One morning—it was the 17th of January, 1912—I received an urgent message by telephone, begging me to go to Hertford House at once. Sir John Scott had died there suddenly. When I reached Manchester Square, I found him lying in the Trustees’ room. He had been discussing business with Mr. MacColl, who had succeeded Sir Claude Phillips as keeper, when all of a sudden he began to have a difficulty in breathing. He said it was nothing, but he grew worse. Doctors were sent for, but there was nothing to be done. That large-hearted man died in the house where he had lived so long, and surrounded by all the beautiful things which he loved and which he had been the means of securing for the nation when he might have had them for himself. The Government had made him a baronet. Lord Rosebery, with a keen appreciation of what he had done, said to me in righteous jest: “They have made him a baronet when they ought to have made him a duke.” A NOTE ON RUSSIAN STUDIES A few days ago—I am writing on the 7th of August, 1916—I read in the _Times_ a long speech by one of our preter-pluperfect rulers, announcing the determination of the Government to encourage the study of Russian, on account of its glorious literature. I think the adjective was “glorious,” but, at any rate, it was some such word. Was there ever a better example of the danger of giving reasons? Had this illustrious gentleman deigned to glance at some such easily accessible book as Mr. Maurice Baring’s delightful little “Outline of Russian Literature,” he would have been saved from talking such nonsense. We are told that upon one occasion Dr. Johnson declared that he could quote by heart a whole chapter of the Natural History of Iceland from the Danish of Horreboro, and immediately proceeded to show that it was no vain boast. Chapter LXXII, Concerning Snakes. There are no snakes to be met with throughout the whole island.