The Duke seems to be much regretted, and the whole country wears deep mourning for him, with crape on the hat, and black gloves, 'ce qui fait le désespoir' of all shopkeepers. People put their servants into black liveries, and write on paper with a broad black edge. Meantime the Christmas pantomimes go on as merrily as ever. It has a strange effect to see Harlequin and Columbine skipping about on the stage in all conceivable frivolities and antics, while the coal-black audience, dressed as for a funeral procession, clap and shout with delight. I this minute received your letter from B----. Really so merry, I might almost say so pungent a one, you have not written of a long time. The B---- originals seem to have quite electrified you, and though I rejoice at it, I can't help being a little jealous. But you will soon come back to _your_ original. I say with Cæsar, I fear not the fat, but the lean; and so long as you tell me that you preserve your charming 'embonpoint,' I am easy. I had a great mind, however, to plague you a little in return; but I know you don't bear jesting 'par distance' well, so I abstain. To vent my humour in some way, I send you a bit out of my journal,--a 'pendant' to your African Travels; for the poor meagre journal is still alive, though it has received no nutriment by the month together, and the little it has had, has not the least 'haut gout.' Don't expect, therefore, anything facetious or satirical, but something quite serious. It is laid upon you as a punishment. EXTRACTS FROM MY JOURNAL. I was lately reading a review of Lady Morgan's Salvator Rosa. A passage in it touched me deeply, 'et pour cause.' It is the very original description of her hero, nearly as follows.