In the Diplomatic service Ambassadors retire at the age of seventy; there was real sorrow in the English Colony in Paris when it was known that the Marquis of Dufferin and Ava was nearing this period. It being, however, inevitable, it was decided to render their departure as little sorrowful as possible, so far as the British Colony was concerned. A Committee was formed to consider a presentation to Lord Dufferin, and also a Committee of ladies, who were anxious to mark their appreciation of Her Excellency’s kindness and untiring work in connection with the various charities. It was agreed to present to the Ambassador a portrait of his son, Lord Ava, who was also very popular, and M. Benjamin Constant was commissioned to paint it. It was unfortunately not ready for the day when the presentation was made, but the subscribers were invited to view it later. It is now, of course, of very special value, owing to the unfortunate death of Lord Ava in South Africa. At the banquet, when the presentation was made, the Earl made a most interesting speech, part of which is well worth recording. He said: “That he felt he was not addressing an audience, but was speaking to a few dear and intimate friends, and therefore would not make a set speech. When one had something to say from one’s heart words came easily. Considering the almost minatory words in Scripture, addressed to those who, like himself, had reached their seventieth year, he hardly knew whether he might consider himself as possessed of a future, or whether he ought not to regard his life as over, and himself as an uninvited guest at a crowded banquet. He consoled himself, however, with the reflection that the words of Holy Scripture were addressed to a people whose life began rather earlier—who married, for instance, sometimes at the age of ten, and whose girls were occasionally mothers at that age. As he had not married till he was thirty-six, he concluded that he was only now beginning his life. Speaking as he did in the British Embassy, he remembered what he felt at his first appearance there. It was in that room that he had ventured upon his first waltz, having been ordered to dance. The lady was, he feared, thoroughly disgusted with her partner. In this room, too, he remembered a performance of the ‘School for Scandal,’ in which three of the characters had been taken by three descendants of Sheridan—the Duchess of Somerset, his mother, and Mr. R. Sheridan. Finally, the room would be after this associated with one of the most gratifying incidents of his life, the presentation of this gift by his friends in Paris. He would like to say a few words on his choice of the present. He had desired something which might descend to his heirs, and remain long afterwards as a memorial of the kind feelings with which he had been regarded in Paris. He had not chosen, therefore, a valuable picture or other object which squandering descendants—such