was introduced into the island. What! preserved unadulterated by savages dispersed among mountains, and so often driven from their dens, so wasted by wars civil and foreign! Has one man ever got all by heart? I doubt it; were parts preserved by some, other parts by others? Mighty lucky, that the tradition was never interrupted, nor any part lost-not a verse, not a measure, not the sense! luckier and luckier. I have been extremely qualified myself lately for this Scotch memory; we have had nothing but a coagulation of rains, fogs, and frosts, and though they have clouded all understanding, I suppose, if I had tried, I should have found that they thickened, and gave great consistence to my remembrance. You want news-I must make it, if I send it. To change the dullness of the scene I went to the play, where I had not been this winter. They are so crowded, that though I went before six, I got no better place than a fifth row, where I heard very ill, and was pent for five hours without a soul near me that I knew. It was Cymbeline, and appeared to me as long as if every body in it went really to Italy in every act, and came back again. With a few pretty passages and a scene or two, it is so absurd and tiresome, that I am persuaded Garrick * * * * 2 To GEORGE MONTAGU, Esq. Arlington-street, Dec. 23, 1761. Past midnight. I AM this minute come home, and find such a delightful letter from you, that I cannot help answering it, and telling you so before I sleep. You need not affirm, that your ancient wit and pleasantry are revived; your letter is but five and twenty, and I will forgive any vanity that is so honest and so well founded. Ireland I see produces wonders of more sorts than one; if my lord Anson was to go lord-lieutenant, I suppose he would return a ravisher. How different am I from this state of revivification! Even such talents as I had are far from blooming again; and while my friends, or cotemporaries, or predecessors, are rising to preside over the fame of this age, I seem a mere antediluvian; must live upon what little stock of reputation I had The rest of this letter is lost. [Or.] acquired, and indeed grow so indifferent, that I can only wonder how those whom I thought as old as myself, can interest themselves so much about a world whose faces I hardly know. You recover your spirits and wit, Rigby' is grown a speaker, Mr. Bentley a poet, while I am nursing one or two gouty friends, and sometimes lamenting that I am likely to survive the few that I have left. Nothing tempts me to launch out again; every day teaches me how much I was mistaken in my own parts, and I am in no danger now but of thinking I am grown too wise; for every period of life has its mistake. Mr. Bentley's relation to lord Rochester by the St. Johns is not new to me, and you had more reason to doubt of their affinity by the former marrying his mistress, than to ascribe their consanguinity to it. I shall be glad to see the epistle are not the Wishes to be acted? Remember me, if they are printed; and I shall thank you for this new list of prints. I have mentioned names enough in this letter to lead me naturally to new ill usage I have received. Just when I thought my book finished, my printer ran away, and had left eighteen sheets in the middle of the book untouched, having amused me with sending proofs. He had got into debt, and two girls * * ; being two, he could not marry two Hannahs. You see my luck; I had been kind to this fellow; in short, if the faults of my life had been punished as severely as my merits have been, I should be the most unhappy of beings; but let us talk of something else. I have picked up at Mrs. Dunch's auction the sweetest Petitot in the world—the very picture of James the Second, that he gave Mrs. Godfrey, and I paid but six guineas and a half for it. I will not tell you how vast a commission I had given; but I will own, that about the hour of sale, I drove about the door to find what likely bidders there were. The first coach I saw was the 1 The hon. Richard Rigby, M. P. for Tavistock, secretary to the duke of Bedford while lord lieutenant for Ireland. [Ed.] 2 Arabella Churchill, sister of the great duke of Marlborough, was the mistress of James the second while duke of York, by whom she had four children--the celebrated duke of Berwick, the duke of Albemarle, and two daughters. She afterwards became the wife of colonel Charles Godfrey, master of the Jewel office, and died in 1714, leaving by him two daughters, Charlotte, viscountess Falmouth, and Elizabeth, wife of Edmund Dunch, esq. [Ed.] Chudleighs; could I help concluding, that a maid of honour, kept by a duke, would purchase the portrait of a duke kept by a maid of honour-but I was mistaken. The Oxendens reserved the best pictures; the fine china, and even the diamonds, sold for nothing; for nobody has a shilling. We shall be beggars if we don't conquer Peru within this half year. If you are acquainted with my lady Barrymore, pray tell her that in less than two hours t'other night the duke of Cumberland lost four hundred and fifty pounds at loo; Miss Pelham won three hundred, and I the rest. However, in general, loo is extremely gone to decay; I am to play at princess Emily's tomorrow for the first time this winter, and it is with difficulty she has made a party. My lady Pomfret is dead on the road to Bath; and, unless the deluge stops, and the fogs disperse, I think we shall die. A few days ago, on the cannon firing for the king going to the house, somebody asked what it was for? Monsieur de Choiseul replied, Apparemment, c'est qu'on voit le soleil." 66 Shall I fill up the rest of my paper with some extempore lines, that I wrote t'other night on lady Mary Coke having St. Anthony's fire in her cheek? You will find nothing in them to contradict what I have said in the former part of my letter; they rather confirm it. No rogue you were, nor can a dart From Love's bright quiver wound your heart. But gives you mightier power to please. 3 The right hon. countess dowager of Pomfret, relict of Thomas Fermor, second lord and first earl of Pomfret, died 17th December 1761. [Ed.] 4 Good night: Willes is dead, and Pratt' is to be chief justice; Mr. Yorke attorney-general; solicitor, I don't know who. the watchman cries, past one! Yours ever. To GEORGE MONTAGU, Esq. Arlington-street, Dec. 30, 1761. I HAVE received two more letters from you since I wrote last week, and I like to find by them that you are so well and so happy. As nothing has happened of change in my situation but a few more months passed, I have nothing to tell you new of myself. Time does not sharpen my passions or pursuits, and the experience I have had by no means prompts me to make new connections. 'Tis a busy world, and well adapted to those who love to bustle in it. I loved it onceloved its very tempest: now I barely open my window, to view what course the storm takes. The town, who, like the devil, when one has once sold oneself to him, never permits one to have done playing the fool, believe I have a great hand in their amusements; but to write pamphlets, I mean as a volunteer, one must love or hate, and I have the satisfaction of doing neither. I would not be at the trouble of composing a distich to achieve a revolution. 'Tis equal to me what names are on the scene. In the general view, the prospect is very dark: the Spanish war, added to the load, almost oversets our most sanguine heroism; and now we have an opportunity of conquering all the world, by being at war with all the world, we seem to doubt a little of our abilities. On a survey of our 4 The right hon. John Willes, knt., lord chief justice of the Common Pleas, died 15th December, 1761. [Ed.] 5 Charles Pratt was created, in 1765, baron Camden, of Camden-place, in the county of Kent, and soon afterwards was appointed lord high chancellor, but resigned the seals in 1770. In 1776 he was created viscount Bayham, of Bayham, county Sussex, and earl Camden, and died in 1794, and was succeeded by his son, John Jefferys, who was advanced in 1812 to the dignity of marquis Camden, and at the same time created earl of Brecknock in Wales. [Ed.] 6 Charles Yorke, second son of the first earl of Hardwicke, was afterwards appointed, in 1770, lord Chancellor; but died suddenly while the patent of his creation to the barony of Morden was in progress. [Ed.] situation, I comfort myself with saying, "Well, what is it to me?" A selfishness that is far from anxious, when it is the first thought in one's constitution; not so agreeable when it is the last, and adopted by necessity alone. You drive your expectations much too fast, in thinking my Anecdotes of Painting are ready to appear, in demanding three volumes. You will see but two, and it will be February first. True, I have written three, but I question whether the third will be published at all; certainly not soon; it is not a work of merit enough to cloy the town with a great deal at once. My printer ran away and left a third part of the two first volumes unfinished. I suppose he is writing a tragedy himself, or an epistle to my lord Melcomb, or a panegyric on my lord Bute. Jemmy Pelham1 is dead, and has left to his servants what little his servants had left him. Lord Ligonier was killed by the newspapers, and wanted to prosecute them; his lawyer told him it was impossible-a tradesman indeed might prosecute, as such a report might affect his credit. "Well, then," said the old man, "I may prosecute, too, for I can prove I have been hurt by this report: I was going to marry a great fortune, who thought I was but seventy-four; the newspapers have said I am eighty, and she will not have me." 2 Lord Charlemont's Queen Elizabeth I know perfectly; he out-bid me for it; is his villa finished? I am well pleased with the design in Chambers. I have been my out-of-town with lord Waldegrave, Selwyn, and Williams; it was melancholy the missing poor Edgecumbe, who was constantly of the Christmas and Easter parties. Did you see the charming picture Reynolds painted for me of him, Selwyn, and Williams? It is by far one of the best things he has executed. He has just finished a pretty whole-length of lady Elizabeth Keppel,3 in the bridemaid's habit, sacrificing to Hymen. 1 The hon. James Pelham, of Crowhurst, Sussex, died 27th December 1761; he had been principal secretary to the prince of Wales, and for nearly forty years secretary to the several lords chamberlain. He sate in parliament six times for Hastings and Newark. [Ed.] 2 Richard, second lord Edgecumbe, who died 13th May, 1761. His father Richard, the first lord, created baron Edgecumbe in 1742, had been an intimate friend of sir Robert Walpole. [Ed.] 3 She was daughter of the earl of Albemarle, and married to the marquis of Tavistock. [Or.] |