The very serious illness which ushered in the year 1880, and which confined Reeve to his room till near the end of January, formed a very important era in his life. Though it passed away, so that, after a fortnight at Brighton, he was able, by the middle of February, to attend to his official duties at the Council Office, the bad effects remained. He was no longer a young man, but he had carried his years well. He had travelled, he had occasionally shot, and always with a keen sense of enjoyment. Now, the full weight of his age told at once. His illness left him ten years older; unable to undergo the fatigue of field sports, and feeling that of travel sometimes irksome. And Foxholes afforded him a tempting excuse. From this time, instead of going for his holiday to Scotland, to France, or to Geneva, it seemed so much easier to go to Foxholes, so much more comfortable to spend it there. And for the next fifteen years a large part of his time was passed at Foxholes, where, in the most delightful climate known in this country, surrounded by beautiful scenery and with a commanding view of the sea, amid the comforts of home and in the company of his books and his chosen friends, he could say, from both the material and moral point of view: Suave, mari magno turbantibus aequora ventis, E terra magnum alterius spectare laborem. Of course, his duties at the Council Office required him to be in town during the season and while the Court was sitting; and in the April of this year he noted a breakfast at Lord Houghton's, to meet Renan, and presiding as a Vice-President at a meeting of the Society of Antiquaries. Otherwise the Journal is almost a blank, containing little beyond the dates of going to Foxholes or returning to town.