sip--giving, as he did,
little traits of Kings and Kaisers, and telling us the way in which
majesty was graciously pleased to blow his royal nose. Imagine a female
pen engaged on such themes! What clever and sharp little touches would
reveal the whole tone of a "reception"! We should not be told "His
Majesty received me coldly," but we would have a beautiful analysis
of the royal mind in all its varied moods of displeasure, concealment,
urbanity, reserve, and deception. Compared with the male version of the
same incident, it would be like Faraday's report on a case of supposed
poisoning beside the blundering narrative of a country apothecary!

It is a long time--a very long time--before an old country has energy
enough to throw off any of its accustomed ways. It requires the vigorous
assault of young and sturdy intelligences, and, above all, immense
persistence, to effect it.

Light comes very slowly indeed through the fog of centuries' growth, and
there is hope always when even the faintest flicker of a ray pierces the
Boeotian cloud. Now, for some years back, it may have been remarked that
a sort of suspicion has been breaking on the minds of our rulers, that
the finer, the higher, and subtler organisations of women might find
their suitable sphere of occupation in the diplomatic service.

"I don't speak German, but I play the German flute," said the apologetic
gentleman; and so might we say. We don't engage ladies in diplomacy,
but we employ all the old women of our own sex! Wherever we find a
well-mannered, soft-spoken, fussy old soul, with a taste for fine
clothes and fine dinners, fond of court festivities, and heart and soul
devoted to royalties, we promote him. If he speak French tolerably, we
make him a Minister; if he be fluent, an Envoy Extraordinary.

I remember an old medical lecturer in Dublin formerly, who used to hold
forth on the Materia Medica in the hall of the University, and who,
seeing a "student" whose studies had been for some time before pursued
in Germany, appear in the lecture-room, with a note-book and pen to take
down the lecture--

"Tell that young gentleman," said the Professor, "to put up his writing
materials, for there's not one word he'll hear from me that he'll not
find in the oldest editions of the 'Dublin Pharmacopoeia.'" In the same
spirit our diplomatists may sneer at the call for blue-books. We have
all of us had the whole thing already in the 'Times;' and why? Because
we ch