Speaking of the number of excellent people met in London, Field on his return told with great gusto his experience at a dinner-party there at which he was seated between the wife of a member of Parliament and Mrs. Humphry Ward. The conversation turned upon P.T. Barnum, who was then in London with his "greatest show on earth." One of the ladies inquired of Field if he was acquainted with the famous showman, to which Field said he replied, with the utmost gravity and earnestness: "From my earliest infancy. Do you know, madame, that I owe everything I am and hope to be to that great, good man? When he first discovered me I was living in a tree in the wilds of Missouri, clothed in skins and feeding on nuts and wild berries. Yes, madam. Phineas T. Barnum took me from my mother, clothed me in the bifurcated raiment of civilization, sent me to school, where I began to lisp in numbers before I had mastered the multiplication table, and I have been lisping ever since." Field had a peculiar hesitation in his speech, almost amounting to the pause of an embarrassed stutterer; and if he related this experience to the British matrons as he rehearsed it to his friends afterward, it was small wonder that they swallowed it with many a "Really!" "How curious!" "Isn't it marvellous?" This dinner occurred at the time when the trial of several members of the Clan-na-gael for the murder of Dr. Cronin was in progress in Chicago. The case was followed with as much interest in England as in America. When Mrs. Ward learned that Field hailed from that city, she said to him, "I am so glad to meet somebody from Chicago, for I am greatly interested in the town. Do tell me, did you know Dr. Cronin or any of those horrid Clan-na-gaels?" "I had the satisfaction of telling her," said Field, "that Martin Bourke (one of the suspects) and I had been very intimate friends, and that Dan Coughlin (another) and I belonged to the same hunting club, and had often shot buffaloes and cougars on the prairie a few miles west of Chicago. As for Sullivan, the ice-man, I assured her that if that man was convicted it would be a severe blow to the best circles of the city." "Still more satisfaction had I," Field added, "in the conviction that my auditor believed every one of the preposterous yarns I told her." "The new volume" referred to in Field's letter to Mr. Gray was that which subsequently took the form of "Echoes from the Sabine Farm," published by his friend and fellow-bibliomaniac, Francis Wilson. The story of how it came to be issued in that particular form is told by Mr. Wilson in his introduction to the subscription edition. It was originally Field's intention that I should take charge of this publication, although I had never been consulted about it. Therefore I was somewhat surprised on receiving the following note: PHILADELPHIA, December 20th, 1889. MR. SLASON THOMPSON-- DEAR SIR: