Perhaps some British statesman might not think these suggestions beneath his notice. Let him send a competent agent to examine and report upon this subject. He will probably discover that the whole nuisance can be swept away without inflicting the slightest injury on the national exchequer. It would form no discreditable sentence in a statesman’s epitaph to read that “he did away with the needless and offensive restrictions imposed on British subjects from the outer empire visiting the Imperial centre.” Having at last passed the Custom House, I drove to Rock Ferry, one of the most pleasant suburbs of Liverpool, to visit a family I was acquainted with, and with them I passed a most enjoyable day. The greeting I received was most cordial and gratifying. In the afternoon I started for London, leaving my daughter behind me, and I found myself once more whirling through the green meadows and cultivated fields of England. I was alone, but I did not feel solitary. How charming everything looked! The air was fresh with passing showers, and the rain played for some quarter of an hour on the landscape only to make it look fresher and fairer, and, when the sun came out, more full of poetry. Why, we are at Harrow-on-the-Hill! Has time gone so quickly? There is so much to think about, so many fresh scenes to gaze upon, and so many events seem to crowd into the hours that the traveller, in his bewilderment, loses count of time. I am again in London, at Batt’s hotel, Dover street, and I walk to the Empire Club to learn if there are any letters for me. I am disappointed to find there is no cablegram. I despatched one from Moville, and one word in reply would have told me if all was well. I recollect well the depression I experienced at the time at not receiving news. It was an inexplicable feeling; not exactly one of impatience or disappointment, but rather of keen anxiety. “Why should there be silence,” I murmur, when everything points to the necessity for a reply. Next day my business took me to the city, and I returned as rapidly as I could. In the afternoon, to relieve my suspense, I went to the Geological Society’s rooms, and mechanically looked over the books and specimens. I wandered into the rooms of the Royal Society, and found before me the well known features of Mary Somerville as they are preserved in her bust. I then strolled into the parks and down to the Club, and still no cablegram. These facts are of no interest to any but the writer, but possibly they may suggest, not simply to the transmitter of telegrams but to the officials who pass them through their hands, how much often depends upon their care and attention, and that there is something more required than simply receiving and recording a message. There is the duty of seeing to its proper delivery, and it was precisely on this ground that my trouble took its root.