Henry Parkes

“ Has not my father's wife been kind, never to send me the least thing in the world, and yet she thinks she is entitled to the name of 'mother,' but I think she does not act 'mother-like!'
I have seen the fine park and the Queen's palace and the Queen's carriage, but they are not, all of them, worth a fig to see. The park, crowded with people like a fair, the palace, guarded everywhere with soldiers with their bayonets fixed; I would rather walk in a rural lane than in such places, where you can go so far and no farther, without being stopped by a soldier with a bayonet in his hand. ”

“ He is quite idolized by the old ladies where we live, and he is called 'a poet' by The Charter of yesterday. He has had no end of presents from people whom he has not known many months. One old gentleman made him a present of an ivory tablet, a set of reading books, and a shoe-lift, and paper knife, worth twelve or fourteen shillings. ”