We had music; and Mr.Du Maurier sang a drinking song, accompanying himself on the piano.
George Eliot had specially asked for this song, saying, I remember, "A good drinking song is the only form of intemperance I admire!" I think also that Lewes seemed in higher spirits than when I had been with him at Florence.

But this was no more than an additional testimony to the fact that _she_ was happier.
She also was, I take it, in better health, for we had some most delightful walks over the exceptionally beautiful country in the neighbourhood of their house, to a greater extent than she would, I think, have been capable of at Florence.
One day we made a most memorable excursion to visit Tennyson at Black Down.

It was the first time I had ever seen him.

He walked with us round his garden, and to a point finely overlooking the country below, charmingly varied by cultivated land, meadow and woodland.

It was a magnificent day; but as I looked over the landscape I thought I understood why the woods, which one looks down on from a similar Italian height, are called _macchie_--stains, whereas our ordinarily more picturesque language knows no such term and no such image.