Letters from England, 1846-1849. By Elizabeth Davis Bancroft. (Smith, Elder,
and Co. 6s. net.)—Mrs. Bancroft was the wife of the historian George Bancroft, who, after American custom, came as Minister to England in 1846. She wrote these letters during the period of her husband's tenure of office. They are highly interesting, especially to any reader whose memory can carry him back some sixty years. Mrs. Bancroft admired England and English people, but was not put out of conceit with her own country and people. She found that the women were "more cultivated as a body "; the manners of the men were easier ; there was less need, or supposed need, of self-assertion. She was pleased "amazingly " with the pronunciation which gave "every letter its due." (How about the final "g "?) She came into contact with a number of famous people, as Miss Berry (the one whom Horace Walpole wanted to marry), Lord and Lady Palmerston, Sir Robert Peel (with whom she was greatly taken), Kinglake (Eathen), " a quiet, unobtrusive person in manner, though his book is quite an effervescence," and many others. Lady Charlotte Lindsay, daughter of Lord North, told her that " it had worried her father in his old age that he remained Minister during the American troubles when he wished to resign." Here is a curious Russian picture. Baron Brunnow was then Russian Ambassador, and was going to entertain the Grand Duke Constantine. Unfortunately the Duke and Duchess of Saxe-Weimar had made an appointment for 7 p.m. on that day, and when H.S.H. arrived they had not returned. " The Baroness advanced to the Grand Duke and sank on her knees before him, asking pardon in Russian. He begged her to rise ; but she remained in an attitude of deep humiliation, until the Grand Duke sunk also on his knees and gently raised her." And here is an instance of "fine old crusted Toryism." The letters which used to be delivered at Lord Suffield's house at 2 p.m. were expedited by the railway to 7 a.m., but it was not permitted to distribute them before the old time. What a mistake to call one of the improved kinds of apple after this grand lady's name ! She would have preferred the indigenous crab. Of social matters, Mrs. Bancroft found the gradations of rank among servants the most difficult. She confounded the lady's-maid and butler with the plebs of footmen and housemaids, whereas they fed apart, and " had loaf-sugar with their tea." She never succeeded in understanding the difference of work between an upper and an under housemaid. The volume has many portraits, not new of course, but making an interesting series.
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