intercourse between the families at Farringford and Dimbola. In 1878 her mother's heart yearned to see her children once more, and in October of that year she set sail for Ceylon, promising to return to the Isle of Wight speedily, and never again to forsake her dear Freshwater friends. But in the early part of the following year, Lord Tennyson received a letter from Hardinge and Henry Cameron, telling how, as the day died on Sunday, January 26th, the sweet tender gracious spirit of our beloved mother passed away in peace. No death could have been more calm, more beautiful than this. "Thrice blest whose lives are faithful prayers." Her soul was ripe for heaven, if ever soul was. The beautiful tender thoughts of your "In Memoriam" are a solace to us as they have been to many aching weary hearts. We buried her in the quiet little churchyard at the head of the valley in Bogaliawantalawa, just such a spot as she would have chosen for her rest. So we left her, and returned to the dear father to cheer and comfort him.' In May, 1880, deep black-edged letters from Ceylon were once more put into Lord Tennyson's hands, telling how,

'on the 8th of this month, my dearest father left us, and, I hope, rejoined my dear mother in the spirit-world. When Death impresses his signmanual on any countenance he gives it a great dignity. But his face, so noble and intellectual in life, looked perfectly sublime. We had his body carried fifty miles through the grand mountain and forest scenery which he in life so loved. A grand tropical thunder-storm burst over us as we passed down the mountain side to Dimbulla,* and it was grander than any military salute of guns, and seemed as though the heavens joined in paying honour to the dead. A coffin, draped in white, placed in a car drawn by two white bulls, took the body as far towards Bogaliawantalawa as the road went, and then twenty-six coolies carried the coffin in silence to St. Regulus, where he and mother had spent many happy days. The next day, we travelled slowly through grand passes and forest, and at five o'clock in the evening we placed him by the side of our darling mother, his wife, friend, and

*From which Mrs. Cameron's Freshwater cottage was named.

companion of forty years. You who knew the entire happiness of our dear home at Freshwater, well know with what bursting hearts we left the loved ones in their grave.'

"The outer world knew Julia Margaret Cameron best as an epoch-maker in the history of photography; but much as the inner circle of her friends admired the wonderful studies she made of learned men and fair women, with their Rembrandt-like effects of light and shade, Mrs. Cameron was even more esteemed by them for herself than for her art, since in her they found one who, whilst loving her own family with a passionate affection, and expecting those who loved her to love them all too for her sake, yet, so far from suffering her affections to degenerate into that egoisme à deux ou à trois which is scarcely less utter selfishness because it takes in a family instead of the ego alone, she so far entered with her very soul into every concern of those who had the privilege of her friendship that she seemed almost to lose her own personality in theirs, and, in the midst of her own deepest griefs and highest joys, she was ever ready to rejoice

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with them in their happiness or to weep over their sorrows, to aid them with her wise counsel, and to sacrifice her time, her money, and even her health to serve them. In a word, Mrs. Cameron was a woman worthy of the post she occupied of one of the chiefest among the friends of Lord and Lady Tennyson.

"After the bodily presence of Mrs. Cameron was taken from us, her spirit seemed to linger on in the person of a sister, who had come to Freshwater in order to be near her.* This was Mrs. Prinsep, the wife of Mr. Thoby Prinsep, the wellknown East India Director. To their house, 'The Briery,' the Laureate (together with his eldest son, who, after leaving college became his father's inseparable companion) was an almost daily visitor, and many were the hours spent by him in congenial conversation, on politics, literature, or science, with the master mind that had long had so potent a share in the government of India, and whose ready grasp of almost every

* She was the "Grace" of the trio before mentioned. † So-called from its sweet-brier hedge. It is now let to Lord Kenmare.

imaginable subject was only less wonderful than his marvellous memory. His keen interest in contemporary politics was unimpaired by the fact that his loss of eyesight compelled him to depend on others for his knowledge of passing events. Lord Tennyson took delight in reading aloud to him the interesting letters which every mail brought him from his artist-son, Mr. Val Prinsep, whilst the latter was engaged on his large painting of the 'Proclamation of the Queen as Empress of India' (which letters have since been published, almost without alteration, under the title of 'Imperial India').

"With the Prinseps lived, for part of the year, the artist from whom their son Val had first learnt to handle the brush - Mr. Watts, the Royal Academician; and many a pleasant talk about art have the poet and the painter had together in the large studio at the Briery, on whose walls the colossal study of the 'Drayman and his Horses' used to hang. Many more of his pictures adorned the living-rooms, which were artistically furnished with costly objects from the East-so arranged that comfort was