'857-59 PUBLIC DINNER TO LIVINGSTONE 71 
''vith them. I had a plate of soup and a pleasant 
^hat, and Lord Dufferin, who was of the party, 
'''alked back with me home. Lord John looking 
Wonderfully well. Says he will walk over to see 
now we are come back. No politics, only a 
kittle bit of British Museum matters, to prime him, 
he has to move the Estimates in the House.’ 
In February 1858, both Professor Owen and 
his wife attended the public dinner given to Dr. 
Livingstone, and Mrs. Owen gives the following 
Account of it in her diary : — 
‘I found Mrs. Livingstone in the ladies’ gal- 
Lry, and we sat together. Miss Burdett-Coutts 
^^me in and sat on the other side of her, and then 
Lady F'ranklin next to her. There were between 
*^hree and four hundred at the dinner. Poor Mrs. 
Livingstone was in a stout linsey dress, and thick 
honnet, and, as the heat was overpowering, even 
rest of us (who were in evening dress) suffered 
Considerably from it. I persuaded her to take 
cff as much as she could. She bore the scene 
Wonderfully well, but I saw she kept her eyes 
‘'^tently fixed on her husband the whole time, 
"^he honours, paid with three times three, to one 
Woman by such an assembly would have been 
almost too much to bear for most people, but no 
Hottentot could have betrayed less emotion under 
trying circumstances than she did ; there is 
•doubtless much activity of mind hidden under her 
extreme quietness. She betrayed, by a slight 
