I have just left a very happy group upon the veranda--Estella and our two darling little children; Christina and her three flaxen-haired beauties. Max is away on his sheep farm. My mother and Mrs. and Mr. Phillips are reading, or playing with the children. The sun is shining brightly, and the birds are singing. I enter my library to make this entry in my journal. God has greatly blessed us and all our people. There were a few conservatives who strenuously objected at first to our reforms; but we mildly suggested to them that if they were not happy--and desired it--we would transfer them to the outside world, where they could enjoy the fruits of the time-hallowed systems they praised so much. They are now the most vigorous supporters of the new order of things. And this is one of the merits of your true conservative: if you can once get him into the right course he will cling to it as tenaciously as he formerly clung to the wrong. They are not naturally bad men; their brains are simply incapable of suddenly adjusting themselves to new conceptions. The Demon returned yesterday from a trip to the outside world. Max's forebodings have been terribly realized. Three-fourths of the human race, in the civilized lands, have been swept away. In France and Italy and Russia the slaughter has been most appalling. In many places the Demon sailed for hundreds of miles without seeing a human being. The wild beasts--wolves and bears--are reassuming possession of the country. In Scandinavia and in northern America, where the severity of the climate somewhat mitigated the ferocity of man, some sort of government is springing up again; and the peasants have formed themselves into troops to defend their cattle and their homes against the marauders. But civility, culture, seem to have disappeared. There are no newspapers, no books, no schools, no teachers. The next generation will be simply barbarians, possessing only a few dim legends of the refinement and wonderful powers of their ancestors. Fortunate it is indeed, that here, in these mountains, we have preserved all the instrumentalities with which to restore, when the world is ready to receive it, the civilization of the former ages. Our constitution has worked admirably. Not far from here has arisen the beautiful village of Lincoln. It is a joy to, visit it, as I do very often.