27, 1836, ADMIRALTY

It was decided that we should go to the Duchess of Buccleuch's
breakfast. My horror of breakfasts is only increased by having been
to this one, though I believe it was particularly pleasant.
Certainly the day was perfect, and the sight and the music pretty;
but I scarcely ever disliked people more or felt more beaten down
by shyness. My only thoughts from the moment we went in were: How I
wish it was over, and how I wish nobody would speak to me.

_September_ 6, 1836, ROEHAMPTON

Mama and I went to dine at Holland House.... The rooms are just
what one would expect from the outside of the handsome old house,
with a number of good pictures in the library, where we sat, all
portraits. Lord Holland is perfectly agreeable, and not at all a
man to be afraid of, in the common way of speaking, but for that
very reason I always am afraid of him--much more than of her, who
does not seem to me agreeable. I was very sorry Lord Melbourne did
not come, as he would have made the conversation more general and
agreeable.

The impression she made on others in her girlhood will be seen by this
passage in the "Reminiscences of an Idler," by Chevalier Wyhoff: "I had the
honour of dancing a quadrille with Lady Fanny Elliot, the charming daughter
of the Earl of Minto. Her engaging manners and sweetness of disposition
were even more winning than her admitted beauty."

In July it was decided that her brother Henry should go out to Australia
with Sir John Franklin. The idea of parting troubled her extremely, and,
moreover, the project dashed all the castles in the air she had built for
him. August 21st was the day fixed for his sailing. The 20th came--"dismal,
dismal day, making things look as if they understood it was his last." Long
afterwards, whenever she saw the front of Roehampton House, where she said
good-bye to him, the scene would come back to her mind--the waiting
carriage and the last farewells. The autumn winds had a new significance to
her now her brother was on the sea. She was troubled too about religious
problems, but she found it difficult, almost impossible, to talk about the
thoughts which were occupying her. Writing of her cousin Gilbert Elliot,
afterwards Dean of Bristol, for whom she felt both affection and respect,
she says: "In the evening Cousin Gilbert talked a great deal, and not only
usefully but delightfully, about differe