Pleasanter day. Attended Divine Service at the Chapel. Mr Martineau preached a discourse rather in his less attractive vein. Afternoon, a walk with Mary in the course of which we visited the zoological gardens, and took a look at the great animals. It seemed to me as if their coats were brightened by the cold season. The lions never looked better, and the tigers and bears seemed in rich robes. The seals also swam about with great vivacity, especially as the keeper was just in the act of supplying them with fish. He remarked however that they were less eager than common as the fish were less fresh than they liked to have them. On my return home I found Sir Henry Holland. Having no particularly reading I went through several articles in the latest number of the Quarterly Review. How much time and growth does to change our views of things! I remember the day when I used to consider such writing as authority merely because it was done with boldness and with assurance. After dinner, I read to Mrs A and to Mary, the first part of Dickens’s Christmas production of “Somebody’s luggage.”