graphs, of steam boats, of the penny post, of gas lit cities and cheap newspapers, of lyceums, libraries, etc.

Crossing Kew green we saw in many windows cards offering apartments to let. Wishing to know how these compared in various ways with those of London, we rapped at one of the doors, and were introduced by a dowdy servant girl, her sleeves rolled up above her elbows and her face smudged with dirt and blackened with smoke, to her mistress, Mrs. Jones. Mrs. Jones was quickly discovered to be a representative woman of her class, and with a real woman's volubility. As she conducted us through the house she almost stunned us with a torrent of words in which she set forth the advantages of Kew in general as a place of residence and her edifice in particular, as the most eligible and desirable of Kew lodging houses. The impulsive landlady went on to declare that she had been uniformly patronized by the quality, such as Sir John McLeod and Lord Claud Hamilton, who came there annually to fish; by the Percys of Homedale, not the Homedales of Percy, a junior branch of that ancient race, and that if we came to her she would guarantee us every home comfort and all reasonable luxuries. Notwithstanding our haste to see the vegetable prides of Kew, we suffered ourselves to be detained until she had counted up among the gentle-folks she had entertained, a considerable part of the peerage, and, what seemed to us the larger moiety of the landed gentry.

The house, a roomy, rambling one, was ordinary enough in appearance and appointments. The lodgings, however, were higher in price than similar suites in London Expressing surprise at this fact, she informed us with an emphatic toss of her head, which caused her cork-scrcw curls to tremble in the still air, as her cap darted in the direction of the opposite wall in a parabolic curve; that Kew was most decidedly a fashionable town, not so large as London, but by no means small, and quite charming. "Besides," said she with a triumphant air, as she straightened herself up, throwing back a pair of square shoulders and advancing a protuberant Lust, "I live in the same street with the Duchess."

Incredible as it may seem to American readers, a feeble impres sion only was made on our minds by this earnest advocate, and we backed out of the front hall without having engaged lodgings.

Recrossing the green to the Brown Jug, a respectable looking inn, we heard from the barmaid while despatchiug in the parlor a glass of the inevitable 'arf and 'arf; a girl robust in figure and fresh in complexion-that Mrs. Jones not only lived in the same street, but on the same side of it, with the Dowager Duchess of Cambridge, and that she was in the habit of entertaining many "high judicial gents and other official functionaries." This fact account

ed at once for the good woman's credit and consequence, for the indignant toss of her head and the high price of her apart

ments.

A rain coming on it was decided that we should pass the night at the Brown Jug. After a European repast in the shape of a "meaty tea," we established ourselves in a fireside chair and began to ruminate.

A century's residence is by no means necessary in the mother country to make the stranger acquainted with the abject servility of the middle and lower orders towards the nobility. The deity of rank is absolutely idolized by them. The successful man of business, be he banker, merchant or manufacturer, considers nothing more desirable than to bestow his daughter, she may be beautiful and accomplished, upon the son, though an unworthy son, of a Lord. On the other hand it must be admitted that the impecunious Viscount is not too proud to replenish his coffers by an alliance with a wealthy tea dealer, beer brewer or cotton spinner. It is a fair bargain and an understood thing that the money offsets the rank. The eagerness, however, with which the middle classes pursue their high game, and their pride at bringing it down, is marvelous. Few things connected with the commercial classes so much excites Republican surprise as this gross want of self respect. That sense of equality to which Americans are bred, finds no place among the inferior orders in Britain. Instinctively they kotou to it the moment they are confronted by superior rank. This obsequiousness is peculiar to the shopocracy-as deeply implanted in them as the Sepoy's abhorrence of a greased cartridge. To them a title outweighs all earthly considerations. To be patronized by a Lord is a great stroke of good luck and will make the fortune of a tradesman, or a green grocer or fish monger. Everybody is sure to patronize those whom nobility patronizes. To be surrounded by the odor of aristocracy is a safe card for a fortune. And this though the ancient nobility is principally sprung. as they should know, from the twenty thousand adventurers who landed at Hastings in 1c66 and of whom it has been truly said: "These founders of the House of Lords were greedy and ferocious pirates. They were all alike, they took everything they could carry, they burned, harried, violated, tortured and killed until everything English was brought to the verge of ruin. Such, however, is the illusion of antiquity and wealth, that decent and dignified men now existing boast their descent from these filthy thieves. Or if you come down to later times, of which a faithful record has been left by Grammont, Pepys and Evelyn, from prostitutes taken from the theatres and made duchesses, and their bastards, Dukes and Lords."

When a shopkeeper has amassed a fortune, he retires to Tyburnia, on the route to the West-end or some fashionable watering place, and seeks the means of introduction into a higher circle. In a country enjoying the commercial prosperity of England, the number of such aspirants is large, and they often find it no easy matter to accomplish their wishes. The affluent "upper ten” are ever on the alert to head off intruders and preserve the exclusiveness of patrician realms. Relying solely upon their wealth, the new rich endeavor to acquire, through its instrumentality, the "open sesame." It is their only card; luckily it is a trump, and the best of trumps-the long trump. In the end they always succeed. The advertisements in the supplement to the Times furnish many striking evidences of these facts. Among the more recent we have seen is the following: "Home offered free of expense. A married lady of good family and highly connected, offers to receive as her guest for the winter season or longer, any. lady or young lady of good birth, who in sole return would procure introduction for them to the leading society of either Dover or Leamington. All traveling expenses and further advantages paid. A happy home offered. Full particulars, with the best and highest references given. Address, L. V., Portman Library, Baker street, Portman Square, London, W."

The same feeling, in a modified form, shows itself in all classes -even in the Peerage, where the gouty old Baron turns up his humor-eaten nose and his watery eyes in contempt at modern degeneracy and the new creations-the new Peerages.

In the piping times of peace the principal avenue to success is through the law-a lawyer of eminent learning and ability rarely failing to make his way into Parliament and thence to the peerage. Two cases of the kind occurred during our residence in England. Sir. Wm. Vernon Harcourt, who was a rising barrister in 1861, (and who, by the way, married a daughter of the American historian, John L. Motley,) ten years later was a Member of Parliament for Oxford and Solicitor General And Sir Hardinge Gifford, who was little known beyond his Inn of Court in 1861, was in 1875 Member of Parliament for Guilford and is the present Solicitor General. These conspicuous men, who owe their success to their bright intellectual endowments, their erudition and persevering industry, are sneered at by the older Peers, who superciliously style them "Law lords." They seem to have forgotten that the power, wealth, and influence of a country lie not so much in the higher as in the middle classes; not with the aristocratic few, but with the plebian many. What true man is there, however great his pride of race, who would not rather owe his position to his powers of heart and intellect, rather than to the mere accident

of existence which brought him into life as the heir of a nobleman instead of the son of a peasant. That class designated more particularly as our ancient nobility--those descended from the first Norman invaders or old Saxon nobles, are in general very proud of their descent, and most of them disdain all familiar intercourse with any of those among their fellow subjects, whom they think a degree below themselves, or if they condescend to speak to them, and admit them to some kind of familiarity, their condescension is such an odd mixture of urbanity and haughtiness, that it proves very disgusting to men of any parts and spirit. During our first visit to London in 1851-52, the writer had the pleasure to become acquainted with a "city magnate," Mr. Jones Lloyd-one of those enterprising merchants whose operations extend to the farthest corners of the earth. On his return to London ten years later, he was much gratified to find Mr. Loyd's great merits and success had been recognized, and that he had been raised to the Peerage, as Lord Overstone. We were not a little disgusted, from time to time, to hear these illiberal and narrow-minded old fogies still haughtily speaking of Lord Overstone as Jones Lloyd. Men like Lord Overstone smile at such impotent malice, while the mass of the people regard it as "all right as matters go" and are ever raking among the musty records of the Herald's Office to trace their origin to some one of the above mentioned twenty thousand Norman adventurers. A rage for titles exists and where the title of a woman is higher than that of her husband, it is not dropped, but ever paraded in contrast with his, which is construed, "how wonderfully I have condescended to marry him.”

In every paper you see, during the season, such announcements as the following taken from the Times: "Frances, Countess Waldergrave and the Right Hon. Chichester Fortesque, M. P. (her fourth husband, her title being derived from her first) received a select party at dinner on yesterday," and "The Countess of Guilford and Mr. Elliot will leave town on Wednesday next for the Continent"-Mr. Elliott being her second husband.

If a man belongs to an order of Knighthood, he never forgets to sign after his name letters by which he is known, as John Bull, C. B., meaning Companion of the Bath, and Richard Roe, K. G., Knight of the Garter.

A country gentleman informed us that it was common in the rural districts for wives of Members of Parliament to have engraved upon their cards, "W. M. P," meaning wife of a Member of Parliament, but as no case of the kind came under our observation, we must presume that he was indulging in chaff. A dingy looking dealer in milk and cheese opposite our lodgings sent us his card which ran as follows: "Harry Patmore, P. A. R. F." Not

understanding the meaning of these letters, and presuming that he could hardly belong to a learned society or the most recent batch of new creations, we had recourse to our landlady who solved the mystery by explaining that the title he bore was "Purveyor of Asses Milk to the Royal Family."

The daily papers chronicle the most trifling incidents connected with the Royal family, so that they may be said to live constantly in the full gaze of the public-to have no private life whatever. If the Prince of Wales should come to town for a day from his country seat, Sandringham, the details are gathered by the penny aliners and Jenkinses of the press and all the circumstances of the journey to and fro are minutely detailed, as if the route he took to the railway station, and the persons by whom he was attended, were matters of the greatest public importance. The public is informed that his carriages were close and not open ones; that the carriages on arriving at the station did not draw up at the public entrance, but passed on to the Queen's private waiting room; that there was a platform, and moreover a platform covered with crimson cloth, and that the Royal party alighted on said platform that the Prince and Princess appeared in excellent health and spirits, and that instead of passing on from the platform to the waiting room without condescending to notice the spectators, they actually "bowed very graciously to the bystanders.' The dress of the Princess is described with the minuteness and particularity of a mantaumaker, and the Prince, we are told, wore a wide awake instead of his usual chimney pot hat. The names of the officials who received the Royal party on the crimson cloth platform and escorted it therefrom are duly recorded, and before the perilous journey is commenced the farther additional information is vouchsafed that the "State saloon was placed in the centre of the passenger train," and that notwithstanding these tremendous preparations, "the train left at the usual hour," and travelling by certain stations with its illustrious inmates-the only stations by which it could pass-arrived at the usual hour at the London terminus, where we are further told, every preparation was made by the railway authorities for the reception of the Royal party, who are said to have stood the fatiguing journey of two hours remarkably well. Every incident is now again detailed how they left the train, what carriages they entered; through what streets they passed; how his Royal Highness, seeing a chimney on fire, expressed the opinion that the public health required that all families residing in the Metropolis should adopt the Derby patent for consuming their own smoke; how the public assembled in front of Marlborough House to catch a glimpse of the future king and queen, and how they were disappointed by the Royal party which