Ever your affectionate friend,

    Charles Dickens

Bright colors were a constant delight to him; and the gay hues of flowers were those most welcome to his eye.  When the rhododendrons were in bloom in Cobham Park, the seat of his friend and neighbor, Lord Darnley, he always counted on taking his guests there to enjoy the magnificent show.  He delighted to turn out for the delectation of his Transatlantic cousins a couple of postilions in the old red jackets of the old red royal Dover road, making the ride as much as possible like a holiday drive in England fifty years ago.

When in the mood for humorous characterization, Dickens’s hilarity was most amazing.  To hear him tell a ghost story with a very florid imitation of a very pallid ghost, or hear him sing an old-time stage song, such as he used to enjoy in his youth at a cheap London theatre, to see him imitate a lion in a menagerie-cage, or the clown in a pantomime when he flops and folds himself up like a jack-knife, or to join with him in some mirthful game of his own composing, was to become acquainted with one of the most delightful and original companions in the world.

On one occasion, during a walk with me, he chose to run into the wildest of vagaries about conversation.  The ludicrous vein he indulged in during that two hours’ stretch can never be forgotten.  Among other things, he said he had often thought how restricted one’s conversation must become when one was visiting a man who was to be hanged in half an hour.  He went on in a most surprising manner to imagine all sorts of difficulties in the way of becoming interesting to the poor fellow.  “Suppose,” said he, “it should be a rainy morning while you are making the call, you could not possibly indulge in the remark, ’We shall have fine weather to-morrow, sir,’ for what would that be to him?  For my part, I think,” said he, “I should confine my observations to the days of Julius Caesar or King Alfred.”

At another time when speaking of what was constantly said about him in certain newspapers, he observed:  “I notice that about once in every seven years I become the victim of a paragraph disease.  It breaks out in England, travels to India by the overland route, gets to America per Cunard line, strikes the base of the Rocky Mountains, and, rebounding back to Europe, mostly perishes on the steppes of Russia from inanition and extreme cold.”  When he felt he was not under observation, and that tomfoolery would not be frowned upon or gazed at with astonishment, he gave himself up without reserve to healthy amusement and strengthening mirth.  It was his mission to make people happy.  Words of good cheer were native to his lips, and he was always doing what he could to lighten the lot of all who came into his beautiful presence.  His talk was simple, natural, and direct, never dropping into circumlocution nor elocution.  Now that he is gone, whoever has known him intimately