eries of the Louvre yesterday, it
being a day on which the public are excluded. The Baron received us,
did the honours of the Musee with all the intelligence and urbanity
that distinguish him, and made as favourable an impression on my
countrymen as they seemed to have produced on him.

Rogers has a pure taste in the fine arts, and has cultivated it _con
amore_; Luttrell brings to the study a practised eye and a matured
judgment; but Lord John, nurtured from infancy in dwellings, the walls
of which glow with the _chefs-d'oeuvre_ of the old masters and the best
works of the modern ones, possesses an exquisite tact in recognizing at
a glance the finest points in a picture, and reasons on them with all
the _savoir_ of a connoisseur and the feeling of an amateur.

It is a pleasant thing to view collections of art with those fully
capable of appreciating them, and I enjoyed this satisfaction
yesterday. The Baron de Cailleux evinced no little pleasure in
conducting my companions from one masterpiece to another, and two or
three hours passed away rapidly in the interesting study.

The Marquis and Marquise de B----, Comte V----, and some others, dined
here yesterday. The Marquise de B---- is very clever, has agreeable
manners, knows the world thoroughly, and neither under nor overvalues
it. A constant friction with society, while it smoothes down asperities
and polishes manners, is apt to impair if not destroy much of the
originality and raciness peculiar to clever people. To suit themselves
to the ordinary level of society, they become either insipid or
satirical; they mix too much water, or apply cayenne pepper to the wine
of their conversation: hence that mind which, apart from the artificial
atmosphere of the busy world, might have grown into strength and
beauty, becomes like some poor child nurtured in the unhealthy
precincts of a dense and crowded city,--diseased, stunted, rickety, and
incapable of distinguishing itself from its fellows.

As clever people cannot elevate the mass with which they herd to their
own level, they are apt to sink to theirs; and persons with talents
that might have served for nobler purposes are suffered to degenerate
into _diseurs de bons mots_ and _raconteurs de societe_, content with
the paltry distinction of being considered amusing. How many such have
I encountered, satisfied with being pigmies, who might have grown to be
giants, but who were consoled by the reflection that in that world