read a thousand times better in the Times, which I should think you might contrive to get in Vevay. Suffice it that the Derby-Dizzies, after it was thought certain that they would be upset on the Cardwell motion of censure regarding the Ellen- borough despatch business, have got a little fresh rope. The withdrawal of that motion was a denouement expected by nobody the day before. Lord Lyndhurst, who at eighty-six is not " passion's slave " nor party's, told me that the Govern- ment would be in a minority of eight or ten, and that then they would dissolve Parliament, and have a general election. The truth is that this threat of a dissolution is exactly what saved the Ministry. Parliament has been but a year in session, and there are so many members who were so exces- sively disgusted at the idea of the risk, trouble, and expense of unseating themselves, and clambering back into their seat again, or failing to do so, that they were glad to let the Ministers off, knowing them to be reckless and desperate enough to try the hazard of a general election. 1858.] LOKD JOHN RUSSELL. 249 Accordingly down goes Dizzy for the Easter holidays to Slough, and after a constituency dinner, seems to have abso- lutely been made drunk with the unexpected chance of retain- ing power a few months longer. He then delivered to the farmers and graziers and gentlemen there assembled, one of the cleverest, wittiest, most mendacious, most audacious, most besotted speeches that was ever made. He clapped his wings and " crowed like chanticleer an hour by the dial," without apparently remembering that electric telegraphs and steno- graphy had been invented. In a day or two afterwards, Par- liament came together again, and Dizzy recoiled in secret horror " e'en at the noise himself had made." Palmerston gave him two tremendous dressings in the House of Commons, and then Lord Clarendon in the Lords administered a most serious fustigation. In short, never was a Chancellor of Exchequer so belaboured since such officials were instituted. The lie was given to him as flatly as the Pickwickian rules permit by Palmerston and by Clarendon, and although Dizzy defended himself at first with adroitness and impudence, he was fairly obliged to eat his own words. Well, Lord John touched lightly and slightly on these matters in his still small voice. I said it was a severe strain upon an English statesman to remember that every word he uttered in public was instantly and for ever to be recorded even as it fell from his lips. He said if a man did think of that he would not be able to open them. He spoke a little of the row about the Cuba slave trade and the American skippers, said that the American and English naval officers were the best people to settle that kind of embroglio, that they always respected each other and fraternised if the thing were possible, that the idea of war with America could never enter an Englishman's head. The triangulation of England may be considered complete as long as he and Palmerston are both alive. Both mean to be First Minister of the Whigs. Meantime the Tories, without any real principle of action, keep the provisional government by the equilibrium esta- blished between the large body of independents and the respective forces of Palmerston and Lord John. 250 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. VIII. I was introduced to a good many ladies, some of them pretty and young. There is no doubt that the English aristocracy has much beauty. When I say how handsome the women are, the reply is invariable that is a great compliment from an American, for everybody knows that the American women are the handsomest in the world. On the whole I think that the grandmothers of England are the most miraculous race. There are the Duchess of Somerset, Lady Dufferin, and Mrs. Norton, then Lady Stanley, of whom I have spoken several times, the Marchioness of Londonderry, and various others, all exceed- ingly handsome women still. I can hardly remember the names of the many persons I was presented to. I remember one, a lively, agreeable person, whose name was Lady Edward Thynne, a daughter of Mrs. Gore the novelist. She was apparently a young woman, and I dare say she is capable of having at this moment ten grandchildren for aught I know to the contrary. Nothing can be kinder than Mrs. Norton. She takes me under her especial convoy, and seems to think she can never do enough for me. I feel as if I had known her for years, and I am satisfied she does not dislike me, or she would not be presenting me to everybody worth knowing. While I was talking with her at another time she said, " Oh, there is my lover, I must go and speak to him." She then went up to a plain-looking benignant little old gentleman in a white hat and a kind of old-world look about him that seemed to require a pig-tail and white top boots. She whispered to him a moment, and he came forward, beamingly saying, " Delighted, I am sure, to make Mr. Motley's acquaintance," and shook me warmly by the hand. This was the old Marquis of Lansdowne, late President of the Council. He told me he was deeply interested in my book, and that he had been much instructed by me, and was much obliged to me. He said he was obliged to go away immediately as the debate on the Slough business was to come up in the Lords that afternoon, but he hoped soon to see me again. My friend Lady Stanley and her daughter, Maude Stanley (a pretty name, is it not?) were there, also the Baroness Eothschild, who seems a very good- 1858.] HENKY HALLAM. 251 humoured personage, and a great friend of the Amorys, through the Lyndhursts, and a lot of other people were there. I returned by the rail at six, and was tremendously tired, to dress for dinner at eight at Lady Airlie's. She is a very pretty, fresh, rosy woman, daughter of Lady Stanley, and married to a handsome, good-humoured and unaffected young Scotchman, the Earl of Airlie. The dinner was not very large. There were half a dozen Members of Parliament there and their wives. The lady next me was rather pretty ; opposite was a bright, lively young woman, with an intelli- gent, sparkling, piquante face, and a merry laugh, who was Lady Goderich. I was introduced to her before dinner, and she went away after the coffee and ballad singing were finished. I am however invited to dine at her house next week. She was prettily dressed, with a head-dress of gold coins, and a great string of pearls round a very white neck. Lord Goderich, whom I have met once or twice, and who is a rising man in politics, did not come on account of business in Parliament. In the evening came Lady Stanley and Miss Stanley (her sister-in-law), who knew Washington Irving and other veterans. Wednesday morning, before I was out of bed, I received a note requiring an answer. It was again from Lady W. Kussell. It began : " I hope, my dear sir, that you are at liberty on Saturday next? For if I fail in this second negotiation I shall never be employed diplomatically again." She then said Lord and Lady Palmerston begged me to dine on the following Saturday, and she concluded : " Pray do not tell me that you are again indissolubly pre-engaged." The same forenoon Mackintosh came to me by appointment to go with me to Mr. Hallam's, who had previously expressed a wish that I should call. The great historian is long past the " middle ages " now. He is paralysed in the right leg, the right arm, and slightly in the tongue. His face is large, regularly handsome, ruddy, fresh, and very good-humoured. He re- ceived me with great cordiality, and we had half an hour's talk. He begged me to leave my address, and I suppose he means to invite me to something or other, for I believe he 252 MOTLEY'S LETTEKS. [CHAP. VIII. occasionally entertains his friends. His mind does not seem essentially dimmed, and there is nothing senile in his aspect, crippled as he is. He is a wreck, but he has not sunk head downwards, as you sometimes see, which is the most melan- choly termination to the voyage. His mind seems bright and his spirits seem light. I dined this day at the Warres'. You know about them. I like them both very much. To my great delight Froude was there. He had just come up from Bideford. He looks delicate, has a slight cough, but is mainly troubled about his eyes. (The result, however, of his consulta- tion with an oculist the following day, was that the disease was not an alarming one, but would probably be chronic.) The party was a pleasant one ; the house is a large, elegant mansion in Belgravia. I do not know who the company all were. On the other side of me was Mrs. Mildmay, who seemed an agreeable person. She told me she would see that a ticket for the next " Almack's " was sent me, which balls it seems are revived this season after an immemorial desuetude, as might express himself. After dinner I was introduced to Lady Mary Fielding, who knew the Sturgis's very well. The next day I received a message from her that her father (Earl of Denbigh) was too gouty to call on me, but that if I would waive ceremony and call there, it would be very kind of me. So I suppose I shall go this week. In the evening late I went to the Cosmopolitan with Froude. I had some talk with Layard and one or two others, and met Lord Goderich, who asked me to dine Saturday of this week. On Thursday I went to St. Paul's Cathedral, to witness the ceremony of the singing of the charity children. This takes place once a year. I had received a card from the Dean of St. Paul's for a seat in his pew. The spectacle is certainly very touching and impressive. There are about 4000 children, mostly under the age of ten or eleven. Arranged in long rows, rising tier upon tier above each other, and all dressed in dark stuff gowns with white kerchiefs and aprons and mittens, with quaint old-world starched caps about their young fresh faces, they have a very unique aspect. Particu- larly when they all rose and seated themselves as by a single 1858.] THE CHAPTER COFFEE HOUSE. 253 impulse, the flutter of these thousands of white wings all through the church, with the devout innocent look of the thousands of child faces, and the piping of their baby voices, suggested the choir of the angels in Paradise. I do not know much to say of the charity. It is merely a collection of all the children, some of whom are fed, clothed, and educated by various schools, which are variously endowed. But as an artistic exhibition it is certainly most effective. Thackeray, who was with me in the pew, said : " It is the finest thing in the world finer than the Declaration of Independence." After the ceremony the luncheon for twenty or thirty invited guests was in the deanery, which is a large comfortable house near the church. I like Milman. He is very quick, shrewd, active of mind, almost a man of genius, a good historian, and appa- rently a good-hearted, sympathising person altogether. The sermon by a full-blown bishop was remarkably slow. I dined with Thackeray afterwards. The only people I liked and knew were Mr. and Mrs. Blackwood. Friday morning I went down to the City with the Amorys. I acted as cicerone to show them the Chapter Coffee-house in Paternoster Kow, which you and my darling Lily will recol- lect is the place of all others in the world in London which Charlotte Bronte selected when she came suddenly from Yorkshire to London to make a two days' visit. The place is as gloomy and forbidding as it is described to be by Mrs. Gaskell, and certainly no house in all the town could be imagined more forlorn for any woman to select as even a temporary residence. The alley is so narrow that one can almost touch the houses on both sides, and the whole expres- sion of the locality is disconsolate in the last degree. The inscription is " Chapter Coffee House Faithful " ; and I asked a man who is there to superintend the premises, which are to be let, whether he had ever heard of Miss Bronte. " Can't say I ever heard the name, sir. Was she here in Mr. Faithful's time?" was the only reply. The slender furrow made by little Jane Eyre in the ocean of London had long been effaced. We went also to the beautiful Temple church and gardens ; and I thought of you, dear Mary, and the pleasure it gave you 254 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. VIII. to see these places when we were together in London. I went afterwards to the Deanery of St. Paul's, to call on the Milmans, found them at home, and they brought me back to the West End, along with Mr. Senior, an ancient writer on political economy, and a contributor to the Edinburgh Review. This day I dined by myself at the Athenaeum. The next day, Saturday, after a day spent in the British Museum, I went with Lady W. Eussell and Arthur to the Palmerstons. Cambridge House is one of the finest mansions in London, not far from Hyde Park Corner. I was received very cordially by Lord and Lady Palmerston. She is agreeable and well bred in her manner, but at present without anything striking in her appearance. Lord Palmerston is not the least like any picture I ever saw of him. I thought him a tall, slender man. He is, on the contrary, rather short, and looks older than I expected, although I knew him to be seventy-four. His face is, however, handsome, and his address very gentle, soft, and winning. The features are regular, the teeth, if indigenous, good, but the eyes are small and rather lack-lustre. He had the broad blue ribbon of the garter over his white waistcoat, and he wore, what one rarely sees now-a-days, a blue coat with gilt buttons. He talked with me a few moments on miscellaneous topics, and dinner was soon afterwards announced. I went to the salle a manger with Mrs. William Cowper. The company consisted, besides the hosts, of Lord and Lady Claren- don, their daughter, Lady Constance Villiers, the Countess of Tankerville, Lady Olivia Ossulston, her daughter-in-law, a very handsome woman, Lady Victoria Ashley, Monckton Milnes, Mr. Labouchere, Monsieur Duvergier d'Hauranne (an ex- minister of Louis Philippe), Lady William Kussell and Arthur Kussell, and one or two others whom I have for- gotten. The dining-room is large and elegant. The service was plate, and the dinner and wines very good, but much like all dinners. I found my neighbour, Mrs. Cowper, a very pretty and agreeable person, disposed to please and be pleased, and the dinner went on with the hush and calm characteristic of these stately occasions. When the ladies retired I found myself next to Lord Palmerston, and he talked with me a 1858.] LORD PALMERSTON LORD CLARENDON. 255 long time about English politics and American matters, saying nothing worth repeating, but conversing always with an easy, winning, quiet manner, which accounts for his great popu- larity among his friends. At the same time it seemed difficult to realise that he was the man who made almost every night, and a very late hour in the night, those rattling, vigorous, juvenile, slashing speeches which ring through the civilised world as soon as uttered. I told him that it seemed to me very difficult to comprehend how any man could make those ready impromptu harangues in answer always to things said in the course of the debate, taking up all the adversary's points in his target, and dealing blows in return, without hesitation or embarrassment. He said very quietly that it was all a matter of habit ; and I suppose that he really does it with as much ease as he eats his breakfast. After we rose from table, Lord Clarendon came forward to me, and was introduced, and spoke very kindly to me, saying that my name was very familiar to everybody in England, and that it was a great pleasure to him to make my acquaint- ance. He asked me how I liked the arrangements of the State Paper Office, and expressed himself with much interest concerning my proceedings. He talked with me a quarter of an hour or so very agreeably. Soon after we reached the saloons, of which there were four or five en suite, the company began to pour in, and they were soon overflowing. Baron Brunnow, the Kussian ambassador, a tall man, with an intensely ugly but very shrewd face, the Duke of Malakoff, a short square figure with a broad white waistcoat and a sin- gularly coarse and brutal physiognomy, and various other diplomats less known to fame, were there. There were a good many ladies whom I had met at the Duchess of Somerset's and other places, Lady Airlie and her mother Lady Stanley, the Baroness Eothschild and her daughter, recently married to another Eothschild, Lady Lyndhurst and her daughter, and various others, with all of whom I had the usual vapid conver- sation common in the crush of crowded saloons. I was also introduced to one or two literary and scientific celebrities, such as Hay ward, a celebrated writer in the Quarterly, and 256 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. VIII, Sir Henry Rawlinson, the famous Eastern traveller, and Sir Eoderick Murchison, the great geologist. Lady W. Russell, on introducing me to the last-named personage, said that she was as Boswell said of himself with regard to General Paoli and Dr. Johnson, " like an isthmus connecting two great con- tinents." But I did not think the grim geologist seemed to relish having his ancient stratum of reputation placed on a level with so recent and tertiary a formation as he probably considers mine to be. I do not know that I have anything further to record of this evening's entertainment. I forgot to say that upon the forenoon of this day Lord Lansdowne left his card for me, together with an invitation to dinner for next Friday. The difficulty now with me is to reduce my invitations to order, for as I often have two a day, and cannot eat more than one dinner per diem, there is often embarrassment of choice. On Sunday I went to call on Mrs. Norton, and found her as agreeable as ever. I think she talks about as well as Holmes, and at the same time has that attractive manner, low, sweet voice and expressive style of beauty which has made her so celebrated. While I was there several people came in, among others, Stirling, the Charles V. man ; and presently the old Marquis of Lansdowne toddled in, and sat drinking every word she said with great delight. On going away he hoped I should not decline his invitation, adding that Mrs. Norton's presence would probably not make me less willing to be of the party. I dined with the Sturgis's. The company was Frank Cunningham and his wife, who have just turned up out of Egypt, and look very fresh and pleased with their perambu- lations, and Colonel Hamley. Afterwards I went for an hour to the Cosmopolitan, where I found A. Russell (who begged me to send his particular regards to you), Reeve, Layard, Mackintosh, Milnes, and others ; and I am now, at 2 A.M., just finishing this long-winded epistle. So good-night and Grod bless you and my darling children, dearest Mary. : Ever affectionately yours, J. L. M. 1858.] LONDON SOCIETY. 257 To Us Wife. London, June 13th, 1858. MY DEAREST MARY, As usual upon Sunday morning I am going to give myself the pleasure of sending you a brief account of my seeings and doings. I do not think that I have a great deal that will prove interesting. I say also sincerely that the principal, nay the only, source of gratifica- tion to me in being the " favoured guest of many a gay and brilliant throng," as E. Swiveller might express himself, is that I can amuse you and Lily with a few sketches of people and things you may have heard of. Let me, however, thank you both for your letters of June 6th last Sunday. The Eussells are kindness itself to me. I like Lady William extremely, and I feel sure she likes me, and is very fond of introducing me to people she thinks worth knowing. I visit her occasionally, and she comes and takes me to parties, etc. I got a note from her last Monday morning, which I would send you if it were not on such thick paper. I think, however, an extract from it will amuse you. It begins thus " My dear sir, I hope you will break every tie, should you be entangled, on the 15th, and accept the enclosed invitation from my friend, who tried with me to find you at Lady Palmerston's. The dinner will be pleasant, and Lord Brougham, who will be there, pants to make your acquaintance. I saw him no less than three times in one day, et chaque fois il etait question de vous," etc., with a good deal more in the same vein. The card is from Lady Williams (wife or widow, I do not know which, of one of the judges), and takes place day after to- morrow. To resume my week's small beer. On Monday I worked pretty hard all day (which is very apt not to be the case, my time is so cut up with breakfasts, luncheons, etc.) at the State Paper Office. In the afternoon I went down with the Sturgises, Hamley, and the Blackwoods, to a dinner at Eichmond. I did not care much for it, as I was not much disposed to be merry, and I feel very unhappy and depressed, more than VOL. I. S 258 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. VIII. tongue can tell, about my dear mother. If I were amusing myself here in London, and if going to dinners were what it is to so many, what it might have been to me at twenty-five, an excitement and a pastime, I should reproach myself. But I do it with deliberation, and at a great sacrifice to my own feelings, because I believe it to be as it were my duty, being here in London, and with every door opened to me even without knocking, to see something and only once for all of English society. There is nothing to say of this Eichmond dinner. The Sturgises and Hamley were as gay and amusing as ever, and the Blackwoods are quiet, simple, intelligent people whom I like very much. I think I told you that he is both proprietor and editor of the famous magazine established by his father. On Tuesday there was a dinner at Lady Stanley's of Alderley. I think it was rather made for me than otherwise. The com- pany was, besides the Stanleys, their married daughter and her husband, Lord Airlie, Lord Strangford, a young man who has been much in the East, and who is a very good Oriental scholar, and son of Lord Strangford, who translated the ' Lusiad' of Camoens, Lady Palmerston, her daughter Lady Shaftesbury, Lord Lyndhurst, Lord Brougham, Lord and Lady Stratford de Kedcliffe. Lord Lyndhurst, who has very much lost the use of his legs, but not of his brains, did not come up in the drawing-room. I was introduced to Lord Brougham before dinner. He shook hands cordially, and expressed himself as glad to make my acquaintance, but he did not seem to "pant" so much as might have been expected. We soon went to dinner, and his place was at the opposite end of the table from mine, so that our ac- quaintance for the present is limited. I have no doubt I shall see more of him, but to tell you the truth I fear he is a mere wreck. Let me give you a photograph, while his grotesque image still lingers in the camera-obscura of my brain. He is exactly like the pictures in Punch, only Punch flatters him. The common pictures of Palmerston and Lord John are not like at all to my mind, but Brougham is always hit exactly. His face, like his tongue and his mind, is shrewd, sharp, 1858.] LYNDHUEST AND BROUGHAM. 259 humorous. His hair is thick and snow-white and shiny ; hi& head is large and knobby and bumpy, with all kinds of phrenological developments, which I did not have a chance fairly to study. The rugged outlines or headlands of his face are wild and bleak, but not forbidding. Deep furrows of age and thought and toil, perhaps of sorrow, run all over it, while his vast mouth, with a ripple of humour ever playing around it, expands like a placid bay under the huge promontory of his fantastic and incredible nose. His eye is dim and could never have been brilliant, but his voice is rather shrill, with an unmistakable northern intonation ; his manner of speech is fluent, not garrulous, but obviously touched by time ; his figure is tall, slender, shambling, awkward, but of course perfectly self-possessed. Such is what remains at eighty of the famous Henry Brougham. My place at table was between Lady Stanley and the pretty Countess of Airlie, her daughter; on her right sat Lord Stratford de Kedcliffe, and at the other end of the table on each side of Lord Stanley were Brougham and Lyndhurst. I have already described Lyndhurst. When sitting down he appears younger than Brougham, although really six years older (he was eighty-six last week) ; his voice is silvery and his manner very suave and gentle. The company was too large for general conversation, but every now and then we at our end paused to listen to Brougham and Lyndhurst chaffing each other across the table. Lyndhurst said, "Brougham, you disgraced the woolsack by appearing there with those plaid trousers, and with your peer's robe on one occasion put on over your chancellor's gown." " The devil ! " said Brougham, " you know that to be a calumny ; I never wore the plaid trousers." " Well," said Lyndhurst, " he confesses the two gowns. Now the present Lord Chancellor never appears except in small clothes and silk stockings." Upon which Lady Stanley observed that the ladies in the gallery all admired Lord Chelmsford for his handsome leg. " A virtue that was never seen in you, Brougham," said Lyndhurst, and so on. I do not repeat these things because they are worth recording, but because I always try to Boswellize a little for s 2 260 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. VIII. your entertainment. All dinner-time, Lord Lyndhurst's servant, who came with him, stood behind him, allowing him to eat only the dishes which he selected for him, and seeming very much like the Doctor who stood behind Sancho Panza, when governor of Barataria, and perpetually waved away the dishes which that functionary was inclined to devour. Lord Lyndhurst is always very kind and attentive to me. He called out to me in the old-fashioned way to drink wine with him at table, and after dinner both he and Brougham addressed a good deal of the conversation, which turned on American matters, slave trade, etc., to me, and you may be sure that I was glad to speak my mind on those subjects. I told them, however, that the English were doing a great deal of damage and no good, by the utterly indefensible and insolent conduct of the petty officers in the West Indian seas. There is no doubt that all this will be speedily put an end to, for the English are very anxious to avoid any quarrel with America as well as not to furnish us with any additional pretext for taking Cuba. I liked Lord Stratford de Kedcliffe very much. He is the man, you know, who has been so long ambassador in Constantinople, and doubtless stands at the head of English diplomacy. He is a tall, thin man, with a handsome, distin- guished face, bald and grey, advanced in the soixantaine, with perfectly simple, unpretending manners. I had imagined, from the accounts of him, a tremendous swell, with much pomp and circumstance. He talked with me a good deal during dinner, and when we went to the drawing-room, he requested a formal introduction, and conversed half an hour with me. He had been in former times minister in America, and among other people he remembered very well John Quincy Adams and Mr. Otis. He told me he should like to cultivate my acquaintance while I was in England, and I suppose I ought to call on him, as he is an ex-ambassador and as he cannot know where I live. I have not yet done so, however, as I cannot meet people even half-way. Mrs. Norton took me severely to task for making old Lord Lansdowne call first on me, saying that I had no business to give him the trouble to send word to inquire my address, which he had been 1858.] THE HOUSE OF COMMONS. 261 obliged to do. Lord Lyndhurst, on account of his leg-less condition, did not come upstairs, and Lord Brougham stayed down with him to talk of some bill, soon to be brought into the Lords, so that neither came above the horizon that night. Wednesday. As I had resolved, according to your wish, to refuse no invitations to sit at " good men's feasts," I had accepted an invitation to a dejeuner at Lord Carlisle's at Chiswick House. There was a great flower show at the Horti- cultural Gardens, which are near Lord Carlisle's house, and he had taken the opportunity to make a small party. About thirty people sat down at 2.30 o'clock. I had hoped that the Duchess of Sutherland would be there ; she was not, and unless Lord Carlisle comes to town I am afraid I shall not see her. Her daughter Lady Blantyre was there. I went to table with Lord Carlisle's sister, Lady Dover. There was also the family of Hamilton Fish of New York. I have a curiosity to see the Duchess of Sutherland on account of her high reputation, but I do not like to ask for an introduction, and prefer to wait till I am bumped in her direction in the general maelstrom of London society. Mackintosh was there, but not his wife, and with that exception I cannot tell you the names of the people. They were doubtless all swells, but I doubt if there were any celebrities. On Thursday I worked all day at the State Paper Office, and dined en famille with Thackeray, whom I happened to meet the evening before at the Athenaeum. He has been very friendly to me ; I believe him to be very kindhearted and benevolent. His eldest daughter I like very much. When I came home in the evening I found an invitation from Lady Palmerston for the same night. It had been overlooked or mislaid or something, and was marked "immediate," but it was too late for me, fatigued as I was, to go. I suppose there will be another next Saturday. On Friday afternoon I went into the Athenaeum for a sandwich, and there I met Milnes, who asked me to breakfast next Wednesday. He also asked me to go down to the House with him, which I was willing to do for an hour or two, although I was to dine at eight. When you are introduced 262 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. VIII. by a member you are seated in the House itself in some very good seats reserved for members of the other House and " illus- trious foreigners," so that you hear the debates quite as well as the M.P.'s themselves. For such a brief visit I made rather a good hit. The testy old Admiral Napier had just been asking some questions about the defences of England, and Dizzy then got up to reply. In the course of his speech, which was about twenty minutes, he made the announcement, new to most people, that the Cagliari question had been settled so satisfactorily. This is another piece of good fortune in the run of luck which the Ministers have been having. It was not new to me, for we had happened, as we walked down, to meet Delane, editor of the Times, who had mentioned the circum- stance. Dizzy's manner was calm on this occasion, statesman- like and very different from the boisterous and declamatory style adopted by him the other day in his speech at Slough. He expresses himself with considerable fluency for an English- man, the most eloquent of whom are so apt to " stick on con- versation's burrs." Afterwards Bright made a few remarks. He is one of the favourites of the House, belonging to the branch of that extreme Liberal party which has taken the present Ministers under its protection, to annoy Palmerston on the one side and Lord John on the other. It was quite amusing to see him patting Disraeli on the head from the Opposition benches. His manner is easy, conversational, slightly humorous, rather fluent. The whole style of thing is very different in Parlia- ment from the American way of proceeding in Congress or State Legislatures. Everything here is toned down to a gentle business-like mediocrity. The invisible but most omnipotent demon of good taste which presides over the English world, social, political, and moral, hangs over the heads of the legis- lators and suppresses their noble rage. The consequence is that eloquence is almost impossible. Nobody drinks up Esel or eats crocodiles, but at the same time a good deal of passion and rhetoric, which might occasionally explode to advantage, is for ever sealed up. I doubt whether Sheridan or Burke in this age would not find the genial current of their soul to be 1858.] DINNER AT LANSDOWNE HOUSE. 263 frozen by this clear cold atmosphere of good taste which coagulates the common talk of Englishmen, however wise or witty. I was obliged to come away very early to dress for dinner at Lansdowne House. You remember the place which is on the opposite side of Berkeley Square to Thomas's hotel and inside a brick wall. (By the way, the Airlies live next door to Thomas's.) The house for London is spacious and splendid, the reception-rooms and dining-room being on the ground floor. I should think the dining-room was about 50 feet by 25, and well proportioned as to height. There are many statues about it. The hostess at Lansdowne House is his daughter-in-law, Lady Shelburne, who is pretty and pleasing. The company consisted of Mrs. Norton, Dean Milman and his wife, Lord Macaulay, Lady Dufferin and her son Lord Dufferin, Hayward, Miss Thellusson, and a gentleman whose name I did not hear. Kather a small party for so large a room. I had on my left the young lady who declaimed so vigorously at Lady Stanley's, and who is intelligent and agreeable. On my right I had the good luck to have Lady Dufferin, whom before I had hardly seen. She is extremely agreeable, full of conversation, with a charming manner, and has or had almost as much beauty and almost as much genius as her sister Mrs. Norton, with a far better fate. At table by wax-light she looked very handsome, with a wreath of white roses on her black hair ; while her son, a very handsome youth of near thirty, sat near her looking like her brother. Hallam's ' Middle Ages ' ought to be a classic work in England certainly, for there is no country in the world in which that epoch is so triumphant. The grandmothers of Eng- land seem almost as young as the mothers. Lady Dufferin has, I believe, never published, but she is perpetually writing vers de societe, prologues for private theatricals, songs and impromp- tus. Mrs. Norton's ( Miss Myrtle is going to marry ' and * So so, Sir, you have come at last,' are as familiar, as you know very well, as Percy's * Ballads.' Her son told me that Lord Palmerston once quoted a verse of " the charming woman," saying, " as the old song says," which wus not particularly com- 264 MOTLEY'S LETTEKS. [CHAP. VIII. plimentary to the woman, however agreeable it might have been to the poetess. She made herself very agreeable all dinner-time. I told her I had just heard Disraeli speak. She said she had always known him and liked him in spite of his tergiversations and absurdities. When he was very young and had made his first appearance in London society as the author of * Vivian Grey/ there was something almost incredible in his aspect. She assured me that she did not exaggerate in the slightest degree in describing to me his dress when she first met him at a dinner party. He wore a black velvet coat lined with satin, purple trousers with a gold band running down the outside seam, a scarlet waistcoat, long lace ruffles falling down to the tips of his fingers, white gloves with several brilliant rings outside them, and long black ringlets rippling down upon his shoulders. It seemed impossible that such a Guy Fawkes could have been tolerated in any society. His audacity, which has proved more perennial than brass, was always the solid foundation of his character. She told him, however, that he made a fool of himself by appearing in such fantastic shape, and he afterwards modified his costume, but he was never to be put down. She gave me another anecdote of him. " He was once dining," said Lady Dufferin, " with my insufferable brother-in-law, Mr. Norton (of course long before the separa- tion), when the host begged him to drink a particular kind of wine, saying he had never tasted anything so good before. Disraeli agreed that the wine was very good. ' Well,' said Norton, ' I have got wine twenty times as good in my cellar.' ' No doubt, no doubt,' said Dizzy, looking round the table, 'but, my dear fellow, this is quite good enough for such canaille as you have got to-day.' Everybody saw that the remark was intended as a slap for Mr. Norton, except that individual himself, who was too obtuse to feel it." I do not know that I have anything more to record of this dinner. Macaulay was too far off for me to hear much of his talk till the ladies retired, although I observed very few of those brilliant "flashes of silence in his conversation" to which Sydney Smith once alluded. After dinner, the con- 1858.] LANSDOWNE HOUSE. 265 versation was miscellaneous, but Hayward, who is a Quarterly Reviewer of some reputation and a diner-out, got into an argument with Macaulay about sculpture and painting, and the whole apple-cart of conversation was upset. Milman was agreeable, as he always is, and so was Macaulay. Old Lord Lansdowne sat beaming and genial in the centre of his system, and had evidently acquired a good deal of fresh warmth and radiance from Mrs. Norton, who sat next him, and had been looking handsomer than I ever saw her before. She was dressed in white, and from the end of the table where I sat it would have required a very powerful telescope to dis- cover that she had passed thirty. Before we went away, Milman invited me next week to breakfast with Macaulay. He had again a violent fit of coughing just before he went to the drawing-room, but it seemed to me of an asthmatic cha- racter. He went away early, and I departed about eleven. Next afternoon I drove out with the Amorys to a breakfast (at Lady Dufferin's, at her villa in Highgate, about five miles from London). The grounds are charming ; the villa a beautiful English house, with lawn and shrubbery, and oaks, and wide views over the hill and dale, such as are in perfection in England. The weather was, as it has been for the last ten days, very summery and sultry. Tea tables and ices were spread on the lawn under the trees, and there were many persons of my acquaintance present. The Stanleys, the Airlies, Mrs. Norton, the Duchess of Wellington, and various other persons were there. The tone of the party was very much sans gene, and Mrs. Norton triumphed over her age and the sunlight. Both the Amorys looked very well. I do not know that I have anything special to record of this afternoon's entertainment. The Countess of Clarendon was there, and requested Lady Dufferin to introduce me to her, and was very civil and agreeable. We returned in time for me to dress, and go to dine at Lord Goderich's at eight. I think I mentioned in my last that Lord Goderich is a rising young politician, with a good deal of talent, and very liberal principles. Of my acquaintance was Hurlbert, who, as I have before mentioned, has recently turned up here, and A. Kussell. 266 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. VIII. Besides, there was the " young couple " whom we met two or three years ago at Lucerne. As I rarely forget faces, I recognised theirs. They are a Mr. and Mrs. . He is a Member of Parliament and a Eadical. She sat on my left, and I asked in the course of dinner whether she remembered where we had last met. She said she had been puzzling over it (which I do not believe at all) ; I said, in Lucerne. Then she remembered, or affected to remember, and added, " Why is it that we English, when we meet abroad, are so very friendly, and when we reappear in London are so very hedgehoggy ? " I told her that the reason why there was no hedgehogginess on this occasion was because I was not an Englishman. " From which of the sister islands, then ? " she asked. " From none," I answered. " Then from one of the colonies?" "Yes," said I, "from Australia." Kussell and Lady Goderich laughed, and I left her to burst in ignorance. After the dinner, Kussell and I retired to the Athenaaum at eleven, to drink soda and water and smoke cigars, which evil habit I have occasionally resumed late at night, but very rarely at the Cosmopolitan. To-day, Sunday for the last sheet of this letter I have taken up late this evening I have done nothing but take a short drive in the park with the Amorys, and dine with the Sturgises, and now I am tired, and so I shall say God bless you, dearest Mary ; kiss my darling children, and believe me ever, Most affectionately yours, J. L. M. To Us Mother. London, June llfh, 1858. MY DEAEEST MOTHER, I was rejoiced to find by the letters which arrived yesterday that your health had improved. It makes me very sad to hear of you as suffering so much pain, and I trust most sincerely that the change of air and the quiet of Eiverdale will re-invigorate you, and that we may have the happiness to hear of a still further improvement. I 1858.] LORD BROUGHAM AND THE SLAVE TRADE. 267 am leading rather a solitary life here, for although I go a good deal into society, this is rather as a matter of duty than anything else. My own family are all far away from me in Switzerland ; although thank God they have hitherto been pretty well, I cannot feel perfectly comfortable when the separation is such a decided one. Moreover, I do not get so much time to work as I hoped to do. London is such a large place that an enormous deal of time is spent in getting from one place to another. If you go out to breakfast or to luncheon your day is broken in two, and is no longer good for anything. Lord Brougham interests me as much as any man. He is now eighty years of age, but I do not see that he is much broken. His figure is erect, not very graceful, certainly, but active. His face is so familiar to every one, principally through the pictures in Punch, as hardly to require a description. The whole visage is wild and bizarre, and slightly comical, but not stern or forbidding. Like his tongue and his mind, it is eminently Scotch, sharp, caustic, rugged, thistle-ish. The top of the head is as flat as if it had been finished with a plane. The brain-chamber is as spacious as is often allotted to any one mortal, and, as the world knows, the owner has furnished it very thoroughly. The face is large, massive, seamed all over with the deep furrows of age and thought and toil ; the nose is fantastic and incredible in shape. There is much humour and benevolence about the lines of the mouth. His manner is warm, eager, earnest, cordial. I was with him half an hour yesterday, and he talked a good deal of the question of Cuba and the slave trade. He was of opinion that the claim to visit must be given up ; that there was no logical defence for it, but he spoke with a sigh and almost with tears at the apparent impossibility of suppressing the slave trade, or of preventing in America the indefinite extension and expansion of slavery. I told him that Americans belonging to the Free States were placed in a position such as no great body of men had ever before found themselves in. They were forced to choose between an act of political suicide or connivance at the 268 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. VIII. steady expansion of the slavery system, which was repugnant both to their principles and to their interests. A man in Ohio or Massachusetts must either be a rebel and bend his energy to the dissolution of the Union, or he must go heart and hand with Alabama and Carolina in acquiring Cuba and Central America, and carving out an endless succession of slave states for the future. He said this was quite true, and that all lovers of progress and liberal institutions could not help being afflicted at the terrible position in which the Free States were placed. Whichever way one looked, dissolution seemed to stare us in the face, for the annexation of the worn- out, effete, mongrel Spanish- American population into our con- federation was after all a vitiation, corruption and death to our original and powerful organization. I do not give you exactly his words, but as I agreed in everything he said, and as he seemed to sympathise with all I ventured to express, I thought it would interest you to hear it. No man wishes more good, more glory, more prosperity to the American people than Lord Brougham, but he cannot believe (nor can I) that those objects are to be attained by extending slavery and re-esta- blishing the slave trade. I have got to the end of my sheet, my dearest mother, and so I shall bid you good-bye for the present, meaning to write again very soon. I shall remain about a fortnight longer in London, and then leave for Holland, where I have some two or three months' work. My best love to father, to my dear A , of whom I am glad to hear so much better accounts, and to all the rest of the family. And believe me, my dear mother, Most affectionately your son, J. L. M. To his Wife. London, June 20ta, 1858. MY DEAREST MARY, Although I go out a good deal, and dine with somebody or other every day, I see no new cele- brities, and, indeed, there are very few to see. I doubt if I shall see Disraeli or Bulwer. Both are now Ministers, and 1858.] LORD BROUGHAM. 269 rarely go into society, I believe. Carlyle was to have come to breakfast at Milnes's, but he was ill, and sent an apology. Monday I dined with Mr. Darwin, cousin to Mackintosh, and son or grandson of the man who wrote the ' Botanical Garden/ Mackintosh was there, and his sister and brother-in-law the Wedgwoods, descendants of the famous Wedgwood the potter, and sundry other people, whose names I do not know. The day was insufferably hot. The weather, the three or four days of the past week, has been hotter than any one ever believed it possible to be in England. The glass was near 90 in the shade, and there was a sense of suffocation in the air, which was intensified by dining in the inevitable white choker in close rooms. For once in my life I have known the weather too warm for my taste, but it has furnished a topic of con- versation inexhaustible and providential. On Tuesday I dined with Lady Williams, the widow of a judge of some note. The company consisted of Mr Har- court, 1 a bland old gentleman, to whom I was introduced on arriving. When I came in with A. Kussell (Lady W. Kussell, being taken suddenly ill, was unable to come to the dinner), Lady Williams addressed me in French. I replied in that language, thinking perhaps she had mistaken me for Malakoff, and being unwilling to disturb the illusion. She, however, soon after presented me to the said Mr. Harcourt, and after I had turned away, I heard her ask him confiden- tially if he had read the D. K. As she is very hard of hearing, he was obliged to whisper in a tremendous under- tone audible a mile off, " Not yet, but Lady Waldegrave (his wife) is reading it at this moment with great pleasure ; " all of which I was cense not to hear. Then came Lord Brougham, looking as droll as ever. There certainly never was a great statesman and author who so irresistibly suggested the man who does the comic business at a small theatre as Brougham. You are compelled to laugh when you see him as much as at Keeley or Warren. Yet there is absolutely nothing comic in his mind. On the contrary, he is always earnest, vigorous, impressive, but there is no resisting his nose. It is not merely 1 George Harcourt, Esq. 270 MOTLEY'S LETTEKS. [CHAP. VIII. the configuration of that wonderful feature which surprises you, but its mobility. It has the litheness and almost the length of the elephant's proboscis, and I have no doubt he can pick up pins or scratch his back with it as easily as he could take a pinch of snuff. He is always twisting it about in quite a fabulous manner. Then there were Lord and Lady Stratford de Kedcliffe, the Earl of Powis, who told me that he knew the Fays when they lived in Shropshire, some young men whose names I have forgotten, and a very pretty girl who sat next me, whose name was Campbell. I can absolutely tell you nothing of this entertainment. I am not much of a judge of cookery ; I really cannot say whether the cuisine of the various places where I dine is commendable or the reverse, and I can only say that it is stereotyped. The same soups, fishes, and dishes succeed each other in one unvarying procession, just as in a Boston dinner party or a German table d'hote. No doubt, too, the society is too large. The wide orbits in which the higher constellations move, admit but slight possi- bilities of conjunction, and so in solemn silence, or nearly so, all move round the vast terrestrial ball. There is not much chance for anything beyond a slight and formal acquaintance, however disposed the natives may be to be civil to strangers, and in my own case I have received a good deal of civility. Still, the width of society makes it dreary for a foreigner. On Wednesday morning I breakfasted with Milnes. He is a particularly good fellow, hearty, jolly, intelligent, rich, and hospitable, a man of letters, and a Member of Parliament. His wife is at present in the country, so that he does not give dinners, although they say his house is one of the best to dine at in London. A breakfast is in itself an absurdity. At least I for one hate to talk at breakfast to people with whom I am not intimate. It takes at least a few glasses of champagne to thaw the surface of any general intercourse, but to pour tea upon the ice is indeed a weakness. To be jolly over muffins is the most wretched of delusions. There was a Professor from Bal- timore, whose specialty seems to be an international currency, 1858.] MADAME MOHL. 271 who asked if I happened to be acquainted with my namesake, the author of the * Dutch Kepublic,' two or three foreigners, Lord Ashburton, and a Crimean hero or two, et voila. I am sure I cannot tell you anything of the conversation, as there was no celebrity present whose head I can take off for your amusement. ... I dined with John Forster, formerly editor of the Examiner, author of several very clever works. The company consisted of Dilke, editor of the Athendeum, Egg the painter, Sir C. Eastlake, President of the Koyal Academy, and his wife. The thermometer had been at 90 all day, and you may imagine what the effect of wax candles, steaming dishes, and a parboiled dozen or two of human creatures must have been. For my own feelings I can only say that St. Lawrence on his gridiron was an emblem of cool comfort in comparison. The conversation was not exciting or instructive. Lady Eastlake had been a good deal in Germany and in Courland, and I have an idea that she is the author of a very clever book I once read called ' Letters from the Baltic.' Her husband is a sensible man in his profession of cognoscente. On Thursday morning, while I was making a call on Julia Sturgis, in walked Madame Mohl. We fell into each other's arms of course. I do not know how long she is to stay here. It appears that the Queen of Holland has been lately making a visit to the Emperor in Paris. She told Mr. Mohl she wanted to see Mignet, Cousin, and other celebrities. He told her she could not, for nothing would induce such men to go to the Tuileries. The only way it could be managed was for her to come to his house, and he would invite them to meet her. With this she was delighted, so the Mohls gave a luncheon or dinner, I forget which, and had all these celebrities, and her Majesty came and was delighted. Mme. Mohl said that Count Kandwyk told her it was indis- pensable that I should report myself to him on my arrival at the Hague. He is her Master of Ceremonies. I do not think I shall, however ; certainly not if I can possibly help it. That day I went, according to appointment, to the House of Lords, sent in my card to Lord Brougham, who came out and brought me into the House, and gave me a place on what is 272 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. VIII. called the steps of the throne, where you are separated by a slight rail from the body of the House. The speaking on the Cuba business was opened by the Bishop of Oxford, in a fervid and impassioned speech. He is the son of the celebrated Wilberforce, and one of the best speakers in England. There is no need of my talking about the matter of this debate. The manner is all which is im- portant, as you have perhaps seen what was said ; and if not, it is of little consequence, for the whole matter, so far as England and America are concerned, is settled. The men who spoke were, besides the Bishop of Oxford, Brougham, who was earnest, eager, and eloquent as a young man ; Earl Grey, who was very peppery and pugnacious ; Clarendon, who was gentle- manlike ; Carlisle, who was brief but earnest and almost eloquent. Just before the end of the debate he came over to me to tell me that he had just sent me a note inviting me to dinner on the 3rd July. On the whole the style of thing was very creditable, the elocution was above mediocrity, and the tone was in mortifying contrast to that of the recent debate in our Senate, where each speaker vied with the rest in using violent and abusive language towards England, I say morti- fying contrast, because whatever be the right or the wrong, and I believe that we are right, yet it is detestable to see people without any feeling of the responsibility of statesmen and bragging away about going into a naval war with a power which has got some four hundred ships of war while we have got twenty-five or thirty. On Saturday I went to a large morning party at the Marchioness of Westminster's. Their residence is Grosvenor House, one of the most splendid palaces in London. There were a dozen or two of people that I knew there. The prin- cipal reception room was the great picture gallery, but there was no opportunity of seeing the pictures, and the crowd was so great that there was no chance for anything but to suffer and be strong for a little while, and then to come away. I was obliged to leave by five o'clock, as I was engaged three weeks long, with fifty or sixty of my compatriots, to be starred and gartered by Mr. Peabody at Kichmond. I went with the 1858.] LONDON SOCIETY. 273 Sturgis's in their carriage. The day was fine and the drive pleasant, and the dinner less oppressive than I had antici- pated. The Amorys were there, both looking handsome and beautifully dressed, the Dallases, Fishers, and a comprehensive catalogue of starred and striped individuals from Connecticut to California, the latter State being represented by a volumi- nous nuggety lady. I conducted to dinner Mrs. Morell, the married daughter of Mrs. Dallas. We reached town at about 11.30, at which hour I was deposited at Cambridge House, where there was a party. There is nothing particular to be said of this festival, nobody there whom I have not described. Lord Palmerston came up to me, and talked a quarter of an hour very pleasantly ; and there were others whom I like to meet, as Baron Bentinck, the Netherlands Minister; an especially agreeable person, Baroness Eothschild, who invited me to dinner next Thursday. Affectionately yours, J. L. M, VOL. I. 274 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CiiAr. IX. CHAPTEK IX. LONDON SOCIETY (CONTINUED). London dinner parties Pembroke Lodge Lady J. Eussell Sir H. Seymour Lord Gifford Dufferin Lodge Cliveden The Duchess of Sutherland- Breakfast with Monckton Milnes Thackeray at work Danby Seymour Harrow speeches The Kothschilds Stafford House "An honest diner- out " Concert at Lansdowne House Lord Stanhope " Owen Meredith "- "Tom Brown" Hatfield Samuel Wilberforce Lord Shaftesbury Lord Denbigh Dinner at Chiswick House Holland House Stoke Park Gray's 'Elegy' Dinner at Holland House Lord Macaulay Lord Clarendon Cassiobury Park A series of dinner parties-^Bath House Ball at Apsley House India debate in House of Lords Lord Weusleydale Mount Felix East Horsley Towers Hay ward Prince Frederick of Schleswig-Holstein Kinglake Journey to the Hague. To his Wife. London, June 27th, 1858. MY DEAREST MARY, My last letter, rather a jejune speci- men, I am afraid, was duly posted on the Sunday. I believe that the wondrous tale of my adventures on that occasion was brought up to Saturday inclusive. There are so many indi- viduals in London society, that it is a long time before one meets, except at a grand evening party, many persons on any one occasion that one has seen before, and at the same time those you met yesterday, that it comes to the same thing. About 8 P.M. I drive daily in a hansom along Piccadilly, in a white choker, and the colossal and comical statue of the Duke of Wellington always seems to tower above Belgravia, as the presiding genius of dinner parties, marshalling his baton the way that so many thousands are to go to table. Then you go -into a grave-looking mansion of nankeen-coloured brick, are received by a squad of respectable flunkeys, confide your name in a modest whisper to one of them, so that he may roar it up the staircase to his colleagues on the landing. Then you go into a large salon with a score or so of gentlemen and 1858.] LONDON DINNER PARTIES. 275 ladies. Then, after the usual remarks concerning the heat of the weather and the odoriferousness of the Thames, the solemn procession goes down to the salle a manger. " Slowly and sadly we sat us down," and precisely the same dishes in exactly the same order are placed under our noses, exactly at the same moment. Then, after the normal lapse of an hour and a half, the usual struggle of crinolines takes place, and the ladies soar to the supernal regions. The male survivors pretend to be relieved, and to draw nearer and affect to talk politics, although nothing is ever said, and pretend to drink wine, although not a pint is consumed. Then after the normal twenty minutes are past, the solemn question, " A little more wine ? " is pro- pounded, and the procession with funeral gravity moves upstairs as if they had all met to pay the last homage to a deceased friend, and were glad to have accomplished the rite in a becoming manner. After coffee, the party is sometimes strengthened by a fresh infusion of new company from without, and the languid circulation is thus improved, and then you eclipse yourself when you like, or remain till twelve o'clock, draining the cup to the dregs. To descend to particulars. On Sunday I drove out with A. Eussell, by invitation, to Pembroke Lodge, Eichmond, to make a visit to Lord and Lady John Eussell. I have already described him to you, and I have nothing to add to that picture. His manner, especially in his own house, is more pleasing than I had expected. His voice is gentle, and his address is not restrained or even indifferent. We sat in the drawing-room till a shower was over, and then we walked about the grounds with Lord John. This place is one given, or rather lent, to him by the Queen for his life, and is built in the royal park, and has a magnificent view of the Thames scenery, with all the rich combinations of bosky bourn and sunny glade, and cottage chimneys, that smoke beneath the ancient oak Milton so loved to paint. I think the ' Allegro ' and 4 Penseroso ' must have been written on the top of Eichmond Hill. Lady John Eussell looks like her brother, Henry Elliot, from whom she said she had often heard of me. They have several children, the youngest a pretty little girl. The T 2 276 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. IX. cottage is simply and plainly furnished. It was pleasant enough to see the ex-Premier under his own vine and fig-tree. He is a very good politician and statesman, and a model pere de famille. They wished me to appoint another day to come out to luncheon. I dined afterwards with Mrs. Norton. She made the dinner for me, but she was somewhat disappointed in her company, several of the persons that she wanted, among others Delane, having been engaged. The company consisted of the Marquis of Lansdowne ; Lord Dufferin, and his mother, Lady Dufferin ; the "young couple" of whose name I think I have already informed you ; Mr. Har- court ; Hayward, the Quarterly Keviewer and universal diner out ; the Earl of Clifford, and Sir Hamilton Seymour, the man who was Minister in Petersburg at the time when the " sick man " gave the Czar Nicholas so much anxiety. I believe I have already described the individuals composing the troop thus enumerated, except the two last-named indi- viduals. Sir H. Seymour is not especially describable. He is obviously intelligent, caustic, and apparently good-humoured, and with a good deal of the usage du monde to be expected in a veteran diplomatist. He is still comparatively young, but has laid himself up on a pension. Lord Clifford is the eldest son of the Marquis of Tweeddale, is an M.P. till he succeeds to his father's peerage, is about thirty-five years old, plain- looking, intelligent, spectacled, and a sculptor of remarkable talent. There is at Dufferin Lodge a marble bust of Lady Dufferin executed by him, which is singularly like and very beautiful, and another one in plaster of her brother, Brinsley Sheridan, which is almost as good. I do not remember any- thing especially worth reporting of this dinner. The conversa- tion rolled on the accustomed wheels. But where two such persons as Mrs. Norton and Lady Dufferin were present, you may imagine that it was not slow. Mrs. Norton, however, was a good deal indisposed, so much so as to be obliged to leave the table. She recovered, however, and remained till 12.30 in her salon, at which hour Hayward and myself retired. The de- scriptions of Mrs. Norton have not been exaggerated. In the noon of her beauty she must have been something wondrous. 1858] CLIVEDEN. 277 On Monday I got a pretty good day's work in the State Paper Office, and at seven I drove out to Highgate to dine with Lady Dufferin. There was no party, except one young man whose name I forget, and Brinsley Sheridan, with his wife and two daughters. Mr. Sheridan has a good deal of the family fascination, being still very handsome, with a very winning address. One of his daughters is very pretty, and is just engaged to be married to the eldest son of Lord Poltimore. This dinner, although merely a family one, was one of the pleasantest I have been at. When there is one such person at table as Lady Dufferin, of course it makes all the difference. She has known everybody, and tells peppery little anecdotes, strikes out little portraits, and talks on grave and gay subjects with the same animation and brilliancy. Then she paints beautifully, having adorned the panels of her own boudoir with her own pencil, and is perpetually writing clever verses. When well dressed, she is very pretty, but she never could have had the beauty of Mrs. Norton, who has the head of a classic muse, and the eyes of a sibyl. I brought Sheridan into town, who asked me for a lift, that some one else might be accommodated in his carriage, and he made himself very agreeable during the drive. On Thursday I went with Mrs. Norton and Stirling by rail to Cliveden. This is a villa belonging to the Duke of Suther- land, and famous in Pope's verses as " Cliveden's proud alcove," " The bower of wanton Shrewsbury and love," and now in possession of a purer celebrity. I had received an invitation from the Duchess through Mrs. Norton, entirely unawares, as I had never been presented to her ; but, as I have already observed, it was probable that I should be drifted in her direction before I left London. I suppose you will like a description of her. There is something very plenteous and bountiful and sunny in her aspect. She is tall, and very large, and carries herself with a very good-natured stateliness. Her hair is blonde-silvered, her features are large and well chiselled, her smile is very beaming,, and there is benevo- 278 MOTLEY'S LETTEKS. [CHAP. IX. lence and sunshine in every look and word. With her ripe, autumnal, exuberant person, and radiating expression, she looks a personified Ceres, and ought always to be holding a cornucopia in her right hand. She welcomed me like an old friend, shaking hands as if I had known her from the tenderest - infancy; and then we went, being late, to the table, where about twenty-five people were already seated. The company consisted mainly of ladies. There was next me Lady C. Denison, wife of the Speaker of the House of Commons; opposite was Mrs. Van de Weyer, who was affectionate in her greetings, and there were various members of the Carlisle family; Lady Stafford, the daughter-in-law of the Duchess, Lady Blantyre, and a Count and Countess Potofski, Austrian Poles, for whom the party was made; Grenfell, a brother of Mrs. Froude, whom I very often meet in society, and whose father's place adjoins Cliveden ; Miss Weston, cousin of Mrs. Van de Weyer, who has been several years in Europe, and seems ladylike and intelligent, and various others whose names I have forgotten. There was not much done at the party. The view from the house is wonderfully fine, commanding a view of the silver Thames, winding through plains of almost ever green freshness, and masses of ancient foliage, such as England only has to show. The house is modern, and a small palace built by Barry, the painting of the ceiling and panels is by Landseer and other artists, the service of the table of quite regal magnifi- cence, and the strawberries very portentous in size. After the " trifling foolish banquet " we loafed about the grounds, but the whole thing was brought to a rapid termination because the Duchess, who is not living here at the moment, was to go to town by the 4.30 train. This house is only one of a dozen or two palaces, villas, and castles which they possess. Of course they only reside here a few weeks in each year. She charged me to make her a visit very soon at Stafford House, saying that she was always at home about two. On Wednesday morning I breakfasted again with Milnes. The company consisted of two or three English Consuls from foreign parts, Parker the publisher, Mr. Arthur Stanley, cousin 1858.J BREAKFAST WITH MILNES. 279 of Lady Stanley of Alderley, a canon of Christchurch and an eminent divine, whom I had met before at Milman's, Lord Car- lisle, Earl Grey and Lord Stratford de Bedcliffe. I sat next to the two last-named individuals. I had never met Lord Grey before, although I had heard him speak. He told me he knew me very well through the D.E. and I found him rather an entertaining person. He has more talents than many of his brother peers. I see no reason to modify my sentiments on the breakfast system. If the autocrat of the breakfast table had been present, the scene would have been changed indeed. If he could only establish his sway in London, a social revolu- tion would be produced ; and I am quite persuaded that if by accident, without changing any of his other qualities, he could have a palingenesis, and appear as a Howard or Stanley of England, people would gather up his conversation, five baskets full every time he honoured any mahogany. As he was not there I took no notes of anybody's conversation, not even my own, which I flatter myself would exceed in dulness that of any of my competitors. Kingsley gave me a very pressing invitation to visit him at Eversley. Milnes, by the way, is bright, jolly, and amusing, one of the best fellows in London. If he would only shove his entertainments to the other edge of the daylight, and give us cups that inebriate instead of cheering, I should have no fault to find with him. After breakfast I went down to the British Museum. I had been immersed half-an-hour in my MSS., when happening to turn my head round I found seated next to me Thackeray with a file of old newspapers before him writing the ninth number of the ' Virginians.' He took off his spectacles to see who I was, then immediately invited me to dinner the next day (as he seems always to do everybody he meets), which invitation I could not accept, and he then showed me the page he had been writing, a small delicate legible manuscript. After this we continued our studies. I can conceive nothing more harass- ing in the literary way than his way of living from hand to mouth. I mean in regard to the way in which he furnishes food for the printer's devil. Here he is just finishing the number which must appear in a few days. Of course, whether 280 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. IX. ill or well, stupid or fertile, he must produce the same amount of fun, pathos, or sentiment. His gun must be regularly loaded and discharged at command. I should think it would wear his life out. This day I dined at Mr. Danby Seymour's. He is a very good fellow, an M.P., and of the elder branch of the Seymour family. He descends from the famous pro- tector Duke of Somerset, and a less remote Sir Edward Seymour ancestor is the one who made the famous reply to William III., when he landed from Holland. " You are one of the family of the Duke of Somerset ? " asked this king. " JSTo, your majesty," answered Sir Edward, " he is of mine," which was true, the ducal branch being the younger one. They have some fine portraits in the house, one of this same Sir Edward, another of the protector Duke, and a full length, large as life, of Harry VIII., by Holbein. I made the acquaintance of Mr. Seymour the first time I was at Cambridge House. On being introduced to him he said, " I know you well, I read your book eight years ago." To whom I replied that he was my earliest reader, for he had read it six years before it was published, and we have been great friends ever since. There were not many notables present, and the usual sprinkling of lords and ladies, colonels and M.P.'s. The lady with whom I went to dinner was very lively and sociable Mrs. Yernon Smith, wife of the man of whom you have heard as having been President of the India Board in Lord Palmerston's ministry. They sent me an in- vitation to dinner next day for a few days afterwards, but I was engaged. I eclipsed myself rather early from the evening party which followed the dinner, and went to the Cosmopolitan. Among the usual members who were there, there was one Mr. Yenables, one of the Saturday Keviewers, who told me of a per- sonal compliment which will please you and Lily to hear. He said that he was an intimate acquaintance of Tennyson, and that Tennyson had recently told him that he admired my history more than any he had ever read, and that he had rarely been so much excited by any book. He did not know that I was in town till the day he went away, or would have liked to see me, etc. As this is somewhat different from the lanalites 1858.] HARROW SPEECHES. 281 of every day, I thought I would sink my blushes and let you hear it. On Thursday morning Dean and Mrs. Milman called in their carriage to take me to Harrow to hear what are called the " Harrow Speeches," to which I had received an invitation from Dr. Vaughan, the head master. This affair is very much like our college commencement. The prize boys speak Latin, Greek, and English orations and poems, and there are also a few scenes from French, German, and English plays acted. The declamation was of a very inferior description. When they acted, however, and so got out of themselves into somebody else, it was quite different, and although their pronunciation of French and German was stunning to unprepared ears, their performance in other respects was rather light and airy. After the exercises were over, the invited guests went to a collation in the head master's house. Lord Palmerston, who rode down, a distance of ten miles, and back, was called on first after the banquet in the usual form. It is not fair to criticize such performances, for certainly there never was a more senseless ceremony than this, of calling men out to make speeches when they have nothing in the world to say. I went up afterwards to the churchyard of Harrow-on-the- Hill to see the tomb on which Byron used to be fond of sitting when he was at school there. The view is a very extensive panorama and very English and beautiful. We got back to town just in time to dress for dinner. I dined with the Rothschilds. This is the Baron Lionel, about whom the row as to his seat in Parliament has been so long reproducing itself. It seems probable that next week the Bill will pass, and that he will take his seat as member for London, to which office he has been so often elected. His wife is very nice, with much esprit, intelligence and cultivation. There was the married daughter of the house, the wife of course of another Kothschild l (for the Rothschilds all marry Eothschilds), who is very beautiful and perfectly Hebrew and Oriental. A pale face, arched brows, eyes and hair of the blackest, with a gentle, pretty manner and a petite figure, are her character- 1 Baroucss Alphonsc- cle Rothschild. 282 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. IX. istics. Then there is a younger daughter of their father's house, unmarried, and a son too. Besides these were Hay ward, Villiers, brother of Lord Clarendon, the Honourable Geo. Byng, rejoicing in the appellation of " Poodle Byng," and nobody else. I sat next to Mme. Kothschild and so did very well. On Friday I called at Stafford House. The Duchess was at home, and after I had been there a little while invited me to go to luncheon. This is, in fact, a 2.30 dinner as you know, consisting of soup, boiled and roast, pastry and fruit, like any other dinner, is an institution at first devised to keep the strong in awe, for who has the strength to eat two dinners in one day ? Of course there was no company, and I only came to make a morning call. There were the Duke, Lady Stafford, and Lady Blantyre. After the refection the Duchess showed me all over the house. Descriptions of houses are not much. Suffice it to say, that this is the best private palace in London. The double staircase especially is very broad and stately, and the wide entrance hall is ornamented with fine groups of statuary by modern sculptors nothing very remarkable, but very good as furniture. I think there are few of the palaces in Genoa with so fine an entrance and staircase. The rooms are all very grand and gilded, the " enervating saloons," to get an invita- tion to which Roebuck complains of the baseness perpetrated by members of Parliament, and the gallery is very handsome. I was disappointed in the pictures. With the exception of two Murillos from the Soult collection, ' Abraham Entertaining the Angels,' and ' The Eeturn of the Prodigal Son,' both of which are treated with a dramatic energy unusual with Murillo, and with his richest and strongest colour with these two signal exceptions there are hardly any first-rate pictures. After passing a very agreeable hour or two in this way I took my leave. I dined that day with the Sturgis's. By the way, Milnes, the other day, being invited by Lady Palmerston to dinner, declined on the ground of a previous engagement. She begged him to decline the previous engagement. " No," says Milnes, " whatever else I may be, I am an honest diner out." The party at the Sturgis's had few persons that I knew. I went to dinner with Mrs. Mansfield, mother of 1858.] LOKD STANHOPE. 283 General Mansfield, who at the age of forty has already acquired great reputation and rank in India. She is originally from Baltimore, she told me, but has been in England ever since her marriage. Then there were a Mr. and Mrs. Ponsonby ; she a very pretty woman and sister to Lady Stanley of Alderley. I do not remember anything worthy of note at the dinner, which, like all those at the Sturgis's, was very good, they have almost the best cuisine in London. At eleven o'clock we adjourned to Lansdowne House, where there was a private concert, to which the Sturgis's as well as myself were invited. The concert room is very spacious and elegantly decorated. The musicians were Yiardot, Garcia, Grisi, Mario, Graziani, and others. The room was, however, very hot, and it was difficult to get a good place, so that as a concert I cannot say that I enjoyed it much. It was not a very general party, only several large spoonfuls of the cream of the cream. I do not remember any people of whom I have not spoken, except some members of the Koyal Family, the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge, and the Princess Augusta. But to tell you the truth I forgot to look at them, and so cannot describe them to you, saving the Duke of Cam- bridge, who stood near me about five minutes. I had a good deal of talk as usual with Mrs. Norton, Lady Dufferin, Mme. Kothschild, and other old acquaintances. The Duchess of Manchester was there also, a very pretty blonde, with a wreath of gold scallop shells in her hair. The Marchioness of Stafford was there also, and these two are considered the prettiest women in London. Next day I worked pretty well at the S.P.O. for a few hours, but there is no doubt that my time is a good deal cut up, and although I shall get through my work pretty soon, yet I could have accomplished it all by this time, and sooner, had I been entirely unknown. Breakfasts, luncheons, and visits, consume valuable hours in this wide wilderness. I went in the after- noon to return a visit to Lord Stanhope, who had called on me the day before. He is better known to the world at large under the name of Lord Mahon, which he bore when he wrote the ' History of England from the Peace of Utrecht,' a work 284 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CiiAi-. IX. which has a high reputation, and was favourably reviewed on its first appearance by Macaulay. He is a distinguished per- sonage in the way of letters, science and art, and I found him particularly agreeable. He is a slender, thin man, with hand- some features, curly hair, and spectacles. He showed me the MS. of Byron's i Curse of Minerva/ in which almost every word had been altered, so numerous were the corrections ; also a very pretty valentine of some thirty lines, written by Macaulay to his (Lord Stanhope's) little daughter. Afterwards I drove down to Chiswick, to dine with Lord Carlisle. The company consisted of William Prescott and his wife, who are on their way to America, sailing next Saturday ; a Mr. Calvert, a very entertaining and intelligent Englishman, who is Consul in the East, and has a farm on the ruins of Troy ; Lord Granville ; the Speaker of the House of Commons, and his wife, Lady Charlotte Denison ; Lord and Lady Chiches- ter, Lady Shannon, and Colonel and Lady Louisa Pyne. I give you the names just as they would be given by Jenkins, the reporter of fashionable intelligence for the Morning Post. The only notabilities of this party were the Speaker, who is tall, with a good Roman face, which must look uncom- monly well in the wig. He seemed good-humoured, and sufficiently reasonable, and I daresay looks very stately in his costume. Lord Granville was Minister of Foreign Affairs in Palmerston's Government, is small, bright, boyish-looking, young, and very agreeable. He has a decided resemblance to Longfellow in manner and visage. Lady Charlotte, the Speaker's wife, is a good-natured, cultivated person, whom I have met several times. The rest of the company were commonplace folks, not worth describing, except that you will like to hear a word of the Prescotts. They came over with the AVhartons from Calais, who have gone for the summer to the Isle of Wight, so that you will not see them, I am sorry to say. They speak of Prescott, the father, as very well, and wishing to write, but restrained by the physicians and friends. He is more popular here than ever. After returning to town at eleven, I went to a rather small party at the Palmerstons/ 1 1858.] "OWEN MEREDITH" AND "TOM BROWN." 285 To his Wife. London, July 4th, 1858. MY DEAEEST MARY, This will be but a short and dull letter. I wrote you an unconscionably long one last Sunday. To-day, and for several days past, I have been very much indisposed. You need not be in the least degree alarmed. It is only my old enemy, difficulty of breathing, but it is so obstinate and unrelenting that it makes me incapable of work or amusement, and depresses me very much. There is not the least need of your worrying yourself, for it is only what I have been suffering from for half my life, and I daresay, after a few days or weeks longer, it will pass away. I should not mention it at all, except by way of excuse for my inability to write anything to amuse you much this week. It does not prevent my daily occupations, but it rather neutralises them. I go to the S.P.O. every day, but it is difficult for me to work, and I dine out every evening, but it is a supplice to talk or to eat. Last Sunday I passed an hour at Mrs. Norton's. Among other persons there was Lytton, 1 the son of Sir E. B. Lytton. I met him afterwards the same evening, and he made me a formal speech about the D.E., saying it was a great privilege to know the author, etc. He is a handsome young man, and very clever, having published some poems, which are good, under the nom de plume of " Owen Meredith." Sunday evening, I drove out to Wimbledon, and dined with Hughes, the author of ' Tom Brown's School-days,' a book which has had a great run, and is generally admired. He had invited me once before, but I was engaged. Hughes is an excellent fellow, very plain, unsophisticated and jolly, of course full of talent. He is not a professional author, but a working barrister. His wife is a pretty and pleasing person, and they live in a pretty cottage near Wimbledon Common. Kingsley was expected, but did not come, which was also the case with Lord and Lady Goderich, who were prevented by illness. The only persons present besides ourselves were Mrs. Phillips, wife 1 The present Earl of Lytton. 286 MOTLEY'S LETTEKS. [CHAP. IX. of the artist ; a gentleman whose name I have forgotten, and a Lady somebody. The dinner was plain, but it was san gene, the conversation less guindee and conventional than is cus- tomary in London. Monday I went out with A. Kussell by appointment to Hatfield, a celebrated country-house of the Elizabethan period, originally presented to Eobert Cecil, first Earl of Salisbury, and now inhabited by his descendant the present Marquis of Salisbury. A part of the house remains as it was originally built, the other portion was burned some years ago, together with the mother of the present proprietor, but has been re- stored in the same style. It is a rambling, zigzag structure of brick, with gables, turrets, and oriels, a superb dining-room, oak-ceilinged and wainscoted and floored, a fine library, superb views of park scenery and distant hills from the windows, and stately avenues of lime-trees and horse-chestnuts. Then there are various portraits of the great Lord Burleigh and his greater son, Queen Elizabeth, and other historical personages, which have a peculiar interest for me, as I happen to be writing about them. And there are also formal old-fashioned gardens, with clipped yew hedges, and alleys, and fish-ponds, and con- servatories. Descriptions of palaces are a bore, and I will not describe. We had luncheon in the antique banqueting-room. There are also in the library some private papers of the famous Lord Burleigh, which I should like very much to have the ran- sacking of, although I have hundreds of them in the archives ; but Lord Salisbury, I have always understood, does not wish any one to see them, so that I did not allude to the subject. I dined this day with Sir Charles Lyell. The Prescotts, whom it is always a pleasure to meet, both on their own account and their father's, were there, and Mr. and Mrs. Lyell. James Lawrence came in the evening. He is just come out alone for rheumatism, and is going straight to the Continent. I regret very much to say that he gives an unsatisfactory account of Prescott. He is kept on a very low diet, and I fear such great precaution is rather alarming. Next day I had a quiet dinner at Mackintosh's, almost the first time I have dined in London except at a dinner party, and 1858.] S. WILBERFOECE LORD SHAFTESBURY. 287 I was very glad of the repose. I like them both very much and they have been very friendly to me. She always tells me to send her kindest regards to you. I am very weary of sitting at good men's feasts or bad ones. I have dined out about forty days in succession, and I am now inclined to go into the wilderness and fast forty days, but I have about a dozen invitations ahead. On Wednesday I breakfasted with Lord Stanhope. I think I spoke of him in my last letter. Lady Stanhope is very agreeable, with a very sweet face, one of the persons I like best in London. I have nothing special to say of this entertainment except merely to mention the names of the guests, and I suppose that you will like to hear them. Macaulay did not come, which is the third time I have been disappointed of meeting him at breakfast. Each time he has been obliged to excuse himself on account of illness, and I am afraid that he is in a very bad way. His cough is certainly very alarming, and each time when I have met him at dinner he has had a very alarming fit of it. The persons who did come were Milnes, whom it is always pleasant to meet ; the Bishop of Oxford, whom I have met once or twice before at breakfast, and who is a solid, thickset man, agreeable iu conversation, and a splendid orator .... Lord and Lady Shaftesbury, Lord Powis, and one or two more. Lady Shaftes- bury is daughter to Lady Palmerston, and is a fresh, handsome woman, although one of her younger sons has just set forth to make a tour in America. England is certainly the paradise of grandmothers. Lord Shaftesbury has made himself distin- guished by promoting all sorts of charities, is strong about Sabbath-breaking, and is in general one of the leaders of the Exeter Hall political pietists. He is very lugubrious about the present aspect of affairs in England, and assured me that he considered the country fast rolling down the hill into the abyss of democracy. This day I dined with Mr. Nassau Senior, a noted writer on political economy, an Edinburgh reviewer, and an ex-professor. Latterly he has travelled much in Greece, and his MS. journals are lent about London and Paris. He is friendly and hospitable 288 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. IX. and very repandu. His son is a big, burly barrister in spectacles. His son's wife, Mrs. Nassau Senior, junior, is pretty, very fair, with a wonderful profusion of gilt flaxen crinkle-crankled hair, and a remarkably fine voice, with which she discoursed after dinner much eloquent music. She is sister to Tom Hughes, alias Tom Brown. Phillips the artist and his wife, both sensible, agreeable people, were the only ones of the company I knew. On Thursday I went with the Sturgises and Incheses, after an early dinner, to the Princess Theatre to see the * Merchant of Venice.' It was crowded, hot, and uncomfortable. I had afterwards for the same evening an invitation, which of course I could not accept, from Lady W. Eussell to go with her to Covent Garden Opera. This house I have not yet seen, and it is very large and handsome. However, I did not care much more about going to the one or the other. The Queen was there, and of course rather a brilliant crowd. Friday I dined with Lady Mary Fielding and her father the Earl of Denbigh. They sent me an invitation to dinner for either Friday or Saturday, so I took Friday. The family is distinguished for two things for claiming to be the elder branch of the imperial house of Austria, calling themselves Counts of Hapsburg, and having the double-headed eagle on their spoons ; and for numbering the immortal Henry Fielding among the scions of their house. The party was almost a family one, there being about five ladies, Fielding, and two or three colonels of the same name. Besides these were Max Muller, the famous Oxford philosopher, a very learned though comparatively a young man, and Arthur Stanley, of whom I have spoken to you before. He has asked me to dinner three times, but I have always been engaged. I chronicle these names and very important facts, because I have nothing else in the world to say. Of course you do not care to hear how many " dead letters " I read in the State Paper Office, or any of the details regarding my diggings generally. Saturday, having a few days before found Noel's card on my table, I went up to Lady Byron's, but found that they were again flown. It is in vain to attempt to see anybody in London except by positive appointment. Lady Byron was at 1858.] CHISWICK HOUSE. 289 home by a sea-coal fire (for the weather has become as unblushingly cold as it was hot a week ago ) ; she is pretty well for her, and was pleased to see me. This day I dined again with Lord Carlisle. The Milmans were going also, and took me in their carriage to Chiswick House, about five or six miles from Hyde Park Corner. It is always pleasant to go to Lord Carlisle's, he is so unaffectedly cordial and even affec- tionate, that it would be impossible not to be fond of him. He has been more attentive to me than anybody in London, except the Kussells and Mrs. Norton, and I like him ex- tremely (I mean, of course, of my new acquaintances). The company, besides the Milmans, consisted of Mr. Ball, a M.P., who has been an under secretary, and his wife, who is a Venetian, speaking hardly any English, who sat next me, and was quite delighted when she found I could speak French ; Macaulay, who came contrary to expectation, but has a very bad cough and looks very feeble ; Mr. Labouchere, once Minister for the Colonies, and his wife, Lady Mary, sister of Lord Carlisle ; Mr. C. Howard, his brother ; Lord and Lady Wensleydale, Sir David Dundas, who is just going to America, and two Members of Parliament. Nothing very memorable occurred. Macaulay did not talk so much as usual, although he seemed in good spirits enough. He was speaking with me after we went upstairs upon American matters, when he was seized with two or three violent fits of coughing. Soon after he went away, and everybody seemed to feel anxious about him. Lady Mary Labouchere is as kind-hearted and agreeable as the rest of the family. I had never met her before, but she treated me like an old acquaintance, invited me to go out to their country place to-morrow to lunch, and see the churchyard where Gray's * Elegy ' was written, and to dine with her in town next Wednesday. Lord Wensleydale is the Baron Parke about whose life peerage there was such a row a year or two ago. It was finally settled by making him a peer tout bonnement, with remainder to his lawful issue, but as he and his wife are about seventy-five years old each, and have no sons as yet, it seems likely enough that it will remain a life peerage. I VOL. i. u 290 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. IX. stopped at Cambridge House coming up, where, as usual, on Saturdays, there was an assembly. Lady Palmerston is always kind enough to invite me ; passed an hour or two there, and I returned at one o'clock. To-day I dine at Holland House, which historical mansion I will describe in my next. God bless you, dearest Mary ; take care of my darling children, kiss them all three a thousand times, and believe me, Most affectionately yours, J. L. M. To Us Wife. London, July llth, 1858. MY DEAREST MARY, I am not able to give you any new sketches of celebrities. Having seen nearly all the prominent people in London, chalked them out taut Hen que mal for your entertainment, I can now do little more than send you, like Jenkins, a list of the nobility and gentry that I meet daily at dinner and other parties. Sunday, I paid my weekly visit to Mrs. Norton, and found her as agreeable and interesting as she always is. Her talent for conversation is almost as remarkable as her beauty, and even superior to her poetic genius. I dined afterwards at Holland House. This is a quaint, antique old manor house belonging to the early period of James I., but having the general characteristics of the Elizabethan mansion. Built of brown brick, with turrets and gables, mullioned oriel windows, terraces, stately stair- cases, tapestried rooms, and painted ceilings, it is, on not a very large scale, one of the most beautiful country houses that it is possible to conceive. It is approached by a noble avenue of lime trees, is surrounded by an ample lawn, dotted with oaks, pastures, " where the nibbling sheep doth stray," and by a vast park of splendid forest trees, while close to the house are trim gardens, with clipt hedges, sundials, fountains, and statues, and " a lush of flowers " sufficient to gladden the soul of John Keats, and all this in what might be called the heart of London, certainly in its pericardium. 1858.] HOLLAND HOUSE. 291 Kensington, near which country village Holland House once stood, is already swallowed into the all-devouring stomach of London, assimilated into the brick and mortar chyle out of which the life of that gigantic organisation is perpetually reproduced and enlarged. " Kensington Gore " is a recognised street of London, and the avenue gates of Holland House open really upon a continuation of Piccadilly. There was a dis- cussion yesterday where I was dining about the value of the place for building purposes. Lord Clarendon said it would bring in an income of 6,000 a year ; and Eothschild, who sat next me, said it was worth 150,000 at least. Yet the present Lord Holland only lives here about six weeks in the year, residing the rest of the time in Naples, where he has a fine house, as in Paris. He is a singularly agreeable person in his manners. I went out there this day, having received an invitation on very brief acquaintance, and expecting to find myself rather awkwardly placed among strangers. I got there about eight (having been invited for 7.30, and this is punctuality itself), and there were but two persons in the room. In the twilight I did not recognise them, but presently I observed the familiar proboscis of Lord Brougham wagging in a friendly manner towards me. He and another gentleman, commonly called Bear Ellice, were the only persons there. Brougham was very cross at waiting for his dinner, having been there half an hour, and Lord Holland had not shown himself. Presently he came in and apologised by saying that Lady Holland was taken ill and could not appear. Brougham's wrath was mollified, and he became very agreeable. Lord and Lady Lyndhurst soon arrived, and with a few others, including the Due de Richelieu and some persons whose names I did not hear, the party was complete. Lord Holland made me sit next to him, and Lady Lyndhurst was on the other side, so that I felt perfectly at home. Lords Lyndhurst and Brougham were chaffing each other as usual. Nothing can be more genial, genuine, and delightful than Lyndhurst's manner. He is particularly kind and friendly to me on all occasions, made me come and sit with him after dinner, and we talked together for half an hour. He always u 2 292 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. IX. expresses much interest in my studies and writings, but it is not for tkat that I like his society, but because of the magni- ficent spectacle he affords of a large bright intellect setting in " one unclouded blaze of living light," without any of the dubious haze which so often accompanies the termination of a long and brilliant career. Everybody looks up to him with reverence and delight. He is full of fun, always joking, always genial, and alive to what is going on around him from day to day. He has made two or three very good speeches this session, and is going to make another, and there is not a sign of senility in anything that he says. The next day I went by invitation to Stoke Park to luncheon. This is the beautiful country seat of Mr. and Lady Mary Labouchere. He is a man eminent in politics, of great wealth and formerly a Cabinet Minister, as Secretary for the Colonies. She is the youngest sister of Lord Carlisle and the Duchess of Sutherland, and the most amiable creature living. Indeed the whole family seems somehow or other to have absorbed more gallons apiece of the milk of human kindness than would serve for the average allowance of several hundred individuals. It is certainly agreeable to see people in high station and with vast wealth so overflowing with benevolent virtues. Chill penury could certainly not suppress their noble rage, but in my experience I have found that luxury sometimes has as refrigerating an effect upon the " genial currents of the soul " as poverty itself. These delicious ex- pressions, which you recognise, are bits from that immortal, monumental poem, the i Elegy in the Country Churchyard,' are very a propos at this moment, for the i Elegy' was composed on this very spot. It was to see the church and churchyard that they asked me out to dine. There was no company except Lord Carlisle (whom I may call now my inti- mate friend, for he is untiring in his demonstrations of regard for me), his brother Charles Howard and his mother-in-law Lady Wensleydale. We walked over the grounds, went to a bit of the old manor house once the residence of Sir Chris- topher Hatton, and then round about the churchyard. It is exactly what it ought to be ; and as almost every line 1858.] STOKE PARK GRAY'S 'ELEGY.' 293 of that poem has lingered in my memory ever since I used to recite it when a small boy to my dear mother, I enjoyed the exquisite fidelity of the description to the actual scenery, which is as remarkable as, on the other hand, its broad lofty and stately moralisation, which would be almost as true in a graveyard in Wisconsin or Connecticut as in Buckingham- shire. " The rugged elm and yew trees' shade " are still there, embowering the little church, which stands on the edge of Stoke Park ; and the little enclosures, " where heaves the turf in many a mouldering heap," have been literally ploughed into furrows by the long succession of sowers and reapers in God's acre. The " ivy mantled tower," where the " moping owl doth to the moon complain" is still covered with its luxuriant festoons, but I regret to say that the ivy looks sickly and as if decaying. The church itself is one of the most exquisite of English country churches, and this is saying enough. The only thing I missed was the village. There is none in sight ; and (at present at least) there is not much in the stately and sequestered aristocratic park to suggest all those rural pic- tures which the musing, melancholy poet painted, and the " rude forefathers of the hamlet " driving t'heir teams afield, the busy housewives' evening care, and children climbing the paternal knee. All is very still and silent, and nothing like profane vulgar intrudes upon the calm and exclusive scene. This is what I missed most in the locality. For the rest it is perfect. Gray lies buried in the same grave with his mother, and a plain monument, inscribed with some of the best lines of the elegy, has been erected in the park. I had to hurry to town because I had to dine out. This day it was at Lady Williams, with whom I dined once before. She is a very clever person, original and rather funny, and receives the best company in London. There is nothing very remarkable to say of the entertainment. Now that I have described to you many dinners, the rest hardly require to be sung. There are the same dishes, the same wines, the same solemn stillness, the- same gorgeous flunkeys, and a score of p ersonages of quality, the same even if different, for one lord differeth less from another in glory than do the stars in their 294 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. IX. courses. To-day were again Lord Brougham and Lord Lyndhurst at dinner, whom I meet so often that I am gradu- ally getting to mistake myself for an Ex-Chancellor, and shall probably be soon caught propounding legal opinions with oracular gravity and expecting my words to be accepted as oracles. On Tuesday I dined again at Holland House. (I have been invited to dine there four times in a week, so that if they retain their original maternal principle of the Holland House organisation, I have a right to conclude that they do not con- sider me a bore.) The company to-day consisted of the Due d'Aumale (one of the sons of King Louis Philippe) and the Duchesse, Lord and Lady Clarendon, Macaulay, Duvergier d'Hauranne, Lady J. Kussell, and Hayward. It is always de- lightful to meet Macaulay, and to see the reverence with which he is regarded by everybody ; painful to observe the friendly anxiety which every one feels about his health. Sir H. Holland told me his complaints were bronchial and asthmatic, but I should have thought them more like dropsy. He was obliged to leave the table for a few minutes on account of a spasm of coughing, which has been the case ever since I have met him. I think, unless he is much changed, that Sydney Smith's descriptions or rather flings at him are somewhat unjust. He is not in the least the " colloquial oppressor " he has been represented. On the contrary, every one wishes to hear him talk, and very often people are disappointed because he does not talk enough. To be sure, a mind so brimful as his must spout forth uncontrollably, if you once pull out the plug ; nevertheless he is always willing to shut himself up again, if anybody else wishes to pour himself out. Usually nobody does where he is present. His conversation is, however, rather learned and didactic than spirituette. His " brilliant flashes " are only those of silence, according to Sydney's memorable sarcasm. This is strange, for in his writings he is brilliant and . flashing almost to painfulness, but I observe nothing pointed or epigrammatic or humorous in his talk. It is very wise and very instructive, but not the kind to set the table in a roar. 1858.] CASSIOBURY PARK. 295 Lord and Lady Clarendon I meet very often ; they are very civil to me, and are both among the most agreeable people in London. You are aware that he is one of the most eminent political characters in England, having been a long time a Foreign Minister, and subsequently Minister of Foreign Affairs. He is a tall, thin, handsome, aristocratic-looking person. His wife is a blonde, very young for her age, whatever it may be, with an amiable manner. On Wednes- day morning I went out by rail to Cassiobury Park, seat of the Earl of Essex, to which place I had received an invitation to a fete ehampetre or luncheon party. In the com- partment in which I went were Mrs. Norton, Lady Stanley, Lord and Lady Airlie, and Lord Stratford de Kedcliffe. The party was brilliant, the park magnificent, the house stately. There is nothing very exhilarating to be said of the party. They are generally somewhat slow these same country festivities. If it were not for Mrs. Norton I should be often bored on such occasions. But she can create an oasis in the most arid place, where one can listen to the constant and musical gurgle of her witty or thoughtful conversation and be refreshed. The luncheon was a kind of brief and somewhat scrambling dinner. The Duke of Cambridge, at the board's end, stolid and manful, flanked by Malakoff, looking like a military Silenus; and at the right of Lord Essex was the Princess Edward of Saxe- Weimar. I cannot give you a list of the other swells who were present, for I forget the names almost as soon as I hear them. The grounds and the gardens, the park and the lawn, looked very brilliant with the rainbow-coloured petals of the female flowers blooming out so suddenly in all directions, but not to blush unseen, nor to waste their sweetness, and the "whole dream of fair women " was as successful as such things usually are. If I were Boccaccio or Tennyson, instead of a somewhat slow and cynical Dryasdust, I dare say I could paint wondrous pictures of romance and poetry upon such a canvas as was here unrolled ; but in my commonplace frame of mind, the scene was commonplace. As usual I had to fidget into town before I was ready, in order to be in time to dress. 296 MOTLEY'S LETTEKS. [CHAP. IX. To-day Lord Lyndhurst gave me a dinner, the company being invited to meet me. This is a compliment of which I am very proud. The party was a small one. There was Lord Carlisle, Lord Granville, Lord Wensleydale, Mr. Greville, Sir E. Landseer, Lord Ashburton, and Lord Sefton, a youth who reminded me somewhat of W , being very lively, boyish, and rattling ; and it was too funny to hear him speak incidentally of doing something or other in the House of Lords, with the rest of the hereditary legislators. The party was particularly cosy and agreeable, more so than almost any I have assisted at. I consider it a privilege to have known so well and seen so much of Lord Lyndhurst. This day he was even more genial and sunny than usual. Lady Lynd- hurst is always kind and obliging. On Friday I dined with Lord Granville. I hardly think it worth my while to rack my memory to give you a list of the twenty persons present. The lady next me was agreeable and handsome, and opposite me was a remarkably pretty woman. I knew their names once, but have now forgotten. On my right was rather an amusing personage who had just arrived from the Cape of Good Hope, and had been in Cuba and the United States. Then there was a gigantic and agreeable Russian named Count Pahlen, and a famous homeopathic doctor, Quin, and a mass of others whom I do not remember even indistinctly. Next day I dined with Vernon Smith. He was once of the Palmerston Cabinet, as Secretary of the Board of Con- trol for India. He is a handsome man and popular in society. His wife is a very pretty young woman of fifty, a not very rare genus in England, and an agreeable, lively, sociable person. The company were the Eothschilds, Baron, Baroness, and daughter, whom I have already described to you ; the Marchioness of Clanricarde and her daughter ; Lord and Lady Clarendon, Lord St. Germans, and Mrs. Dyce Sombre. The latter personage was the one whom I escorted to dinner. I had received an invitation to dine the same day with Lady Palmerston, but could not accept it, but I went there in the evening. There were but few persons, not a party Lady William Russell, Lord Shaftesbury, who invited me to 1858.] LONDON DINNERS. 297 make a visit to him at his country place, as has also Lord Stanhope, Lord Carlisle, and many others, which invitations of course I cannot accept. Kennedy of Baltimore was there also. I called this morning on them. I have got to the end of my fourth sheet, dearest Mary. I dine to-day with Monckton Milnes ; to-morrow with Lord Ashburton, and so on ; and there is a ball to-morrow night at the Duchess of Wellington's, to which I shall probably go. God bless you and my dear children. Kiss them a million times, and believe me always, Affectionately yours, J. L. M. To his Wife. July 18th, 1858. MY DEAREST MARY, I came up this morning from Walton, where I went yesterday, and found my dear Lily's letter on my table, and was much gratified by it, as also by funny little Susie's delightful epistle. Thank them both, and kiss them, as well as my darling Mary, a hundred times. I also enclose a letter from .my mother just received, and you will be glad to hear that she is decidedly better. I wrote to her by the last mail, and shall very soon write again. I will now huddle up very rapidly what I have been doing so far as society is concerned, premising that I have now finished with London, and that I have declined all invitations for this week. On Sunday I dined with Monckton Milnes. His wife I had seen for the first time the evening before at Lady Palmerston's. The dinner was small, consisting of two Frenchmen, one, the editor of the Siecle, who never could hear himself talk enough, and a Marquis de Kibere, a Legitimist, married to an English- woman, an agreeable and intelligent person. I have nothing more to say of this festivity. Next day I dined at Bath House, the splendid mansion in Piccadilly of Lord Ashburton. He is the son of the first Lord Ashburton, and the head of the second branch of the Barings. He is an exceedingly shy, almost 298 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. IX. timid, personage, but cultivated and friendly. He has a very fine collection of paintings in his town house, and still more at his country residence, the Grange, to which he has given me a very pressing invitation. The dinner consisted of Lord and Lady Euston (the niece of Lord Ashburton), Lord and Lady Dufferin, Sir David Dundas, Mr. Drummond, M.P., and Henry Taylor, author of i Philip van Artevelde.' The latter per- sonage, I think, I have not before described to you. He is tall, apparently forty-five or fifty years of age, with a handsome, striking face, with regular features, and long grizzled hair, and a quiet, perfectly English manner. We sat next each other at table, but his conversation was quite as commonplace as mine, or any other Christian; it is impossible to chronicle anything concerning it. I liked him, on the whole, as well as any literary man whom I have met, always excepting Froude. I had a good deal of talk with Lady Dufferin after dinner, whom it is always delightful to meet. In the evening I went, with the rest of the world and wife, to the Duchess of Wellington's ball. Apsley House is, on the whole, the finest private palace in London, except Stafford House. The staircase, corridors, entrance-hall, are all spacious and imposing ; a heroic, colossal, and very detestable statue of Napoleon salutes you in the vestibule, and there are several portraits of him, as well as of great English generals and com- panions in arms of the Iron Duke, upon the walls of the various saloons. The great dancing hall is very large and lofty, hung in cherry colour, but, being well gilded and gas-lighted, is, not- withstanding, very brilliant, and the other rooms en suite are elegant and palatial. As I know a great many people now, I amused myself well enough for a couple of hours, although, as a general rule, I enjoy nothing in London but dinner parties, not because I want to eat, which you know is not my faiblesse, but because it is impossible to talk with any comfort except in a demi-couchant attitude, and as my toes have ceased to be fantastic, the dancing hall has no attractions for me, and makes me rather dismal. " They have dancing shoes with nimble soles I have sole of lead," etc. I cannot say, however, in my capacity of spectator, that the actors in such scenes 1858.] LOKD WENSLEYDALE. 299 seem inspired by any very wild excitement. Their tameness is shocking to me, as was that of the " beasts that roared over the plain " to the late Alexander Selkirk. On Tuesday I dined with the Sturgis's, a small party of English, among whom were Lord Dufferin and Arthur Russell, and Lady Selina Vernon, a great friend of Mrs. Sturgis, next whom I sat at dinner. On Wednesday I dined by myself at the Athenaeum. Thursday afternoon Lord Lyndhurst took me down to the House of Lords, to hear the commencement of the India debate. It is always a great pleasure to me to see Lord Lyndhurst. He is very kind to me, always makes much of me when we meet at dinner (and it has been my privilege to dine very often in company with him), and makes me help him up from his chair, and takes my arm to go upstairs, a dis- tinction I am very proud of. He is a most charming old man, full of fun and wit, interested in everything going on, and, as I am, much occupied with the present as the past, notwith- standing his eighty-six years. His face is very smooth, less wrinkled than mine, so that his brown wig is almost illusory. The debate was rather poor. I heard the Earl of Derby, who was fluent enough and graceful, but tedious as a king. After him came Lord Granville, whom I like so much personally that I was very glad to find him a very good orator, with an admirable sonorous voice, and with some humour in his style of speaking. I was obliged to go off in the middle of his speech, because I had promised to go down to Walton to dine (they moved there yesterday), it being Mrs. Sturgis's birth- day. I came up the following morning, being engaged to dine with Lord and Lady Wensleydale. The party was rather made for me, I believe, as I had the honour of going with Madame to dinner. He is the famous Judge, Baron Parke, a shrewd, keen, quick, lively, jolly personage. She is, not unjustly, vain of getting into the peerage in her old days, and of having her stock mingled with the blood of all the Howards, her daughter, now dead, having been the wife of Charles Howard, brother of Lord Carlisle. He is a very kind-hearted, unaffected person, like all the family that I know. The rest 300 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. IX. of the company, so far as I remember them, were the dear old Lord Lyndhurst, Dr. Lushington, Mr. Pemberton Leigh, a distinguished barrister (who I believe once refused the Lord Chancellorship), Mr. Fitzgerald, Under-Secretary of State, Lady Cranworth, Lady W. Kussell, Lady Robert Cecil, and one or two more. After dinner came in a reinforcement from without, among others a person whom I always like to meet Lady Mary Labouchere. The next day I had accepted an invitation to lunch with Lady John Russell, having declined once or twice before. I went out by rail to Richmond. The weather was magnificent, and I walked up the hill from the station, and enjoyed the spacious and far-famed view. There was nobody at Pembroke Lodge except George Elliot, Lady John's brother, and Sir George and Lady Theresa Lewis. He was Chancellor of the Exchequer in the last Administration. Lady Theresa is sister to Lord Clarendon, remarkably clever and spirituelle, full of talk and cultivation. Lord John was very amusing, told lots of anecdotes about i the Duke of Wellington, George IV., and other personages with much sly humour and enjoyment. The popular idea of " Johnny " is that of a cold, cynical, reserved personage, but in his own house I never saw a more agreeable manner. I proceeded afterwards overland to Kingston, whence the rail brought me to Walton, and the quiet scenery and friendly welcome which is the lot of those who are intimate in that beautiful house, is most refreshing. God bless you, my dearest Mary, kiss my dear children, and believe me, Most affectionately yours, J. L. M. 1858.] JOURNEY TO THE HAGUE. 301 To Ms Wife. Oude Doelen, The Hague, July 2Qth, 1858. MY DEAREST MARY, Yesterday, Sunday morning, at 10 A.M., I took the boat for Kotterdam, arrived at that place at 8.30 this morning, and by rail at 9.30 reached this hotel by ten. So that twenty-four hours of discomfort and boredom, mingled with a gale of wind, have saved me a long, tiresome and expensive railroad journey, had I gone any other way. It blew very hard indeed in the morning, so that if I had had you all with me I should not have gone, but luckily the wind was very favourable, and as we steamed away directly before it, we were not incommoded. It faded out by nightfall. To go back and very rapidly account for myself since I last wrote. On Monday I went to Walton, to rest a little and breathe the delicious country air, but after two pleasant days, during which Mount Felix and its occupants were as delightful and friendly as ever, went over to Lord Lovelace's. Previously, on the Tuesday, Julia Sturgis and I drove over to Twickenham, where her boys are at a private school, attended and were some- what amused by the distribution of prizes, two of which fell to little Julian and one to Harry, and then brought them home in a very jolly frame of mind for the holidays. By appoint- ment I went to East Horsley Towers on Wednesday, and stayed till Friday morning. I like Lady Annabella King, the daughter of Ada Byron, very much. She has much talent, very agreeable manners, and a good deal of fun, plays and paints admirably, and has evidently a very sweet disposition. I returned to town on Friday, found there a very kind note from Lady Palmerston inviting me to Brocket Hall for the three days which had just expired (I having been absent all the week, had not received the note). I was sorry to miss this, as Hayward told me that the party was very pleasant and " Pam " in excellent spirits. Friday, I dined at the Athenaeum, along with Hayward, who amuses me with his malicious little anecdotes about everybody who ever is or was in London ; Sir Henry Rawlinson, the cele- 302 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. IX. brated Orientalist ; the Prince Frederick of Schleswig-Holstein, one of the deposed family of claimants to the buried Majesty of Denmark, and a very accomplished and agreeable young man of much character and talent whom I met very often, and, fourthly, Kinglake, author of * Eothen.' I forget whether you read or liked that remarkable book, but I have read it more than once, and like it exceedingly. It is full to the brim of talent and caustic observation, and I was glad to meet him. There is nothing marquant in his appearance or conversation. He is blond of beard and visage, fortyish in years, with a good eye and a pleasant voice, like most Englishmen. He has thus far made no great figure in Parliament. Good-bye, God bless you, dearest Mary ; excuse the meagreness of this letter, but I thought it better to scribble off a dozen lines rather than delay another day, lest you should be anxious. I am very tired and stupid, not having slept in that confounded boat. Kiss my darlings a thousand times. Ever affectionately, J. L. M. ( 303 ) CHAPTEK X. THE HAGUE. Work at the Hagrue The National Archives Presentation to the Queen of Holland "The House in the Wood" A royal dinner party Prince Frederick The American Kevivalists Lord Dunfermline Family anni- versariesA Dutch literary celebrity The King of Holland Court Fetes Court Ball in Amsterdam Prince Henry The Prince of Orange. To his Wife. The Hague, August 1st, 1858. MY DEAREST MAKY, I wrote you on Monday last, the morning of my arrival in this place. To-day I resume my Sunday letters, although I fear they will be rather meagre in future. This is not so large a town as London. I saw M. Groen van Prinsterer the morning of my arrival. He is going away immediately, to my regret, on a journey of some weeks, and will hardly be back till after my departure. However he has already published a second volume of his documents from the private Archives of the Orange-Nassau family, so that I have no special need of his presence, as everything which I require in that collection is now printed in a most convenient and readable form. With regard to the great collection of national Archives, I have of course immediately plunged over head and ears in them. My old friend, Backhuyzen van der Brink is on the spot. It is of great service to have his intro- duction to the Holland public. Madame Groen, on taking leave of the Queen the day of my arrival, told her that I was here, and the same day I saw Count Bylandt. He told me that the Queen expressed disappointment to him in January that she did not see me in my visit at that time, so that he said he was glad to find that I had kept my promise of return- ing. Count Eandwyk called on me, with Bylandt, the evening of the day of my arrival, and accordingly the next day I addressed 304 MOTLEY'S LETTEES * [CHAP. X. a note to him requesting the honour of a presentation, etc. I received an answer the same morning appointing the interview for 3.30 P.M. Accordingly I drove out at that time to the " House in the Wood " (Huis ten Bosch), in which beautiful little villa in the very heart of the forest she is at present residing, the King being at Wiesbaden. I was received in the large saloon by an elderly maid of honour, who entertained me with discourse on various subjects, social, literary, and political, for a few minutes, and then I was sent for, and she piloted me to her Majesty. The Queen received me at the door, quite without ceremony, with " I am so glad to make your acquaintance, Mr. Motley, pray sit down ;" so she seated herself on her sofa and made me take a fauteuil near it, and then she conversed with me for about half an hour in the most unaffected, simple, and agreeable manner possible. She is tall, very fair, and must have had a great deal of blonde German beauty. She was very simply dressed, but I am sorry for Susie's sake that I have entirely forgotten her costume. Her teeth are beautiful, and her hands small, white, and exquisitely shaped. Her voice is agreeable and she speaks English, not only with great elegance and fluency, but almost entirely without a foreign accent. This by the way was one of the compliments which she paid me, observing "how beauti- fully you speak English," adding, " for to tell you the truth we think we can always tell the difference, and we do not like American English generally so well, but you seem to me to speak like an Englishman," etc. She said a great many things in a very graceful way about the * Dutch Kepublic/ asked me how I came originally to take up the subject, and alluded to various portions of the work, etc. She spoke of Lady W. Kussell as an old friend for whom she had much affection, and expressed disappointment that she had never been at the Hague. We talked a good deal too about Mrs. Norton, of whom she expressed the most unbounded ad- miration for her genius and the charm of her conversation. I hardly remember much more of her conversation. She is cer- tainly very clever, remarkably intelligent, and with a great deal of information on all subjects, a person who has read much and 1858.] THE QUEEN OF HOLLAND. 305 acquired much and with, much capacity for thought on high and important matters. Altogether I have rarely made a morning visit on any lady where the conversation was more fluent, lively, and interesting. The best compliment I can pay her is, that one quite forgets that she is a queen, and only feels the presence of an intelli- gent and very attractive woman. The interview lasted so long as to make me think, contrary to the rule of courts, that I was to take my leave, and I said, " Your Majesty must send me away if I am tiresome," but she said, " No, no, do not go, what have you got to do, do you dine out ? " I said yes, but that was nothing, and it was a long time to the dinner hour. I desired nothing better than to stay, etc. So we talked on some time longer, and then she rose, saying, " Will you have the kindness to dine with me the day after to-morrow at 5.30 ? " Of course I accepted, made my bow and departed. I dined that day with a gentleman, a friend of Groen van Prinsterer's, M. Elout de Soeterwonde, a man of much distinction, literary, cultivated, a member of the States General and a judge. He called on me the day of my arrival, saying, that every Hollander had a right to my acquaintance, etc., and I found his family very pleasant. His wife is a very pretty, pleasing woman, and to my profound astonishment she informed me that she had seven children. They live in a very pretty, old-fashioned house on the edge of the wood called the Huister Noot, not far from the Hotel Bellevue. It was a kind of family party, brothers and sisters-in-law, and so on, but they were all friendly and kind-hearted and intelligent, and I was glad to see something of the interior of the best Holland families. On Friday I dined by appointment with the Queen. The company about sixteen or eighteen in all, male and female were received by a tall chamberlain (nobody was in uniform) and ushered into one of the large saloons. Here, as usual on such occasions, we were all stuck up in a cir- cular row, like the jars in the " Forty Thieves," and presently entered the Queen like Morgiana, and went round dropping a few words into the ears of each. After this process was got through with (and she talked VOL. I. x 306 MOTLEY'S LETTEKS. [CHAP. X. to me a good while), we went to dinner, Queen first alone, then the ladies were all driven in by the master of the cere- monies by themselves, and then the gentlemen followed helter skelter, each having been previously informed where he was to place himself at table, something according to the Peabody system. I hardly knew the names of the company. The Belgian minister and his wife, the Danish minister, Count Kandwyck, a professor of botany, and various ladies of honour, etc. The Queen sat in the middle of the table, the two ministers one on each side of her, I sat opposite her with Count Kandwyck on my right, and a very chatty agreeable maid of honour on my left, who had accompanied the Queen last year to England, and knew a great many people that I knew. The dinner was very good, better on the whole than most of the London dinners, and the only fault was the march of the dishes, which was rapid enough to suit Mr. Cabot. There was no pausing, and as I cannot talk with my mouth full, I was obliged either to hold my tongue half the time, or lose half my dinner. Now strange to say, or very naturally, I have recently a great appetite produced by going into the North Sea every morning before breakfast, a system which I shall keep up as long as I am here, although it costs me two hours and two francs per diem, all of which I begrudge. After dinner (which by the way was in the great circular hall built by Amalia de Solms, wife of Frederic Henry, youngest son of William the Silent, and adorned by magnificent frescoes by the scholars of Rubens), we returned and made another circle in the saloon, had our coffee, and the Morgianic process was repeated. The Queen stopped and talked with me a long time about English society, the Palmerstons, Clarendons, Hollands. She also spoke of Madame Mohl and her husband (of which last couple she spoke with much kindness). By the way, she observed to me the day before that she had never been able to make out whether Madame Mohl wore her own hair or a wig, but I told her she might set her mind entirely at rest on that subject. No human intellect con Id ever conceive, or the hand of man execute such a wonderful Medusa crop, nor would it be within 1858.] THE EOYAL FAMILY OF HOLLAND. 307 the resources of science to manufacture any artificial covering which would stand all the tugging and tossing to which those serpent locks were daily subjected. The Queen agreed with me that there never was a kinder-hearted or more amusing or original little old woman in the world. The next day I had an audience of Prince Frederic, uncle of the King. He had mentioned me as having been presented to the Queen, and of course it was necessary for me to call like- wise upon him. He is a man of sixty, very mild and amiable in character and manners, married to a sister of the King of Prussia, and of the Empress of Russia, and I believe a very noble and unexceptionable character. The interview lasted about three quarters of an hour. He was very frank and cordial, of course made the * Dutch Kepublic ' the principal topic for a long time, and then discoursed on other matters. I do not think I can recollect anything of the conversation, but he seemed very amiable and simple, and was certainly very friendly. He said at parting, he hoped he did not see me for the last time, and I dare say I shall be invited to dine at his country place, where he is staying, a few miles out of town. These matters are a little interruption, but the place is so quiet and small that I have plenty of working hours, whereas in London the enormousness of all dimensions makes one's time shrivel into nothingness, and each day shrinks into an hour so far as any real work is concerned. Ever most affectionately yours, J. L. M. To his Wife. The Hague, August 15th, 1858. MY DEAREST MARY, I work every morning at home two hours before breakfast, then go to the Archives till three, after which, in the course of the day and evening, I get a few hours more. I am more than ever desponding about my task. It is very extensive, laborious, and expensive, I am obliged to travel over thousands of square miles of documents followed x 2 308 MOTLEY'S LETTEKS. [CHAP. X. by a couple of copyists, who will, of course, require treble the time to write which it takes me to read, and, without reckoning the confounded expense of the whole business, there is such an endless amount of time to be consumed in waiting. I have dined out four times this week, but I do not think 'I could find much entertainment for you in a description of these festivities. On Monday I dined with Mr. . They are friendly people, intensely religious, and I dare say they think me a violent uncompromising Calvinist like themselves. On this occasion there were some raw Scotchmen, just de- scended from their native heath and mad with orthodoxy. One of them observed, on some reference to the late revival in America, that the hand of the Lord was most manifest in that great and wonderful development. He then gave an instance of a mercantile friend, who had gone out to New York in the midst of the commercial crisis to collect some money owing to him, but who had naturally, like every other creditor, been referred to the town pump for liquidation. He had brought back, however, something far better than silver or gold, for he had himself experienced religion in New York, and had returned a regenerated sinner, a brand snatched from the burning. These were almost his exact expressions saving the irreverent allusions to the pump and I thought the idea of the New Yorkers paying off their Scotch creditors by unlimited draughts upon the treasures of the next world one of the best dodges I have yet heard of. I could hardly sit still in my chair however, I kept my countenance and looked edified. The next day I dined with a young couple, de Jonghe. He is a very nice fellow, who is employed in the Archives, but seems to have property of his own, and is of good family. His father was a distinguished man of letters here. His wife is a pretty, pleasing person, talking English as many of the women here do perfectly. The next day I dined with Lord Dunfermline. The party was the same as the last time I dined there, with the addition of Bylandt, and the subtraction of Spanish Minister and his daughter. They (the D.'s) are very friendly, unaffected people, 1858.] THE HAGUE. 309 and I like them very much. Day after to-morrow I am to dine with Baron Golstein, the Minister of Foreign Affairs. Ever yours, J. L. M. To his Wife. The Hague, August 29th, 1858. MY DEAREST MARY, Since I last wrote I have had the pleasure of receiving your letters from Geneva, and two from Vevay, also Susie's and Mary's, and a long and very charmingly written letter from my dear Lily, taking great pains, and very successfully, to impart to me a portion of the pleasure which she has derived from the excursion to Chamouni. I am so glad you and she were not disappointed, that you found the Amory party so friendly, and that the weather was so auspicious. I am sure I wish you could have more such amusements. Before I go any further, let me, after thanking my sweet little Mary for her letter expressing sorrow that I should have written upon August 1st, and not have remembered at the moment that it was her fifteenth birthday. She knows how much I love her, and if I did not say anything about her fete, it was from no want of interest in such a day. My darling child! It seems impossible that she can have lived fifteen years in this weary world, for she seems as young and as innocent now as if she had just descended from heaven. I never feel as if I had any right to her, and I can never express half the tenderness and the affection I feel for her. Since she has been in the world she has been a blessing and a consola- tion, and she can never cause you or me any unhappiness, except she should die, which God in His mercy forbid ! My little impudent, nonsensical, good-hearted Susie, too, is getting to be a very good child, and in time, when she can be induced to talk a little and get up an appetite for her dinner, she will be all that can be wished for. Affectionately yours, J. L. M. 310 MOTLEY'S LETTEKS. [CHAP. X. To Us Wife. The Hague, September 3rd, 1858. MY DEAKEST MAKY, The other day I received a visit, while, I was seated at my solitary breakfast in the salle a manger, from a benignant old gentleman, who came forward smiling, and said, " Mr. Motley, I believe." " Yes." " Well, I am - ." I looked as conscious as I could, at a moment's warning, of being in the presence of a celebrity ; but as I had rarely or never heard of the great , I was a little embarrassed, not knowing exactly what his particular line of eminence might be. He relieved me, however, by seating himself at once at my table as spectator, not participator, and informing me that he was the author of many poems, histories, dramas, and political pamphlets. He made a slight but handsome allusion to the D. E., but to my great relief he evidently preferred talking of his own performances, which he was good enough to do for about half an hour without cessation. As his English, which he insisted upon talking, was imperfect, and his teeth, I regret to say, still more so, I was not able to enter into the full current of his conversation. Moreover, as he took snuff to such an extent as to make him decidedly unpleasant, I should have preferred to receive his visit after breakfast. He observed, quoting Lord Byron, that " the myrtles and roses of sweet two- and-twenty were worth all your laurels however so plenty." From which I inferred that his head was crowned with laurels, for there could certainly be nothing in common with him and the other two shrubs. I am sure I do not know why I am boring you with the portraiture of this individual, except that the week is sterile in topics for your entertainment. Moreover, it is too bad in me to ridicule a personage who, I have since been informed, is really a deserving and eminent man of letters, and who came to see me as a mark of politeness, and begged me, if I came to , to make his house my home. The King returned last Friday, and on the following Monday I had an interview with him at the palace at the Northend, the one opposite which is the equestrian statue of 1858.] THE KING OF HOLLAND. 311 William the Silent. I drove thither by appointment at 12.30, and was ushered into a very small room, where I was left for a little while in the company of an inkstand and a sheet of paper, in case, I suppose, that if any reflections suggested themselves, I might instantly reduce them to writing. Soon afterwards two young aides-de-camp came in, one a whis- kered light-infantry man, the other a fierce Hussar, and after bowing profoundly, they both began conversing with me on the subject of the D. E., o 1 ' wliicli I am, without affec- tation, getting as tired as ever was a wandering dog of a tin canister tied to its tail. Exactly as the clock struck the half-hour, the door opened, and a stoutish, youngish, tallish man, in a blue cut-away coat, checked shirt with a turn- down collar and grey trousers, walked up to me and said in English with a loud voice, " Mr. Motley, you have written a most magnificent work, and I am proud to make your acquaintance." Whereupon I shrewdly suspected the individual to be his Majesty, although I had expected to be ushered through six more rooms at least ; but the King is one of those royal person- ages who has the good sense to leave a gap in the hedge of his divinity for special occasions. I must say that he made a very agreeable impression upon me ; and you will say, of course, that this is on account of my susceptibility to flattery. I know it to be a weakness, but if people are very polite and complimen- tary and kind to me, whether they are kings and queens, or only knaves or persons of lesser rank, I am but too apt to respond I cannot help it. The King is forty-one, but looks younger, having thick, brown, ungrizzled hair and beard, a fresh, smooth, unwrinkled face, regular features, a clear blue eye, and a tall, erect, muscular, and graceful figure. He speaks English with a good accent and in rather a violent manner, as if he was disposed to tear through all idiomatic difficulties by main force. He was very cordial and agreeable, and kept me about three-quarters of an hour, and at departing hoped he should have the pleasure of seeing me again. Two days afterwards I received a package containing the twelve volumes of Groen van Prinsterer's * Archives et Correspondance de la Maison 312 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. X. d'Orange/ splendidly bound and gilt, with a note from the King's librarian informing me that it was a present from his Majesty. On the first page of the first volume, moreover, the King had written this inscription, which, as I shall be obliged to pack up the books, you will like me to copy, so excuse the vanity of the proceeding : " A Mr. J. L. Motley, historien conscientieux et eloquent, au digne appreciateur du l er Guillaume d'Orange, le plus grand homme de son epoque, est offert de souvenir, comme temoignage d'estime et d'admiration. " GUILLAUME III D' ORANGE, " Koi des Pays-Bas. "La Haye, 31 Aoutl858." Perhaps the chief pleasure that I derive from this present is the proof which it affords that the King thoroughly appreciates the grandeur of his immortal ancestor and namesake, and religiously cherishes his glory and his memory. I am invited to a Court ball at Amsterdam on Tuesday night. The fetes of the birthday of the Prince of Orange (yesterday, 4th) consisted in a dinner to the Ministers of State, and Chiefs of Foreign Legations, and the ball, day after to-morrow, to which the foreign ministers are not invited, so that I shall hardly find an acquaintance there. I wrote to the Marechal de la Cour that I had no court-dress, the invitation being to a "bal gala," but I received in consequence an invitation to come " en frac," and to Amsterdam I must go. Fortunately the Danish Minister, who is the most kind- hearted, obliging fellow in the world, is going to stay on after the dinner at Amsterdam, and has promised to see that I have a room, a carriage, together with his own servant to go to the ball with me. His name is de Bille ; he was brought up in America, where his father was minister, and he is the most amiable creature living. It is my present intention to leave the Hague for Arnheim this day week, on my way to Vevay. I may possibly stop one day with Bismarck if he is at Frankfort, but I think I shall be with you at latest this day fortnight, perhaps a little earlier. 1858.] COURT BALL AT AMSTERDAM. 313 The weather has been dreary for a fortnight, I hope you have it better in Switzerland. Good-bye, my dearest Mary. My love to my dear children. God bless you ! Ever affectionately yours, J. L. M. P.S. I forgot to mention that, by a rather odd coincidence, on the same day on which I received the King's present, I took from the post office a letter from one John Hopkins of Chattanooga, Tennessee, informing me that " some weeks since a bookseller, of whom he was making some purchases, insisted until he purchased the D. E. ; " he then declares himself highly gratified by the perusal of the work, and expresses a thousand wishes for my happiness. J. L. M. To his Wife. The Hague, September llth, 1858. MY DEAREST MARY, I have neither time nor topics for anything but a very brief epistle. I leave to-morrow morning early for Arnheim, thence I intend to make a brief excursion to Zutphen for the sake of seeing that town, which was the scene of many events in the period I am to write about, and the neighbouring village of Warmfeld, where Sir Philip Sidney was killed. I suppose I shall sleep at Zutphen to-morrow night, and the next day get as far as Bonn, thence to Mayence, Bale, and Yevay. If Bismarck is at Frankfort, I shall pass a day with him there, if not I shall not go to Frankfort at all. I may arrive on Thursday. I may not get to Vevay till Saturday. I hope that you got my note from Amsterdam and acted upon it immediately. The ball at the Amsterdam palace was much like other Court balls, or rather it was much unlike them in one respect, the Hague Society was not there. As Touchstone would have said in respect that it is at Amsterdam, it liketh me well, but 314 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. X. in respect it is not at Court, 'tis a very vile ball. In fact it was rather a national sort of thing. The marechals and cham- berlains of the Court, and other swells were there, and of course the royal family and their hangers-on, but no other ladies from the Hague. The royal family were all very civil to me. The king came up to me very early in the evening, shook hands very cordially, and after talking with me some time, said his brother Prince Henry wished to make my acquaintance, and if I would come with him, he would introduce me. So we went together to the next room, and I was presented. Prince Henry is a young, delicate-looking fellow, rather shy, and I believe quite intelligent. He talked about America, where he was once, and seemed to have -been very much pleased with his visit. The Prince of Orange came up to me as soon as he saw me, and the king introduced me. He is rather tall, and very slight in figure, with a very interesting and amiable face, resembling very much his mother. I believe he is considered very kind-hearted, disposed to act well his part, and with very good talents. The Queen says he is lazy, but she is very fond of him. His manner is extremely good. I was also intro- duced to the Princess Frederic, who is an intelligent and accomplished person, the sister of the King of Prussia and of the Empress-dowager of Kussia, and also of the Princess Henry, who is very lively, young, and jolly, daughter of Duke Bernhard of Saxe Weimar, who travelled in America, and was the hero of the famous story about " Are you the man who is going in the stage to Baltimore ? " " Yes." " Well, I am the gentleman who is going to drive you." I was just going to ask her if she remembered the story, when the music struck up a tremendous flourish and drowned the conversation. I must break off short here, dearest Mary, for I have a million things to do. Give a thousand kisses to my dear children, and believe me always, Most affectionately yours, J. L. M. ( 315 ) CHAPTER XL HOME, PAEIS. Home Allibone's notice of the * History ' Other letters of commendation Work on the ' History of the United Netherlands 'Its difficulties Want of a hero Mr. Story Letter from M. Guizot about the 'Dutch Eepublic ' The Prince of Wales in Home Outbreak of the war in Italy Mr. Motley and family go to Paris Causes and prospects of the war Eeturn to England Gloomy prospects of European politics. To his Mother. Home, October Wtk, 1858. MY DEAREST MOTHER, I write a line in the midst of great confusion, merely to let you know that we have arrived in this place for the winter. We are still in the hotel, and our trunks are still packed, so I cannot get your letter to Mary (which we had the great pleasure of receiving just before we left Vevay) to read over again, which I shall be most delighted to do the first thing after we get established. We have taken a lodging, very satisfactory on the whole, on the Corso, with plenty of rooms, new furniture, and sunny. It will be ready for us in five days, and I hope to get to w r ork very soon afterwards. The Storys whom we expected to find already returned from the country are not yet here, but are expected every day. I am most happy to hear from yourself such good accounts of your health. I do entertain very sincere hopes that you have turned the corner, and that your constitution will prove itself much stronger than you feared, and that your recovery will be permanent. Do not fail to write to me as often as you can. Your letters are inexpressibly delightful to me. I am sorry to find by your last that my father had not been very well. By your description of his ailment, however, it seems obvious that it was but a temporary one, and no doubt it has 316 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. XL long since passed away. I have not yet had time to reply to two or three notes which I received from him. The reason is that they came just as I was obliged to pack up everything, and since that time I have been so much on the road that my papers have been buried out of sight. I remember, however, that he enclosed the proof sheets of an extract from Mr. Allibone's Biographical Dictionary in which honourable men- tion was made of my labours. Perhaps he will be willing, as he has been in correspondence with that gentleman, to state to him that I feel very much honoured and flattered by the very obliging manner in which he has spoken of my work, and that I wish every success to the difficult and very important enter- prise in which he is engaged. That it deserves to succeed cannot be doubted, to judge from the strong language of encomium used concerning it by the eminent gentlemen whose letters on the subject have been published. As I have not myself yet seen the work, I am of course not able to express an opinion of my own. I feel also very grateful for the warm and hearty com- mendations bestowed upon me in the letters of Dr. Lieber, Mr. Everett, Mr. Prescott, Hillard, Sumner, and others. Nothing can be more encouraging to a writer engaged in the arduous pursuits of literature, in which he is obliged to spend not only time and strength but also no inconsiderable amount of money, than to find his labours smiled upon and sympathised with by the most eminent minds of his country, and I shall always feel proud of such approbation. I expect to be as hard at work as I have been ever since I left home for a good while to come. I do not know when I shall have a couple of volumes ready, for I have gone in very deep and have been striking out wide. I left Holland at the latter end of August, and, after stopping a couple of very agreeable days at Frankfort with one of the most intimate friends I have in the world, Mr. de Bismarck, now Prussian Ambassador at the Diet, and formerly a companion of my youth, I came to Vevay, whence, after reposing a fortnight, we took the rail to Lyons and Marseilles, and thence the steamboat to Civita Vecchia. Our voyage of two nights and a day was very prosperous, the 1858.] RESIDENCE IN ROME. 317 sea calm, and the skies bright and warm, so much so that I, in my own person, passed the night on deck. I had hoped to have found an opportunity to send the London letters, which you think will amuse you, before now. It has, however, been impossible thus far, but I am in daily hope of finding some one who will take them to London at least, whence there will be always a chance of getting them to Boston. I must once more observe that for two reasons they ought never to go out of the house. First, because they are deliberately full of egotism and vanity. I mean that Mary and Lily wished to know what people said to me about my book, and I did so to a certain extent, although I have a right to say in my defence that a great many things were said to me which I should blush to repeat even in a letter to them or to you. To Us Mother. Rome, November 2,7th, 1858. MY DEAREST MOTHER, It is several weeks since I wrote, I believe, but time passes so rapidly that it does not seem so long ago. We are now in very comfortable lodgings in the Corso, about opposite the church of San Carlo, if you happen to remember it. We are on the third floor, but as the rooms are all sunny and well furnished when you get there, and plenty of them, we do not much mind going upstairs. I have a very good room for my study, and I am hard at work. I began my first volume about a fortnight ago and hope to have it done by April. My task is, however, rather a difficult one, more so I think than in my former book. I have to spread myself over a wide surface, for after the death of William the Silent, the history of the provinces becomes for a time swallowed in the general current of European history. I do not mean by that that it loses its importance. On the contrary the Netherlands question becomes the great question of Christendom. Netherlands history is for a time the only 318 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. XI. European history. France, England, Spain, and Holland being all mingled into one great conflicting mass, it is difficult to say who are friends and who are enemies, except as the divid- ing line is drawn according to religious opinion. I am obliged, therefore, in order to carry out my intention, to go more fully into English and French contemporaneous history than I did in the other book. This obliges me to take much greater care, because I come very often upon fields which have been more trodden before than the historical soil of the Netherlands. I have, however, made very extensive collections of MSS. in England, Holland and France, and whatever may be the success of the merits of the volumes when done, I am sure I shall have plenty of solid work in them, and from original and substantial materials. You may imagine that it is not a very money-making concern, but history writing must be pursued honestly as a science, if it is to be permanently valuable, and not as a trade. I have not yet succeeded in getting a title for my book. It is in reality a continuation of the other on a little different plan, but I do not mean to call it so, but bring it out as an independent work. All history is of course but a fragment. You may write the history of two centuries, and yet you will give but a slice of the great lump of human history, and I wish each of my histories to stand on their own legs. I suppose I shall eventually think of some brief title. That is the only part of the book of which I hope to take a mercantile view. A telling and selling title is always desirable to attract readers and buyers. The great cause of regret that I have, however, admits of no remedy. There is no great hero. It is difficult to scare up another William of Orange, and whatever success or virtue my other book may have had, is owing to my having discovered one of the great men of the world's history, who was, I think, not generally known or appreciated. I have several lesser lights in the course of my new volumes, and shall make what I can of them in succession, but I feel the difference between them and that radiant character. I have been talking of myself, my dearest mother, or rather 1859.] MR. STORY. 319 of what I am about, because I know that it will interest you. I get up at daylight every morning and begin to work. This sounds very fine, but you know it is not daylight at this season before seven. Little Mary and I and Susie have a cup of coffee at that hour together, the two other females not rising so early. The French governess comes from nine to eleven for the two children, and at 11.30 we breakfast a la fourcliette, and dine at six. I thus get every day eight or nine hours of work. The children are very well, and the climate agrees with them. The Storys we see frequently, and like them both very much. She is a bright, sweet-tempered, intelligent person, and he is decidedly a man of genius. His sculpture is of a very high order of merit. He has just completed an exquisite statue of Hero holding a torch, as if looking for Leander, which has as much expression as has often been put into marble. I wish I were rich enough to buy it, not because he is in the condition of a poor artist, having money enough of his own. His statue of his father is admirable. He has also just finished a Cleopatra, which is highly original in attitude and design. The children are very fond of E , who is about Mary's age, and they have a dancing class together twice a week, which is a good deal of amusement for them. Mr. and Mrs. Charles Perkins, Mrs. Bruen, and Miss Bruen, are also here, and I believe Edward Perkins and his wife. Mrs. Cleveland and Mrs. Doane are come, or coming. There are also other scattering of Americans here and there, but none I think whom you are acquainted with. I am, most affectionately, your son, J. L. M. From M. Guizot. Paris, 25 f wrier 1859. Vous avez probablement deja vu par les journaux, Mon- sieur, que le premier volume de la traduction de votre 'Histoire de la Fondation de la Eepublique des Provinces- 320 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. . [CHAP. XL Times' vient de paraitre. L'editeur, M. Michel-Levy, a du, d'apres ma recommandation, vous en envoyer denx ex- emplaires. Je vous prie de me faire savoir si cet ordre a ete execute. J'aurai mieux aime qu'on publiat les deux volumes ensemble ; la traduction franpaise en aura quatre ; mais la publication, deja avanpee, d'une autre traduction franpaise en Belgique a decide M. Michel-Levy a se presser. Je sais que cette traduction beige a ete faite sans votre aveu ; M. Mohl m'a donne connaissance de ce que vous lui avez ecrit a cet egard. Je ne doute pas que votre ouvrage n'obtienne, en France, le succes bien merite qu'il a obtenu aux Etats-Unis et en Angleterre, et qu'il n'aide efficacement au triomphe de cette grande cause de la liberte religieuse que vous avez soutenu avec tant de sincerite, de savoir et d'eloquence. Eecevez, Monsieur, 1'assurance de tous mes sentiments d'estime et de consideration tres distinguee. GUIZOT. To his Mother. Rome, MarcJt 26th, 1859. MY DEAKEST MOTHER, We go on here in a very jog-trot fashion. I work pretty hard, but the ditch grows larger with every successive dig. I have nearly finished a volume, but I am not very well satisfied with it. You need not be anxious about my head-aches ; I have them from time to time, but they are by no means so furious or so frequent as they used to be. The children and Mary are all very well. Last Tuesday I had the honour of dining with the Prince of Wales, who is passing the winter here. The invitation was quite unexpected by me. Colonel Bruce (who is his governor, and a very agree- able person, brother of Lord Elgin) called on me, and said his Koyal Highness was desirous of making my acquaintance. The next day I received a note from him, saying that H.K.H. Baron Eenfrew would be happy to see me at dinner, etc. Baron Renfrew is the Prince's travelling name. The party 1858.] THE PRINCE OF WALES. 321 was very small ; there was Colonel and Mrs. Bruce, the parson, the doctor, the aide-de-camp, the diplomatic representative here, Mr. Russell, Mr. Gibson the sculptor, Mr. Hay, an excellent old gentleman here, formerly an Under-Secretary of State, and myself. The Prince is about eighteen. His profile is extremely like that of the Queen. The complexion is pure, fresh, and healthy, like that of most English boys ; his hair is light brown, cut short, not curly. His eyes are bluish-grey, rather large, and very frank in their expression; his smile very ready and genuine ; his manners are extremely good. I have not had much to do with royal personages, but of those I have known, I know none whose address is more winning, and with whom one feels more at one's ease. He has been well educated, and I should think had a good mind ; but of course it is impossible to measure his intellect after so brief an acquaintance. I talked to him before dinner. At dinner he sat on one side of Mrs. Bruce, and I on the other, and we talked upon the common topics, the table not being too large for general conver- sation. After dinner he asked me to take the chair next him, and we conversed for half an hour together. He talked about German literature, Goethe, and Schiller, objects of art in Eome. Altogether the dinner was a very pleasant one, and it is very agreeable to me to have made the acquaintance of the future Sovereign of the magnificent British Empire in such a simple and unceremonious manner. I have left myself no room, my dearest mother, except to say God bless you. Give my love to the governor, A , and all the rest of the family, small and great, and with the united and kindest affection of us all, I am, Most affectionately, your son, J. L. M. VOL. I. 322 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. XL To his Mother. Paris, June 5th, 1859. MY DEAEEST MOTHER, We left Kome Wednesday morning, June 1st, and reached Paris Friday afternoon at 5 P.M. of June 3rd. This is the most rapid travelling we were ever guilty of. The railroad took us in two hours to Civita Vecchia ; then the steamer landed us in Marseilles in about thirty hours more. Then the express train, which started at IO30 P.M. of Thursday evening, brought us to Paris in eighteen additional hours. The weather was very fine, so that the journey, though disagreeable, was soon accomplished. It seems almost incredible that we were breakfasting in our Koman lodgings on Wednesday, and that I am now writing to you on Sunday morning from an apartment in which we have already installed ourselves at Paris. We were driven out of Italy by the war. My plans have been quite upset by these unforeseen circumstances. It had been my intention to pass most of the summer in Venice, going thither about the middle of June, and staying there till September, after which we should have probably wintered in Florence. There is much very important and interesting matter in Venice which I had reckoned upon, not only for the work which at present occupies me, but for future historical labours ; and as Edward Perkins and Lillie Cleveland, whom our Lily is very fond of, thought of passing the summer there also, the project was a very satisfactory one. I could have worked hard all day, and we could have swum about by moonlight in gondolas in the evenings. But " The best laid schemes o' mice and men gang oft a-gley," and so there was no staying in Italy. We have come for the present to Paris a place which we one and all detest. Kome was tranquil enough, but the climate after the middle of June has a bad reputation, and, indeed, there were three cases of fever, one, and perhaps two, fatal ones in the apartment underneath ours in the same house. I believe, however, that 1859.] THE WAR IN ITALY. 323 it was typhus and not Roman fever, and contracted in another place. We have been all, thank God, very well, and the weather in Rome was exquisitely beautiful up to the moment of our departure, the very perfection of spring that season which exists only in imagination with us. I can hardly con- ceive of two things more diametrically opposed to each other in the way of atmosphere than the April and May of Rome and Boston. It is not very easy for me to give you any news about the war in Italy. The events, as they occur, are of course imme- diately given in the American newspapers. The telegraph adding, however, its inevitable blunders to the indispensable lies of the bulletin, the confusion is worse confounded than ever. Thus there is no doubt that in all the engagements that have taken place hitherto, in which much life has been squandered without any result, the advantage has been uniformly with the French and Sardinians. Yet in the official accounts, for example, of the action of Montebello the state- ment of the allies is that there were 4000 French and 400 Sardinians engaged with 18,000 Austrians. The Austrian commander-in-chief, on the contrary, puts the number of French and Sardinians at 40,000. With regard to the war itself, my sympathies are warmly with Sardinia. Nothing can be more chivalrous, manly, vigorous, progressive, and enlightened, than the King of Sardinia, his Prime Minister, and his whole nation. It seems to me that no man deserves to mention the word liberty, who does not feel the warmest admiration and sympathy with so noble a cause. But of course it is extremely difficult to place con- fidence in the intentions of the French Emperor for me it is impossible, and while I do not wonder that Sardinia should have made the alliance, yet it is not easy to be very hopeful as to the result. It is true that the Emperor has hedged himself about with protestations and self-denying ordinances of all kinds, but those who remember his career for the last ten years, can hardly put much faith in such exuberance of virtue on his part, and I do not believe there will be very much gained for liberty and human progress if Prince Napoleon is Y 2 324 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. XL made into a King of Etruria, and a Murat into King of Naples, and a Bonaparte (I forget his name) made into a pope. Yet the Italian liberals are very sanguine. There are no Italians, high or low, who do not sympathise with the movement (except the reigning individuals of course), and who do not abhor Austria. The position of Prussia with a king who has hope- lessly lost his reason, and yet may live many years, complicates matters very much. The German politicians are rapidly tending to an almost unanimous conviction that the interests of Germany require them all to support Austria, and they pro- bably will do so, a result which will make the war universal. They are impelled to this by their hereditary and natural hatred of France, and by the indispensable necessity of keeping a united Germany as a bulwark against Kussia. Yet if there were a young, vigorous, intellectual sovereign in Prussia at this moment, a man like Frederic the Great, or Peter the Great, he would see that the time had arrived for Prussia to secure at last the object of its ambition, the imperial crown of Germany. If the house of Brandenburg, which governs the powerful, wholly German, and progressive Prussia, could become emperors of Germany, to the utter annihilation of a fictitious, artificial sham, which was got up at the Congress of Vienna forty years ago, and baptized the Empire of Austria, in which there are only about seven millions of Germans, shaken up pell-mell in a great bag with some thirty millions 01 Slavonians, Magyars, Italians, Croats, and Greeks, and the Lord knows what a hodge-podge, which has never had any vitality except in defiance of all laws, divine or human if such a result could take place, then there might be a real Germany, and a handsome solution to the present European question. You ask me whether I propose publishing one volume at a time of my book, and that is exactly what I do not know myself. I have written a volume since November last in Eome. But it will take me some two or three months to get it into publishing shape, and where I shall find a resting-place I know not. Two days in Paris have convinced me that the expense of this town is so frightful, as to make it altogether 1858.] PARIS. 325 beyond my possibilities, and we are now thinking a little of England for a time. My facilities for work are greater there than anywhere, as I have always a copyist or two engaged at work. But we have not yet decided on anything, but have meantime taken a lodging for a month, during which we shall make up our minds. I do not know that I can say anything more to entertain you, my dear mother. The influences of Paris are very depressing to me. I dislike the place more and more every time I come to it. I like Italy, but there are many drawbacks to a residence there for a literary man. But the climate is most delightful, and spoils you for other atmospheres. I found it favourable to labour, and I do not think I ever got through a greater amount of work in the same time than I did in Eome. My habits in one respect are changed. I have become a comparatively early riser. I got up usually in the winter at seven, and latterly at six. I get more time I find by this system. We are all well. Most affectionately your son, J. L. M. To Ms Mother. Mount Felix, Walton-on-Thames, August 18th, 1859. MY DEAREST MOTHER, Your letter of 18th July was welcomed most warmly. I am delighted to find you feeling yourself so well, and I was still more gratified to be informed a few days ago by Mr. Lothrop that he had seen you just before he left home, and that he had not seen you looking so well for years, and that you seemed to him quite recovered. I cannot help regretting a little that you did not carry out your plan of making a visit to Nahant, for it seems to me that a tonic atmosphere like that of Nahant would give you courage and strength to grapple with your enemy, who seems already a retreating one. As to age, I wish you could see some of the people in London society. There is Lord 326 MOTLEY'S LETTERS. [CHAP. XL Palmerston, seventy-five years exactly, Prime Minister in England for the second time, full of life, bustle, and business in the House of Commons every night till after midnight, and making a speech every night, receiving large companies at dinner, and in the evening every Saturday for the whole season, and having no more idea of considering himself old than Lady Palmerston, who is, I believe, of exactly the same age, and in her way quite as alive and youthful in manner and appearance, and quite as active, influential, and reigning, and charming a personage in the great London world as she ever was. Then there is Lord Lyndhurst, who celebrated his eighty- seventh birthday last month, whose intellect is as vivid, whose voice as melodious, and whose interest in the great questions agitating the world as comprehensive and unflagging, as if he had fifty years less upon his back than he has. He made an admirable speech on foreign politics the other night, and he told me a few days ago that he meant to make a speech on a subject which he has very much at heart the natural necessity of a strong and cordial alliance between the two great English commonwealths on the two sides of the Atlantic. England and America together, he says, may defy the world, and England can have no real friend among the despotic governments of Europe. The season was too late, he thought, for him to make a speech on the subject this year, but he meant to do it next session. So you see that eighty- seven years do not prevent him from laying out work for himself in the future. He is very fond of his two nieces, Mrs. Amory and her daughter, and always speaks of them, as you may suppose, with the warmest interest and affection. I do not say anything of our few weeks in London. You have been recently reading my letters of last year, in which the whole ground was gone over, and, in addition, Lily has written you (I hope you have received them, and were not alarmed at the postage) a detailed account of our proceedings in the form of a journal, which she kept mainly because she thought it would amuse and interest you. I did not care a great deal about going through a second London season. But as we were obliged to leave Italy (where 1858.] EUROPEAN POLITICS. 327 I had intended passing a second winter, having sent all my books and papers there), there seemed no other course open, particularly as I had much literary business in England. I thought too that, as Lily was just grown up, and old enough to go into society, and likely to please and be pleased, it was a kind of duty to let her have the advantage which my position as a man of letters gives her, of seeing for once the most brilliant and cultivated society in the world, viz., the highest circles of London in the full of the season. I must say, without meaning to take any credit to myself, except as belonging to a peculiar class, that I cannot help forming a favourable idea of English civilisation when I see the position accorded in this country to those who cultivate art, science, and literature, as if those things were worth something, and were entitled to some consideration, as well as high birth, official rank, and wealth, which on the Continent are the only passports. I do not like to say much about European politics. A black cloud seems to envelop the Continent. The nations of the earth, in their cowardice or their inertness, have allowed the most dangerous malefactor who ever usurped supreme power to paralyse and stultify them all, and frighten them all out of their wits. The confidence reposed by the whole Italian people at the beginning of this year in the intentions of Louis Napoleon, was as incredible as it was pathetic, and would have converted into a hero any man standing in his position who had been possessed of one spark of virtue or generosity. There is no doubt of two things that he originated the Italian revolt, and that he has, against the unanimous wishes of the Italians, left them in the lurch, having pledged himself to Austria to restore the archdukes. The firm, moderate, consistent, unanimous, dignified and cou- rageous conduct of the Italians in this tremendous crisis will always remain one of the grand lessons of history. If they are destined to be crushed into submission, after this calm and deliberate expression of their wishes, at any rate a significant chapter in the history of freedom and tyranny will have been recorded, and it will be something that the mask will at last 328 MOTLEY'S LETTEKS. [CHAP. XI. be torn from the face of the French Emperor. The Tuscan Assembly has just voted unanimously that the Hapsburg- Lorraine dynasty shall never be restored. They will doubt- less vote as unanimously to annex themselves to Sardinia. Our plans are not yet fixed, although they will be before the end of the week. A furnished house is offered me at the Hague for a year, which I shall either take, or take lodgings in the country in England. I have lost three months, and must get to work again, if my two volumes are to be ready by next fall. We are all well, staying at this delightful country house of the Sturgis' s, where we are always treated with such hospitality that it seemed as if the house belonged to us. Mrs. John Sturgis had a little girl born a week ago, and both mother and child are going on very well. Little H , the youngest child of Mr. and Mrs. Eussell Sturgis, is a most charming little boy. Give my love to the governor and all the family. Always most affectionately your son, J. L. M. ( 329 ) CHAPTER XII. RESIDENCE IN ENGLAND PUBLICATION OF 'THE UNITED NETHERLANDS/ Oatlands Park Difficulties of his work London in November "Wm. Stirling East Sheen Professor Owen Mr. and Mrs. Grote John Murray and the ' History of the United Netherlands ' Letter from M. Guizot proposing Mr. Motley as corresponding member of the French Academy Letter to Dr O. W. Holmes about the ' Autocrat ' International copyright Mr. Motley's affection for England American and European politics Letter from Mr. N. Hawthorne ' The Marble Faun' Letter from Dr. O. W. Holmes Poli- tical and literary affairs in the States Praise of the Dutch Republic ' The Eoyal Academy dinner D.C.L. at Oxford Oxford Commemoration Letter from Lady Dufferin to Mrs. Norton Lady Dufferin and her son Approaching completion of the ' United Netherlands ' Lord de Grey Studley Koyal Fountains Abbey Sidney Herbert Visits in Scotland Keir Glen Quoich Mr. and Mrs. Ellice Inveraray The Duke of Argyll Taymouth Lord Breadalbane The Prince of Wales' visit to America Election of Abraham Lincoln Publication of the ' United Nether- lands ' Letters of acknowledgment from M. St. Hilaire and from M. Guizot. To his Mother. Oatlands Park Hotel, Walton-on- Thames, November 24