and the hostess the centre; and the American author, "as the stranger, had the honor of a seat next to Lady Holland." When talking, he was offered by her a plate of herring, of which he frankly avowed he "ought to have eaten one, even to the fins and tail"; but little dreaming of their international worth just then, the herring were declined. With good humor his hostess said: "You do not know what you say; they are Dutch." With some vigor of look and tone Cooper repeated—"Dutch!" The reply was: "Yes, Dutch; we can only get them through an ambassador."
Then Cooper rose to the occasion by replying: "There are too many good things of native production to require a voyage to Holland on my account." Of their host Rogers' record was: "Lord Holland always comes down to breakfast like a man upon whom sudden good fortune had just fallen—his was the smile that spoke the mind at ease." And after his death were found on Lord Holland's dressing-table, and in his handwriting, these lines on himself:
Nephew of Fox and friend of Gay,
Enough my meed of fame
If those who deighn'd to observe me say
I injured neither name.
"Here Rogers sat, and here forever dwell
With me, those Pleasures that he sang so well."
After dining at Lord Grey's Cooper wrote of him: "He on all occasions acted as if he never thought of national differences"; and the author thought him "the man of most character in his set." We are told that England is the country of the wealthy, and that the king is seldom seen, although the royal start from St. James for Windsor was seen and described as going off "at a slapping pace."
