The morning papers announce the death of Lord Lyndhurst. This makes the fourth person of note who has passed away within a short time. The others were Lord Clyde, Edward Ellice and Whately, the Archbishop of Dublin. In the post was a biography of Lyndhust, very well written but tolerably caustic. In truth, his history has nothing very elevated about it. An acute reasoning lawyer he made his way up the ladder by his cool judgment and knowledge how to profit by circumstances. American born, and the son of an American refugees he overcame all the difficulties of want of connection and of property, and became towards the last the Oracle of the Tory Aristocracy. His latest years were his best. To me he has always been very courteous, and begged me to go and see him much oftener than I chose to go accept. He retained his mental faculties extraordinarily though the gout had long paralyzed his powers of motion. He was essentially an adventurer in life, as have been many of the men who have mounted the woolsack, but he succeeded482 better than most of them in making his position improve as he lived along. He does not leave an equal in his particular line, behind him. Lord Brougham always partakes of the Mountebank, which he never did. The mail brought me letters and papers which I read much of the morning, but they were not so satisfactory as usual. Visits from Mr Collins and one or two others. Having done my best to bring up all the arrears of business, at four o’clock I started from the Victoria station for St Leonards. I reached our new abode, No 96. Marina, without incident, and found the family well and quietly established there. Henry returned to take my place in town.