"'Doceat,' says St. Thomas. 'And the second?'
"'Sanctissimus.'
"'Oret! and the third?'
"'Prudentissimus!'
"'Regat! Let him rule!' says the Saint."
"February 20. To Methodist Church of Rev. Mr. Burt. A sensible short discourse—seems a very sincere man: has an earlier service for Italians, well attended. On my way home, stopped at Gargiulo's and bought a ragged but very good copy of the 'Divina Commedia,' unbound, with Doré's illustrations."
"February 26. To tea at Mrs. Hazeltine's where met William Allen Butler, author of 'Nothing to Wear'—a bright-eyed, conversable man. Have a sitting to Anderson. When I returned from Mrs. Hazeltine's I found Hall Caine.... He told much about Gabriel Rossetti, with whom he had much to do. Rossetti was a victim of chloral, and Caine was set to keep him from it, except in discreet doses."
"March 4. Went to see the King and Queen, returning from the review of troops. They were coldly received. She wore crimson velvet—he was on horseback and in uniform...."
"March 9. Club at Jessie Cochrane's; young Loyson, son of Père Hyacinthe, gave an interesting lecture on the religion of Ancient Rome, which he traced back to its rude Latin beginning; the Sabines, he thought, introduced into it one element of spirituality. Its mythology was borrowed from Greece and from the Etruscans—later from Egypt and the East. The Primitive Aryan religion was the worship of ancestors. This also we see in Rome. A belief in immortality appears in the true Aryan faith. Man, finding himself human, and related to the divine, felt that he could not die."
"March 15.... Mme. Helbig gave us an account of the Russian pilgrimage which came here lately. Many of the pilgrims were peasants. They travelled from Russia on foot, wearing bark shoes, which are very yielding and soft. These Russian ladies deprecated the action of Peter the Great in building St. Petersburg, and in forcing European civilization upon his nation, when still unprepared for it."