VISIT TO AMERICA 25 



most intimate friends and frequent correspondents was 

 H. B. Tristram,* who had just at this time returned from 

 a very successful expedition to Algeria. 



Boston, 

 September 1, 1857. 



MY DEAR TRISTRAM, 



I can only afford you just time enough and 

 this scrap of paper to express my exultation at your safe 

 return from the most unprecedented campaign that 

 Algeria has ever been the theatre of. The glories of 

 African generals of all nations and times sink to nothing 

 when compared with yours ; Sesostris, Marius, Alexander, 

 Menon, Abercromby, with all the moderns, Bugeaud, Sir 

 Harry Smith, and Pelissier, are nobodies. Moses only 

 spoiled the Egyptians, but to have carried off such a 

 booty under the noses of French naturalists is a much 

 greater triumph, and the Algerians seem to me to have 

 expiated all their past cruelties to Christian slaves by 

 the way they have assisted you. In the plenitude of 

 your wealth, however, I hope you will not forget one who 

 on whichever side of the Atlantic and the Tropic of Cancer 

 he has been, has been always wishing for your success ; 

 not, though, that I can offer you anything more like 

 "reciprocity" than that which under the same name 

 Brother Jonathan holds out to the Blue-nosed fishermen. 

 But I am one of those who will readily hoard up quicquid 

 de Libycis verritur areis. I have seen Dr. Brewer and 

 his collection, of neither is much to be said ; the Dr. is 

 reserved to an astonishing degree for a Yankee, and has 

 evidently never enjoyed anything like those glorious 

 days of last September when you met me at Cambridge, 

 the memory of those talks de omnibus avibus, etc., has 

 cheered me many a time for the last eight months, when 

 with the exception of two hours with Downs at Halifax 

 (a real out and outer) I have not met with a soul who 

 could converse on the subject. His collection is ex- 

 tremely moderate considering the scope of it and what 



* Canon of Durham, D.D., F.R.S. : died 1906. 



