ed force in its
performances. Hence the semblance exceeded the reality, and it might
have been said of him, as it was said of Guizot, "Il impose et il en
impose." This biography of him makes, consequently, no appeal to the
deeper feelings and awakens no train of higher thought. But it has an
interest which, though of an ordinary kind, is scarcely surpassed in
degree by that of any similar work; and it forms a worthy memorial
of a man whose wide attainments, strict integrity and warm affections
endeared him to his intimates and made him respected by all.

T.S. PERRY.

OUR MONTHLY GOSSIP.

A REMINISCENCE OF MACAULAY.

It was in June, 1857, that I had the good fortune to meet Macaulay
at dinner at the house of my dear friend, the Rev. Derwent Coleridge,
then principal of St. Mark's College, Chelsea. The brilliant career
of the great talker and essayist was drawing to its close, and it is
partly on this account that I make now what record I can of my single
meeting with him. He was beginning to give up society, so that only at
the houses of his oldest friends was there any chance of seeing him.
Besides the especial attraction of Macaulay's presence it was an
interesting company that was gathered that evening around my friend's
hospitable board. One felt that the English dinner, that choicest of
all opportunities for exchange of thought, was here to be enjoyed
in high perfection. Among the guests were Mr. Blore, an elderly
gentleman, one of whose distinctions was that he had been a friend
of Sir Walter Scott and the architect of Abbotsford; Mr. Helmore, the
well-known writer on choral music; Mr. Tremenheere, who had traveled
in America and had written on the subject of education in our country;
and Mr. Herbert Coleridge, the gifted son of Sara Coleridge--young man
of the highest promise, who had taken a double first-class at Oxford.
Alas! that his mother, herself of such brilliant powers, had not
lived to know of this high achievement of her son!--she whose love and
thought for her children, and unwearied efforts for their intellectual
advancement, are so abundantly shown in the _Memoir and Letters_ which
her daughter has lately published! Alas! too, that the son for whom
such high hopes had been cherished, and whose opening manhood was of
such promise, was himself cut off three years after the time of which
I now write! Miss Edith Coleridge, the other child of Sara Coleridge,
was also present. She was even then