... I think I have made up my mind to run over to London for a day or two, to bid the Nortons good-by, for I cannot bear to have the sea between us before I see them again. If I do, I shall arrive about the 7th of May, and I shall count on seeing you as much as possible.... I have read your “Are we Christians?” and liked it, of course, because I found _you_ in it, and that is something that will be dear to me so long as I keep my wits. I think I should say that you lump _shams_ and _conventions_ too solidly together in a common condemnation. All conventions are not shams by a good deal, and we should soon be Papuans without them. But I dare say I have misunderstood you. _To the Same._ PARIS, 3 May, 1873. I shall arrive Monday night, and have taken a chamber at the Queen’s Hotel, which is described to me as “somewhere behind the Burlington Arcade,” which is tolerably central. I shall not think of billeting myself on you, especially as you are not yet fairly settled. But I wish to see as much of you as may be. I must see your new nest as I did the old one, for that was a great satisfaction to me, and I recall it often in fancy. I must make the acquaintance of Miss Laura, too, in whom I feel an added interest now that I have got my step, and am a grandfather.[53] You would laugh at the number of perambulators (as they call baby-wagons nowadays) and ponies that I have bought for that wonderful boy, as I lie awake at night and hear the tramp of the _sergent de ville_ under my windows. I have carried him through college so many times, that he must be a prodigy of learning by this time. I do not know whether I ought to betray it even to you, but he has more than once shown a tendency to be _fast_, though I have reclaimed him. I am quite sure he is steady now, and does not drink more than is good for him. That story of the police court was much exaggerated.