For ourselves, after cool weather in Paris we came in for a piece of very sultry weather in London, where we had to stay awhile, our lodgings here not being available till about 15th September. So after staying to the Harvard boat-race,--which I saw from the umpire’s boat, and Mrs. Gray, with good Miss S., from some grounds above Fulham,--we set off on a little round of visits, first to the Darwins’, near Bromley, then to the Churches’ in Somersetshire, a pleasant country rectory and a delightful couple. You remember the university sermons we had up the Nile were his. Next we passed a day with an old bachelor botanical acquaintance near Taunton, who makes a capital squire; then to Torquay for three days (with a daughter of Sir William Hooker, and her husband, Dr. Lombe), one of which I devoted to an excursion down the river Dart from Totness to Dartmouth (which the English think much of, but you dwellers on the Hudson would not), and to a view of that quaint little town. On our way back we had an hour at Exeter to see the cathedral; a night and morning at Salisbury, the cathedral as to exterior, site, and all, and beautiful spire, one of the most satisfactory in England; took a glance at Wilton, a peep into old George Herbert’s little church of Bemerton and into his house and garden; stopped over a train at Romsey to see the fine Norman abbey church, and to Winchester, most interesting cathedral as to the interior, Winchester school and the old Hospital of St. Cross. Then, on returning to London, we settled down here, and after a few days were joined by the rest of our party from France. ... No one in England recognized me with my venerable white beard! Ever, dear Howland, your affectionate ASA GRAY. The winter Dr. Gray spent in Egypt, in 1869, he raised a full beard, which so changed his appearance that, though eyes and voice were there, his oldest friends did not know him on his return, and he had great glee in imposing himself on his old friend Dr. Torrey, when he went to the station to meet him in Boston, as a persistent hack-driver. Even when he declared himself, Dr. Torrey would scarcely believe him; he and Professor Henry always maintained a man had no lawful right so to change his outward appearance after middle age. TO R. W. CHURCH. KEW, October 6, 1869.