Free Ebooks - The Letters of Horace Walpole,

The Letters of Horace Walpole,
Earl of Orford:

Including Numerous letters Now First Published
From The Original Manuscripts.

In Four Volumes.
Vol. IV.

1770-1797.

Philadelphia: Lea And Blanchard.

1842.

C. Sherman & Co. Printers
19 St. James Street.

Contents Of Vol. IV.

[Those Letters now first collected are marked N.]

1770.

1. To Sir David Dalrymple, January 1.-Thanks for his "History
of Scottish Councils." The spirit of controversy the curse of
modern times. Attack on the House of Commons. Outcry against
grievances. Despotism and unbounded licentiousness--(N.) 25

2. To the same, Jan. 23.-Mr. Charles Yorke's rapid history.
Lord Chatham's attempt to enlarge the representation. Sir
George Savile and Mr. Burke's attack on the House of Commons.
Modern Catilines. Corruption of senators. Wilkes, Parson Horne,
and JUnius--[N.] 26

3. To George Montagu, Esq. March 31.-Print of Alderman
Backwell--28

4. To the same, May 6.-Backwardness of the season. Marriages.
Masquerades. New establishment at Almack's. Intercourse between
age and youth--28

5. To the same, June 11.-Description of Lord Dysart's house at
Ham--29

6. To the same, June 29.-Promising a visit on his way to Stowe.
Death of Alderman Beckford--31

7. To the same, July 1.-On not finding him at home--32

8. To the same, July 7.-Account of his visit to Stowe, Lines
addressed to Princess Amelia--33

9. To the Earl of Strafford, July 9.-Visit to Stowe, Alderman
Beckford's death--35

10. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, July 12.-Visit to Stowe--36

11. To George Montagu, Esq. July 14.-Reversion of Walpole's
place--37

12. To the same, July 15-Correcting a mistake in his last--38

13. To the same Oct. 3.-Fit of the gout. The gate of age--38

14. To the same, Oct. 16--39

15. To the Earl of Strafford, Oct. 16.-Convalescence. Dispute
with Spain--39

16. To the Earl of Charlemont, Oct. 17.-In answer to an
application on behalf of an artist, and a wish to be permitted
to read his tragedy--[N.] 40

17. To the Rev. Mr. Cole, Nov. 15.-Soliciting his interest in
Cambridgeshire for Mr. Brand--41

18. To the same, Nov. 26.-Mr. Bentham's "History of Ely
Cathedral"--41

19. To the same, Dec. 20.-Mr. Essex's projected "History of
Gothic Architecture." Antiquarian Society. Dean Milles.
Gentlemen engravers at Cambridge--42

20. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, Dec. 25.-Planting of
poplar-pines. Dryden's "King Arthur" altered by Garrick--43

21. To the same, Dec. 29.-Change in the French ministry.
Overthrow of the Duc de Choiseul. Banishment of the Duc de
Praslin. New law arrangements at home--44

1771.

22. To the Rev. Mr. Cole, Jan. 10.-Suggestions for getting the
projected History of Gothic Architecture patronized by the
King--45

23. To the same, May -29.-Letters of Edward the Sixth--46

24. To the same, June 11.-On the various attacks upon his
writings. Archaeologia, or Old Women's Logic. Mr. Masters--47

25. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, June 17.-Visit to Ampthill.
Houghton Park. Mausoleum of the Bruces--[N.] 48

26. To the Earl of Strafford, June 20 . -Intended visit to
Paris. Madame du Deffand. New French ministry. The Duc
d'Aiguillon. Life of Cellini. Charles Fox--49

27. To the Rev. Mr. Cole, June 22.-On the cross to be erected
at Ampthill to the memory of Catherine of Arragon--50

28. To the same, June 24.-Thanks for some prints and letters--
51

29. To John Chute, Esq. July 9.-Account of his journey to
Paris--51

30. To the Hon. H. S, Conway, July 30.-French politics.
Distress at court. Vaudevilles against Madame du Barry.
Amusements at Paris. Gaillard's "Rivalit`e de la France et de
l'Angleterre"--52

31. To John Chute, Esq. Aug. 5.-Progress of English gardening
in France. New arr`ets. General distress. State of Le Soeor's
paintings at the Chartreuse. The charm of viewing churches and
convents dispelled. Shock at learning the death of Gray--55

32. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, Aug. 11.-Reflection on the death
of Gray. Lady Beauchamp. Opium a false friend--57

33. To the Rev. Mr. Cole, Aug. 12.-Reflections on the death of
Gray--58

34. To the Earl of Strafford, Aug. 25.-Climate of Paris. French
economy and retrenchment. Mademoiselle Guimard. Mademoiselle
Heinel. Suppression of the French Parliaments. Ruinous
condition of the palaces and pictures--59

35. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, Sept. 7.-Return to England.
Deplorable condition of the French finances--61

36. To the Rev. Mr. Cole, Sept. 10.-Thanks for some particulars
of Gray's death. Dr. James Browne. Gray's portrait--62

37. To the same, Oct. 12.-Mr. Essex's design for the cross at
Ampthill. Calvin and Luther--63

'38. To the same, Oct. 23.-Armour of Francis the First. Ancient
window from Bexhill. Tomb of Capoccio--63

1772.

39. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, January 7.-Effects of an
explosion of powder-mills at Hounslow--64

40. To the Rev. Mr. Cole, Jan. 28.-Dean Milles. Relics of Gray.
Letters on the English nation. Garrick and his writings.
Wilkes's squint--65

41. To the same, June 9--66

42. To the same, June 17.-Thanks for some literary researches.
Letters of Sir Thomas Wyat. Lives of Leland, Hearne, and Wood.
Browne Willis. Peter Gore and Thomas Callaghan--66

43. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, June 22.-Panic occasioned by
Fordyce's bankruptcy. Cherubims. Exercise. Letters of Guy
Patin. Charles Fox's annuities. Lives of Leland, Hearne, and
Wood. Entry in Wood's Diary. Freemasonry. Peter Gore--68

44. To the Rev. Mr. Cole, July 7.-King Edward's letters.
Portrait of Gray. Death of Mr. West the antiquary. His
collections. Foote's comedy of "The Nabob"--70

45. To the same, July 28.-Archaeologia, or, Old Women's Logic.
Antiquarian Society. Life of Sir Thomas Wyat. William Thomas's
"Peleryne"--70

46. To the same, Aug. 25.-Thanks to Dr. Browne for a goar-stone
and seal belonging to Gray. Lincoln and York cathedrals. Roche
Abbey. Screen of York Minster--71

47. To the same, Aug. 28.-Indolence of age. inquiries after
some prints--72

48. To the same, Nov. 7.-Fit of the gout. Regret at not being
able to see Mr. Essex--73

49. To the same.-On the rapacity of a gentleman who had thinned
Mr. Cole's collection of prints--74

50. To the Countess of Ailesbury, Dec. 20.-Account of Reynal's
"Histoire Philosophique et Politique du Commerce des Deux
Indes"--74

1773.

51. To the Rev. Mr. Cole, Jan. 8.-Mr. Masters's answer to
"Historic Doubts." Antiquarians. Freemasonry. Governor Pownall.
Edition of "M`emoires du Comte de Grammont." Dedication to
Madame du Deffand. Gray's "Odes"--75

52. To the same, Feb. 18.-Miscellaneous antiquities. Governor
Pownall's System of Freemasonry. Mrs. Marshall's "Sir Harry
Gaylove, or Comedy in Embryo"--77

53. To the Rev. William Mason, March 2.-Thanks for submitting
his collections for the "Life of Gray" to his correction.
Origin of the differences between them. Takes to himself the
chief blame in the quarrel--(N.) 78

(54. To the same, March 27.-Mason the author of "The Heroic
Epistle to Sir William Chambers." Account of Gray's going
abroad with him--79

55. To the Rev. Mr. Cole, April 7.-ArchaEologia, or Old Women's
Logic. Masters's answer to "Historic Doubts." Sale of Mr.
West's collections--80

56. To the same, April 27.@Character of authors. Shenstone's
and Hughes' "Correspondence." Declines acquaintance with Mr.
Gough. Scotch metaphysicians. Anstey's "New Bath Guide."
"Heroic Epistle." Oliver Goldsmith. Johnson's pension--81

57. To the same, May 4.-On being mentioned by the public orator
at Cambridge--82

58. To the same, May 29.--83

59. To Dr. Berkenhout, July 5.-Declining to supply materials
for a biographical notice of himself--84

60. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, Aug. 30.-Visit to Houghton.
Deplorable state of his nephew's private affairs. Mortification
of family pride--84

61. To the Earl of Strafford, Sept. 24.-Journey to Houghton.
State of his nephew's affairs. Lady Mary Coke's ardour of
peregrination. Beatific print of Lady Huntingdon. Whitfield and
the Methodists. Death of the Duke of Kingston--85

62. To the same, Nov. 15.-Best way of contending with the folly
and vice of the world. Proposed tax on Irish absentees. Lady
Mary Coke's mortifications. Count Gage and Lady Mary Herbert--
86

63. To Lady Mary Coke.-On her ardour of peregrination--87

64. To the Hon. Mrs. Grey, Dec. 9.-Advice from Dr. Walpole to
Lady Blandford suffering from a fit of the gout--89

65. To Sir David Dalrymple, Dec. 14.-Thanks for his "Remarks on
the History of Scotland"--[N.] 90

1774.

66. To the Rev. Mr. Cole, May 4.-Reasons for his long silence.
Temptations to visit Strawberry. Fate of Mr. Bateman's
collection of curiosities. Conjectured fate of Strawberry--90

67. To the same, May 28.-Pennant's "Tour to Scotland and the
Hebrides." Ossian. Fingal's Cave. Brave way of being an
antiquary. Mr. Gough described. Fenn's "Original Letters."
Society of Antiquaries. Old friends--91

68. To the same, June 21.-Efficacy of James's powder. Old
friends in old age our best amusement. Flattery. Queen
Catherine's Cross at Ampthill--93

69. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, June 23.-On the General's tour of
military observation. Politics. Quebec-bill--94

70. To the Rev. Mr. Cole, Aug. 15.-Account of his antiquarian
pursuits. Journey into Worcestershire. Matson. Gloucester
Cathedral. Monument of Edward the Second. Bishop Hooper's
house. Prinknash. Berkeley Castle. Murder of Edward the Second.
Thornbury Castle. The vicar of Thornbury--95

71. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, Aug. 18.-On the General's
introduction to the King of Prussia. Account of his own journey
into Worcestershire--98

72. To the same, Sept. 7.-On the General's visit to the mines
of Cremnitz. Visit to Berkeley Castle. Lord Malton presented at
court in coal-black hair--99

73. To the same, Sept. 27.-Rejoices at the General's flattering
reception at foreign courts. Character of the Germans. Italian
women. Reasons for not taking a trip to Paris. French dirt. New
elections. Mode of passing his time--101

74. To the same, Sept. 28.-Cautions for his conduct at Paris.
Entreaty to take much notice of Madame du Deffand. Her
character. Wishes to have back his letters to her. Mademoiselle
de l'Espinasse. The Duchesse de Choiseul. Monsieur Buffon.
Comte de Broglie--103

75. To the Rev. Mr. Cole, Oct. 11.-Elections. His nephew's
mental alienation--105

76. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, Oct. 16.-New elections. Wilkes's
popularity. Charles Fox. Character of M. de Maurepas. Reasons
for not meeting him at Paris--106

77. To the same, Oct. 29.-On the General's being deprived of a
seat in the new Parliament. Objects to be seen at Paris. Church
of the Celestines. Richelieu's tomb at the Sorbonne. H`otel de
Carnavalet. Versailles. The Luxembourg. Pictures at the Palais
Royal. Church of the Invalids. St. Roch. The Carmelites. The
Val de Grace. The Sainte Chapelle. Tomb of Cond`e; and of
Cardinal Fleury--108

78. To the Countess of Ailesbury, Nov. 7.-Domestic news.
Marriages. Wilkes's popularity. Mr. Burke's success at Bristol.
"Wit-and-a-gamut." Comforts of old age--110

79. To the Earl of Strafford, Nov. 11.-Concert at Isleworth.
Leoni. The Opera. The Duchess of Kingston--112

80. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, Nov. 12. Thanks for his
attentions to Madame du Deffand. American disturbances. General
Burgoyne's "Maid of the Oaks," The Duc de la Vali`ere.
Chevalier de Boufflers. Madame de Caraman. Madame de Mirepoix.
Abb`e Raynal. Mademoiselle de Rancoux. Le Kain. Mo]`e.
Preville. M. Boutin's English garden--112

81. To the same, Nov. 27.-Deaths. Disturbed state of America.
The Duchess of Kingston. French despotism. Madame du Deffand.
Opera. The Bastardella. Death of lord Holland--115

82. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, Dec. 15.-Remonstrances from
America. Lord Chatham--118

83. To the same, Dec. 26.-The Prince de Conti. Proceedings of
the French Parliament. Petitions from America. Burke's
speeches. Duchesse de Lauzun. St. Lambert--119

84. To the same, Dec. 31.-Biblioth`eque du Roi. Abb`e
Barthelemi. Duc de Choiseul. "History of Furness Abbey"--121

1775.

85. To the Rev. Mr. Cole, Jan. 9.-Nell Gwynn's letter. Strutt's
"Manners and Customs of the Inhabitants of England." Duke
Humphrey's skull at St. Albans--124

86. To the Hon. H . S. Conway, Jan. 15.-Party-men. Lord George
Germain. Mr. Burke. Lord Chatham. Marquis of Rockingham.
Operations of the Bostonians. General Gage. New Parnassus at
Batheaston. Bouts-rim`es. Lines on a buttered muffin, by the
Duchess of Northumberland. Lord Palmerston's poem on Beauty.
Rulhi`ere's Russian Anecdotes--124

87. To the same, Jan. 22.-Debate in the House of lords on Lord
Chatham's motion for withdrawing the troops from Boston. Plan
for cutting off all traffic with America. Illness of the Duke
of Gloucester. Committee of oblivion. Death of Dowdeswell and
Tom Hervey--[N.]
128

88. To the Rev. Mr. Cole, April 11.-Warm approbation of mason's
Life of gray. Verses by Lord Rochford, Anne Boleyn's brother--
129

89. To the same, April 25.-Mason's Life of Gray. "Peep in the
Gardens at Twickenham." Whitaker's History of Manchester.
Bryant's Ancient Mythology--132

90. To the same, June 5,-Genealogical inquiries. Blomefield's
Norfolk--134

91. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, July 9.-Projected trip to Paris.
American news. Story of Captain Mawhood, the teaman's son--136

92. To the same, August 9.-Preparations for a journey to Paris.
War between the Lord Chamberlain and Foote for refusing to
license his play--[N.] 137

93. To the Countess of Ailesbury, Aug. 17.-Journey to
Paris--138

94. To the same, Aug. 20.-Arrival at Paris. Madame du Deffand.
Madame Clotilde's wedding. M. Turgot's economy--139

95. To Mrs. Abington, Sept.-Regret at not knowing she was at
Paris. Compliment to her great merits as an actress--[N.) 140

96. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, Sept. 8.-On Lady Ailesbury being
overturned in her carriage. Madame du Deffand. Lady Barrymore.
Madame de Marchais Madame de Viri. French opinion of our
dispute with America--140

97. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, Oct. 6.-Illness of Madame du
Deffand. Economy and reformation of the bon-ton at Paris.
Horse-race on the Plain de Sablon. French politics, and
probable changes--142

98. To the Rev. Mr. Cole, Dec. 10.-English version of Gray's
Latin Odes--144

99. To the Countess of Ailesbury, Dec. 11.-Trial of the Duchess
of Kingston. Le Texier's French readings--145

100. To the Rev. Mr. Cole, Dec. 14.-Society of Antiquarians.
Opening of Edward the First's tomb. Prints from pictures at
Houghton--146

101. To Thomas Astle, Esq. Dec. 19.-On the attainder of George
Duke of Clarence, found in the Tower--147

1776.

102. To the Rev. Mr. Cole, Jan. 26.-Subject of the Painting at
the Rose Tavern in Fleet-street. Attainder of George Duke of
Clarence--148

103. To Edward Gibbon, Esq. February.-Thanks for the first
volume of the "Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire"--[N.] 149

104. To the same, Feb. 14.-Panegyric on the first volume of the
"Decline and Fall"--[N.) 150

105. To the Rev. Mr. Cole, March 1.-On the old painting at the
Rose Tavern in Fleet-street. Antiquarian accuracy--151

106. To Dr. Gem, April 4.-French politics. Resistance of the
Parliament to the reformations of Messieurs de Malesherbes and
Turgot. Extraordinary speeches of the Avocat-G`en`eral. Our
dispute with America--151

107. To the Rev. Mr. Cole, April 16.-Death of the Rev. Mr.
Granger. Trial of Duchess of Kingston--153

108. To the same, June 1.-Mr. Granger's prints and papers
purchased by Lord Mountstuart--154

(109) To the same, June 11.-Vexations and disappointments of
the gout--155

110. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, June 30.-Gallery and beauty-room
at Strawberry. Lady Diana Beauclerk. His own talents and
pursuits. Picture of his mind--156

111. To the' Rev. Mr. Cole, July 23.-Thanks for the present of
a vase. Condolence on the ill state of his health--157

112. To the same, July 24.-Effects of General Conway's illness
on his own mind. Outliving one's friends. Mr. Penticross--158

113. To the same, Aug. 19.-Inquiries after Dr. Kenrick Prescot.
Death of Mr. Damer--159

114. To the same, Sept. 9.-Alterations at Strawberry. Lord
Carmarthen--160

115. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, Oct. 31.-Folly and madness of
the dispute with America. Opening of Parliament. Prospect of a
war with France. Reasons for his retirement--(N.] 161

116. To the Earl of Strafford, Nov-. 2.-retirement. Effects of
our climate. Unhappy dispute with America. Prospect of war with
France--162

117. To the Rev. Mr. Cole, Dec. 9.-Sir John Hawkins's "History
of Music"--163

1777.

118. To the Rev. Mr. Cole, Feb. 20.-Purchase of the shutters of
the altar at St. Edmondsbury--163

119. To the same, February 27.-Requesting the loan of some of
his manuscripts. Dr. Dodd--165

120. To the same, May 22.-Continuance of his nephew's mental
illness. Love of Cambridge. Inclination to a sequestered life.
Charles the Fifth--166

121. To the Rev. Mr. Cole, June 19.-Macpherson's success with
Ossian the ruin of Chatterton. Rowley's pretended poems.
Chatterton's death--167

122. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, July 10.-M. d'Agincourt's
"Histoire de l'Art par les Monumens." The "Hayssians." Madame
de Blot. M. Schomberg. Madame Necker's character of Walpole--
168

123. To Robert Jephson, Esq. July 13.-Advice respecting the
representation of his tragedy. Success of Sheridan's School for
Scandal--[N.] 169

124. To the Rev. Mr. Cole, Aug. 31.-True wisdom. Illness of the
Duke of Gloucester. Monasteries. Recluse life. "In six weeks my
clock will strike sixty!"--171

125. To the same, Sept. 16.-Thanks for the loan of manuscripts.
Nonsense. Sincerity the foundation of long friendship. Sir
Joshua Reynolds's portrait of Soame Jenyns. Duke of
Gloucester's recovery--172

126. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, Sept. 16.-Description of a
machine called the Delineator. His "unlearnability"--173

127. To the Rev. Mr. Cole, Sept. 22.-Suggesting a life of
Thomas Baker, author of "Reflections on Learning." Burnet's
History. Christiana, Queen of Sweden. Calvin--173

128. To Robert Jephson, Esq. Oct. 1.-"The Law of Lombardy"--
[N.] 175

129. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, Oct. 5.-Apologies for not
meeting him at Goodwood. Disinclination to move from home.
"Threescore to-day State of his health and spirits. His idea of
old age--176

130. To Robert Jephson. Esq. Oct. 17.-Criticism on ,The Law of
Lombardy"--[N.] 177

131. To the Rev. Mr. Cole, Oct. 19.-Burnet's History. Duke
Lauderdale. Sir John Dalrymple and Macpherson's Histories.
Friendship. Efficacy of the bootikins--179

1778.

132. To the Rev. Mr. Cole, March 31.-Politics. Life of Mr.
Baker--181

133. To the same, April 23.-Life of Baker. Pennant's "Welsh
Tour." Warton's "History of English Poetry." Lord Hardwicke's
State Papers." Aspect of the times--181

134. To the same, May 21.-Restoration of Popery. Lord Chatham's
interment. Intercourse with Chatterton. Detection of his
forgeries--182

135. To the Rev. William Mason.-Visit from Dr. Robertson. The
Doctor's contemplated "History of King William." Macpherson's
and Sir John Dalrymple's scandals--184

136. To the Rev. Mr. Cole, June 3.-Patriots and politics. Dr.
Franklin. Lord Chatham's interment. His merits and demerits.
Mr. Tyrwhit. Chatterton's forgeries--186

137. To the same, June 10.-His political creed, and opinion of
parties and political men. Life of Mr. Baker. Rowley and
Chatterton. Mat. Prior. Mr. Hollis. Mrs. Macauley--187

138. To the Countess of Ailesbury, June 25.--Mr. Conway's
governorship. Cuckoos and Nightingales. Robbery of Mrs. Clive--
189

139. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, July 8.-Suggesting the propriety
of pacification with America. Conduct of the Opposition. French
neutrality. Partition of Poland--189

140. To the Rev. Mr. Cole, July 12.-Projected Life of Mr.
Baker. Dr. Kippis's "Biographia Britannica." Addison's
character of Lord Somers. Whitgift and Abbot. Archbishop
Markham. Calvin and Wesley. Popery and Presbyterianism.
Churches and convents--191

141. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, July 18.-Sailing of the Brest
fleet. Political prospects--192

142. To the Rev. Mr. Cole, July 24.-Answer to the attack upon
him prefixed to Chatterton's works. Gray's tomb, and Mason's
epitaph--193

143. To the same, Aug. 15.-Rowley's pretended poems. Walpole's
defence. Bishop Walpole'-s tomb. Baker's Life--194

144. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, Aug, 21.-Recollections of
Sussex. Arundel Castle,. Tombs of the Fitzalans. Knowle and
Penshurst. Summer Hill. Leeds Castle. Goldsmiths' Company.
Aquatic adventure--195

145. To the Rev. Mr. Cole, Aug. 22.-Chatterton. Attacks on
Walpole in the Critical Review. Lord Hardwicke and the Carleton
Papers. Literary squabbles. The "Old English Baron." Lady
Craven's "Sleep Walker." A literary adventure--196

146. To the same, Sept. 1.-Attack on him in the Critical
Review. Cabal in the Antiquarian Society. Their Saxon and
Danish discoveries, and Roman remains. Value of Mr. Cole's
collections,. Visit from Dr. Kippis--198

147. To the same, Sept. 18.-"Biographia Britannica." Life of
the first Lord Barrington. Anecdote of the present peer--200

148. To the same, Oct. 14.-Defence of Sir Robert Walpole
against a charge of instigating George the Second to destroy
the will of his father. Lord Chesterfield--202

149. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, Oct. 23.-Account of his
pursuits--201

150. To the Rev. Mr. Cole, Oct. 26.-Completion of his Life of
Mr. Baker--204

151. To the same, Nov. 4.-Attack of the gout. Character of Mr.
Baker--205

152. To Lady Browne. Nov. 5.-Reflections on the state of' his
health. Lady Blandford's obstinacy--[N.] 206

153. To the same, Dec. 18.-Admiral Keppel's trial. Lord Bute.
Lord George Germaine. Lady Holderness, Lord and Lady
Carmarthen--[N.] 207

154. To the Earl of Buchan, Dec. 24.-Reply to inquiries after
certain portraits--[N.) 209

155. To Edward Gibbon, Esq.-On the attacks upon his History of
the Decline and Fall--[N.] 210

1779.

156. To the Rev. Mr. Cole, Jan. 3.-Life of Mr. Baker. Damage
done by the great tempest on New-year's morning. Death of
Bishop Kidder. Tamworth Castle. Lord Ferrers's passion for
ancestry--211

157. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, Jan. 9.-Mrs. Miller's follies at
Batbeaston. Ennui. His recent illness. Prospects of old age.
Admiral Keppel's trial. Grecian Republics. Anecdote of Sir
Robert Walpole. Character of Sir William Meredith--212

158. To the Rev. Mr. Cole, Jan. 15.-Life of Mr. Baker. Pamphlet
respecting Chatterton--213

159. To the same, Jan. 28.-Reasons for not printing his
pamphlet concerning Chatterton. His Hieroglyphic Tales--214

160. To the same, Feb. 4.-Answer to Mr. Cole's objections to
his Life of Baker--215

161. To the same, Feb. 18.-His opinion of Hasted's history of
Kent. Lord Ferrers and Tamworth Castle--215

162. To Sir David Dalrymple, March 12.-Thanks for his "Annals."
Portrait of Duns Scotus--[N.] 216

163. To the Rev. Mr. Cole, March 28.-Swinburne's Travels in
Spain. The Alhambra. Character of Moses. Cumberland's Masque of
"Calypso." Design of a chimney-piece, by Holbein--216

164. To Edward Gibbon, Esq.-Congratulations on his
,Vindication" of his "History"--[N.] 218

165. To the Rev. Mr. Cole, April 12.-St. Peter's portrait.
Richard the Third. Truth and Falsehood. Murder of Miss Ray by
Mr. Hackman. Shades of madness. Solace in books and past ages--
218

166. To the same, April 20.-Plates after designs by Rubens--219

167. To the same, April 23.-Sale of the pictures at Houghton--
220

168. To Mrs. Abington.-Regrets at not being able to accept an
invitation--(N.) 220

169. To the Rev. Mr. Cole, May 21.-History of the Abbey of Bec.
Keate's "Sketches from Nature." Church of Reculver. Person of
Richard the Third--221

170. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, May 22.-Attack on Jersey. War in
America. Masquerades. Festino at Almack's. Lord Bristol's
wonderful calf--221

171. To the Rev. Mr. Cole, June 2.-State of his health.
Strictures on a volume of the ArchEeologia. Pictures at
Houghton--222

172. To the Rev. Dr. Lort, June 4.-Painted shutters from the
altar of St. Edmund's Bury--224

173. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, June 5.-Disturbances in Ireland.
Spanish declaration of war. Treatment of America. Tickell's
"Cassette Verte." Dr. Franklin. "Opposition Mornings." Story of
Mrs. Ellis and her great O--225

174. To the same, June 16.-Sailing of the Brest fleet.
Probability of a war with Spain. Dispute with America. State of
Ireland. F`ete at the Pantheon--227

175. To the Hon. George Hardinge, July 4.-Thanks for drawings
of Grignan. Letters of Madame de S`evign`e, and of her
daughter. Character of Coulanges--229

176. To the Countess of Ailesbury, July 10.-Conjectures on the
political state of the country. Washington and Clinton.
Difficulty of conquering America--230

177. To the Rev. Mr. Cole, July 12.-Value of the pictures at
Houghton--231

178. To the same, Aug. 12.-Thanks for offer of painted glass.
"History of Alien Priories"--232

179. To the Countess of Ailesbury, Aug. 13.-Situation of
General Conway in Jersey. Constancy of Fortune. Folly of
pursuing the war with America--233

180. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, Sept. 12.-Alarms for the
General's situation at Jersey. Battle between Byron and
D'Estaing. Mrs. Damer. Eruption of Vesuvius--234

181. To the Rev. Mr. Cole, Nov. 16.-Mr. Tyson's Journal. Old
Gate at Whitehall. Nichols's "Alien Priories." Rudder's
"History of Gloucestershire." Removal of old friends--235

182. To the same, Dec. 27.-Earl-bishops. Lord Bristol. Rudder's
"History of Gloucestershire"--236

1780.

183. To the Rev. Mr. Cole, Jan. 5.-Congratulations on his
providential escape. Count-bishops. Old painting found in
Westminster-abbey. Tomb of Ann of Cleve. Reburial of the crown,
robes, and sceptre of Edward the First. Sale of the Houghton
pictures--237

184. To Robert Jephson, Esq., Jan. 25.-His opinion of Mr.
Jephson's "Count of Narbonne;" and advice on casting the parts-
-[N.] 238

185. To the same, Jan. 27.-Tragedy of the "Count of Narbonne."
Warburton's panegyric on the "Castle of Otranto." Miss Aikin's
"Fragment." "Old English Baron"--[N.] 240

186. To the Rev. Mr. Cole, Feb. 5.-New volume of the
"Biographia Britannica." Characters of Dr. Birch, Dr.
Blackwell, and Dr. John Brown. Dr. Kippis's threat. Cardinal
Beaton. Dr. Bentley. Mr. Hollis. Barry the painter--242

187. To the same, Feb. 27.-Rodney's victory. Home prospects.
Party divisions. History of Leicester. Cit`e des dames.
Christiana of Pisa--242

188. To the same, March 6.-Thanks for his portrait in glass.
History of Leicester. Dean Mills and Mr. Masters. Pine-apples.
Charles the Second's gardener--245

189. To the same, March 13.-Atkyns's Gloucestershire.
Hutchinson's Northumberland. Romantic Correspondence of Hackman
and Miss Ray. Sir Herbert Croft's,,Love and Madness."
Chatterton. "The Young Villain." Lord Chatham. Lady Craven's
"Miniature Picture"--246

190. To the same, March 30.-Projected reform of the House of
Commons. Annual parliaments--248

191. To the same, May 11.-Death of Mr. Tyson, and of his old
friend George Montagu. His character--248

192. To the same, May 19.-Character of Joseph Spence--249

193. To the same, May 30.-Altar-doors from St. Edmundsbury.
Annibal Caracci and Shakspeare--250

194. To Mrs. Abington, June 11.-Invitation to Strawberry Hill--
[N.] 251

195. To the Earl of Strafford, June 12.-Lord George Gordon and
the Riots of London. Persecutions under the cloak of religion.
Highway robberies. Ambition the most detestable of passions--
251

196. To the Rev. Mr. Cole, June 15.-London riots. Black
Wednesday. Lord George Gordon in the Tower. Electioneering
rioting in Cambridgeshire. Mr. Banks and the Otaheitans--253

197. To the same, July 4.-Wishes his having written the Life of
Baker to be kept a secret--254

198. To the Earl of Strafford, Sept. 9.-Folly of election
contests. Dissatisfaction in the fleet--255

199. To the Rev. Mr. Cole, Sept. 27.-Electioneering agitations.
Death of Madame du Deffand--256

200. To the same, Oct. 3.-"Life of Mr. Baker." Dr. James Brown-
-256

201. To the same, Nov. 11.-Mr. Gough's "Topography."
Introduction of ananas. Rose, the gardener of Charles the
Second. Folly of antiquaries--257

202. To the same, Nov. 24.-Mr. Gough's "Topography." Character
of Mr. Pennant. Dean Milles. Judge Barrington. Dulness and
folly of Grose's Dissertations. Rejoices in having done with
the professions of author and printer, and determines to be
comfortably lazy--259

203. To the same, Nov. 30.-In answer to a request for a copy of
his Anecdotes for the University Library at Cambridge.
Character of Mr. Gough--260

204. To Sir David Dalrymple, Dec. 11.-Thanks for communications
for his Anecdotes of Painters. Hogarth. Colonel Charteris.
Archbishop Blackbourne and Mrs. Conwys. Poetry of Richardson
and Hogarth. Lord Chesterfield's story of Jervas. Origin of Oil
Painting--261

205. To the Rev. Mr. Cole, Dec. 19.-Friendship between Gray and
Mason. Views of Strawberry Hill--263

1781.

206. To Sir David Dalrymple, Jan. 1.-Thanks for his favourable
opinion of his father. His reasons for not writing his Life.
Dr. Kippis and his "Biographia Britannica." Lord Barrington and
the Hamburgh lottery. Character of King William. Folly of
reburying the crown and robes of' Edward the First. "Dr.
Johnson's notions of sacrilege--[N.) 264

207. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, Jan. 3.-On the General's speech
for quieting the troubles in America. Melancholy state of the
country--266

208. To the Rev. Mr. Cole, Feb. 7.-Death of Lady Orford at
Pisa--268

209. To the same, Feb. 9.-Wolsey's negotiations. Value of Mr.
Cole's manuscripts. Character of Mr. Pennant--269

210. To the Earl of Buchan, Feb. 10.-Thanks for being elected
member of the Scotch Society of Antiquaries--[N.] 269

211. To Sir David Dalrymple, Feb. 10.-Sir William Windham and
Sir Robert Walpole, Archibald Duke of Argyll. Scotch Society of
Antiquaries. Portrait of Lady Mary Douglas--[N.] 270

212. To the Rev. Mr. Cole, March 2.-Reasons for becoming a
member of the Scotch Antiquarian Society--272

213. To the same, March 5.-Inquiries after Lord Hardwicke's
"Walpoliana"--273

214. To the same, March 29.-Contradicting a report of Mr.
Pennant's indisposition of mind--273

215. To the same, April 3.-Lord Hardwicke's "Walpolianae"--274

216. To the same, May 4.-Character of Dr. Farmer. On his own
rank as an author. Pennant's "Welsh Tour." Madame du Deffand's
dog Tonton--274

217. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, May 6.-Relief of Gibraltar. Lord
Cholmondeley at Brookes's. Winnings of Charles Fox and
Fitzpatrick. India affairs. Arrival of Tonton--275

218. To the same, May 28.-Scotch thistles. French politics.
Resignation of Necker. Proposals for a pacification with
America. Charles Fox and the Marriage-bill. Folly of retiring
from the world--277

219. To the same, June 3. 'Projected French attack on Jersey.
Siege of Gibraltar. "The Young William Pitt's" first display.
Mr. Bankes. Theatricals. Consequences of lord Cornwallis's
victories--279

220. To the Earl of Strafford, June 13.-Visit from Mr. Storer--
281

221. To the Rev. Mr. Cole, June 16.-Sir Richard Worsley's
History of the Isle of wight. Nichols's Life of Hogarth. "AEdes
Strawberrianae." Miseries of having a house worth being seen--
282

222. To the Earl of Charlemont, July 1.-On Mr. Preston's poems-
-[N.] 284

223. To the Rev. Mr. Cole, July 7.-Orthodoxy and heterodoxy--
284

224. To the same, July 26--286

225. To the Earl of Strafford, Aug. 31.-Difficulty of sending
an entertaining letter. Mason's English Garden. Marriage of
Lord Althorp--286

226. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, Sept. 16.-Their long and
uninterrupted friend- ship. Madame du Deffand's papers. Henley
bridge--287

227. To John Nichols, Esq. Oct. 31.-Criticisms on his Life of
Hogarth--288

228. To Robert Jephson, Esq. Nov. 7.-On his tragedy of "The
Count of Narbonne"--[N.] 290

229. To the same, Nov. 10.--[N.] 292

230. To the same, Nov. 13.--[N.] 293

231. To the same, Nov. 18.--[N.] 293

232. To the Hon. H. S. Conway,- Nov. 18.-On Mr. Jephson's
tragedy of "The Count of Narbonne"--294

233. To Robert Jephson, Esq. Nov. 18.-Favourable reception of
"The Count of Narbonne"--[N.] 295

234. To the Earl of Strafford, Nov. 27.-Surrender of the
British forces at York Town. Gloomy forebodings of the
consequences. General spirit of dissipation--296

235. To the Earl of Buchan, Dec. 1.-British disgraces in
America. Ancient portraits--[N.) 297

236. To Robert Jephson, Esq. Dec. 3.-On his expression of
dissatisfaction at some alterations in the scenes of his play--
[N.] 299

237. To the Rev. Mr. Cole, Dec. 30.-The gout described. Etching
of Browne Willis. Character of Mr. Gough. Mr. George Steevens.
Rowley and Chatterton controversy--299

1782.

238. To the Rev. Mr. Cole, Jan. 27.-Interview with, and
characters of Mr. Gough and Mr. Steevens--302

239. To the same,. Feb. 14.-Thanks for the loan of some
manuscripts. Society of Antiquaries. Description of his
regimen. His great nostrum--303

240. To the same, Feb. 15.-Specimen of Mr. Gough's "Sepulchral
Monuments." Antiquarian solemnities ridiculed. Count-bishop
Hervey. Martin Sherlock the English traveller--304

241. To the Rev. William Mason.-New French translation of the
Elder Pliny. Common jargon of Poetry--307

242. To the Rev. Mr. Cole, Feb. 22.-Rowley and Chatterton
controversy--308

243. To the Hon. George Hardinge, March 8.-On the success of
General Conway's motion for putting an end to the American war-
-309

244. To the Rev. Mr. Cole, March 9.-Character of Dr. Farmer.
Declaration of war by the Emperor against the Crescent.
Ambition and interest under the mask of religion--310

245. To the same, April 11.-His preference of English to Latin
inscriptions. Mason's Archaeological Epistle to Dean Milles.
Melancholy death of Mr. Chamberlayne. Dr. Glynn--310

246. To the same, May 24.-On his own illness. The Chatterton
controversy--312

247. To the same, June 1.-Bishop Newton's Life. Pratt's "Fair
Circassian." Cumberland's "Anecdotes of Painters in Spain"--313

248. To John Nichols, Esq., June 19.-Dr. Henry Bland the
translator of Cato's speech into Latin--315

249. To the Rev. Mr. Cole, June 21.-Old age and solitude.
Marivaux and Cr`ebillon. Multiplicity of writers. Errors in
Nichols's "Select Poems"--315

250. To the same, July 23.-Merits of Nichols's "Life of
Bowyer." Dr. Mead. Carteret Webb. Great men. Dr. Birch's
Catalogue of Manuscripts in the British Museum--316

251. To the Earl of Strafford, Aug. 16.-Inclemency of the
season. Robberies. Comte de Grasse. Mrs. Clive's declining
health. Philosophy of deceiving one's self--317

252. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, Aug. 20.--[N.] 318

253. To the Earl of Buchan, Sept. 15.-Dr. Birch's Catalogue.
Mr. Tyrwhitt's book on the Rowleian controversy--[N.] 319

254. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, Sept. 17.-On the General's being
appointed Commander-in-chief. His new coke ovens--319

255. To the Earl of Strafford, Oct. 3.-General Elliot's success
at Gibraltar. Necessity of peace. Increase of highway
robberies. Mr. Mason--320

256. To the Rev. Mr. Cole, Nov. 5.--On Mr. Cole's illness. His
death--321

1783.

257. To George Colman, Esq. May 10.-Thanks for his translation
of Horace's Art of Poetry--322

258. To the Earl of Buchan, May 12.-Congratulations on the
success of the Scotch Antiquarian Society. Roman remains.
Biography of illustrious men. Account of John Law. Papers in
the Scotch college at Paris, and paintings in the Castle of
Aubigny--N.) 324

259. To the Hon. George Hardinge, May 17.-Sir Thomas Rumbold's
Bill of pains and penalties--325

260. To the Earl of Strafford, June 24.-Visits of the French to
England. Their Anglomanie. George Ellis. Beau Dillon.
"Antoinette." Mr. Mason. Fashionable life--326

261. To the same, Aug. 1.-Complains of his own inactivity and
indifference. Speculations on the peace. Lord Northesk. Shock
of an earthquake--328

262. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, Aug. 15.-Addresses of the Irish
Volunteers. Political speculations. Mr. Fox--330

263. To the same, Aug. 27.--[N.) 331

264. To the Earl of Strafford, Sept. 12.-Visit to Astley's
theatre. Sir William Hamilton. Mr. Mason's new discoveries in
painting. Pursuit of health--332

265. To the same, Oct. 11.-Disturbed state of Ireland.
Parliamentary reform. Yorkshire Associations Leaders of
friction. Lord Carlisle's tragedy. Lord and lady Fitzwilliam--
334

266. To Lady Browne, Oct. 19.-State of his health--[N.)336

267. To Governor Pownall, Oct. 27.-Observations on a defence of
Sir Robert Walpole by the Governor. Character of Home. Sylla.
Liberality of George the First and Second to his father--336

268. To the same, Nov. 7.-The same subject--339

269. To the Earl of Strafford, Nov. 10.-Situation of Ireland.
Flowers of Billingsgate. Flood and Grattan. Meeting of the
delegates. Difference between correcting abuses and removing
landmarks. Character of Mr. Fox--339

270. To the same, Dec. 11.-Excellence of letter-writing.
India-bill. Air-balloons. Mrs. Siddons. Lord Thurlow. Flood and
Courtenay--341

1784
.

271. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, May 5.-Congratulations on the
General's retirement from place and Parliament. Mr. Fox's
election--342

272. To Miss Hannah More, May 6.-Thanks for her poem, the "Bas
Bleu"--[N.] 344

273. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, May 21.-Epitaph-writing. Lord
Melcombe's Diary. Cox's Travels--345

274. To the Countess of Ailesbury, June 8.-Voltaire's Memoirs.
Lord Melcombe's Diary. Severity of the weather--346

275. To the Hon. H. S. Conway', June 25.-Benefits of retirement
from public life. Local grievances. Highway robberies. The good
things of life--347

276. To the same, June 30.-Inclemency of the season. Death of
Lady Harrington. Lunardi's balloon--348

277. To the Earl of Strafford, Aug. 6.-Earthquakes. The Deluge.
Uncertainty of human reasoning--349

278. To Mr. Dodsley, Aug. 8.-Declining Mr. Pinkerton's offer of
a dedication to him of his Essay on Medals--[N.] 350

279. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, Aug. 14.-Frequency of robberies
in his neighbourhood. Disturbed state of Ireland--350

280. To John Pinkerton, Esq. Aug. 24.-Thanks for the perusal of
his poems, and invitation to Strawberry Hill--[N.] 351

281. To the Earl of Strafford, Sept. 7.-Congratulations on the
return of fine weather. Air-balloons and highwaymen. Sir
William Hamilton. Mrs. Walsingham. Mrs. Damer's "sleeping
dogs"--351

282. To John Pinkerton, Esq. Sept. 27.-Criticisms on his
comedy--N.] 353

283. To the same, Oct. 6.-Further criticisms on his comedy.
Remarks on English poetry, on poetry in general, and on the
drama--N.] 354

284. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, Oct. 15.-Speculations on the
perfection of air-balloons--356

285. To John Pinkerton, Esq. Oct. 28.-His own publications and
literary career. Remarks on Mr. Pinkerton's projected History
of the Reign of George the Second--[N.] 358

286. To Miss Hannah More, Nov. 13.-On the poems and conduct of
Ann Yearsley, the Bristol tnilkwoman. Danger of encouraging her
poetical propensity. Fate of Stephen Duck--360

287. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, Nov. 28.-Continental politics.
Poetical epistle to Lady Lyttelton--362

1785.

288. To Miss Hannah More, April 5.-In answer to an anonymous
letter from Miss More, ridiculing the prevailing adoption of
French idioms into the English language--363

289. To John Pinkerton, Esq. June 22.-Strictures on "Heron's
Letters of Literature." Mr. Pinkerton's proposed amendment of
the English language. Lady Mary Wortley Montague. Mr. Hume and
Mr. Gray--[N.] 365

290. To the same, June 26,-Further criticisms on Heron's
"Letters." Definition and exemplification of grace. Remarks on
Waller, Milton, Cowley, Boileau, Pope, and Madame de S`evign`e-
-[N.] 367

291. To the same, July 27.-Declining to print Greek authors at
the Strawberry Hill press--[N.] 371

292. To the same, Aug. 18.-Declines to print an edition of the
Life of St. Ninian--[N.] 372

293. To the same, Sept. 17.-Advising him not to reply to the
critiques of anonymous adversaries--[N.] 372

294. To George Colman, Esq. Sept. 19.-On sending him a copy of
the Duc de Nivernois' translation of his "Essay on Modern
Gardening"--[N.] 374

295. To the Earl of Buchan, Sept. 23.-Literary stores in the
Vatican, and in the Scottish College at Paris. Mr. Herschell's
discoveries--[N.] 374

296. To John Pinkerton, Esq. Sept. 30.-Advice on his intended
publication of Lives of the Scottish Saints. His opinion of
Bishop Headley. Reflections on his own life--[N.] 376

297. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, Oct. 6.-Jarvis's window at New
College. Blenheim. Beau Desert. Stowe. "The Charming Man."
Boswell's "Tour to the Hebrides"--377

298. To the Earl of Charlemont, Nov. 23.-Order of St. Patrick--
(N.] 379

299. To Lady Browne, Dec. 14.-Last illness and death of Kitty
Clive. Lord John Russell's marriage--[N.] 379

1786.

300. To Miss Hannah More, Feb. 9.-On her poem of "Floria,"
dedicated to him--380

301. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, June 18.-Account of his visit to
the Princess Amelia at Gunnersbury. Stanzas addressed to the
Princess. Her answer. Purchase of the Jupiter Serapis and Julio
Clovio--381

302. To Richard Gough, Esq. June 21.-Thanks for the present of
his "Sepulchral Monuments." The Duc de Nivernois' translation
of his "Essay on Gardening"--383

303. To the Earl of Strafford, Aug. 29.-The new bridge at
Henley. Mrs. Damer's colossal masks. Visit from Count Oginski.
Out-pensioners of Bedlam. Lord George Gordon. Archbishop
Chicheley and Henry the Fifth--384

304. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, Oct. 29.-Two Charades by Colonel
Fitzpatrick. Precocity of Robert Stewart, afterwards Marquis of
Londonderry--386

305. To the Right Hon. Lady Craven, Nov. 27.-Apologies for not
having written, and thanks for a drawing of the Castle of
Otranto--387

1787.

306. To Miss Hannah More, Jan. 1.-With a present of "Christine
de Pise." Her "Cit`e des Dames." Mrs. Yearsley--388

307. To the Right Hon. Lady Craven, Jan. 2.-On her ladyship's
travels. Sir John Mandeville. Lady Mary Wortley. Peter the
Hermit--389

308. To Miss Hannah More, Feb. 23.-Christina's 11 Life of
Charles the Fifth"--390

309. To the Rev. Henry Zouch, March 13.-Proposing to return the
letters he had received from him--[N.) 391

310. To Miss Hannah More, June 15.-The Irish character. Miss
Burney--(N.] 391

311. To the Hon, H. S. Conway, June 17.-Expected visit from the
Princess Lubomirski. "The Way to keep Him"--393

312. To the Earl of Strafford, July 28.-St. Swithin. The Duke
of Queensberry's dinner to the Princess de Lamballe. Mrs.
French's marble pavement. Lord Dudley's obelisk. Miss Boyle's
carvings--394

313. To Miss Hannah More, Oct. 14.-Ingratitude of Anne Yearsley
to her. Mrs. Vesey. Dr. Johnson's Letters. Bruce's Travels.
Gibbon's History. Figaro--395

314. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, Nov. 11.-On the small Druidical
temple presented by the States of Jersey to the General.
Stonehenge--397

1788.

315. To Thomas Barrett, Esq. June 5.-Gibbon's "Decline and
Fall." Sheridan's speech against Mr. Hastings--398

316. To the Earl of Strafford, June 17.-General Conway's comedy
of "False Appearances." Sheridan's speech against Mr. Hastings-
-399

317. To Miss Hannah More, July 4. Newspaper reading. General
Conway's play--401

318. To the same, July 12.-On his own writings. Authorship
after seventy. Voltaire at eighty-four. Fate of his last
tragedy. Mrs. Piozzi. Pipings of Miss Seward and Mr. Hayley--
402

319. To the Earl of Strafford, Aug. 2.-On a reported discovery
of new letters of Madame de S`evign`e. Letters of the Duchess
of Orleans. Druidical temple from Jersey--404

320. To John Pinkerton, Esq. Aug. 14.-Criticism on his Ode for
the Scottish Revolution Club--[N.) 405

321. To Miss Hannah More, Aug. 17.-Rumoured discovery of new
letters of Madame de S`evign`e. Library of Greek and Latin
authors at Naples--[N.] 406

322. To the Earl of Strafford, Sept. 12.-Account of the
Druidical temple at Park- place. The Duchess of Kingston's
will--407

323. To Miss Hannah More, Sept. 22.-Ingratitude of Mrs.
Yearsley. Education of the Great. Walpolia'na. Virtuous
intentions. Enthusiasts and quack- doctors--408

324. To the Right Hon. Lady Craven, Dec. 11.-Wisdom of retiring
from the world in time. Voltaire. Lord Chatham. Mr. Anstey.
King of Prussia's Memoirs. Poverty of the French language, as
far as regards verse and pieces of eloquence--[N.] 411

1789.

(325. To the Miss Berrys. Feb. 2.-Acceptance of an invitation.
Expressions of delight on being in their society--[N.] 413

326. To the same, March 20.-Madame de la Motte's M`emoire
Justificatif. General illumination for the King's recovery.
Hairs of Edward the Fourth's head--[N.] 413

327. To Miss Hannah More, April 22.-Darwin's Botanic Garden.
Loves of the Plants. Success of General Conway's comedy--[N.]
414

328. To the Miss Berrys, April 28.-Darwin's Botanic Garden. His
poetry characterized--[N.]415

329. To the same, June 23.-Destruction of the Opera-house by
fire. The nation tired of Operas. "The room after." Mr. Batt
and the Abb`e Nicholls--[N.] 416

330. To Miss Hannah More, June 23.-On her poem of Bishop
Bonner's Ghost. Offers to print it at Strawberry Hill. Bruce's
Travels--[N.] 418

331. To Miss Berry, June 30.-Arabian Nights. Bishop Atterbury.
Sinbad the Sailor versus AEneas. Mrs. Piozzi's Travels. King's
College Chapel. Effects of criticism and comparison. Pageantry
of popery--[N.] 419

332. To Miss Hannah More, July 2.-Thanks for permission to
print "Bishop Bonner's Ghost." Account of his fall. Gratitude
to Providence for his lot--421

333. To Miss Berry, July 9.-Recovery from his fall. Present
state of France. Tumults at Versailles on the reported
resignation of Necker. Marshal Broglio appointed
commander-in-chief Camp round Paris. Mutinous disposition of
the army. Voltaire's correspondence. His letters to La
Chalotais--422

334. To Miss Hannah More, July 10.-"Bishop Bonner's Ghost"--425

335. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, July 15.-Dismissal of Necker.
Paris in an uproar. Storming and destruction of the Bastille.
Speculation on the probable results. The Duke of Orleans and
Mirabeau--425

336. To Miss Hannah More, July 20.-Result of her "double
treachery." A visit from Bishop Porteiis. The visit returned--
427

337. To Miss Berry, July 29.-Anarchy in Paris. Account of La
Chalotais. Treachery of Calonne. Character of the Duc de
Vrilli`ere. St. Swithin's day. Predicts the fall of Necker--
(N.] 428

338. To John Pinkerton, Esq. July 31.-Remarks on his Inquiry
into the early History of Scotland"--(N.] 431

339. To Miss Hannah More, Aug. 8.-On sending her copies of
"Bonner's Ghost."
Complains of letters--[N.] 432

340. To John Pinkerton, Esq., Aug. 14.-Confesses his want of
taste for the ancient
histories of nations. Remarks on the different modes of
treating antiquities--[N.] 433

341. To the same, Aug. 19.-Compliments him on his strong and
manly understanding. Account of his own studies--[N.] 434

342. To Richard Gough, Esq. Aug. 24.-Strictures on the injuries
done to Salisbury cathedral by the recent alterations--435

343. To the Miss Berrys, Aug. 27.-Illness of the Countess of
Dysart. Richmond and Hampton Court gossip--(N.) 436

344. To the same. Sept. 4.-On their declining a visit to
Wentworth House. The Duke of Clarence at Richmond. Miss
Farren's Beatrice. Account of Lady Luxborough. Wentworth Castle
described. Violences in France. Destruction of chateaus in
Burgundy. Assemblage of deserters round Paris. Patience of Lady
Dysart under her suffering. Mademoiselle d'Eon in petticoats--
[N.] 437

345. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, Sept. 5.-Thanks to him for a
poem. Death of Lady Dysart. Terrible situation of Paris.
Predicts that the kingdom will become a theatre of civil wars--
440

346. To Miss Hannah More, Sept. 7.-Congratulation on the
demolition of the functions of the Bastille. The `Etats a mob
of kings. Time the composer of a good constitution. Negro
slavery. Suggests the possibility of relieving slaves by
machine work. Utility of starting new game to invention.
Barrett's History of Bristol. The Biographia Britannica and
Chatterton--441

347. To the same, Nov. 4.-Death of Lady Dysart and Lord
Waldegrave. Mrs. Yearsley's Earl Goodwin. Death of Mr. Barrett.
Succedaneum for negro labour. Suggests the propriety of Mr.
Wilberforce's starting the abolition of slavery to the `Etats.
Character of the `Etats--444

1790.

348. To Miss Hannah More, Feb. 20.-With his contribution to a
charitable subscription--446

349. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, June 25.-Charles Fox and the
Westminster gridiron. Puerile pedantry of the French `Etats.
Destruction of the statues of Louis Quatorze. Bruce's Travels--
[N.) 447

350. To the Earl of Strafford, June 26.-Reflections on the
state of France. Consciences of tyrants. Luther and Calvin.
Fate of projectors--448

351. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, July 1.-Bruce's Travels. French
barbarity and folly. Grand Federation in the Champ de Mars.
Rationality of the Americans. Franklin and Washington. A great
man wanted in France. Return of Necker. His insignificance--
[N.] 448

352. To Miss Berry, July 3,-His alarm at their design of
visiting Italy. Atrocities of the French `Etats. Good-humoured
speech of Marie Antoinette. Winchester Cathedral. Netley Abbey.
Visit from the Duchess of Marlborough--[N.] 450

353. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, Aug. 9.-Peace of Spain. Miss
Gunning's reported match with Lord Blandford--452

354. To the Earl of Strafford, Aug. 12.-Lord Barrymore's
exhibitions at the Richmond theatre. Reflections on the
progress of the French Revolution--452

355. To Sir David Dalrymple, Sept. 21.-Pictures at Burleigh.
Shakspeare Gallery. Macklin's Gallery--454

356. To the Miss Berrys, Oct. 10.-On their departure for Italy.
Regrets at the loss of their society--[N.] 455

357. To the same, Oct. 31.-Burke's "Reflections." Calonne's
"Etat de la France"--[N.] 457

358. To the same, Nov. 8.-Pacification with Spain and Brabant.
Earl Stanhope and the Revolution Club. Mr. Burke's "Reflections
on the French Revolution" characterized. Visit from the Prince
of Furstemberg--[N.] 458

359. To Miss Berry, Nov. 11.-Mr,,;. Damer's departure for
Lisbon. Effects of Burke's pamphlet on Dr. Price. Mr. Merry's
"Laurel of Liberty." The Della Crusca school of poetry
described--[N.] 460

360. To the Miss Berrys, Nov. 18.-Character of the Bishop of
Arras. Dr. Price's talons drawn by Mr. Burke. Revolution Club
exploded--[N.) 461

361. To the same, Nov. 27.-Anxiety for a letter from Florence--
[N.] 463

362. To Miss Agnes Berry, Nov. 29.-Thanks for her letter.
Correggio. Guercino, a German edition of Guido. Lord Stanhope's
speech against Calonne's book. Dr. Price's answer to Burke.
Reasons for creating Mr. Grenville a peer. Richmond arrivals.
Duke of Clarence. Mrs. Fitzherbert. Duke of Queensbury. Madame
Griffoni. Works of Massaccio. Fra Bartolomeo. Benvenuto
Cellini's Perseus--464

363. To the Miss Berrys, Dec. 20.-Character of Mr. Burke's
"Reflections." Mrs. Macaulay's reply to it--[N.] 465

1791.

364. To Miss Berry, Jan. 22.-Recovery from a severe illness.
Death of Mrs. French. Illness of George Selwyn--[N.] 466

365. To the Miss Berrys, Jan. 29.-Effects of his late illness.
Picture of himself. Death and character of George Selwyn.
Mademoiselle Pagniani. Story of Miss Vernon and Martindale. The
Gunninghiad. Visit from Mr. Batt. Overthrow of the French
monarchy. The Duchess of Gordon and Mr. Dundas--[N.] 468

366. To Miss Berry, Feb. 4.-Regrets at their absence, and
anxiety for their return. Destructive tempest. The rival
Opera-houses. Taylor's pamphlet against the Lord Chamberlain--
(N.) 470

367. To the same, Feb. 12. -Hi@ anxiety for their return, but
resolution not to derange their plans of economy. Comte de
Coigny. Instability of the present government of France. Horne
Tooke's libel in the House of Commons. Christening of Miss
Boycot--(N.] 472

368. To Miss Agnes Berry, Feb. 13.-Narrative of the history of
a marriage supposed to have been likely to take place between
Miss Gunning and the Marquis of Blandford--[N.] 474

369. To the Earl of Charlemont, Feb. 17.-On a surreptitious
edition of The Mysterious Mother, published at Dublin--[N.] 476

370. To Miss Agnes Berry, Feb. 18.-Codicil to Gunning's story.
Opening of the Pantheon. Dieu et mon Droit versus Ich Dien--
(N.] 477

371. To the Miss Berrys, Feb. 26.-More of the Gunnings: Arrival
of Madame du Barry to recover her jewels. The King of France's
aunt stopped from leaving France. Majesty of the mob. The
Monster. Gibbon's account Of Necker in retirement; and opinions
of Burke's Reflections. Madame du Barry and the Lord Mayor.
Recovery of her jewels. Jerningham's poetry--(N.) 479

372. To the same, March 5.-London unknown to Londoners. "Who is
Sir Robert Walpole?" Destruction of the Albion Mills. Automaton
snuff-box [N.] 481

373. To Miss Berry, March 19.-Mrs. Gunning's letter to the Duke
of Argyle--[N.] 484

374. To the Miss Berrys, March 28.-King's message on the
situation of Europe. Blusterings of the Autocratrix. Bounces
and huffs of Prussia. Royal reconciliation. Taylor and the Lord
Chamberlain. Prosecution of the Gunnings. Gunnilda's letter to
Lord Blandford--(N.) 486

375. To Miss Berry, April 3.-On her fall down a bank at Pisa.
Kemble and Mrs. Siddons. Mrs. Damer's reception at Elvas. Death
of Dr. Price. Outrageous violence of the National Assembly.
Paine's answer to Burke--[N.] 488

376. To the same, April 15.-Lady Diana Beauclerc's designs for
Dryden's Fables. War with Russia. Madame du Barry dining with
the Prince of Wales. Increased population of London. Story of
the young woman at St. Helena. A party at Mrs. Buller's
described--[N.) 490

377. To Miss Berry, April 23.-Resignation of the Duke of Leeds.
Progress of the repairs at Clivedon. The abolition of the
slave-trade rejected. Captain Bowen's pamphlet against
Gunnilda. Hannah More and the Gretna Green runaway. Lord
Cholmondeley's marriage. Indian victory--(N.] 492

378. To the same, May 12,-Congratulations on her recovery.
Earnest wish to put them in possession of Clivedon during his
life. Unhappy quarrel between Mr. Burke and Mr. Fox. Mrs.
Damer's arrival from Spain--[N.] 495

379. To the same, May 19.-Thanks for her punctuality in
writing. Advantages of resources in one's self. Internal armour
more necessary to females than weapons to men. Duchesse de
Brissac. Duc de Nivernois. Hastings's impeachment. The Countess
of Albany in London. Her presentation at court. Her visit to
the Pantheon--[N.] 497

380. To the same, May 26.-The Duchess of Gordon's journal of a
day. Arrival of Sir William Hamilton with the Nymph of the
Attitudes. Strictures on Boswell's Life of Dr. Johnson.
Johnson's abuse of Gray. Burke's "Letter to a member of the
National Assembly." His character of Rousseau. Lodge's
"Illustrations of British History" panegyricised. Lord Mount-
Edgcumbe's bon-mot on M. d'Eon--[N.] 500

381. To the Miss Berrys, June 2--"This is the note that nobody
wrote." Interview with, and description of, Madame d'Albany--
[N.] 504

382. To the same, June 8.-Frequency of highway robberies. The
birthday. Madame d'Albany. Mrs. Fitzherbert. Mrs. Cosway. Lally
de Tollendal's tragedy. French politics. Rage for building in
London. Visit to Dulwich College--[N.] 505

383. To the same, June 14. Mrs. Hobart's rural breakfast. Dr
Beattie. Malone's Shakspeare--[N.] 508

384. To Miss Berry-, June 23.-Madame du Barry at Mrs. Hobart's
breakfast. Dr. Robertson's "Disquisition." French anarchy.
Madame d'Albany at the House of Lords--[N.] 510

385. To the same, July 12.-Calonne in London. Attack of the
rheumatism--[N 512

386. To the Miss Berrys, July 26.-Tom Paine in England, Crown
and Anchor celebration of the French Revolution. Birmingham
riots. Flight of the King of France to, and return from,
Varennes. Marriage of the Duke of York. Catherine of Russia.
Bust of Mr. Fox--[N.] 512

387. To Miss Berry, Aug. 17.-Spirit of democracy in
Switzerland. Peace with Russia. M. de Bouill`e's bravado. Sir
William Hamilton's pantomime wife. Antique statues--[N.) 514

388. To the Miss Berrys, Aug. 23.-Miss Harte and her attitudes.
Conversation with Madame du Barry. Account of a boat-race. The
soi-disante Margravine in England--[N.] 516

389. To the same, Sept. 11.-Lord Blandford's marriage. Sir W.
Hamilton married to his Gallery of Statues. Successes in India-
-[N.] 517

390. To the same, Sept. 18.-Mrs. Jordan. Miss Brunton's
marriage. Lord Buchan's jubilee for Thomson. Character of the
"Seasons." Danger of returning to England through France--[N.]
519

391. To the same, Sept. 25.-Valombroso. Ionian antiquities.
Egyptian pyramids. Mr. Gilpin and Richmond Hill--[N.) 520

392. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, Sept: 21.-The French emigrants
at Richmond. Progress of the French Revolution. The Legislative
Assembly. The King's forced acceptance of the new constitution.
Predicts the flight of La Fayette and the Lameths. Condorcet
turned placeman. Character of Mirabeau--(N.] 522

393. To Miss Hannah More, Sept. 29.-State of his health. The
Bishop of London's charity sermon. Miss Berrys. Anxiety for
their safe return from Italy. Miss Burney. Mrs. Barbauld's
Verses on the Abolition of the Slave-trade--[N.) 523

394. To Miss Berry, Oct. 9.-Anxiety for their safe return.
Account of a visit to Windsor Castle. St. George's chapel. The
new screen. Jarvis's window. West's paintings. Story of Peg
Nicholson. Thanks for their disinterested generosity in
returning to England. The Bolognese school. General Gunning and
the tailor's wife--[N.] 526

395. To John Pinkerton, Esq. Dec. 26.-His feelings and
situation on his accession to the title of Earl of Orford--[N.]
--528

1792.

396. To Miss Hannah More, Jan. 1.-Increase of trouble and
business occasioned by his accession to the title--529

397. To Thomas Barrett, Esq., May 14.-Darwin's Triumph of
Flora"--530

398. To Miss Hannah More, Aug. 21.-The Massacre of Paris.
Butcheries at the Tuilleries. Tortures of the King and Queen.
Heroic conduct of Madame Elizabeth. Thankfulness for the
tranquillity of England. Mrs. Wolstoncroft's "Rights of Women."
Gratitude for past comforts, and submission to his future lot--
[N.] 531

399. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, Aug. 31.-Detail of French
Atrocities. Anecdotes of the Duchess of York. State of his
health--533

1793.

400. To Miss Hannah More, Feb. 9.-French horrors. Beheading Of
Louis the Sixteenth. Assignats. Diabolical conduct of the Duke
Of Orleans. heroism of Madame Elizabeth. Sublime sentence of
Father Edgeworth. Speculations on the future--535

401. To the same, March 23.-On her -' Village Politics." French
atheism. Massacre of Manuel. Condorcet's new constitution--538

402. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, June 13.-On parties and
party-men. Injury done to the cause of liberty by the French
republicans--540

403. To the same, July 17.-Sultriness of the season. English
felicity, French atrocities. Separation of Maria Antoinette
from her son--541

404. To the Miss Berrys, Sept. 17.-Reminds them of his first
introduction to them--[N.] 542

405. To the same, Sept. 25.-Visit of the Duchess of York to
Strawberry Hill--[N.] 543

406. To the same, Oct. 6.-Inertness of the grand alliance
against France--[N.] 544

407. To Miss Hannah More, Oct.-On the answer to her pamphlet
against M. Dupont. Atrocities of the French atheists--[N.] 546

408. To the Miss Berrys, Oct. 15.-Arrest of the Duchesse de
Biron, and of the Duchesse de Fleury. Execution of Marie
Antoinette. The Duchesse de la Vali`ere--[N.] 547

409. To the same, Nov. 7.-Murder of Maria Antoinette. Loss of
Lord Montagu and Mr. Burdett in the falls of Schaflhausen.
Suicide of Mr. Tickell. "Death an endless sleep." Mr. Lysons'
Roman Remains. Account of his Own readings--[N.] 549

410. To Miss Berry, Dec. 4.-Visit to Haymarket Theatre. Young
Bannister in "The Children of the Wood." The Comte de Coigni.
Fate of the Duc de Fleury--[N.] 552

411. To the same, Dec. 13.-Reported successs of Lord Howe, and
the Duke of Brunswick. Quarrel between Robespierre and
Barr`ere. Fate of Barrave, Orleans, and Brissot. Mr.
Jerningham's play. Character of Mrs. Howe--(N.] 553

1794.

412. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, Jan. 16.-On the gloomy prospect
of affairs. Jasper Wilson's Letter to Mr. Pitt--555

413. To Miss Berry, April 16.-Successes in Martinico. Mrs.
Piozzi's "British Synomymes." Mr. Courtenay's verses on him--
[N.] 556

414. To Miss Hannah More, April 27.-An invitation to meet Lady
Waldegrave--556

415. To the Miss Berrys, Sept. 27.-Visit to Mrs. Damer's new
house. Her bust of Mrs. Siddons. Canterbury. A Ghost story.
Lord Holland's buildings at Kingsgate. Recommends them to
visit Mr. Barrett at Lee--(N.) 558

416. To Miss Berry, Oct. 7.-On the advisability of her
accepting a situation at court--(N.] 561

417. To the Miss Berrys, Oct. 17.-On their visit to Mr. Barrett
at Lee--(N.] 563

418. To the Rev. Mr. Beloe, Dec. 2.-On his intending to
dedicate his translation of aulus Gellius to Lord Orford--
564

1795.

419. To Miss Hannah More, Jan. 24.-With his subscription to the
fund for promoting the dispersion of the Cheap Repository
Tracts. Death of Condorcet, Orleans, etC. Justice of
Providence--565

420. To the same, Feb. 13.-On receiving some ballads written by
her for the Cheap Repository. Bisliol) Wilson's edition of
the Bible presented to her by Lord Orford--566

421. To William Roscoe, Esq. April 4.-On his sending him a copy
of his Life of Lorenzo de Medici--567

422. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, July 2.-The Queen's expected
visit to Strawberry Hill--569

423. To the same, July 7.-Account of the Queen's visit to
Strawberry Hill--569

1796.

424. To Miss Berry, Aug. 18.-Mr. and Mrs. Conway. Madame
Arblay's "Camilla." Arundel Castle. Monuments of the
Fitzalans. Account of a visit from Mr. Penticross--[N.] 570

425. To the same, Auff. 24.-Arundel Castle. Chapel of the
Fitzalans--[N.) 572

426. To Miss Hannah More, Aug. 29.-Giving an account of his
health; and expressing gratitude to God for the blessings he
enjoys--573

427. To Richard Gough, Eq. Dec. 3.-Thanking him for
the second volume of his "Sepulchral Monuments"--574

(428. To Miss Berry, Dec. 15.-Account Of the debates in the
House of Commons on the Loan to the Emperor. Death of Lord
Orford--[N.] 575

1797

429. To the Countess of Ossory, Jan. 13--576

End of Volume IV.

Letter 1 To Sir David Dalrymple.(1)
Arlington Street, Jan. 1, 1770. (page 25)

Sir,
I have read with great pleasure and information, your History
of Scottish Councils. It gave me much more satisfaction than I
could have expected from so dry a subject. It will be perused,
do not doubt it, by men of taste and judgment; and it is happy
that it will be read Without occasioning a controversy. The
curse of modern times is, that almost every thing does create
controversy, and that men who are willing to instruct or amuse
the world have to dread malevolence and interested censure,
instead of receiving thanks. If your part of our country is at
all free from that odious spirit, you are to be envied. In our
region we are given up to every venomous mischievous passion,
and as we behold all the public vices that raged in and
destroyed the remains of the Roman Commonwealth, so I wish we
do not experience some of the horrors that brought on the same
revolution. When we see men who call themselves patriots and
friends of liberty attacking the House of Commons, to what,
Sir, can you and I, who are really friends of liberty, impute
such pursuits, but to interest and disappointed ambition! When
we see, on one hand, the prerogative of the Crown excited
against Parliament, and on the other, the King and Royal Family
traduced and insulted in the most shameless manner, can we
believe such a faction is animated by honesty or love of the
constitution? When, as you very sensibly observe, the authors
of grievances are the loudest to complain of them, and when
those authors and their capital enemies shake hands, embrace,
and join in a common cause, which set can we believe most or
least sincere? And when every set of men have acted every
part, to whom shall the well-meaning look up? What can the
latter do, but sit with folded arms and pray for miracles?
Yes, Sir, they may weep over a prospect of ruin too probably
approaching, and regret a glorious country nodding to its fall,
when victory, wealth, and daily universal improvements, might
make it the admiration and envy of the world? Is the Crown to
be forced to be absolute? Is Caesar to enslave us, because he
conquered Gaul? Is some Cromwell to trample on us, because
Mrs. Macaulay approves the army that turned out the House of
Commons, the necessary consequence of such mad notions? Is
eloquence to talk or write us out of ourselves? or is Catiline
to save us, butt so as by fire? Sir, I talk thus freely,
because it is a satisfaction, in ill-looking moments, to vent
one's apprehensions in an honest bosom. YOU Will not, I am
sure, suffer my letter to go out of your own hands. I have no
views to satisfy or resentments to gratify. I have done with
the world, except in the hopes of a quiet enjoyment of it for
the few years I may have to come; but I love my country, though
I desire and expect nothing from it, and I would wish to leave
it to posterity, as secure and deserving to be valued, as I
found it. Despotism, or unbounded licentiousness, can endear
no nation to any honest man. The French can adore the monarch
that starves them, and banditti are often attached to their
chief; but no good Briton can love any constitution that does
not secure the tranquillity and peace of mind of all.

(1) Now first collected.

Letter 2 To Sir David Dalrymple.(2)
Arlington Street, Jan. 23, 1770. (page 26)

Sir,
I have not had time to return you the enclosed sooner, but I
give you my honour that it has neither been out of my hands,
nor been copied. It is a most curious piece, but though
affecting art has very little; so ill is the satire disguised.
I agree with you in thinking it ought not to be published yet,
as nothing is more cruel than divulging private letters which
may wound the living. I have even the same tenderness for the
children of persons concerned; but I laugh at delicacy for
grandchildren, who can be affected by nothing but their pride-
-and let that be hurt if it will. It always finds means of
consoling itself.

The rapid history of Mr. Yorke is very touching.(3) For
himself, he has escaped a torrent of obloquy, which this
unfeeling and prejudiced moment was ready to pour on him. Many
of his survivors may, perhaps, live to envy him! Madness and
wickedness gain ground--and you may be sure borrow the chariot
of virtue. Lord Chatham, not content with endeavouring to
confound and overturn the legislature, has thrown out, that one
member more ought to be added to each county;(4) so little do
ambition -,And indulgence scruple to strike at fundamentals!
Sir George Savile and Edmund Burke, as if envying the infamous
intoxication of Wilkes, have attacked the House of Commons
itself, in the most gross and vilifying language.(5) In short,
the plot thickens fast, and Catilines start up in every street.
I cannot say Ciceros and Catos arise to face them. The
phlegmatic and pedants in history quote King William's and
Sacheverel's times to show the present is not more serious; but
if I have any reading, I must remember that the repetition of
bad scenes brings about a catastrophe at last! It is small
consolation to living sufferers to reflect that history will
rejudge great criminals; nor is that sure. How seldom is
history fairly stated! When do all men concur in the Same
sentence? Do the guilty dead regard its judicature, or they
who prefer the convict to the judge? Besides, an ape of Sylla
will call himself Brutus, and the foolish people assist a
proscription before they suspect that their hero is an
incendiary. Indeed, Sir, we are, as Milton says--

"On evil days fallen and evil tongues!"

I shall be happy to find I have had too gloomy apprehensions.
A man, neither connected with ministers nor opponents, may
speculate too subtly. If all this is but a scramble for power,
let it fall to whose lot it will! It is the attack on the
constitution that strikes me. I have nothing to say for the
corruption of senators; but if the senate itself is declared
vile by authority, that is by a dissolution, will a re-election
restore its honour? Will Wilkes, and Parson Horne, and Junius
(for they will name the members) give us more virtuous
representations than ministers have done? Reformation must be
a blessed work in the hands of such reformers! Moderation, and
attachment to the constitution, are my principles. Is the
latter to be risked rather than endure any single evil? I
would oppose, that is restrain, by opposition check, each
branch of the legislature that predominates in its turn;--but
if I detest Laud, it does not make me love Hugh Peters.

Adieu, Sir! I must not tire you with my reflections; but as I
am flattered with thinking I have the sanction of the same
sentiments in you, it is natural to indulge even unpleasing
meditations when one meets with sympathy, and it is as natural
for those who love their country to lament its danger. I am,
Sir, etc.

(2) Now first collected.

(3) On the 17th, Mr. Charles Yorke was appointed lord
chancellor, and a patent was ordered to be made out, creating
him a peer, by the title of Lord Morden; but, three days after,
before the patent could be completed, he suddenly closed his
valuable life, at the early age of forty-eight.-E.

(4) Lord Chatham, on the preceding day, had made his celebrated
speech on the state of the nation, which had the good fortune
to be ably reported by Sir Philip Francis, and attracted the
particular attention of Junius. The following is the passage
which gave Walpole so much offence:--"Since we cannot cure the
disorder, let us endeavour to infuse such a portion of new
health into the constitution, as may enable it to support its
most inveterate diseases. The representation of the counties
is, I think, still preserved pure and uncorrupted. That of the
greatest cities is upon a footing equally respectable; and
there are many of the larger trading towns which stilt preserve
their independence. The infusion of health which I now allude
to would be to permit every county to elect one member more in
addition to their present representation." Sir Philip
Francis's report of this speech was first printed by Almon in
1792. Junius, in a letter to Wilkes, of the 7th of September
1771, says--"I approve highly of Lord Chatham's idea of
infusing a portion of new health into the constitution, to
enable it to bear its infirmities; a brilliant expression, and
full of intrinsic wisdom." There can be little doubt that
Junius and Sir Philip Francis were present in the House of
Lords, when this speech was delivered. See Chatham
Correspondence, vol. iii. p. 406.-E.

(5) The speeches of Sir George Savile and Mr. Burke, above
alluded to, will be found in Sir Henry Cavendish's Debates.-E.

Letter 3. To George Montagu, Esq.
Arlington Street, March 31, 1770. (page 28)

I shall be extremely obliged to you for Alderman Backwell. A
scarce print is a real present to me, who have a table of
weights and measures in my head very different from that of the
rich and covetous. I am glad your journey was prosperous. The
weather here has continued very sharp, but it has been making
preparations for April to-day, and watered the streets with
some soft showers. They will send me to Strawberry to-morrow,
where I hope to find the lilacs beginning to put forth their
little noses. Mr. Chute mends very slowly, but you know he has
as much patience as gout.

I depend upon seeing you whenever you return this wayward. You
will find the round chamber far advanced, though not finished;
for my undertakings do not stride with the impetuosity of my
youth. This single room has been half as long in completing as
all the rest of the castle. My compliments to Mr. John, whom I
hope to see at the same time.

Letter 4 To George Montagu, Esq.
Strawberry Hill May 6, 1770. (page 28)

If you are like me, you are fretting at the weather. We have
not a leaf, yet, large enough to make an apron for a Miss Eve
at two years old. Flowers and fruits, if they come at all this
year, must meet together as they do in a Dutch picture; our
lords and ladies, however, couple as if it were the real
Giovent`u dell' anno. Lord Albemarle,(6) you know has
disappointed all his brothers and my niece; and Lord
Fitzwilliam is declared sposo to Lady Charlotte Ponsonby.(7)
It is a pretty match, and makes Lord Besborough as happy as
possible.

Masquerades proceed in spite of church and King. The Bishop of
London persuaded that good soul the Archbishop to remonstrate
against them; but happily the age prefers silly follies to
serious ones, and dominos, comme de raison, carry It against
lawn sleeves.(8)

There is a new Institution that begins to and if it proceeds,
will make a considerable noise. It is a club of both sexes to
be erected at Almack's, on the model of that of the men at
White's. Mrs. Fitzroy, Lady Pembroke, Mrs. Meynel, Lady
Molyneux, MISS Pelham, and Miss Loyd, are the foundresses. I
am ashamed to say I am of so young and fashionable a society;
but as they are people I live with, I choose to be idle rather
than morose. I can go to a young supper, without forgetting
how much sand is run out of the hourglass. Yet I shall never
pass a triste old age in turning the psalms into Latin or
English verse. My plan is to pass away calmly; cheerfully if I
can; sometimes to amuse myself with the rising generation, but
to take care not to fatigue them, nor weary them with old
stories, which will not interest them, as their adventures do
not interest me. Age would indulge prejudices if it did not
sometimes polish itself against younger acquaintance; but it
must be the work of folly if one hopes to contract friendship
with them, or desires it, or thinks one can become the same
follies, or expects that they should do more than bear one for
one's good humour. In short, they are a pleasant medicine,
that one should take care not to grow fond of. Medicines hurt
when habit has annihilated their force; but you see I am in no
danger. I intend by degrees to decrease my opium, instead of
augmenting the dose. Good-night! You see I never let our
long-lived friendship drop, though you give it so few
opportunities of breathing.

(6) George, third Earl of Albemarle. His lordship had married,
on the 20th of April, Anne, youngest daughter of Sir John
Miller, Bart. of Chichester. He died in October 1772.-E.

(7) Lady Charlotte Ponsonby, second daughter of William, second
Earl of Besborough. The marriage took place on the 1st of
July.-E.

(8) Dr. Johnson, having read in the newspapers an account of a
masquerade given at Edinburgh, by the Countess Dowager of Fife,
at which Boswell had appeared in the character of a dumb
conjuror, thus wrote to him:--"I have heard of your masquerade.
What says your synod to such innovations? I am not studiously
scrupulous, nor do I think a Masquerade either evil in itself
or very likely to be the occasion of evil, yet, as the world
thinks it a very licentious relaxation of manners, I would not
have been one of the first masquers in a country where no
masquerades had ever been before."-E.

Letter 5 To George Montagu, Esq.
Strawberry Hill, June 11, 1770. (page 29)

My company and I have wished for you very much to-day. The
Duchess of Portland, Mrs. Delany, Mr. Bateman, and your cousin,
Fred. Montagu, dined here. Lord Guildford was very obliging,
and would have come if he dared have ventured. Mrs. Montagu
was at Bill-hill with Lady Gower. The day was tolerable, with
sun enough for the house, though not for the garden. You, I
suppose, will never come again, as I have not a team of horses
large enough to draw you out of the clay of Oxfordshire.

I went yesterday to see my niece(9) in her new principality of
Ham. It delighted me and made me peevish. Close to the
Thames, in the centre of all rich and verdant beauty, it is so
blocked up and barricaded with walls, vast trees, and gates,
that you think yourself an hundred miles off and an hundred
years back. The old furniture is so magnificently ancient,
dreary and decayed, that at every step one's spirits sink, and
all my passion for antiquity could not keep them up. Every
minute I expected to see ghosts sweeping by; ghosts I would not
give sixpence to See, Lauderdales, Tollcmaches, and Maitlands.
There is one old brown gallery full of Vandycks and Lelys,
charming miniatures, delightful Wouvermans, and Polenburghs,
china, japan, bronzes, ivory cabinets, and silver dogs, pokers,
bellows, etc. without end. One pair of bellows is of filigree.
In this state of pomp and tatters my nephew intends it shall
remain, and is so religious an observer of the venerable rites
of his house, that because the gates never were opened by his
father but once for the late Lord Granville, you are locked out
and locked in, and after journeying all round the house, as you
do round an old French fortified town, you are at last admitted
through the stable-yard to creep along a dark passage by the
housekeeper's room, and so by a back-door into the great hall.
He seems as much afraid of water as a cat; for though you might
enjoy the Thames from every window of three sides of the house,
you may tumble into it before you guess it is there. In short,
our ancestors had so little idea of taste and beauty, that I
should not have been surprised if they had hung their pictures
with the painted sides to the wall. Think of such a palace
commanding all the reach of Richmond and Twickenham, with a
domain from the foot of Richmond-hill to Kingston-bridge, and
then imagine its being as dismal and prospectless as if it
stood "on Stanmore's wintry wild!" I don't see why a man should
not be divorced from his prospect as well as from his wife, for
not being able to enjoy it. Lady Dysart frets, but it is not
the etiquette of the family to yield, and @ she must content
herself with her chateau of Tondertentronk as well as she can.
She has another such ample prison in Suffolk, and may be glad
to reside where she is. Strawberry, with all its painted glass
and gloom, looked as gay when I came home as Mrs. Cornelis's
ball-room.

I am very busy about the last volume of my Painters, but have
lost my index, and am forced again to turn over all my Vertues,
forty volumes of miniature MSS.; so that this will be the third
time I shall have made an index to them. Don't say that I am
not persevering, and yet I thought I was grown idle. What
pains one takes to be forgotten! Good-night!

(9) Charlotte, daughter of Sir Edward Walpole, married to Lord
Huntingtower, who had just succeeded to the title of the Earl
of Dysart, on the death of his father.-E.

Letter 6 To George Montagu, Esq.
Strawberry Hill, June 29, 1770. (page 30)

Since the sharp mountain will not come to the little hill, the
little hill must go to the mountain. In short, what do you
think of seeing me walk into your parlour a few hours after
this epistle! I had not time to notify myself sooner. The
case is, Princess Amelia has insisted on my going with her to,
that is, meeting her at Stowe on Monday, for a week. She
mentioned it to me some time ago, and I thought I had parried
it; but having been with her at Park-place these two or three
days, she has commanded it so positively that I could not
refuse. Now, as it would be extremely inconvenient to my
indolence to be dressed up in weepers and hatbands by six
o'clock in the morning, and lest I should be taken for chief
mourner going to Beckford's funeral,(10) I trust you will be
charitable enough to give me a bed at Adderbury for one night,
whence I can arrive at Stowe in a decent time, and caparisoned
as I ought to be, when I have lost a brother-in-law(11) and am
to meet a Princess. Don't take me for a Lauson, and think all
this favour portends a second marriage between our family and
the blood-royal; nor that my visit to Stowe implies my
espousing Miss Wilkes. I think I shall die as I am, neither
higher nor lower; and above all things, no more politics. Yet
I shall have many a private smile to myself, as I wander among
all those consecrated and desecrated buildings, and think what
company I am in, and of all that is past; but I must shorten my
letter, or you will not have finished it when I arrive. Adieu!
Yours, a-coming! a-coming!

(10) William Beckford, Esq. Lord Mayor of London, who died on
the 21st of June, during his second mayoralty, in the
sixty-fifth year of his age. On the 5th of the following
month, at a meeting of the Common Council, "a motion being made
and question put, that the statue of the Right Hon. William
Beckford, late Lord Mayor, deceased, be erected in the
Guildhall of this city, with the inscription of his late
address to his Majesty, the was resolved in the affirmative."
The speech here alluded to is the one which the Alderman
addressed to his Majesty on the 23d of May, with reference to
the King's reply--"That he should have been wanting to the
public, as well as to himself, if he had not expressed his
dissatisfaction at the late address." At the end of the
Alderman's speech, in his copy of the City Addresses, Mr. Isaac
Reed has inserted the following note:--"It is a curious fact,
but a true one, that Beckford did not utter one syllable of
this speech. It was penned by Horne Tooke, and by his art put
on the records of the city and on Beckford's statue; as he told
me, Mr. Braithwaite, Mr. Sayers, etc. at the Athenian club.
Isaac Reed." There can be little doubt that the worthy
commentator and his friends were imposed upon. In the Chatham
Correspondence, vol. iii. p. 460, a letter from Sheriff
Townsend to the Earl expressly states, that with the exception
of the words "and necessary" being left out before the word
"revolution," the Lord Mayor's speech in the Public Advertiser
of the preceding day is verbatim the one delivered to the
King.--E.

(11) George third Earl of Cholmondeley. He married, in 1723,
Mary the youngest daughter of @Sir Robert Walpole.-E.

Letter 7 To George Montagu, Esq.
Adderbury, Sunday night, July 1, 1770. (page 32

You will be enough surprised to receive a letter from me dated
from your own house, and may judge of my mortification at not
finding you here; exactly as it happened two years ago. In
short, here I am, and will tell you how I came here; in truth,
not a little against my will. I have been at Park-place with
Princess Amelia, and she insisted on my meeting her at Stowe
to-morrow. She had mentioned it before, and as I have no
delight in a royal progress, and as little in the Seigneur
Temple, I waived the honour and pleasure, and thought I should
hear no more of it. However, the proposal was turned into a
command, and every body told me I could not refuse. Well, I
could not come so near, and not call upon you; besides, it is
extremely convenient to my Lord Castlecomer, for it would have
been horrid to set out at seven o'clock in the morning, full-
dressed, in my weepers, and to step out of my chaise into a
drawing-room. I wrote to you on Friday, the soonest I could
after this was settle(], to notify myself to you, but find I am
arrived before my letter. Mrs. White is all goodness; and
being the first of July, and consequently the middle of winter,
has given me a good fire and some excellent coffee and bread
and butter, and I am as comfortable as possible, except in
having missed you. She insists on acquainting you, which makes
me write this to prevent your coming; for as I must depart at
twelve o'clock to-morrow, it would be dragging you home before
your time for only half an hour, and I have too much regard for
Lord Guildford to deprive him of your company. Don't therefore
think of making this unnecessary compliment. I have treated
your house like an inn, and it will not be friendly, if you do
not make as free with me. I had much rather that you would
take it for a visit that you ought to repay. Make my best
compliments to your brother and Lord Guildford, and pity me for
the six dreadful days that I am going to pass. Rosette is fast
asleep in your chair, or I am sure she would write a
postscript. I cannot say she is either commanded or invited to
be of this royal party; but have me, have my dog.

I must not forget to thank you for mentioning Mrs. Wetenhall,
on whom I should certainly wait with great pleasure, but have
no manner of intention of going into Cheshire. There is not a
chair or stool in Cholmondeley, and my nephew, I believe, will
pull it down. He has not a fortune to furnish or inhabit it;
and, if his uncle should leave him one, he would choose a
pleasanter country. Adieu! Don't be formal with me, and don't
trouble your hand about yours ever.

Letter 8 To George Montagu, Esq.
Strawberry Hill, Saturday night, July 7, 1770. (page 33)

After making an inn of your house, it is but decent to thank
you for my entertainment, and to acquaint you with the result
of my journey. The party passed off much better than I
expected. A Princess at the Heart of a very small set for five
days together did not promise well. However, she was very
good-humoured and easy, and dispensed with a large quantity of
etiquette. Lady Temple is good-nature itself, my lord was very
civil, Lord Besborough is made to suit all sorts of people,
Lady Mary Coke respects royalty too much not to be very
condescending, Lady Anne Howard(12) and Mrs. Middleton filled
up the drawing-room, or rather made it out, and I was so
determined to carry it off as well as I could, and happened to
be in such good spirits, and took such care to avoid politics,
that we laughed a great deal, and had not one cloud the whole
time.

We breakfasted at half an hour after nine; but the Princess did
not appear till it was finished; then we walked in the garden,
or drove about in cabriolets, till it was time to dress; dined
at three, which, though properly proportioned to the smallness
of company to avoid ostentation, lasted a vast While, as the
Princess eats and talks a great deal; then again into the
garden till past seven, when we came in, drank tea and coffee,
and played at pharaoh till ten, when the Princess retired, and
we went to supper, and before twelve to bed. You see there was
great sameness and little vivacity in all this. It was a
little broken by fishing, and going round the park one of the
mornings; but, in reality, the number of buildings and variety
of scenes in the garden, made each day different from the rest,
and my meditations on so historic a spot prevented my being
tired. Every acre brings to one's mind some instance of the
parts or pedantry, of the taste or want of taste, of the
ambition or love of fame, or greatness or miscarriages, of
those that have inhabited, decorated, planned, or visited the
place. Pope, Congreve, Vanbrugh, Kent, Gibbs, Lord Cobham,
Lord Chesterfield, the mob of nephews, the Lytteltons,
Granvilles, Wests, Leonidas Glover, and Wilkes, the late Prince
of Wales, the King of Denmark, Princess Amelia, and the proud
monuments of Lord Chatham's services, now enshrined there, then
anathematized there, and now again commanding there, with the
temple of Friendship, like the temple of Janus, sometimes open
to war, and sometimes shut up in factious cabals--all these
images crowd upon one's memory, and add visionary personages to
the charming scenes, that are so enriched with fanes and
temples, that the real prospects are little less than visions
themselves.

On Wednesday night, a small Vauxhall was acted for us at the
grotto in the Elysian fields, which was illuminated with lamps,
as were the thicket and two little barks on the lake. With a
little exaggeration I could make you believe that nothing was
so delightful. The idea was really pretty; but as my feelings
have lost something of their romantic sensibility, I did not
quite enjoy such an entertainment alfresco so much as I should
have done twenty years ago. The evening was more than cool,
and the destined spot any thing but dry. There were not half
lamps enough, and no music but an ancient militia-man, who
played cruelly on a squeaking tabor and pipe. As our
procession descended the vast flight of' steps into the garden,
in which was assembled a crowd of people from Buckingham and
the neighbouring villages to see the Princess and the show, the
moon shining very bright, I could not help laughing as I
surveyed our troop, which, instead of tripping lightly to such
an Arcadian entertainment, were hobbling down by the
balustrades, wrapt up in cloaks and greatcoats, for fear of
catching cold. The Earl, you know, is bent double, the
Countess very lame; I am a miserable walker, and the Princess,
though as strong as a Brunswick lion, makes no figure in going
down fifty stone stairs. Except Lady Anne, and by courtesy
Lady Mary, we were none of us young enough for a pastoral. We
supped in the grotto, which is as proper to this climate as a
sea-coal fire would be in the dog-days at Tivoli.

But the chief entertainment of the week, at least what was so
to the Princess, was an arch, which Lord Temple has erected to
her honour in the most enchanting of all picturesque scenes.
It is inscribed on one side, 'Amelia Sophia Aug.,' and has a
medallion of her on the other. It is placed on an eminence at
the top of the Elysian fields, in a grove of orange-trees. You
come to it on a sudden, and are startled with delight on
looking through it: you at once see, through a glade, the river
winding at the bottom; from which a thicket arises, arched over
with trees, but opened, and discovering a hillock full of
haycocks, beyond which in front is the Palladian bridge, and
again over that a larger hill crowned with the castle. It is a
tall landscape framed by the arch and the overhovering trees,
and comprehending more beauties of light, shade, and buildings,
than any picture of Albano I ever saw. Between the flattery
and the prospect the Princess was really in Elysium: she
visited her arch four or five times every day, and could not
satiate herself with it. statues of Apollo and the Muses stand
on each side of the arch. One day she found in Apollo's hand
the following lines, which I had written for her, and
communicated to Lord Temple:--

T'other day, with a beautiful frown on her brow,
To the rest of the gods said the Venus of Stowe,
"What a fuss is here made with that arch just erected,
How our temples are slighted, our antirs neglected!
Since yon nymph has appear'd, We are noticed no more,
All resort to her shrine, all her presence adore;
And what's more provoking, before all our faces,
Temple thither has drawn both the Muses and Graces."
"Keep your temper, dear child," Phoebus cried with a smile,
"Nor this happy, this amiable festival spoil.
Can your shrine any longer with garlands be dress'd?
When a true goddess reigns, all the false are suppress'd."

If you will keep my counsel, I will own to you, that originally
the two last lines were much better, but I was forced to alter
them out of decorum, not to be too pagan upon the occasion; in
short, here they are as in the first sketch,--

"Recollect, once before that our oracle ceased,
When a real divinity rose in the East."

So many heathen temples around had made me talk as a Roman poet
would have done: but I corrected my verses, and have made them
insipid enough to offend nobody. Good night! I am rejoiced to
be once more in the gay solitude of my own little Temple. Yours
ever.

(12) Lady Anne Howard, daughter of Henry fourth Earl, and
sister of Frederick fifth Earl of Carlisle.-E.

Letter 9 To The Earl Of Strafford.
Strawberry Hill, July 9, 1770. (page 35)

I am not going to tell you, my dear lord, of the diversions or
honours of Stowe, which I conclude Lady Mary has writ to Lady
Strafford. Though the week passed cheerfully enough, it was
more glory than I should have sought of my own head. The
journeys to Stowe and Park-place have deranged my projects so,
that I don't know where I am, and I wish they have not given me
the gout into the bargain; for I am come back very lame, and
not at all with the bloom that one ought to have imported from
the Elysian field. Such jaunts when one is growing old is
playing with edged-tools, as my Lord Chesterfield, in one of
his Worlds,(13) makes the husband say to his wife, when she
pretends that gray powder does not become her. It is charming
at twenty to play at Elysian fields, but it is no joke at
fifty; or too great a joke. It made me laugh as we were
descending the great flight of steps from the house to go and
sup in the grotto on the banks of Helicon: we were so cloaked
up, for the evening was very cold, and so many of us were
limping and hobbling, that Charon would have easily believed we
were going to ferry over in earnest. It is with much more
comfort that I am writing to your lordship in the great
bow-window of my new round room, which collects all the rays of
the southwest sun, and composes a sort of summer; a feel I have
not known this year, except last Thursday. If the rains should
ever cease, and the weather settle to fine, I shall pay you my
visit at Wentworth Castle; but hitherto the damps have affected
me so much, that I am more disposed to return to London and
light my fire, than brave the humours of a climate so
capricious and uncertain, in the country. I cannot help
thinking it grows worse; I certainly remember such a thing as
dust: nay, I still have a clear idea of it, though I have seen
none for some years, and should put some grains in a bottle for
a curiosity, if it should ever fly again.

News I know none. You may be sure it was a subject carefully
avoided at Stowe; and Beckford's death had not raised the glass
or spirits of the master of the house. The papers make one
sick with talking of that noisy vapouring fool, as they would
of Algernon Sidney.

I have not happened to see your future nephew, though we have
exchanged visits. It was the first time I had been at
Marble-hill, since poor Lady Suffolk's death; and the
impression was so uneasy, that I was not sorry not to find him
at home. Adieu, my good lord! Except seeing you both, nothing
can be more agreeable than to hear of yours and Lady
Strafford's health, who, I hope, continues perfectly well.

(13) No. 18. A Country Gentleman's Tour to Paris with his
Family.-E.

Letter 10 To The Hon. H. S. Conway.
Arlington Street, July 12, 1770. (page 36)

Reposing under my laurels! No, no, I am reposing in a much
better tent, under the tester of my own bed. I am not obliged
to rise by break of day and be dressed for the drawing-room; I
may saunter in my slippers till dinner-time, and not make bows
till my back is as much out of joint as my Lord Temple's. In
short, I should die of the gout or fatigue, if I was to be
Polonius to a Princess for another week. Twice a-day we made a
pilgrimage to almost every heathen temple in that province that
they call a garden; and there is no sallying out of the house
without descending a flight of steps as high as St. Paul's. My
Lord Besborough would have dragged me up to the top of the
column, to see all the kingdoms of the earth; but I would not,
if he could have given them to me. To crown all, because we
live under the line, and that we were all of us giddy young
creatures, of near threescore, we supped in a grotto in the
Elysian fields, and were refreshed with rivers of dew and
gentle showers that dripped from all the trees, and put us in
mind of the heroic ages, when kings and queens were shepherds
and shepherdesses, and lived in caves, and were wet to the skin
two or three times a-day. Well! thank Heaven, I am emerged
from that Elysium, and once more in a Christian country!--Not
but, to say the truth, our pagan landlord and landlady were
very obliging, and the party went off much better than I
expected. We had no very recent politics, though volumes about
the Spanish war; and as I took care to give every thing a
ludicrous turn as much as I could, the Princess was diverted,
the six days rolled away, and the seventh is my sabbath; and I
promise you i will do no manner of work, I, nor my cat, nor my
dog, nor any thing that is mine. For this reason, I entreat
that the journey to Goodwood may not take place before the 12th
of August, when I will attend you. But this expedition to
Stowe has quite blown up my intended one to Wentworth Castle: I
have not resolution enough left for such a journey. Will you
and Lady Ailesbury come to Strawberry before, or after
Goodwood? I know you like being dragged from home as little as
I do; therefore you shall place that visit just when it is most
convenient to you.

I came to town the night before last, and am just returning.
There are not twenty people in all London. Are not YOU in
despair about the summer? It is horrid to be ruined in coals in
June and July. Adieu. Yours ever.

Letter 11 To George Montagu, Esq.
Strawberry Hill, July 14, 1770. (page 37)

I see by the papers this morning that Mr. Jenkinson(14) is
dead. He had the reversion of my place, which would go away,
if I should lose my brother. I have no pretensions to ask it,
and you know It has long been my fixed resolution not to accept
it. But as Lord North is your particular friend, I think it
right to tell you, that you may let him know what it is worth,
that he may give it to one of his own sons, and not bestow it
on somebody else, without being apprised of its value. I have
seldom received less than fourteen hundred a-year in money, and
my brother, I think, has four more from it. There are besides
many places in the gift of the office, and one or two very
considerable. Do not mention this but to Lord North, or Lord
Guilford. It is unnecessary, I am sure, for me to say to you,
but I would wish them to be assured that in saying this, I am
incapable of, and above any finesse, or view, to myself. I
refused the reversion for myself several years ago, when Lord
Holland was secretary of state, and offered to obtain it for
me. Lord Bute, I believe, would have been very glad to have
given it to me, before he gave it to Jenkinson; but I say it
very seriously, and you know me enough to be certain I am in
earnest, that I would not accept it upon any account. Any
favour Lord North will do for you will give me all the
satisfaction I desire. I am near fifty-three; I have neither
ambition nor interest to gratify. I can live comfortably for
the remainder of my life, though I should be poorer by fourteen
hundred pounds a-year; but I should have no comfort if, in the
dregs of life, I did any thing that I would not do when I was
twenty years younger. I will trust to you, therefore, to make
Use of this information in the friendly manner I mean it, and
to prevent my being hurt by its being taken otherwise than as a
design to serve those to whom you wish well. Adieu! Yours
ever.

(14) Charles Jenkinson, at this time one of the lords of the
treasury. In 1786, He was created Baron Hawkesbury, and in
1796 advanced to the dignity of Earl of Liverpool.-E.

Letter 12 To George Montagu, Esq.
Strawberry Hill, Sunday, [July 15, 1770.] (page 38)

I am sorry I wrote to you last night, for I find it is Mrs.
Jenkinson(15) that is dead, and not Mr.; and therefore I should
be glad to have this arrive time enough to prevent your
mentioning the contents of my letter. In that case, I should
not be concerned to have given you that mark of my constant
good wishes, nor to have talked to you of my affairs, which are
as well in your breast as my own. They never disturb me; for
my mind has long taken its stamp, and as I shall leave nobody
much younger than myself behind me for whom I am solicitous, I
have no desire beyond being easy for the rest of my life I
could not be so if I stooped to have obligations to any man
beyond what it would ever be in my power to return. When I was
in Parliament, I had the additional reason of choosing to be
entirely free; and my strongest reason of all is, that I will
be at liberty to speak truth both living and dead. This
outweighs all considerations of interest, and will convince
you, though I believe you do not want that conviction, that my
yesterday's letter was as sincere in its resolution as in its
professions to you. Let the matter drop entirely, as it is now
Of no consequence. Adieu! Yours ever.

(15) Amelia, daughter of William Watts, Esq. formerly governor
of Fort William, in Bengal.-E.

Letter 13 To George Montagu, Esq.
Strawberry Hill, Oct. 3, 1770. (page 38)

I am going on in the sixth week of my fit, and having had a
return this morning in my knee, I cannot flatter myself with
any approaching prospect of recovery. The gate of painful age
seems open to me, and I must travel through it as I may! If
you have not written one word for another, I am at a loss to
understand you. You say you have taken a house in London for a
year, that you are gone to Waldeshare for six months, and then
shall come for the winter. Either you mean six weeks, or
differ with most people in reckoning April the beginning of
winter. I hope your pen was in a hurry, rather than your
calculation so uncommon; I certainly shall be glad of your
residing in London. I have long wished to live nearer to you,
but it was in happier days. I am now so dismayed by these
returns of gout, that I can promise myself few comforts in any
future scenes of my life.

I am much obliged to Lord Guildford and Lord North, and was
very sorry that the latter came to see Strawberry in so bad a
day, and when I was so extremely ill, and full of pain, that I
scarce knew he was here; and as my coachman was gone to London,
to fetch me bootikins, there was no carriage to offer him; but,
indeed, in the condition I then was, I was not capable of doing
any of the honours of my house, suffering at once in my hand,
knee, and both feet. I am still lifted out of bed by two
servants; and by their help travel from my bedchamber down to
the couch in my blue room; but I shall conclude, rather than
tire you with so unpleasant a history. Adieu! Yours ever.

Letter 14 To George Montagu, Esq.
Arlington Street, Oct. 16, 1770. (page 39)

At last I have been able to remove to London; but though long
weeks are gone and over since I was seized, I am only able to
creep about upon a flat floor, but cannot go up and down
stairs. However, I have patience, as I can at least fetch a
book for myself', instead of having a servant bring me a wrong
one. I am much obliged to Lord Guildford for his goodness to
me, and beg my thanks to him. When you go to Canterbury, pray
don't wake the Black Prince. I am very unwarlike, and desire
to live the rest of my time upon the stock of glory I saved to
my share Out Of the last war. I know not more news than I did
at Strawberry; there are not more people in town than I saw
there, and I intend to return thither on Friday or Saturday.
Adieu! Yours ever.

Letter 15 To The Earl Of Strafford.
Arlington Street, Oct. 16, 1770. (page 39)

Though I have so very little to say, it is but my duty, my dear
lord, to thank you for your extreme goodness to me and your
inquiring after me. I was very bad again last week, but have
mended so much since Friday night, that I really now believe
the fit is over. I came to town on Sunday, and can creep about
my room even without a stick, which is more felicity to me than
if I had got a white one. I do not aim yet at such preferment
as walking up stairs; but having moulted my stick, I flatter
myself I shall come forth again without being lame. The few I
have seen tell me there is nobody else in town. That is no
grievance to me, when I should be at the mercy of all that
should please to bestow their idle time upon me. I know
nothing of the war-egg, but that sometimes it is to be hatched
and sometimes to be addled.(16) Many folks get into the nest,
and sit as hard upon it as they can, concluding it will produce
a golden chick. As I shall not be a feather the better for it,
I hate that game-breed, and prefer the old hen Peace and her
dunghill brood. My compliments to my lady and all her poultry.

(16) The dispute with Spain relative to the possession of the
Falkland Islands, had led to a considerable augmentation both
of the army and navy; which gave an appearance of authenticity
to the rumours of war which were now in circulation.-E.

Letter 16 To The Earl Of Charlemont.(17)
Arlington Street, Oct. 17, 1770. (page 40)

My lord,
I am very glad your lordship resisted your disposition to make
me an apology for doing me a great honour; for, if you had not,
the Lord knows where I should have found words to have made a
proper return. Still you have left me greatly in your debt.
It is very kind to remember me, and kinder to honour me with
your commands: they shall be zealously obeyed to the utmost of
my little credit; for an artist that your lordship patronises
will, I imagine, want little recommendation, besides his own
talents. It does not look, indeed, like very prompt obedience,
when I am yet guessing only at Mr. Jervais's merit; but though
he has lodged himself within a few doors of me, I have not been
able to get to him, having been confined near two months with
the gout, and still keeping my house. My first visit shall be
to gratify my duty and curiosity. I am sorry to say, and beg
your lordship's pardon for the confession, that, however high
an opinion I have of your taste in the arts, I do not equally
respect your judgment in books. it is in truth a defect that
you have in common with the two great men who are the
respective models of our present parties--

"The hero William, and the martyr Charles."

You know what happened to them after patronising Kneller and
Bernini--

"One knighted Blackmore, and one pensioned Quarles."

After so saucy an attack, my lord, it is time to produce my
proof. It lies in your own postscript, where you express a
curiosity to see a certain tragedy, with a hint that the other
works of the same author have found favour in your sight, and
that the piece ought to have been sent to you. But, my lord,
even your approbation has not made that author vain; and for
the lay in question, it has so many perils to encounter, that
it never thinks of producing itself. It peeped out of its
lurking corner once or twice; and one of those times, by the
negligence of a friend, had like to have been, what is often
pretended in prefaces, stolen, and consigned to the press.
When your lordship comes to England, which, for every reason
but that, I hope will be Soon, you shall certainly see it; and
will then allow, I am sure. how improper it would be for the
author to risk its appearance in public. However, unworthy as
that author may be, from his talents, of your lordship's
favour, do not let its demerits be confounded with the esteem
and attachment with which he has the honour to be, my lord,
your lordship's most devoted servant.

(17) James Caulfield, Earl of Charlemont, an Irish nobleman,
distinguished for his literary taste and patriotism. Of him
Mr. Burke said, ,He is a man of such polished manners, of a
mind so truly adorned and disposed to the adoption of whatever
is excellent and praiseworthy, that to see and converse with
him would alone induce me, or might induce any one who relishes
such qualities, to pay a visit to Ireland." He died in 1799,
and in 1810, his Memoirs were published by Francis Hardy, Esq.
in a quarto volume.-E.

Letter 17 To The Rev. Mr. Cole.
Arlington Street, Nov. 15, 1770. ((page 41)

Dear sir,
If you have not engaged your interest in Cambridgeshire, you
will oblige me much by bestowing it on young Mr. Brand, the son
of my particular acquaintance, and our old schoolfellow. I am
very unapt to trouble my head about elections, but wish success
to this.

If you see Bannerman, I should be glad you would tell him that
I am going to print the last volume of my Painters, and should
like to employ him again for some of the heads, if he cares to
undertake them: though there will be a little trouble as he
does not reside in London. I am in a hurry, and am forced to
be brief, but am always glad to hear of you, and from you.
Yours most sincerely.

letter 18 To The Rev. Mr. Cole.
Arlington Street, Nov. 20, 1770. (page 41)

I believe our letters crossed one another without knowing it.
Mine, it seems, was quite unnecessary, for I find Mr. Brand has
given up the election. Yours was very kind and obliging, as
they always are. Pray be so good as to thank Mr. Tyson for me
a thousand times; I am vastly pleased with his work, and hope
he will give me another of the plates for my volume of heads
(for I shall bind up his present), and I by no means relinquish
his promise of a complete set of his etchings, and of a visit
to Strawberry Hill. Why should it not be with you and Mr.
Essex, whom I shall be very glad to see--but what do you talk
of a single day? Is that all you allow me in two years?

I rejoice to see Mr. Bentham's advertisement at last. I depend
on you, dear Sir, for procuring me his book(18) the instant it
is possible to have it. Pray make my compliments to all that
good family. I am enraged, and almost in despair, at Pearson
the glass-painter, he is so idle and dissolute. He has done
very little of the window, though what he has done is glorious,
and approaches very nearly to Price.

My last volume of Painters begins to be printed this week; but,
as the plates are not begun, I doubt it will be long before the
whole is ready. I mentioned to you in my last Thursday's
letter a hint about Bannerman, the engraver. Adieu!

(18) The "History and Antiquities of the Conventual and
Cathedral Church at Ely," which appeared in the following
year.-E.

Letter 19 To The Rev. Mr. Cole.
Arlington Street, Dec. 20, 1770. (page 42)

Dear Sir
I am very zealous, as you know, for the work; but I agree with
you in expecting very little success from the plan.(19)
Activity is the best implement in such undertakings, and that
seems to be wanting; and, without that, it were vain to think
of who would be at the expense. I do not know whether it were
not best that Mr. Essex should publish his remarks as simply as
he can. For my own part, I can do no more than I have done,-
-sketch out the plan. I grow too old, and am grown too
indolent, to engage in any more works: nor have I time. I wish
to finish some things I have by me, and to have done. The last
volume of my Anecdotes, of which I was tired, is completed and
with them I shall take my leave of publications. The last
years of one's life are fit for nothing but idleness and quiet,
and I am as indifferent to fame as to politics.

I can be of as little use to Mr. Granger in recommending him to
the Antiquarian Society. I dropped my attendance there four or
five years ago, from being sick of their ignorance and
stupidity, and have not been three times amongst them since.
They have chosen to expose their dullness to the world, and
crowned it with Dean Milles's(20) nonsense. I have written a
little answer to the last, which you shall see, and then wash
my hands of them.

To say the truth, I have no very sanguine expectation about the
Ely window. The glass-painter, though admirable, proves a very
idle worthless fellow, and has yet scarce done any thing of
consequence. I gave Dr. Nichols notice of his character, but
found him apprised of it. The Doctor, however, does not
despair, but pursues him warmly. I wish it may succeed!

If you go over to Cambridge, be so good as to ask Mr. Grey when
he proposes being in town; he talked of last month. I must beg
you, too, to thank Mr. Tyson for his last letter. I can say
no more to the Plan than I have said. If he and Mr. Essex
should like to come to town, I shall be very willing to talk it
over with them, but I can by no means think of engaging in any
part of the composition.

These holidays I hope to have time to arrange my drawings, and
give bannerman some employment towards my book, but I am in no
hurry to have it appear, as it speaks of times so recent; for
though I have been very tender of not hurting any living
relations of the artists, the latter were in general so
indifferent, that I doubt their families will not be very well
content with the coldness of the praises I have been able to
bestow. This reason, with my unwillingness to finish the work,
and the long interval between the composition of this and the
other volumes, have, I doubt, made the greatest part a very
indifferent performance. An author, like other mechanics,
never does well when he is tired of his profession.

I have been told that, besides Mr. Tyson, there are two other
gentlemen engravers at Cambridge. I think their names are
Sharp or Show, and Cobbe, but I am not at all sure of either.
I should be glad, however, if I could procure any of their
portraits; and I do not forget that I am already in your debt.
Boydell is going to recommence a suite of illustrious heads,
and I am to give him a list of indubitable portraits of
remarkable persons that have never been engraved; but I have
protested against his receiving two sorts; the one, any old
head of a family, when the person was moderately considerable;
the other, spurious or doubtful heads; both sorts apt to be
sent in by families who wish to crowd -their own names into the
work; as was the case more than once in Houbraken's set, and of
which honest Vertue often complained to me. The Duke of
Buckingham, Carr, Earl of Somerset, and Thurloe, in that list,
are absolutely not genuine--the first is John Digby Earl of
Bristol. Yours ever.

(19) Mr. Essex's projected History of Gothic Architecture.
See vol. iii. Letter 366 to the Rev. Mr. Cole, Aug. 12,
1769.-E.

(20) Dr. Jeremiah Milles, dean of Exeter, many years president
of the Antiquarian Society. He engaged ardently in the
Chatterton controversy, and published the whole of the poems
purporting to be written by Rowley, with a glossary; thereby
proving himself a fit subject for that chef-d'oeuvre of wit and
poetry, the Archaeological Epistle, written by Mason.
Walpole's answer is entitled, "Reply to the Observations on the
Remarks of the Rev. Dr. Milles, Dean of Exeter and President
of the Society of Antiquaries, on the Wardrobe Account of 1483,
etc." It is inserted in the second volume of his collected
Works-E.

Letter 20 To The Hon. H. S. Conway.
Arlington Street, Christmas-day. (page 43)

If poplar-pines ever grow,(21) it must be in such a soaking
season as this. I wish you would send half-a-dozen by some
Henley barge to meet me next Saturday at Strawberry Hill, that
they may be as tall as the Monument by next summer. My
cascades give themselves the airs of cataracts, and Mrs. Clive
looks like the sun rising out of the ocean. Poor Mr.
Raftor(22) is tired to death of their solitude; and, as his
passion is walking, he talks with rapture of the brave rows of
lamps all along the street, just as I used formerly to think no
trees beautiful without lamps to them, like those at Vauxhall.

As I came to town but to dinner, and have not seen a soul, I do
not KNOW whether there is any news. I am just going to the
Princess,(23) where I shall hear all there is. I went to King
Arthur(24) on Saturday, and was tired to death, both of the
nonsense of the piece and the execrable performance, the
singers being still worse than the actors. The scenes are
little better (though Garrick boasts of rivalling the French
Opera,) except a pretty bridge, and a Gothic church with
windows of painted glass. This scene, which should be a
barbarous temple of Woden, is a perfect cathedral, and the
devil officiates at a kind of high-mass! I never saw greater
absurdities. Adieu!

(21) The first poplar-pine (or, as they have since been called,
Lombardy poplar) planted in England was at Park-place, on the
bank of the river near the great arch. It was a cutting
brought from Turin by Lord Rochford in his carriage, and
planted by General Conway's own hand.

(22) Brother of Mrs. Clive. He had been an actor himself, and,
when his sister retired from the stage, lived with her in the
house Mr. Walpole had given her at Twickenham.

(23( The Princess Amelia.

(24) Dryden's dramatic opera of King Arthur, or the British
Worthy, altered by Garrick, was this year brought out at Drury
Lane, and, by the aid of scenery, was very successful.-E.

Letter 21 To The Hon. H. S. Conway.
Arlington Street, Dec. 29, 1770. (page 44)

The trees came safe: I thank you for them: they are gone to
Strawberry, and I am going to plant them. This paragraph would
not call for a letter, but I have news for you of importance
enough to dignify a despatch. The Duc de Choiseul is fallen!
The express from Lord Harcourt arrived yesterday morning; the
event happened last Monday night, and the courier set out so
immediately, that not many particulars are yet known. The Duke
was allowed but three hours to prepare himself, and ordered to
retire to his seat at Chanteloup: but some letters say, "il ira
plus loin." The Duc de Praslin is banished, too, and Chatelet
is forbidden to visit Choiseul. Chatelet was to have had the
marine; and I am Sure is no loss to us. The Chevalier de Muy
is made secretary of state pour la guerre;(25) and it is
concluded that the Duc d'Aiguillon is prime-minister, but was
not named so in the first hurry. There! there is a revolution!
there is a new scene opened! Will it advance the war? Will it
make peace? These are the questions all mankind is asking.
This whale has swallowed up all gudgeon-questions. Lord
Harcourt writes, that the d'Aiguillonists had officiously taken
opportunities of assuring him, that if they prevailed it would
be peace; but in this country we know that opponents turned
ministers can change their language It is added, that the
morning of Choiseul's banishment'(26) the King said to him,
"Monsieur, je vous ai dit que je ne voulais point la guerre."
Yet how does this agree with Franc`es's(27) eager protestations
that Choiseul's fate depended on preserving the peace? How
does it agree with the Comptroller-general's offer of finding
funds for the war, and of Choiseul's proving he could not?--But
how reconcile half the politics one hears? De Guisnes and
Franc`es sent their excuses to the Duchess of Argyle last
night; and I suppose the Spaniards, too; for none of them were
there.--Well! I shall let all this bustle cool for two days;
for what Englishman does not sacrifice any thing to go his
Saturday out of town? And yet I am very much interested in
this event; I feel much for Madame de Choiseul, though nothing
for her Corsican husband; but I am in the utmost anxiety for my
dear old friend,(28) who passed every evening with the Duchess,
and was thence in great credit; and what is worse, though
nobody, I think, can be savage enough to take away her pension,
she may find great difficulty to get it paid--and then her poor
heart is so good and warm, that this blow on her friends, at
her great age, may kill her.(29) I have had no letter, nor had
last post--whether it was stopped, or whether she apprehended
the event, as I imagine--for every one observed, on Tuesday
night, at your brother's, that Franc`es could not open his
mouth. In short, I am most seriously alarmed about her.

You have seen in the papers the designed arrangements in the
law.(30) They now say there is some hitch; but I suppose it
turns on some demands, and so will be got over by their being
granted. Mr. Mason, the bard, gave me yesterday, the enclosed
memorial, and begged I would recommend it to you. It is in
favour of a very ingenious painter. Adieu! the sun shines
brightly; but it is one o'clock, and it will be set before I
get to Twickenham. Yours ever.

(25) The Chevalier, afterwards Mar`echal de Muy, was offered
that place, but declined it. He eventually filled it in the
early part of the reign of Louis XVI.-E.

(26) The Duc de Choiseul was dismissed from the ministry
through the intrigues of Madame du Barry, who accused him of an
improper correspondence with Spain.-- E.

(27) Then charg`e des affaires from the French court in London.

(28) It appears by Madame du Deffand's Letters to Walpole, that
she had addressed to him, on the 27th of December, one of
considerable length, filled with details relative to the
dismissal of the Duc de Choiseul, which took place on the 24th,
and the appointment of his successor; but this letter is
unfortunately lost.-E.

(29) By the reduction which the Abb`e de Terrai, when he first
entered upon the controle g`en`eral, made upon all pensions,
Madame du Deffand had lost three thousand livres of income. To
her letter of the 2d of February 1771, announcing this
diminution, Walpole made the following generous reply:--"Je ne
saurois souffrir une telle diminution de votre bien. O`u
voulez-vous faire des retranchemens? O`u est-il possible que
vous en fassiez? Ne daignez pas fire un pas, s'il n'est pas
fait, pour remplacer vos trois Mille livres. Ayez assez
d'amiti`e pour moi pour les accepter de ma part. Accordez-moi,
je vous conjure, la gr`ace, que je vous demande aux genoux, et
jouissez de la satisfaction de vous dire, j'ai un ami qui ne
permettra jamais que je me jette aux pieds des grands. Ma
Petite, j'insiste."-E.

(30) Mr. Bathurst was created Lord Apsley, and appointed Lord
Chancellor; Sir William de Grey was made Chief Justice of the
Common Pleas; Mr. Thurlow, attorney-general and Mr. Wedderburn,
solicitor-general.-E.

Letter 22 To The Rev. Mr. Cole.
Arlington Street, Jan. 10, 1771. (page 45)

As I am acquainted with Mr. Paul Sandby, the brother of the
architect,(31) I asked him if there was a design, as I had
heard, of making a print or prints of King's College Chapel, by
the King's order'! He answered directly, by no means. His
brother made a general sketch of the chapel for the use of the
lectures he reads on architecture at the Royal Academy. Thus,
dear Sir, Mr. Essex may be perfectly easy that there is no
intention of interfering with his work. I then mentioned to
Mr. Sandby Mr. Essex's plan, which he much approved, but said
the plates would cost a great sum. The King, he thought, would
be inclined to patronise the work; but I own I do not know how
to get it laid before him. His own artists would probably
discourage any scheme that might entrench on their own
advantages. Mr. Thomas Sandby, the architect, is the only one
of them I am acquainted with; and Mr. Essex must think whether
he would like to let him into any participation of the work.
If I can get any other person to mention it to his Majesty, I
will; but you know me, and that I have always kept clear of
connexions with courts and ministers, and have no interest with
either, and perhaps my recommendation might do as much hurt as
good, especially as the artists in favour might be jealous Of
One who understands a little of their professions, and is apt
to say what he thinks. In truth, there is another danger,
which is that they might not assist Mr. Essex without views of
profiting of his labours. I am slightly acquainted with Mr.
Chambers,(32) the architect, and have a good opinion of him: if
Mr. Essex approves my communicating his plan to him or Mr.
Sandby, I should think it more likely to succeed by their
intervention, than by any lord of the court; for, at last, the
King would certainly take the opinion of his artists. When you
have talked this over with Mr. Essex, let me know the result.
Till he has determined, there can be no use in Mr. Essex's
coming to town.

Mr. Gray will bring down some of my drawings to Bannerman, and
when you go over to Cambridge, I will beg you now and then to
supervise him. For Mr. Bentham's book, I rather despair of it;
and should it ever appear, he will have had people expect it
too long, which will be of no service to it, though I do not
doubt of its merit. Mr. Gray will show you my answer to"Dr.
Milles.(33) Yours ever.

(31) Paul Sandby, the well-known artist in water-colours, was
brother to Thomas Sandby, who was professor of architecture in
the Royal Academy of London.-E.

(32) Afterwards Sir William Chambers, author of the well-known
"Treatise on Civil Architecture;" a "Dissertation on Oriental
Gardening," etc. In 1775, he was appointed to superintend the
building of Somerset-house, in the Strand.-E.

(33) In the early part of this year, Walpole's house in
Arlington-street was broke open, without his servants being
alarmed; all the locks forced off his drawers, cabinets, etc.
their contents scattered about the rooms, and yet nothing taken
away. In her letter of the 3d of April, Madame du Deffand
says, "Votre aventure fait tenir ici toute sorte de propos: les
uns disent que l'on vous soup`connait d'avoir une
correspondence secr`ete avec M. de Choiseul.-E.

Letter 23 To The Rev. Mr. Cole.
Arlington Street, May 29, 1771. (page 46)

Dear Sir,
I have but time to write you a line, that I may not detain Mr.
Essex, who is so good as to take charge of this note, and of a
box, which I am sure will give you pleasure, and I beg may give
you a little trouble. It contains the very valuable seven
letters of Edward the sixth to Barnaby Fitzpatrick. Lord
Ossory, to whom they belong, has lent them to me to print, but
to facilitate that, and to prevent their being rubbed or hurt
by the printer, I must entreat your exactness to copy them, and
return them with the copies. I need not desire your particular
care; for you value these things as much as I do, and will be
able to make them out better than I can do, from being so much
versed in old writing. Forgive my taking this liberty with
you, which, I flatter myself, will not be disagreeable. Mr.
Essex and Mr. Tyson dined with me at Strawberry Hill; but could
not stay so long as I wished. The party would have been still
more agreeable if you had made a fourth. Adieu! dear Sir,
yours ever.

Letter 24 To The Rev. Mr. Cole.
Arlington Street, June 11, 1771. (page 47)

You are very kind, dear Sir, and I ought to be, nay, what is
more, I am ashamed of giving you so much trouble; but I am in
no hurry for the letters. I shall not set out till the 7th of
next month, And it will be sufficient if I receive them a week
before I set out. Mr. C. C. C. C. is very welcome to attack me
about a Duchess of Norfolk. He is even welcome to be in the
right; to the edification I hope of all the matrons at the
Antiquarian Society, who I trust will insert his criticism in
the next volume of their Archaeologia, or Old Women's Logic;
but, indeed, I cannot bestow my time on any more of them, nor
employ myself in detecting witches for vomiting pins. When
they turn extortioners like Mr. Masters,(34) the law should
punish them, not only for roguery, but for exceeding their
province, which our ancestors limited to killing their
neighbour's cow, or crucifying dolls of wax. For my own part,
I am so far from being out of charity with him, that I would
give him a nag or new broom whenever he has a mind to ride to
the Antiquarian sabbat, and preach against me. Though you have
more cause to be angry, laugh -,it him as I do. One has not
life enough to throw away on all the fools and knaves that come
across one. I have often been attacked, and never replied but
to Mr. Hume and Dr. Milles--to the first, because he had a
name; to the second, because he had a mind to have one:--and
yet I was in the wrong, for it was the only way he could attain
one. In truth, it is being too self-interested, to expose only
one's private antagonists, when one lets worse men pass
unmolested. Does a booby hurt me by an attack on me, more than
by any other foolish thing he does? Does not he tease me more
by any thing he says to me, without attacking me, than by any
thing he says against me behind my back? I shall, therefore,
most certainly never inquire after or read Mr. C. C. C. C.'s
criticism, but leave him to oblivion with her Grace of Norfolk,
and our wise society. As I doubt my own writings will soon be
forgotten, I need not fear that those of my answerers will be
remembered.

(34) There is a note on this letter in Cole's handwriting. Mr.
Mason had informed him, that Mr. Masters had lately read a
paper at the Antiquarian Society against some mistake of Mr.
Walpole's respective a Duchess of Norfolk; and he adds, "This I
informed Mr. Walpole of in my letter, and said something to him
of Masters' extortion in making me pay forty pounds towards the
repairing his vicarage-house at Waterbeche, which he pretended
he had fitted up for my reception."

Letter 25 To The Hon. H. S. Conway.(35)
Strawberry Hill, June 17, 1771. (page 48)

I was very sure you would grant my request, if you could, and I
am perfectly satisfied with your reasons; but I do not believe
the parties concerned will be so too, especially the heads of
the family, who are not so ready to serve their relations at
their own expense as gratis. When I see you I will tell you
more, and what I thought I had told you.

You tax me with four days in Bedfordshire; I was but three at
most, and of those the evening I went, and the morning I came
away, made the third day. I will try to see you before I go.
The Edgcumbes I should like and Lady Lyttelton, but Garrick
does not tempt me at all. I have no taste for his perpetual
buffoonery, and am sick of his endless expectation of flattery;
but you who charge me with making a long visit to Lord and Lady
Ossory,--you do not see the mote in your own eye; at least I am
sure Lady Ailesbury does not see that in hers. I could not
obtain a single day from her all last year, and with difficulty
got her to give me a few hours this. There is always an
indispensable pheasantry that must be visited, or some thing
from which she cannot spare four-and-twenty hours. Strawberry
sets this down in its pocket-book. and resents the neglect.

At two miles from Houghton Park is the mausoleum of the Bruces,
where I saw the most ridiculous monument of one of Lady
Ailesbury's predecessors that ever was imagined; I beg she will
never keep such company. In the midst of an octagon chapel is
the tomb of Diana, Countess of Oxford and Elgin. From a huge
unwieldy base of white marble rises a black marble cistern;
literally a cistern that would serve for an eating-room. In
the midst of this, to the knees, stands her ladyship in a white
domino or shroud, with her left hand erect as giving her
blessing. It put me in mind of Mrs. Cavendish when she got
drunk in the bathing-tub. At another church is a kind of
catacomb for the Earls of Kent: there are ten sumptuous
monuments. Wrest and Hawnes are both ugly places; the house at
the former is ridiculously old and bad. The state bedchamber
(not ten feet high) and its drawing-room, are laced with Ionic
columns of spotted velvet, and friezes of patchwork. There are
bushels of deplorable earls and countesses. The garden was
execrable too, but is something mended by Brown. Houghton Park
and Ampthill stand finely: the last is a very good house, and
has a beautiful park. The other has three beautiful old
fronts, in the style of Holland House, with turrets and
loggias, but not so large within. It is the worst contrived
dwelling I ever saw. Upon the whole, I was much diverted with
my journey. On my return I stayed but a single hour in London,
saw no soul, and came hither to meet the deluge. It has rained
all night, and all day; but it is midsummer, consequently
midwinter, and one can expect no better. Adieu!

(35) Now first printed.

Letter 26 To The Earl Of Strafford.
Strawberry Hill, June 20, 1771. (page 49)

I have waited impatiently, my dear lord, for something worth
putting into a letter but trees do not speak in parliament, nor
flowers write in the newspapers; and they are almost the only
beings I have seen. I dined on Tuesday at Notting-hill(36)
with the Countesses of Powis and Holderness, Lord and Lady
Pelham, and Lord Frederick Cavendish--and Pam; and shall go to
town on Friday to meet the same company at Lady Holderness's;
and this short journal comprises almost my whole history and
knowledge.

I must now ask your lordship's and Lady Strafford's commands
for Paris. I shall set out on the 7th of next month. You will
think, though you will not tell me so, that these are Very
juvenile jaunts at my age. Indeed, I should be ashamed if I
went for any other pleasure but that of once more seeing my
dear blind friend, whose much greater age forbids my depending
on seeing more often.(37) It will, indeed, be amusing to
change the scene of politics for though I have done with our
own, one cannot help hearing them--nay, reading them; for, like
flies, they come to breakfast with one's bread and butter. I
wish there was any other vehicle for them but a newspaper; a
place into which, considering how they are exhausted, I am sure
they have no pretensions. The Duc d'Aiguillon, I hear, is
minister. Their politics, some way or other, must end
seriously, either in despotism, a civil war, or assassination.
Methinks, it is playing deep for the power of tyranny. Charles
Fox is more moderate: he only games for an hundred thousand
pounds that he has not.

Have you read the Life of Benvenuto Cellini,(38) my lord? I am
angry with him for being more distracted and wrong-headed than
my Lord Herbert. Till the revival of these two, I thought the
present age had borne the palm of absurdity from all its
predecessors. But I find our contemporaries are quiet good
folks, that only game till they hang themselves, and do not
kill every body they meet in the street. Who would have
thought we were so reasonable?

Ranelagh, they tell me, is full of foreign dukes. There is a
Duc de la Tr`emouille, a Duc d'Aremberg, and other grandees. I
know the former, and am not sorry to be out of his way.

It is not pleasant to leave groves and lawns and rivers for a
dirty town with a dirtier ditch, calling itself the Seine; but
I dare not encounter the sea and bad inns in cold weather.
This consideration will bring me back by the end of August. I
should be happy to execute any commission for your lordship.
You know how earnestly I wish always to show myself your
lordship's most faithful humble servant.

(36) near Kensington. The villa of Lady Mary Coke.

(37) In the February of this-year Madame du Deffand had made
her will, and bequeathed Walpole all her manuscripts-. In her
letter of the 17th, informing him that she had so done, she
says, "Je fis usage de votre 'j'y consens.' J'ai une vraie
satisfaction que cette affaire soit termin`ee, et jamais vous
ne m'avez fait un plus v`eritable plaisir qu'en pronon`cant ces
deux mots."-E.

(38) The celebrated Florentine sculptor, "one of the most
extraordinary men in an extraordinary age," so designated by
Walpole. His Life, written by himself, was first published in
English in 1771, from a translation by Dr. T. Nugent; of which
a new edition, corrected and enlarged, with the notes and
observations of G. P. Carpani, translated by Thomas Roscoe,
appeared in 1822.-E.

Letter 27 To The Rev. Mr. Cole.
Arlington Street, June 22, 1771. (page 50)

I just write you a line, dear Sir, to acknowledge the receipt
of the box of papers, which is come very safe, and to give you
a thousand thanks for the trouble you have taken. As you
promise me another letter I will wait to answer it.

At present I will only beg another favour, and with less shame,
as it is of a kind you will like to grant. I have lately been
at Lord Ossory's at Ampthill. You know Catherine of Arragon
lived some time there.(39) Nothing remains of the castle, nor
any marks of residence, but a very small bit of her garden. I
proposed to Lord Ossory to erect a cross to her memory on the
spot, and he will. I wish, therefore, you could, from your
collections of books, or memory, pick out an authentic form of
a cross, of a better appearance than the common run. It must
be raised on two or three steps; and if they were octagon,
would it not be handsomer? Her arms must be hung like an order
upon it. Here is something of my idea.(40) The shield
appendant to a collar. We will have some inscriptions to mark
the cause of erection. Adieu! Your most obliged.

(39) After her divorce from Henry the Eighth.

(40) A rough sketch in the margin of the letter.

Letter 28 To The Rev. Mr. Cole.
Strawberry Hill, June 24, 1771. (page 51)

Dear Sir,
when I wrote to you t'other day, I had not opened the box of
letters, and consequently had not found yours, for which, and
the prints, I give you a thousand thanks; though Count Bryan I
have, and will return to you. Old Walker(41) is very like, and
is valuable for being mentioned in the Dunciad, and a
curiosity, from being mentioned there without abuse.

Your notes are very judicious,(42) and your information most
useful to me in drawing up some little preface to the Letters;
which, however, I shall not have time now to do before my
journey, as I shall set out on Sunday se'nnight. I like your
motto much. The Lady Cecilia's Letters are, as you say, more
curious for the writer than the matter. We know very little of
those daughters of Edward IV. Yet she and her sister
Devonshire lived to be old; especially Cecily, who was married
to Lord Wells; and I have found why: he was first cousin to
Henry VII., who, I suppose, thought it the safest match for
her. I wish I knew all she and her sisters knew of her
brothers, and their uncle Richard III. Much good may it do my
Lord of Canterbury with his parboiled stag! Sure there must be
more curiosities in Bennet Library!

Though your letter is so entertaining and useful to me, the
passage I like best is a promise you make me of a visit in the
autumn with Mr. Essex. Pray put him in mind of it, as I shall
you. It would add much to the obligation if you would bring
two or three of your MS. volumes of collections with you.
Yours ever.

(41) Dr. Richard Walker, vice-master of Trinity College, by
Lambourne.

(42) From King Edward's Journal relating to Mr. Fitzpatrick.

Letter 29 To John Chute, Esq.
Amiens, Tuesday evening, July 9, 1771. (page 51)

I am got no farther yet, as I travel leisurely, and do not
venture to fatigue myself. My voyage was but of four hours. I
was sick only by choice and precaution, and find myself in
perfect health. The enemy, I hope, has not returned to pinch
you again, and that you defy the foul fiend. The weather is
but lukewarm, and I should choose to have all the windows shut,
if my smelling was not much more summerly than my feeling; but
the frowsiness of obsolete tapestry and needlework is
insupportable. Here are old fleas and bugs talking of Louis
Quatorze like tattered refugees in the park, and they make poor
Rosette attend them, whether she will or not. This is a woful
account of an evening in July, and which Monsieur de St.
Lambert has omitted in his Seasons, though more natural than
any thing he has placed there. I f the Grecian religion had
gone into the folly of self-mortification, I suppose the
devotees of Flora would have shut themselves up in a nasty inn,
and have punished their noses for the sensuality of having
smelt to a rose or a honeysuckle.

This is all I have yet to say; for I have had no adventure, no
accident, nor seen a soul but my cousin Richard Walpole, whom I
met on the road and spoke to in his chaise. To-morrow I shall
lie at Chantilly, and be at Paris early on Thursday. The
Churchills are there already. Good night-- and a sweet one to
you!

Paris, Wednesday night, July 10.

I was so suffocated with my inn last night, that I mustered all
my resolution, rose with the alouette this morning, and was in
my chaise by five o'clock I got hither by eight this evening,
tired, but rejoiced; I have had a comfortable dish of tea, and
am going to bed in clean sheets. I sink myself even to my dear
old woman(43) and my sister; for it is impossible to sit down
and be made charming At this time of night after fifteen posts,
and after having been here twenty times before.

At Chantilly I crossed the Countess of Walpole, who lies there
to-night on her way to England. But I concluded she had no
curiosity about me-and I could not brag of more about her-and
so we had no intercourse. I am wobegone to find my Lord F -* *
* in the same hotel. He is as starched as an old-fashioned
plaited neckcloth, and come to suck wisdom from this curious
school of philosophy. He reveres me because I was acquainted
with his father; and that does not at all increase my
partiality to the son.

Luckily, the post departs early to-morrow morning I thought you
would like to hear I was arrived -well. I should be happy to
hear you are so; but do not torment yourself too soon, nor will
I torment you. I have fixed the 26th of August for setting out
on my return. These jaunts are too juvenile. I am ashamed to
look back and remember in what year of Methuselah I was here
first. Rosette Sends her blessing to her daughter. Adieu!
Yours ever.

(43) Madame du Deffand; who, in her letter to Walpole of the
12th of June, had said, "Je sens l'exc`es de votre
complaisance; j'ai tant de joie de l'esp`erance de vous revoir
qu'il me semble que rien ne peut plus m'affliger ni
m'attrister."--E.

Letter 30 To The Hon. H. S. Conway.
Paris, July 30, 1771. (page 52)

I do not know where you are, nor where this will find you, nor
when it will set out to seek you, as I am not certain by whom I
shall send it. It is of little consequence, as I have nothing
material to tell you, but what you probably may have heard.

The distress here is incredible, especially at court. The
King's tradesmen are ruined, his servants starving, and even
angels and archangels cannot get their pensions and salaries,
but sing, "Woe! woe! woe!" instead of Hosannahs. Compi`egne is
abandoned; Villiers-coterets and Chantilly(44) crowded, and
Chanteloup(45) still more in fashion, whither every body goes
that pleases; though, when they ask leave, the answer is, "Je
ne le defends ni le permets." This is the first time that ever
the will of a King of France was interpreted against his
inclination. Yet, after annihilating his Parliament, and
ruining public credit, he tamely submits to be affronted by his
own servants. Madame de Beauveau, and two or three
high-spirited dames, defy this Czar of Gaul- Yet they and their
cabal are as inconsistent on the other hand. They make
epigrams, sing vaudevilles(46) against the mistress, hand about
libels against the Chancellor, and have no more effect than a
sky-rocket; but in three months will die to go to court, and to
be invited to sup with Madame du Barry. The only real struggle
is between the Chancellor(47) and the Duc d'Aiguillon. The
first is false, bold, determined, and not subject to little
qualms. The other is less known, communicates himself to
nobody, is suspected of deep policy and deep designs, but seems
to intend to set out under a mask of very smooth varnish; for
he has just obtained the payment of all his bitter enemy La
Chalotais' pensions and arrears. He has the advantage, too, of
being but moderately detested in comparison of his rival, and,
what he values more, the interest of the mistress.(48) The
Comptroller-general serves both, by acting mischief more
sensibly felt; for he ruins every body but those who purchase a
respite from his mistress.(49) He dispenses bankruptcy by
retail, and will fall, because he cannot even by these means be
useful enough. They are striking off nine millions la caisse
militaire, five from the marine, and one from the afaires
`etrang`eres: yet all this will not extricate them. You never
saw a great nation in so disgraceful a position. Their next
prospect is not better: it rests on an imbecile, both in mind
and body.

July 31.

Mr. Churchill and my sister set out to-night after supper, and
I shall send this letter by them. There are no new books, no
new Plays, no new novels; nay, no new fashions. They have
dragged old Mademoiselle Le Maure out of a retreat of thirty
years, to sing at the Colis`ee, which is a most gaudy Ranelagh,
gilt, painted, and becupided like an Opera, but not calculated
to last as long as Mother Coliseum, being composed of chalk and
pasteboard. Round it are courts of treillage, that serve for
nothing, and behind it a canal, very like a horsepond, on which
there are fireworks and justs. Altogether it is very pretty;
but as there are few nabobs and nabobesses in this country, and
as the middling and common people are not much richer than Job
when he had lost every thing but his patience, the proprietors
are on the point of being ruined, unless the project takes
place that is talked of. It is, to oblige Corneille, Racine,
and Moli`ere to hold their tongues twice a-week, that their
audiences may go to the Colis`ee. This is like our
Parliament's adjourning when senators want to go to Newmarket.
There is a Monsieur Gaillard writing a "History of the
Rivalit`e de la France et de l'Angleterre."(50) I hope he will
not omit this parallel.

The instance of their poverty that strikes me most, who make
political observations by the thermometer of baubles, is, that
there is nothing new in their shops. I know the faces of every
snuff-box and every tea-cup as well as those of Madame du Lac
and Monsieur Poirier. I have chosen some cups and saucers for
my Lady Ailesbury, as she ordered me; but I cannot say they are
at all extraordinary. I have bespoken two cabriolets for her,
instead of six, because I think them very dear, and that she
may have four more if she likes them. I shall bring, too, a
sample of a baguette that suits them. For myself, between
economy and the want of novelty, I have not laid out five
guineas--a very memorable anecdote in the history of my life.
Indeed, the Czarina and I have a little dispute; she has
offered to purchase the whole Crozat collection of pictures, at
which I had intended to ruin myself. The Turks thank her for
it! Apropos, they are sending from hence fourscore officers to
Poland, each of whom I suppose, like Almanzor, can stamp with
his foot and raise an army.

As my sister travels like a Tartar princess with her whole
horde, she will arrive too late almost for me to hear from you
in return to this letter, which in truth requires no answer,
v`u que I shall set out myself on the 26th of August. You will
not imagine that I am glad to save myself the pleasure of
hearing from you; but I would not give you the trouble of
writing unnecessarily. If you are at home, and not in
Scotland, you will judge by these dates where to find me.
Adieu!

P. S. Instead of restoring the Jesuits, they are proceeding to
annihilate the Celestines, Augustines, and some other orders.

(44) The country palaces of the Duke of Orleans and the Prince
of Cond`e; who were in disgrace at court for having espoused
the cause of the Parliament of Paris, banished by the
Chancellor Maupeou.

(45) The country seat of the Duc de Choiseul, to which, on his
ceasing to be first minister, he was banished by the King.

(46) The following `echantillon of these vaudevilles was given
by Madame du Deffand to Walpole:--

"L'avez-vous vue, ma Du Barry,
Elle a ravi mon `ame;
Pour elle j'ai perdu l'esprit,
Des Fran`cais j'ai le bl`ame:
Charmants enfans de la Gourdon,
Est-elle chez vous maintenant?
Rendez-la-moi,
Je suis le Roi,
Soulagez mon martyre;
Rendez-la-moi,
Elle est `a moi,
Je suis son pauvre Sire.
Llavez-vous vue, etc.

"Je sais qu'autrefois les laquais
Ont f`et`e ses jeunes attraits;
Que les cochers,
Les peruquiers,
L'aimaient, l'aimaient d'amour ex`eme,
Mais pas autant que je l'aime.
L'avez-vous vue," etc,-E.

(47) Maupeou.

(48) Madame du Barry.'''

(49) The Abb`e Terrai was comptroller-general of the finances.
His mistress, known in the fashionable circles of Paris by the
name of La Sultane, received money, as it was supposed, in
concert with the Abb`e himself, for every act of favour or
justice solicited from the department over which he presided.-E.

(50) In a letter to Walpole, Madame du Deffand thus speaks of
this work:--"Il m'arrive une bonne fortune apr`es laquelle je
soupirais depuis longtemps: c'est un livre qui me plait
infiniment; il est de M. Gaillard; il a Pour titre 'Rivalit`e
de la France et de l'Angleterre;' il est par chapitres, et
chaque chapitre est les `ev`enemens du r`egne d'un Roi de
France et d'un Roi d'Angleterre contemporains. Il est bien
loin d'`etre fini; il n'en est qu'a Philippe de Valois et
Edouard Trois. Il n'y a que trois volumes; il y en aura
peut-`etre douze ou quinze." The work, which was not completed
till the year 1774, extended to eleven Volumes.-E.

Letter 31 To John Chute, Esq.
Paris, August 5, 1771. ((page 55)

It is a great satisfaction to Me to find by your letter of the
30th, that you have had no return of your gout. I have been
assured here, that the best remedy is to cut one's nails in hot
water. It is, I fear, as certain as any other remedy! It
would at least be so here, if their bodies were of a piece with
their understandings; or if both were as curable as they are
the contrary. Your prophecy, I doubt, is not better founded
than the prescription. I may be lame; but I shall never be a
duck, nor deal in the garbage of the Alley. I envy your
Strawberry tide, and need not say how much I wish I was there
to receive you. Methinks, I should be as glad of a little
grass, as a seaman after a long voyage. Yet English gardening
gains ground here prodigiously-not much at a time, indeed--I
have literally seen one, that is exactly like a tailor's paper
of patterns. There is a Monsieur Boutin, who has tacked a
piece of what he calls an English garden to a set of stone
terraces, with steps of turf. There are three or four very
high hills, almost as high as, and exactly in the shape of, a
tansy pudding. You squeeze between these and a river, that is
conducted at obtuse angles in a stone channel, and supplied by
a pump, and when walnuts Come in I suppose it will be
navigable. In a corner enclosed by a chalk wall are the
samples I mentioned: there is a stripe of grass, another of
corn, and a third en friche, exactly in the order of beds in a
nursery. They have translated Mr. Whately's book,(51) and the
Lord knows what barbarism is going to be laid at our door.
This new anglomanie will literally be mad English.

New arr`ets, new retrenchments, new misery, stalk forth every
day. The Parliament of Besan`con is dissolved; so are the
grenadiers de France. The King's tradesmen are all bankrupt;
no pensions are paid, and every body is reforming their suppers
and equipages. Despotism makes converts faster than ever
Christianity did. Louis Quinze is the true rex
Ckristianissimus, and has ten times more success than his
dragooning great-grandfather. Adieu, my dear Sir! Yours most
faithfully.

Friday, 9th.

This was to have gone by a private hand, but cannot depart till
Monday; so I may be continuing my letter till I bring it
myself. I have been again at the Chartreuse; and though it was
the sixth time, I am more enchanted with those paintings(52)
than ever. If it is not the first work in the world, and must
yield to the Vatican, yet in simplicity and harmony it beats
Raphael himself. There is a vapour over all the pictures, that
makes them more natural than any representation of objects-1
cannot conceive bow it is effected! You see them through the
shine of a southeast wind. These poor folks do not know the
inestimable treasure they possess--but they are perishing these
pictures, and one gazes at them as at a setting sun. There is
the purity of a Racine in them, but they give me more pleasure-
-and I should much sooner be tired of the poet than of the
painter.

It is very singular that I have not half the satisfaction in
going into C, churches and convents that I used to have. The
consciousness that the vision is dispelled, the want of fervour
so obvious in the religious, the solitude that one knows
proceeds from contempt, not from contemplation, make those
places appear like abandoned theatres destined to destruction.
The monks trot about as if they had not long to stay there; and
what used to be the holy gloom is now but dirt and darkness.
There is no more deception than in a tragedy acted by
candlesnuffers. One is sorry to think that an empire of common
sense would not be very picturesque; for, as there is nothing
but taste that can compensate for the imagination of madness, I
doubt there will never be twenty men of taste for twenty
thousand madmen. The world will no more see Athens, Rome, and
the Medici again, than a succession of five good emperors, like
Nerva, Trajan, Adrian, and the two Antonines.

August 13.

Mr. Edmonson called on me; and, as he sets on to-morrow, I can
safely trust my letter to him. I have, I own,, been much
shocked at reading Gray's(53) death in the papers. 'Tis an
hour that makes one forget any subject of complaint, especially
towards one with whom I lived in friendship from thirteen years
old. As self lies so rooted in self, no doubt the nearness of
our ages made the stroke recoil to my own breast; and having so
little expected his death, it is Plain how little I expect my
own. Yet to you, who of all men living are the most forgiving,
I need not excuse the concern I feel. I fear most men ought to
apologize for their want of feeling, instead of palliating that
sensation when they have it. I thought that what I had seen of
the world had hardened my heart; but I find that it had formed
my language, not extinguished my tenderness. In short, I am
really shocked--nay, I am hurt at my own weakness, as I
perceive that when I love any body, it is for my life; and I
have had too Much reason not to wish that such a disposition
may very seldom be put to the trial.(54) You, at least, are
the only person to whom I would venture to make such a
confession.

Adieu! my dear Sir! Let me know when I arrive, which will be
about the last day of the month, when I am likely to see YOU.
I have much to say to you. Of being here I am most heartily
tired, and nothing but the dear old woman should keep me here
an hour-I am weary of them to death-but that is not new! Yours
ever.

(51) Entitled "An Essay on Design in Gardening," Mr. Whately
was at this time under-secretary of state, and member for
Castle Rising. In January, 1772, he was made keeper of the
King's private roads, gates, and bridges, and died in the June
following.-E.

(52) The Life of St. Bruno, painted by Le Soeur, in the
cloister of the Chartreuse.

(53) On the 24th of July," says Mr. Mitford, "Gray, while at
dinner in the college hall, was seized with an attack of the
gout in his stomach. The violence of the disease resisted all
the powers of medicine: on the 29th he was seized with
convulsions, which returned more violently on the 30th; and he
expired on the evening of that day, in the fifty-fifth year of
his age." Works, Vol. i, P. lvi-E.

(54) "It will appear from this and the two following letters,"
observes Mr. Mitford, "that Walpole's affection and friendship
for Gray was warm and sincere after the reconcilement took
place; and indeed, before that, and immediately after the
quarrel, I believe his regard for Gray was undiminished."
Works, vol. iv. p. 2 12-E.

Letter 32 To The Hon. H. S. Conway.
Paris, August 11, 1771. (page 57)

You will have seen, I hope, before now, that I have not
neglected writing to you. I sent you a letter by my sister,
but doubt she has been a great while upon the road, as they
travel with a large family. I was not sure where you was, and
would not write at random by the post.

I was just going out when I received yours and the newspapers.
I was struck in a most sensible manner, when, after reading
your letter, I saw in the newspapers that Gray is dead! So very
ancient an intimacy(55) and, I suppose, the natural reflection
to self on losing a person but a year older, made me absolutely
start in my chair. It seemed more a corporal than a mental
blow; and yet I am exceedingly concerned for him, and every
body must be so for the loss of such a genius. He called on me
but two or three days before I came hither; he complained of
being ill, and talked of the gout in his stomach--but I
expected his death no more than my own--and yet the same death
will probably be mine.(56) I am full of all these
reflections-but shall not attrist you with them: only do not
wonder that my letter will be short, when my mind is full of
what I do not give vent to. It was but last night that I was
thinking how few persons last, if one lives to be old, to whom
one can talk without reserve. It is impossible to be intimate
with the Young, because they and the old cannot converse on the
same common topics; and of the old that survive, there are few
one can commence a friendship with, because one has probably
all one's life despised their heart or their understandings.
These are the steps through which one passes to the unenviable
lees of life!

I am very sorry for the state of poor Lady Beauchamp. It
presages ill. She had a prospect of long happiness. Opium is
a very false friend. I will get you Bougainville's book.(57)
I think it is on the Falkland Isles, for it cannot be on those
just discovered; but as I set out to-morrow se'nnight, and
probably may have no opportunity sooner of sending it, I will
bring it myself. Adieu! Yours ever.

(55) It will b recollected, that General Conway travelled with
Gray and Walpole in 1739, and separated from them at Geneva.-E.

(56) Gray's last letter to Walpole was dated March 17, 1771; it
contained the following striking passage:--"He must have a very
strong stomach that can digest the crambe recocta of Voltaire.
Atheism is a vile dish, though all the cooks of France combine
to make new sauces to it. As to the soul, perhaps they may
have none on the Continent; but I do think we have such things
in England; Shakspeare, for example, I believe, had several to
his own share. As to the Jews (though they do not eat pork), I
like them, because they are better Christians than Voltaire."
Works vol. iv. p. 190.-E.

(57) An English translation of the book appeared in 1773, under
the title of "History of a Voyage to the Malonine, or Falkland
Islands, made in 1763 and 1764, under the command of M. de
Bougainville; and of two Voyages to the Straits of Magellan,
with an account of the Patagonians; translated from Don
Pernety's Historical Journal, written in French." In the same
year was published a translation of Bougainville's "Voyage
autour du Monde." This celebrated circumnavigator retired from
the service in 1790. He afterwards was made Count and Senator
by Napoleon Buonaparte, became member of the National Institute
and of the Royal Society of London, and died at Paris in 1811,
at the age of eighty-two.-E.

Letter 33 To The Rev. Mr. Cole.
Paris, August 12, 1771. (page 53)

I am excessively shocked at reading in the papers that Mr. Gray
is dead! I wish to God you may be able to tell me it is not
true! Yet in this painful uncertainty I must rest some days!
None of my acquaintance are in London--I do not know to whom to
apply but to you--alas! I fear in vain! Too many circumstances
speak it true!--the detail is exact;--a second paper arrived by
the same post, and does not contradict it--and, what is worse,
I saw him but four or five days before I came hither: he had
been to Kensington for the air, complained of the gout flying
about him, of sensations of it in his stomach: I, indeed,
thought him changed, and that he looked ill--still I had not
the least idea of his being in danger--I started up from my
chair when I read the paragraph--a cannon-ball would not have
surprised me more! The shock but ceased, to give way to my
concern; and my hopes are too ill-founded to mitigate it. If
nobody has the charity to write to me, my anxiety must continue
till the end of the month, for I shall set out on my return on
the 26th; and unless you receive this time enough for your
answer to leave London on the 20th, in the evening, I cannot
meet it till I find it in Arlington-street, whither I beg you
to direct it.

If the event is but too true, pray add to this melancholy
service, that of telling me any circumstance you know of his
death. Our long, very long friendship, and his genius, must
endear to me every thing that relates to him. What writings
has he left? Who are his executors?(58) I should earnestly
wish, if he has destined any thing to the public, to print it
at my press--it would do me honour, and would give me an
opportunity of expressing what I feel for him. Methinks, as we
grow old, our only business here is to adorn the graves of our
friends, or to dig our own! Adieu, dear Sir! Yours ever.

P. S. I heard this unhappy news but last night; and have just
been told, that Lord Edward Bentinck goes in haste to-morrow to
England; so that you will receive this much sooner than I
expected: still I must desire you to direct to
Arlington-street, as by far the surest conveyance to me.

(58) His executors were, Mason the poet and the Rev. Dr. Brown,
master of Pembroke Hall. "He hath desired," wrote Dr. Brown to
Dr. Wharton, "to be buried near his mother, at Stoke, near
Windsor, and that one of his executors would see him laid in
the grave; a melancholy task, which must come to my share, for
Mr. Mason is not here." Works, vol. iv. p. 206.-E.

Letter 34 To The Earl Of Strafford.
Paris, August 25, 1771. (page 59)

I have passed my biennial six weeks here, my dear lord, and am
preparing to return as soon as the weather will allow me. It
is some comfort to the patriot virtue, envy, to find this
climate worse than our own. There were four very hot days at
the end of last month, which, you know, with us northern people
compose a summer: it has rained half this, and for these three
days there has been a deluge, a storm, and extreme cold. Yet
these folks shiver in silk, and sit with their Windows open
till supper-time. Indeed, firing is very dear, and nabobs very
scarce. Economy and retrenchment are the words in fashion, and
are founded in a little more than caprice. I have heard no
instance of luxury but in Mademoiselle Guimard, a favourite
dancer, who is building a palace: round the salle `a manger
there are windows that open upon hot-houses, that are to
produce flowers all winter. That is worthy of * * * * * *.
There is a finer dancer, whom Mr. Hobart is to transplant to
London; a Mademoiselle Heinel or Ingle, a Fleming.(59) She is
tall, perfectly made, very handsome, and has a set of attitudes
copied from the classics. She moves as gracefully slow as
Pygmalion's statue when it was Coming to life, and moves her
leg round as imperceptibly as if she was dancing in the zodiac.
But she is not Virgo.

They make no more of breaking parliaments here than an English
mob does of breaking windows. It is pity people are so
ill-sorted. If this King and ours could cross over and figure
in, Louis XV. would dissolve our parliament if Polly Jones did
but say a word to him. They have got into such a habit of it
here, that you would think a parliament was a polypus: they cut
it in two, and by next morning half of it becomes a whole
assembly. This has literally been the case at Besan`con.(60)
Lord and Lady Barrymore, who are in the highest favour at
Compiegne, will be able to carry over the receipt.

Everybody feels in their own way. My grief is to see the
ruinous Condition of the palaces and pictures. I was yesterday
at the Louvre. Le Brun's noble gallery, where the battles of
Alexander are, and of which he designed the ceiling, and even
the shutters, bolts, and locks, is in a worse condition than
the old gallery at Somerset-house. It rains in upon the
pictures, though there are stores of much more valuable pieces
than those of Le Brun. Heaps of glorious works by Raphael and
all the great masters are piled up and equally neglected at
Versailles. Their care is not less destructive in private
houses. The Duke of Orleans' pictures and the Prince of
Monaco's have been cleaned, and varnished so thick that you May
see your face in them; and some of them have been transported
from board to cloth, bit by bit, and the seams filled up with
colour; so that in ten years they will not be worth sixpence.
It makes me as peevish as if I was posterity! I hope your
lordship's works will last longer than these of Louis XIV. The
glories of his si`ecle hasten fast to their end, and little
will remain but those of his authors.

(59) "It was at this time," says Dr. Burney, "that dancing
seemed first to gain the ascendant over music, by the superior
talents of Mademoiselle Heinel, whose grace and execution were
so perfect as to eclipse all other excellence. Crowds
assembled at the Opera-house, more for the gratification of the
eye than the ear; for neither the invention of a new composer,
nor the talents of new singers, attracted the public to the
theatre, which was almost abandoned till the arrival of this
lady, whose extraordinary merit had an extraordinary
recompense; for, besides the six hundred pounds' salary allowed
her by the Honourable Mr. Hobart, as manager, she was
complimented with a regallo of six hundred more from the
Maccaroni Club. 'E molto particulare,' said Cocchi, the
Composer; 'ma quei Inglesi non fanno conto d'alcuna cosa se non
ben pagata:' It is very extraordinary that the English set no
value upon any thing but what they pay an exorbitant price
for."-E.

(60) The Parliaments of Besan`con, Bourdeaux,
Toulouse and Britany, were, in succession, totally suppressed
by Louis XV. New courts were assembled in their stead; most of
the former members being sent into banishment.-E.

Letter 35 To The Hon. H. S. Conway.
Arlington Street, Sept. 7, 1771. (page 61)

I arrived yesterday,(61) within an hour or two after you was
gone, which mortified me exceedingly: Lord knows when I shall
see you. You are so active and so busy, and cast bullets(62)
and build bridges, are pontifex maximus, and, like Sir John
Thorold or Cimon, triumph over land and wave,
that one can never get a word with you. Yet I am very well
worth a general's or a politician's ear. I have been deep in
all the secrets of France, and confidant of some of the
principals of both parties. I know what is, and is to be,
though I am neither priest nor conjuror -and have heard a vast
deal about breaking carabiniers and grenadiers; though, as
usual, I dare say I shall give a woful account of both. The
worst part is, that by the most horrid oppression and injustice
their finances will very soon be in good order-unless some
bankrupt turns Ravaillac, which will not surprise me. The
horror the nation has conceived of the King and Chancellor
makes it probable that the latter, at least, will be
sacrificed. He seems not to be without apprehension, and has
removed from the King's library a MS. trial of a chancellor
who was condemned to be hanged under Charles VII. For the
King, qui a fait ses `epreuves, and not to his honour, you will
not wonder that he lives in terrors.

I have executed all Lady Ailesbury's commissions; but mind, I
do not commission you to tell her, for you would certainly
forget it. As you will, no doubt, come to town to report who
burnt Portsmouth;(63) I will meet you here, if I am apprised of
the day. Your niece's marriage,(64) pleases me extremely.
Though I never saw him till last night, I know a great deal of
her future husband, and like his character. His person is much
better than I expected, and far preferable to many of the fine
young moderns. He is better than Sir Watkin Williams Wynne, at
least as well as the Duke of Devonshire, and Adonis compared to
the charming Mr. Fitzpatrick. Adieu!

(61) Mr. Walpole arrived at Paris on the '10th of July, and
left it on the 2d of September-E.

(62) Mr. Conway was now at the head of the ordnance, but with
the title and appointments of lieutenant-general only. The
particular circumstances attending this are thus recorded in a
letter from Mr. Walpole to another correspondent at the time
(January 1770), and deserve to be known:--"The King offered the
mastership of the ordnance, on Lord Granby's resignation, to
Mr. Conway, who is only lieutenant-general of it: he said he
had lived in friendship with Lord Granby, and would not profit
by his spoils; but, as he thought he could do some essential
service in the office, where there were many abuses, if his
Majesty would be pleased to let him continue as he is, be would
do the business of the office without accepting the salary."-E.

(63) On the 27th of July, a fire had broken out in the dockyard
at Portsmouth, which, as it might be highly prejudicial to the
country at that period, excited universal alarm. The loss
sustained by it, which at first was supposed to be half a
million, is said to have been about one hundred and fifty
thousand pounds.-E.

(64) The marriage of Lady Gertrude Seymour Conway to Lord
Villiers, afterwards Earl of Grandison.

Letter 36 To The Rev. Mr. Cole.
Strawberry Hill, Sept. 10, 1771. (page 62)

However melancholy the occasion is, I can but give you a
thousand thanks, dear Sir-., for the kind trouble you have
taken, and the information you have given me about poor Mr.
Gray. I received your first letter at Paris; the last I found
at my house in town, where I arrived only on Friday last. The
circumstance of the professor refusing to rise in the night and
visit him, adds to the shock. Who is that true professor of
physic? Jesus! is their absence to murder as well as their
presence?

I have not heard from Mr. Mason, but I have written to him. Be
so good as to tell the Master at Pembroke,(65) though I have
not the honour of knowing him, how sensible I am of his
proposed attention to me, and how much I feel for him in losing
a friend of so excellent a genius. Nothing will allay my own
concern like seeing any of his compositions that I have not yet
seen. It is buying them too dear--but when the author is
irreparably lost, the produce of his Mind is the next best
possession. I have offered my press to Mr. Mason, and hope it
will be accepted.

Many thanks for the cross, dear Sir; it is precisely what I
wished. I hope you and Mr. Essex preserve your resolution of
passing a few days here between this and Christmas. Just at
present I am not My own master, having stepped into the middle
of a sudden match in my own family. Lord Hertford is going to
marry his third daughter to Lord Villiers, son of Lady
Grandison, the present wife of Sir Charles Montagu. We are all
felicity, and in a round of dinners. I am this minute returned
from Beaumont-lodge, at Old Windsor, where Sir Charles
Grandison lives. I will let you know, if the papers do not,
when our festivities are subsided.

I shall receive with gratitude from Mr. Tyson either drawing or
etching of our departed friend; but wish not to have it
inscribed to me, as it is an honour, more justly due to Mr.
Stonehewer. If the Master of Pembroke will accept a copy of a
small picture I have of Mr. Gray, painted soon after the
publication of his Ode on Eton, it shall be at his service--and
after his death I beg, it may be bequeathed to his college.
Adieu!

(65) Dr. James Brown. Gray used to call him "le petit bon
homme;" and Cole, in his Athene Cantab, says of him--"He is a
very worthy man, a good scholar, small, and short-sighted." In
the Chatham Correspondence there will be found an interesting
letter from the Master of Pembroke to Lord Chatham, in which he
thus speaks of his illustrious son, the future minister of this
country: " Notwithsanding the illness of your son, I have
myself seen, and have heard enough from his tutors, to be
convinced both of his extraordinary genius and most amiable
disposition. He promises fair, indeed to be one of those
extraordinary persons whose eminent parts, equalled by as
eminent industry, continue in a progressive state throughout
their lives; such persons appear to be formed by Heaven to
assist and bless mankind." Vol. iv. p. 311.-E.

Letter 37 To The Rev. Mr. Cole.
Strawberry Hill, Oct. 12, 1771. (page 63)

Dear Sir,
As our wedding will not be so soon as I expected, and as I
should be unwilling You Should take a journey in bad weather, I
wish it may be convenient to you and Mr. Essex to come hither
on the 25th day of this present month. If one can depend on
any season, it is on the chill suns of October, which, like an
elderly beauty, are less capricious than spring or summer. Our
old-fashioned October, you know, reached eleven days into
modern November, and I still depend on that reckoning, when I
have a mind to protract the year.

Lord Ossory is charmed with Mr. Essex's cross(66) and wishes
much to consult him on the proportions. Lord Ossory has taken a
small house very near mine; is now, and will be here again,
after Newmarket. He is determined to erect it at Ampthill, and
I have written the following lines to record the reason:

In days of old here Ampthill's towers were seen;
The mournful refuge of an injured queen.
Here flowed her pure, but unavailing tears;
Here blinded zeal sustain'd her sinking years.
Yet Freedom hence-her radiant banners waved,
And love avenged a realm by priests enslaved.
From Catherine's wrongs a nation's bliss was spread,
And Luther's light from Henry's lawless bed,

I hope the satire on Henry VIII. will make you excuse the
compliment to Luther, Which, like most poetic compliments, does
not come from my heart. I only like him better than Henry,
Calvin, and the Church of Rome, who were bloody persecutors.
Calvin was an execrable villain, and the worst of all; for he
copied those whom he pretended to correct. Luther was as
jovial as Wilkes, and served the cause of liberty without
canting. Yours most sincerely.

(66) Mr. Cole applied to Mr. Essex, who furnished a design for
the cross, which was followed.

Letter 38 To The Rev Mr. Cole.
Strawberry Hill, Oct. 23, 1771. (page 63)

I am sorry, dear Sir, that I cannot say your answer is as
agreeable and entertaining as you flatter me my letter was; but
consider, you are prevented coming to me, and have flying pains
of rheumatism--either were sufficient to spoil your letter.

I am sure of being here till to-morrow se'nnight, the last of
this month; consequently I may hope to see Mr. Essex here on
Monday, Tuesday, or Wednesday next. After that I cannot answer
for myself, on account of our wedding, which depends on the
return of a courier from Ireland. If I can command any days
certain in November, I will give you notice: and yet I shall
have a scruple of dragging you so far from home at such a
season. I will leave it to your option, only begging you to be
assured that I shall always be most happy to see you.

I am making a very curious purchase at Paris, the complete
armour of Francis the First. It is gilt, in relief, and is
very rich and beautiful. It comes out of the Crozat
collection.(67) I am building a small chapel, too, in my
garden, to receive two valuable pieces of antiquity, and which
have been presents singularly lucky for me. They are the
window from Bexhill, with the portraits of Henry III. and his
Queen, procured for me by Lord Ashburnham. The other, great
part of the tomb of Capoccio, mentioned in my Anecdotes of
Painting on the subject of the Confessor's shrine, and sent to
me from Rome by Mr. Hamilton, our minister at Naples. It is
very extraordinary that I should happen to be master of these
curiosities. After next summer, by which time my castle and
collection will be complete (for if I buy more I must build
another castle for another collection), I propose to form
another catalogue and description, and shall take the liberty
to call on you for your assistance. In the mean time there is
enough new to divert you at present.

(67) This curiosity was at first estimated at a thousand
crowns, but Madame du Deffand finally purchased it for Walpole
for fifty louis. "Ce bijou," she says, "me parait un peu cher
et ressemble beaucoup aux casques du Ch`ateau d,Otrante: si
vous persistez `a le d`esirer, je le payerai, je le ferai
encaisser et Partir sur le champ. C'est certainement une
pi`ece tr`es belle et tr`es rare, mais infiniment ch`ere."-E.

Letter 39 To The Hon. H. S. Conway.
Late Strawberry Hill, Jan. 7, 1772. (page 64)

You have read of my calamity without knowing it, and will pity
me when you do. I have been blown up; my castle is blown up;
Guy Fawkes has been about my house: and the 5th of November has
fallen on the 6th of January! In short, nine thousand
powder-mills broke loose yesterday morning on
Hounslow-heath;(68) a whole squadron of them came hither, and
have broken eight of my painted-glass windows; and the north
side of the castle looks as if it had stood a siege. The two
saints in the hall have suffered martyrdom! they have had their
bodies cut off, and nothing remains but their heads. The two
next great sufferers are indeed two of the least valuable,
being the passage-windows to the library and great parlour--a
fine pane is demolished in the round-room; and the window by
the gallery is damaged. Those in the cabinet, and
Holbein-room, and gallery, and blue-room, and green-closet,
etc. have escaped. As the storm came from the northwest, the
china-closet was not touched, nor a cup fell down. The
bow-window of brave old coloured glass, at Mr. Hindley's, is
massacred; and all the north sides of Twickenham and Brentford
are shattered. At London it was proclaimed an earthquake, and
half the inhabitants ran into the street.

As lieutenant-general of the ordnance, I must beseech you to
give strict order that no more powder-mills may blow up. My
aunt, Mrs. Kerwood, reading one day in the papers that a
distiller's had been burnt by the head of the still flying off,
said, she wondered they did not make an act of parliament
against the heads of stills flying off. Now, I hold it much
easier for you to do a body this service; and would recommend
to your consideration whether it would not be prudent to have
all magazines of powder kept under water till they are wanted
for service. In the mean time, I expect a pension to make me
amends for what I have suffered under the government. Adieu!
Yours.

(68) Three powder-mills blew up on Hounslow-heath, on the 6th
of January, when such was the violence of the explosion that it
was felt not only in the metropolis, but as far as Gloucester,
and was very generally mistaken for the shock of an
earthquake.-E.

Letter 40 To The Rev. Mr. Cole.
Arlington Street, Jan. 28, 1772. (page 65)

It is long indeed, dear Sir, since we corresponded. I should
not have been silent if I had had any thing worth telling you
in your way: but I grow such an antiquity myself, that I think
I am less fond of what remains of our predecessors.

I thank you for Bannerman's proposal; I mean, for taking the
trouble to send it, for I am not at all disposed to subscribe.
I thank you more for the note on King Edward; I mean, too, for
your friendship in thinking of me. Of Dean Milles I cannot
trouble myself to think any more. His piece is at Strawberry:
perhaps I may look at it for the sake of your note. The bad
weather keeps me in town, and a good deal at home; which I find
very comfortable, literally practising what so many persons
pretend they intend, being quiet and enjoying my fireside in my
elderly days.

Mr. Mason has shown me the relics of poor Mr. Gray. I am sadly
disappointed at finding them so very inconsiderable. He always
persisted, when I inquired about his writings, that he had
nothing by him. I own I doubted. I am grieved he was so very
near exact--I speak of my own satisfaction; as to his genius,
what he published during his life will establish his fame as
long as our language lasts, and there is a man of genius left.
There is a silly fellow, I do not know who, that has published
a volume of Letters on the English Nation, With characters of
our modern authors. He has talked such nonsense On Mr. Gray,
that I have no patience with the compliments he has paid me.
He must have an excellent taste; and gives me a woful opinion
of my own trifles, when he likes them, and cannot see the
beauties of a poet that ought to be ranked in the first line.
I am more humbled by any applause in the present age, than by
hosts of such critics as Dean Milles. Is not Garrick reckoned
a tolerable author, though he has proved how little sense is
necessary to form a great actor'? His Cymon, his prologues and
epilogues, and forty such pieces of trash, are below
mediocrity, and yet delight the mob in the boxes as well as in
the footman's gallery. I do not mention the things written in
his praise; because he writes most Of them himself! But you
know any one popular merit can confer all merit. Two women
talking Of Wilkes, one said he squinted--t'other replied,
"Squints!--well, if he does, it is not more than a man should
squint." For my part, I can see how extremely well Garrick
acts, without thinking him six feet high. It is said
Shakspeare was a bad actor; why do not his divine plays make
our wise judges conclude that he was a good one? They have not
a proof of the contrary, as they have in Garrick's works--but
what is it to you or me what he is? We may see him act with
pleasure, and nothing obliges us to read his writings.(69)

(69) The best defence of Garrick against the charges which
Walpole so repeatedly brings against him will be found in the
estimation in which he was held by the most distinguished of
his contemporaries. His friend Dr. Johnson thought well of'
his talent in prologue writing: "Dryden," he said, "has written
prologues superior to any that David has written; but David has
written more good prologues than Dryden has done. It is
wonderful that he has been able to write such variety of them.
A true conception of character and natural expression of it,
were his distinguished excellences; but I thought him less to
be envied on the stage than at the head of a table. He was the
first man in the world for sprightly conversation."-E.

Letter 41 To The Rev. Mr. Cole.
Arlington Street, June 9, 1772. (page 66)

Dear sir,
The preceding paper(70) was given me by a gentleman, who has a
better opinion of my bookhood than I deserve. I could give him
no satisfaction, but told him, I would get inquiry made at
Cambridge for the pieces he wants. If you can give any
assistance in this chase, I am sure you will: as it will be
trouble enough, I will not make my letter longer.

(70) This letter enclosed some queries from a gentleman abroad,
respecting books, etc. relating to the order of Malta.

Letter 42 To The Rev. Mr. Cole.
Strawberry Hill, June 17, 1772. (page 66)

Dear sir,
You are a mine that answers beyond those of Peru. I have given
the treasure you sent me to the gentleman from whom I had the
queries. He is vastly obliged to you, and I am sure so am I,
for the trouble you have given yourself"and, therefore I am
going to give you more. King Edward's Letters are printed.(71)
Shall I keep them for you or send them, and how? I intend you
four copies--shall you want more? Lord Ossory takes a hundred,
and I have as many; but none will be sold.

I am out of materials for my press. I am thinking of printing
some numbers of miscellaneous MSS. from my own and Mr. Gray's
collection. If you have any among your stores that are
historic, new and curious, and like to have them printed, I
shall be glad of them. Among Gray's are letters of Sir Thomas
Wyat the elder.(72) I am sure you must have a thousand hints
about him. If you will send them to me I will do you justice;
as you will see I have in King Edward's Letters. Do you know
any thing of his son,(73) the insurgent, in Queen Mary's reign?

I do not know whether it was not to Payne the bookseller, but I
am sure I gave somebody a very few notes to the British
Topography. They were indeed of very little consequence.

I have got to-day, and am reading with entertainment, two vols.
in octavo, the Lives of Leland, Hearne, and Antony Wood.,(74)
I do not know the author, but he is of Oxford. I think you
should add that of your friend Brown Willis.(75) There is a
queer piece on Freemasonry in one of the volumes, said to be
written, on very slender authority, by Henry VI. with notes by
Mr. Locke: a very odd conjunction! It says that Arts were
brought from the East by Peter Gower. As I am sure you will
not find an account of this singular person in all your
collections, be it known to you, that Peter Gower was commonly
called Pythagoras. I remember our newspapers insisting that
Thomas Kouli Khan was an Irishman, and that his true name was
Thomas Callaghan.

On reading over my letter, I find I am no sceptic, having
affirmed no less than four times, that I am sure. Though this
is extremely awkward, I am sure I will not write my letter over
again; so pray excuse or burn my tautology.

P. S. I had like to have forgotten the most obliging, and to me
the most interesting part of your letter-your kind offer of
coming hither. I accept it most gladly; but, for reasons I
will tell you, wish it may be deferred a little. I am going to
Park-place (General Conway's), then to Ampthill (Lord
Ossory's), and then to Goodwood (Duke of Richmond's); and the
beginning of August to Wentworth Castle (Marquis of
Rockingham's); so that I shall not be at all settled here till
the end of the latter month. But I have a stronger reason. By
that time will be finished a delightful chapel I am building in
my garden, to contain the shrine of Capoccio, and the Window
with Henry III. and his Queen. My new bedchamber will be
finished too, which is now all in litter: and, besides,
September is a quiet month; visits to make or receive are over,
and the troublesome go to shoot partridges. If that time suits
you, pray assure me I shall see you on the first of September.

(71) "Copies of seven original Letters from King Edward VI. to
Barnaby Fitzpatrick." Strawberry Hill, 1772.-E.

(72) He was the contemporary and friend of Surrey, and was
accused by Henry VIII. of being the paramour of Anne Boleyn;
but the King's suspicion dying away, he was appointed, in 1537,
Henry's ambassador to the Emperor. His poems have recently
been published in the Aldine edition of the Poets; and in the
Biographical Preface to them are included some of his admirable
letters.-E.

(73) Sir Thomas Wyatt "the younger," son of the preceding, who
is presumed to have received that designation from having been
knighted in the lifetime of his father. Having joined in the
effort to place Lady Jane Grey on the throne, he was condemned
and executed for high treason, on the 11th of April 1554.-E.

(74) The editor was W. Huddersford, fellow of Trinity
College.-E.

(74) Browne Willis, the antiquary, and author of "A Survey of
the Cathedrals of England;" "Notitia Parliamentaria," etc. He
was born at Blandford in 1682, and died in February 1760. Dr.
Ducarel printed privately, immediately after his death, a small
quarto pamphlet, entitled " Some Account Of Browne Willis, Esq.
LL. D." One of Willis's peculiarities was his fondness for
visiting cathedrals on the saints, days to which they were
dedicated.-E.

Letter 43 To The Hon. H. S. Conway.
Strawberry Hill, Monday, June 22, 1772. (page 68)

It is lucky that I have had no dealings with Mr. Fordyce;(75)
for, if he had ruined me, as he has half the world, I could not
have run away. I tired myself with walking on Friday: the gout
came on Saturday in my foot; yesterday I kept my bed till four
o'clock, and my room all day-but, with wrapping myself all over
with bootikins, have scarce had any pain-my foot swelled
immediately, and today I am descended into the blueth and
greenth:(76) and though you expect to find that I am paving the
way to an excuse, I think I shall be able to be with you on
Saturday. All I intend to excuse myself from, is walking. I
should certainly never have the gout, if I had lost the use of
my feet. Cherubims that have no legs, and do nothing but stick
their chins in a cloud and sing, are never out of order.
Exercise is the worst thing in the world, and as bad an
invention as gunpowder.

Apropos to Mr. Fordyce, here is a passage ridiculously
applicable to him, that I met with yesterday in the letters of
Guy Patin: "Il n'y a pas long-temps qu'un auditeur des comptes
nomm`e Mons. Nivelle fit banqueroute; et tout fra`ichement,
c'est-`a-dire depuis trois jours, un tr`esorier des parties
casuelles, nomm`e SanSon, en a fait autant; et pour vous
montrer qu'il est vrai que res humanae faciunt circulum, comme
il a `et`e autrefois dit par Plato et par Aristote, celui-l`a
s'en retourne d'o`u il vient. Il est fils d'un paysan; il a
`et`e laquais de son premier m`etier, et aujourd'hui il n'est
plus rien, si non qu'il lui reste une assez belle femme."--I do
not think I can find in Patin or Plato, nay, nor in Aristotle,
though he wrote about every thing, a parallel case to Charles
Fox:(77) there are advertised to be sold more annuities of his
and his society, to the amount of five hundred thousand pounds
a-year! I wonder what he will do next, when he has sold the
estates of all his friends!

I have been reading the most delightful book in the world, the
Lives of Leland, Tom earne, and Antony Wood. The last's diary
makes a thick volume in octavo. One entry is, "This day Old
Joan began to make my bed." In the story of Leland is an
examination of a freemason, written by the hand of King Henry
VI., with notes by Mr. Locke. Freemasonry, Henry VI., and
Locke, make a strange heterogeneous olio; but that is not all.
The respondent, who defends the mystery of masonry, says it was
brought into Europe by the Venetians--he means the Phoenicians.
And who do you think propagated it? Why, one Peter Gore--And
who do you think that was?--One Pythagoras, Pythagore. I do
not know whether it is not still More extraordinary, that this
and the rest of the nonsense in that account made Mr. Locke
determine to be a freemason: so would I too, if I could expect
to hear of more Peter Gores.

Pray tell Lady Lyttelton that I say she will certainly kill
herself if she lets Lady Ailesbury drag her twice a-day to feed
the pheasants, and you make her climb cliffs and clamber over
mountains. She has a tractability that alarms me for her; and
if she does not pluck up a spirit, and determine never to be
put out of her own way, I do not know what may be the
Consequence. I will come and set her an example of
immovability. Take notice, I do not say one civil syllable to
Lady Ailesbury. She has not passed a whole day here these two
years. She is always very gracious, says she will come when
you will fix a time, as if you governed, and then puts it off
whenever it is proposed, nor will spare one Single day from
Park-place-as if other people were not as partial to their own
Park-places, Adieu! Yours ever.

Tuesday noon.

I wrote my letter last night; this morning I received yours,
and shall wait till Sunday, as you bid me, which will be more
convenient for my gout, though not for other engagements, but I
shall obey the superior, as nullum tempus occurrit regi et
podagrae.

(75) The greatest consternation prevailed at this time in the
metropolis, in consequence of the banking-house of Neale,
James, Fordyce, and Down having stopped payment. Fordyce was
bred a hosier in Aberdeen. For a memoir of him, see Gent. Mag.
vol. x1ii. p. 310.-E.

(76) Cant words of Walpole for blue and green. He means, that
he came out of his room to the blue sky and green fields.

(77) Gibbon, in a letter to Mr. Holroyd, of the 8th of
February, in reference to the recent debate in the House of
Commons, on the clerical petition for relief from subscription
to the Thirty-nine Articles, says--"I congratulate you on the
late victory of our dear Mamma, the Church of England. She had,
last Thursday, seventy-one rebellious sons, Who pretended to
set aside her will, on a account of insanity; but two hundred
and seventeen worthy champions, headed by Lord North, Burke,
Charles Fox, etc., though they allowed the thirty-nine clauses
of her testament were absurd and unreasonable, supported the
validity of it with infinite honour. By the bye, Charles Fox
prepared himself for that holy work by passing twenty-one hours
in the pious exercise of hazard; his devotions cost him only
about five hundred pounds an hour, in all, eleven thousand
pounds."-E.

Letter 44 To The Rev. Mr. Cole.
Strawberry Hill, July 7, 1772. (page 70)

Dear Sir,
I sent you last week by the Cambridge Fly, that puts up in
Gray's-inn-lane, six copies of King Edward's Letters, but fear
I forgot to direct their being left at Mr. Bentham's, by which
neglect perhaps you have not yet got them; so that I have been
very blamable, while I thought I was very expeditious; and it
was not till reading your letter again just now that I
discovered my carelessness.

I have not heard of Dr. Glynn, etc., but the housekeeper has
orders to receive them. I thank you a thousand times for the
Maltese notes, which I have given to the gentleman, and for the
Wyattiana: I am going to work on the latter.

I have not yet seen Mr. 's print, but am glad it is so like. I
expected Mr. Mason would have sent me one early; but I suppose
he keeps it for me, as I shall call on him in my way to Lord
Strafford's.

Mr. West,(78) one of our brother antiquaries, is dead. He had
a very curious collection of old pictures, English coins,
English prints, and manuscripts. But he was so rich, that I
take for granted nothing will be sold. I could wish for his
family pictures of Henry V. and Henry VIII.

Foote, in his new comedy of The Nabob, has lashed Master Doctor
Miles and our Society very deservedly for the nonsensical
discussion they had this winter about Whittington and his Cat.
Few of them are fit for any thing better than such researches.
Poor Mr. Granger has been very ill, but is almost recovered. I
intend to invite him to meet you in September. It is a party I
shall be very impatient for: you know how sincerely I am, dear
Sir, your obliged and Obedient humble servant.

(78) James West, Esq. He was for some time one of the
secretaries of the treasury, vice president of the Society of
Antiquaries, and president of the Royal Society. His curious
collection of manuscripts were purchased by the Earl of
Shelburne, and are now deposited in the British Museum.-E.

Letter 45 To The Rev. Mr. Cole.
Strawberry Hill, July 28, 1772. (page 70)

Dear Sir,
I am anew obliged to you, as I am perpetually, for the notice
you give me of another intended publication against me in the
Archaeologia, or Old Woman's Logic. By Your account, the
author will add much credit to their Society! For my part, I
shall take no notice of any of his handycrafts. However, as
there seems to be a willingness to carp at me, and as gnats may
on a sudden provoke one to give a slap, I choose to be at
liberty to say what I think Of the learned Society; and
therefore I have taken leave of them, having so good an
occasion presented as their council on Whittington and his Cat,
and the ridicule that Foote has thrown on them. They are
welcome to say any thing on my writings, but that they are the
works of a fellow of so foolish a Society.

I am at work on the Life of Sir Thomas Wyat, but it does not
please me; nor will it be entertaining, though you have
contributed so many materials towards it. You must take one
trouble more it is to inquire and search for a book that I want
to see. It is the Pilgrim; was written by William Thomas, who
was executed in Queen Mary's time; but the book was printed
under, and dedicated to, Edward VI. I have only an imperfect
memorandum of it, and cannot possibly recall to mind from
whence I made it. All I think I remember is, that the book was
in the King's library. I have sent to the Museum to inquire
after it; but I cannot find it mentioned in Ames's History of
English Printers. Be so good as to ask all your antiquarian
friends if they know such a work.

Amidst all your kindness, you have added one very disagreeable
paragraph:--I mean, you doubt about coming here in September.
Fear of a sore throat would be a reason for your never coming.
It is one of the distempers in the world the least to be
foreseen, and September, a dry month, one of the least likely
months to bring it. I do not like your recurring to so very
ill-founded an excuse, and positively will not accept it,
unless you wish I should not be so much as I an, dear Sir, Your
most faithful humble servant,
H. W.

Letter 46 To The Rev. Mr. Cole.
Strawberry Hill, Aug. 25, 1772. (page 71)

Dear sir,
I thank YOU for your notices, dear Sir, and will deliver you
from the trouble of any further pursuit of the Peleryne of
Thomas. I have discovered him among the Cottonian MSS. in the
Museum, and am to see him.

If Dr. Browne is returned to Cambridge, may I beg you to give
him a thousand thanks for the present he left at my house, a
goarstone and a seal, that belonged to Mr. Gray. I shall lay
them up in my cabinet at Strawberry among my most valuables.
Dr. Browne, however, was not quite kind to me; for he left no
direction where to find him in town, so that I could not wait
upon him, nor invite him to Strawberry Hill, as I much wished
to do, Do not these words, "invite him to Strawberry," make
Your ears tingle? September is at hand, and You must have no
sore throat. The new chapel in the garden is almost finished,
and you must come to the dedication.

I have seen Lincoln and York, and to say the truth, prefer the
former in some respects. In truth, I was scandalized in the
latter. William of Hatfield's tomb and figure is thrown aside
into a hole: and yet the chapter possess an estate that his
mother gave them. I have charged Mr. Mason(79) with my
anathema, unless they do justice. I saw Roche Abbey, too;
which is hid in such a venerable chasm, that you might lie
concealed there even from a 'squire parson of the parish. Lord
Scarborough, to whom it belongs, and who lives at next door,
neglects it as much as if he was afraid of ghosts. I believe
Montesino's cave lay in just such a solemn thicket, which is
now so overgrown, that, when one finds the spot, one can scarce
find the ruins.

I forgot to tell you, that in the screen of York Minster there
are most curious statues of the Kings of England, from the
Conqueror to Henry VI.; very singular, evidently by two
different hands, the one better than the other, and most of
them I am persuaded, very authentic. Richard II., Henry III.,
and Henry V., I am sure are; and Henry Iv., though unlike the
common portrait at Hampton-court, in Herefordshire, the most
singular and villanous countenance I ever saw. I intend to try
to get them well engraved. That old fool, James I., is crowded
in, in the place of Henry VII., that was taken away to make
room for this piece of flattery; for the chapter did not slight
live princes. Yours ever.

(79) Mason was a residentiary of York cathedral; as well as
prebendary of Duffield, and rector of Aston.-E.

Letter 47 To The Rev. Mr. Cole.
Strawberry Hill, August 28, 1772. (page 72)

Dear Sir,
Your repentance is much more agreeable than your sin, and will
cancel it whenever you please. Still I have a fellow-feeling
for the indolence of age, and have myself been writing an
excuse this instant for not accepting an invitation above
threescore miles off. One's limbs, when they grow old, will
not go any where, when they do not like it. If yours should
find themselves in a more pliant humour, you are always sure of
being welcome here, let the fit of motion come when it will.

Pray what is become of that figure you mention of Henry VII.,
which the destroyers, not the builders have rejected? and which
the antiquaries, who know a man by his crown better than by his
face, have rejected likewise? The latter put me in mind of
characters in comedies, in which a woman disguised in man's
habit, and whose features her very lover does not know, is
immediately acknowledged by pulling off her hat, and letting
down her hair, which her lover had never seen before. I should
be glad to ask Dr. Milles, if he thinks the crown of England
was always made, like a quart pot, by Winchester measure? If
Mr. Tyson has made a print from that little statue, I trust he
will give me one; and if he, or Mr. Essex, or both, will
accompany you hither, I shall be glad to see them.

At Buckden, in the Bishop's palace, I saw a print of Mrs.
Newcome: I Suppose the late mistress of St. John's. Can you
tell me where I can procure one? Mind, I insist that you do
not serve me as you have often done, and send me your own, if
you have one. I seriously will not accept it, nor ever trust
you again. On the staircase, in the same palace, there is a
picture of two young men, in the manner of Vandyck, not at all
ill done; do you know who they are, or does any body? There is
a worse picture, in a large room, of some lads, which, too, the
housemaid did not know. Adieu! dear Sir, yours ever.

Letter 48To The Rev. Mr. Cole.
Strawberry Hill, Nov. 7, 1772. (page 73)

Dear Sir,
I did receive the print of Mrs. Newcome, for which I am
extremely obliged to you, with a thousand other favours, and
should certainly have thanked you for it long ago, but I was
then, an(I am now, confined to my bed with the gout in every
limb, and in almost every joint. I have not been out of my
bedchamber these five weeks to-day and last night the pain
returned violently into one of my feet; so that I am now
writing to you in a most uneasy posture, which will oblige me
to be very short.

Your letter, which I suppose was left at my house in Arlington
street by Mr. Essex, was brought to me this morning. I am
exceedingly sorry for his disappointment, and for his coming
without writing first; in which case I might have prevented his
journey. I do not know, even, whither to send to him, to tell
him how impossible it is for me just now, in my present painful
and hopeless situation, to be of any use to him. I am so weak
and faint, I do not see even my nearest relations, and God
knows how long it will be before I am able to bear company,
much less application. I have some thoughts, as soon as I am
able, of removing to Bath; so that I cannot guess when it will
be in my power to consider duly Mr. Essex's plan with him. I
shall undoubtedly, if ever capable of it, be ready to give him
my advice, such as it is; or to look over his papers, and even
to correct them, if his modesty thinks me more able to polish
them than he is himself. At the same time, I must own, I think
he will run too great a risk by the expense. The engravers in
London are now arrived at such a pitch of exorbitant
imposition, that, for my own part, I have laid aside all
thoughts of having a single plate more done.

Dear Sir, pray tell Mr. Essex how concerned I am for his
mischance, and for the total impossibility I am under of seeing
him now. I can write no More, but I shall be glad to hear from
you on his return to Cambridge: and when I am recovered, you
may be assured how glad I shall be to talk his plan over with
him. I am his and Your obliged humble servant.

Letter 49 To The Rev. Mr. Cole.
(page 74)

I have had a relapse, and not been able to use my hand, or I
should have lamented with you on the plunder of your prints by
that Algerine hog.(80) I pity you, dear Sir, and feel for your
awkwardness, that was struck dumb at his rapaciousness. The
beast has no sort of taste neither-and in a twelvemonth will
sell them again. I regret particularly one print, which I dare
to say he seized, that I gave you, Gertrude More; I thought I
had another, and had not; and, as you liked it, I never told
you so. This Muley Moloch used to buy books, and now sells
them. He has hurt his fortune, and ruined himself, to have a
Collection, without any choice of what it should be composed.
It is the most underbred swine I ever saw; but I did not know
it was so ravenous. I wish you may get paid any how; you see
by my writing how difficult it is to me, and therefore will
excuse my being short.

(80) This letter may want some explanation. A gentleman, a
collector of prints, and a neighbour of Mr. Walpole's, had just
before requested to see Mr. Cole's collection, and on Mr.
Cole's offering to accommodate him with such heads as he had
not, he selected and took away no less than one hundred and
eighty-seven of the most rare and valuable.

Letter 50 To The Countess Of Ailesbury.
Arlington Street, Dec. 20, 1772. (page 74)

Indeed, Madam, I want you and Mr. Conway in town. Christmas has
dispersed all my company, and left nothing but a loo-party or
two. If all the fine days were not gone out of town, too, I
should take the air in a morning; but I am not yet nimble enough,
like old Mrs. Nugent, to jump out of a postchaise into an
assembly.

You have a woful taste, my lady, not to like Lord Gower's bonmot.
I am almost too indignant to tell you of a most amusing book in
six volumes, called "Histoire Philosophique et Politique du
commerce des Deux Indes."(81) It tells one every thing in the
world;--how to make conquests, invasions, blunders, settlements,
bankruptcies, fortunes, etc.; tells you the natural and
historical history of all nations; talks commerce, navigation,
tea, coffee, china, mines, salt, spices; of the Portuguese,
English, French, Dutch, Danes, Spaniards, Arabs, caravans,
Persians, Indians, of Louis XIV. and the King of Prussia; of La
Bourdonnais, Dupleix, and Admiral Saunders; of rice, and women
that dance naked; of camels, ginghams, and muslin; of millions of
millions of livres, pounds, rupees, and cowries; of iron cables,
and Circassian women; of Law and the Mississippi; and against all
governments and religions. This and every thing else is in the
two first volumes. I cannot conceive what is left for the four
others. And all is so mixed, that you learn forty new trades and
fifty new histories in a single chapter. There is spirit, wit,
and clearness and, if there were but less avoirdupois weight in
it, it would be the richest book in the world in materials--but
figures to me are so many ciphers, and only put me in mind of
children that say, an hundred hundred hundred millions. However,
it has made me learned enough to talk about Mr. Sykes and the
Secret Committee,(82) which is all that any body talks of at
present, and yet Mademoiselle Heinel(83) is arrived. This is all
I know, and a great deal too, considering I know nothing, and
yet, were there either truth or lies, I should know them; for one
hears every thing in a sick room. Good night both!

(81) By the Abb`e Raynal. sensible of the faults of his work,
the Abb`e visited England and Holland to obtain correct
mercantile information, and, on his return, published an improved
edition at Geneva, in ten volumes, octavo. Hannah More relates,
that, when in England, the Abb`e was introduced to Dr. Johnson,
and advancing to shake his band, the Doctor drew back and put it
behind him, and afterwards replied to the expostulation of a
friend--"Sir, I will not shake hands with an infidel." The
Parliament of Paris ordered the work to be burnt, and the author
to be arrested; but he retired to Spain, and, in 1788, the
National Assembly cancelled the decree passed against him. He
died at Passy in 1794, at the age of eighty-five.-E.

(82) Upon indian affairs.

(83) See ante, p. 59, letter 34.

Letter 51 To The Rev. Mr. Cole.
Arlington Street, Jan. 8, 1773. (page 75)

In return to your very kind inquiries, dear Sir, I can let you
know, that I am quite free from pain, and walk a little about
my room, even without a stick: nay, have been four times to
take the air in the park. Indeed, after fourteen weeks this is
not saying much; but it is a worse reflection, that when one is
subject to the gout, and far from young, one's worst account
will probably be better than that after the next fit. I
neither flatter myself on one hand, nor am impatient on the
other--for will either do one any good? one must bear one's lot
whatever it be.

I rejoice Mr. * * * * has justice,(84) though he had no bowels.
How Gertrude More escape' him I do not guess. It will be wrong
to rob you of her, after she has come to you through so many
hazards--nor would I hear of it either, if you have a mind to
keep her, or have not given up all thoughts of a collection
since you have been visited by a Visigoth.

I am much more impatient to see Mr. Gray's print, than Mr.
What-d'ye-call-him's answer to my Historic Doubts.(85) He may
have made himself very angry; but I doubt whether he will make
me at all so. I love antiquities; but I scarce ever knew an
antiquary who knew how to write upon them. Their
understandings seem as much in ruins as the things they
describe. For the Antiquarian Society, I shall leave them in
peace with Whittington and his Cat. As my contempt for them
has not, however, made me disgusted with what they do not
understand, antiquities, I have published two numbers of
Miscellanies, and they are very welcome to mumble them with
their toothless gums. I want to send you these--not their
gums, but my pieces, and a Grammont,(86) of which I have
printed only a hundred copies, and which will be extremely
scarce, as twenty-five copies are gone to France. Tell me how
I shall convey them safely.

Another thing you must tell me, if you can, is, if you know any
thing ancient of the Freemasons Governor Pownall,(87) a
Whittingtonian, has a mind they should have been a corporation
erected by the popes. As you see what a good creature I am,
and return good for evil, I am engaged to pick up what I can
for him, to support this system, in which I believe no more
than in the pope: and the work is to appear in a volume of the
Society's pieces. I am very willing to oblige him, and turn my
cheek, that they may smite that, also. Lord help them! I am
sorry that they are such numsculls, that they almost make me
think myself something! but there are great authors enough to
bring me to my senses again. Posterity, I fear, will class me
with the writers of this age, or forget me with them, not rank
me with any names that deserve remembrance. If I cannot
survive the Milles's, the What-d'ye-call-him's, and the
compilers of catalogues of topography, it would comfort me very
little to confute them. I should be as little proud of success
as if I had carried a contest for churchwarden.

Not being able to return to Strawberry Hill, where all my books
and papers are, and my printer lying fallow, I want some short
bills to print. Have you any thing you wish printed? I can
either print a few to amuse ourselves, or, if very curious, and
not too dry, could make a third number of Miscellaneous
Antiquities.

I am not in any eagerness to see Mr. What-d'ye-call-him's
pamphlet against me; therefore pray give yourself no trouble to
get it for me. The specimens I have seen of his writing take
off all edge from curiosity. A print of Mr. Gray will be a
real present. Would it not be dreadful to be commended by an
age that had not taste enough to admire his Odes? Is not it
too great a compliment to me to be abused too? I am ashamed!
Indeed our antiquaries ought to like me. I am but too much on
a par with them. Does not
Mr. Henshaw come to London? Is he a professor, or only a lover
of engraving? If the former, and he were to settle in town, I
would willingly lend him heads to copy. Adieu!

(84) The gentleman who had carried off so many of Mr.
Cole's prints. He now fully remunerated Mr. Cole in a valuable
present of books.

(85) Mr. Master's pamphlet, printed at the expense of the
Antiquarian Society in the second volume of the Archaeologia.

(86) "M`emoires du Comte de Grammont, nouvelle edition,
augment`ee de Notes et Eclaircissemens n`ecessaires, par M.
Horace Walpole." Strawberry Hill, 1772, 4to. To the M`emoires
was prefixed the following dedication to Madame du Deffand:--
"L'Editeur VOUS Consacre cette edition, comme un monument de
son amiti`e, de son admiration, et de son respect, a vous dont
les gr`aces, l'esprit, et le gout retracent an si`ecle present
le si`ecle de Louis XIV., et les agr`emens de l'auteur de ces
Memoires."

(87) Thomas Pownall, Esq. the antiquary, and a constant
contributor to the Archaeologia. Having been governor of South
Carolina and other American colonies, he was always
distinguished from his brother John, who was likewise an
antiquary, by the title of Governor.-E.

Letter 52 To The Rev. Mr. Cole.
Arlington Street, Feb. 18, 1773. (page 77)

The most agreeable ingredient of your last, dear Sir, is the
paragraph that tells me you shall be in town in April, when I
depend on the pleasure of seeing you; but, to be certain, wish
you would give me a few days' law, an let me know, too, where
you lodge. Pray bring your books, though the continuation of the
Miscellaneous Antiquities is uncertain. I thought the
affectation of loving veteran anecdotes was so vigorous, that I
ventured to print five hundred copies., One, hundred and thirty
only are sold. I cannot afford to make the town perpetual
presents; though I find people exceedingly eager to obtain them
when I do; and if they will not buy them, it is a sign of such
indifference, that I shall neither bestow my time, nor my cost,
to no purpose. All I desire is, to pay the expenses, which I can
afford much less than my idle moments. Not but the operations
of-my press have often turned against myself in many shapes. I
have told people many things they did not know, and from fashion
they have bought a thousand things out of my hands, which they do
not understand, and only love en passant. At Mr. West's sale,
I got literally nothing: his prints sold for the frantic sum of
1495 pounds 10 shillings. Your and my good friend Mr. Gulston
threw away above 200 pounds there.

I am not sorry Mr. Lort has recourse to the fountainhead: Mr.
Pownall's system of Freemasonry is so absurd and groundless,
that I am glad to be rid of intervention. I have seen the
former once: he told Me he was willing to sell his prints, as
the value of them is so increased--for that very reason I did
not want to purchase them.

Paul Sanby promised me ten days ago to show Mr. Henshaw's
engraving which I received from Dr. Ewen) to Bartolozzi, and
ask his terms, thinking he would delight in So Very promising a
scholar; but I have heard nothing since, and therefore fear
there is no success. Let me, however, see the young man when
he comes, and I will try if there is any other way of serving
him.

What shall I say to you, dear Sir, about Dr. Prescot? or what I
say to him? It hurts me not to be very civil, especially as
any respect to my father's memory touches me much more than any
attention to myself, which I cannot hold to be a quarter so
well founded. Yet, how dare I write to a poor man, who may do,
as I have lately seen done by a Scotchwoman that wrote a
play,(88) and printed Lord Chesterfield's and Lord Lyttelton's
letters to her, as Testimonia fluctorum: I will therefore beg
you to make my compliments and thanks to the master, and to
make them as grateful as you please, provided I am dispensed
with giving any certificate under my hand. You may plead my
illness, which, though the fifth month ended yesterday, is far
from being at an end, My relapses have been endless - I cannot
yet walk a step: and a great cold has added an ague in my
cheek, for which I am just going to begin the bark. The
prospect for the rest of my days is gloomy. The case of my
poor nephew still more deplorable - he arrived in town last
night, and bore his Journey tolerably-but his head is in much
more danger of not recovering than his health; though they give
us hopes of both. But the evils of life are not good subjects
for letters--why afflict one's friends? Why make commonplace
reflections? Adieu! Yours ever.

(88) "Sir Harry Gaylove; or, Comedy in Embryo;" by Mrs. Jane
Marshall. It was printed in Scotland by subscription, but not
acted. in the preface, she complains bitterly of the managers
of the three London theatres, for refusing her the advantages
of representing her performance.-E.

Letter 53 To The Rev. William Mason.(89)
March 2, 1773. (page 78)

What shall I say? How shall I thank you for the kind manner in
which you submit your papers to my correction? But if you are
friendly, I must be just. I am so far from being dissatisfied,
that I Must beg to shorten your pen, and in that respect only
would I wish, with regard to myself, to alter your text. I am
conscious that in the beginning of the differences between Gray
and me, the fault was mine. I was young, too fond of my own
diversions; nay, I do not doubt, too much intoxicated by
indulgence, vanity, and the insolence of my situation, as a
prime minister's Son, not to have been inattentive to the
feelings of one, I blush to say, that I knew was obliged to me;
of one, whom presumption and folly made me deem not very
superior in parts, though I have since felt my infinite
inferiority to him. I treated him insolently. He loved me,
and I did not think he did. I reproached him with the
difference between us, when he acted from the conviction of
knowing that he was my superior. I often disregarded his wish
of seeing places, which I would not quit my own amusements to
visit, though I offered to send him thither without me.
Forgive me, if I say that his temper was not conciliating, at
the same time that I confess to you, that he acted a most
friendly part had I had the sense to take advantage of it. He
freely told me my faults. I declared I did not desire to hear
them, nor would correct them. You will not wonder,, that with
the dignity of his spirit, and the obstinate carelessness of
mine the breach must have widened till we became incompatible.

After this confession, I fear you will think I fall short in
the words I wish to have substituted for some of yours. If you
think them inadequate to the state of the case, as I own they
are, preserve this letter and let some future Sir John
Dalrymple produce it to load my memory; but I own I do not
desire that any ambiguity should aid his invention to forge an
account) for me. If you would have no objection, I would
propose your narrative should run thus, [Here follows a note,
which is inserted verbatim in Mason's Life of Gray.(90)] and
contain no more, till a more proper time shall come for
publishing the truth, as I have stated it to you. While I am
living, it is not pleasant to see my private disagreements
discussed in magazines and newspapers.

(89) This and the following letter are from Mr. mitford's
valuable edition of Gray's Works. See vol. iv. pp. 216, 218.-
E.

(90) "In justice to the memory of so respectable a friend, Mr.
Walpole enjoins me to charge himself with the chief blame in
their quarrel - confessing that more attention and
complaisance, more deference to a warm friendship, superior
judgment and prudence, might have prevented a rupture that gave
such uneasiness to them both and a lasting concern
to the survivor; though, in the year 1744, a reconciliation was
effected between them, by a lady who wished well to both
parties."-E.

Letter 54 To The Rev. William Mason.
Strawberry Hill, March 27, 1773. (page 79)

I have received your letter, dear Sir, your manuscript, and
Gray's letters to me. Twenty things crowd upon my pen, and
jostle, and press to be laid. As I came here to-day for a
little air, and to read you undisturbed, they shall all have a
place in due time. But having so safe a conveyance for my
thoughts, I must begin with the uppermost of them, the Heroic
Epistle. I have read it so very often, that I have got it by
heart; and now I am master of all its beauties, I confess I
like it infinitely better than I did, though I liked it
infinitely before. There is more wit, ten times more delicacy
of irony, as much poetry, and greater facility than and as in
the Dunciad. But what Signifies what I think? All the world
thinks the same. No soul has, I have heard, guessed within an
hundred miles. I catched at Anstey's name, and have,
contributed to spread that notion. It has since been called
Temple Luttrell's, and, to my infinite honour, mine; Lord -----
- swears he should think so, if I did not praise it so
excessively. But now, my dear Sir, that you have tapped this
mine of talent, and it runs so richly and easily, for Heaven's
sake, and for England's sake, do not let it rest! You have a
vein of irony, and satire, etc.

I am extremely pleased with the easy unaffected simplicity of
your manuscript (Memoirs of Gray), and have found scarcely any
thing I could wish added, much less retrenched, unless the
paragraph on Lord Bute,(91) which I don't think quite clearly
expressed; and yet perhaps too clearly, while you wish to
remain unknown as the author of the Heroic Epistle,(92) since
it might lead to suspicion. For as Gray asked for the place,
and accepted it afterwards from the Duke of Grafton, it might
be thought that he, or his friend for him, was angry with the
author of the disappointment. I can add nothing to your
account of Gray's going abroad with me. It was my own thought
and offer, and cheerfully accepted. Thank you for inserting my
alteration. As I am the survivor, any Softening would be
unjust to the dead. I am sorry I had a fault towards him. It
does not wound me to own it; and it must be believed when I
allow it, that not he, but I myself, was in the wrong.

(91) This paragraph was suppressed-E.

(92) In March, 1798, Mr. Matthias suggested, in the Pursuits of
Literature, that Walpole's papers would possibly lead to the
discovery of the author of the far-famed Heroic Epistle to Sir
William Chambers. By Thomas Warton, the poet-laureate, it was
supposed to have been "written by Walpole, and buckrum'd by
Mason;" and Mr. Croker, in a note to his edition of Boswell's
Johnson, says of it, "there can be no doubt that it was the
joint production of Mason and Walpole; Mason supplying the
poetry and Walpole the points;" while the Quarterly Review,
vol. xv. p. 385, observes, that "when it is remembered that no
one then alive, with the same peculiar taste and the same
political principles, could have written such poetry, we must
either ascribe the Heroic Epistle to Mr. Mason, or suppose,
very needlessly and improbably, that one person supplied the
matter and another shaped it into verse; but, the personal
insolence displayed in this poem to his Sovereign, which was
probably the true reason for concealing the writer's -the
principles of genuine taste which abound in it--the bitter and
sarcastic strain of indignation against a monstrous mode of bad
taste then beginning to prevail in landscape gardening, and,
above all, a vigorous flow of spirited and harmonious verse,
all concur to mark it as the work of our independent and
uncourtly bard," The above letter settles the long-disputed
point, and fixes the sole authorship of this exquisite poem on
Mason.-E.

Letter 55 To The Rev. Mr. Cole.
Arlington Street, April 7, 1773. (page 80)

I have now seen the second volume of the Archaeologia, or Old
Woman's Logic, with Mr. Masters's Answer to me. If he had not
taken such pains to declare it was written against my Doubts, I
should have thought it a defence of them; for the few facts he
quotes make for my arguments, and confute himself; particularly
in the case of Lady Eleanor Butler; -whom, by the way, he makes
marry her own nephew, and not descend from her own family,
because she was descended from her grandfather.

This Mr. Masters is an excellent Sancho Panza to such a Don
Quixote as Dean Milles! but enough of such goosecaps! Pray
thank Mr. Ashby for his admirable correction of Sir Thomas
Wyat's bon-mot. It is right beyond all doubt, and I will quote
it if ever the piece is reprinted.

Mr. Tyson surprises me by usurping your Dissertation. It seems
all is fish that comes to the net of the Society- Mercy on us!
What a cart-load of brick and rubbish, and Roman ruins, they
have piled together! I have found nothing-, tolerable in the
volume but the Dissertation of Mr Masters; which is followed by
an answer, that, like Masters, contradicts him, without
disproving any thing.

Mr. West's books are selling outrageously. His family will
make a fortune by what he collected from stalls and Moorfields.
But I must not blame the virtuosi, having surpassed them. In
short I have bought his two pictures of Henry V. and Henry
VIII. and their families; the first of which is engraved in my
Anecdotes, or, as the catalogue says, engraved by Mr. H.
Walpole, and the second described there. The first cost me 38
pounds and the last 84, though I knew Mr. West bought it for
six guineas. But, in fact, these two, with my Marriages of
Henry VI. and VII., compose such a suite of the House of
Lancaster, and enrich my Gothic house so completely, that I
would not deny myself. The Henry VII. cost me as much, and is
less curious: the price of antiquities is so exceedingly risen,
too, at present, that I expected to have paid more. I have
bought much cheaper at the same sale, a picture of Henry VIII.
and Charles V. in one piece, both much younger than I ever saw
any portrait of either. I hope your pilgrimage to St.
Gulaston's this month will take place, and that you will come
and see them. Adieu!

Letter 56 To The Rev. Mr. Cole.
Arlington Street, April 27, 1773. (page 81) '

I had not time this morning to answer your letter by Mr. Essex,
but I gave him the card you desired. You know, I hope, how
happy I am to obey any orders of yours.

In the paper I showed you in answer to Masters, you saw I was
apprised of Rastel's Chronicle: but pray do not mention my
knowing of it; because I draw so much from it, that I lie in
wait, hoping that Milles, or Masters, or some of their fools,
will produce it against me; and then I shall have another word
to say to them, which they do not expect, since they think
Rastel makes for them.

Mr. Gough(93) wants to be introduced to me! Indeed! I would
see him, as he has been midwife to Masters; but he is so dull,
that he would only be troublesome--and besides you know I shun
authors, and would never have been One myself, if it obliged me
to keep such bad company. They are always in earnest, and
think their profession serious, and dwell upon trifles, and
reverence learning. I laugh at all those things, and write
only to laugh at them, and divert myself. None of us are
authors of any consequence; and it is the most ridiculous in
all vanities to be vain of being mediocre. A page in a great
author humbles me to the dust; and the conversation of those
that are not superior to myself, reminds me of what will be
thought of myself. I blush to flatter them, or to be flattered
by them, and should dread letters being published some time or
other, in which they should relate our interviews, and we
should appear like those puny conceited Witlings in Shenstone's
and Hughes' Correspondence,(94) who give themselves airs from
being in possession of the soil of Parnassus for the time
being; as peers are proud, because they enjoy the estates of
great men who went before them. Mr. Gough is very welcome to
see Strawberry Hill; or I would help him to any scraps in my
possession, that would assist his publications; though he is
one of those industrious who are only reburying the dead-but I
cannot be acquainted with him. It is contrary to my system,
and my humour; and, besides, I know nothing of barrows, and
Danish entrenchments, and Saxon barbarisms, and Phoenician
characters--in short, I know nothing of those ages that knew
nothing--then how should I be of use to modern literati? All
the Scotch metaphysicians have sent me their works. I did not
read one of them, because I do not understand what is not
understood by those that write about it; and I did not get
acquainted with one of the writers. I should like to be
intimate with Mr. Anstey,(95) even though he wrote Lord
Buckhorse, or with the author of the Heroic Epistle.(96) I
have no thirst to know the rest of my contemporaries, from the
absurd bombast of Dr. Johnson down to the silly Dr. Goldsmith;
though the latter changeling has had bright gleams of parts,
and the former had sense, 'till he charged it for words, and
sold it for a pension. Don't think me scornful. Recollect
that I have seen Pope, and lived with Gray. Adieu! Yours
ever.

P. S. Mr. Essex has shown me a charming drawing, from a
charming round window at Lincoln. It has revived all my
eagerness to have him continue his plan.

(93) Richard Gough, Esq., author of the British Topography, and
the Sepulchral Monuments of Great Britain; and editor of
Camden's Britannia. This learned antiquary was born in 1735,
and died in the year 1809-E.

(94) A second edition had just appeared of "Letters by several
eminent Persons deceased; including the Correspondence of John
Hughes, Esq, and several of His Friends."-E.

(95) The author of the New Bath Guide. See vol. iii., letter
307 to George Montagu, Esq., June 20 1766.-E.

(96) See ante, letter 54, P. 80.-E.

Letter 57 To The Rev. Mr. Cole.
Arlington Street, May 4, 1773. (page 82)

I should not have hurried to answer your letter, dear Sir, the
moment I receive it, but to send you another ticket(97) for
your sister, in case she should not have recovered the other;
and I think you said she was to stay but a fortnight in town.
I would have sent it to her, had I known whither: and I have
made it for five persons, in case she should have a mind to
carry so many.

I am sorry for the young engraver; but I can by no means meddle
with his going abroad, without the father's consent. it would
be very wrong, and would hurt the young man essentially, if the
father has any thing to leave. , In any case, I certainly would
not be accessory to sending away the son against the father's
will. The father is an impertinent fool--but that you
and I cannot help.

Pray be not uneasy about Gertrude More: I shall get the
original or, at least, a copy. Tell me how I shall Send you
martagons by the safest conveyance, or any thing else you want.
I am always in your debt; and the apostle-spoon will make the
debtor side in my book of gratitude run over.

Your public orator has done me too much honour by far--
especially as he named me with my father,(98) to whom I am so
infinitely inferior, both in parts and virtues. Though I have
been abused undeservedly, I feel I have more title to censure
than praise, and -will subscribe to the former sooner than to
the latter. Would not it be prudent to look upon the encomium
as a funeral oration, and consider Myself as dead? I have
always dreaded outliving myself, and writing after what small
talents I have should be decayed. Except the last volume of
the Anecdotes of Painting, which has been finished and printed
so long, and which, appear when they may, will still come too
late for many reasons. I am disposed never to publish any more
of my own self; but I do not say so positively, lest my
breaking my intention should be but another folly. The gout
has, however, made me so indolent and inactive, that if my head
does not inform me how old I grow, at least my mind and my feet
will--and can one have too many monitors of one's weakness!

I am sorry you think yourself so much inconvenienced by
stirring from home. ' This is an incommodity by which your
friends will suffer more than yourself, and nobody more,
sensibly than yours, etc.

(97) Of admission to Strawberry.

(98) On presenting a relation of Mr. Walpole's to the
Vice-chancellor for his honorary degree.

Letter 58 To The Rev. Mr. Cole.
Arlington Street, May 29, 1773. (page 83)

Dear Sir,
I have been so much taken up of late with poor Lord Orford's
affairs, I have not had, and scarce have now, time to write you
a line, and thank you for all your kindnesses, information, and
apostle -spoon. I have not Newcomb's Repertorium, and shall be
obliged to you for the transcript; not as doubting, but to
confirm what Heaven, King Edward I., and the Bishop of the
Tartars have deposed in favour of Malibrunus, the Jew painter's
abilities. I should sooner have suspected that Mr. Masters
would have produced such witnesses to condemn Richard III. The
note relating to Lady Boteler does not relate to her marriage.

I send you two martagon roots, and some jonquils; and have
added some prints, two enamelled Pictures, and three medals.
One of Oliver, by Simon; a fine one of Pope Clement X., and a
scarce one of Archbishop Sancroft and the Seven Bishops. I
hope the two latter will atone for the first. As I shall never
be out of your debt, pray draw on me for any more other roots,
or any thing that will be agreeable to you, and excuse me at
present.

Letter 59 To Dr. Berkenhout.(99)
July 6, 1773, (page 84)

Sir,
I am so much engaged in private business at present, that I
have not had time to thank you for the favour of your letter:
nor can I now answer it to your satisfaction. My life has been
too insignificant to afford materials interesting to the
public. In general, the lives of mere authors are dry and
unentertaining; nor, though I -have been one occasionally, are
my writings of a class or merit to entitle me to any
distinction. I can as little furnish you, Sir, with a list of
them or their dates, which would give me more trouble to make
out than is worth while. If I have any merit with the public,
it is for printing and preserving some valuable works of
others; and if ever you write the lives of printers, I may be
enrolled in the number. My own works, I suppose, are dead and
buried; but, as I am not impatient to be interred with them, I
hope you will leave that office to the parson of the parish,
and I shall be, as long as I live, yours, etc.

(99) Dr. John Berkenhout had been a captain both in the English
and Prussian service, and in 1765 took his degree of MD. at
Leyden. his application to Walpole was for the purpose of
procuring materials for a life of him In his forthcoming work,
"Biographia Literaria, or a Biographical History of Literature;
containing the Lives of English, Irish, and Scottish Authors,
from the dawn of Letters in these Kingdoms to the present
Time." The first volume, which treats of those writers who
lived from the beginning of the fifth to the end of the sixth
century, and which is the only one ever published, appeared in
1777. He died in 1791-E.

Letter 60 To The Hon. H. S. Conway.
Arlington Street, Aug. 30, 1773. (page 84)

I returned last night from Houghton,(100) where multiplicity of
business detained me four days longer than I intended, and
where I found a scene infinitely more mortifying than I
expected; though I certainly did not go with a prospect of
finding a land flowing with milk and honey. Except the
pictures, which are in the finest preservation, and the woods,
which are become forests, all the rest is ruin, desolation,
confusion, disorder, debts, mortgages, sales, pillage, villany,
waste, folly, and madness. I do not believe that five thousand
pounds would put the house and buildings into good repair. The
nettles and brambles in the park are up to your shoulders;
horses have been turned into the garden, and banditti lodged in
every cottage. The perpetuity of livings that come up to the
park-pales have been sold--and every farm let for half its
value. In short, you know how much family pride I have, and
consequently may judge how much I have been mortified! Nor do I
tell you half, or near the worst circumstances. I have just
stopped the torrent-and that is all. I am very uncertain
whether I must not fling up the trust; and some of the
difficulties in my way seem unsurmountable, and too dangerous
not to alarm even my zeal; since I must not ruin myself, and
hurt those for whom I must feel, too, only to restore a family
that will end with myself, and to retrieve an estate' from
which I am not likely ever to receive the least advantage.

if you will settle with the Churchills your journey to
Chalfont, and will let me know the day, I will endeavour to
meet you there; I hope it Will not be till next week. I am
overwhelmed with business--but, indeed, I know not when I shall
be otherwise! I wish you joy of this endless summer.

(100) Whither he had gone during the mental alienation of his
nephew, George Earl of Orford, to endeavour to settle and
arrange his affairs.

Letter 61 To The Earl Of Strafford.
Strawberry Hill, Sept. 24, 1773. (page 85)

The multiplicity of business which I found chalked out to me by
my journey to Houghton, has engaged me so much, my dear lord,
and the unpleasant scene opened to me there struck me so
deeply, that I have neither had time nor cheerfulness enough to
flatter myself I could amuse my friends by my letters. Except
the pictures, I found every thing worse than I expected, and
the prospect almost too bad to give me courage to pursue what I
am doing. I am totally ignorant of most of the branches of
business that are fallen to my lot, and not young enough to
learn any new business well. All I can hope is to clear the
worst part of the way; for, in undertaking to retrieve an
estate, the beginning is certainly the most difficult of the
work--it is fathoming a chaos. But I will not unfold a
confusion to your lordship which your good sense will always
keep You from experiencing --very unfashionably; for the first
geniuses of the age hold, that the best method of governing the
world is to throw it into disorder. The experiment is not yet
complete, as the rearrangement is still to come.

I am very seriously glad of the birth of your nephew,(101)
my lord; I am going this evening with my gratulations'; but
have been so much absent and so hurried, that I have not yet
had the pleasure of seeing

Lady Anne,(102) though I have called twice. To Gunnersbury I
have no summons this summer: I receive such honours, or the
want of them, with proper respect. Lady Mary Coke, I fear, is
in chace of a Dulcineus that she will never meet. When the
ardour of peregrination is a little abated, will not she
probably give in to a more comfortable pursuit; and, like a
print I have seen of -the blessed martyr Charles the First,
abandon the hunt of a corruptible for that of an incorruptible
crown? There is another beatific print just published in that
style: it is of Lady Huntingdon. With much pompous humility,
she looks like an old basket-woman trampling on her coronet at
the mouth of a cavern.-Poor Whitfield! if he was forced to do
the honours of the spelunca!--Saint Fanny Shirley is nearer
consecration. I was told two days ago that she had written a
letter to Lady Selina that was not intelligible. Her grace of
Kingston's glory approaches to consummation in a more worldly
style. The Duke(103) is dying, and has given her the whole
estate, seventeen thousand a-year. I am told she has already
notified the contents of the will, and made offers of the sale
of Thoresby. Pious matrons have various ways of expressing
decency.

Your lordship's new bow-window thrives. I do not want it to
remind me of its master and mistress, to whom I am ever the
most devoted humble servant.

(101) A son of John Earl of Buckingham, who died young.

(102) Lady Anne Conolly.

(103) The Duke of Kingston died on the 22d of September, when
all his honours became extinct.-E.

Letter 62 To The Earl Of Strafford.
Arlington Street, Nov. 15, 1773. (page 86)

I am very sorry, my dear lord, that you are coming towards us
so slowly and unwillingly. I cannot quite wonder at the
latter. The world is an old acquaintance that does not improve
upon one's hands: however, one must not give way to the
disgusts it creates. My maxim, and practice, too, is to laugh,
because I do not like to cry. I could shed a pailfull of tears
over all I have seen and learnt Since my poor nephew's
misfortune-the more one has to do with men the worse one finds
them But can one mend them? No. Shall we shut ourselves up
from them? No. We should grow humourists-and of all animals an
Englishman is least made to live alone. For my part, I am
conscious of so many faults, that I think I grow better the
more bad I see in my neighbours; and there are so many I would
not resemble, that it makes me watchful over myself You, my
lord, who have forty more good qualities than I have, should
not seclude yourself. I do not wonder you despise knaves and
fools: but remember, they want better examples; they will never
grow ashamed by conversing with one another.

I came to settle here on Friday, being drowned out of
Twickenham. I find the town desolate, and no news in it, but
that the ministry give up the Irish -tax-some say, because it
will not pass in Ireland; others, because the city of London
would have petitioned against it; and some, because there were
factions in the council-- which is not the most incredible of
all. I am glad, for the sake of some of my friends who would
have suffered by it, that it is over.(104) In other respects, I
have too much private business of my own to think about the
public, which is big enough to take care of itself.

I have heard some of Lady Mary Coke's mortifications. I have
regard and esteem for her good qualities, which are many; but I
doubt her genius will never suffer her to be quite happy. As
she will not take the psalmist's advice of not putting trust, I
am sure she would not follow mine; for, with all her piety,
King David is the only royal person she will not listen to, and
therefore I forbear my sweet counsel. When she and Lord
Huntingdon meet, will not they put you in mind of Count-Gage
and Lady Mary Herbert, who met in the mines of Asturias, after
they had failed of the crown of Poland?(105) Adieu, my dear
lord! Come you and my lady among us. You have some friends
that are not odious, and who will be rejoiced to see you both-
-witness, for one, yours most faithfully.

(104) A tax upon absentees. Mr. Hardy, in his Memoirs of Lord
Charlemont, says, that the influence of the Whig leaders
predominated so far as to oblige the ministers to relinquish
the measure.-E.

(105) "The crown of Poland, venal twice an age,
To just three millions stint;ed modest Gage."

Pope in a note to the above couplet, states that Mr. Gage and
Lady Mary Herbert, " each of them, in the Mississippi scheme,
despised to realize above three hundred thousand pounds: the
gentleman with a view to the purchase of the crown of Poland,
the lady on a vision of the like royal nature: they have since
retired into Spain, where they are still in search of gold, in
the mines of the Asturias."-E.

Letter 63 To Lady Mary Coke.(106)
((page 87)

Your ladyship's illustrious exploits are the constant theme of
my meditations. Your expeditions are so rapid, and to such
distant regions, that I cannot help thinking you are possessed
of the giant's boots that stepped seven leagues at a stride, as
we are assured by that accurate historian Mother Goose. You
are, I know, Madam', an excellent walker, yet methinks seven
leagues at once are a prodigious straddle for a fair lady. But
whatever is your manner of travelling, few heroines ancient or
modern can be compared to you for length of journeys.
Thalestris, Queen of the Amazons, and M. M. or N. N. Queen of
Sheba, went each of them the Lord knows how far to meet
Alexander the Great and Solomon the Wise; the one to beg the
favour of having a daughter (I suppose) and heiress by him; and
the other, says scandal, to grant a like favour to the Hebrew
monarch. Your ladyship, who has more real Amazonian
principles, never makes visits but to empresses, queens, and
princesses; and your country is enriched with the maxims of
wisdom and virtue which you collect in your travels. For such
great ends did Herodotus, Pythagoras, and other sages, make
voyages to Egypt, and every distant kingdom; and it is amazing
how much their own countries were benefited by what those
philosophers learned in their peregrinations. Were it not that
your ladyship is actuated by such public spirit, I could Put
YOU in mind, Madam, of an old story that might save you a great
deal of fatigue and danger-and now I think of it, as I have
nothing better to fill my letter with, I will relate it to you.

Pyrrhus, the martial and magnanimous King of Epirus (as my Lord
Lyttelton would call him), being, as I have heard or seen
Goodman Plutarch say, intent on his preparations for invading
Italy, Cineas, one of the grooms of his bedchamber, took the
liberty of asking his majesty what benefit he expected to reap
if he should be successful in conquering the Romans?--Jesus!
said the King, peevishly; why the question answers itself.
When we have overcome the Romans, no province, no town, whether
Greek or barbarian, will be able to resist us: we shall at once
be masters of all Italy. Cineas after a short pause replied,
And having subdued Italy, what shall we do next?--Do next?
answered Pyrrhus; why, seize Sicily. Very likely, quoth
Cineas: but will that put an end to the war?-The gods forbid!
cried his Majesty: when Sicily is reduced, Libya and Carthage
will be within our reach. And then, without giving Cineas time
to put in a word, the heroic Prince ran over Africa, Greece,
Asia, Persia, and every other country he had ever heard of upon
the face of God's earth; not one of which he intended should
escape his victorious sword. At last, when he was at the end
of his geography, and a little out of breath, Cineas watched
his opportunity, and said quietly, Well, Sire, and when we have
conquered all the world, what are we to do then?--Why, then,
said his Majesty, extremely satisfied with his own prowess, we
will live at our ease; we: Will spend whole days in banqueting
and carousing, and will think of nothing but our pleasures.

Now, Madam, for the application. Had I had the honour a few
years ago of being your confidential abigail, when you
meditated a visit to Princess Esterhazi, I would have ventured
to ask your ladyship of what advantage her acquaintance would
be to you? Probably you would have told me, that she would
introduce you to several electresses and margravines, whose
courts you would visit. That having conquered all their
hearts, as I am persuaded you would, your next jaunt would be
to Hesse; from whence it would be but a trip to Aix, where
Madame de Rochouart lives. Soaring from thence you Would
repair to the Imperial court at Vienna, where resides the most
august, most virtuous, and most plump of empresses and queens-
-no, I mistake--I should only have said, of empresses; for her
Majesty of Denmark, God bless her! is reported to be full as
virtuous, and three stone heavier. Shall not you call at
Copenhagen, Madam? If you do, you are next door to the
Czarina, who is the quintessence of friendship, as the Princess
Daskioff says, whom, next to the late Czar, her Muscovite
Majesty loves above all the world. Asia, I suppose, would not
enter into your ladyship's system Of conquest; for, though it
contains a sight of queens and sultanas, the poor ladies are
locked up in abominable places, into which I am sure your
ladyship's amity would never carry you--I think they call them
seraglios. Africa has nothing but empresses stark-naked; and
of complexions directly the reverse of your alabaster They do
not reign in their own right; and what is worse, the emperors
of those barbarous regions wear no more robes than the
sovereigns of their hearts. And what are princes and
princesses without velvet and ermine? As I am not a jot a
better geographer than King Pyrrhus, I can at present recollect
but one lady more who reigns alone, and that is her Majesty of
Otaheite, lately discovered by Mr. Bankes and Dr. Solander; and
for whom, your ladyship's compassionate breast must feel the
tenderest emotions,' she having been cruelly deprived of her
faithful minister and lover Tobiu, since dead at Batavia.

Well,'Madam, after you should have given me the plan of your
intended expeditions, and not left a queen regent on the face
of the globe unvisited,-- I would ask what we were to do next?-
-Why then, dear Abigail, you would have said, we will retire to
Notting-hill, we will plant shrubs all the morning, read
Anderson's Royal Genealogies all the evening; and once or twice
a week I will go to Gunnersbury and drink a bottle with
Princess Amelia. Alas, dear lady! and cannot you do all that
without skuttling from one end of the world to the other?--This
was the, upshot of all Cineas's inquisitiveness: and this is
the pith of this tedious letter from, Madam, your ladyship's
most faithful Aulic Counsellor and humble admirer.

(106) See the two preceding letters. It will be recollected
that Lady Mary Coke was sister-in-law to The Earl of Strafford,
and widow of Viscount Coke, heir apparent of Thomas Earl of
Leicester, who died without issue by her, in his father's
lifetime. Lady Mary died at a great age in 1811-E.

Letter 64 To The Hon. Mrs. GREY.(107)
Dec. 9, 1773. (page 89)

DEAR MADAM,
As I hear Lady Blandford has a return of the gout-, as I
foretold last night from the red spot being not gone, I beg you
will be so good as to tell her, that if she does not encourage
the swelling by keeping her foot wrapped up as hot as possible
in flannel, she will torment herself and bring more pain. I
will answer that if she will let it swell, and suffer the
swelling to go off of itself, she will have no more pain; and
she must remember, that the gout will bear contradiction no
more than she herself(108) Pray read this to her, and what I
say farther--that though I know she will not bear pain for
herself, I am sure she will for her friends. Her misfortune
has produced the greatest satisfaction that a good mind can
receive, the experience that that goodness has given her a
great many sincere friends, who have shown as much concern as
ever was known, and the most disinterested; as we know her
generosity has left her nothing to give. We wish to preserve
her for her own sake and ours, and the poor beseech her to bear
a little pain for them.

I am going out of town till Monday, or would bring my
prescription myself. She wants no virtue but patience; and
patience takes it very ill to be left out of such good company.
I am, dear Madam, Your obedient servant,
Dr. WALPOLE.

(107) NOW first printed.

(108) It has already been stated, that Lady Blandford was
somewhat impatient in her temper.-E.

Letter 65 To Sir David Dalrymple.(109)
Arlington Street, Dec. 14, 1773. (page 90)

Sir,
I have received from Mr. Dodsley, and read with pleasure, your
Remarks on the History of Scotland," though I am not
competently versed in some of the subjects. Indeed, such a
load of difficult and vexatious business is fallen upon me by
the unhappy situation of my nephew, Lord Orford, of whose
affairs I have been forced to undertake the management, though
greatly unfit for it, that I am obliged to bid adieu to all
literary amusement and pursuits; and must dedicate the rest of
a life almost worn out, and of late wasted and broken by a long
illness, to the duties I owe to my family. I hope you, Sir,
will have no such disagreeable avocation, and am your obliged
servant.

(109) Now first collected.

Letter 66 To The Rev. Mr. Cole.
Arlington Street, May 4, 1774. (page 90)

Dear Sir,
We have dropped one another, as if we were not antiquaries, but
people of this world-or do you disclaim me, because I have
quitted the Society? I could give You but too sad reasons for
my silence. The gout kept entire possession of me for six
months; and, before it released me, Lord Orford's illness and
affairs engrossed me totally. I have been twice in Norfolk
since you heard from me. I am now at liberty again. What is
your account of yourself? To. ask you to come above ground,
even so far as to see me, I know is in vain or I certainly
would ask it. You impose Carthusian shackles on Yourself, Will
not quit your cell, nor will speak above once a week. I am
glad to hear of you, and to see your hand, though you make that
as much like print as you can. If you were to be tempted
abroad, it would be a pilgrimage: and I can lure you even with
that. My chapel is finished, and the shrine will actually be
placed in less than a fortnight. My father is said to have
said, that every man had his price. You are a Beatus, indeed,
if you resist a shrine. Why should not you add to your
claustral virtues that of a peregrination to Strawberry? You
will find me quite alone in July. Consider, Strawberry is
almost the last monastery left, at least in England. Poor Mr.
Bateman's is despoiled. Lord Bateman has stripped and
plundered it: has sequestered the best things, has advertised
the site, and is dirtily selling by auction what he neither
would keep, nor can sell for a sum that is worth while. I was
hurt to see half the ornaments of the chapel, and the
reliquaries, and in short a thousand trifles, exposed to
sneers. I am buying a few to keep for the founder's sake.
Surely it is very indecent for a favourite relation, who is
rich, to show so little remembrance and affection. I suppose
Strawberry will have the same fate! It has already happened to
two of my friends. Lord Bristol got his mother's house from
his brother, by persuading her he was in love with it. He let
it in a month after she was dead band all her favourite
pictures and ornaments, which she had ordered not to be
removed, are mouldering in a garret! You are in the right to
care so little for a world where there is no measure but
avoirdupois. Adieu! Yours sincerely.

Letter 67 To The Rev. Mr. Cole.
Strawberry Hill, May 28, 1774. (page 91)

Nothing will be more agreeable to me', dear Sir, than a visit
from you in July. I will try to persuade Mr. Granger to meet
you; and if you had any such thing as summer in the fens, I
would desire you to bring a bag with you. We are almost
freezing here in the midst of beautiful verdure, with a
profusion of blossoms and flowers; but I keep good fires, and
seem to feel warm weather while I look through the window; for
the way to ensure summer in England, is to have it framed and
glazed in a comfortable room.

I shall be still more glad to hear you are settled in Your
living. Burnham is almost in my neighbourhood; and its being
in that of Eton and Windsor, will more than console you, I
hope, for leaving Ely and Cambridge. Pray let me know the
moment you are certain. It would now be a disappointment to me
as well as you. You shall be inaugurated in my chapel, which
is much more venerable than your parish church, and has the
genuine air of antiquity. I bought very little of poor Mr.
Bateman's. His nephew disposed of little that was worth
houseroom, and Yet pulled the whole to pieces.

Mr. Pennant has Published a new Tour to Scotland and the
Hebrides: and, though he has endeavoured to paint their dismal
isles and rocks in glowing colours, they will not be satisfied;
for he seems no bigot about Ossian, at least in some passages;
and is free in others, which their intolerating spirit will
resent. I cannot say the book is very entertaining to me, and
it is more a book of rates than of antiquities. The most
amusing part was communicated to him by Mr. Banks, who found
whole islands that bear nothing but columns, as other places do
grass and barley. There is a beautiful cave called Fingal's;
which proves that nature loves Gothic architecture.

Mr. Pennant has given a new edition of his former Tour, with
more cuts. Among others, is the vulgar head, called the
Countess of Desmond. I told him I had discovered, and proved
past contradiction, that it is Rembrandt's mother. He owned
it, and said, he would correct it by a note-but he has not.
This is a brave way of being an antiquary! as if there could be
any merit in giving for genuine what one knows to be spurious.
He is, indeed, a superficial man, and knows little of history
or antiquity: but he has a violent rage for being an author.
He set out with Ornithology, and a little Natural History, and
picks Up his knowledge as he rides. I have a still lower idea
of Mr. Gough; for Mr. Pennant, at least, is very civil: the
other is a hog. Mr. Fenn,(110) another smatterer in antiquity,
but. a very good sort of man, told me, Mr. Gough desired to be
introduced to me--but as he has been such a bear to you,(111)
he shall not come. The Society of Antiquaries put me in mind
of what the old Lord Pembroke said to Anstis the herald: "Thou
silly fellow! thou dost not know thy own silly business." If
they went behind taste by poking into barbarous ages, when
there was no taste, one could forgive them--but they catch at
the first ugly thing they see, and take it for old, because it
is new to them, and then usher it pompously into the world, as
if they had made a discovery; though they have not yet cleared
up a single point that is of the least importance, or that
tends to Settle any obscure passage in history.

I will not condole with you on having had the gout, since you
find it has removed other complaints. Besides as it begins
late, you are never likely to have it severely. I shall be in
terrors in two or three months, having had the four last fits
periodically and biennially Indeed, the two last were so long
and severe, that my remaining and shattered strength could ill
support such.

I must repeat how glad I shall be to have you at Burnham. When
people grow old, as you and I do, they should get together.
Others do not care for us: but we seem wiser to one another by
finding fault with them. Not that I am apt to dislike young
folks, whom I think every thing becomes: but it is a kind of
self-defence to live in a body. I dare to say that monks never
find out that they grow old fools. Their age gives them
authority, and nobody contradicts them. In the world, one
cannot help perceiving one is out of fashion. Women play at
cards with women of their own standing, and censure others
between the deals, and thence conclude themselves Gamaliels. I
who see many young men with better parts than myself, submit
with a good grace, or retreat hither to my castle, where I am
satisfied with what I have done, and am always in good humour.
But I like to have one or two old friends with me. I do not
much invite the juvenile, who think my castle and me of equal
antiquity: for no wonder, if they supposed George I. lived in
the time of the crusades.

Adieu! my good Sir, and pray let Burnham Wood and Dunsinane be
good neighbours. Yours ever.

(110) Sir John Fenn, who edited the "Original Letters, written
during the Reigns of Henry VI., Edward IV., Richard III., and
Henry ViI., by various Persons of rank and consequence,
digested in a Chronological order - with Notes historical and
explanatory;" which were published in four volumes, quarto,
between the years 1787-1789. The letters are principally by
members of the Paston family and others, who were of great
consequence in Norfolk at the time Sir John who was a native of
Norwich, died in 1794. A fifth volume was published in 1823.-
E.

(111) Alluding to his not having answered a letter from Mr.
Cole for nearly a twelvemonth.

Letter 68 To The Rev. Mr. Cole.
Strawberry Hill, June 21, 1774. (page 93)

Your illness, dear Sir, is the worst excuse you could make me;
and the worse, as you may be well in a night, if you will, by
taking six grains of James's Powder. He cannot cure death; but
he can most complaints that are not mortal or chronical. He
could cure you so soon of colds, that he would cure you of
another distemper, to which I doubt you are a little subject,
the fear of them. I hope you were certain, that illness is a
legal plea for missing induction, or you will have nursed a
cough and hoarseness with too much tenderness, as they
certainly could bear a journey. Never see my face again, if
you are not rector of Burnham. How can you be so bigoted to
Milton? I should have thought the very name would have
prejudiced you against the place, as the name is all that could
approach towards reconciling me to the fens. I shall be very
glad to see you here, whenever you have resolution enough to
quit your cell. But since Burnham and the neighbourhood of
Windsor and Eton have no charms for you, can I expect that
Strawberry Hill should have any? Methinks, that when one grows
old, one's contemporary friends should be our best amusement:
for younger people are soon tired of us, and our old stories:
but I have found the contrary in some of mine. For your part,
you care for conversing with none but the dead: for I reckon
the unborn, for whom you are writing, as much dead, as those
from whom you collect. .

You certainly ask no favour, dear Sir, when you want prints of
Me. They are at any body's service that thinks them worth
having. The owner sets very little value on them, since he
sets very little, indeed, on himself: as a man, a very faulty
one; and as an author, a very
middling one; which
whoever thinks a comfortable rank, is not at all my opinion.
Pray convince me that you think I mean sincerely, by not
answering me with a compliment. it is very weak to be pleased
with flattery; the stupidest of 'all delusions to beg it. From
You I should take it ill. We have known one another almost
fifty years--to very little purpose, indeed, if any ceremony is
necessary, or downright sincerity not established between us.
tell me that you are recovered, and that I shall see you some
time or other. I have finished the catalogue of my collection;
but you shall never have it without fetching, nor, though a
less punishment, the prints you desire. I propose in time to
have plates of my house added to 'the Catalogue, yet I Cannot
afford them, unless by degrees. Engravers are grown so much
dearer, without My growing richer, that I must have patience! a
quality I seldom have, but when I must. Adieu! Yours ever.

P. S. I have lately been at Ampthill, and saw Queen Catherine's
cross. It is not near large enough for the situation, and would
be fitter for a garden than a park: but it is executed in the
truest and best taste. Lord Ossory is quite satisfied, as well
as I, and designs Mr. Essex a present of some guineas. If ever
I am richer, I shall consult the same honest man about building
my offices, for Which I have a plan: but if I have no more
money, ever, I Will not run in debt, and distress myself: and
therefore remit my designs to chance and a little economy.

Letter 69 To The Hon. H. S. Conway.
Strawberry Hill, June 23, 1774. (page 94)

I have nothing to say--which is the best reason in the world
for writing; for one must have a great regard for any body, one
writes to, when one begins a letter neither on ceremony nor
business. You are seeing armies,(112) who are always in fine
order--and great spirits when they are in cold blood: I am
sorry you thought it worth while to realize what I should have
thought you could have seen in your mind's eye. However, I
hope you will be amused and pleased With viewing heroes, both
in their autumn and their bud. Vienna will be a new sight; so
will the Austrian eagle and its two heads, I should like
seeing, too, if any fairy would present me with a chest that
would fly up into the air by touching a peg, and transport me
whither I pleased in an instant: but roads, and inns, and dirt,
are terrible drawbacks on My curiosity. I grow so old and so
indolent, that I scarce stir from hence; and the dread of the
gout makes me almost as much a prisoner, as a fit of it. News
I know none, if there is any. The papers tell me that the city
was to present a petition to The King against the Quebec-bill
yesterday; and I suppose they will tell me to-morrow whether it
was presented. The King's speech tells me, there has nothing
happened between the Russians and the Turks.(113) Lady
Barrymore told me t'other day, that nothing was to happen
between her and Lord Egremont. I am as well satisfied with
these negatives, as I should have been with the contrary. I am
much more interested about the rain, for it destroys all my
roses and orange-flowers, of which I have exuberance; and my
hay is cut, and cannot be made. However, it is delightful to
have no other distresses. When I compare my present
tranquillity and indifference with all I suffered last
year,(114) I am thankful for my happiness and enjoy it--unless
the bell rings early in the morning--then I tremble, and think
it an express from Norfolk.

It is unfortunate that when one has nothing to talk of but
one's self, one should have nothing to' say of one's self. It
is shameful, too, to send such a scrap by the post. I think I
shall reserve it till Tuesday. If -I have then nothing to add,
as is probable, you must content yourself with my good
intentions, as you, I hope, will with this speculative
campaign. Pray, for the future, remain at home and build
bridges: I wish you were here to expedite ours to Richmond,
which they tell me Will not be passable these two years. I
have done looking so forward. Adieu!

(112) Mr. Conway was now on a tour of military curiosity
through Flanders, Germany, Prussia, and part of Hungary.

(113) Peace between Russia and Turkey Was proclaimed at St.
Petersburgh on the 14th of August, 1774.-E.

(114) During the illness of his nephew, Lord Orford.

Letter 70 To The Rev. Mr. Cole.
Matson, near Gloucester, Aug. 15, 1774. (page 95)

Dear Sir,
As I am your disciple in antiquities (for you studied them when
I was but a scoffer), I think it my duty to give you some
account of my journeying, in the good cause. You will not
dislike my date. I am in the Very mansion where King Charles
the First and his two eldest sons lay during the siege; and
there are marks of the last's
hacking with his hanger on a window, as he told Mr. Selwin's
grandfather afterwards. The present master has done due honour
to the royal residence, and erected a good marble bust of the
Martyr, in a little gallery. In a window is a shield in
painted glass, with that King's and his Queen's arms, which I
gave him. So you see I am not a rebel, when alma mater
antiquity stands godmother.

I went again to the cathedral, and, on seeing the monument of
Edward II a new historic doubt started which I pray you to
solve. His Majesty has a longish beard - and such were
certainly worn at that time. Who is the first historian that
tells the story of his being shaven with cold water from a
ditch and weeping to supply warm, as he was carried to Berkeley
Castle? Is not this apocryphal? The house whence Bishop
Hooper(115) was carried to the stake, is still standing, tale
quale. I made a visit to his actual successor, Warburton, 'who
is very infirm, speaks with much hesitation, and, they say,
begins to lose his memory. They have destroyed the beautiful
cross; the two battered heads of Henry III. and Edward III. are
in the Postmaster's garden.

Yesterday I made a jaunt four miles hence that pleased me
exceedingly, to Prinknash, the individual villa of the abbots
of Gloucester. I wished you there with their mitre on. It
stands on a glorious, but impracticable hill, in the midst of a
little forest of beech, and commanding Elysium. The house is
small, but has good rooms, and though modernized here and
there, not extravagantly. On the ceiling of the hall is Edward
IVth's Jovial device, a fau-con serrure. The chapel is low and
small, but antique, and with painted glass, with many angels in
their coronation robes, i. e. wings and crowns. Henry VIII.
and Jane Seymour lay here: in the dining-room are their arms in
glass, and of Catherine of Arragon, and of Brays and Bridges.
Under the window, a barbarous bas-relief head of Harry, young:
as it is still on a sign of an alehouse, on the descent of the
hill. Think of my amazement, when they showed me the chapel
plate, and I found on it, on four pieces, my own arms,
quartering my mother-in-law, Skerret's, and in a shield of
pretence, those of Fortescue certainly by mistake, for those of
my sister-in-law, as the barony of Clinton was in abeyance
between her and Fortescue Lord Clinton. The whole is modern
and blundered: for Skerret should be impaled, not quartered,
and instead of our crest, are two spears tied together in a
ducal coronet, and no coronet for my brother, in whose time
this plate must have been made, and at whose sale it was
probably bought; as he finished the repairs of the church at
Houghton, for which, I suppose, this decoration was intended.
But the silversmith was no herald, you see.

As I descended the hill, I found in a wretched cottage a child,
in an ancient oaken cradle, exactly in the form of that lately
published from the cradle of Edward II. I purchased it for
five shillings; but don't know whether I shall have fortitude
enough to transport it to Strawberry Hill. People would
conclude me in my second childhood.

To-day I have been at Berkeley and Thornbury Castles. The
first disappointed me much, though very entire. It is much
smaller than I expected, but very entire, except a small part
burnt two years ago, while the present Earl was in the house.
The fire began in the housekeeper's room, who never appeared
more; but as she was strict over the servants, and not a bone
of her was found, it was supposed that she was murdered, and
the body conveyed away. The situation is not elevated nor
beautiful, and little improvements made of late, but some silly
ones `a la Chinoise, by the present Dowager. In good sooth, I
can give you but a very imperfect account; for, instead of the
lord's
being gone to dine with the mayor of Gloucester, as I expected,
I found him in the midst of all his captains of the militia. I
am so sillily shy of strangers and youngsters, that I hurried
through the chambers; and looked for nothing but the way out of
every room. I just observed that there were many bad portraits
of the family, but none ancient; as if the Berkeleys had been
commissaries, and raised themselves in the last war. There is
a plentiful addition of those of my Lord Berkeley of Stratton,
but no knights templars, or barons as old as Edward I.; yet are
there three beds on which there may have been as frisky doings
three centuries ago, as there probably have been within these
ten ears. The room shown for the murder of Edward II., and the
shrieks of an agonizing king, I verily believe to be genuine.
It is a dismal chamber, almost at top of the house, quite
detached, and to be approached only by a kind of foot-bridge,
and from that 'descends' a large flight of steps that terminate
on strong gates; exactly the situation for a corps de garde.
In that room they show you a cast of a face in plaister, and
tell you it was taken from Edward's. I was not quite so easy
of faith about that; for it is evidently the face of Charles I.

The steeple of the church, lately rebuilt handsomely, stands
some paces from the body; in the latter are three tombs of the
old Berkeleys;, with cumbent figures. The wife of the Lord
Berkeley,(116) who was supposed to be privy to the murder, has
a curious headgear; it is like a long horseshoe, quilted in
quatrefoils; and, like Lord Foppington's wig, allows no more
than the breadth of a half-crown to be discovered of the face.
Stay, I think I mistake; the husband was a conspirator against
Richard II. not Edward. But in those days, loyalty was not so
rife as at present.

>From Berkeley Castle I went to Thornbury, of which the ruins
are half-ruined. It would have been glorious, if
finished.(117) I wish the lords of Berkeley had retained the
spirit of deposing till Henry the VIIIth's time! The situation
is fine, though that was not the fashion; for all the windows
of the great apartment look into the inner court. The prospect
was left to the servants. Here I had two adventures. I could
find nobody to show me about. I saw a paltry house that I took
for the sexton's, at the corner of the close, and bade my
servant ring, and ask who could show me the Castle. A voice in
a passion flew, from a casement, and issued from a divine.
"What! was it his business to show the Castle? - Go look for
somebody else! What did the fellow ring for as if the house was
on fire?" The poor
Swiss came back in a fright, and said, the doctor had sworn at
him. Well--we scrambled over a stone stile, saw a room or two
glazed near the gate, and rung at it. A damsel came forth and
satisfied our curiosity. When we had done seeing, I said,
"Child, we don't know our Way, and want to be directed into the
London road; I see the Duke's steward yonder at the window,
pray desire him to come to me, that I may consult him." She
went--he stood staring at us at the window, and sent his
footman. I do not think courtesy is a resident at Thornbury.
As I returned through the close, the divine came running, out
of breath, and without his beaver or band, and calls out, "Sir,
I am come to justify myself: your servant says I swore at him:
I am no swearer--Lord bless me! (dropping his voice) it is Mr.
Walpole!" "Yes, Sir, and I think you was Lord Beauchamp's
tutor at Oxford, but I have forgot your name." "Holwell, Sir."
"Oh! yes." and then I comforted him, and laid the ill-breeding
on my footman's being a foreigner; but could not help saying, I
really had taken his house for the sexton's. "Yes, Sir, it is
not very good without, won't you please to walk in!" I did, and
found the inside ten times worse, and He was making an Index to
Homer, a lean wife, suckling a child. He is going to publish
the chief beauties, and I believe had just been reading some of
the delicate civilities that pass between Agamemnon and
Achilles, and that what my servant took for oaths, were only
Greek compliments.(118) Adieu! Yours ever.

You see I have not a line more of paper.

(115) John Hooper, Bishop of Gloucester, who, having refused to
recant his opinions, was burned alive before the cathedral of
Gloucester in the year 1554.-E.

(116) Thomas, third Lord Berkeley, was entrusted with the
custody of Edward II.; but, owing to the humanity with which he
treated the captive monarch, he was forced to resign his
prisoner and his castle to Lord Maltravers and Sir Thomas
Gournay. After the murder of Edward, Lord Berkeley was
arraigned as a participator in the crime, but honourably
acquitted. The Lady Berkeley alluded to by Walpole was his
first wife, Margaret, daughter of Roger de Mortimer, Earl of
March, and widow of Robert Vere, Earl of Oxford.-E.

(117) Thornbury Castle was designed, but never finished by the
Duke of Buckingham, in Henry VIII's time.-E.

(118) The Rev. William Holwell, vicar of Thornbury, prebendary
of Exeter, and some time chaplain to the King. He was
distinguished by superior talents as a scholar, and a critical
knowledge of the Greek language. His "Extracts from Mr. Pope's
Translation, corresponding with the Beauties of Homer, selected
from the Iliad," were published in 1776.-E.

Letter 71 To The Hon. H. S. Conway.
Strawberry Hill, August 18, 1774. (page 98)

It is very hard, that because you do not get my letters, you
will not let me receive yours, who do receive them. I have not
had a line from you these five weeks. Of your honours and
glories fame has told me;(119) and for aught I know, you may be
a veldt-marshal by this time, and despise such a poor cottager
as me. Take notice I shall disclaim you in my turn, if you are
sent on a command against Dantzich, or to usurp a new district
in Poland.(120)

I have seen no armies, kings, or. empresses, and cannot send
you such august gazettes; nor are they what I want to hear of.
I like to hear you are well and diverted; nay, have pimped
towards the latter, by desiring Lady Ailesbury to send you
Monsieur do Guisnes's invitation to a military f`ete at
Metz.(121) For my part, I wish you was returned to your
plough. Your Sabine farm is in high beauty. I have lain there
twice within this week, going to and from a visit to George
Selwyn, near Gloucester; a tour as much to my taste as yours to
you. For fortified towns I have seen ruined castles.
Unluckily, in that of Berkeley I found a hole regiment of
militia in garrison, and as many young officers as if the
Countess was
in possession, and ready to surrender at indiscretion. I
endeavoured to comfort myself, by figuring that they were
guarding Edward II. I have seen many other ancient sights
without asking leave of the King of Prussia: it would not
please me so much to write to him, as it once did to write for
him.(122)

They have found at least seventy thousand pounds of Lord
Thomond's.(123) George Howard has decked himself with a red
riband, money, and honours! Charming things! and yet One may
be happy without them.

The young Mr. Coke is returned from his travels n love with the
Pretender's queen,(124) who has permitted him to have her
picture. What can I tell you more? Nothing. Indeed, if I
only write to postmasters, my letter is long enough. Every
body's head but mine is full of elections. I had the
satisfaction at Gloucester, where George Selwyn is canvassing,
of reflecting on my own wisdom. "Suave mari maggno turbantibus
aequora ventis," etc. I am certainly the greatest philosopher
in the world, without ever having thought of being so: always
employed, and never busy;' eager about trifles, and indifferent
to every thing serious. Well, if it is not philosophy, it is
at least content. I am as pleased here with my own nutshell,
as any monarch you have seen these two months astride his
eagle--not but I was dissatisfied when I missed you at
Park-place, and was peevish at your being in an Aulic chamber.
Adieu! Yours ever.

P- S. They tell us from Vienna, that the peace is made between
Tisiphone and the Turk: is it true?

(119) Alluding to the distinguished notice taken of General
Conway by the King of Prussia.

(120) The first dismemberment of Poland had taken place in the
preceding year, by which a third of her territory was ceded to
Russia, Austria, and Prussia.-E.

(121) To see the review of the French regiment of Carabineers,
then commanded by Monsieur de Guisnes.

(122) Alluding to the Letter to Rousseau in the name of the
King of Prussia.

(123) Percy Wyndham Obrien. He was the second son of Sir
Charles Wyndham, chancellor of the exchequer to Queen Anne; and
took the name of Obrien, pursuant to the Earl of Thomond in
Ireland.

(124) The Countess of Albany.-E.

Letter 72 To The Hon. H. S. Conway.
Strawberry Hill, Sept. 7, 1774. (page 99)

I did not think you had been so like the rest of the world, as,
when you pretended to be visiting armies, to go in search of
gold and silver mines!(125) The favours of courts and the
smiles of emperors and kings, I see, have corrupted even you,
and perverted you to a nabob. Have you brought away an ingot
in the calf of your leg? What abomination have you committed?
All the gazettes in Europe have sent you on different
negotiations: instead of returning With a treaty in your
pocket, you will only come back with bills of exchange. I
don't envy your subterraneous travels, nor the hospitality of
the Hungarians. Where did you find a spoonful of Latin about
you? I have not attempted to speak Latin these thirty years,
without perceiving I was talking Italian thickened with
terminations in us and orum. I should have as little expected
to find an Ovid in those regions; but I suppose the gentry of
Presburg read him for a fashionable author, as our squires and
their wives do the last collections of ballads that have been
sung at Vauxhall and Marybone. I wish you may have brought
away some sketches of Duke Albert's architecture. You know I
deal in the works of royal authors, though I have never admired
any of their own buildings, not excepting King Solomon's
temple. Stanley(126) and Edmondson in Hungary! What carried
them thither? The chase of mines too? The first, perhaps,
waddled thither obliquely, as a parrot would have done whose
direction was to Naples.

Well, I am glad you have been entertained, and seen such a
variety of sights. You don't mind fatigues and hardships, and
hospitality, the two extremes that to me poison travelling. I
shall never see any thing more, unless I meet with a ring that
renders one invisible. It was but the other day that, being
with George Selwyn at Gloucester, I Went to view Berkeley
Castle, knowing the Earl was to dine with the mayor of
Gloucester. Alas! when I arrived, he had put off the party to
enjoy his militia a day longer, and the house was full of
officers. They might be in the Hungarian dress, for aught I
knew; for I was so dismayed, that I would"fain have persuaded
the housekeeper that she could not show me the apartments; and
when she opened the hall, and I saw it full of captains, I hid
myself in a dark passage, and nothing could persuade me to
enter, till they had the civility to quit the place. When I
was forced at last to go over the castle, I ran through it
without seeing any thing, as if I had been afraid of being
detained prisoner.

I have no news to send you: if I had any, I would not conclude,
as all correspondents do, that Lady Ailesbury left nothing
Untold. Lady Powis is gone to hold mobs at Ludlow, where there
is actual war, and where a knight, I forget his name, one of
their friends, has been almost cut in two with a scythe. When
you have seen all the armies in Europe, you will be just in
time for many election-battles--perhaps, for a war in America,
whither more troops are going. Many of those already sent have
deserted; and to be sure the- prospect there is not smiling.
Apropos, Lord Mahon,(127) whom Lord Stanhope, his father, will
not suffer to wear powder because wheat is so dear, was
presented t'other day in coal-black hair and a white feather:
they said, "he had been tarred and feathered."

In France you will find a new scene.(128) The Chancellor is
sent, a little before his time, to the devil. The old
Parliament is expected back. I am sorry to say I shall not
meet you there. It will be too late in the year for me to
venture, especially as I now live in dread of my biennial gout,
and should die of it in an h`otel garni, and forced to receive
all comers--I, who you know lock myself up when I am ill as if
I had the plague.

I wish I could fill my sheet, in return for your five pages.
The only thing-you will care for knowing is, that I never saw
Mrs. Damer better in her life, nor look so well. You may trust
me, who am so apt to be frightened about her.

(125) Mr. Conway had gone to see the gold and silver mines of
cremnitz, in the neighbourhood of Grau, in Hungary.

(126) Mr. Hans Stanley.

(127) Charles Viscount Mahon, born on the 3d of August 1753.
In the following December, he married Lady Hester Pitt, eldest
daughter of the Earl of Chatham. He succeeded his father, as
third Earl Stanhope, in March 1786, and died in 1816.-E.

(128) In Consequence of the death of Louis XV. on the 10th of
May.-E.

Letter 73 To The Hon. H. S. Conway.
Strawberry Hill, Sept. 27, 1774. (page 101)

I should be very ungrateful indeed if I thought of complaining
of you, who are goodness itself to me: and when I did not
receive letters from 'you, I concluded it happened from your
eccentric positions. I am amazed, that hurried as YOU have
been, and your eyes and thoughts- crowded with objects, you
have been able to find time to write me so many and such long
letters, over and above all those to Lady, Ailesbury, your
daughter, brother, and other friends. Even Lord Strafford
brags of your frequent remembrance. That your superabundance
of royal beams would dazzle you, I never suspected. Even I
enjoy for you the distinctions you have received--though I
should hate such things for myself, as they are particularly
troublesome to me,'and I am particularly awkward under them,
and as I abhor the King of Prussia, and if I passed through
Berlin, should have no joy like avoiding him--like one of our
countrymen, who changed horses at Paris, and asked what the
name of that town was? All the other civilities you have
received I am perfectly happy in. The Germans are certainly a
civil, well-meaning people, and, I believe, one of the least
corrupted nations in Europe. I do not think them very
agreeable; but who do I think are so? A great many French
women, some English men, and a few English women; exceedingly
few French men. Italian women are the grossest, vulqarest of
the sex. If an Italian man has a grain of sense, he is a
buffoon. So much for Europe!

I have already told you, and so must Lady Ailesbury, that my
courage fails me, and I dare not meet you at Paris, As the
period arrived when the gout used to come, it is never a moment
out of my head. Such a suffering, such a helpless condition as
I was in for five months and a half, two years ago, makes me
tremble from head to foot. I should die at once if seized in a
French inn; or, what, if possible, would be worse, at Paris,
where I must admit every body.--I, who you know can hardly bear
to see even you when I am ill, and who shut up myself here, and
would not let Lord and Lady Hertford come near me--I, who have
my room washed though in bed, how could I bear French dirt! In
short, I, who am so capricious, and whom you are pleased to
call a philosopher, I suppose because I have given up every
thing but my own will--how could I keep my temper, who have no
way of keeping my temper but by keeping it out of every body's
way! No, I must give up the satisfaction of being with you at
Paris. I have just learnt to give up my pleasures, but I
cannot give up my pains, which such selfish people as I who
have suffered much, grow to compose into a system that they are
partial to, because it is their own. I must make myself amends
when you return: you will be more stationary, I hope, for the
future; and if I live I shall have intervals of health. In
lieu of me, you will have a charming succedaneum, Lady Harriet
Stanhope.(129) Her father, who is more a hero than i, is
packing up his old decrepit bones, and goes too. I wish she
may not have him to nurse, instead of diverting herself.

The present state of your country is, that it is drowned and
dead drunk; all water without, and wine within. Opposition for
the next elections every where, even in Scotland; not from
party, but as laying Out money to advantage. In the
head-quarters, indeed, party is not out of the question: the
day after to-morrow will be a great bustle in the city for a
Lord Mayor,(130) and all the winter in Westminster, where Lord
Mahon and Humphrey Cotes oppose the court. Lady Powis is
saving her money at Ludlow and Powis Castles by keeping open
house day and night against Sir Watkin Williams, and fears she
shall be kept there till the general election. It has rained
this whole month, and we have got another inundation. The
Thames is as broad as your Danube, and all my meadows are under
water. Lady Browne and I, coming last Sunday night from Lady
Blandford's, were in a piteous plight. The ferryboat was
turned round by the current, and carried to Isleworth. Then we
ran against the piers of our new bridge, and the horses were
frightened. Luckily, my cicisbeo -was a Catholic, and screamed
to so many Saints, that some of them at the nearest alehouse
came and saved us, or I should have had no more gout, or what I
dreaded I should; for I concluded we should be carried ashore
somewhere, and be forced to wade through the mud up to my
middle. So you see one may wrap oneself up in flannel and be
in danger, without visiting all the armies on the face of the
globe, and putting the immortality of one's chaise to the
proof.

I am ashamed Of sending you three sides of smaller paper in
answer to seven large--but what can I do? I see nothing, know
nothing, do nothing. My castle is finished, I have nothing new
to read, I am tired of writing, I have no new or old bit for my
printer. I have only black hoods around me; or, if I go to
town, the family-party in Grosvenor Street. One trait will
give you a sample of how I passed my time, and made me laugh,
as it put me in mind of you; at least it was a fit of absence,
much more likely to have happened to you than to me. I was
playing eighteenpenny tredrille with the Duchess of
Newcastle(131) and Lady Browne, and certainly not much
interested in the game. I cannot recollect nor conceive what I
was thinking of, but I pushed the cards very gravely to the
Duchess, and said, "Doctor, you are to deal." You may guess at
their astonishment, and how much it made us all laugh. I wish
it may make you smile a moment, or that I had any thing better
to send you. Adieu, most affectionately. Yours ever.

(129) a Daughter of the Earl of Harrington. Her ladyship was
married, in 1776, to Thomas second Lord Foley.-E.

(130) When Mr. Wilkes was elected.

(131) Catherine, eldest daughter and heiress of the Right Hon.
Henry Pelham, married to Henry ninth Earl of Lincoln; who, in
consequence of his marriage with her, inherited in 1768, the
dukedom of Newcastle-under-Line on the demise of the Countess's
uncle, Thomas Pelham Holles, Who had been created Duke of
Newcastle.under-Line, with special remainder to the Earl of
Lincoln , in 1756 _E.

Letter 74 To The Hon. H. S. Conway.
Strawberry Hill, Sept. 28, 1774. (page 103)

Lady Ailesbury brings you this,(132) which is not a letter, but
a paper of direction, and the counterpart of what I have
written to Madame du Deffand. I beg of you seriously to take a
great deal of notice of this dear old friend of mine. She
will, perhaps, expect more attention
from you, as my friend, and as it is her own nature a little,
than will be quite convenient to you: but you have an infinite
deal of patience and good-nature, and will excuse it. I was
afraid of her importuning Madame Ailesbury, who has a vast deal
to see and do, and, therefore, I prepared Madame du Deffand,
and told her Lady Ailesbury loves amusements, and that, having
never been at Paris before, she must not confine her: so you
must pay for both--and it will answer: and- I do not, I own,
ask this Only for Madame du Deffand's sake, but for my own, and
a little for yours. Since the late King's death she has not
dared to write to me freely, and I want to know the present
state of 'France exactly, both to satisfy my Own curiosity, and
for her sake, as- I wish to learn whether her, pension, etc. is
in any danger from the present ministry, some of whom are not
her friends. She can tell you a great deal if she will--by
that I don't mean that she is reserved, or partial to, her Own
country against ours--quite the contrary; she loves me better
than all France together--but she hates politics; and
therefore, to make her talk on it, you must tell her it is to
satisfy me, and that I want to know whether she is well at
court, whether she has any fears from the government,
particularly Maurepas and Nivernois: and that I am eager to
have Monsieur do Choiseul and ma grandmaman, the Duchess,
restored to power. If you take it on this foot easily, she
will talk to you with the utmost frankness and with amazing
cleverness. I have told her you are strangely absent, and
that, if she does not repeat it over and over, you will forget
every syllable; so I have prepared her to joke and be quite
familiar with you at once.(133) She knows more of personal
characters, and paints them better, than any body: but let this
be between ourselves, for I would not have a living soul
suspect, that I get any intelligence from her, which would hurt
her; and, therefore, I beg you not to let any human being know
of this letter, nor of your conversation with her, neither
English nor French.

Madame du Deffand hates les philosophes; so you must give them
up to her. She and Madame Geoffrin are no friends: so, if you
go thither, don't tell her of it. Indeed, you would be sick of
that house, whither all pretended beaux esprits and faux
savants go, and where they are very impertinent and dogmatic.

Let me give you one other caution, which I shall give to Lady
Ailesbury too. Take care of your papers at Paris, and have a
very strong lock to your porte-feuille. In the h`otels garnis
they have double keys to every lock, and examine every drawer
and paper of the English they can get at. They will pilfer,
too, whatever they can. I was robbed of half my clothes there
the first time, and they wanted to hang poor Louis to save the
people of the house who had stolen the things.

Here is another thing I must say. Madame du Deffand has kept a
great many of my letters, and, as she is very old, I am in pain
about them. I have written to her to beg she will deliver them
up to you to bring back to me, and I trust she Will.(134) If
she does, be so good to take great care of them. If she does
not mention them, tell her before you come away, that I begged
you to bring them; and if she hesitates, convince her how it
would hurt me to have letters written in very bad French, and
mentioning several people, both French and English, fall into
bad hands, and, perhaps, be printed.

Let me desire you to read this letter more than once, that you
may not forget my requests, which are very important to me; and
I must give you one other caution, without which all would be
useless.

There is at Paris a Mademoiselle de l,Espinasse,(135) a
pretended bel esprit, who was formerly an humble companion of
Madame du Deffand; and betrayed her and used her very ill. I
beg of you not to let any body carry you thither. It Would
disoblige my friend of all things in the world, and she would
never tell you a syllable; and I own it would hurt me, who have
such infinite obligations to her, that I should be very unhappy
if a particular friend of mine showed her this disregard. She
has done every thing upon earth to please and serve me, and I
owe it to her to be earnest about this attention. Pray do not
mention it; it might look simple in me, and yet I owe it to
her, as I know it would hurt her, and, at her age, with her
misfortunes, and with infinite obligations on my side, can I do
too much to show My gratitude, or prevent her any new
mortification? I dwell upon it, because she has some enemies so
spiteful that they try to carry all English to Mademoiselle de
l'Espinasse.

I wish the Duchess of Choiseul may come to Paris while you are
there; but I fear she will not; you would like her of all
things. She has more sense and more virtues than almost any
human being. If you choose to see any of the savans, let me
recommend Monsieur Buffon. He has not only much more sense
than any of them, but is an excellent old man, humane, gentle,
well-bred, and with none of the arrogant pertness of all the
rest. if he is at Paris, you will see a good deal of the Comte
d e Broglie at Madame du Deffand's. He is not a genius of the
first water, but lively and sometimes agreeable. The court, I
fear, will be at Fontainbleau, which will prevent your seeing
many, unless you go thither. Adieu! at Paris! I leave the rest
of my paper for England, if I happen to have any thing
particular to tell you.

(132) Mr. Conway ended is military tour at Paris; whither Lady
Ailesbury and Mrs. Damer went to meet him, and where they spent
the winter together.

(133) In her letter to Walpole, of the 28th of October, Madame
du Deffand draws the following portrait of General Conway:--
"Selon l'id`ee que vous m'en aviez donn`ee, je le croyais
grave, s`ev`ere, froid, imposant; c'est l'homme le plus
aimable, le plus facile, le plus doux, le plus obligeant, et le
plus simple que je connaisse. Il n'a pas ces premiers
mouvemens de sensibilit`e qu'on trouve en vous, mais aussi
n'a-t-il pas votre humeur."-E.

(134) To this request Madame du Deffand replied--"Je ne me
flatte point de vous revoir l'ann`ee prochaine, et le renvoi
que vous voulez que je vous fasse de vos lettres est ce qui
m'en fait denier. Ne serait-il pas plus naturel, si vous
deviez venir, que je vous les rendisse `a vous-m`eme? car vous
ne pensez pas que je ne puisse vivre encore un an. Vous me
faites croire, Par votre m`efiance, que vous avez en vue
d'effacer toute trace de votre intelligence avec Moi."-E.

(135) Mademoiselle de l'Espinasse, the friend of D'Alembert,
born at Lyons in 1732, was the natural child of Mademoiselle
d'Albon, whose legitimate daughter was married to the Marquis
de Vichy. After the death of her mother, she resided with
Monsieur and Madame de Vichy; but in consequence of some
disagreements, left them, and in May
1754, went to reside with Madame du Deffand, with whom she
remained until 1764. The letters of Mademoiselle de
l'Espinasse were published some few years since.-E.

Letter 75 To The Rev. Mr. Cole.
Strawberry Hill, Oct. 11, 1774. (page 105)

Dear Sir,
I answer yours immediately; as one pays a shilling to clench a
bargain, when one suspects the seller. I accept your visit in
the last week of this month, and will prosecute you if you do
not execute. I have nothing to say about elections, but that I
congratulate myself ,every time I feel I have nothing to do
with them. By my nephew's strange conduct about his boroughs,
and by many other reasons, I doubt whether he is so well as he
seemed to Dr. Barnardiston. It is a subject I do not love to
talk on; but I know I tremble every time the bell rings at my
gate at an unusual hour.

Have you seen Mr. Granger's Supplement? Methinks it grows too
diffuse. I have hinted to him that fewer panegyrics from
funeral orations would not hurt it. Adieu!

Letter 76 To The Hon. H. S. Conway.
Strawberry Hill, Sunday, Oct. 16, 1774. (page 106)

I received this morning your letter of the 6th from Strasburg;
and before you get this you will have had three from me by Lady
Ailesbury. One of them should have reached you much sooner;
but Lady Ailesbury kept it, not being sure where you was. It
was in answer to one in which you told me an anecdote, which in
this last you ask if I had received.

Your letters are always so welcome to me, that you certainly
have no occasion for excusing what you say or do not say. Your
details amuse me, and so would what you suppress; for, though I
have no military genius or curiosity, whatever relates to
yourself must interest me. The honours you have received,
though I have so little taste for such things myself, gave me
great satisfaction; and I do not know whether there is not more
pleasure in not being a prophet in one's own country, when one
is almost received like Mahomet in every other. To be an idol
at home, is no assured touchstone of merit. Stocks and stones
have been adored in fifty regions, but do not bear
transplanting. The Apollo Belvidere and the Hercules Farnese
may lose their temples, but never lose their estimation, by
travelling.

Elections, you may be sure, are the only topic here at
present--I mean in England--not on this quiet hill, where I
think of them as little as of the spot where the battle of
Blenheim was fought. They say there will not be much
alteration, but the phoenix will rise from its ashes with most
of its old plumes, or as bright. Wilkes at first seemed to
carry all before him, besides having obtained the mayoralty of
London at last. Lady Hertford told me last Sunday, that he
would carry twelve members. I have not been in town since, nor
know any thing but what I collect from the papers; so. if my
letter is opened, M. de Vergennes will not amass any very
authentic intelligence from my despatches.

What I have taken notice of, is as follows: For the city Wilkes
will have but three members: he will lose Crosby, and Townsend
will carry Oliver. In Westminster, Wilkes will not have one;
his Humphrey Cotes is by far the lowest on the poll; Lord Percy
and Lord T. Clinton are triumphant there. Her grace of
Northumberland sits at a window in Covent-garden, harangues the
mob, and is "Hail, fellow, well met!" At Dover, Wilkes has
carried one, and probably will come in for Middlesex himself
with Glynn. There have been great endeavours to oppose him,
but to no purpose. Of this I am glad, for I do not love a mob
so near as Brentford especially, as my road lies through it.
Where he has any other interest I am too ignorant in these
matters to tell you. Lord John Cavendish is opposed at York,
and at the beginning of the poll had the fewest numbers.
Charles Fox, like the ghost in Hamlet, has shifted to many
quarters; but in most the cock crew, and he walked off.(136) In
Southwark there has been outrageous rioting; but I neither know
the candidates, their connexions, nor success. This, perhaps,
will appear a great deal of news at Paris: here, I dare to say,
my butcher knows more.

I can tell you still less of America. There are two or three
more ships with forces going thither, and Sir William Draper as
second in command.

Of private news, except that Dyson has had a stroke of palsy
and will die, there is certainly none; for I saw that shrill
Morning Post, Lady Greenwich, two hours ago, and she did not
Know a paragraph.

I forgot to mention to you M. de Maurepas. He was by far the
ablest and most agreeable man I knew at Paris: and if you stay,
I think I could take the liberty of giving you a letter to him;
though, as he is now so great a man, and I remain so little an
one, I don't know whether it would be quite so proper--though
he was exceedingly good to me, and pressed me often to make him
a visit in the country. But Lord Stormont can certainly carry
you to him--a better passport.

There was one of my letters on which I wish to hear from you.
There are always English coming from Paris, who would bring
such a parcel: at least, you might send me one volume at a
time, and the rest afterwards: but I should not care to have
them ventured by the common conveyance. Madame du Deffand is
negotiating for an enamel picture for me; but, if she obtains
it, I had rather wait for it till you come. The books I mean,
are those I told you Lady Ailesbury and Mrs. Damer would give
you a particular account of, for they know my mind exactly.
Don't reproach me with not meeting you at Paris. Recollect
what I suffered this time two years; and, if you can have any
notion of fear, imagine my dread of torture for five months and
a half! When all the quiet of Strawberry did but just carry me
through it, could I support it in the noise of a French hotel!
and, what would be still worse, exposed to receive all visits?
for the French, you know, are never mor in public than in the
act of death. I am like animals, and love to hide myself when
I am dying. Thank God, I am now two days beyond the crisis
when I expected my dreadful periodic visitant, and begin to
grow very sanguine about the virtue of the bootikins. I shall
even have courage to go to-morrow to Chalfont for two days, as
it is but a journey of two hours. I would not be a day's
journey from hence for all Lord Clive's diamonds. This will
satisfy you. I doubt Madame du Deffand is not so easily
convinced--therefore, pray do not drop a hint before her of
blaming me for not meeting you rather assure her you are
persuaded it would have been too great a risk for me at this
season. I wish to have her quite clear of my attachment to
her; but that I do not always find so easy. You, I am sure,
will find her all zeal and entpressement for you and yours.
Adieu! Yours ever.

(136) Mr. Fox was returned for Malmesbury.-E.

Letter 77 To The Hon. H. S. Conway.
Strawberry Hill, Oct. 29, 1774. (page 108)

I have received your letter of the 23d, and it certainly
overpays me, when you thank instead of scolding me, as I
feared. A passionate man has very little merit in being in a
passion, and is sure of saying many things he repents, as I do.
I only hope you think that I could not be so much in the wrong
for every body; nor should have been, perhaps, even for you, if
I had not been certain I was the only person, at that moment,
that could serve you essentially: and at such a crisis, I am
sure I should take exactly the same part again, except in
saying some things I did, of which I am ashamed!(137) I will
say no more now on that topic, nor on any thing relating to it,
because I have written my mind very fully, and you will know it
soon. I can only tell you now, that I approve extremely your
way of thinking, and hope you will not change it before you
hear from me, and know some material circumstances. You and
Lady Ailesbury and I agree exactly, and she and I certainly
consider only you. I do not answer her last, because I could
not help telling you how very kindly I take your letter. All I
beg is, that you would have no delicacy about my serving you
any way. You know it is a pleasure to me: any body else may
have views that would embarrass you; and, therefore, till you
are on the spot, and can judge for yourself (which I always
insist on, because you are cooler than I, and because, though I
have no interests to serve, I have passions, which equally
mislead one,) it will be wiser to decline all kind of proposals
and offers. You will avoid the plague of contested elections
and solicitations: and I see no reasons, at present, that can
tempt you to be in a hurry.(138)

You must not expect to be Madame du Deffand's first favourite.
Lady Ailesbury has made such a progress there, that you will
not easily supplant her. I have received volumes in her
praise.(139) You have a better chance with Madame de Cambis,
who is very agreeable; and I hope you are not such an English
husband as not to conform to the manners of Paris while you are
there.

I forgot to mention one or two of my favourite objects to Lady
Ailesbury, nay, I am not sure she will taste one of them, the
church of the C`elestines. it is crowded with beautiful old
tombs; one of Francis II. whose beatitude is presumed from his
being husband of the martyr Mary Stuart. - Another is of the
first wife of John Duke of Bedford, the Regent Of France. I
think you was once there with me formerly. The other is
Richelieu's tomb, at the Sorbonne--but that every body is
carried to see. The H`otel de Carnavalet,(140) near the Place
Royale, is worth looking at, even for the fa`cade, as you drive
by. But of all earthly things the most worth seeing is the
house at Versailles, where the King's pictures, not hung up,
are kept. There is a treasure past belief, though in sad
order. and piled one against another. Monsieur de Guerchy once
carried me thither; and you may certainly get leave. At the
Luxembourg are some hung up, and one particularly is worth
going to see alone: it is the Deluge by Nicolo Poussin, as
winter. The three other seasons are good for nothing: but the
Deluge is the first picture in the world of its kind. You will
be shocked to see the glorious pictures at the Palais Royal
transplanted to new canvasses, and new painted and varnished,
as if they were to be scenes at the Opera-at least, they had
treated half-a-dozen of the best so, three years ago, and were
going on. The Prince of Monaco has a few fine, but still worse
used; one of them shines more than a looking glass. I fear the
exposition of pictures is over for this year; it is generally
very diverting.(141) I, who went into every church of Paris,
can assure you there are few worth it, but the Invalids-except
the scenery at St. Roch, about one or two o'clock at noon, when
the sun shines; the Carmelites, for the Guido and the portrait
of Madame de la Vali`ere as a Magdalen; the Val de Grace, for a
moment; the treasure at Notre Dame; the Sainte Chapelle, where
in the ante-chapel are two very large enamelled portraits; the
tomb of Cond`e at the Great Jesuits in the Rue St. Antoine, if
not shut up; and the little church of St. Louis in the Louvre,
where is a fine tomb of Cardinal Fleury, but large enough to
stand on Salisbury-plain. One thing some of u must remember,
as you return; nay, it is better to go soon to St. Denis, and
Madame du Deffand must get you a particular order to be shown
(which is never shown without) the effigies of the Kings.(142)
They are in presses over the treasure which is shown, and where
is the glorious antique cameo-cup; but the countenance of
Charles IX. is so horrid and remarkable, you would think he had
died on the morrow of the St. Barthelemi, and waked full of the
recollection. If you love enamels and exquisite medals, get to
see the collection of a Monsieur d'Henery, who lives in the
corner of the street where Sir John Lambert lives--I forget its
name. There is an old man behind the Rue de Colombier, who has
a great but bad collection of old French portraits; I delighted
in them, but perhaps you would not. I, you may be sure, hunted
out every thing of that sort. The convent and collection of
St. Germain, I mean that over against the H`otel du Parc Royal,
is well worth seeing--but I forget names strangely--Oh!
delightful!--Lord Cholmondeley sends me word he goes to Paris
on Monday: I shall send this and my other letter by him. It
was him I meant; I knew he was going and had prepared it.

Pray take care to lock up your papers in a strong box that
nobody can open. They imagine you are at Paris on some
commission, and there is no trusting French hotels or servants.
America is in a desperate situation, The accounts from the
Congress are not expected before the 10th, and expected very
warm. I have not time to tell you some manoeuvres against them
that will make your blood curdle. Write to me when you can by
private hands, as I will to you. There are always English
passing backwards and forwards.

(140) Where Madame de S`evign`e resided.

(141) He means from their extreme bad taste.

(142) The abbey of St. Denis was shorn of its glories during
the Revolution. On the 16th of October 1793, the coffin of
Louis XV. was taken out of the vaults; and, after a stormy
debate, it was decided to throw the remains of all the kings,
even those of Henry IV. and Louis XIV. which were yet to a
great degree preserved entire, into a pit, to melt down their
leaden coffins on the spot, and to take
away and cast into bullets whatever
lead remained in the church; not even excepting the roof.-E.

Letter 78 To The Countess Of Ailesbury.
Strawberry Hill, Nov. 7, 1774. (page 110)

I have written such tomes to Mr. Conway, Madam, and have so
nothing new to write, that I might as well, methinks, begin and
like the lady to her husband: "Je vous `ecris parce que je n'ai
rien `a faire: je finis parce que je n'ai rien `a vous dire."
Yes, I have two complaints to make, one of your ladyship, the
other of myself. You tell me nothing of Lady Harriet; have you
no tongue, or the French no eyes? or are her eyes employed in
nothing but seeing? What a vulgar employment for a fine
woman's eyes, after she has risen from her toilet! I declare I
will ask no more questions--what is it to me, whether she is
admired or not? I should know how charming she is, though all
Europe were blind. I hope I am not to be told by any barbarous
nation upon earth what beauty and grace are.

For myself, I am guilty of the gout in my elbow; the left-
-witness my handwriting. Whether I caught cold by the deluge
in the night, or whether the bootikins, like the water of Styx,
can only preserve the parts they surround, I doubt they have
saved me but three weeks, for so long my reckoning has been
out. However, as I feel nothing in my feet, I flatter myself
that this Pindaric transition will not be a regular ode, but a
fragment, the more valuable for being imperfect.

Now for my gazette.--Marriages--Nothing done. Intrigues--More
in the political than civil way. Births--Under par since Lady
Berkeley left off breeding. Gaming--Low water. Deaths--Lord
Morton, Lord Wentworth, Duchess Douglas. Election stock--More
buyers than sellers. Promotions--Mr. Wilkes as high as he can
go.--Apropos, he was told the Lord Chancellor intended to
signify to him, that the King did not approve the City's
choice: he replied, "Then I shall signify to his lordship, that
I am at least as fit to be Lord Mayor as he to be Lord
Chancellor." This being more gospel than every thing Mr.
Wilkes says, the formal approbation was given.

Mr. Burke has succeeded in Bristol, and Sir James Peachey will
miscarry in Sussex. But what care you, Madam, about our
Parliament? You will see the rentr`ee of the old one, with
songs and epigrams into the bargain. We do not shift our
Parliaments with so much gaiety. Money in one hand, and abuse
in t'other--those are all the arts we know. Wit and a gamut I
don't believe ever signified a Parliament,(143) whatever the
glossaries may say; for they never produce pleasantry and
harmony. Perhaps you may not taste this Saxon pun, but I know
it will make the Antiquarian Society die with laughing.

Expectation hangs on America. The result of the general
assembly is expected in four or five days. If one may believe
the papers, which one should not believe, the other side of the
waterists are not doux comme des moutons, and yet we do intend
to eat them. I was in town on Monday; the Duchess of Beaufort
graced our loo, and made it as rantipole as a Quaker's meeting.
Louis Quinze ,(144) I believe, is arrived by this time, but I
fear without quinze louis.

Your herb-snuff and the four glasses are lying in my warehouse,
but I can hear of no ship going to Paris. You are now at
FOntainbleau, but not thinking of Francis 1. the Queen of
Sweden, and Monaldelschi. It is terrible that one cannot go to
courts that are gone! You have supped with the Chevalier de
Boufflers: did he act every thing in the world, and sing every
thing in the world, and laugh at every thing in the world? Has
Madame de Cambis sung to you "Sans d`epit, sans
l`egert`e?"(145) Has Lord Cholmondeley delivered my pacquet?
I hear I have hopes of Madame d'Olonne.(146) Gout or no gout, I
shall be little in town till after Christmas. My elbow makes
me bless myself that I am not at Paris. Old age is no such
uncomfortable thing, if one gives oneself up to it with a good
grace, and don't drag it about

"To midnight dances and the public show."

If one stays quietly in one's own house in the country, and
cares for nothing but oneself, scolds one's servants, condemns
every thing that is new, and recollects how charming a thousand
things were formerly that were very disagreeable, one gets over
the winters very well, and the summers get over themselves.

(143) Witenagemoot.

(144) This was a cant name given to Lady Powis, who was very
fond of loo, and had lost much money at the game.

(145) The first words of a favourite French air.

(146) The Portrait in enamel of Madame d'Olonne by Petitot,
which Walpole afterwards purchased.-E.

Letter 79 To The Earl Of Strafford.
Strawberry Hill, Nov. 11, 1774. (page 112)

I am sorry there is still time, my dear lord, to write to you
again; and that though there is, I have so little to amuse you
with. One is not much nearer news for being within ten miles
of London than if in Yorkshire; and besides, whatever reaches
us, Lady Greenwich catches at the rebound before me, and Sends
you before I can. Our own circle furnishes very little.
Dowagers are good for propagating news when planted, but have
done with sending forth suckers. Lady Blandford's coffee-house
is removed to town, and the Duchess of Newcastle's is little
frequented, but by your sister Anne, Lady Browne, and me. This
morning, indeed, I was at a very fine concert at old Franks's
at Isleworth, and heard Leoni,(147) who pleased me more than
any thing I have heard these hundred years. There is a full
melancholy melody in his voice, though a falsetto, that nothing
but a natural voice ever compasses. Then he sung songs of
Handel in the genuine simple style, and did not put one in pain
like rope-dancers. Of the Opera I hear a dismal account; for I
did not go to it to sit in our box like an old King dowager by
myself. Garrick is treating the town, as it deserves and likes
to be treated, with scenes, fireworks, and his own writing. A
good new play I never expect to see more, nor have seen since
The Provoked Husband, which came out when I was at school.

Bradshaw is dead, they say by his own hand: I don't know
wherefore. I was told it was a great political event. If it
is, our politics run as low as our plays. From town I heard
that Lord Bristol was taken speechless with a stroke of the
palsy. If he dies, Madam Chudleigh(148) must be tried by her
peers, as she is certainly either duchess or countess. Mr.
Conway and his company are so pleased with Paris, that they
talk of staying till Christmas. I am glad; for they will
certainly be better diverted there than here. Your lordship's
most faithful servant.

(147) Leoni, a celebrated singer of the day, considered one of
the best in England. He was a Jew, and engaged at the
synagogues, from which he is said to have been dismissed for
singing in the Messiah of Handel.-E.

(148) The Duchess of Kingston; against whom an indictment for
bigamy was found on the 8th of December, she having married the
Duke of Kingston, having been previously married to the Hon.
Augustus John Hervey, then living, and who, by the death of his
brother, in March, 1775, became Earl of Bristol.-E.

Letter 80 To The Hon. H. S. Conway.
Strawberry Hill, Nov. 12, 1774. (page 112)

I have received a delightful letter from you of four sheets,
and another since. I shall not reply to the campaigning part
(though much obliged to you for it), because I have twenty
other subjects -more pressing to talk of The first is to thank
you for your excessive goodness to my dear old friend-she has
some indiscretions, and you must not have any to her; but she
has the best heart in the world, and I am happy,, at her great
age, that she has spirits enough not to he always upon her
guard. A bad heart, especially after long experience,, is but
too apt to overflow inwardly with prudence. At least, as I am
but too like her, and have corrected too few of my faults, I
would fain persuade myself that some of them flow from a good
principle--but I have not time to talk of myself, though you
are much too Partial to me, and give me an opportunity; yet I
shall not take it.

Now for English news, and then your letter again. There has
been a great mortality here; though Death has rather been pri`e
than a volunteer. Bradshaw, as I told Lady Ailesbury last
post, shot himself. He is dead, totally undone. Whether that
alone was the cause, or whether he had not done something
worse, I doubt. I cannot conceive that, with his resources, he
should have been hopeless--and, to suspect him of delicacy,
impossible!

A ship is arrived from America, and I doubt with very bad
news; for none but trifling letters have yet been given out-
-but I am here, see nobody that knows any thing,,and only hear
by accident from people that drop in. The sloop that is to
bring the result of the general assembly is not yet come.
There are indeed rumours, that both the non-importation, and
even non-exportation have been decreed, and that the flame is
universal. I hope this is exaggerated! yet I am told the
stocks will fall very much in a day or two.

I have nothing to tell Lady Ailesbury, but that I hear a
deplorable account of the Opera. There is a new puppet-show at
Drury Lane, as fine as scenes can make it, called "The Maid of
the Oaks,"(149) and as dull as the author could not help making
it.

Except M. d'Herouville, I know all the people you name. C. I
doubt, by things I have heard formerly, may have been a
concessionnaire. The Duke, your protecteur(150) is mediocre
enough; You would have been more pleased with his wife. The
Chevalier's(151) bon-mot is excellent, and so is he. He has as
much buffonnerie as the Italians, With more wit and novelty.
His impromptu verses often admirable. Get Madame du Deffand to
show you his embassy to the Princess Christine, and his verses
on his eldest uncle, beginning Si Monsieur de Veau. His second
uncle has parts, but they are not so natural. Madame de
Caraman is a very good kind of woman, but has not a quarter of
her sister's parts.(152) Madame de Mirepoix is the agreeable
woman of the world when she pleases-but there, must not be a
card in the room. Lord * * * * has acted like himself; that
is, unlike any body else. You know, I believe, that I think
him a very good spetcr; but I have little opinion of his
judgment and knowledge of the world, and a great Opinion of his
affectation and insincerity. The Abb`e Raynal, though he wrote
that fine work on the Commerce des Deux Indes, is the most
tiresome creature in the world. The first time I met him was
at the dull Baron d'Olbach's: we were twelve at table: I
dreaded opening My Mouth in French, before so many people and
so many servants: he began questioning me, cross the table,
about our colonies, which I understand as little as I do
Coptic. I made him signs I was deaf. After dinner, he found I
was not, and never forgave me. Mademoiselle do Raucoux I never
saw till you told me Madame du Deffand said she was d`emoniaque
sans chaleur! What painting! I see her now. Le Kain sometimes
pleased me, oftener not. Mol`e is charming in genteel, or in
pathetic comedy, and would be fine in tragedy, if he was
stronger. Preville is always perfection. I like his wife in
affected parts, though not animated enough. There was a
delightful woman who did the Lady Wishforts, I don't know if
there still, I think her name Mademoiselle Drouin; and a fat
woman, rather elderly, who sometimes acted the soubrette. But
you have missed the Dumenil, and Caillaut! What irreparable
losses! Madame du Deffand, perhaps--I don't know--could obtain
your hearing the Clairon, yet the Dumenil was infinitely
preferable.

I could now almost find in my heart to laugh at you for liking
Boutin's garden.(153) Do you know, that I drew a plan of it,
as the completest absurdity I ever saw. What! a river that
wriggles at right angles through a stone gutter, with two tansy
puddings that were dug out of it, and three or four beds in a
row, by a corner of the wall, with samples of grass, corn, and
of en friche, like a tailor's paper of patterns! And you like
this! I will tell Park-place--Oh! I had forgot your audience in
dumb show--Well, as Madame de S`evign`e said, "Le Roi de
Prusse, c'est le plus grand Roi du monde still."(154) My love
to the old Parliament; I don't love new ones.

I went several times to Madame do Monconseil's, who is just
what you say. Mesdames de Tingri et de la Vauguion I never
saw: Madame de Noailles once or twice, and enough. You say
something of Madame de Mallet, which I could not read; for, by
the way, your brother and I agree that you are grown not to
write legibly: is that lady in being? I knew her formerly.
Madame de Blot(155) I know, and Monsieur de Paulmy I know; but
for Heaven's sake who is Colonel Conway?(156) Mademoiselle
Sanadon is la sana donna, and not Mademoiselle Celadon,(157) as
you call her. Pray assure my good Monsieur Schouwalov(158)of
my great regard: he is one of the best of beings.

I have said all I could, at least all I should. I reserve the
rest of my paper for a postscript; for this is but Saturday,
and my letter cannot depart till Tuesday: but I could not for
one minute defer answering your charming volumes, which
interest me so much. I grieve for Lady Harriet's swelled face,
and wish for both their sakes .She could transfer it to her
father. I assure her I meant nothing by desiring you to see
the verses to the Princess Christine,(159) wherein there is
very profane mention of a pair of swelled cheeks. I hear
nothing of Madame d'Olonne. Oh! make Madame du Deffand show
you the sweet portrait of Madame de Prie, the Duke of Bourbon's
mistress. Have you seen Madame de Monaco, and the remains of
Madame de Brionne? If -you wish to see Mrs. A * * *, ask for
the Princesse de Ligne. If you have seen Monsieur de Maurepas,
you have seen the late Lord Hardwicke.(160) By your not naming
him, I suppose the Duc de Nivernois, is not at Paris. Say a
great deal for me to M. de Guisnes.. You will not see my
passion, the Duchess de Chatillon. if You see Madame de
Nivernois, you will think the Duke of Newcastle is come to life
again. Alas! where is my Postscript? Adieu! Yours ever.

(149) Written by General Burgoyne. Walpole's opinion of the
General's abilities as a writer totally changed upon the
appearance of "The Heiress", which he always called the
greatest comedy in the English language.-E.

(150) The Duc de la Vali`ere: whom Mr. Conway had said, that,
when presented to him, "his reception was what might be called
good but rather de protection."

(151) The Chevalier de Boufflers; well known for his "Letters
from Switzerland," addressed to his mother; his "Reine de
Golconde," a tale; and a number of very pretty vers de
soci`et`e.-E.

(152) Madame de Cambis.-E.

(153) See another ludicrous description of this garden in a
letter to Mr. Chute; ante, P. 55, letter 31.-E.

(154) This alludes to Mr. Conway's presentation to the King of
France, Louis XVI. at Fontainbleau, of which, in his letter to
Mr. Walpole he gives the following account:-- "on St. Hubert's
day in the morning I had the honour of being presented to the
King: 'twas a good day, and an excellent deed. You may be sure
I was well received! the French are so polite! and their court
so Polished! The Emperor, indeed, talked to me every day; so
did the King of Prussia, regularly and much; but that was not
to be compared to the extraordinary reception of his most
Christian Majesty, who, when I was presented, did not stop nor
look to see what sort of an animal was offered to his notice,
but carried his head, as it seemed, somewhat higher, and passed
his way."

(155) Wife Of M. Chavigny de Blot, attached to the service of
the Duke of Orleans: she Was sister to the Comte d'Hennery, who
died at St. Domingo, where he was commander-in-chief.

(156) An officer in the French service.

(157) Mademoiselle Sanadon, a lady who lived with Madame du
Deffand. She was niece to the P`ere Sanadon, well known by his
translation of Horace, accompanied with valuable notes, and by
his elegant Poems and orations in the Latin language.-E.

(158) The Russian minister at Paris.
See vol. iii., Letter to the Earl of Hertford, March 26, 1765,
letter 245. Madame du Deffand thus describes the Count in a
letter to Walpole:--"Je trouve notre bon ami un peu ennuyeux;
il n'a nulle inflexion dans la parole, nul mouvement dans
l'`ame; ce qu'il dit est une lecture sans p`en`etration."-E.

(159) BY the Chevalier do Boufflers.

(160) He means, from their personal resemblance.

Letter 81 To The Hon. H. S. Conway.
Arlington Street, Nov. 27, 1774. (page 115)

I have received your delightful Plump packet with a letter of
six pages, one from Madame du Deffand, the Eloges,(161) and the
Lit de Justice. Now, observe my gratitude: I appoint you my
resident at Paris, but you are not to resemble all our
ministers abroad, and expect to live at home, which would
destroy my Lord Castlecomer's(162) view in your staying at
Paris. However, to prove to you that I have some gratitude
that is not totally selfish, I will tell you what little news I
know, before I answer your letter; for English news, to be
sure, is the most agreeable circumstance in a letter from
England.

On my coming to town yesterday, there was nothing but more
deaths--don't you think we have the plague? The Bishop of
Worcester,(163) Lord Breadalbane, Lord Strathmore. The first
fell from his horse, or with his horse, at Bath, and the
bishopric was incontinently given to Bishop North.

America is still more refractory, and I doubt will outvote the
ministry. They have picked General Gage's pocket of three
pieces of cannon,(164) and intercepted some troops that were
going to him. Sir William Draper is writing plans of
pacification in our newspapers; and Lord Chatham flatters
himself that he shall be sent for when the patient is given
over; which I don't think at all unlikely to happen. My poor
nephew is very political too: so we shall not want mad doctors.
Apropos, I hear Wilkes says he will propose Macreth for
Speaker.

The Ecclesiastical Court are come to a resolution that the
Duchess of Kingston is Mrs. Hervey; and the sentence will be
public in a -fortnight. It is not so certain that she will
lose the estate. Augustus(165) is not in a much more pleasant
predicament than she is. I saw Lord Bristol last night: he
looks perfectly well, but his speech is much affected, and his
right hand.

Lady Lyttelton, who, you know, never hears any thing that has
happened, wrote to me two days ago, to ask if it would not be
necessary for you to come over for the meeting of the
Parliament. I answered, very gravely, that to be sure you
ought: but though Sir James Morgan threatened you loudly with a
petition, yet, as it could not be heard till after Christmas, I
was afraid you could not be persuaded to come sooner. I hope
she will inquire who Sir James Morgan is, and that people will
persuade her she has made a confusion about Sir James Peachy.
Now for your letter.

I have been in the Chambre de Parlement, I think they call it
the Grande Chambre; and was shown the corner in which the
monarchs sit, and do not wonder you did not guess where it was
they sat. It is just like the dark corner, under the window,
where I always sat in the House of Commons. What has happened,
has passed exactly according to my ideas. When one King breaks
one parliament, and another, what can the result be but
despotism? or of what else is it a proof? If a Tory King
displaces his father's Whig lord
chamberlain, neither lord chamberlain has the more or the less
power ,over the theatres and court mournings and birthday
balls. All that can arrive is, that the people will be still
more attached to the old parliament, from this seeming
restitution of a right--but the people must have some power
before their attachment can signify a straw. The old
parliament, too, may some time or other give itself more airs
on this confession of right; but that too cannot be but in a
minority, when the power of the crown is lessened by reasons
that have nothing to do with the parliament. I will answer for
it, they will be too grateful to give umbrage to their
restorer. Indeed, I did not think the people would be so
quick-sighted at once, as to see the distinction of old and new
was without difference. Methinks France and England are like
the land and the sea; one gets a little sense when the other
loses it.

I am quite satisfied with all you tell me about my friend. My
intention is certainly to see her again, if I am able; but I am
too old to lay plans, especially when it depends on the despot
gout to register or cancel them. It is even melancholy to see
her, when it will probably be but once more; and still more
melancholy, when we ought to say to one another, in a different
sense from the common, au revoir! However, as mine is a pretty
cheerful kind of philosophy, I think the best way is to think
of dying, but to talk and act as if one was not to die; or else
one tires other people, and dies before one's time. I have
truly all the affection and attachment for her that she
deserves from me, or I should not be so very thankful as I am
for your kindness to her. The Choiseuls will certainly return
at Christmas, and will make her life much more agreeable. The
Duchess has as much attention to her as I could have; but that
will not keep me from making her a visit.

I have only seen, not known, the younger Madame de Boufflers.
For her musical talents, I am little worthy of them-yet I am
just going to Lady Bingham's to hear the Bastardella, whom,
though the first singer in Italy, Mrs. Yates could not or would
not agree with,(166) and she is to have twelve hundred pounds
for singing twelve times at the Pantheon, where, if she had a
voice as loud as Lord Clare's, she could not be heard. The two
bon-mots You sent me are excellent; but, alas! I had heard them
both before; consequently your own, which is very good too,
pleased me much more. M. de Stainville I think you will not
like: he has sense, but has a dry military harshness, that at
least did not suit me--and then I hate his barbarity to his
Wife.(167)

You was very lucky indeed to get one of the sixty tickets.(168)
Upon the whole, your travels have been very fortunate, and the
few mortifications amply compensated. If a Duke(169) has been
spiteful when your back was turned, a hero-king has been all
courtesy. If another King has been silent, an emperor has been
singularly gracious- -Frowns or silence may happen to anybody:
the smiles have been addressed to you particularly. So was the
ducal frown indeed-but would you have earned a smile at the
price set on it? One cannot do right and be always applauded--
but in such cases are not frowns tantamount?

As my letter will not set forth till the day after to-morrow, I
reserve the rest for my additional news, and this time will
reserve it.

St. Parliament's day, 29th, after breakfast.

The speech is said to be firm, and to talk of the
rebellion(170) of our province of Massachusetts. No sloop is
yet arrived to tell us how to call the rest. Mr. Van(171) is
to move for the expulsion of Wilkes; which will distress, and
may produce an odd scene. Lord Holland is certainly dead; the
papers say, Robinson too, but that I don't know--so many deaths
of late make report kill to right and left.

(161) Two rival Eloges of Fontenelle, by ChamPfort and La
Harpe.-E.

(162) A cant phrase of Mr. Walpole's; which took its rise from
the following story:--The tutor of a young Lord Castlecomer,
who lived at Twickenham with his mother, having broken his leg,
and somebody pitying the poor man to Lady Castlecomer, she
replied, "Yes indeed, it is very inconvenient to my Lord
Castlecomer."-E.

(163) Dr. James Johnson.-E.

(164) The seizure of Fort William and Mary, near Portsmouth, in
New Hampshire, by the provincial militia, in which they found
many barrels of gunpowder, several pieces of cannon, etc.-E.

(165) Augustus Hervey, to whom she was first married.

(166) Mrs. Yates was at this time joint manager of the Opera
with Mrs. Brook. In November 1773, she spoke a Poetical
exordium, by which it appeared that she intended mixing plays
with operas, and entertaining the public with singing and
declamation alternately; but permission could not be obtained
from the Lord Chamberlain to put this plan into execution.-E.

(167) Upon a suspicion OF gallantry with Clairval, an actor,
she was confined for life in the convent Of les filles de
Sainte Marie, at Nancy.-E.

(168) To see the Lit de Justice held by Louis XVI. when he
recalled the Parliament of Paris, at the instigation of the
Chancellor Maupeou, and suppressed the new one of their
creation.

(169) The Duke de Choiseul.

(170) The King's Speech announced, "that a most daring spirit
of resistance and disobedience to the law still unhappily
prevailed in the province of Massachusett's Bay;" and expressed
the King's "firm and steadfast resolution to withstand every
attempt to weaken or impair the supreme authority Of this
legislature over all the dominions of his crown: the
maintenance of which he considered as essential to the dignity,
the safety, and welfare of the British empire."-E.

(171) Charles Van, Esq. member for Brecon town. No motion for
the expulsion of Wilkes took place.-E.

Letter 82 To The Hon. H. S. Conway.
Arlington Street, Dec. 15, 1774. (page 118)

As I wrote to Lady Ailesbury but on Tuesday, I should not have
followed it so soon with this, if I had nothing to tell you but
of myself. My gouts are never dangerous, and the shades of
them not important. However, to despatch this article at once,
I will tell you, that the, pain I felt yesterday in my elbow
made me think all former pain did not deserve the name.
Happily the torture did not last above two hours; and, which is
more surprising, it is all the real pain I have felt; for
though my hand has been as sore as if flayed, and that both
feet are lame, the bootikins demonstrably prevent or extract
the sting of it, and I see no reason not to expect to get out
in a fortnight more. Surely, if I am laid up but one month in
two years, instead of five or six, I have reason to think the
bootikins sent from heaven.

The long expected sloop is arrived at last, and is indeed a man
of war! The General Congress have voted a non-importation, a
non-exportation, a non-consumption; that, in case of
hostilities committed by the troops at Boston, the several
provinces will march to the assistance of their countrymen;
that the cargoes of ships now at sea shall be sold on their
arrival, and the money arising thence given to the poor at
Boston.; that a letter, in the nature of a petition of rights,
shall be sent to the King; another to the House of Commons; a
third to the people of England; a demand of repeal of all the
acts of Parliament affecting North America passed during this
reign, as also of the Quebec-bill: and these resolutions not to
be altered till such repeal is obtained.

Well, I believe you do not regret being neither in parliament
nor in administration! As you are an idle man, and have
nothing else to do, you may sit down and tell one a remedy for
all this. Perhaps you will give yourself airs, and say you was
a prophet, and that prophets are not honoured in their own
country. Yet, if you have any inspiration about you, I assure
you it will be of great service-we are at our wit's end-which
was no great journey. Oh! you conclude Lord Chatham's crutch
will be supposed a wand, and be sent for. They might as well
send for my crutch; and they should not have it; the stile is a
little too high to help them over. His Lordship is a little
fitter for raising a storm than laying one, and of late seems
to have lost both virtues. The Americans at least have acted
like men,(172) gone to the"bottom at once, and set the whole
upon the whole. Our conduct has been that of pert children: we
have thrown a pebble at a mastiff, and are surprised that it
was not frightened. Now we must kill the guardian of the house
which will be plundered the moment little master has nothing
but the old nurse to defend it. But I have done with
reflections; you will be fuller of them than I.

(172) "I have not words to express my satisfaction," says Lord
Chatham in a letter of the 24th, "that the Congress has
conducted this most arduous and delicate business with such
manly Wisdom and calm resolution, as do the highest honour to
their deliberations. Very few are the things contained in
their resolves, that I could wish had been otherwise."
Correspondence, vol. ii, p. 368.-$.

Letter 83 To The Hon. H. S. Conway.
Arlington Street, Dec. 26, 1774. (page 119)

I begin my letter to-day, to prevent the fatigue of dictating
two to-morrow. In the first and best place, I am very near
recovered; that is, though still a mummy, I have no pain left,
nor scarce any sensation of gout except in my right hand, which
is still in complexion and shape a lobster's claw. Now, unless
any body can prove to me that three weeks are longer than five
months and a half, they will hardly convince me that the
bootikins are not a cure for fits of the gout and a Very short
cure, though they cannot prevent it: nor perhaps is it to be
wished they should; for, if the gout prevents every thing else,
would not one have something that does? I have but one single
doubt left about the bootikins, which is, whether they do not
weaken my breast: but as I am sensible that my own spirits do
half the mischief, and that, if I could have held my tongue,
and kept from talking and dictating letters, I should not have
been half so bad as I have been, there remains but half due to
bootikins on the balance: and surely the ravages of the last
long fit, and two years more in age, ought to make another
deduction. Indeed, my forcing myself to dictate my last letter
to you almost killed me; and since the gout is not dangerous to
me, if I am kept perfectly quiet, my good old friend must have
patience, and not insist upon letters from me but when it is
quite easy to me to send them. So much for me and my gout. I
will now endeavour to answer such parts of your last letters as
I can in this manner, and considering how difficult it is to
read your writing in a dark room.

I have not yet been able to look into the French harangues you
sent me. Voltaire's verses to Robert Covelle are not only very
bad, but very contemptible.

I am delighted with all the honours you receive, and with all
the amusements they procure you, which is the best part of
honours. For the glorious part, I am always like the man in
Pope's Donne,

"Then happy he who shows the tombs, said I."

That is, they are least troublesome there. The
serenissime(173) you met at Montmorency is one of the least to
my taste; we quarrelled about Rousseau, and I never went near
him after my first journey. Madame du Deffand will tell you
the story, if she has not forgotten it.

It is supposed here, that the new proceedings of the French
Parliament will produce great effects: I don't suppose any such
thing. What America will produce I know still less; but
certainly something very serious. The merchants have summoned
a meeting for the second of next month, and the petition from
the Congress to the King is arrived. The heads have been shown
to Lord Dartmouth; but I hear one of the agents is again
presenting it; yet it is thought it will be delivered, and then
be ordered to be laid before Parliament. The whole affair has
already been talked of there on the army and navy-days; and
Burke, they say, has shone with amazing Wit and ridicule on the
late inactivity of Gage, and his losing his cannon and straw;
on his being entrenched in a town with an army of observation;
with that army being, as Sir William Meredith had said, an
asylum for magistrates, and to secure the port. Burke said, he
had heard of an asylum for debtors and whores, never for
magistrates; and of ships never of armies securing a port.
This is all there has been in Parliament, but elections.
Charles Fox's place did not come into question. Mr. * * *, who
is one of the new elect, has opened, but with no success.
There is a seaman, Luttrell,(174) that promises much better.

I am glad you like the Duchess de Lauzun:(175) she is one of my
favourites. The H`otel du Chatelet promised to be very fine,
but was not finished when I was last at Paris. I was much
pleased with the person that slept against St. Lambert's poem:
I wish I had thought of the nostrum, when Mr. Seward, a
thousand years ago, at Lyons, would read an epic poem to me
just as I had received a dozen letters from England. St.
Lambert is a great Jackanapes, and a very tiny genius: I
suppose the poem was The Seasons, which is four fans spun out
into a Georgic. If I had not been too ill, I should have
thought of bidding you hear midnight mass on Christmas-eve in
Madame du Deffand's tribune, as I used to do. To be sure, you
know that her apartment was part of Madame du Montespan's,
whose arms are on the back of the grate in Madame du Deffand's
own bedchamber. Apropos, ask her to show you Madame de Prie's
pinture, M. le Duc's mistress--I am very fond of it--and make
her tell you her history.(176)

I have but two or three words more. Remember my parcel of
letters from Madame du Deffand,(177) and pray remember this
injunction not to ruin yourselves in bringing presents. A very
slight fairing of a guinea or two obliges as much,
is much more fashionable, and not a moment sooner forgotten
than a magnificent one; and then you may very cheaply oblige
the more persons; but as the sick fox, in Gay's Fables, says
(for one always excepts oneself),

"A chicken too might do me good."

i allow you to go as far as three or even five guineas for a
snuff-box for me; and then, as ***** told the King, when he
asked for the reversion of the lighthouse for two lives, and
the King reproached him, with having always advised him against
granting reversions; he replied, "Oh! Sir, but if your Majesty
will give me this, I will take care you shall never give away
another." Adieu, with my own left hand.

(173) The Prince de Conti.

(174) The Hon. James Luttrell, fourth son of Lord Irnham, a
lieutenant in the navy.-E.

(175) She became Duchesse de Biron upon the death of her
husband's uncle, the Marechal Duke de Biron. See vol. iii.,
Letter to John Montagu, Feb. 4, 1766, letter 294. Her person
is thus described by Rousseau:--"Am`elie de Boufflers a une
figure, une douceur, une timidit`e devierge: rien de plus
aimable et de plus int`eressant que sa figure; rien de plus
tendre et de plus chaste que
les sentiments qu'elle inspire."-E.

(176) Madame de Prie was the mistress of the Regent Duke of
Orleans. A full account of her family, character, etc. will be
found in Duclos's Memoirs.-E.

(177) At Walpole's earnest solicitation, Madame du Deffand
returned by General Conway all the letters she had received
from him. In so doing, she thus wrote to him:--"Vous aurez
longtemps de quoi allumer votre feu, surtout si vous joignez `a
ce que j'avais de vous avez de moi, et rien ne serait plus
juste: mais je m'en rapporte `a votre prudence; je ne suivrai
pas l'exemple de m`efiance que vous me donnez."-E.

Letter 84 To The Hon. H. S. Conway.
Arlington Street, Dec. 31, 1774. (page 121)

No child was ever so delighted to go into breeches, as I was
this morning to get on a pair of cloth shoes as big as Jack
Harris's: this joy may be the spirits of dotage-but what
signifies whence one is happy? Observe, too, that this is
written with my own right hand, with the bootikin actually upon
it, which has no distinction of fingers: so I no longer see any
miracle in Buckinger, who was famous for writing without hands
or feet; as it was indifferent which one uses, provided one has
a pair of either. Take notice, I write so much better without
fingers than with, that I advise you to try a bootikin. To be
sure, the operation is a little slower; but to a prisoner, the
duration of his amusement is of far more consequence than the
vivacity of it.

Last night I received your very kind, I might say your letter
tout court, of Christmas-day. By this time I trust you are
quite out of pain about me. My fit has been as regular as
possible; only, as if the bootikins were post-horses, it made
the grand tour of all my limbs in three weeks. If it will
always use the same expedition, I m content it should take the
journey once in two years. You must not mind my breast: it was
always the weakest part of a very weak system ; yet did not
suffer now by the gout, but in consequence of it; and would not
have been near so bad, if I could have kept from talking and
dictating letters. The moment I am out of pain, I am in high
spirits ; and though I never take any medicines, there is one
thing absolutely necessary to be put into my mouth--a gag. At
present, the town is so empty that my tongue is a sinecure.

I am well acquainted with the Biblioth`eque du Roi, and the
medals, and the prints. I spent an entire day in looking over
the English portraits, and kept the librarian without his
dinner till dark night, till I was satisfied. Though the
Choiseuls(178) will not acquaint with you, I hope their Abb`e
Barthelemil(179) is not put under the same quarantine. Besides
great learning, he has infinite wit and polissonnerie and is
one of the best kind of men in the world. As to the
grandpapa,(180) il ne nous aime pas nous autres, and has never
forgiven Lord Chatham. Though exceedingly agreeable himself, I
don't think his taste exquisite. Perhaps I was piqued; but he
seemed to like Wood better than any of US. Indeed, I am a
little afraid that my dear friend's impetuous zeal may have
been a little too prompt in pressing you upon them d'abord:--
but don't say a word of this--it is her great goodness.--I
thank you a million of times for all yours to her:-she is
perfectly grateful for it. The Chevalier'S(181) verses are
pretty enough. I own I like Saurin's(182) much better than you
seem to do. Perhaps I am prejudiced by the curse on the
Chancellor at the end.

Not a word of news here. In a sick room one hears all there
is, but I have not even a lie; but as this will not set out
these three days, it is to be hoped some charitable Christian
will tell a body one. Lately indeed we heard that the King of
Spain had abdicated; but I believe it was some stockjobber that
had deposed him.

Lord George Cavendish, for my solace in my retirement, has
given me a book, the History of his own Furness-abbey, written
by a Scotch ex-Jesuit.(183) I cannot say that this unnatural
conjunction of a Cavendish and a Jesuit has produced a lively
colt; but I found one passage worth any money. It is an
extract of a constable's journal kept during the civil war; and
ends thus: "And there was never heard of such troublesome and
distracted times as these five years have been, but especially
for constables." It is so natural, that inconvenient to my
Lord Castlecomer is scarce a better proverb.

Pray tell Lady Ailesbury that though she has been so very good
to me, I address my letters to you rather than to her, because
my pen is not always-upon its guard, but is apt to say whatever
comes into its nib; and then, if she peeps over your shoulder,
I am cens`e not to know it. Lady Harriet's wishes have done me
great good: nothing but a father's gout could be obdurate
enough to resist them. My Mrs. Damer says nothing to me; but I
give her intentions credit, and lay her silence on you.

January 1. 1775. a happy new year!

I walk! I walk! walk alone!--I have been five times quite
round my rooms to-day, and my month is not up! The day after
to-morrow I shall go down into the dining-room; the next week
to take the air: and then if Mrs. * * * * is very pressing,
why, I don't know what may happen. Well! but you want news,
there are none to be had. They think there is a ship lost with
Gage's despatches. Lady Temple gives all her diamonds to Miss
Nugent.(184) Lord Pigot lost 400 pounds the other night at
Princess Amelia's. Miss Davis(185) has carried her cause
against Mrs. Yates and is to sing again at the Opera. This is
all my coffee-house furnished this morning.

(178) Mr. Conway and the ladies of his party had met with the
most flattering and distinguished reception at Paris from every
body but the Duc and Duchesse de Choiseul, who rather seemed to
decline their acquaintance.

(179) The author of the Voyage du Jenne Anacharsis.

(180) A name given to the Duc de Choiseul by Madame du Deffand.

(181) Verses written by the Chevalier de Boufflers, to be
presented by Madame du Deffand to the Duke and Duchess of
Choiseul.

(182) They were addressed to M. do Malesherbes, then premier
president de la Cour des Aides; afterwards, still more
distinguished by his having been the intrepid advocate Selected
by the unfortunate Louis the Sixteenth on his trial. He soon
after perished by the same guillotine, from which he could not
preserve his ill-fated master-E.

(183) "The Antiquities of Furness; or
an account of the Royal Abbey of St. mary, in the vale Of
Nightshade, near Dalton, in Furness." London, 1774 4to. This
volume, which was dedicated to Lord George Cavendish, Was
written by Thomas West, the antiquary, who was likewise the
author of "A Guide to the Lakes in Cumberland, Westmoreland,
and Lancashire."-E.

(184) Mary, only daughter and heiress
of Robert Earl Nugent, of the kingdom of Ireland. She was
married, on the 16th of May, 1775, to George Grenville, second
Earl Temple, who then assumed, by royal permission, the
surnames of Nugent and Temple before that of Grenville, and the
privilege of signing Nugent before all titles whatsoever. In
1784, he was created Marquis of Buckingham.-E.

(185) Cecilia Davis known in Italy by the name of L'Inglesina,
first appeared at the
Opera in 1773.
She was considered on the Continent as second only to Gabrieli,
and in England is said to have been surpassed only by Mrs.
Billington. She was a pupil of the celebrated Hasse and, after
having taught several crowned heads, died at an advanced age,
and in very distressed circumstances, in 1836.-E.

Letter 85To The Rev. Mr. Cole.
Arlington Street, Jan. 9, 1775. (page 124)

I every day intended to thank you for the copy of Nell Gwyn's
letter, till it was too late; the gout came, and Made me moult
my goosequill. The letter is very curious, and I am as well
content as with the original. It is lucky you do not care for
news more recent Than the Reformation. I should have none to
tell you; nay, nor earlier neither. Mr. Strutt's(186) second
volume I suppose you have seen. He showed me two or three much
better drawings from pictures in the possession of Mr. Ives.
One of them made me very happy; it is a genuine portrait of
Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester, and is the individual same face
as that I guessed to be his in my Marriage of Henry VI. They
are infinitely more like each other, than any two modern
portraits of one person by different painters. I have been
laughed at for thinking the skull of Duke Humphrey at St.
Albans proved my guess; and yet it certainly does, and is the
more like, as the two portraits represent him very bald, with
only a ringlet of hair, as monks have. Mr. Strutt is going to
engrave his drawings. Yours faithfully.

(186) His " Complete Views of the Manners, Customs, Arms,
Habits, etc. of the Inhabitants of England from the arrival of
the Saxons till the reign of Henry the VIII.; with a short
Account of the Britons during the Government of the Romans."-E.

Letter 86 To The Hon. H. S. Conway.
Arlington Street, Jan, 15, 1775. (page 124)

You have made me very happy by saying your journey to Naples is
laid aside. Perhaps it made too great an impression on me; but
you must reflect, that all my life I have satisfied myself with
your being perfect, instead of trying to be so myself. I don't
ask you to return, though I wish it: in truth there is nothing
to invite you. I don't want you to come and breathe fire and
sword against the Bostonians, like that second Duke of Alva,
the inflexible Lord George Germain; or to anathematize the
court and its works, like the incorruptible Burke, who scorns
lucre, except when he can buy a hundred thousand acres from
naked Caribs for a song. I don't want you to do any thing like
a party-man. I trust you think of every party as I do, with
contempt, from Lord Chatham's mustard-bowl down to Lord
Rockingham's hartshorn. All, perhaps, will be tried in their
turns, and yet, if they had genius, might not be Mighty enough
to save us. From some ruin or other I think nobody can, and
what signifies an option of mischiefs? An account is come of
the Bostonians having voted an army of sixteen thousand men,
who are to be called minute-men, as they are to be ready at a
minute's warning. Two directors or commissioners, I don't know
what they are called, are appointed. There has been too a kind
of mutiny in the fifth regiment. A soldier was found drunk on
his post. Gage, in his time of danger, thought vigour
necessary, and sent the fellow to a court-martial. They
ordered two hundred lashes. The general ordered them to
improve their sentence. Next day it was published in the
Boston Gazette. He called them before him, and required them
on oath to abjure the communication, three officers refused.
Poor Gage is to be scape-goat, not for this, but for what was a
reason against employing him, incapacity. I Wonder at the
precedent! Howe is talked of for his successor. Well, I have
done with you!--Now I shall go gossip with Lady Ailesbury

You must know, Madam, that near Bath is erected a new
Parnassus, composed of three laurels,- a myrtle-tree, a
weeping-willow, and a view of the Avon, which has been
new-christened Helicon. Ten years ago there lived a Madam
Riggs, an old rough humourist who passed for a wit; her
daughter, who passed for nothing, married to a Captain Miller,
full of good-natured officiousness. These good folks were
friends of Miss Rich,(187) who carried me to dine with them at
Batheaston, now Pindus. They caught a little of what was then
called taste, built and planted, and begot children, till the
whole caravan- were forced to. go abroad to retrieve. Alas!
Mrs. Miller is returned-' a beauty, a genius, a Sappho, a
Muse, as romantic as Mademoiselle Scuderi, and as sophisticated
as Mrs. Vesey. The captain's fingers are loaded with cameos,
his tongue runs over with virt`u, and that both may contribute
to the improvement of their own country, they have introduced
bouts-rim`es as a new discovery. They hold a Parnassus-fair
every Thursday, give out rhymes and themes, and all the flux of
quality at Bath contend for the prizes. A Roman vase dressed
with pink ribands and myrtles receives the poetry which is
drawn out every festival; six judges of these Olympic games
retire and select the brightest compositions, which the
respective successful acknowledge, kneel to Mrs. Calliope
Miller, kiss her fair hand, and are crowned by it with myrtle,
with--I don't know what. You may think this is fiction, or
exaggeration. Be dumb, unbelievers! The collection is printed,
published. (188) Yes, on my faith, there are bouts-rim`es on a
buttered muffin, made by her grace the Duchess of
Northumberland;(189) receipts to make them by Corydon the
venerable, alias George Pitt; others very pretty, by Lord
Palmerston;(190) some by Lord Carlisle; many by Mrs. Miller
herself, that have no fault but wanting metre; and immortality
promised to her without end or measure. In short, since folly,
which never ripens to madness but in this hot climate, ran
distracted, there was never any thing so entertaining or so
dull--for you cannot read so long as I have been telling.(191)

January 17.

Before I could finish this, I received your despatches by Sir
Thomas Clarges, and a most entertaining letter in three tomes.
It is being very dull, not to be able to furnish a quarter so
much from your own country-but what can I do? You are embarked
in a new world, and I am living on the scraps of an old one, of
which I am tired. The best I can do is to reply to your
letter, and not attempt to amuse you when I have nothing to
say. I think the Parliament meets today, or in a day or
two-but I hope you are coming. Your brother says so, and
Madame du Deffand says so; and sure it is time to leave Paris,
when you know ninety of the inhabitants.(192) There seems much
affectation in those that will not know you;(193) and
affectation is always a littleness--it has been even rude: but
to be sure the rudeness one feels least, was that which is
addressed to one before there has been any acquaintance.

Ninon came,(194) because, on Madame du Deffand's mentioning it,
I concluded it a new work, and am disappointed. I can say this
by heart. The picture of Madame de Prie, which you don't seem
to value, and so Madame du Deffand says, I believe I shall
dispute with you; I think it charming, but when offered to me
years ago, I would not take it--it was now given to you a
little a mon intention.

I am sorry that, amongst all the verses you have sent me, you
should have forgotten what you commend the most, Les trois
exclamations. I hope you will bring them with you. Voltaire's
are intolerably stupid, and not above the level of officers in
garrison. Some of M. de Pezay's are very pretty, though there
is too much of them; and in truth I had seen them before.
Those on Madame de la Vali`ere pretty too, but one is a little
tired of Venus and the Graces. I am most pleased with your
own--and if you have a mind to like them still better, make
Madame du Deffand show you mine, which are neither French, nor
measure, nor metre. She is unwilling to tell me so-, which
diverts me. Yours are really genteel and new.

I envy you the Russian Anecdotes(195) more than M. de
Chamfort's Fables, of which I know nothing; and as you say no
more, I conclude I lose not much. The stories of Sir
Charles(196) are so far not new to me, that I heard them of him
from abroad after he was mad: but I believe no mortal of his
acquaintance ever heard them before; nor did they at all
correspond with his former life, with his treatment of his
wife, or his history with Mrs. Woffington, qui n'`etait pas
dupe. I say nothing on the other stories you tell me of
billets dropped,(197) et pour cause.

I think I have touched all your paragraphs, and have nothing
new to send you in return. In truth, I go nowhere but into
private rooms,; for I am not enough recovered to relaunch into
the world, when I have so good an excuse for avoiding it. The
bootikins have done wonders; but even two or three such
victories will cost too dear. I submit very patiently to my
lot. I am old and broken, and it never was my system to impose
upon myself when one can deceive nobody else. I have spirits
enough for my use, that is, amongst my friends and
contemporaries: I like Young people and their happiness for
every thing but to live with; but I cannot learn their
language, nor tell them old stories, of which I must explain
every step as I go. Politics' the proper resource of age, I
detest--I am Contented, but see few that are so--and I never
will be led by any man's self-interest. A great scene is
opening, of which I cannot expect to see the end! I am pretty
sure not a happy end--so that, in short, I am determined to
think the rest of my life but a postscript: and as this has
been too long an One, I will wish You good night, repeating
what you know already, that the return of you three is the most
agreeable prospect I expect to see realized. Adieu!

(187) Daughter of Sir Robert Rich, and sister to the second
wife of George Lord Lyttelton.

(188) They were published under the title of "Poetical
Amusements at a Villa near Bath." An edition appeared in 1781,
in four volumes.-E.

(189) "The pen which I now take and brandish
Has long lain useless in my standish.
Know, every maid, from her on patten,
To her who shines in glossy satin,
That could they now prepare an oglio
>From best receipt of book in folio,
Ever so fine, for all their puffing,
I should prefer a butter'd muffin;
A muffin Jove himself might feast on,
If eat with Miller at Batheaston."-E.

(190) The following are the concluding lines of a poem on
Beauty, by Lord Palmerston:--

"In vain the stealing hand of Time
May pluck the blossoms of their prime;
Envy may talk of bloom decay'd,
How lilies droop and roses fade;
But Constancy's unalter'd truth,
Regardful of the vows of youth,
Affection that recalls the past,
And bids the pleasing influence last,
Shall still preserve the lover's flame
In every scene of life the same;
And still with fond endearments blend
The wife, the mistress, and the friend!"-E.

(191) "Lady Miller's collection of verses by fashionable
people, which were put into her vase at Batheaston, in
competition for honourary prizes being mentioned, Dr. Johnson
held them very cheap: 'Bouts-rim`es,' said be, 'is a mere
conceit, and an old conceit; I wonder how people were persuaded
to write in that manner for this lady.' I named a gentleman of
his acquaintance who wrote for the vase. Johnson--'He was a
blockhead for his pains!' Boswell. 'The Duchess of
Northumberland wrote.' Johnson: 'Sir, the Duchess of
Northumberland may do what she pleases; nobody will say any
thing to a lady of her high rank: but I should be apt to throw
* * * *'s verses in his face.'" Boswell. vol. v. p. 227.-E.

(192) Madame du Deffand, writing of General Conway to Walpole,
had said--"Savez-vous combien il connait d`ej`a de personnes
dans Paris? Quatre.vingt dix. Il n'est nullement sauvage."-E.

(193) The Duc du Choiseul.

(194) The Life of Ninon de l'Enclos.

(195) The account of the revolution in Russia which placed
Catherine II. on the throne, by M. de la Rulhi`ere, afterwards
Published. Mr. Conway had heard it read in manuscript in a
private society.

(196) Sir Charles Hanbury Williams.

(197) This alludes to circumstances Mr. Conway mentions as
having taken place at a ball at Versailles.

Letter 87 To The Hon. H. S. Conway.(198)
January 22, 1775. (page 128)

After the magnificent overture for peace from Lord Chatham,
that I announced to Madame du Deffand, you will be most
impatient for my letter. Ohin`e! you will be sadly
disappointed. Instead of drawing a circle with his wand round
the House of Lords, and ordering them to pacify America, on the
terms he prescribed before they ventured to quit the
circumference of his commands, he brought a ridiculous,
uncommunicated, unconsulted motion for addressing the King
immediately to withdraw the troops from Boston, as an earnest
of lenient measures. The Opposition stared and shrugged; the
courtiers stared and laughed. His own two or three adherents
left him, except Lord Camden and Lord Shelburne, and except
Lord Temple, who is not his adherent and was not there.
Himself was not much animated, but very hostile; particularly
on Lord Mansfield, who had taken care not to be there. He
talked of three millions of Whigs in America, and told the
ministers they were checkmated and had not a move left to make.
Lord Camden was as strong. Lord Suffolk was thought to do
better than ever, and Lord Lyttelton's declamation was
commended as usual. At last, Lord Rockingham, very punily, and
the Duke of Richmond joined and supported the motion; but at
eight at night it was rejected by 68 to 18, though the Duke of
Cumberland voted for it.(199)

This interlude would be only entertaining, if the scene was not
so totally gloomy. The cabinet have determined on civil war,
and regiments are going from Ireland and our West Indian
islands. On Thursday the plan of the war is to be laid before
both Houses. To-morrow the merchants carry their petition;
which, I suppose, will be coolly received, since, if I hear
true, the system is to cut off all traffic with America at
present--as, you know, we can revive it when we please. There!
there is food for meditation! Your reflections, as you
understand the subject better than I do, will go further than
mine could. Will the French you converse with be civil and
keep their countenances?

George Damer(200) t'other day proclaimed your departure for the
25th; but the Duchess of Richmond received a whole cargo of
letters from ye all on Friday night, which talk of a fortnight
or three weeks longer. Pray remember it is not decent to be
dancing at Paris, when there is a civil war in your own
country. You would be like the Country squire, who passed by
with his hounds as the battle of Edgehill began.

January 24.

I am very sorry to tell you the Duke of Gloucester is dying.
About three weeks ago the physicians said it was absolutely
necessary for him to go abroad immediately. He dallied, but
was actually preparing. He now cannot go, and probably will
not live many days, as he has had two shivering fits, and the
physicians give the Duchess no hopes.(201) Her affliction and
courage are not to be described; they take their turns as she
is in the room with him or not. His are still greater. His
heart is broken, and yet his firmness and coolness amazing. I
pity her beyond measure; and it is not a time to blame her
having accepted an honour which so few women could have
resisted, and scarce one ever has resisted.

The London and Bristol merchants carried their petitions
yesterday to the House of Commons. The Opposition contended
for their being heard by the committee of the whole House, who
are to consider the American papers; but the Court sent them to
a committee(202) after a debate till nine at night, with
nothing very remarkable, on divisions of 197 to 81, and 192 to
65. Lord Stanley(203) spoke for the first time; his voice and
manner pleased, but his matter was not so successful.
Dowdeswell(204 is dead, and Tom Hervey.(205) The latter sent
for his Wife and acknowledged her. Don't forget to inform me
when my letters must stop. Adieu! Yours ever.

(198) Now first printed.

(199) In the Chatham correspondence will be found another, and
a very different, account of this debate, in a letter to Lady
Chatham, from their son William:--"Nothing," he says,
"prevented my father's speech from being the most forcible that
can be imagined, and the administration fully felt it. The
matter and manner were striking; far beyond what I can express.
It was every thing that was superior; and though it had not the
desired effect on an obdurate House of Lords, it must have an
infinite effect without doors, the bar being crowded with
Americans, etc. Lord Suffolk, I cannot say answered him, but
spoke after him. He was a contemptible orator indeed, with
paltry matter and a whining delivery. Lord Shelburne spoke
well, and supported the motion warmly. Lord Camden was
supreme, with only One exception, and as zealous as possible.
Lord Rockingham spoke shortly, but sensibly; and the Duke of
Richmond well, and with much candour as to the Declaratory act.
Upon the whole, it was a noble debate. The ministry were
violent beyond expectation, almost to madness. instead of
recalling the troops now there, they talked of sending more.
My father has had no pain, but is lame in one ankle near the
instep from standing so long. No wonder he is lame: his first
speech lasted above an hour, and the second half an hour;
surely, the two finest speeches that ever were made before,
unless by himself!" Dr. Franklin too, who heard the debate,
says, in reference to Lord Chatham's speech-"I am filled with
admiration of that truly great man. I have seen, in the course
of my life, sometimes eloquence without wisdom and often wisdom
without eloquence: in the present instance, I see both united,
and both, as I think, in the highest degree possible." Vol. iv.
pp. 375, 385.-E.

(200) Afterwards second Earl of Dorchester-E.

(201) His Royal Highness survived this illness more than thirty
years.-E.

(202) This committee was wittily called by Mr. Burke, and
afterwards generally known as "the committee of oblivion."-E.

(203) Afterwards Earl of Derby-E.

(204) The Right Hon. William Dowdeswell, of Pull Court, member
for the county of Worcester. He died at Nice, whither he had
gone for the recovery of his health.-E.

(205) The Hon. Thomas Hervey, second son of John first Earl of
Bristol.-E.

Letter 88 To The Rev. Mr. Cole.
Arlington Street, April 11, 1775. (page 129)

I thank you, dear Sir, for your kind letter., and the good
account YOU give of yourself-nor can I blame your change from
writing that is, transcribing, to reading--sure you ought to
divert yourself rather than others-though I should not say s,
if your pen had not confined itself to transcripts.

I am perfectly well, and heed not the weather; though I wish
the seasons came a little oftener into their own places instead
of each Other's. From November, till a fortnight ago, we had
much warmth that I should often be glad of in summer--and since
we are not sure of it then, was rejoiced when I could get it.
For myself, I am a kind of delicate Hercules; and though made
of paper, have, by temperance, by using as much cold water
inwardly and outwardly as I can, and by taking no precautions
against catching cold, and braving all weathers, become capable
of suffering by none. My biennial visitant, the gout, has
yielded to the bootikins, and stayed with me this last time but
five weeks in lieu of five months. Stronger men perhaps would
kill themselves by my practice, but it has done so long with
me, I shall trust to it.

I intended writing to you on Gray's Life,(206) if you had not
prevented me. I am charmed with it, and prefer it to all the
biography I ever saw. The style is excellent, simple,
unaffected; the method admirable, artful, and judicious. He
has framed the fragments, as a person said, so well, that they
are fine drawings, if not finished pictures. For my part, I am
so interested in it, that I shall certainly read it over and
over. I do not find that it is likely to be the case with many
yet. Never was a book, which people pretended to expect so
much with impatience, less devoured-at least in London, where
quartos are not of quick digestion. Faults are found, I hear,
at Eton with the Latin Poems for false quantities-no
matter-they are equal to the English -and can one say more?

At Cambridge, I should think the book would both offend much
and please; at least if they are as sensible to humour as to
ill-humour; and there is orthodoxy enough to wash down a camel.
The Scotch and the Reviewers will be still more angry. and the
latter have not a syllable to pacify them. So they who wait
for their decisions will probably miss of reading the most
entertaining book in the world--a punishment which they who
trust to such wretched judges deserve; for who are more
contemptible than such judges, but they who pin their faith on
them?

In answer to you, yourself, my good Sir, I shall not subscribe
to your censure of Mr. Mason, whom I love and admire, and who
has shown the greatest taste possible in the execution of this
work. Surely he has said enough in gratitude, and done far
beyond what gratitude could demand., It seems delicacy in
expatiating on the legacy; particularizing more gratitude would
have lessened the evidence of friendship, and made the 'justice
done to Gray's character look more like a debt.,_ He speaks of
him in slender circumstances, not as distressed: and so he was
till after the deaths of his parents and aunts; and even then
surely not rich. I think he does somewhere say that he meant to
be buried with his mother, and not specifying any other place
confirms it. In short, Mr. Mason shall never know your
criticisms; he has a good heart, and would feel them, though
certainly not apprised that he would merit them. A man who has
so called out all his -friend's virtues, could not want them
himself.

I shall be much obliged to you for the prints you destine for
me. The Earl of Cumberland I have, and will not rob you of. I
wish you had been as successful with Mr. G. as with Mr. T. I
mean, if you are not yet paid-now is the time, for he has sold
his house to the Duke of Marlborough-I suppose he will not keep
his prints long: he changes his pursuits Continually and
extravagantly-and then sells to indulge new fancies.

I have had a piece of luck within these two days. I have long
lamented our having no certain piece written by Anne Boleyn's
brother, Lord Rochford. I have found a very pretty copy of
verses by him in the new published volume of the Nuge Antiquae,
though by mistake he is called, Earl of, instead Of Viscount,
Rochford. They are taken from a MS-dated twenty-eight years
after the author's death, and are much in the manner of Lord
Surrey's and Sir T. Wyat's poems. I should at first have
doubted if they were not counterfeited, on reading my Noble
Authors; but then the blunder of earl for viscount would hardly
have been committed. A little modernized and softened in the
cadence, they would be very pretty.

I have got the rest of the Digby pictures, but at a very high
rate. There is one very large of Sir Kenelm, his wife, and two
sons, in exquisite preservation, though the heads of him and
his wife are not so highly finished as those I have--yet the
boys and draperies are so that, together with the size, it is
certainly the most capital miniature in the world: there are a
few more, very fine too. I shall be happy to show them to you,
whenever You Burnhamize--I mean before August, when I propose
making MY dear old blind friend a visit at Paris--nothing else
would carry me thither. I am too old to seek diversions, and
too indolent to remove to a distance by choice, though not so
immovable as YOU to much less distance. Adieu! Pray tell me
what you hear is said of Gray's Life at Cambridge.

(206) "The Poems of Mr. Gray: to which are prefixed Memoirs of
his Life and Writings; by W, Mason, M A, York, 1775." At the
end of Mason's work Mr. Cole wrote the following memorandum:--
"I am by no means satisfied with this Life; it has too much the
affectation of classical shortness to please me, More
circumstances would have suited my taste better; besides, I
think the biographer had a mind to revenge himself of the
sneerings Mr. Gray put upon him, though he left him, I guess,
above a thousand pounds, which is slightly hinted at only; yet
Mr. Walpole was quite satisfied with the work when I made my
objection." A copy of Gray's will is given in the Rev. J.
Mitford's very valuable edition of the poet's works, published
by Pickering, in four volumes, in 1836.-E.

Letter 89 To The Rev. Mr. Cole.
Arlington Street, April 5, 1775. (page 132)

The least I can do, dear Sir, in gratitude for the cargo of
prints I have received to-day from you, is to send you a
medicine. A pair of bootikins will set out to-morrow morning
in the machine that goes from the Queen's-head in
Gray's-inn-lane. To be certain, you had better send for them
where the machine inns, lest they should neglect delivering
them at Milton. My not losing a moment shows my zeal; but if
you can bear a little pain, I should not press you to use them.
I have suffered so dreadfully, that I constantly wear them to
diminish the stock of gout in my constitution; but as your fit
is very slight, and will not last, and as you are pretty sure
by its beginning so late, that you will never have much; and s
the gout certainly carries off other complaints, had not you
better endure a little, when it is rather a remedy than a
disease? I do not desire to be entirely delivered from the
gout, for all reformations do but make room for some new
grievance: and in my opinion a disorder that requires no
physician, is preferable to any that does. However, I have put
relief in your power, and you will judge for yourself. You
must tie them as tight as you can bear, the flannel next to the
flesh; and, when you take them off, it should be in bed: rub
your feet with a warm cloth, and put on warm stockings, for
fear of catching cold while the pores are open. It would kill
any body but me, who am of adamant, to walk out in the dew in
winter in my slippers in half an hour after pulling off the
bootikins. A physician sent me word, good-naturedly, that
there was danger of catching cold after the bootikins, unless
one was careful. I thanked him, but told him my precaution
was, never taking any. All the winter I pass five days in a
week without walking out, and sit often by the fireside till
seven in the evening. When I do go out, whatever the weather
is, I go with both glasses of the coach down, and so I do at
midnight out of the hottest room. I have not had a single
cold, however slight, these two years.

You are too candid in submitting at once to my defence of Mr.
Mason. It is true I am more charmed with his book than I almost
ever was with one. I find more people like the grave letters
than those of humour, and some think the latter a little
affected, which is as wrong a judgment as they could make; for
Gray never wrote any thing easily but things of humour. Humour
was his natural and original turn--and though from his
childhood he was grave and reserved, his genius led him to see
things ludicrously and satirically; and though his health and
dissatisfaction gave him low spirits, his melancholy turn was
much more affected than his pleasantry in writing. You knew
him enough to know I am in the right-but the world in general
always wants to be told how to think, as well as what to think.
The print, I agree with you, though like, is a very
disagreeable likeness, and the worst likeness of him. It gives
the primness he had under constraint; and there is a blackness
in the countenance which was like him only the last time I ever
saw him, when I was much struck with it: and, though I did not
apprehend him in danger, it left an impression on me that was
uneasy, and almost prophetic of what I heard but too soon after
leaving him. Wilson drew the picture under such impression,
and I could not bear it in my room; Mr. Mason altered it a
little, but Still it is not well, nor gives any idea of the
determined virtues of his heart. It just serves to help the
reader to an image of the person whose genius and integrity
they must admire, if they are so happy as to have a taste for
either.

The Peep into the Gardens at Twickenham is a silly little book,
of which a few little copies were printed some years ago for
presents, and which now sets up for itself as a vendible book.
It is a most inaccurate, superficial, blundering account of
Twickenham and other places, drawn up by a Jewess, who has
married twice, and turned Christian, poetess, and authoress.
She has printed her poems, too, and one complimentary copy of
mine, which, in good breeding, I could not help Sending her in
return for violent compliments in verse to me. I do not
remember that hers were good; mine I know were very bad, and
certainly never intended for the press.

I bought the first volume of Manchester, but could not read it;
it was much too learned for me, and seemed rather an account of
Babel than Manchester, I mean in point of antiquity.(207) To
be sure, it is very kind in an author to promise one the
history of a country town, and give one a circumstantial
account of the antediluvian world into the bargain. But I am
simple and ignorant, and desire no more than I pay for. And
then for my progenitors, Noah and the Saxons, I have no
curiosity about them. Bishop Lyttelton used to plague me to
death about barrows, and tumuli, and Roman camps, and all those
bumps in the ground that do not amount to a most imperfect
ichnography; but, in good truth, I am content with all arts
when perfected, nor inquire how ingeniously people contrive to
do without them--and I care still less for remains of art that
retain no vestiges of art. Mr. Bryant,)208) who is sublime in
unknown knowledge, diverted me more, yet I have not finished
his work, no more than he has. There is a great ingenuity in
discovering all his history [though it has never been written]
by etymologies. Nay, he convinced me that the Greeks had
totally mistaken all they went to learn in Egypt, etc. by
doing, as the French do still, judge wrong by the ear--but as I
have been trying now and then for above forty years to learn
something, I have not time to unlearn it all again, though I
allow this our best sort of knowledge. If I should die when I
am not clear in the History of the World below its first three
thousand years, I should be at a sad loss on meeting with Homer
and Hesiod, or any of those moderns in the Elysian fields,
before I knew what I ought to think of them. Pray do not
betray my ignorance: the reviewers and such literati have
called me a learned and ingenious gentleman. I am sorry they
ever heard my name, but don't let them know how irreverently I
speak of the erudite, whom I dare to say they admire. These
wasps, I suppose, will be very angry at the just contempt Mr.
Gray had for them, and will, as insects do, attempt to sting,
in hopes that their twelvepenny readers will suck a little
venom from the momentary tumour they raise--but good night-and
once more, thank you for the prints. Yours ever.

(207) "The History of Manchester," by John Whitaker, B. D.
London, 1771-3-5. 2 vols. 4to. "We talked," says Boswell, "of
antiquarian researches. Johnson. 'All that is really known Of
the ancient state of Britain is contained in a few Pages. We
can know no more than what the old writers have told us; Yet
what large books we have upon it; the whole of which, excepting
such parts as are taken from these old writers, is all a dream,
such as Whitaker's Manchester.'" Life of Johnson, vol. vii. p.
189.-E.

(208) Jacob Bryan, the learned author of "A New System; or, n
Analysis of Ancient Mythology," 4to. 1774-6, 3 vols.; and of
many other works. His character was thus finely drawn, in
1796, by Mr. Matthias, in "The Pursuits of Literature:"--"No
man of literature can pass by the name of Mr. Bryant without
gratitude and reverence. He is a gentleman of attainments
peculiar to himself, and of classical erudition without an
equal in Europe. His whole life has been spent in laborious
researches, and the most curious investigations. He has a
youthful fancy and a playful wit; with the mind, and
occasionally with the pen of a poet; and with an ease and
simplicity of style aiming only at perspicuity, and, as I
think, attaining it. He has lived to see his eightieth winter
(and May he yet long live!) with the esteem of the wise and
good; in honourable retirement from the cares of life; with a
gentleness of manners, and a readiness and willingness of
literary communication seldom found. He is admired and sought
after by the young who are entering on a course of study, and
revered, and often followed, by those who have completed it.
Nomen in exemplum sero servabirnus evo!" Mr. Bryant died in
1804, in his eighty-ninth year, in consequence Of a wound on
his Shin, occasioned by his foot slipping from a chair which he
had stepped on to reach a book in his library-E.

Letter 90 To The Rev. Mr. Cole.
Strawberry Hill, June 5, 1775. (page 134)

I am extremely concerned, dear Sir, to hear you have been so
long confined by the gout. The painting of your house may,
from the damp, have given you cold-I don't conceive that paint
can affect one otherwise, if it does not make one sick, as it
does me of all things. Dr. Heberden(209) (as every physician,
to make himself talked of, will Set up Some new hypothesis,)
pretends that a damp house, and even damp sheets, which have
ever been reckoned fatal, are wholesome: to prove his faith he
went into his own new house totally Unaired, and survived it.
At Malvern, they certainly put patients into sheets just dipped
in the spring-however, I am 'glad you have a better proof that
dampness is not mortal, and it is better to be too cautious
than too rash. I am perfectly well, and expect to be so for a
year and a half-I desire no more of the bootikins than to
curtail my fits.

Thank you for the note from North's Life, though, having
reprinted my Painters, I shall never have an opportunity of
using it. I am still more obliged to you for the offer of an
Index to my Catalogue but, as I myself know exactly where to
find every thing in it, and as I dare to say nobody else will
want it, I shall certainly not put YOU to that trouble.

Dr. Glynn will certainly be most welcome to see my house, and
shall, if I am not at home:-still I had rather know a few days
before, because else he may happen to come when I have company,
as I have often at this time of the year, and then it is
impossible to let it be seen, as I cannot ask my company, who
may have come to see it too, to go out, that somebody else may
see it, and I should be Very sorry to have the Doctor
disappointed. These difficulties, which have happened more
than once, have obliged me to give every ticket for a
particular day; therefore, if Dr. Glynn will be so good as to
advertise me of the day he intends to come here, with a
direction, I shall send him word what day he can see it.

I have just run through the two vast folios of Hutchins's
Dorsetshire.(210) He has taken infinite pains; indeed, all but
those that would make it entertaining.

Pray can you tell me any thing of some relations of my own, the
Burwells? My grandfather married Sir Jeffery Burwell's
daughter, of Rongham, in Suffolk. Sir Jeffery's mother, I
imagine, was daughter of a Jeffery Pitman, of Suffolk; at least
I know there was such a man in the latter, and that we quarter
the arms of Pitman. But I cannot find who Lady Burwell, Sir
Jeffery's wife, was. Edmondson has searched in vain in the
Heralds' office; and I have outlived all the ancient of my
family so long, that I know not of whom to Inquire, but you of
the neighbourhood. There is an old walk in the park at
Houghton, called "Sir Jeffery's Walk," where the old gentleman
used to teach my father (Sir Robert) his book. Those very old
trees encouraged my father to plant at Houghton. When people
used to try to persuade him nothing would grow there, he said,
why Will not other trees grow as well as those in Sir Jeffery's
Walk?--Other trees have grown to some purpose! Did I ever tell
you that ,my father was descended from Lord Burleigh? The
latter's granddaughter, by his son Exeter, married Sir Giles
Allington, whose daughter married Sir Robert Crane, father of
Sir Edward Walpole's .'Wife. I want but Lady Burwell's name to
Make my genealogic tree Shoot out stems every way. I have
recovered a barony in fee, which has no defect but in being
antecedent to any summons to Parliament, that of the Fitz
Osberts: and On MY Mother's side it has mounted the Lord knows
whither by the Philipps,s to Henry VIII. and has sucked in
Dryden for a great-uncle: and by Lady Philipps's mother, Darcy,
to Edward III. and there I stop for brevity's sake--especially
as Edward III. is a second Adam; who almost is not descended
from Edward 1 as posterity will be from Charles II. and all the
princes in Europe from James I. I am the first antiquary of my
race. People don't know how entertaining a study it is. Who
begot whom is a most amusing kind of hunting; one recovers a
grandfather instead of breaking one's own neck--and then one
grows so pious to the memory of a thousand persons one never
heard of before. One finds how Christian names came into a
family, with a world of other delectable erudition. You cannot
imagine how vexed I was that Bloomfield(211) died before he
arrived at Houghton--I had promised myself a whole crop of
notable ancestors-but I think I have pretty well unkennelled
them myself. Adieu! Yours ever.

P. S. I found a family of Whaplode in Lincolnshire who give our
arms, and have persuaded myself that Whaplode is a corruption
of Walpole, and came from a branch when we lived at Walpole in
Lincolnshire.

(209) Dr. William Heberden, the distinguished physician and
medical writer, who died on the 17th of March, 1801, at the
advanced age of ninety-one.-E.

(210) "The History and Antiquities of the County of Dorset."
London, 1774, in two volumes, folio. A second edition,
corrected, augmented, and improved, by Richard Gough and John
Bowyer Nichols, in four Volumes, folio, appeared in
1796-1815.-E.

(211) The Rev. Francis Blomefield, the author of an " Essay
towards a Topographical History of the County of Norfolk,"
which was left unfinished by him, and continued by the Rev.
Charles Parkin. It was first printed in five folio volumes:
1739-1773. A second edition, in eleven volumes, octavo,
appeared in 1805-1810.-E.

Letter 91 To The Hon. H. S. Conway.
Strawberry Hill, July 9, 1775. (page 136)

The whole business of this letter would lie in half a line.
Shall you have room for me on Tuesday the 18th? I am putting
myself into motion that I may go farther. I told Madame du
Deffand how you had scolded me on her account, and she has
charged me to thank you, and tell you how much she wishes to see
you, too. I would give any thing to go-But the going!--However,
I really think I shall, but I grow terribly affected with a
maladie de famille, that of taking root at home.

I did but put my head into London on Thursday, and more bad news
from America.(211) I wonder when it will be bad enough to make
folks think it so, without going on! The stocks, indeed, begin
to grow a little nervous, and they are apt to affect other
pulses. I heard this evening here that the Spanish fleet is
sailed, and that we are not in the secret whither-but I don't
answer for Twickenham gazettes, and I have no better. I have a
great mind to tell you a Twickenham story; and yet it will be
good for nothing, as I cannot send you the accent in a letter.
Here it is, and you must try to set it to the right emphasis.
One of our maccaronis is dead, a Captain Mawhood, the teaman's
son. He had quitted the army, because his comrades called him
Captain Hyson, and applied himself to learn the classics and
freethinking; and was always disputing with the parson of the
parish about Dido and his own soul. He married Miss Paulin's
warehouse, who had six hundred a-year; but, being very much out
of conceit with his own canister, could not reconcile himself to
her riding-hood--so they parted beds in three nights. Of late he
has taken to writing comedies, which every body was welcome to
hear him read, as he could get nobody to act them. Mrs. Mawhood
has a friend, one Mrs. V * * *, a mighty plausible good sort of
body, who feels for every body, and a good deal for herself, is
of a certain age, wears well, has some pretensions that she
thinks very reasonable still, and a gouty husband. Well! she was
talking to Mr. Rafter about Captain Mawhood a little before he
died. "Pray, Sir, does the Captain ever communicate his writings
to Mrs. Mawhood?" "Oh, dear no, Madam; he has a sovereign
contempt for her understanding." "Poor woman!" "And pray, Sir,-
- give me leave to ask you: I think I have heard they very seldom
sleep together!" "Oh, never, Madam! Don't you know all that?"
"Poor woman!" I don't know whether you will laugh; but Mr.
Raftor,(213) who tells a story better than any body, made me
laugh for two hours. Good night!

(212) Of the commencement of hostilities with the Americans at
Lexington on the 19th of April.-E.

(213) Mr. Raftor brother to Mrs. Clive.-E.

Letter 92 To The Hon. H. S. Conway.(214)
Strawberry Hill, August 9, 1775. (page 137)

Well, I am going tout de bon, and I heartily wish I was returned.
It is a horrid exchange, the cleanness and verdure and
tranquillity of 'Strawberry, for a beastly ship, worse inns, the
pav`e of the roads bordered with eternal rows of maimed trees,
and the racket of an h`otel garni! I never doat on the months of
August and September, enlivened by nothing but Lady Greenwich's
speaking-trumpet--but I do not want to be amused--at least never
at the expense of being put in motion. Madame du Deffand, I am
sure, may be satisfied with the sacrifice I make to her!(215)

You have heard, to be sure, of the war between your brother and
Foote; but probably do not know how far the latter has carried
his impudence. Being asked, why Lord Hertford had refused to
license his piece, he replied, "Why, he asked me to make his
youngest son a box-keeper, and because I would not, he stopped my
play."(216) The Duchess of Kingston offered to buy it off, but
Foote would not take her money, and swears he will act her in
Lady Brumpton; which to be sure is very applicable.

I am sorry to hear Lord Villiers is going to drag my lady through
all the vile inns in Germany. I think he might go alone.

George Onslow told me yesterday, that the American Congress had
sent terms of accommodation, and that your brother told him so;
but a strange fatality attends George's news, which is rarely
canonical; and I doubt this intelligence is far from being so..
I shall know more to-morrow, when I go to town to prepare for my
journey on Tuesday. Pray let me hear from you, enclosed to M.
Panchaud.

I accept with great joy Lady Ailesbury's offer Of coming hither
in October, which will increase my joy in being at home again. I
intend to set out on my return the 25th Of next month. Sir
Gregory Page has left Lord Howe eight thousand pounds at present,
and twelve more after his aunt Mrs. Page's death.

Thursday, 10th.

I cannot find any ground for believing that any proposals are
come from the Congress. On the contrary, every thing looks as
melancholy as possible. Adieu!

(214) Now first printed.

(215) In her letter of the 5th of August, Madame du Deffand, by
way of inducement to Walpole to take the journey, says--"Je vous
jure que je ne me soucierai de rien pour vous; c'est `a dire, de
vous faire faire une chose Plut`ot qu'une autre: vous serez
totalement libre de toutes vos pens`ees, paroles, et actions,
vous ne me verrez pas un souhait un d`esir qui Puisse contredire
vos pens`ees et Vos volont`es: je saurai que M. Walpole est `a
Paris, il saura que je demeure `a St. Joseph; il sera maitre d'y
arriver, d'y rester, de s'en aller, comme il lui plaira."-E.

(216) The piece was entitled "The Trip to Calais;" in which the
author having ridiculed, under the name of Kitty Crocodile, the
eccentric Duchess of Kingston she offered him a sum of money to
strike out the part. A correspondence took place between the
parties, which ended in the Duchess making an application to Lord
Hertford, at that time Lord Chamberlain, who interdicted the
performance. Foote, however, brought it out, with some
alterations, in the following year, under the title of "The
Capuchin."-E.

Letter 93 To The Countess Of Ailesbury.
>From t'other side of the water, August 17, 1775.(217) (page 138)

Interpreting your ladyship's orders in the most personal sense,
as respecting the dangers of the sea, I -write the instant I am
landed. I did not, in truth, set out till yesterday morning at
eight o'clock; but finding the roads, horses, postilions, tides,
winds, moons, and Captain Fectors in the pleasantest humour in
the world, I embarked almost as soon as I arrived at Dover, and
reached Calais before the sun was awake;-and here I am for the
sixth time in my life, with only the trifling distance of
seven-and-thirty years between my first voyage and the present.
Well! I can only say in excuse, that I am got into the land of
Struldburgs, where one is never too old to be young, and where la
b`equille du p`ere Barnabas blossoms like Aaron's rod, or the
Glastonbury thorn. Now, to be sure, I shall be a little
mortified, if your ladyship wanted a letter of news, and did not
at all trouble your head about my navigation. However, you will
not tell one so; and therefore I will persist in believing that
this good news will be received with transport at Park-place, and
that the bells of Henley will be set a ringing. The rest of my
adventures, must be deferred till they have happened, which is
not always the case of travels. I send you no Compliments from
Paris, because I have not got thither, nor delivered the bundle
which Mr. Conway sent me. I did, as Your ladyship commanded; buy
three pretty little medallions in frames of filigraine, for our
dear old friend. They will not ruin you, having cost not a
guinea and a half; but it was all I could find that was genteel
and portable; and as she does not measure by guineas, but
attentions, she will be as much pleased as if you had sent her a
dozen acres of Park-place. As they are in bas-relief, too, they
are feelable, and that is a material circumstance to her. I wish
the Diomede had even so much as a pair of Nankin!

Adieu, toute la ch`ere famille! I think of October with much
satisfaction; it will double the pleasure of my return.

(217) Mr. Walpole reached Paris on the 19th of August and left it
on the 19th of October.-E.

Letter 94 To The Countess Of Ailesbury.
Paris, August 20, 1775. (page 139)

I have been sea-sick to death: I have been poisoned by dirt and
vermin; I have been stifled by beat, choked by dust, and starved
for want of any thing I could touch: and yet, Madam, here, I am
perfectly well, not in the least fatigued; and, thanks to the
rivelled parchments, formerly faces, which I have seen by
hundreds, I find myself almost as young as When I came hither
first in the last century. In spite of my whims, and delicacy,
and laziness, none of my grievances have been mortal: I have
borne them as well as if I had set up for a philosopher, like the
sages of this town. Indeed, I have found my dear old woman So
well, and looking so much better than she did four years ago,
that I am transported with pleasure, and thank your ladyship and
Mr. Conway for driving me hither. Madame du Deffand came to me
the instant I arrived, and sat by me whilst I stripped and
dressed myself; for, as she said, since she cannot see there was
no harm in my being stark.(218) She was charmed with your
present; but was so Kind as to be so much more charmed with my
arrival, that she did not think of it a moment. I sat with her
till half an hour after two in the morning, and had a letter from
her before MY eyes were open again. In short, her soul is
immortal, and forces her body to bear it company.

This is the very eve of Madame Clotilde's(219) Wedding - but
Monsieur Turgot, to the great grief of Lady Mary Coke, will
suffer no cost, but one banquet, one ball, and a play at
Versailles. Count Viry gives a banquet, a bal masqu`e, and a
firework. I think I shall see little but the last, from which I
will send your ladyship a rocket in my next letter. Lady Mary, I
believe, has had a private audience of the ambassador's leg,(220)
but en tout bien, et honneur, and only to satisfy her ceremonious
curiosity about any part of royal nudity. I am just going to
her, as she is to Versailles; and I have not time to add a word
more to the vows of your ladyship's most faithful.

(218) Madame du Deffand had just completed her seventy-eighth
year.-E.

(219) Madame Clotilde, sister of Louis XV1. Turgot was the new
minister of finance, who, With his colleagues were endeavouring,
by every practicable means, to reduce the enormous expenditure of
the country.-E.

(220) Mr. Walpole alludes to the ceremony of the marriages of
princesses by proxy.-E.

Letter 95 To Mrs. Abington(221)
Paris, September [1775.] (page 140)

If I had known, Madam, of your being at Paris, before I heard it
from Colonel Blaquiere, I should certainly have prevented your
flattering invitation, and have offered you any services that
could depend on my acquaintance here. It is plain I am old, and
live with very old folks, when I did not hear of your arrival.
However, Madam, I have not that fault at least of a veteran, the
thinking nothing equal to what they admired in their youth. I do
impartial justice to your merit, and fairly allow it not only
equal to that of any actress I have seen, but believe the present
age will not be in the wrong, if they hereafter prefer it to
those they may live to see. Your allowing me to wait on you in
London, Madam, will make me some amends for the loss I have had
here; and I shall take an early opportunity of assuring you how
much I am, Madam, your most obliged humble servant.

(221) Now first printed. This elegant and fashionable actress
was born in 1735, quitted the stage in 1799, and died in 1815.-E.

Letter 96 To The Hon. H. S. Conway.
Paris, Sept 8, 1775. (page 140)

The delays of the post, and its departure before its arrival,
saved me some days of anxiety for Lady Ailesbury, and prevented
my telling you how concerned I am for her accident; though I
trust, by this time, she has not even pain left. I feel the
horror you must have felt during her suffering in the dark, and
on the sight of her arm;(222) and though nobody admires her
needlework more than I, still I am rejoiced that it will be the
greatest sufferer. However, I am very impatient for a farther
account. Madame du Deffand, who, you know, never loves her
friends by halves, and whose impatience never allows itself time
to inform itself, was out of her wits, because I could not
explain exactly how the accident happened, and where. She wanted
to write directly, though the post was just gone; and, as soon as
I could make her easy about the accident, she fell into a new
distress about her fans for Madame de Marchais, and concludes
they have been overturned, and broken too. In short, I never saw
any thing like her. She has made engagements for me till Monday
se'nnight; in which are included I don't know how many journeys
into the country; and as nobody ever leaves her without her
engaging them for another time, all these parties will be so many
polypuses, that will shoot out into new ones every way. Madame
de Jonsac,(223) a great friend of mine, arrived the day before
yesterday, and Madame du Deffand has pinned her down to meeting
me at her house four times before next Tuesday, all parentheses,
that are not to interfere with our other suppers; and from those
suppers I never get to bed before two or three o'clock. In
short, I need have the activity of a squirrel, and the strength
of a Hercules, to go through my labours--not to count how many
d`em`el`es I have had to raccommode, and how many m`emoires to
present against Tonton,(224) who grows the greater favourite the
more people he devours. As I am the only person who dare correct
him, I have already insisted on his being confined in the Bastile
every day to after five o'clock. T'other night he flew at Lady
Barrymore's face, and I thought would have torn her eye out; but
it ended in biting her finger. She was terrified: she fell into
tears. Madame du Deffand, who has too much parts not to see
every thing in its true light, perceiving that she had not beaten
Tonton half enough, immediately told us a story of a lady, whose
dog, having bitten a piece out of a gentleman's leg, the tender
dame in a great fright, cried out, "Won't it make my dog sick?"

Lady Barrymore(225) has taken a house. She will be glutted with
conquests: I never saw any body so much admired. I doubt her
poor little head will be quite overset.

Madame de Marchais(226) is charming: eloquence and attention
itself I cannot stir for peaches, nectarines, grapes, and bury
pears. You would think Pomona was in love with me. I am not so
transported with N * * * * cock and hen. They are a tabor and
pipe that I do not understand. He mouths and she squeaks and
neither articulates. M. d'Entragues I have not seen. Upon the
whole, I am much more pleased with Paris than ever I was; and,
perhaps, shall stay a little longer than I intended. The Harry
Grenville's(227) are arrived. I dined with them at Madame de
Viry's,(228) who has completed the conquest of France by her
behaviour on Madame Clotilde's wedding, and by the f`etes she
gave. Of other English I wot not, but grieve the Richmonds do
not come. I am charmed with Dr. Bally; nay, and with the King of
Prussia--as much as I can be with a northern monarch. For your
Kragen, I think we ought to procure a female one, and marry it to
Ireland, that we may breed some new islands against we have lost
America. I know nothing of said America. There is not a
Frenchman that does not think us distracted.

I used to scold you about your bad writing, and perceive I have
written in such a hurry, and blotted my letter so much, that you
will not be able to read it: but consider how few moments I have
to myself. I am forced to stuff my ears with cotton to get any
sleep. However, my journey has done me good. I have thrown off
at least fifteen years. Here is a letter for my dear Mrs. Damer
from Madame de Cambis, who thinks she doats on you all. Adieu!

P. S. I shall bring you two `eloges of Marshal Catinat; not
because I admire them, but because I admire him, because I think
him very like you.

(222) Lady Ailesbury had been overturned in her carriage at
Park-place, and dislocated her wrist.

223) La Comtesse de Jonsac, sister of the President Henault.

(224) A favourite dog of Madame du Deffand's.

(225) Third daughter of William second Earl of Harrington, and
wife of Richard sixth Earl of Barrymore, who, dying in 1780, left
issue Richard and Henry, each of whom became, successively, Earl
of Barrymore; a title which expired upon the death of the latter,
in 1823.-E.

(226) Madame de Marchais, n`ee Laborde, married to a
valet-de-chambre of Louis XV1. From her intimacy with M.
d'Angivillier, Directeur des B`atiments, Jardins, etc. du Roi,
She had the opportunity of obtaining the finest fruits and
flowers.-E.

(227) Henry Grenville, brother to Earl Temple. He married Miss
Margaret Banks. He died in 1784.-E.

(228) Miss Harriet Speed. She had married M. le Comte do Viry
when he was minister at London from the Court of Turin. She is
one of the ladies to whom Gray's "Long Story" is addressed. For
an account of her, see Vol. iii. P. 160, letter 102.-E.

Letter 97 To The Hon. H. S. Conway.
Paris, Oct. 6, 1775. (page 142)

It will look like a month since I wrote to you; but I have been
coming, and am. Madame du Deffand has been so ill, that the day
she was seized I thought she would not live till night. Her
Herculean weakness, which could not resist strawberries and cream
after supper, has surmounted all the ups and downs which followed
her excess; but her impatience to go every where, and to do every
thing has been attended with a kind of relapse, and another kind
of giddiness: so that I am not quite easy about her, as they
allow her to take no nourishment to recruit, and she will die of
inanition, if she does not live upon it. She cannot lift her
head from the pillow without `etourdissemens; and yet her spirits
gallop faster than any body's, and so do her repartees. She has
a great supper to-night for the Due de Choiseul, and was in such
a passion yesterday with her cook about it, and that put Tonton
into such a rage, that nos dames de Saint Joseph thought the
devil or the philosophers were flying away with their convert! As
I have scarce quitted her, I can have had nothing to tell you.
If she gets well, as I trust, I shall set out on the 12th; but I
cannot leave her in any danger--though I shall run many myself,
if I stay longer. I have kept such bad hours with this malade
that I have had alarms of gout; and bad weather, worse inns, and
a voyage in winter, will ill suit me. The fans arrived at a
propitious moment, and she immediately had them opened on her
bed, and felt all the patterns, and had all the papers described.
She was all satisfaction and thanks, and swore me to do her full
justice to Lady Ailesbury, and Mrs. Damer. Lord Harrington and
Lady Harriet are arrived; but have announced and persisted in a
strict invisibility. I know nothing of my ch`ere patrie, but
what I learn from the London Chronicle; and that tells me, that
the trading towns are suing out lettres de noblesse, that is,
entreating the King to put an end to commerce, that they may all
be gentlemen. Here agriculture, economy, reformation,
philosophy, are the bon-ton even at court. The two nations seem
to have crossed over and figured in; but as people that copy take
the bad with the good, as well as the good with the bad, there
was two days ago a great horserace in the plain de Sablon,
between the Comte d'Artois,(229) the Duc de Chartres,(230)
Monsieur de Conflans, and the Duc de Lauzun.(231) The latter won
by the address of a little English postilion, who is in such
fashion, that I don't know whether the Academy will not give him
for the subject of an `eloge.

The Due de Choiseul, I said, is here; and, as he has a second
time put off his departure, cela fait beaucoup de bruit. I shall
not at all be surprised if he resumes the reins, as (forgive me a
pun) he has the Reine at ready. Messrs. de Turgot and
Malesherbes certainly totter--but I shall tell you no more till I
see you; for though this goes by a private hand, it is so
private, that I don't know it, being an English merchant's, who
lodges in this hotel, and whom I do not know by sight: so,
perhaps, I may bring you word of this letter myself. I flatter
myself Lady Ailesbury's arm has recovered its straightness and
its cunning. . .

Madame du Deffand says, I love you better than any thing in the
world. If true, I hope you have not less penetration: if you
have not, or it is not true, what would professions avail?-So I
leave that matter in suspense. Adieu!

October 7.

Madame du Deffand was quite well yesterday; and at near one this,
morning I left the Duc de Choiseul, the Duchess de Grammont, the
Prince and the Princess of Beauveau, Princess Of Poix,(232) the
Mar`echale de Luxembourg, Duchess de Lauzun, Ducs de Gontaut(233)
et de Chabot, and Caraccioli, round her chaise longue; and she
herself was not a dumb personage. I have not heard yet how she
has slept, and must send away my letter this moment, as I must
dress to go to dinner with Monsieur de Malesherbes at Madame de
Villegagnon's. I must repose a great while after all this living
in company; nay, intend to go very little into the world again,
as I do not admire the French way of burning one's candle to the
very snuff in public. Tell Mrs. Damer, that the fashion now is
to erect the toup`ee into a high detached tuft of hair, like a
cockatoo's crest; and this toup`ee they call la physionomie--I
don't guess why.

My laquais is come back from St. Joseph's, and says Marie(234) de
Vichy has had a very good night, and is quite well.--Philip!(235)
let my chaise be ready on Thursday.(236)

(229) Afterwards Charles the Tenth.-E.

(230) On the death of his father, in 1785, he became Duke of
Orleans. In 1792, he was chosen a member of the
National-Convention, when he adopted the Jacobinical title of
Louis-Philippe-Joseph Egalit`e; and, in November 1793, he
suffered by the guillotine. -E.

(231) The Duc de Lauzun, son of the Duc de Gontaut, the maternal
nephew of the Duchesse de Choiseul.-E.

(232) Wife of the Prince de Poix, eldest son of the Mar`echal de
Mouchy, and daughter of the Prince de Beauveau. The Prince de
Poix retired to this country on the breaking out of the French
revolution, accompanied by his son, Comte Charles de Noailles,
who married the daughter of La Borde, the great banker.-E.

(233) The Duc de Gontaut, brother to the Mar`echal Duc de Biron,
and father to the Duc de Lauzun. The Duchesse de Gontaut was a
sister of the Duchesse de Choiseul-E.

(234) The maiden name of Madame du Deffand was Marie de Vichy
Chamrond. She was born in 1697, of a noble family in the
province of Burgundy; and, as her fortune was small, she was
married by her parents, in 1718, to the Marquis du Deffand; the
union being settled with as little attention to her feelings as
was usual in French marriages of that age. A separation soon
took place; but Walpole says they always continued on good terms,
and that upon her husband's deathbed, at his express desire, she
saw him.-E.

(235) Mr. Walpole's valet-de-chambre.

(236) Walpole left Paris on the 12th; upon which day, Madame du
Deffand thus wrote to him--"Adieu! ce mot est bien triste!
Souvenez que vous laissez ici la personne dont vous `etes le plus
aim`e, et dont le bonheur et le malheur consistent dans ce que
vous pensez pour elle. Donnez-moi de vos nouvelles le plus t`ot
qu'il sera possible."-E.

Letter 98 To The Rev. Mr. Cole.
Strawberry Hill, Dec. 10, 1775. (page 144)

I was very sorry to have been here, dear Sir, the day you called
on me in town. It is so difficult to uncloister you, that I
regret not seeing you when you are out of your own ambry. I have
nothing new to tell you that is very old; but you can inform me
of something within your own district. Who is the author, E. B.
G. of a version of Mr. Gray's Latin Odes into English,(237) and
of an Elegy on my wolf-devoured dog, poor Tory? a name you will
marvel at in a dog of mine; but his godmother was the widow of
Alderman Parsons, who gave him at Paris to Lord Conway, and he to
me. The author is a poet; but he makes me blush, for he calls
Mr. Gray and me congenial pair. Alas! I have no genius; and if
any symptom of talent, so inferior to Gray's, that Milton and
Quarles might as well be coupled together. We rode over the Alps
in the same chaise, but Pegasus drew on his side, and a
cart-horse on mine. I am too jealous of his fame to let us be
coupled together. This author says he has lately printed at
Cambridge a Latin translation of the Bards; I should be much
obliged to you for it.

I do not ask you if Cambridge has produced any thing, for it
never does. Have you made any discoveries? Has Mr. Lort? Where
is he? Does Mr. Tyson engrave no more? My plates for Strawberry
advance leisurely. I am about nothing. I grow old and lazy, and
the present world cares for nothing but politics, and satisfies
itself with writing in newspapers. If they are not bound up and
preserved in libraries, posterity will imagine that the art of
printing was gone out of use. Lord Hardwicke(238) has indeed
reprinted his heavy volume of Sir Dudley Carleton's Despatches,
and says I was in the wrong to despise it. I never met with any
body that thought otherwise. What signifies raising the dead so
often, when they die the next minute? Adieu!

(237) Edward Burnaby Greene, formerly of Bennet College, but at
that time a brewer in Westminster, He likewise published
translations of Pindar, Persius, Apollonius Rhodius, Anacreon,
etc.-E.

(238) Philip Yorke, second Earl of Hardwicke, when Lord Royston,
published the "Letters to and from Sir Dudley Carleton, Knight,
during his Embassy in Holland, from January 1615-16 to December
1620," 4to. 1727; and, in 1775, a second edition, "with large
additions to the Historical Preface."-E.

Letter 99 To The Countess Of Ailesbury.
Arlington Street, Dec. 11, 1775. (page 145)

Did you hear that scream?--Don't be frightened, Madam; it was
only the Duchess of Kingston last Sunday was sevennight at
chapel: but it is better to be prepared; for she has sent word to
the House of Lords, that her nerves are so bad she intends to
scream for these two months, and therefore they must put off her
trial. They are to take her throes into consideration to-day;
and that there may be sufficient room for the length of her veil
and train, and attendants, have a mind
to treat her with Westminster-hall. I hope so, for I should like
to see this com`edie larmoyante; and, besides, I conclude, it
would bring your ladyship to town. You shall have
timely notice.

There is another comedy infinitely worth seeing--Monsieur Le
Texier. He is Pr`eville, and Caillaud, and Garrick, and Weston,
and Mrs. Clive, all together; and as perfect in the most
insignificant part, as in the most difficult.(239) To be sure,
it is hard to give up loo in such fine weather, when one can play
from morning till night. In London, Pam can scarce get a house
till ten o'clock. If you happen to see the General your husband,
make my compliments to him, Madam; his friend the King of Prussia
is going to the devil and Alexander the Great.

(239) M. Le Texier was a native of Lyons, where he was directeur
des fermes. The following account of the readings of this
celebrated Frenchman, is from a critique on Boaden's Life of
Kemble, in the Quarterly Review, vol. xxxiv. p. 241:--"On one of
the author's incidental topics we must pause for a moment with
delightful recollection. We mean the readings of Le Texier, who,
seated at a desk, and dressed in plain clothes, reads French
plays with such modulation of voice, and such exquisite point of
dialogue, as to form a pleasure different from that of the
theatre, but almost as great as we experience in listening to a
first-rate actor. When it commenced, M. Le Texier read over the
dramatis persome, with the little analysis of character usually
attached to each name, Using the voice and manner with which he
afterwards read the part: and so accurately was the key-note
given, that he had no need to name afterwards the person who
spoke; the stupidest of the audience could not miss to recognise
him." Madame du Deffand, in a letter to Walpole, says of him--
"Soyez s`ur, que lui tout seul est la meilleure troupe que nous
avons:" and again in one to Voltaire--"Assis dans un fauteuil,
avec un livre `a la main, il jouc les comedies o`u1 il y a sept,
huit, dix, douze personnages, si parfaitement bien, qu'on ne
saurait croire, m`eme en le regardant, que ce soit le m`eme homme
qui Parle. Pour moi, l'illusion est parfaitc."-E.

Letter 100 To The Rev. Mr. Cole.
Arlington Street, Dec. 14, 1775. (page 146)

Our letters probably passed by each other on the road, for I
wrote to you on Tuesday, and have this instant received one from
you, which I answer directly, to beg pardon for my incivility,
nay, ingratitude, in not thanking you for your present of a whole
branch of most respectable ancestors, the Derehaughs--why, the
Derehaughs alone would make gentlemen of half the modern peers,
English or Irish. I doubt my journey to France was got into my
head, and left no room for an additional quarter-but I have given
it to Edmondson, and ordered him to take care that I am born
again from the Derehaughs. This Edmondson has got a ridiculous
notion into his head that another, and much ancienter of my
progenitors, Sir Henry Walpole, married his wife Isabella
Fitz-Osbert, when she was widow to Sir Walter Jernegan; whereas,
all the Old Testament says Sir Walter married Sir Henry's widow.
Pray send me your authority to confound this gainsayer, if you
know any thing particular of the matter.

I had not heard of the painting you tell me of. As those
boobies, the Society of Antiquaries, have gotten hold of it, I
wonder their piety did not make them bury it again, as they did
the clothes of Edward I.(240) I have some notion that in
Vertue's MSS. or somewhere else, I don't know where, I have read
of some ancient painting at the Rose Tavern. This I will tell
you-but Mr. Gough is such" a bear, that I shall not satisfy him
about it. That Society, when they are puzzled, have recourse to
me; and that would be so often, that I shall not encourage them.
They may blunder as they please, from their heavy president down
to the pert Governor Pownall, who accounts for every thing
immediately, before the Creation or since. Say only to Mr.
Gough, that I said I had not leisure now to examine Vertue's MSS.
If I find any thing there, you shall know-but I have no longer
any eagerness to communicate what I discover. When there was so
little taste for MSS. which Mr. Gray thought worth transcribing,
and which were so valuable, would one offer more pearls?

Boydel brought me this morning another number of the Prints from
the pictures at Houghton. Two or three in particular are most
admirably executed--but alas! it will be twenty years before the
set is completed. That is too long to look forward to at any
age!--and at mine!--Nay, people will be tired in a quarter of the
time. Boydel, who knows this country, and still more this town,
thinks so too. Perhaps there will be newer, or at least more
fashionable ways of engraving, and the old will be despised--or,
which is still more likely, nobody will be able to afford the
expense. Who would lay a plan for any thing in an overgrown
metropolis hurrying to its fall!

I will return you Mr. Gough's letter when I get a frank. Adieu!

(240) The Society of Antiquaries, having obtained permission to
do so, had, on the 2d of May 1774, opened the tomb of Edward the
First in Westminster. The body was found in perfect
preservation, and most superbly attired. The garments were, of
course, carefully replaced in the tomb.-E.

Letter 101 To Thomas Astle, Esq.
December 19, 1775. (page 147)

Sir,
I am much obliged, and return you my thanks for the paper you
have sent me. You have added a question to it, which, if I
understand it, you yourself, Sir, are more capable than any body
of answering. You say, "Is it probable that this instrument was
framed by Richard Duke of Gloucester?" If by framed you mean
drawn up, I should think princes of the blood, in that barbarous
age, were not very expert in drawing acts of attainder, though a
branch of the law more in use then than since. But as I suppose
you mean forged, you, Sir, so conversant in writings of that age,
can judge better than any man. You may only mean forged by his
order. Your reading, much deeper than mine, may furnish you with
precedents of forged acts of attainder: I never heard of one; nor
does my simple understanding suggest the use of such a forgery,
on cases immediately pressing; because an act of attainder being
a matter of public notoriety, it would be revolting to the common
sense of all mankind to plead such an one', if it had not really
existed. If it could be carried into execution by force, the
force would avail without the forgery, and would be at once
exaggerated and weakened by it. I cannot, therefore, conceive
why Richard should make use of so absurd a trick, unless that
having so little to do in so short and turbulent a reign, he
amused himself with treasuring up in the tower a forged act for
the satisfaction of those who, three hundred years afterwards,
should be glad of discovering new flaws in his character. As
there are men so bigoted to old legends, I am persuaded, Sir,
that you would please them, by communicating your question to
them. They would rejoice to suppose that Richard was more
criminal than even the Lancastrian historians represent him; and
just at this moment I don't know whether they would not believe
that Mrs. Rudd assisted him. I, who am, probably, as absurd a
bigot on the other side, see nothing in the paper you have sent
me, but a confirmation of Richard's innocence of the death of
Clarence. As the Duke of Buckingham was appointed to superintend
the execution, it is incredible that he should have been drowned
in a butt of malmsey, and that Richard should have been the
executioner. When a seneschal of England, or as we call it, a
lord high steward, is appointed for a trial, at least for
execution, with all his officers, it looks very much as if, even
in that age, proceedings were carried on with a little more
formality than the careless writers of that time let us think.
The appointment, too, of the Duke of Buckingham for that office,
seems to add another improbability [and a work of supererogation]
to Richard's forging the instrument. Did Richard really do
nothing but what tended to increase his unpopularity by glutting
mankind with lies, forgeries, absurdities, which every man living
could detect?
I take this opportunity, Sir, of telling you how sorry I am not
to have seen you long, and how glad I shall be to renew our
acquaintance, especially if you like to talk over this old story
with me, though I own it is of little importance, and pretty well
exhausted.(241) I am, Sir, with great regard, your obliged
humble servant.

(241) To the above letter it was intended to subjoin the
following queries:--

"If there was no such Parliament held, would Richard have dared
to forge an act for it?

"Would Henry VII. never have reproached him with so absurd a
forgery?

"Did neither Sir T. More nor Lord Bacon ever hear of that
forgery?

"As Richard declared his nephew the Earl of Warwick his
successor, would he have done so, if he had forged an act of
attainder of Warwick's father?

"if it is supposed he forged the act, when he set aside Warwick,
could he pretend that act was not known when he declared him his
heir? Would not so recent an act's being unknown have proved it a
forgery; and if there had been no such Parliament as that which
forged it, would not that have proved it a double forgery? The
act, therefore, and the parliament that passed it, must have been
genuine, and existed, though no other record appears. The
distractions of the times, the evident insufficiency or
partiality of the historians of that age, and the interest of
Henry VII to destroy all records that gave authority to the House
Of York and their title, account for our wanting evidence of that
Parliament."

Letter 102 To The Rev. Mr. Cole.
January 26, 1776. (page 148)

I have deferred answering your last letter, dear Sir, till I
cannot answer with my own hand. I made a pilgrimage at Christmas
to Queen's Cross, at Ampthill, was caught there by the snow,
Imprisoned there for a fortnight, and sent home bound hand and
foot by the gout. The pain, I suppose, is quite frozen, for I
have had none; nothing but inflammation and swelling, and they
abate. In reality, this is owing to the bootikins, which -though
they do not cure the gout, take out its sting. You, who are
still more apt to be an invalid, feel, I fear, this Hyperborean
season; I should be glad to hear you did not.

I thought I had at once jumped upon a discovery of the subject of
the painted room at the Rose Tavern, but shall not plume myself
upon my luck till I have seen the chamber, because Mr. Gough's
account seems to date the style of the painting earlier than
-will serve my hypothesis. I had no data to go upon but the site
having belonged to the family of Tufton (for I do not think the
description at all answers to the taking of Francis I., nor is it
at all credible that there should be arms in the painting, and
yet neither those of France or Austria). I turned immediately to
Lord Thanet's pedigree, in Collins's Peerage, and found at once
an heroic adventure performed by one of the family, that accords
remarkably with the principal circumstance. It is the rescue of
the Elector Palatine, son of our Queen of Bohemia, from an
ambuscade laid for him by the Duke of Lorrain. The arms, Or, and
Gules, I thought were those of Lorrain, which I since find are
Argent and Gules. The Argent indeed may be turned yellow by age,
as Mr. Gough says he does not know whether the crescent is red or
black. But the great impediment is, that this achievement of a
Tufton was performed in the reign of Charles II. Now in that
reign, when
we were become singularly ignorant of chivalry, anachronisms and
blunders might easily be committed by a modern painter, yet I
shall not adhere to my discovery, unless I find the painting
correspond with the style of the modern time to which I would
assign it; nor will I see through the eyes of my hypothesis, but
fairly.

I shall now turn to another subject. Mr. Astle, who has left me
off ever Since the fatal era of Richard III. for no reason that
I can conceive but my having adopted his discovery, which for
aught I know may be a reason with an antiquary, lately sent me
the attainder of George Duke of Clarence, which he has found in
the Tower and printed; and on it, as rather glad to confute me
and himself, than to have found a curiosity, he had written two
or three questions which tended to accuse Richard of having
forged the instrument, though to the instrument itself is added
another, which confirms my acquittal of Richard of the murder of
Clarence-but, alas! passion is a spying glass that does but make
the eyes of folly more blind.

I sent him an answer, a copy of which I enclose. Since that, I
have heard no more of him, nor shall, I suppose, till I see this
new proof of Richard's guilt adopted into the annals of the
Society, against which I have reserved some other stigmas for it.
Mr. Edmondson has found a confirmation of Isabella Fitz-Osbert
having married Jernegan after Walpole. I forget where I found my
arms of the Fitz-Osberts. Though they differ from yours of Sir
Roger, the colours are the same, and they agree with yours of
William Fitz-Osborne. There was no accuracy in spelling names
even till much later ages; and you know that different branches
of the same family made little variation in their coats.

I am very sorry for the death of poor Henshaw, of which I had not
heard. I am yours most sincerely.

P. S. The queries added to the letter to Mr. Astle were not sent
with it; and, as I reserve them for a future answer, I beg you
will show them to nobody.

Letter 103To Edward Gibbon, Esq.(242)
(February 1776.] (page 149)

Mr. Walpole cannot express how much he is obliged to Mr. Gibbon
for the valuable present he has received;(243) nor how great a
comfort it is to him, in his present situation, in which he
little expected to receive singular pleasure. Mr. Walpole does
not say this at random, nor from mere confidence in the author's
abilities, for he has already (all his weakness would permit)
read the first chapter, and it is in the greatest admiration of
the style, manner, method, clearness, and intelligence. Mr.
Walpole's impatience to proceed will struggle with his disorder,
and give him such spirits, that he flatters himself he shall owe
part of his recovery to Mr. Gibbon; whom, as soon as that is a
little effected, he shall beg the honour of seeing.

(242) Now first collected.

(243) The first quarto volume of the History of the Decline and
Fall of the Roman Empire.-E.

Letter 104 To Edward Gibbon, Esq.(244)
February 14, 1776. (page 150)

After the singular pleasure of reading you, Sir, the next
satisfaction is to declare my admiration. I have read great part
of your volume, and cannot decide to which of its various merits
I give the preference, though I have no doubt of assigning any
partiality to one virtue of the author, which, seldom as I meet
with it, always strikes me superiorly. Its quality will
naturally prevent your guessing which I mean. It is your amiable
modesty. How can you know so much, judge so well, possess your
subject, and your knowledge, and your power of judicious
reflection so thoroughly, and yet command yourself and betray no
dictatorial arrogance of decision? How unlike very ancient and
very modern authors! You have, unexpectedly, given the world a
classic history. The fame it must acquire will tend every day
to acquit this panegyric of flattery.(245) The impressions it
has made on me are very numerous. The strongest is the thirst of
being better acquainted with you--but I reflect that I have been
a trifling author, and am in no light profound enough to deserve
your intimacy, except by confessing your superiority so frankly,
that I assure you honestly, I already feel no envy, though I did
for a moment. The best proof I can give you of my sincerity, is
to exhort you, warmly and earnestly, to go on with your noble
work--the strongest, though a presumptuous mark of my friendship,
is to warn you never to let your charming modesty be corrupted by
the acclamations your talents will receive. The native qualities
of the man should never be sacrificed to those of the author,
however shining. I take this liberty as an older man, which
reminds me how little I dare promise myself that I shall see your
work completed! But I love posterity enough to contribute, if I
can, to give them pleasure through you.

I am too weak to say more, though I could talk for hours on your
history. But one feeling I cannot suppress, though it is a
sensation of vanity. I think, nay, I am sure I perceive, that
your sentiments on government agree with my own. It is the only
point on which I suspect myself of any partiality in my
admiration. It is a reflection of a far inferior vanity that
pleases me in your speaking with so much distinction of that,
alas! wonderful period, in which the world saw five good monarchs
succeed each other.(246) I have often thought of treating that
Elysian era. Happily it has fallen into better hands!

I have been able to rise to-day, for the first time, and flatter
myself that if I have no relapse, you will in two or three days
more give' me leave, Sir, to ask the honour of seeing you. In
the mean time,,be just; and do not suspect me of flattering you.
You will always hear that I say the same of you to every body. I
am, with the greatest regard, Sir, etc.

(244) now first collected.

(245) "I am at a loss," says Gibbon, in his Memoirs, "how to
describe the success of the work without betraying the vanity of
the writer. The first impression was exhausted in a few days; a
second and third edition were scarcely adequate to the demand;
and the bookseller's property was twice invaded by the pirates of
Dublin. My book was on every table, and almost on every
toilette; the historian was crowned by the taste or fashion of
the day; nor was the general voice disturbed by the barking of
any profane critic."-E.

(246) Walpole, in August 1771, had said, "The world will no more
see Athens, Rome, and the Medici again, than a succession of five
good Emperors, like Nerva, Trajan, Adrian, and the two
Antonines." See ante, p. 56-E.

Letter 105 To The Rev. Mr. Cole.
Arlington Street, March 1, 1776. (page 151)

I am sorry to tell you that the curious old painting at the
Tavern in Fleet Street is addled, by the subject turning out a
little too old. Alas! it is not the story of Francis I., but of
St. Paul. All the coats of arms that should have been French and
Austrian, and that I had a mind to convert into Palatine and
Lorrain, are the bearings of Pharisaic nobility. In short, Dr.
Percy was here yesterday, and tells me that over Mr. Gough's
imaginary Pavia is written Damascus in capital letters. Oh! our
antiquaries!

Mr. Astle has at last called on me, but I was not well enough to
see him. I shall return his visit when I can go out. I hope
this will be in a week: I have no pain left, but have a codicil
of nervous fevers, for which I am taking the bark. I have
nothing new for you in our old way, and therefore will not
unnecessarily lengthen my letter, which was only intended to
cashier the old painting, though I hear the antiquaries still go
on with having a drawing taken from it. Oh! our antiquaries!

Letter 106 To Dr. Gem.(247)
Arlington Street, April 4, 1776 (page 151)

It is but fair, when one quits one's party, to give notice to
those one abandons--at least, modern patriots, who often imbibe
their principles of honour at Newmarket, use that civility. You
and I, dear Sir, have often agreed in our political notions; and
you, I fear, will die without changing your opinion. For my
part, I must confess I am totally altered; and, instead of being
a warm partisan of liberty, now admire nothing but despotism.
You will naturally ask what place I have gotten, or what bribe I
have taken? Those are the criterions of political changes in
England-but, as my conversion is of foreign extraction, I shall
not be the richer for it. In One word, it is the relation du lit
de justice(248) that has operated the miracle. When two
ministers(249) are found so humane, so virtuous, so excellent as
to study nothing but the welfare and deliverance of the people;
when a king listens to such excellent men; and when a parliament,
from the basest, most interested motives, interposes to intercept
the blessing, must I not change my opinions, and admire arbitrary
power? or can I retain my sentiments, without varying the object?

Yes, Sir, I am shocked at the conduct of the Parliament-- one
would think it was an English one! I am scandalized at the
speeches of the Ivocat-g`en`eral,(250) who sets up the odious
interests of the nobility and clergy against the cries and groans
of the poor; and who employs his wicked eloquence to tempt the
good young monarch, by personal views, to sacrifice the mass of
his subjects to the privileges of the few. But why do I call it
eloquence? The fumes of interest had so clouded his rhetoric,
that he falls into a downright Iricism. He tells the King, that
the intended tax on the proprietors of land will affect the
property not only of the rich, but of the poor. I should be glad
to know what is the Property of the poor? Have the poor landed
estates? Are those who have landed estates the poor? Are the
poor that will suffer by the tax, the wretched labourers who are
dragged from their famishing families to work on the roads? But
it is wicked eloquence when it finds a reason, or gives a reason
for continuing the abuse. The Advocate tells the King, those
abuses are presque consacr`es par l'anciennet`e. Indeed, he says
all that can be said for nobility, it is consacr`ee par
l'anciennet`e--and thus the length of the pedigree of abuses
renders them respectable!

His arguments are as contemptible when he tries to dazzle the
King by the great names of Henri Quatre and Sully, of Louis XIV.
and Colbert, two couple whom nothing but a mercenary orator would
have classed together. Nor, were all four equally venerable,
would it prove any thing. Even good kings and good ministers, if
such have been, may have erred; nay, may have done the best they
could. They would not have been good, if they wished their
errors should be preserved, the longer they had lasted.

In short, Sir, I think this resistance of the Parliament to the
adorable reformation planned by Messrs. de Turgot and
Malesherbes, is more phlegmatically scandalous than the wildest
tyranny of despotism. I forget what the nation was that refused
liberty when it was offered. This opposition to so noble a work
is worse. A whole people may refuse its own happiness; but these
profligate magistrates resist happiness for others, for millions,
for posterity! Nay, do they not half vindicate Maupeou, who
crushed them? And you, dear Sir, will you now chide my apostacy?
Have-I not cleared myself to your eyes? I do not see a shadow of
sound logic in all Monsieur Seguier's but in his proposing that
the soldiers should work on the roads, and that passengers should
contribute to their fabric; though, as France is not so
luxuriously mad as England, I do not believe passengers could
support the expense of the roads. That argument, therefore, is
like another that the Avocat proposes to the King, and which, he
modestly owns, he believes would be impracticable.

I beg your pardon, Sir, for giving you this long trouble; but I
could not help venting myself, when shocked to find such renegade
conduct in a Parliament that I was rejoiced had been restored.
Poor human kind! is it always to breed serpents from its own
bowels? In one country, it chooses its representatives, and they
sell it and themselves--in others, it exalts despots--in another,
it resists the despot when he consults the good of his people!
Can we -wonder mankind is wretched, when men are such beings?
Parliaments run wild with loyalty, when America is to be enslaved
or butchered. They rebel, when their country is to be set free!
I am not surprised at the idea of the devil being always at our
elbows. They who invented him, no doubt could not conceive how
men could be so atrocious to one another, without the
intervention of a fiend. Don't you think, if he had never been
heard of before, that he would have been invented on the late
partition of Poland! Adieu, dear Sir. Yours most sincerely.

(247) An English physician long settled at Paris, no less
esteemed for his professional knowledge, than for his kind
attention to the poor who applied to him for medical assistance.

(248) The first lit de justice held by Louis XVI.

(249) Messieurs de Malesherbes and Turgot. When the intrigues
which had been set on foot to overthrow the administration of
Turgot had accomplished that object, an event which took place
shortly after the date of this letter Louis XVI requested
Malesherbes to remain in office; but when he refused to do so,
seeing that his friend Turgot had been dismissed, Louis conscious
of the increased anxieties in which he should be involved,
exclaimed, with a sigh, "Que vous `etes heureux! que ne Puis-je
aussi quitter ma place."-E.

(250) Monsieur de Seguier.

Letter 107 To The Rev. Mr. Cole.
April 16, 1776. (page 153)

You will be concerned, my good Sir, for what I have this minute
heard from his nephew, that poor Mr. Granger was seized at the
communion table on Sunday With an apoplexy, and died yesterday
morning at five. I have answered the letter with a word of
advice about his manuscripts, that they may not fall into the
hands of booksellers. He had been told by idle people so many
gossiping stories, that it would hurt him and living persons, to
be printed; for as he Was incapable of 1, if all his collections
were telling an untruth himself, he suspected nobody else--too
great goodness in a biographer.

P. S. The whole world is occupied with the Duchess of Kingston's
trial.(251) I don't tell you a word of it; for you will not care
about it these two hundred years.

(251) in Westminster Hall, before the House of Peers, for
intermarrying with the Duke of Kingston during the lifetime of
her first husband. She was found guilty, but, pleading her
privilege, was discharged without any punishment. Hannah More
gives the following description of the scene:--"Garrick would
have me take his ticket to go to the trial f the Duchess of
Kingston; a sight which, for beauty and magnificence, exceeded
any thing which those who were never present at a coronation or a
trial by peers can have the least notion of. Mrs. Garrick and I
were in full dress by seven. You will imagine the bustle of five
thousand people getting into one hall! yet, in all this hurry, we
walked in tranquilly. When they were all seated, and the
King-at-arms had commanded silence, on pain of imprisonment,
(which, however, was very ill observed,) the gentleman of the
black rod was commanded to bring in his prisoner. Elizabeth,
calling herself Duchess dowager of Kingston, walked in, led by
Black Rod and Mr. La Roche, courtesying profoundly to her judges.
The peers made her a slight bow. The prisoner was dressed in
deep mourning; a black hood on her head; her hair modestly
dressed and powdered; a black silk sacque, with crape trimmings;
black gauze, deep ruffles, and black gloves. The counsel spoke
about an hour and a quarter each. Dunning's manner is
insufferably bad, coughing and spitting at every three words, but
his sense and his expression pointed to the last degree: he made
her grace shed bitter tears. The fair victim had four virgins in
white behind the bar. She imitated her great predecessor, Mrs.
Rudd, and affected to write very often, though I plainly
perceived she only wrote, as they do their love epistles on the
stage, without forming a letter. The Duchess has but small
remains of that beauty of which kings and princes were once so
enamoured. She looked much like Mrs. Pritchard. She is large
and ill-shaped; there was nothing white but her face and, had it
not been for that, she would have looked like a bale of
bombazeen. There was a great deal of ceremony, a great deal of
splendour, and a great deal of nonsense: they adjourned upon the
most foolish pretences imaginable, and did nothing with such an
air of business as was truly ridiculous. I forgot to tell you
the Duchess was taken ill, but performed it badly." In a
subsequent letter, she says--"I have the great satisfaction of
telling you that Elizabeth, calling herself Duchess-dowager of
Kingston, was, this very afternoon, Undignified and unduchessed,
and very narrowly escaped being burned in the hand. If you have
been half as much interested against this unprincipled, artful,
licentious woman as I have, you will be rejoiced at it as I am.
Lord Camden breakfasted with us. He is very angry that she was
not burned in the hand. He says, as he was once a professed
lover of hers, he thought it would have looked ill-natured and
ungallant for him to propose it; but that he should have acceded
to it most heartily, though he believes he should have
recommended a cold iron." Memoirs, vol. i. Pp. 82, 85.-E.

Letter 108 To The Rev. Mr. Cole.

Strawberry Hill, June 1, 1776. (page 154)

Mr. Granger's papers have been purchased by Lord Mount
Stewart,(252) who has the frenzy of portraits as well as I; and,
though I am at the head of the sect, I have no longer the rage of
propagating it, nor would I on any account take the trouble of
revising and publishing the manuscripts. Mr. Granger had drowned
his taste for portraits in the ocean of biography; and, though he
began with elucidating prints, he at last only sought prints that
he might write the lives of those they represented. His work was
grown and growing so voluminous, that an abridgment only could
have made it useful to collectors. I am not surprised that you
wilt not assist Kippis;(253) Bishop Laud and William Prynne could
never agree. You are very justly more averse to Mr. Masters who
is a pragmatic fellow, and at best troublesome.

If the agate knives you are so good as to recommend to me can be
tolerably authenticated, have any royal marks, or, at least, old
setting of the time, and will be sold for two guineas, I should
not dislike having them - though I have scarce room to stick a
knife and fork. But if I trouble you to pay for them, you must
let me know all I owe you already, for I know I am in your debt
for prints and pamphlets, and this new debt will make the whole
considerable enough to be remitted. I have lately purchased
three apostle-spoons to add to the one you was so kind as to give
me. What is become of Mr. Essex? does he never visit London? I
wish I could tempt him thither or hither. I am not only thinking
of building my offices in a collegiate style, for which I have a
good design and wish to consult him, but am actually wanting
assistance at this very moment, about a smaller gallery that I
wish to add' this summer; and which, if Mr. Essex was here, he
should build directly.

It is scarce worth asking him to take the journey on purpose,
though I would pay for his journey hither and back, and would
lodge him here for the necessary time. I can only beg you to
mention it to him as an idle jaunt, the object is so trifling. I
wish more that YOU Could come with him: do you leave your poor
parishioners and their souls to themselves? if you do, I hope
Dr. Kippis will seduce them. Yours ever.

(252) John Lord Mountstuart; in March 1796, created Marquis of
Bute. He died in Geneva in November 1814, when the marquisate
descended to his grandson.-E.

(253) Dr. Andrew Kippis, well-known for the active part he took
in producing the second edition of the" Biographia Britannnica,