ave things and things as
it is, and shall pick up more! He is so very ingenious, and has made a
dado over the mantelpiece, with a white or coloured border on which he
puts pictures and photographs; in the centre is a square of coloured
material with other things mounted on it. I foresee making a similar
design for our Malta mantelpiece, with a gold Maltese cross in the
centre and tiles round illustrating the eight Beatitudes....

I am intensely enjoying this bit here. Yesterday the Jelfs and the
boys and I had a long wander by the canal where the larches and the
birches are getting their tenderest tints on.... On Thursday evening I
went to the Tin Church, with the old bell _tankling_ as I went in, and
the mess bugles tootling afar as I came out. Bell the schoolmaster and
baritone started as if I were a ghost, and sent me a book for the
special hymn. Not a soul in the officers' seats--but a good choir and
a very fair congregation of men and barrack families. Said I to
myself, "I've been living in wealthy Bowdon and in ecclesiastical
York, and not had this. Well done--the Tug of War and the Tin
Tabernacle and the Camp! and unpaid soldiers and their sons to sing
the Lord's Song in the land of their pilgrimage!"

To-day I went with Mrs. Jelf to a meeting at the Club House about
"Coffee Houses." When we got in a "rehearsal" (dramatic) was going on,
and the chaff was "Have you come for the rehearsal or the
coffee-house?" We "Coffee-housers" adjourned to the Whist Room. Sir
Thos. Steele in the chair. I had a long chat with him. He says Music
and the Drama have declined dreadfully. The meeting was full of
friends. "Mat Irvine" nearly wrung my hand off, and I sat by poor
Knollys, who is heart-broken at the death of that dear little soul,
Captain Barton. It was a first-rate meeting, mixed military and
Aldershot tradesmen--a very "nice feeling" displayed--altogether it
was wonderfully pleasant.

_Exeter._ May 16, 1879.

... The weather alternates here between North-Easters and mugginess, and
I have never slept without fires yet. All the same I have had some
lovely _drives_, which you know are so good for me. When Mrs. Fox
Strangways couldn't go the Colonel has taken me alone 12 or 14 miles in
the dog-cart with a very "free-going" but otherwise prettily-behaved
little mare named Daphne. The tumbledown of hills and dales is very
pretty here, and the deep red of the earth, and the whitewashed and
thatched cottages. Very pret