January 21, 1895. Uncle Terry still goes to teas and flirts desperately with the girls who make much of the dear old fellow. Mrs. John L. Gardner is here with wonderful costumes from Paris and such furs--sables and chinchillas. My syndicate goes better always. I have seven subscribers now. I am very glad of the new ones, _Louisville Courier Journal_ and _St. Paul Despatch_. February 23. Rome is full of Americans, who keep me very busy. To-day I wrote the first stint of my newspaper carnival letter, then arranged the flowers and put my house in order for a luncheon party for Mrs. Potter Palmer. In the afternoon drove out with Mrs. Gardner to Villegas’ studio where she “acquired” some of his gorgeous stuffs, old Genoese velvet and the like. To tea at Mrs. MacVeagh’s, where I had a good talk with the Ambassador; he looks like his brother Franklin whom we liked so much in Chicago. To-night to a ball at the Artists’ Club. You must read Paul Sabatier’s “St. Francis of Assisi”; it is delicious. I have just suffered Zola’s “Debacle.” One doesn’t read that book, one suffers it. April 1. Sunday was my reception day; there are only two more of them. They are voted a success. Helen (Gardner) makes the tea. The Price Colliers came. She is a pearl. They are an interesting couple. To-day to lunch with Auntie and Uncle Terry. They have bloomed out with the warm weather and look like a pair of roses. Dear old Mr. Hooker was a sad loss to them; his death has darkened their whole winter. Mr. Story is ill, but his daughter Edith Peruzzi is hopeful. Mr. Hurlbert told me that the reason Mr. Story didn’t recover was that he did not want to. His interest in life died with his wife. It seems that she had taken care of all the material side, his money, wardrobe, every practical detail! Losing her, he finds himself helpless, “perplexed”, as Hurlbert said, “at buying a shoe string.” Saw Salvini in Alfieri’s “Saul” last night; a great joy. He is unchanged, showed not a trace of having “gone off!” I had hardly hoped for this happiness, as he almost never acts now, having retired after his last tour in the United States, with a handsome fortune. Mme. Modjeska in a stage box, looking lovely but older, the sad “older” that dresses like twenty-five and has the face and expression of fifty. But, bless you, if you want my news, buy the weekly _Transcript_; my letters are pretty apt to turn up in Rome, as many traveling Bostonians subscribe to it. The Barrett Wendell children confronted me with one of my own letters the other day and demanded to be taken to the tapestry factory I had described; fortunately it exists.