I set off this morning for Mr. Kemble's, in the Highlands, to be absent until the last of the week.

How the breakfast went off at Mr. King's, at Highwood; and how the Sontag looked, and moved, and conducted herself; and how I admired, but did not talk with her; and how I returned to town with the S-'s, in their carriage; and how I went with Mrs. Sto Niblo's theatre; and how Mr. S was to join us there, and how he did not join us there, but left me to be her cavalier for the whole evening, and how I wondered that he should trust such a charming wife with such a gay young fellow : all this, and more also, I will recount unto you when next we meet. Until then, farewell. Yours truly,

WASHINGTON IRVING.

November 10th, 1852, he writes to Mrs. Storrow :

George Sumner has been twice up here: once on a visit to us, and another time at the H-'s. He was, as usual, full of floating history about the men and the events of the day; having mingled in the most striking scenes and among the most striking people of the countries in which he has travelled and sojourned. I really was heartily glad to meet him again, for he is altogether one of the most curiously instructed American travellers that I have ever met with. Mr. Mitchell (Ike Marvel, author of "Reveries of a Bachelor," "Dream Life," etc.) came up from town, and passed a day with us while Sumner was making his visit. I have taken a great liking to him, both as an author and a man.

I close the year with the following letter to his publisher, who had sent him, the day before Christmas, a parcel of books for the acceptance of the "young ladies," with the remark that it would require a good many more if he were to begin even to suggest the obligations which had been incurred by the honorable and pleasant privi

lege of being associated with his name even in his "humble capacity."

MY DEAR SIR:

[To George P. Putnam, Esq.]

SUNNYSIDE, December 27, 1852.

Your parcel of books reached me on Christmas morning. Your letter, not being addressed to Dearman, went to Tarrytown, and did not come to hand until to-day.

My nieces join with me in thanking you for the beautiful books you have sent us, and you and Mrs. Putnam for your wishes for a merry Christmas and a happy New Year.

For my own especial part, let me say how sensibly I appreciate the kind tone and expressions of your letter; but as to your talk of obligations to me, I am conscious of none that have not been fully counterbalanced on your part; and I take pleasure in expressing the great satisfaction I have derived, throughout all our intercourse, from your amiable, obliging, and honorable conduct. Indeed, I never had dealings with any man, whether in the way of business or friendship, more perfectly free from any alloy.

That those dealings have been profitable, is mainly owing to your own sagacity and enterprise. You had confidence in the continued vitality of my writings. You called them again into active existence, and gave them a circulation that I believe has surprised even yourself. In rejoicing at their success, my satisfaction is doubly enhanced by the idea that you share in the benefits derived from it.

Wishing you that continued prosperity in business which your upright, enterprising, tasteful, and liberal mode of conducting it merits, and is calculated to insure; and again invoking on you and yours a happy New

Year

I remain, very truly and heartily, yours,

WASHINGTON IRVING.

CHAPTER XVI.

AT NEW YORK, ON HIS WAY TO BALTIMORE.— LETTER FROM BALTIMORE.— MEETS THACKERAY IN THE CARS. HOSPITABLE RECEPTION AT BALTIMORE. -DEPARTURE FOR WASHINGTON.- LETTERS FROM WASHINGTON.-AT WORK AMONG THE ARCHIVES OF THE STATE DEPARTMENT.-A MINIATURE ANCHOR PRESENTED TO HIM.- ITS HISTORY.― TABLE-TIPPING.-REMINISCENCES OF THE FAMILY OF THE EMPRESS OF FRANCE.-LETTER TO MRS. KENNEDY, AFTER HIS RETURN TO SUNNYSIDE.

N the course of the preceding year, Mr. Irving had promised his friend Kennedy, the Secretary of the Navy, to pay him a visit at Washington; and "having occasion to rummage the public archives for historical information," he sets out on his journey in the beginning of January.

January 13th, he writes from New York on his way: "The day of my arrival in town I tried to get a ticket to hear Sontag, but, finding there was trickery in disposing of seats, I went off in a huff to the other house, and saw Alboni in the 'Somnambula,' which she performed to admiration."

On another evening before his start, "feeling in want of city amusement," he writes, "I went to Wallack's, and saw the old play of the Road to Ruin,' played in excel

lent style." He also went to a ball, where, though after the opera, he found himself "among the early ones." "I think it," he writes to an unmarried niece, "one of the pleasantest balls I have been at for a long time, inasmuch as I sat all the evening on a sofa beside N in the front room up-stairs, where they received their guests, so as to leave the rooms down-stairs free for the dancers. In this way I saw a great part of the company in the course of the evening, without fatigue, and without going into the ball-rooms to be crowded and cramped, and kicked into a corner. Besides," he adds with a touch of fun, "the dances that are the fashion put me out of countenance, and are not such as a gentleman of my years ought to witness."

On the 17th, he had reached Baltimore, as will appear by the following letter:

[To Miss Catherine Irving, Sunnyside.]

MY DEAR KATE :

BALTIMORE, January 17, 1853.

In a letter to Sarah, I gave an account of my whereabouts and whatabouts while in New York, last week, where I was detained beyond my intended time by a snow-storm. I was rather in a humdrum mood during my sojourn; and, although I had big dinners, gay balls, Italian operas, and Banvard's Diorama to entertain me, I would willingly have stolen back to "my native plains," and given up the "gay world,” and all terrestrial joys. The last evening of my detention, however, the weather and my dull humor cleared up; the latter, doubtless, under the influence of Sontag's charms, who, in the "Daughter of the Regiment," looked, played, and sang divinely.

The next morning proving bright and fair, I broke up my encampment, and got down to the foot of Cortlandt Street, in time for the ferry-boat which took over passengers for the express train. I looked forward to a dull, wintry journey, and laid in a stock of newspapers to while away time; but, in the gentlemen's cabin of the ferry-boat, whom should I see but Thackeray. We greeted each other cordially. He was on his way to Philadelphia, to deliver a course of lectures. We took seats beside each other in the cars, and the morning passed off delightfully. He seems still to enjoy his visit to the United States exceedingly, and enters into our social life with great relish. He had made a pleasant visit to Boston; seen much of Prescott (whom he speaks highly of), Ticknor, Longfellow, etc. Said the Bostonians had published a smashing criticism on him; which, however, does not seem to have ruffled his temper, as I understand he cut it out of the newspaper, and inclosed it in a letter to a female friend in New York. I arrived, after dark, at Baltimore.

I had to inquire my way to Mr. Kennedy's, or rather Mr. Gray's, as Mr. K. shares the house of his father-in-law, in Baltimore. The door was opened by Mr. Gray's old factotum and valley-de-sham Phil, an old negro who formed a great friendship with me at Saratoga last summer, and, I am told, rather values himself on our intimacy. The moment he recognized me, he seized me by the hand with such exclamations of joy, that he brought out old Mr. Gray, and then Miss Gray, into the hall; and then a scene took place worthy of forming a companion piece to the return of the prodigal son. In a moment I felt myself in my paternal home, and have ever since been a favored child of the house. To be sure, there was no fatted calf killed; but there was a glorious tea-table spread, with broiled oysters and other substantial accessories worthy of a traveller's appetite.

Here, then, I am delightfully fixed, in this most hospitable, spacious, comfortable mansion, with Kennedy's library and study at my command, where I am scribbling this letter, and with my friend Phil ever at hand to take care of me, and attend to all my wants and wishes.

On the morrow he writes:-
:-