“My dear Charles,--I cannot tell you how warmly I agree with your last letter upon the state of Europe. I am an old man, I have seen many men and things, and I have been particularly familiar with foreign policy ever since I first entered the House of Commons, now nearly fifty years ago, but rarely have I known a moment more critical than the present. My one comfort lies in the fact that in spite of the divisions of Party, the heart of the nation is still sound, and the leaven of common sense in the electors will save us yet. I feel a shade of regret sometimes to think that the division no longer retains its old name; I should like to feel that, father and son, we had held it for three generations, but though the name has changed, the spirit of the place is the same.... I beg you to mark my words; I may say without boasting that I have rarely been wrong in my judgment of foreign affairs. When one sees things here one sometimes trembles for the future. “This Hotel is not at all what it was. It is ill-kept and damp, and I shall not return to it. “Expect me in London before the end of the week. “PENSHURST.” [Lord Penshurst died shortly after his return to London. He was succeeded by his son Charles, second Baron, but the Division is still represented by a member of the family in the person of Mr. George Bilstead, his second son, the husband of Mrs. Bilstead, and author of _The Coming Struggle in the Balkans_.] The Duel In the year 1895 of blessed memory there was living in the town of Paris at the expense of his parents a young English gentleman of the name of Bilbury; at least, if that were not his name his name was so nearly that that it doesn’t matter. He spoke French very well, and had for his age (which was twenty-four) a very good working acquaintance with French customs. He was popular among the students with whom he associated, and it was his especial desire not to seem too much of a foreigner on the various occasions when French life contrasts somewhat with that of this island. It was something of a little mania of his, for though he was patriotic to a degree when English history or English habits were challenged, yet it made him intolerably nervous to feel exceptional or eccentric in the town where he lived. It was upon this account that he fought a duel.