If I had the honour of a personal acquaintance with Mr. Macaulay, I should venture to write to ask him these questions.  In the excellent history which he is now publishing he alludes to this fact, but he does not try to explain it.  And yet, as I have said before, there is none more pregnant, nor containing within it so good an explanation of the difference between the history of England and that of the other feudal nations in Europe.  If you should meet Mr. Macaulay, I beg you to ask him, with much respect, to solve these questions for me.  But tell me what you yourself think, and if any other eminent writers have treated this subject.

You must think me, my dear friend, very tiresome with all these questions and dissertations; but of what else can I speak?  I pass here the life of a Benedictine monk, seeing absolutely no one, and writing whenever I am not walking.  I expect this cloistered life to do a great deal of good both to my mind and body.  Do not think that in my convent I forget my friends.  My wife and I constantly talk of them, and especially of you and of our dear Mrs. Grote.  I am reading your MSS.,[1] which interest and amuse me extremely.  They are my relaxation.  I have promised Beaumont to send them to him as soon as I have finished them.

St. Cyr, December 8, 1853.

I must absolutely write to you to-day, my dear Senior.  I have long been wishing to do so, but have been deterred by the annoyance I feel at not being able to discuss with you a thousand subjects as interesting to you as they are to me, but which one cannot mention in a letter; for letters are now less secret than ever, and to insist upon writing politics to our friends is equivalent to their not hearing from us at all.  But I may, at any rate, without making the police uneasy, assure you of the great pleasure with which we heard that you intended paying us a little visit next month.

There is an excellent hotel at Tours, where you will find good apartments; for the rest, I hope that you will make our house your inn.  We are near enough to Tours for me to walk there and back, and we regulate our clocks by the striking of theirs; so you see that it is difficult to be nearer.

I think that it is a capital idea of yours to visit French Africa.  The country is curious in itself, also on account of the contrasts afforded by the different populations which spread over the land without ever mixing.

You will find them materials for some of those excellent and interesting articles which you write so well.  When you come I shall be able to give you some useful information, for I have devoted much attention to Algiers.  I have here a long report which I drew up for the Chamber in 1846, which may give you some valuable ideas, though things have considerably changed since that time.

Kind remembrances, &c.,

A. DE TOCQUEVILLE.

[The following are some more of Mrs. Grote’s interesting notes.  She preceded Mr. Senior at St. Cyr.—­ED.]