All this day is a confused dream to me of a dizzy and overwhelming kind.  So many letters that it took C——­ from nine in the morning till two in the afternoon to read and answer them in the shortest manner; letters from all classes of people, high and low, rich and poor, in all shades and styles of composition, poetry and prose; some mere outbursts of feeling; some invitations; some advice and suggestions; some requests and inquiries; some presenting books, or flowers, or fruit.

Then came, in their turn, deputations from Paisley, Greenock, Dundee, Aberdeen, Edinburgh, and Belfast in Ireland; calls of friendship, invitations of all descriptions to go every where, and to see every thing, and to stay in so many places.  One kind, venerable minister, with his lovely daughter, offered me a retreat in his quiet manse on the beautiful shores of the Clyde.

For all these kindnesses, what could I give in return?  There was scarce time for even a grateful thought on each.  People have often said to me that it must have been an exceeding bore.  For my part, I could not think of regarding it so.  It only oppressed me with an unutterable sadness.

To me there is always something interesting and beautiful about a universal popular excitement of a generous character, let the object of it be what it may.  The great desiring heart of man, surging with one strong, sympathetic swell, even though it be to break on the beach of life and fall backwards, leaving the sands as barren as before, has yet a meaning and a power in its restlessness, with which I must deeply sympathize.  Nor do I sympathize any the less, when the individual, who calls forth such an outburst, can be seen by the eye of sober sense to be altogether inadequate and disproportioned to it.

I do not regard it as any thing against our American nation, that we are capable, to a very great extent, of these sudden personal enthusiasms, because I think that, with an individual or a community, the capability of being exalted into a temporary enthusiasm of self-forgetfulness, so far from being a fault, has in it a quality of something divine.

Of course, about all such things there is a great deal which a cool critic could make ridiculous, but I hold to my opinion of them nevertheless.

In the afternoon I rode out with the lord provost to see the cathedral.  The lord provost answers to the lord mayor in England.  His title and office in both countries continue only a year, except in cases of reelection.

As I saw the way to the cathedral blocked up by a throng of people, who had come out to see me, I could not help saying, “What went ye out for to see? a reed shaken with the wind?” In fact, I was so worn out, that I could hardly walk through the building.