ce in 1858, private secretary to his father in 1866, next year
Inspector of Fisheries, later Lieutenant-Governor of the Isle of Man,
and from 1893 to 1899 Secretary to the Post-office. In spite of all this
administrative work his books show that he was a wide, general reader,
apart from his special historical studies. He wrote in an agreeable
literary style, with Macaulay undoubtedly as his model, although he was
by no means a slavish imitator. His "History of Twenty-five Years" seems
to me to be written with a freer hand than the earlier history. He is
here animated by the spirit rather than the letter of Macaulay. I no
longer noticed certain tricks of expression which one catches so easily
in a study of the great historian, and which seem so well to suit
Macaulay's own work, but nobody else's.

An article by Walpole on my first four volumes, in the _Edinburgh
Review_ of January, 1901, led to a correspondence which resulted in my
receiving an invitation last May to pass Sunday with him at Hartfield
Grove, his Sussex country place. We were to meet at Victoria station and
take an early morning train. Seeing Mr. Frederic Harrison the day
previous, I asked for a personal description of his friend Walpole in
order that I might easily recognize him. "Well," says Harrison, "perhaps
I can guide you. A while ago I sat next to a lady during a dinner who
took me for Walpole and never discovered her mistake until, when she
addressed me as Sir Spencer, I undeceived her just as the ladies were
retiring from the table. Now I am the elder by eight years and I don't
think I look like Walpole, but that good lady had another opinion."
Walpole and Harrison met that Saturday evening at the Academy dinner,
and Walpole obtained a personal description of myself. This caution on
both our parts was unnecessary. We were the only historians traveling
down on the train and could not possibly have missed one another. I
found him a thoroughly genial man, and after fifteen minutes in the
railway carriage we were well acquainted. The preface to his "History of
Twenty-five Years" told that the two volumes were the work of five
years. I asked him how he was getting on with the succeeding volumes. He
replied that he had done a good deal of work on them, and now that he
was no longer in an administrative position he could concentrate his
efforts, and he expected to have the work finished before long. I
inquired if the prominence of his family in politics h