Besides the brilliant gas-lights, there are large globes of glass in the druggists' shops, filled with liquid of a deep red, blue, or green colour, the splendid light of which is visible for miles, and often serves as a beacon, though sometimes as an 'ignis fatuus,' if you are unlucky enough to mistake one for another. Of all the shops, the most attractive are those in which the beautiful English crystal is sold. Real diamonds can scarcely glitter more dazzlingly than the far-gleaming collections of some manufacturers. I observed too some articles of rose or other coloured glass, but I was surprised to see how little the forms were changed. The crown lustres, for instance, are just the same as ever; and yet I should think that they might be made in the form of suns with diverging rays, or of bouquets of flowers, instead of this eternal crown; or that small lustres of gay colours, set like 'bijous' of various gems, and fixed against the walls of rooms of appropriate, perhaps oriental, decorations, would produce a new and striking effect. Other very interesting shops contain all the newest implements of agriculture and the mechanic arts, from huge drilling machines and an apparatus for uprooting old trees, to small delicate garden shears, all set out in extensive premises, all arranged with a certain elegance, which is universal, even among the dealers in meat, fish and vegetables. The shops of ironmongers and dealers in lamps well deserve a visit; affording, as they do, a display of the new and the useful, which it would not be easy to find on the whole Continent, either to the same extent or in the same exact perfection. The traveller, however, who confines himself to the 'salons' and the like, and who wants to see only _genteel sights_, had better stay at home. I closed the day with a walk to Chelsea, the hospital for invalid soldiers, where one rejoices to see the old warriors well taken care of, inhabiting a palace, and enjoying gardens with the most beautiful smooth-mowed 'bowling-green' and lofty avenues of horse-chestnut trees, of which a little sovereign might be proud. I dined at the ---- ambassador's at eight o'clock. The dinner was remarkable not only for the amiability of the host, but for genuine Metternich-Johannisberg; for which nectar, even the most inveterate liberal must allow justice to be done to the great minister. At table I found friend B----, the youth of forty, who charged me with abundance of compliments to you. He is the same as ever, and entertained me with a long conversation about his toilet; he declared that he had grown dreadfully thin in England from ennui. I must here give you notice that I can say nothing about London society till a longer residence and 'the season' have enabled me to speak with more confidence on the subject. So long as London remains desert as Palmyra, as to the fashionable world, I shall confine myself to a description of places. _October 10th._