"When I recall my youth: what I was then,

What I am now, and ye beloved ones all;

It seems as though these were the living men,

And we the coloured shadows on the wall."

— MONCKTON MiLNES.

Falmouth, January 1st [1847]. — Samuel Laurence with us. He thinks James Spedding the most beautiful combination of noble qualities he has ever met with. He is collecting letters of Bacon's, by which he hopes to do as much for him as Carlyle has for Cromwell. A bust of Bacon which Laurence has seen is so entirely free from everything mean, that on the strength of it he rejects Lord Campbell's Memoir, believing it to be inaccurate.

08 Oct 1847. Professor Adams' talk yesterday did me great good, showing in living clearness how apparent anomalies get included and justified in a larger Law. There are no anomalies, and I can wait until all the conflicts of Time are reconciled in the Love and Light of Heaven.

12 Oct 1847. Burnard tells amusing stories of his brother sculptors, and their devices to hide their ignorance on certain questions. Chantrey, after sustaining a learned conversation with Lord Melbourne (age 68) to his extremest limits, saved his credit by, "Would your Lordship kindly turn your head on the other side and shut your mouth." Spoke of Bacon (age 70), the sculptor, after having given up his craft for twenty-five years, resuming it, at the request of his dying daughter, to make her monument, and finding himself as much at home with his tools as ever.