The success of this first volume of poems naturally contributed not a little toward establishing Mrs. Moulton firmly in the place she had won already in the literary society of London. Among other celebrities she met at this time Lady Wilde, who, as the poet "Speranza" in the _Dublin Nation_ in 1848 had been a figure really heroic, and who was by no means disinclined to magnify her own virtues. Taking Mrs. Moulton to task as a poet of mere emotion, Lady Wilde said to her reprovingly: "You're full of your own feelin's, me dear; but when I was young and your age, too, only the Woes of Nations got utterance in me pomes." Mrs. Moulton heard Cardinal Newman and Mr. Spurgeon. Of them she wrote: "You see straight into his [Newman's] mind and heart. You feel the glow of his thought, the action of his conscience; you feel the inherent excellence of the man you are dealing with. "Mr. Spurgeon's style is admirable--strong, vigorous Saxon, short sentences, simple in structure, and full of earnestness. His first prayer was brief and earnest, and extremely simple in phraseology. It gave one a sense of intimacy with God, in which was no irreverence. The sermon commenced at 12 M., and lasted three-quarters of an hour. I thought John Bunyan might have preached just such a discourse." To her great regret she missed meeting Tennyson. Long afterward she wrote: "I never met Tennyson, but I just lost him by an accident. I shall never get over the regret of it. I had been invited to various places where he was expected as a guest; but you know how elusive he was, even his best friends could get at him but rarely. One day I had gone out for some idiotic shopping--shopping is always idiotic to me--and when I came back at late dinner time Lord Houghton met me with the question, 'Where have you been? I've been sending messengers all over the city for you. I got hold of Tennyson, and he waited for half an hour to see you.' The fates were never kind enough to bring me within the poet's range again." On the death of Mrs. Sarah Helen Whitman in 1878, Mrs. Moulton wrote of her in the London _Athenæum_. The admiration of Poe which exists in England, the romance of his relations with the "Helen" of his most beautiful poem, made the article especially timely; and from her acquaintance and her warm friendship for Mrs. Whitman, Mrs. Moulton was able to speak with authority. Her description of the personality of Mrs. Whitman is noteworthy: