On company with Mr Alward I attended the service at Treyford Abbey. This time we had one of the same persons whom I had seen officiate before. His sermon was an amplification of a figurative text of a besieged city. I did not think it particularly happy. Mr Moran and Mr Erickson came out at two, but returned before dinner. The latter made a favorable report of Mary’s condition, but he still dwells upon the reduced state of her system, and urged an early departure from here to give her the benefit of a mild climate for the winter. This will render an earlier breaking up of the family necessary than I had contemplated. I shall await with more anxiety the issue of my application to the government. The prospect of farther service at home is much less threatening than it was. I think I may securely count on the President’s disinclination. I took a walk down to the Station with the gentlemen and then to Acton. Spirits very dull. Read Lord Russell’s Life of Lord William.