As we entered, there was such a smoke that we thought we had to encounter a second fog in the house. Some very dirty shabby servants--a thing almost unheard-of here--ran past us to fetch the 'Chátelaine,' who, wrapped in a Scotch plaid, with a staff in her hand and the air of an enchantress, advanced with so majestic an air towards us, that one might have taken her for the Duchess herself. The magic wand was for the purpose of pointing more conveniently to the various curiosities. As a preliminary measure, she required that we should inscribe our names in a large book: unhappily, however, there was no ink in the inkstand, so that this important ceremony was necessarily dispensed with. We passed through many chill and faded rooms, decorated with numerous and fine pictures, though among them are many inferior ones, on which the names of Raphael, Guido, &c. are liberally bestowed. The gallery is extremely rich in fine and genuine Rubens'; the most attractive among which, to me, was his own frequently repeated but excellent portrait. I was also much interested by a whole length portrait of the wild Duke of Buckingham, by Van Dyk,--a roué of a very different sort, both in the delicate turn of the features, the chivalrous dignity, and the tasteful dress, from our modern ones. Further on is a beautiful Madonna, by Carlo Dolce, less smooth and 'banale' than most of those by the same master; and an excellent and most characteristic portrait of Catharine of Medicis. She is very fair, with exquisitely beautiful hands, and a singular expression of cold passion (if I may use the words) in her features, which yet does not excite the feeling of repulsion one would anticipate. Ruben's wife hangs opposite to her,--a handsome Flemish housewife, somewhat vulgar, but beautifully painted and admirably conceived. Philip the Second, by Titian, appeared to me unmeaning:--two beggar boys, by Morillo, admirable. Lot and his daughters, by Rubens;--the female figures somewhat less vulgar and coarse than most of his beauties, who generally have too much in common with the chief produce of his native country: Lot is admirably painted: the picture is however a very unpleasing one. In the bedroom was hung, oddly enough, a disgusting, fearful picture of Seneca's death in the bath,--Seneca already a livid corpse. The portrait of the Duke's mother by Sir Joshua Reynolds is extremely pleasing. Her beauty and sweet child-like look were worthy of a Madonna; and the little boy is a perfect Cupid, full of archness and grace. The library is a magnificent room, containing seventeen thousand volumes, decorated on the one side with a marble statue of Queen Anne; on the other, a strange pendant--a colossal antique bust of Alexander; a model of youthful beauty, in my opinion excelling the Apollo Belvedere. It is more human, and yet the god-like nature appears through the human,--not indeed in the christian, but the pagan sense of the word.