It was a piece of good fortune to find my old friend John Lumley, afterwards Ambassador at Rome, and created Lord Savile, established here as First Secretary. He was very popular in Russian society, as he was everywhere else, and it was a great advantage to have him as sponsor. He was most kind and introduced me to many of the pleasantest people in St. Petersburg. The day after my arrival he drove me about, and took me to see several of his friends. Among others a lovely young widow—only twenty-four years of age—Countess Koucheleff-Bezbarodko, who lived in a palace the magnificence of which I have never seen surpassed. It would have been difficult to determine which was the more beautiful, the lady or her home. The casket was worthy of the jewel, and that is the best that can be said. She afterwards married the eldest son of Prince Suvoroff, the Governor-General of St. Petersburg. But it is idle to expatiate upon the grandeur and luxury of these great palaces; they are a matter of common knowledge, and I shall write no more about them, though of the kindness and friendliness with which we were greeted in them one would hardly weary of talking. The Russian noble has in perfection the greatest of all the qualities which go to make up the character of a _grand seigneur_, that of making his guests, however humble they may be, feel at their ease. That is what makes society in this brilliant city so pleasant. To English people the familiarity of the Russians with English literature has always made a great bond of sympathy. A new novel by Dickens or Thackeray was looked forward to with almost as much excitement as it was in London, and the English classics have become the common property of all. I was not a little astonished when on my being presented to Count Orloff Davidoff, one of the great nobles, he asked me what relation I was to the historian of Greece. He had studied at Edinburgh University. When poor Thackeray died at the end of the year the consternation and sorrow were most touching. He was one of the last men with whom I spoke before leaving home. On the evening before I left London for St. Petersburg I was up in a box at the Promenade Concert. Down below I saw Thackeray’s gigantic figure, his white head towering above the crowd, and I ran down to bid him farewell. He had always been very kind to me as he was to all young people, and I was naturally greatly flattered and fascinated by his charm—for he could be very charming when he chose, though, like his great rival Dickens, and even Addison as Pope tells us, he resented anything like being drawn out in the company of strangers. I several times met him at dinner at Millais’, when he and I would be the only guests, making up a quartette with the genial, handsome host and his no less handsome wife. After dinner Mrs. Millais used to leave us, and we three men adjourned to the great studio where we might smoke in armchair comfort.