HENRY V. PELTON. i 
co-operation among literary men. But gatherings far 
more notable and more influential to the same end, were 
those of Holland House, where through many successive 
years, under the skillful guidance of Lord and Lady 
Holland, and dominated by the spirit of Christian charity 
which controlled both of them, there met a succession 
of cliques, comprising nearly every one eminent in let- 
ters or statemanship ; in art or the drama. To give the 
names of the guests is almost to form a list of those 
names distinguished during those years. 
It seems a considerable descent from these gorgeous en- 
tertainments, where the leaders of the English world 
used to meet, to turn from them to those Wednesday 
nights when Charles and Mary Lamb received their 
friends in their humble home, but one who Knew both 
places familiarly, Sir Thomas Noon Talfourd, has not 
hestitated to compare them, saying ‘‘ the conversation 
which animated each of these memorable circles approxi- 
mated in essence much more nearly than might be sur- 
mised from the difference in station of the principal 
talkers.’”’ At each, literature and art supplied the fav- 
orite topics. 
Montagu House also deserves mention among the 
spots made famous by the gatherings of the learned and 
studious. Having imbibed, when young, her taste for 
learning, through her friendship with many scholarly 
men, Mrs. Montagu received in London an assemblage of 
intellectual persons. At first this was done unpremedi- 
tatively, but afterwards with the design of drawing such 
persons into fellowship and making a centre for literary 
society in London. _ At these assemblies she brought to- 
gether a distinguished company, made up of authors, 
actors, divines and agreeable women. Here came Ers- 
kine, Beauclerk, Garrick, Lord Lytellton, Walpole, 
Lord Chatham. ‘‘ No Englishwoman,”’ it is said, ‘‘ ever 
succeeded so completely in drawing men from the club 
