I now take up Mr. Lee’s narrative. The news of this action, carried by a mail steamer, had reached London several days before the arrival of the exhibits. Under the pressure of an urgent demand the Royal Commission confiscated the space allotted to the United States and parceled it out to British exhibitors. Mr. Holmes on his arrival found not a spot in the Exhibition buildings on which to set his foot. But he was a man of resources. He went before the commission with an eminent Queen’s counsel, who made the point that they had received no official notification of any such action by the United States Government, but had proceeded on a mere newspaper rumor, which they had no right to do; and there was the United States assistant commissioner with his credentials and a shipload of exhibits, and they must admit him. The commissioners yielded most gracefully. They said: “Now, Mr. Holmes, the American space is gone; we cannot restore that to you, but there are unoccupied spots all over the Exhibition, and you may take up any of these, and we will undertake that your whole exhibit shall be well placed.” Upon this Mr. Holmes had gone to work and had been able to find locations for every exhibit, except my engine. [Illustration: WELLINGTON LEE] “But only yesterday,” said Mr. Lee, “Mr. Holmes learned that an engine ordered by the commission to drive the British exhibit of looms, of which there were thirty-three exhibitors, had been condemned by the superintendent of machinery, Mr. Daniel Kinnear Clark, and ordered out of the building.” He added that Mr. Holmes went directly to Mr. Clark and applied for the place for my engine, the bedplate of which, thanks to my precipitate action, had arrived and was then on a truck, in England called a lurry, waiting to be unloaded. In answer to Mr. Clark’s questions, Mr. Holmes had given him his personal assurance that I would be there, and the rest of the engine would be there in ample time, and it would be all that he could possibly desire; and on that assurance he had got the place for me. I informed Mr. Lee that I also had something to tell _him_. I then gave him the situation as already related. He looked very grave. When I had finished he said: “Well, you are in a hole, sure enough; but come, let us get some breakfast, and then we will see what Easton & Amos can do for you.” After eating my first English mutton-chop in a chop-house on the Strand, I accompanied Mr. Lee to their works in the Borough, a long distance away, on the south or Surrey side of the Thames, to reach which we crossed the Southwark bridge.