his youngest son stopped with the maid to buy one, while Tennyson and his wife went on and downstairs. So then I seized the youngest darling with gold hair, and kissed him to my heart's content; and he smiled and seemed well pleased. And I was well pleased to have had in my arms Tennyson's child. After my raid I went on. . . . Of this glimpse of the great poet fortunately accorded to our family my father writes in the "Note-Books:" "Gazing at him with all my eyes, I liked him very well, and rejoiced more in him than in all the other wonders of the exhibition." Again my mother refers to the interesting experience:-- MY DEAR ELIZABETH,--My last letter I had not time to even double up myself, as Mr. Hawthorne was booted and spurred for Liverpool before I was aware, and everything was huddled up in a hasty manner. It was something about Tennyson's family that I was saying. I wanted you to know how happy and loving they all seemed together. As Tennyson is in very ill health, very shy and moody, I had sometimes thought his wife might look worn and sad. I was delighted, therefore, to see her serene and sweet face. I cannot say, however, that there was no solicitude in it, but it was a solicitude entirely penetrated with satisfied tenderness. . . . I did not reply to your last long letter to me about slavery. . . . There is not a single person whom I know or ever talked with who advocates slavery. Your letters to me would be far more appropriate to a slaveholder. . . . I do not see how they apply to me at all. . . . There has been the customary misinterpretation of calm justice in the case of my father's moderation during the wild ardor of abolition. This sort of ardor is very likely necessary in great upheavals, but it is not necessary that every individual should join the partisans (while they slash somewhat promiscuously) at the expense of his own merciful discretion. My mother writes in eloquent exposition of her husband's and her own loyalty to the highest views in regard to the relations of all members of the human family, but she never convinced the hot fidelity of the correspondents of her own household. I will add a letter and note, from Hawthorne to Miss Peabody, partly upon this subject:-- LIVERPOOL, August 13th, '57.