all support from Gros, in so far as he can give it) has occasioned, it is a very signal success.  The good people at Hong- Kong, &c., do not know whether to be incredulous or disgusted at this policy....  I am told a parcel of ridiculous stories about arming of Braves, &c.  I heard that in the western suburb the people ’looked ill- natured,’ so I have been the greater part of my two last days in that suburb, looking in vain into faces to discover these menacing indications.  Yesterday I walked through very out-of-the-way streets and crowded thoroughfares with Wade and two sailors, through thousands and thousands, without a symptom of disrespect....  I know that our people for a long time used to insist on every Chinaman they met taking his hat off.  Of course it rather astonished a respectable Chinese shopkeeper to be poked in the ribs by a sturdy sailor or soldier, and told, in bad Chinese or in pantomime, to take off his hat, which is a thing they never do, and which is not with them even a mark of respect.  I only mention this as an instance of the follies which people commit when they know nothing of the manners of those with whom they have to deal....  We are steaming down to Hong-Kong on a beautiful fresh morning.  I feel as if I was a step on my way home.

At Hong-Kong he remained nearly a fortnight, that his ship might be fitted to go to the North:  his letter for Pekin being sent on, in the meantime, to Shanghae, by the hands of his secretary, Mr. Oliphant.[1]

February 26th.—­To-morrow this letter goes, and still no mail from England.  I think of starting in a few days, and calling at the other ports—­Foochow, Amoy, and Ningpo.  I have a line from Oliphant, who took up my letter to Shanghae, and made a quick though rough passage.  We shall be a good deal longer on the way, and my captain advises me to be off, to anticipate the equinox.  I have just written a despatch to Lord Clarendon, to tell him that perhaps I may go direct from Shanghae to Japan, and so home.  It is almost too good a prospect to be realised.

[Sidenote:  Home news.]

February 27th.—­I had Reed to dine with me yesterday.  He is off this morning to Manila, en route for Shanghae.  The Russian returns on Monday, and we are going to Shanghae by the same route most fraternally....  Your accounts of the boys make me feel as if I had been an age away from home.  God grant that I may get through this business soon, and return to find you all flourishing!

March 1st.—­I received your letters yesterday....  How I wish that I had joined that merry dance on Christmas Day at Dunmore, and seen B. and R. performing their reel steps, and F.[2] snapping his fingers!  You knew now how differently my New Year was passed—­traversing that vast city of the dead—­meditating over that 28th December which Herod had already hallowed....  These letters are my conscience and