Almost in the twilight I visited the town-hall, where the Lord Mayor (only London and York have _Lord_ Mayors) holds his court three times a week, and where the sessions are held every three months. It is an old and handsome Gothic building. Near it are two rooms for the barristers and attorneys (_obern und untern Advocaten_.) In the upper room the Lord Mayor's arms are emblazoned in modern painted glass,--for every tradesman has arms here. One can generally discover from them what is the calling of the possessor. The mottos, however, are less business-like, and seem to me to affect too noble an air. I have now established the proper balance, that is to say, my hands are as tired of writing as my feet of walking. It is time to give the stomach some work to do. If I were Walter Scott, I would give you the bill of fare; but as it is, I don't venture. Instead of it I shall subjoin a word upon my after-dinner reading, which will be furnished again by Madame de Maintenon. It really touched me to see how vividly the poor woman paints the melancholy uniformity, the bitter 'gêne' of her life: and how often and heartily she longs, with a force and a sincerity that cannot be mistaken, for her dismissal from this stage, which, as she says, "worse than all others, _lasts from morning till night_." Amidst all her power and splendour, she still seems to regard death as the most desirable of things: and indeed, after the long endless void,--after the sacrifice of every personal feeling and inclination year after year, one can imagine the mortal weariness of the spirit, longing for its release. This explains the religious mania that took possession of her, which was also characteristic of the childishness of the age. Had a woman of Madame de Maintenon's talents lived at a later period, Molinistes and Jansenistes would hardly have succeeded in extorting a smile of contempt from her; but in her time it was otherwise. Still she is in her way a great woman, as Louis the Fourteenth is, in his, a great king--in a little age. It was precisely because it _was_ little that it formed little things,--Court, society, &c.--to far greater perfection than ours; and thence to the imaginative mind, which contemplates with pleasure the Perfect in every thing, great or small, must ever present an attractive picture. _Sept. 20th._