The days are now growing very short. The sun rises after eight o’clock and sets before four, so that the sunlight when we have it remains but a few hours. I began on my despatches, but did not make so much headway as usual on account of interruptions. The heat and violent language keep up although General Scott’s letter written from Paris has done something to soften it. In the mean while stocks are falling rapidly, and the premiums of insurance especially on long voyages are rising. There is almost a panic in all the markets of England, and yet the newspapers pretend that a war would soon be ended. Mr Forster dropped in a for a few minutes. He said he was on the whole encouraged, but it did not seem to me that there was much to support his words. Mr Schuyler to bid me Goodbye. I went out with Mrs Adams to return some visits. Called on Mr Senior to bring back a parcel of his Diaries which he was so polite as to lend me. Also on Mr Bentsen to whom Dr Howe gave a letter of introduction. Also on Sir Gore Ouseley and his Wife whom we found at home and on Mr and Mrs Hawkey. After this I took a walk. My spirits on the whole very bad. The chances now seem prodigiously against us. And I am reflecting what it will be best to do, whether to go home or to pass the remainder of the winter on the continent and return in the spring. The latter would doubtless be the best but for the uncertainty of being able to get home at all then. In the evening I read Lord Malmesbury’s Diaries. He is a dull writer, but his accounts of his missions are of interest rather from his position than from any thing intrinsic. received a despatch from Lord Russell on the case of Mr Bunch and a curious not warning me that spies are employed to watch all my moments.304