descended from the dais, conversed with the Lord Mayor
and Lady Mayoress, and with the Duke of Cambridge.
Proceeding next to the Council-Chamber, the whole
party partook of a déjeûner of the proportions of a
dinner; the Emperor and Empress sitting at the head
of the table, having the Duke of Cambridge on their
right and the diplomatic body on the left, the Lord
Mayor and the Lady Mayoress sitting at the opposite
end of the table. The guests of the City left the Guildhall
at four o'clock, and returned by a different route to
Buckingham Palace. In the evening, the Queen, Prince
Albert, the Emperor and Empress, accompanied by a
numerous and distinguished suite, went in state to the
Opera at Covent Garden Theatre. The house, brilliantly
and lavishly decorated for the occasion, was filled by a
company many of whom had paid enormous prices for
their sittings. The state box, erected in the centre of
the circle fronting the stage, had been enlarged by the
absorption of several other boxes up to the second tier;
and the retiring-rooms behind, formed by a special
appropriation of saloons and lobbies, were adorned with
great magnificence. At an hour unusually late for a
state visit, between the first and second acts of Fidelio,
the party from Buckingham Palace arrived; the
Emperor leading in or rather led by, the Queen, the Empress
led by Prince Albert. At their entrance, first "Partant
pour la Syrie," then "God save the Queen," greeted
them. At the end of the third act the performance of
these national airs was repeated, reversing the order;
and the rising of the curtain revealed, besides the
performers, hundreds of ladies and gentlemen, in evening
dress, who had paid highly for a sight of the house and
its occupants from the stage. During the evening, many
of the principal streets were brilliantly illuminated.

On Friday the Emperor and Empress, with the Queen
and Prince Albert, visited the Crystal Palace. They
arrived about noon. After examining the various
objects of interest in the building, and showing
themselves to the multitude assembled on the terrace, they
partook of luncheon; and about three o'clock returned
to Buckingham Palace, where there was a grand concert
in the evening. On Saturday morning the illustrious
visitors left Buckingham Palace on their return to
Paris. They were accompanied to the railway station
by Prince Albert and the Duke of Cambridge; and the
Lord Mayor came to pay his respects at parting.
Prince Albert and the Duke of Cambridge accompanied
them to Dover, and on board the steamer, where they
parted with the utmost cordiality. The Emperor and
Empress arrived at Boulogne about four o'clock.

The Queen has conferred the honour of a Baronetcy
on the Lord Mayor of London.

A warm tribute to the merits of Miss Nightingale is
given by the Hon. and Rev. Sidney Godolphin Osborne,
in his newly-published work, "Scutari and its Hospitals."
"Miss Nightingale in appearance is just what you would
expect in any other well-bred woman who may have
seen perhaps rather more than 30 years of life; her
manner and countenance are prepossessing, and this
without the possession of positive beauty; it is a face
not easily forgotten, pleasing in its smile, with an eye
betokening great self-possession, and giving when she
wishes a quiet look of firm determination to every
feature. Her general demeanour is quiet, and rather
reserved; still I am much mistaken if she is not gifted
with a very lively sense of the ridiculous. In conversation
she speaks on matters of business with a grave
earnestness one would not expect from her appearance.
She has evidently a mind disciplined to restrain under
the principles of the action of the moment every feeling
which would interfere with it. She has trained herself
to command, and learnt the value of conciliation towards
others and constraint over herself. I can conceive her
to be a strict disciplinarian; she throws herself into a
work as its head—as such she knows well how much
success must depend upon literal obedience to her every
order. She seems to understand business thoroughly,
though to me she had the failure common to many
'Heads'—a too great love of management in the small
details which had better, perhaps, have been left to
others.—Her nerve is wonderful; I have been with her
at very severe operations, she was more than equal to
the trial. She has an utter disregard of contagion,
I have known her spend hours over men dying of
cholera or fever. The more awful to every sense
any particular case, especially if it was that of a
dying man, her slight form would be seen bending
over him, administering to his ease in every way in
her power, and seldom quitting his side till death
released him. I have heard and read with indignation
the remarks hazarded upon her religious character. I
found her myself to be in her every word and action a
Christian; I thought this quite enough. It would have
been, in my opinion, the most cruel impertinence to
scrutinise her words and acts, to discover to which of
the many bodies of true Christians she belonged. I have
conversed with her several times on the deaths of those
whom I had visited ministerially in the hospitals, with
whom she had been when they died. I never heard one
word from her lips that would not have been just what
I should have expected from the lips of those whom I
have known to be the most experienced and devout of
our common faith. I do not think it is possible to
measure the real difficulties of the work Miss Nightingale
has done, and is doing by the mere magnitude of
the field and its peculiarly horrible nature. Every day
brought some new complication of misery, to be somehow
unravelled by the power ruling in the Sisters'
tower. Each day had its peculiar trial to one who had
taken such a load of responsibility, in an untried field,
and with a staff of her own sex, all new to it. Hers was
a post requiring the courage of a Cardigan, the tact and
diplomacy of a Palmerston, the endurance of a Howard,
the cheerful philanthropy of a Mrs. Fry or a Miss
Neave; Miss Nightingale yet fills that post, and, in my
opinion, is the one individual who in this whole
unhappy war has shown more than any other what real
energy, guided by good sense, can do to meet the calls
of sudden emergency."

Sir De Lacy Evans, learning that his constituents
were about to present him with some costly testimonial,
has written to beg that they will oblige him by giving
up their intention. They have given him so many
proofs of confidence, he said, that it would be
superfluous to give one more. The intention has therefore
been abandoned.

Sir Robert Peel delivered a lecture on the British
poets, at the Marylebone Institution, on the 11th inst,
to an audience described as crowded and fashionable.

The inhabitants of Marylebone held a public
meeting on the 17th instant to record their deep regret
at the loss of Lord Dudley Stuart, to express their
sense of his great services, and to appoint a committee
for raising funds to commemorate those services by
a becoming testimonial. Sir Benjamin Hall presided,
and Lord Ebrington and M. Kossuth spoke from the
platform. A committee was nominated to carry out
the resolutions.

Obituary of Notable Persons.

CHARLOTTE BRONTI, wife of the Rev. Arthur Bell Nicholls
(known to the public by her literary name of Currer Bell),
died at Haworth Parsonage, Yorkshire, on the 31st ult.

ROBERT WALLACE, ESQ., formerly member for Greenock,
died of bronchitis, at Seafield Cottage, near Greenock, on the
1st inst., aged 82.

VISCOUNT BOYNE died on the 30th ult.. in his 78th year.

R. C. CARPENTER, Esq., the eminent architect, died on the
27th ult., aged 43.

MAJOR-GENERAL E. J. O'BRIEN died at York on the 28th
ult., aged 82.

The ARCH-DUCHESS MARY DOROTHY, widow of the Prince
Palatine Joseph, has died at Buda, aged 58.

The HEREDITARY PRINCESS OF SAXE-MEININGEN died
suddenly on the 30th ult., in her 23rd year.

LADY COTTON, widow of Admiral Sir Charles Cotton, died
on the 12th inst., at Madingley, in Cambridgeshire, at the
great age of 92. Her death was accelerated by the news that
her own nephew, and the husband of her niece, had died in
the Crimea; and that two of her grandsons—sons of Lady
King—were on their way to the seat of war.

SIR HENRY DE LA BECHE died suddenly from an attack of
paralysis on the 13th inst., aged 59.

M. DUCOS, the French Minister of Marine, died in Paris on
the 17th inst.

M. ALONZO, formerly Minister of Justice in Spain, died at
Madrid on the 12th inst.