known I often made acquaintance with the splendid gallop of his sleighs, all furs and colour and delightful excitement:  on one occasion having nearly had nose and ears frost-bitten till my neighbour with his fur gloves and snow rubbed life into them again.  With Dr. Dawson of M’Gill University I had plenty of geological talk, especially about the new found Eozoa of the St. Lawrence stratum,—­and with his clever son, and my cousin, Professor Selwyn.  Thereafter I went south, the welcome guest of other cousins, the Vaughan-Tuppers of Brooklyn, among my most hospitable friends over there:  and we routed out all about our family in America, as recorded for ten generations in Freeman’s “History of Massachusetts.”  And I feasted at Mr. Trocke’s on trout from “Tupper Lake” in the Adirondacks,—­the name coming from an ancestor, not as after me, though sometimes thought so; and I met with many points both of family and of authorial interest.  Then I was entertained by the New England Society, which, amongst abounding luxuries, still produces as a characteristic dish the frugal pork and beans of Puritan times.  And the Century and other Clubs made me free of them.  And of course Longfellow, Bryant, Fields, Biglow, O.W.  Holmes, and many others, opened their houses and hearts to me.  And I met and dined in company with General Grant and all sorts of other celebrities,—­and so did all I hoped to do.  Going south, Brantz Mayer at Baltimore, my cousin the Rev. Dr. Tupper (Bishop of the Baptists), and many others are memorable.  Stay, I will give a casual extract from my home-letter, No. 39, of my second visit, giving several names.

“Jan. 18, 1877, evening.  Took an oyster tea at Brantz Mayer’s, and read to a party several things by request, especially as to the souls of animals.  Judge Bond called for me there in his carriage, and took me (as invited by the President) to a great assemblage of Baltimore magnates (inaugurating the John Hopkins University), where I had casually quite an ovation, meeting literally hundreds of friends:  I cannot pretend to remember many names, but these will remind me of others:  General McClellan, General Ellicott (cousin to our Bishop), Carroll, the State Governor, no end of professors, among them Sylvester, who knew my brother Arthur at the Athenaeum, plenty of judges, presidents of institutions, doctors, journalists, lawyers, and many fine figure-heads of elderly magnates; each and all knew me as an early book friend, and I had quite to hold a court for two hours, receiving each as introduced, and having to say something pretty to him.  Mr. Weld (of Lulworth), married to a rich Baltimorean, takes to me monstrously, and with Mr. President Gilman is going to manage a Reading here for me on my return from the South.  He took me after the great event to the Maryland Club (making me a member for a month), and we had a glass of wine together, meeting again several of the bigwigs migrated like ourselves for something better than iced-water!