ch. x.] 18431858. 195 



a half, and enjoyed myself the fresh yet dark green of the 

 grand Scotch firs, the brown of the catkins of the old 

 birches, with their white stems, and a fringe of distant 

 green from the larches, made an excessively pretty view. 

 At last I fell fast asleep on the grass, and awoke with a 

 chorus of birds singing around me, and squirrels running 

 up the trees, and some woodpeckers laughing, and it was as 

 pleasant and rural a scene as ever I saw, and I did not care 

 one penny how any of the beasts or birds had been formed. 

 I sat in the drawing-room till after eight, and then went 

 and read the Chief -Justice's summing up, and thought Ber- 

 nard * guilty, and then read a bit of my novel, which is 

 feminine, virtuous, clerical, philanthropical, and all that 

 sort of thing, but very decidedly flat. I say feminine, for 

 the author is ignorant about money matters, and not much 

 of a lady for she makes her men say, " My Lady." I like 

 Miss Craik very much, though we have some battles, and 

 differ on every subject. I like also the Hungarian ; a thor- 

 ough gentleman, formerly attache at Paris, and then in the 

 Austrian cavalry, and now a pardoned exile, with broken 

 health. He does not seem to like Kossuth, but says, he is 

 certain [he is] a sincere patriot, most clever and eloquent, 

 but weak, with no determination of character. . . . 



* Simon Bernard was tried in April 1858 as an accessory to Orsha's 

 attempt on the life of the Emperor of the French. The verdict was " not 

 guilty." 



