252 LIFE OF SIR JOHN LUBBOCK 



CH. 



the Comptroller (Sir C. Ryan), the Treasury, and 

 the heads of the various public departments 

 were always pleasant and cordial. 



It may be interesting, as a means of indicating 

 the position which Sir John Lubbock at this date 

 held in the popular estimation (perhaps it should 

 be observed that The Pleasures of Life had not 

 then been published), to quote the following 

 " order of merit " from the Pall Mall Gazette, 

 which had been instituting a series of competitions 

 on various subjects among its readers. It is to 

 be noted that the verdict is nominally in respect 

 of " Men of Letters," but obviously the jury 

 did not confine themselves very closely to this 

 restricted point of view. 



The subject of one of our recent competitions was, it 

 will be remembered, to name the forty living Englishmen 

 who should first receive " immortality " if an Academy 

 of Letters on the French model were to be established in 

 this country. The competition proved very popular, 

 and answers came in from all parts of the country and 

 all classes of persons. The following list, in which the 

 names are given in order according to the number of 

 votes recorded for each, may be taken, therefore, as 

 embodying the popular verdict on the several claims to 

 " immortality " of our living men of letters : 



