I shall never forget the beauty of the scene--I wish I could actualize it--and it was accompanied by what appealed not only to the eye, but to the heart, a mysterious sense of at-homeness. Your mother, as I think I have often told you, was seated half-reclining on the sofa which stood with its back to the window, with that wonderful view of capes and sea beyond. And you two stood leaning against her, one on either side. She was, and always remained, supremely beautiful, not only in feature and the bodily frame, but still more from the look in her eyes, the motion of her lips, and the deep clear music of her voice. Such a combination of grace and dignity with simplicity and frankness and friendliness of accost as never was. Such gentle trustfulness and sincerity of welcome as must have won a less susceptible heart than that of the diffidently intrusive [Greek: paidagôgos D]. I thought she must be a queen who had stept down from mediæval days into these more prosaic times which she ennobled. And the two Boys. If I cannot speak about them to you, you will guess the reason. But for the benefit of a younger generation, I appeal to the portraits of her by Watts (now at Aldworth), and of Hallam and Lionel--surely among the best he ever painted--which are given in your father's _Memoir_ (vol. i. facing p. 330 and p. 370). And then he came in, a truly awful[49] moment, but in an instant of time he too had not only banished the nervousness of [Greek: D], but won his heart. His welcome resembled hers in its sincerity. And even if I had been ten times more nervous than I was, and awe-stricken I was, no doubt, something set me at my ease at once. Of his look and manner I find it not only hard, but absurd to attempt to speak. He must have been at that date somewhat over fifty. I was twenty-three, not quite thirty years younger.[50] His figure, so well known in the photographs of the time, was imposing, and it was awe-inspiring to be in the presence of the great Poet we had hero-worshipped in our youth (though he, I think, was not the only divinity in our Pantheon, there was Clough also--Browning at that date had not appeared). But even so formidable as he was on these grounds, the humanity of the man, and what I came to regard as the most abiding, perhaps the deepest-seated, characteristic, his eternal youthfulness, acted as a spell, and timidity melted into affection. I can still feel his hand-grip, soft at once and large and strong, as he stood there peering down on the relatively small mortal before him--so sane, and warm, and trustful.