what is called the last infirmity of noble minds,' ambition, seems to me most contemptible, and utterly unworthy to be the actuating principle of life, and this feeling is enough to prevent my being ambitious.

"Yesterday we saw Salcombe Hill taking his evening sun-bath as we came back along the Exeter roads, which bath was I think more glowing even than I have seen it. From a peaceful little cottage just before us a thin blue smoke was rising, the colour of which was changed, by the golden light in which Salcombe Hill was basking behind it, into a most lovely purple."

"The doctor told me not to smoke, a very disagreeable prescription. He told me Disraeli was one of the most inveterate smokers he ever knew, and very nearly smoked himself to death, and now never touches tobacco."

In answer to a somewhat bigoted and one-sided argument about Romanism, the following extract is a proof of the calm and fairness with which he felt it incumbent to consider all questions of religious difference:

"As to Popery-I think you are right in all you say against it. It is surely a corrupt form of Christianity. But then you and I say so without even having read or heard arguments on the other side (at least I have heard very few, and I believe they say a great deal for themselves). Now if the arguments are good, they ought to be listened to; and if they are bad, they will do me no harm, or rather they will do me good by confirming me in my attachment to Protestantism. However, I don't suppose I shall be able to get the books I mentioned. I must confess that I can't imagine what reasonable defence they can make of their religion. But one can't help feeling as if one ought to know on what grounds at least half of Europe adopt a form of Christianity so different to our own."

The following lines on the late Duke of Wellington,

written two years before his death, gave rise to some little discussion among friends whose orthodoxy was apt to be strict even to a fault. They speak for themselves, and explain the extract connected with them;

THE DUKE OF WELLINGTON,

The warrior's glittering panoply, the frown
Of cannon, and the battle's stormy sea,
The gorgeous triumph and the victor's crown,
The pictur'd record of thy life shall be.

Nor most for these shall Albion bless thy name,
In peace her safeguard as in war her pride;
Thou wast a hero when the foemen came,

Thou art a Father when their pow'r hath died.

Calm be the radiance of thy setting sun,
And softly smile the ev'ning of thy day;
Heav'n rest thee when thy patriot course is run,
And death shall steal thy noble soul away!

"January 22nd, 1851 or 1852.

"As to the two lines at the end of my wretched verses on the Duke, is there anything unchristian in them? Surely not. Observe that I do not in any way attribute his attainment of heaven to his patriotism; in plain prose, I merely say that 'when your patriotic course is run may heaven receive you,' of course implying that heaven would be obtained (if at all) by the only means which can procure it -the merits of Christ. There seems no necessity to express this. Indeed, I think one should be cautious how one uses that awful name in any way out of its place, or mixed up with what (though innocent) is of an earthly nature, such as poems in praise of heroes."

In reference to some public meeting of an ultraProtestant character, he says: I feel sure that public meetings to denounce religious opinion are wrong in principle."

"DORSET STREET, Saturday.

"I was much struck with Roundell Palmer's speech last night, and I agreed with him almost entirely. It was full of thought. I don't know whether you remember my having spoken to you of him as a man who was sure to rise; an Oxford man of my college."

After a discussion about Church and State, in a letter written between 1851-53, he wrote: "I don't think our discussion was of the importance you attached to it. I believe as you do in Christianity, and I think the purest form of it is Protestantism. My doubt is only whether the State-that is the Government-ought to uphold any particular form of religion. Government is instituted for the civil and temporal, not the spiritual welfare of the community. With a view to the temporal welfare it ought, I think, to encourage religion generally, but I doubt whether it ought to interfere with the consciences of men. But suppose I were to admit that Government ought to encourage Christianity as against any other creed, it would not follow that it ought to decide as to the form of Christianity which should be adopted in this country. You and I are Protestants, but there is no doubt that Roman Catholics as well as Dissenters have something to say for themselves, and I don't think civil Government is acting within its province when it attempts to interpret the Bible. In what sense is it to encourage Protestantism? Not, certainly, by persecution of Romanists. How then? By not admitting them to a share in the legislation? This seems to me to be negative persecution, and therefore inadmissible. Should it then-as a fact it does-recognise one Church, and make all persons, whatever their religious opinions, pay for the support of that church? I confess I cannot think so. In short, Government should not interfere with the consciences of men, so as to stand between man and his Creator to interpret His will, and enforce upon His creatures its interpreta

tion. This is arrogating to itself a power to which I think it can have no claim. But as I said before, I think it should uphold religion generally, that is, give every facility and encouragement to the exercise of religion generally, with a view to the temporal welfare of the governed. I will even allow that it should uphold Christianity only, because that only seems really deserving of the name of religion. But to decide between the conflicting forms of Christianity which all sects profess to have taken from the Bible, seems to me not within the province of civil Government. Christ, you say, preached and caused to be preached only His religion, but Christ was a spiritual, not a temporal governor. He Himself declared that His kingdom was not of this world.' I will only say that my view is much the same as that of Archbishop Whately, who is, or appears to be, a good Christian and staunch Protestant, besides being a man of great intellect. It has always seemed to me most unjust and wrong that in Ireland, where threefourths of the population are Romanists, the whole population should be made to pay for the support of the Protestant Church. Supposing, as I have half admitted, that the State ought to uphold to a certain extent Christianity generally, there is no argument to be derived from the example of our Lord in favour of its teaching and upholding one form of Christianity as against another; but of course it was not in the nature of things that it should be so. The Church and State question is political as well as religious.'

"SIDMOUTH, August 31st.

"I wish you could have been with C and me to-day without getting wet. We went up the First Peak, and about half-way between that and the Second Peak began a perilous descent to the shingles. Then we went quite round the rocks at the foot of the Second Peak (where I have never been before), and so on by the isolated rock to Lardrum Bay. This was a most

scrambling journey; as we got near the Bay the sea came quite close to the rocks, and there seemed no way of passing, till we discovered a small hole through which we crept. But we were deceived, for an inlet had to be crossed, and then a dark cave appeared, quite full of water, and immediately between us and our destination. We would not be beaten, and there was nothing for it but to wade through the water up to our knees in it. After much more scrambling and winding we arrived at Lardrum Bay, and so home by the road and First Peak. Such figures. It was a wild walk which gave me much delight. The islet rock is magnificent when you are near it. All the riches of California are spread out on the hills. The Second Peak has a massive crown of burnished gold, and there is all over the landscape a soft flush of delicate green.' ""

"SIDMOUTH, September 5th, 1850.

"Yesterday was a most glorious day, and I went a long walk with M to the hill opposite Dunscombe, which is now my favourite walk. I go first to the Fox House, and then through the little woods and along the hillside quite to the edge of the cliff, where I sit down. and enjoy the lovely view. Dunscombe Wood at that time of day is all steeped in a dark, cool, green shade, with occasional walks seen for a moment and losing themselves the next; the luxuriant depths of the thick ash groves, which are interspersed with patches of the greenest turf, whereon feed your friends, the dark red cows; and at the top, rescued from the wood, mounds heaped one above the other of the shortest, softest, most verdant, most inviting sward, which set off beautifully the calm light blue of the distant sea."

"SIDMOUTH, August 17th.

"I had a most beautiful progress to Exeter by the The day was very fine, and the country

express train.