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

[148] he was very agreeable. The superciliousness he showed when he was in America, and the quiet coldness I used to witness in him sometimes in Edinburgh, in 1819, were not at all perceptible to-day. He was very lively, and yet showed more sense than wit. We talked a good deal about the late atrocious duel of Cilley at Washington; about his recollections of the United States, apropos of which he gave a very humorous account of his own wedding, and of a dinner at President Madison's; about the elder days of the ‘Edinburgh Review’; and about the present state of society at Edinburgh, which he represents as much less brilliant than it was when I was there formerly.

After the ladies were gone we talked about what is now a much-vexed question, in relation to Scotland,—how far the government is bound to provide religious instruction for the poor. Jeffrey said he had been to see Lord Melbourne about it, and took a party view of the matter altogether, as I thought. I maintained that the soil should provide all instruction that is necessary to preserve the order and purity of society for all that live upon it; and I think I had much the best of the argument, drawn from our New England institutions and the Boston Ministry for the Poor. At any rate, I carried Lister and Edward Villiers with me against Jeffrey, who admitted almost everything but its political expediency in Scotland. . . . .

March 30.—Made a long visit to Hallam this morning, whom I found in his study,—a very comfortable room in the back part of his house, well filled with books, some of which were rare. He talked well, and among other things I asked him about the universities, knowing that his relations to them are somewhat peculiar, as he was educated at Oxford, and sent his son to Cambridge, where he much distinguished himself at Trinity. His replies were such as I anticipated, very cold as far as concerns Oxford, on which he has thus decidedly turned his back, but less favorable to either than I supposed they would be. But he is a wise man, a little nervous in his manner and a little fidgety, yet of a sound and quiet judgment. His objection to the English universities, which he expressed strongly, was, that, with such great resources of property and talent, they yet effect so little. Hallam's establishment is not a showy one, but it is rich and respectable. . . . .

We dined at Edward Villiers', where we met old Mrs. Villiers, Mrs. Trotter,—another of the Ravensworths,¹—Bouverie, the son