On one occasion at dinner Hayward told a characteristic anecdote which, although it seemed to amuse the other ladies present, caused me considerable embarrassment. Kinglake afterwards said to me: "I thought you were a hardened married woman; I shall henceforth call you 'miss.'" He was a very sweet, lovable man, old in years but a youth in heart. His letters were full of gaiety and persiflage. Once he wrote to me: "Hayward can pardon you having an ambassador or two at your _feet_, but to find the way to your _heart_, obstructed by a crowd of astronomers, Russ-expansionists, metaphysicians, theologians, translators, historians, poets--this is more than I can endure." He was never tired of rallying me about my callers and friends, insisting that I was a _grande dame_ to whom all the really great in the land came to {194} make obeisance. Once when staying at Sidmouth he wrote: "Mrs. Grundy has a small house there, but she does not know me by sight. If Madame Novikoff were to come, the astonished little town, dazzled first by her, would find itself invaded by theologians, bishops, ambassadors of deceased emperors, and an ex-Prime Minister." When he gave me his photograph, and I gave him mine, he referred to the transaction as "an exchange between the personified months of May and November." On one occasion _The Times_ inserted, to Kinglake's great indignation, a statement that I had been obliged to leave England. Shortly afterwards Chinery, the editor, happened to seat himself at the same table with Kinglake at the Athenæum Club. Kinglake immediately rose and moved to another part of the room. "So unlike me," was his comment; "but somehow a savagery as of youth came over me in my ancient days; it was like being twenty years old again." Later, however, he discovered that Froude had been indirectly responsible for the paragraph, and Kinglake immediately found means of conveying to Chinery his regrets. Poor dear "Eothen's" mind was powerful and bright to his last day. I called on him frequently during his last days, and it was not until the end, which came on January 2nd, 1891, that I realised the extent of my loss. For one thing there is, in the Englishman's eyes, {195} nothing more sacred on earth than the person and property of an Englishman. It would be well if some of our Russian officials would follow the example of their English friends. It is a praiseworthy and unquestioned fact that all Englishmen at home and abroad are penetrated by a personal sense of their duty towards each other. Everything English must be defended and encouraged, every Englishman must be helped and protected. Such patriotic _esprit de corps_ and solidarity makes one sometimes feel quite envious, and indeed I have often noticed the very natural smile of incredulous surprise with which English people regard the so-frequently-met-with indifference shown by certain Russian officials towards Russian affairs.