smoke to escape, looking much like flower-pots turned upside down. The railroad, being built on enormous bridges, looks at a distance like the pictures of the old Roman aqueducts. The Thames is a very crooked river, we crossed it twice on our return to London. At the station we had some distance to descend to get into the street, but the stairs were broad and winding, so we did not mind it. On reaching the hotel, we found some of our party returned from a pleasant visit to Leamington, Kenilworth, Warwick Castle, and Shakspeare's birthplace.

LONDON, May 10.-I am on the qui vive about the Scotia, expecting to see her arrival announced in the papers to-morrow or next day. I have half a mind to go to Liverpool.

To-day we went to the British Museum. I became so interested in looking at old manuscripts that I told the others to go on and not wait for me. The original Magna Charta, signed by King John, I fancy I looked on with far different feelings from what he did when he signed it. The seal was large enough to be affixed to such an important document, being as large as a dessert plate. The volume of St. Cuthbert's Gospels, written by Eadfrith, Bishop of Lindisfarne, between A.D. 693 and 720, interested me. Its binding of wood, steel, velvet, and precious stones was a real curiosity. There were some Persian and Hindoo writings, in letters of ivory on a dark ground, others on plates of silver, about four inches wide; twenty-four or five of these plates, fastened together with silver wire or chains, showed that, though heathen, they were not ignorant of art, nor destitute of worldly lore. I asked for the Doomsday-Book, and was told that the original was kept in the Record Office; but being written in old Latin, it had been translated into modern Latin, and published in four large volumes, with two small volumes of introduction, which were in the Museum. I asked to see them, and was told that I must go to the secretary and get a permit for the reading-room. I did so; and was asked to write my name, the hotel at which I was stopping, and the place from whence I came. Seeing that I was from America, he said,

"England is very proud of her young daughter America." I replied that "the daughter esteemed and looked with much affection upon her mother country." He then asked what book I wanted to see. I told him. He then wanted to know what I wanted to see it for. I replied I wanted to see it, first, because it was such a famous book; and secondly, to see if my name was in it. He laughed, and after some further compliments, I was shown into the reading-room, a chair was given me, and the books were brought.

I found "Belnuif de

land LX acr . . . near Ripon." The

names of the shires were singularly spelled,—Devenescire for Devonshire, Cornvalgie for Cornwall, etc. There is a work to be published soon at the Heraldry Office giving the names of all who emigrated to America between the years 1500 and 1700, the ships in which they sailed, etc. I shall be on the look-out for it.

After the telegram that E was coming, I gave up all thoughts of wishing to be presented to the Queen until she could be with us. Yesterday the commander and lieutenant-commander were to be presented. The secretary of legation came to our parlor to go with them. The secretary was dressed in black,— black breeches, black silk stockings, the coat lined with white silk. The commander and lieutenant were in full uniform,—their coats also being lined with white silk. They drove off in good style, with their coachman in grand livery. The reception was at three o'clock, and the commander was to return and dine with us at six.

It has been some time since any of our navy have been presented to the Queen, so Her Majesty gave our friends a very gracious reception. There were about five hundred presented, though there were perhaps a thousand present in the throneroom. Those belonging to foreign nations remained in the After our friends had been presented they fell back, and had a good opportunity of seeing them all. There were few beautiful women among the English ladies. Many were quite old and looked very antiquated. One poor lady seemed perfectly bewildered,-probably not having been presented since her marriage, and so for a minute stood perfectly still. The

room.

Queen smiled, and motioned those whose business it was to lead her on. We asked how they managed with their long trains. The commander said it was done admirably. As the ladies came around the half-circle formed by the Queen and her attendants, there were four equerries, adepts in catching up trains and passing them from one to the other, so that the ladies could walk along gracefully until they had passed Her Majesty. There is no backing, but sidling around the circle formed by the Queen, royal family, and the lords and ladies in waiting. It will be some time before the Queen holds another drawing-room, as she goes to Windsor Castle to-morrow, and shortly after to Balmoral.

We often meet people who came over in the Russia. We saw seven of them to-day. It seems like a glimpse of home when we meet our countrymen. Yesterday it rained and was quite unpleasant, and to-day we have a regular March wind.

LONDON, May 11.-I see so much that I often get weary, and sometimes confused. This morning we started out with the intention of going to the Albert Hall. Passing through St. James's Park, I bethought me that to-day was the time that the Queen was to leave Buckingham Palace for Windsor, and as we were to pass the palace on our way, I asked a guard in front of Marlborough House, who directed us to a sentry stationed at a box not far from the palace. He told us the Queen was soon to leave, and by which gate. While talking with him, many of the nobility passed in carriages, and he told us who they were. Soon a company of soldiers, with a band of Scotch musicians, the bagpipes playing merrily, passed on towards, the palace. After them came a troop of the Horse Guards. Then the luggage-vans, filled with trunks, boxes, and band-boxes, took their way to the station, the servants in scarlet-and-gold livery. Another van went off in the direction of the Tower, possibly taking the gold service away for safe-keeping. Crowds of people stopped to see the Queen as the garden-gate was unlocked; and then came the Horse Guards in their splendid uniforms, and pages on horseback, and then the Queen's carriage,-an open barouche,-with Her Majesty and the Princess Beatrice on the back seat, and

Lady Waterpark and the Marchioness of Ely in front. There was cheering, and the Queen-a pleasant, matronly-looking lady -bowed right and left as the carriage passed slowly out of the gate into the street. Prince Leopold and his attendants passed in the next carriage. The prince looks rather delicate; it is said his health is not good. He lifted his hat and bowed gracefully to the multitude. Then followed Lord Alfred Paget; Major-General the Hon. A. Hardinge, and two others, in a carriage drawn by four horses,-all raised their military caps as they dashed by. I was glad to have seen the Queen; not for her title as queen, but as the personification of England's power, knowledge, wealth, and government; and would have been pleased to have had an opportunity of giving her the good. wishes of those who said, when I left home, "Give my love to Queen Victoria."

We walked on then to the Royal Albert Hall of Arts. The design was suggested by Prince Albert. The money made by the first International Exhibition was taken to buy the ground for the present building. The ground is now four times more valuable than when it was purchased. The specimens of cloths, shawls, and manufactures of all kinds that I saw, were very fine. So too were the paintings and the statuary. The music hall in this building is in the form of a Roman circus, and is capable of seating fifteen thousand persons. A Belgian band was playing when we went in. I was much interested in the national monument to Prince Albert, near the site of the first Crystal Palace, and opposite the grand entrance to the hall. It is a Gothic canopy rising in a spire one hundred and seventy-five feet high, supported by four groups of granite columns, to serve as a shrine for the statue of the prince, sitting in his robes of the Garter. Flights of steps run up to this statue, occupying a square of one hundred and thirty feet each way. At the lower angles of this pyramid of steps are four marble statues,-Europe, Asia, Africa, and America. Above these are smaller ones,—Agriculture, Manufactures, Commerce, and Engineering. The entire basement above the steps is surrounded by two hundred life-sized figures in high relief, being portraits of the greatest artists, phi