George Ticknor, Life, letters and journals of George Ticknor
George Hillard, Ed.

[12] Von Hammer; Count Dietrichstein, who was the Governor of the Duke of Reichstadt, and is now the principal officer attached to the person of the reigning Empress, and is one of the most elegant and winning gentlemen I have met; with such as he thought I might be glad to see,—Naumann, long one of their employes in England; Baron Zedlitz, who writes for the theatre, and among other things has made a sort of rifacimento of the Estrella de Sevilla; the Minister of War; and some others whom I did not know. I talked chiefly with Count Dietrichstein, Count Bombelles, and Baron Zedlitz, and had a very agreeable time.

In the evening I drove out to Von Hammer's, who held this evening his weekly soiree. Thirty or forty persons were there; among the rest Caroline Pichler, whom I was very glad to see, for the sake of her fifty volumes of romances, some of which are good, and have been translated into English, French, and Italian. She seemed a nice, pleasant old lady. Mr. McNeill was there, whom I remember to have met in London at dinner last year, recently returned from Persia. . . . . He is now going there again as British Minister. He is a very interesting and intellectual gentleman; moreover, a fine scholar in Western as well as Eastern literature. Among them all I passed a truly agreeable evening.

July 1.—. . . . . At a little before three o'clock I went to the Chancery, and made a visit to Von Hammer in his office, and after that went to Prince Metternich's magnificent apartments.

The business of the morning, however, was not quite over, and two persons were still waiting in the antechamber. The Minister of Police came out of the cabinet, and one who, I understood afterwards, had formerly been Minister of Finance to the King of Sardinia, was admitted. His business did not occupy the Premier many minutes. A Hungarian Count, dressed in a full suit of really splendid uniform as a Hussar officer, next passed in, carrying in his hand a huge letter with broad black edges, containing, as I learnt, a reply to the letter of condolence which this officer had carried to the present King of Saxony on the death of the late King,¹. . . . and when this was over the Prince came out into the antechamber to me. Meanwhile, however, Von Hammer had joined me there, and said he wanted to speak to the Premier. I told him I was only going in to see the library, and he said he would go in with me.

When, therefore, the Prince came out, we both went towards the door to meet him. But it was plain, in an instant, that he did not