n, yet anxious to follow up the
train of ideas it had inspired, I sought, and by dint of inquiry,
discovered the habitation of Erasmus. It is in a dirty street, and consists
of one moderately sized, low roofed apartment, on the first floor of an old
fashioned, ill-built house, which the vicissitudes of time have converted
into an _Estaminet_.[1] I was conducted up a dark, narrow staircase into
the close, dingy room, by an ugly, ignorant frau, who seemed to wonder what
earthly inducement I had to visit her dwelling-house. Lumber and
moth-eaten furniture were carelessly scattered around. A solitary window,
partly blocked up by an old mattress, barely admitted light sufficient to
make objects visible. All was neglect and desolation. It seemed almost
impossible that so obscure and dismal a lodging could have been occupied by
so illustrious a tenant. I fancied I beheld the most learned man of his
age, the counsellor and companion of princes, and the contemporary and
rival of Sir Thomas More, indulging his classical reveries in this
comfortless chamber, regardless of its forlorn and squalid aspect. The
charm was omnipotent. Seated in an ancient leathern-bottomed chair, my
hostess, and the dust and darkness of the place were overlooked or
forgotten. The spirit of the mighty dead seemed to hover around, as a sort
of _genius loci_, rescuing the wretched tenement from otherwise deserved
oblivion, and making its very dinginess venerable!

[1] A low resort, something between a French cafe, and an English
pot-house.

On another occasion I recollect experiencing very strikingly, the force of
local impressions. It was when visiting the apartments of Mary Queen of
Scots, in the palace of Holyrood. Recalling to mind, with the enthusiasm of
one of her warmest admirers, every circumstance connected with the eventful
history of that unfortunate princess, it was impossible for me not to feel
penetrated with the deepest interest. I traversed the very rooms in which
she had sat, and conversed, and passed her hours of peaceful privacy. My
fancy pictured that privacy rudely and brutally invaded by Darnley and his
ruffian associates, when bent on the murder of the ill-fated Rizzio. I
mentally compared the circumstances of that deed of blood, as related by
historians, with the facilities for committing it, afforded by the
distribution of apartments. They tallied exactly. There was the little room
in which sat the queen with her ladies