The happiest and the most respectable class in England is, without all doubt, the middle class, whose political activity is confined to the improvement of their own immediate province, and among whom tolerably just views and principles generally prevail. People of this unfashionable class are also the only truly hospitable, and are wholly devoid of the arrogant airs so disgusting in their superiors. They do not run after a foreigner; but if he comes in their way, they treat him with kindness and sympathy. They love their country passionately, but without any view to personal interest,--without hope of sinecures, or intrigue for place. They are often ridiculous, but always deserving of respect, and their national egotism is restricted within more reasonable bounds than that of their superiors. It may now be said with equal truth of England as it formerly was of France, 'que les deux bouts du fruit sont gâtés,'--the aristocracy and the mob. The former unquestionably holds a most noble station: but without great moderation, _without great concessions made to reason and to the spirit of the times_, they will perhaps not occupy this station half a century longer. I once said as much to Prince E----; he laughed in my face,--'mais nous verrons.' I send you a few excerpts from the newspapers, to give you an idea of the freedom of the press. 1st. "Every ship in the Navy ought to hoist her colours; for Lord Melville was an incubus that weighed down the service. Meritorious officers may now have a chance,--under Lord Melville they had none." 2nd. "We hear from good authority that the Great Captain takes extraordinary pains to get into the Cabinet again, but in vain. This _spoiled child of fortune_ ought not to have imagined that his resignation could for a moment have embarrassed the government. We believe, however, that he is not the only ex-Minister who already bitterly repents his folly and arrogance." 3rd. "The Ministerial Septemvirate who wanted to extort power, are much indebted to Mr. Hume's new Act. According to the old law, servants who tried to extort higher wages from their masters were very properly sent to the tread-mill." 4th. "We are assured that a great Septemvir has offered to re-enter the service, on condition that he be made Directing Minister, Grand Constable, and Archbishop of Canterbury." Our Ministers would stare not a little if our blotting-paper journals were to make as free with them. To-morrow I return to _town_: for as the Romans formerly called Rome "the city," so do the English call London "town." _London, April 22nd._ I arrived just in time to be present at a dinner-party at the new Premier's, to which I received an invitation in Brighton.