It was wonderful how many different interests were packed into that full life. Besides all her private visiting, and educational and philanthropic meetings, there were the meetings of literary societies. She often went to those of the Royal Institution, and of the Royal Geographical, taking her girls. She belonged to the Wordsworth Society, and I remember her keen delight in an address by James Russell Lowell, in the library at Lambeth Palace, and again the satisfaction in the beautiful simplicity with which Mr. Lowell, in an address to the Browning Society, took the Christian side in the discussions which were a marked feature of that society. Even for the Society of Psychical Research she could keep an open mind, though in general she did not care for things abstract or vague. For fun she was always ready, and I well remember how we enjoyed Mark Twain’s subtle nonsense, in his lecture on “Our Fellow-savages of the Sandwich Islands.”
She had by nature and early association a great love of the drama, and indulged occasionally in a visit to the theatre, especially enjoying a French play, as she says—
“I am taking an evening sometimes, however, to get a French lesson at the Comèdie Française. I saw L’Avare last night. It is most perfectly acted.
“I saw Bernhardt in Andromaque. She is a wonderful actress, with a curious power of impressing herself on the spectator’s mind. Andromaque made one very sad; it seemed to point to the poor empress. How thankful I should be to die if I were in her place.”
She had much to say on her return from all such experiences, as well as from dinners and fêtes, when she had met and talked with eminent persons. Unhappily, there was no phonograph to take down her talk. It has gone, and with it all the record of times and seasons of public and private import of which she knew.
Then we have a peep at the books that interested her—
“Broadstairs, Aug. 26, 1873.
“Frank has been my companion in all my wanderings. I have read to my heart’s content; the laddie always goes to bed early, and so I had always two or three hours at night. I have devoured books on Education, Siljistrom’s American schools, Heppeau’s ditto. So that I have had two studies of American education; the one from a Swedish point of view, the other from a French. In Belgium, my boy and I studied Motley’s ‘Rise of the Dutch Republic,’ ‘Belfry of Bruges,’ etc. Although the holidays have been more broken up than I care for—they have been restful and enjoyable.
“On Saturday 6th I am to go to Gunnersbury, where my uncle Henry lives, and then I shall have a few days in the middle of the last week of the holidays. If I can, I want to go to Stratford-on-Avon on a pilgrimage—by the way, pilgrimages are all the fashion now!—to Shakespeare’s country.”
“I have been reading with intense interest the American book on the education of girls—the answer, by an American woman, to the book by Dr. Clark which formed the text for Dr. Maudsley’s article in the Fortnightly for April against the Higher Education of Women! The American women make out a strong case for themselves....