[Boston—Sunday, 25 November 1866]
Sunday walked in the morning. Aldrichs came to dinner—talked of Bishop King’s poem Exequy on the death of his wife with admiration. Howells’ poem Forlorn which clever men praise we can see nothing in, any of us.
Mr & Mrs Murray called in the afternoon. Mrs Murray says she will not be disquieted by criticism. The worst review against her pictures by Tom Taylor brought her one of her best friends, Lord Lansdowne.
Professor Holmes amused them much yesterday by propounding the question—what is the happiest animal in creation next to a poet, of course, if we may call him an animal—I’ll tell you what is the happiest—it is the Acherons, the parasite of the honey-bee and why—because he attaches himself to the wing of the bee, is carried without exertion to the sweetest flowers, the bee gathers the honey while the Acherons eats it and all the while the music of the bee attends him as he is borne through the air.
