210 BUSINESS, EECEEATION ; SUNSHINE, SHADOW. 



In subsequent letters to his niece he describes the re- 

 hearsal of the Eglinton Tournament, visits to the British 

 Museum, and interviews with various eminent zoologists. 

 " I did not see poor Children, whose wife, I fear, is dying; 

 but Samouelle and both the Grays were very civil. What 

 I admire in these people is their devotion to their own 

 business. They seem to look upon London just as a great 

 ornithological or entomological world, and care no more 

 about Hyde Park or the House of Commons than they do 

 about Kirkaldy or Canonmills. It would be well for some 

 of us if we could care keenly for anything." " Young 

 White was delighted with the Java insects, six or seven 

 of which were not in the Museum, although Mr Children 

 had them in his private collection. I have got a few 

 tilings from them, and might have got more, if I had been 

 in a taking humour/'' 



" Wednesday, 2ith July 1839. 



"On Tuesday of last week I lunched at Blackheath 

 with the Hays, and went through Greenwich Hospital. 

 Near the Observatory, in Greenwich Park, I saw a man 

 with two other men. He stared at us, and at every- 

 thing, and I stared at him. None of our party discerned 

 who it was, till I told them : and I had no business to 

 know ; but instinct told me it could be nobody but Lord 

 Brougham, and so it was Saturday being a closed. 



