38 AUTOBIOGRAPHY. [ch. ii. 



as he allowed others to turn the stream of his conversation, 

 and this he did allow. 



Lord Stanhope once gave me a curious little proof of 

 the accuracy and fulness of Macaulay's memory. Many 

 historians used often to meet at Lord Stanhope's house ; 

 and, in discussing various subjects, they would sometimes 

 differ from Macaulay, and formerly they often referred to 

 some book to see who was right ; but latterly, as Lord 

 Stanhope noticed, no historian ever took this trouble, and 

 whatever Macaulay said was final. 



On another occasion I met at Lord Stanhope's house 

 one of his parties of historians and other literary men, and 

 amongst them were Motley and Grote. After luncheon I 

 walked about Chevening Park for nearly an hour with 

 Grote, and was much interested by his conversation and 

 pleased by the simplicity and absence of all pretension in 

 his manners. 



Long ago I dined occasionally with the old Earl, the 

 father of the historian. He was a strange man, but what 

 little I knew of him I liked much. He was frank, genial, 

 and pleasant. He had strongly-marked features, with a 

 brown complexion, and his clothes, when I saw him, were 

 all brown. He seemed to believe in everything which was to 

 others utterly incredible. He said one day to me, ".Why 

 don't you give up your fiddle-faddle of geology and zoology, 

 and turn to the occult sciences ? " The historian, then 

 Lord Mahon, seemed shocked at such a speech to me, and 

 his charming wife much amused. 



The last man whom I will mention is Carlyle, seen by 

 me several times at my brother's house and two or three 

 times at my own house. His talk was very racy and inter- 

 esting, just like his writings, but he sometimes went on too 

 long on the same subject. I remember a funny dinner at 

 my brother's, where, amongst a few others, were Babbage 

 and Lyell, both of whom liked to talk. Carlyle, however, 

 silenced every one by haranguing during the whole dinner 

 on the advantages of silence. After dinner, Babbage, in 

 his grimmest manner, thanked Carlyle for his very inter- 

 esting lecture on silence. 



Carlyle sneered at almost every one : One day in my 

 house he called Grote's History " a fetid quagmire, with 

 nothing spiritual about it." I always thought, until his 

 Reminiscences appeared, that his sneers were partly jokes, 

 but this now seems rather doubtful. His expression was 



