Miss Mitford in one of her letters remarks: “It is singular that the name of Mary Anning crosses me often. One of my friend Mr. Kenyon’s graceful poems is addressed to her, and Charmouth and Lyme are dear to me as being full of my first recollections of the sea. I should like of all things to go there again and make acquaintance with Mary Anning.” Here are a few stanzas of the poem alluded to:— “E’en poets shall by thee set store; For wonders feed the poet’s wish; And is their mermaid wondrous more Than thy half-lizard and half-fish? * * * * * While Lyme’s dark-headed urchins grow Each in his turn to grey-haired men, Yet, when grown old, this beach they walk, Some pensive breeze their grey locks fanning, Their sons shall love to hear them talk Of many a feat of Mary Anning.” [Illustration: IN THE DRAWING-ROOM] Writing of their residence in Lyme Mary says:— “My dear mother had three or four young relations, misses in their teens, staying with her and was sufficiently occupied in playing the chaperone to the dull gaieties of the place.... Of course I was too young to be admitted to the society, such as it was; but I had even then a dim glimmering perception of its being anything but exhilarating.” Sometimes the company assembled in the Great House. “One incident that occurred there,” writes Miss Mitford—“a frightful danger—a providential escape—I shall never forget. “There was to be a ball at the rooms, and a party of sixteen or eighteen persons, dressed for the assembly, were sitting in the dining-room at dessert. The ceiling was ornamented with a rich running pattern of flowers in high relief, the shape of the wreath corresponding pretty exactly with the company arranged round the oval table. Suddenly, without the slightest warning, all that part of the ceiling became detached and fell down in large masses upon the table and the floor. It seems even now all but miraculous how such a catastrophe could occur without danger to life or limb; but the only things damaged were the flowers and feathers of the ladies and the fruits and wines of the dessert. I myself, caught instantly in my father’s arms, by whose side I was standing, had scarcely even time to be frightened, although after the danger was over our fair visitors of course began to scream.” Towards the end of their year’s residence in Lyme Regis the fortunes of the Mitford family were once more clouded over. “Nobody told me,” writes Mary, “but I felt, I knew, I had an interior conviction for which I could not have accounted ... that in spite of the company, in spite of the gaiety, something was wrong. It was such a foreshowing as makes the quicksilver in the barometer sink whilst the weather is still bright and clear.