be glad to have helped a famous poet in his obscurity. The poor
fellow has left a good post in the customs to cultivate literature
in London!

"We shall begin to look for you now by every steamer from Boston.
You must make up your mind to spend a good while with us before
going to see your London friends.

"Did you read the article on your friend De Quincey in the last
Westminster? It was written by Mr. ---- of this city, who was in
America a year or two ago. The article is pretty well, but does
nothing like adequate justice to De Quincey; and in fact no
Englishman cares a pin for him. We are ten times as good readers and
critics as they.

"Is not Whipple coming here soon?"

Hawthorne's first visit to London afforded him great pleasure, but he
kept out of the way of literary people as much as possible. He
introduced himself to nobody, except Mr. ----, whose assistance he
needed, in order to be identified at the bank. He wrote to me from 24
George Street, Hanover Square, and told me he delighted in London, and
wished he could spend a year there. He enjoyed floating about, in a sort
of unknown way, among the rotund and rubicund figures made jolly with
ale and port-wine. He was greatly amused at being told (his informants
meaning to be complimentary) "that he would never be taken for anything
but an Englishman." He called Tennyson's "Charge of the Light Brigade,"
just printed at that time, "a broken-kneed gallop of a poem." He
writes:--