Finished “Erasmus” a few days ago—­a great intellect, much wit, clear insight into the religion “falsely so-called” of monks and clergy, but a soul not great enough to utter his convictions aloud in the face of danger, or to perceive that conciliation beginning by hypocrisy must end in worse strife and bitterness.  He saw the evil of the new dogmas and creeds introduced by Luther, of any new creed the rejection of which was penal, but he did not or would not see the similar evil of the legally enforced old creeds and dogmas.

    PEMBROKE LODGE, May 15, 1895

Armenian refugees here to tea—­a husband and wife whose baby she had seen murdered by Turkish soldiers, and a friend who is uncertain whether his wife is alive or murdered—­these three in native dress; hers very picturesque, and she herself beautiful.  The three refugees, all of whom had been eye-witnesses of massacres of relations, looked intensely sad.  She gave an account of some of the hardships they had suffered, but neither they nor we could have borne details of the atrocities.  What they chiefly wished to express, and did express, was deep gratitude for the sympathy of our country, veneration for the memory of John as a friend of the Christian subjects of the Sultan, and thanks to ourselves....  They kissed our hands repeatedly, and the expression of their countenances as they looked at us, though without words, was very touching.

    PEMBROKE LODGE, February 24, 1896

Visit from Mr. Voysey, earnest, interesting, and pathetic in accounts of Whitechapel experiences.  His Theism fills him with the joy of unbounded faith in a perfect God; but his keen sense of the evil done by the worship of Jesus as another and equal God leads him to a painful blindness to that divine character and teaching.

    PEMBROKE LODGE, August 5, 1897

Sinclair [115] has been reading a great deal to me since my illness began.  Miss Austen’s “Emma,” which kept its high ground with me although I had read it too often to find much novelty in the marvellous humour and reality of the characters.  Then “Scenes of Clerical Life” ... the contrast between the minds and the brain-work of Jane Austen and George Eliot very striking.  Jane Austen all ease and spontaneousness and simplicity, George Eliot wonderful in strength and passion, and fond of probing the depths of human anguish, but often ponderous in long-drawn philosophy and metaphysics, and with a tediously cynical and flippant tone underlying her portraits of human beings—­and a wearisome lingering over uninteresting details.  Her defects are, I think, far more prominent in this than in her best later books.

[115] “While in Norfolk Street (in 1882) engaged Sinclair, my good and faithful Sinclair, as maid and housekeeper” (Recollections).  She remained with Lady Russell till her death, and served her with devotion to the end.