pint of water can send a train from this to New York, which it will do shortly." He employs several people to make his machinery, but when they have made it and used it successfully, they declare they don't know _why_ or _how_ it is done. I am trying to persuade John to stop here on Friday on his way from Baltimore and see one of his experiments. I have heard John say that he expected some great discovery would be made shortly, and in the _chemical_ direction. Mr. Keally is a mechanist, and says he discovered this force by accident. It is curiously like the one in Bulwer's novel, which everyone was possessed of and could destroy anything in a moment. Mrs. A. B--- is going to take us a drive this afternoon. At present my letters to Newport have only produced an invitation to dine with Mrs. Belmont on Saturday, which we are unable to accept. Hedley enjoyed his Sunday outing with Mr. Rosengarten, and was introduced to heaps of people, and felt quite an important person. He is always much liked, and _I_ am not surprised. _Wednesday, 15th_.--At two o'clock we met Mr. Childs at the station, and went with him to Bryan Maur by rail, and then his carriage met us and took us to his farm and stables, &c., and then to his house; it is all very new and very tidy and pretty. He told his wife to buy any land she liked four years ago, and build anything she liked on it, and now he has paid the bills and handed her the deeds, and it is all her own. That's the way husbands do things in America! The wives and children have a good time here, and the working classes, too, have many privileges, or perhaps, I should say, that they _share_ them with the richer and more educated people; everywhere, in the trains and trams and restaurants of stations and waiting rooms there is _equality_, and considering all things one does not suffer much by the mixture excepting that they "_level down_," and one misses the comforts and _quiet_ of the English railroads. Some of the working men are remarkably fine and intelligent looking, and always quiet and well behaved. I do not observe any very great politeness to women, which I was led to expect was the prevailing habit in the United States, but I notice that the fathers are wonderfully gentle and helpful with the children. Mrs. Childs is a bright little woman, and sings well, which you would scarcely expect when hearing her voice in speaking. It is a pity that so many of the women have such unpleasant voices, and the _men_ have generally nothing harsh in their tones. A captain of one of the Cunard steamers sat next me, and seeing my distress over a plateful of very large oysters, whispered, "you need not eat them." We had carefully abstained from luncheon, as dinner was at four o'clock, and this was the menu for dinner: soup, _big_ oysters, boiled cod, then devilled crab (which I ate, and it was very good), then very tough stewed beef-steak, large _blocks_ of ice-cream, and peaches, and