These digressions are, I suppose, inartistic, but the death of Lord Clarendon led me to speak of his successor, and so I have wandered on—carried by memories that will not be denied. Gratefully and reverently I wish to lay my humble wreath upon Lord Granville’s tomb. Let me hark back, then, to 1870. On the 19th of July the storm burst and war was declared. It is not for me to deal with the story of the tragedies by which the world was shocked. I only touch upon history where it is necessary, in order to throw light upon my personal sketches. Towards the end of the summer the Prince of Wales invited me to go and stay with him at Abergeldie. We arrived there, if I remember right, on the 11th of August, and I remained among those lovely Scottish mountains for nearly a month. It was quite a small, intimate party, for the picturesque castle has not much accommodation. The romantic tower by the Deeside is just such an old Scottish stronghold as Sir Walter Scott would have loved to describe as the home of a Baron of Bradwardine, standing in a very old-fashioned, unsophisticated garden, bright with late flowers, distributed in Scottish fashion among fruit trees and kitchen requisites, that it would be a crime to attempt to bring under the rule of a modern gardener. On a small lawn there was one old tree—a plane, if I remember right—under which I can still see the great Queen sitting when she came to drink tea with the Prince and Princess, and insisted on having my Chinese servant, Lin Fu, produced for her to see.