We listened long, but, although the air was full of birdsongs that evening, the sweet-voiced warbler was not of the choir.  She talked much, as we rode along, of Kingsley and Ruskin, both of whom she loved as friends as well as authors.  “John Ruskin,” she said, “is good and kind, and charming beyond the common lot of mortals, and there are pages of his prose, to my thinking, more eloquent than any thing out of Jeremy Taylor.”

Speaking of Humor, she said,—­“Between ourselves, I always have a little doubt of genius, when there is none of that quality:  certainly, in the very highest poetry, the two go together.”

She greatly admired Beranger, and often spoke of him as the beautiful old man, the truest and best type of perfect independence.  Hazlitt she ranked highly as an essayist, and she mentioned that she had heard both Charles Lamb and Talfourd praise him as not only the most brilliant, but the soundest of critics.

Among modern romances, those by the author of “The Scarlet Letter” seemed to impress her almost more than any others; and when “The House of the Seven Gables” was translated into Russian, she was filled with delight.  Indeed, she was always among the first to cry, “Bravo!” over any good words for American literature.

“Do coax Mr. Hawthorne and Dr. Holmes,” she said one day, “into visiting England.  I want them to be welcomed as they deserve, and as they are sure to be.”

Her interest in the French Emperor’s career amounted to enthusiasm, and one day she told us a very pretty story about him which she knew to be true.  She said, when he was in England after Strasbourg and before Boulogne, he spent a twelvemonth at Leamington, living in the quietest manner.  One of the principal persons in that town, Mr. H., a very liberal and accomplished man, made a point of showing every attention in his power to the Prince; and they very soon became intimate.  There was in the town an old officer of the Emperor’s Polish Legion, who, compelled to leave France after Waterloo, had taken refuge in England, and, having a natural talent for languages, maintained himself by teaching French, Italian, and German in different families.  The old exile and the young one found each other out, and the language-master was soon an habitual guest at the Prince’s table, where he was treated with the most affectionate attention.  At last Louis Napoleon was obliged to repair to London, but before he went he called on his friend Mr. H. to take leave.  After warm thanks to him for all the pleasure he had experienced in his society, the Prince said,—­

“I am about to prove to you my entire reliance upon your unfailing kindness by leaving you a legacy.  I wish to ask that you would transfer to my poor old friend the goodness you have lavished on me.  His health is failing,—­his means are small; pray, call upon him sometimes, and see that the lodging-house people do not neglect him.  Draw upon me for what may be wanting for his needs or for his comforts.”