Before beginning the series of public appearances, he gave several other private readings that were most enjoyable. One evening he read a chapter from “The Light of the World” in the Everett House dining-rooms, before a select circle of friends. On another day Joseph Jefferson, W. J. Florence, St. Clair McKelway, Murat Halsted, Sir Edwin Arnold, and some of our personal friends dined with us at our house in Brooklyn. Jefferson and Florence were playing at the Brooklyn Academy of Music that week, and in order that we might have plenty of time, and that they should not miss their usual afternoon nap before going to the theatre, we had dinner at noon. We had a good time together. Sir Edwin was at his best. He read selections from “Saadi in the Garden,” and some unpublished poems, to the delight of the two comedians, who enthusiastically declared that they had never enjoyed anything more in their lives. It was after six when they left us--no sleep that afternoon. In the evening our entire party were in the theatre to see Jefferson and Florence in “The Rivals.” The Lotos Club, on the 31st of October, honored Sir Edwin and its own members, by giving a dinner which, from the number participating and the high character of the addresses made, was generally conceded never to have been surpassed in brilliancy in the history of the club. President Frank R. Lawrence occupied the chair, with the guest of honor on his right, and President Seth Low of Columbia College on his left. Among the other guests of the evening were George W. Childs, Richard Henry Stoddard, Edmund Clarence Stedman, Gen. Horace Porter, Paul Dana, Murat Halsted, E. B. Harper, W. H. McElroy, Arthur F. Bowers, Robert Edwin Bonner, Ballard Smith, Walter P. Phillips, H. L. Ensign, Col. Thomas W. Knox, William Winter, Gen. C. H. Collis, Richard Watson Gilder, Max O’Rell, St. Clair McKelway, and Col. E. C. James. The walls and alcoves were hung with emblems indicative of the honors borne by the club’s distinguished guest. Siamese and Japanese flags predominated. On the wall at the poet’s right hung a full-sized portrait of himself, done in crayon by Sarony, and over the doorway which separated the parlors was draped a banneret showing the “Order of the White Elephant”--a Siamese decoration which had been conferred upon only four English-speaking persons: Queen Victoria, Sir Edwin Arnold, Gen. J. A. Halderman, and Col. Thomas W. Knox (the latter two, as it happened, being both members of the Lotos and present.) Sir Edwin wore on his breast his decorations, among which this order was conspicuous. Letters of regret were read from Oliver Wendell Holmes, Charles A. Dana, John G. Whittier, W. D. Howells, the Rev. John Hall, and George William Curtis.