f
esteem for my unworthiness.

Next, I do not know that I have mentioned the late learned Norman poet,
_George Metivier_, as having long ago translated my "Proverbial
Philosophy" into French; he died at a great age, I think past ninety,
and was highly honoured by his native Guernsey, through life and death;
I remember him with much gratitude for his labour of love in respect of
my book. Through many years also I have corresponded with another Norman
poet, _John Sullivan_, whose very clever French poems I have often
versified into English for him, and he has returned the compliment by
sending translated fly-leaves of mine over the Gallic world.

Let one more in this authorial category be the excellent and learned
_Canon R.C. Jenkins_, whom I have known from his childhood, and who in
these latter years has routed out for me, chiefly out of Zedler's
"Genealogical Encyclopaedia," the heraldry and ancestry of my own
Thuringian pedigree; the Canon being one of our keenest antiquaries in
that line, and having German at his fingers' ends. He comes, as I do,
from old Lutheran stock, and is full both of prose and poetry of a high
class. My best regards to him and his.

The _Rev. Wm. Barnes_, of Dorset dialect fame, is another memory; as
also in years past the late _Chevalier de Chatelain_, a relative of my
Norwood friend, _Victor de Pontigny_, a well-known musical authority.

No doubt I have corresponded with most of the literary men of my day,
from Tennyson to--well, I will not sound a bathos, but I do not publish
private notes without permission, and in fact there would be no end of
such printed amenities of literature battledored and shuttlecocked from
one to another. I may, however, mention as a good habit of mine (is it
not a good one?) that, whenever I like a book, I take leave to thank its
author, and have usually received, _en revanche_, warm letters of their
gratitude from many, especially if young ones. Surely it is proper in a
veteran so to encourage a juvenile or even a mature brother, should he
seem to deserve it. As also, be it known, that sometimes I have taken up
the pen faithfully and honestly to rebuke: in these realistic and
atheistic days there are some modern writers, both of prose and poetry,
older or younger, who have reason to thank me for timely
expostulations,--if they have attended to my friendly strictures.

CHAPTER XLII.

POLITICAL.

Throughout my lengthened spell of life I never was a