At Richmond I went to see another lady of more than threescore years’ celebrity, more than fourscore in age, Miss Berry the friend of Horace Walpole, and for her charms of manner and conversation long and still a reigning power.  She has still the vivacity, the careless nature, or refined art, that made her please so much in earlier days,—­still is girlish, and gracefully so.  Verily, with her was no sign of labor or sorrow.

From the older turning to the young, I must speak with pleasure of several girls I know in London, who are devoting themselves to painting as a profession.  They have really wise and worthy views of the artist’s avocation; if they remain true to them, they will enjoy a free, serene existence, unprofaned by undue care or sentimental sorrow.  Among these, Margaret Gillies has attained some celebrity; she may be known to some in America by engravings in the “People’s Journal” from her pictures; but, if I remember right, these are coarse things, and give no just notion of her pictures, which are distinguished for elegance and refinement; a little mannerized, but she is improving in that respect.

The “People’s Journal” comes nearer being a fair sign of the times than any other publication of England, apparently, if we except Punch.  As for the Times, on which you all use your scissors so industriously, it is managed with vast ability, no doubt, but the blood would tingle many a time to the fingers’ ends of the body politic, before that solemn organ which claims to represent the heart would dare to beat in unison.  Still it would require all the wise management of the Times, or wisdom enough to do without it, and a wide range and diversity of talent, indeed, almost sweeping the circle, to make a People’s Journal for England.  The present is only a bud of the future flower.

Mary and William Howitt are its main support.  I saw them several times at their cheerful and elegant home.  In Mary Howitt I found the same engaging traits of character we are led to expect from her books for children.  Her husband is full of the same agreeable information, communicated in the same lively yet precise manner we find in his books; it was like talking with old friends, except that now the eloquence of the eye was added.  At their house I became acquainted with Dr. Southwood Smith, the well-known philanthropist.  He is at present engaged on the construction of good tenements calculated to improve the condition of the working people.  His plans look promising, and should they succeed, you shall have a detailed account of them.  On visiting him, we saw an object which I had often heard celebrated, and had thought would be revolting, but found, on the contrary, an agreeable sight; this is the skeleton of Jeremy Bentham.  It was at Bentham’s request that the skeleton, dressed in the same dress he habitually wore, stuffed out to an exact resemblance of life, and with a portrait mark in wax, the best I ever saw, sits there, as assistant to Dr. Smith