Page:Literary Landmarks of Oxford.djvu/185

151 quoted here, made his homes in Oxford (which were first in High Street, nearly opposite Magdalen, and later at No. 7 Norham Gardens, backing upon the University Park), the centre of everything that was interesting and delightful in an intellectual way. He entertained all the Lights of Literature who had been in Oxford in his time, and among others Emerson, Lowell, and Holmes were his guests in the Norham Gardens house, in which, it may be mentioned, most of these lines were written. Holmes was very happy there during more than one of the "Hundred Days" of his old age. "I had the pleasure of showing him the old buildings of Oxford," wrote Max Miiller. "He seemed to know them all, and had something to ask and to say about every one. When we came to Magdalen College he wanted to see, and to measure, the elms. He was very proud of some elms in America, and he had actually brought some string with which he had measured the largest tree he knew in his own country. He proceeded to measure one of our finest elms at Magdalen, and when he found that it was larger than his American giant, he stood before it, admiring it without a single word of envy or disappointment."

One who has often stood and admired those Magdalen elms, big and noble as they are, cannot