After paying a visit to Mrs. C---- in Windsor, I returned to Lord H---- 's, enjoying with new delight the noble oakwoods of his park, at the entrance of which, the prettiest lodge, tastefully built of trunks and branches of trees, and overgrown with roses, is a sort of index to the lovely character of the whole. I found a large party assembled;--the principal lady of honour (_Oberhofmeisterin_,) two ladies in waiting (_Hofdamen_,) and two equerries of the Queen of Würtemburg,--all German: le Marquis de H----, a Frenchman, with two sons and a daughter, (the latter a true 'Parisienne;') an English clergyman, and another foreign nobleman. The French party have judiciously put forward their cousinship with the childless Peer, are very kindly received, live in the cottage in the valley which I described yesterday, and have expectations of inheriting this noble property,--so that the little French girl is already regarded as 'a good match.' The most interesting person to me in the whole company, however, was the Countess herself. She is a most amiable old lady, full of dignified courtesy, united to a very agreeable turn of mind. She has seen much of life, and relates what she has seen in the most interesting manner. She told me many particulars concerning Lord Byron, who passed much of his boyish time in her house, and was then so untameable that she said she had had unspeakable trouble with the daring, mischievous boy. She did not think him base, but ill-tempered; for she observed that he always took a sort of pleasure in giving pain, especially to women; though when he chose to be amiable, she confessed that it was hardly possible to resist him. She added, that whatever were the defects of his wife, he had certainly treated her very ill, and had exercised a refinement of torture towards her; probably because she had formerly refused him, for which he swore never-ending vengeance even on the day of his marriage. I did not put implicit faith in this account, in spite of my great respect for the narrator. The soul of a poet like Byron is hard to judge;--the ordinary standard is quite inadequate to it, and very few people have any other to apply. Where one is much pleased, one generally pleases; and accordingly I was pressingly invited to spend a few days in this little paradise. My restlessness is, however, as you know full well, equal to my indolence: and as I am difficult to move from a place where I have once fixed myself, ('témoin' my long unprofitable abode in London,) I find it equally difficult to bring myself to remain where the immediate interest is exhausted. I therefore gratefully declined the invitation, and returned to Salthill. _August 30th._