sion of an
hotel bill which I supposed I should have to pay: but then, "What's the
odds so long as you are happy?" The question is, How came the change to
be made? Well, the fact is, I had a letter to a distinguished
politician, the Hon. Senator B---, and he, in his turn, sent me a packet
addressed to the Hon. J. E--- R---; and all at once I became a great man
myself in the hotel. In a note Mr. B--- sent to the President he
informed him that I had been for thirty years a correspondent of certain
papers; and in another note to officials he has the goodness to speak of
me as "the Hon. Mr. R---, a distinguished citizen and journalist of
England." Certainly, then, I have as good a right to the best
accommodation the hotel affords as any other man, and accordingly I do
take my ease in my inn, and not dream, but do dwell, in marble halls,
while obsequious blackies fan me as I eat my meals, which consist of all
the dainties possible--the only things a fellow can eat this hot weather.
I am glad I have put up at Ebbet House, Washington, where I am in clover.
Like Bottom, I feel myself "translated." At Baltimore, the only night I
was there, I did not get a minute's sleep till daylight, because the
National Convention of Master Plumbers was holding its annual orgy just
beneath, and I seriously believed the place would be burned down before
the morning. In the dignified repose of Ebbet House I have no such fear;
my only anxiety is as to how I can ever again reconcile myself to the
time-honoured cold mutton of domestic life after all this luxurious
living. What made Senator B--- confer the dignity of Hon. on me I am at
a loss to understand. I know there are times when I think it right and
proper to blow my own trumpet in the unavoidable absence of my trumpeter;
but, in the present instance, I must candidly confess to have done
nothing of the kind. It is to be presumed that my improved position, as
regards lodging in Ebbet House, Washington, is to be attributed to the
social status given me by Senator B---, a gentleman who, in personal
appearance and size, bears somewhat of a resemblance to our late lamented
Right Hon. W. E. Forster, with the exception that Mr. B--- brushes his
hair--a process which evidently our Bradford M.P. disdained.

This morning I have shaken hands with the President at the White House--a
modest building not larger than our Mansion House, and, like that,
interesting for its many associations. Mr. Arthu