books were religious tracts, highly flavored with terror or pathos, and in one way or another calculated to convey the strongest excitement upon the last subject with which excitement ought to have anything to do.  Pious stimulants, devout drams, this is trying to do good, but I think mistaking the way....

In the evening we went to Lady Farquhar’s; this was a finer party, as it is called, than the last, but not so pleasant.  All the world was there.  Mrs. Norton the magnificent, and that lovely sister of hers, Mrs. Blackwood (afterwards Lady Dufferin), crowned like Bacchantes with grapes, and looking as beautiful as dreams.  Heaps of acquaintance and some friends....

Sunday, 10th.—­ ...  In the evening I read Daru.  What fun that riotous old Pope Julius is!  Poor Gaston de Foix!  It was young to leave life and such well-begun fame.  The extracts from Bayard’s life enchant me.  I am glad to get among my old acquaintance again.  Mr. Harness came in rather late and said all manner of kind things about “The Star of Seville,” but I was thinking about his play all the while; it does not seem to me that the management is treating him well.  If it does not suit the interests of the theater to bring it out now, he surely should be told so, and not kept in a state of suspense, which cannot be delightful to any author, however little of an egotist he may be.

Monday, 20th.—­Went to Kensington Gravel Pits to see Lady Calcott, and sat with her a long time.  That dying woman, sitting in the warm spring sunlight, surrounded with early-blowing hyacinths, the youngest born of the year, was a touching object.  She is a charming person, so full of talent and of goodness.  She talked with her usual cheerfulness and vivacity.  Presently Sir Augustus came down from the painting-room to see me....  I could hardly prevent myself from crying, and I am afraid I looked very sad.  As I was going away and stooped to kiss her, she sweetly and solemnly bade “God bless me,” and I thought her prayer was nearer to heaven than that of most people....

Tuesday, 21st.—­ ...  After tea dropped John at Mr. Murray’s in Albemarle Street, and went on to the theater to see the new opera; our version of “Robert the Devil.”  The house was very full.  Henry Greville was there, with the Mitfords and Mrs. Bradshaw.  What an extraordinary piece, to be sure!  I could not help looking at the full house and wondering how so many decent Englishmen and women could sit through such a spectacle....  The impression made upon me by the subject of Meyerbeer’s celebrated opera appears to have entirely superseded that of the undoubtedly fine music; but I never was able to enjoy the latter because of the former, and the only shape in which I ever enjoyed “Robert the Devil” was in M. Levassor’s irresistibly ludicrous account of it in the character of a young Paris badaud, who had just come from seeing