ogarth--American
Controversy--Cottage at Finchley--Origin of
Mrs. Gamp--Change of Editorship at
_Chronicle_--Macready bound for America--Works
of Charity and Mercy--Visit to
Broadstairs--Sea-side Life in Ordinary--Speech
at Opening of the Manchester
Athenaeum--Dickens's Interest in Ragged
Schools--His Sympathy with the Church of
England--Origin of his _Christmas Carol_--Third
Son born.

THE Cornish trip had come off, meanwhile, with such unexpected and
continued attraction for us that we were well into the third week of
absence before we turned our faces homeward. Railways helped us then not
much; but where the roads were inaccessible to post-horses, we walked.
Tintagel was visited, and no part of mountain or sea consecrated by the
legends of Arthur was left unexplored. We ascended to the cradle of the
highest tower of Mount St. Michael, and descended into several mines.
Land and sea yielded each its marvels to us; but of all the impressions
brought away, of which some afterwards took forms as lasting as they
could receive from the most delightful art, I doubt if any were the
source of such deep emotion to us all as a sunset we saw at Land's-end.
Stanfield knew the wonders of the Continent, the glories of Ireland
were native to Maclise, I was familiar from boyhood with border and
Scottish scenery, and Dickens was fresh from Niagara; but there was
something in the sinking of the sun behind the Atlantic that autumn
afternoon, as we viewed it together from the top of the rock projecting
farthest into the sea, which each in his turn declared to have no
parallel in memory.

But with the varied and overflowing gladness of those three memorable
weeks it would be unworthy now to associate only the saddened
recollection of the sole survivor. "Blessed star of morning!" wrote
Dickens to Felton while yet the glow of its enjoyment was upon him.
"Such a trip as we had into Cornwall just after Longfellow went away! . . .
Sometimes we travelled all night, sometimes all day, sometimes both. . . .
Heavens! If you could have seen the necks of bottles, distracting in
their immense varieties of shape, peering out of the carriage pockets!
If you could have witnessed the deep devotion of the post-boys, the wild
attachment of the hostlers, the maniac glee of the waiters! If you could
have followed us into the earthy old churches we visited, and into the
stra