On the 8th of June we visited the Record Office for a sight of the Domesday Book and other ancient objects of interest there preserved.  As I looked at this too faithful memorial of an inexorable past, I thought of the battle of Hastings and all its consequences, and that reminded me of what I have long remembered as I read it in Dr. Robert Knox’s “Races of Men.”  Dr. Knox was the monoculous Waterloo surgeon, with whom I remember breakfasting, on my first visit to England and Scotland.  His celebrity is less owing to his book than to the unfortunate connection of his name with the unforgotten Burke and Hare horrors.  This is his language in speaking of Hastings:  “... that bloody field, surpassing far in its terrible results the unhappy day of Waterloo.  From this the Celt has recovered, but not so the Saxon.  To this day he feels, and feels deeply, the most disastrous day that ever befell his race; here he was trodden down by the Norman, whose iron heel is on him yet....  To this day the Saxon race in England have never recovered a tithe of their rights, and probably never will.”

The Conqueror meant to have a thorough summing up of his stolen property.  The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle says,—­I quote it at second hand,—­“So very straitly did he cause the survey to be made, that there was not a single hyde, nor a yardland of ground, nor—­it is shameful to say what he thought no shame to do—­was there an ox or a cow, or a pig passed by, and that was not down in the accounts, and then all these writings were brought to him.”  The “looting” of England by William and his “twenty thousand thieves,” as Mr. Emerson calls his army, was a singularly methodical proceeding, and Domesday Book is a searching inventory of their booty, movable and immovable.

From this reminder of the past we turned to the remembrances of home; A——­ going to dine with a transplanted Boston friend and other ladies from that blessed centre of New England life, while I dined with a party of gentlemen at my friend Mr. James Russell Lowell’s.

I had looked forward to this meeting with high expectations, and they were abundantly satisfied.  I knew that Mr. Lowell must gather about him, wherever he might be, the choicest company, but what his selection would be I was curious to learn.  I found with me at the table my own countrymen and his, Mr. Smalley and Mr. Henry James.  Of the other guests, Mr. Leslie Stephen was my only old acquaintance in person; but Du Maurier and Tenniel I have met in my weekly “Punch” for many a year; Mr. Lang, Mr. Oliphant, Mr. Townsend, we all know through their writings; Mr. Burne-Jones and Mr. Alma Tadema, through the frequent reproductions of their works in engravings, as well as by their paintings.  If I could report a dinner-table conversation, I might be tempted to say something of my talk with Mr. Oliphant.  I like well enough conversation which floats safely over the shallows, touching bottom at intervals with a commonplace incident or truism