DEAR SIR,

TO THE REV. MR. COLE.

Strawberry-hill, Monday, June 26, 1769.

:

Oh! yes, yes, I shall like Thursday or Friday, 6th or 7th, exceedingly; I shall like your staying with me two days exceedinglier; and longer exceedingliest and I will carry you back to Cambridge on our pilgrimage to Ely. But I should not at all like to be catched in the glories of an installation, and find myself a doctor, before I knew where I was. It will be much more agreeable to find the whole caput asleep, digesting turtle, dreaming of bishoprics, and humming old catches of Anacreon, and scraps of Corelli, I wish Mr. Gray may not be set out for the north; which is rather the case than setting out for the summer. We have no summers, I think, but what we raise, like pineapples, by fire. My hay is an absolute water-soochy, and teaches me how to feel for you. You are quite in the right to sell your fief in Marshland. I should be glad if you would take one step more, and quit Marshland. We live, at least, on terra firma in this part of the world, and can saunter out without stilts. Item, we do not wade into pools, and call it going upon the water, and get sore throats. I trust yours is better; but I recollect this is not the first you have complained of. Pray be not incorrigible, but come to shore.

Be so good as to thank Mr. Smith, my old tutor, for his corrections. If ever the Anecdotes are reprinted, I will certainly profit of them.

I joked, it is true, about Joscelin de Louvain, and his duchess;

1 The duke of Northumberland. His Grace having been originally a baronet, sir Hugh Smithson, and having married the daughter of Algernon Seymour, duke of Somerset and earl of Northumberland, in 1750 assumed the surname and arms of Percy, and was created duke of Northumberland in 1766. Walpole's allusion is to his becoming a Percy by marriage, as Joscelin had done before him: Agnes de Percy, daughter of William de Percy the third baron, having only consented to marry Joscelin of Lovain, brother of queen Adelicia, second wife of Henry I., and son of Godfrey Barbatus, duke of Lower Lorraine and count of Brabant, who was descended from the emperor Charlemagne, upon his agreeing to adopt either the surname or arms of Percy. He accordingly assumed the name, and retained his paternal

but not at all in advising you to make Mr. Percy pimp for the plate. On the contrary, I wish you success, and think this an infallible method of obtaining the benefaction. It is right to lay vanity under contribution; for then both sides are pleased.

It will not be easy for you to dine with Mr. Grainger from hence, and return at night. It cannot be less than six or sevenand-twenty miles to Shiplake. But I go to Park-place to-morrow [Mr. Henry Conway's], which is within two miles of him, and I will try if 1 can tempt him to meet you here. Adieu!

TO THE EARL OF STRAFFORD.

Arlington-street, July 3, 1769.

WHEN you have been so constantly good to me, my dear lord, without changing, do you wonder that our friendship has lasted so long? Can I be insensible to the honour or pleasure of your acquaintance? When the advantage lies so much ou my side, am I likely to alter the first? Oh, but it will last We have seen friendships without number born and die. Ours was not formed on interest, nor alliance; and politics, the poison of all English connections, never entered into ours. You have given me a new proof by remembering the chapel of Luton. I hear it is to be preserved ; and am glad of it, though I might have been the better for its ruins.

I should have answered your lordship's last post, but was at Park-place. I think lady Ailesbury quite recovered; though her illness has made such an impression that she does not yet believe it.

It is so settled that we are never to have tolerable weather in June, that the first hot day was on Saturday-hot by comparison; for I think it is three years since we have really felt the feel of summer. I was, however, concerned to be forced to come

arms, in order to perpetuate his claim to the principality of his father, should the elder line of the reigning duke at any period become extinct. This fact is expressly mentioned in the great pedigree at Sion house-"The ancient arms of Hainault the lord Jocelin retained, and gave his children the surname of Percy." [Ed.]

to town yesterday on some business; for, however the country feels, it looks divine, and the verdure we buy so dear is delicious. I shall not be able, I fear, to profit of it this summer in the loveliest of all places, as I am to go to Paris in August. But next year I trust I shall accompany Mr. Conway and lady Ailesbury to Wentworth-castle. I shall be glad to visit Castle Howard and Beverley; but neither would carry me so far, if Wentworthcastle was not in the way.

2

The Chatelets are gone, without any more battles with the Russians. The papers say the latter have been beaten by the Turks; which rejoices me, though against all rules of politics: but I detest that murderess, and like to have her humbled. I don't know that this piece of news is true; it is enough to me that it is agreeable. I had rather take it for granted, than be at the trouble of inquiring about what I have so little to do

1 The duc de Chatelet, the French ambassador, had affronted comte Czernicheff, the Russian ambassador, at a ball at court, for precedence; and a challenge ensued: but their meeting was prevented. [Or.] The marquis de Chatelet published a statement upon the occasion, in which he accused the Russian ambassador of having, in compliance with the directions of the empress, sought to obtain precedence at court before all the other ambassadors, and of having, accordingly, repaired to court on the evening of the king's birth-day an hour before the usual time, and thereby secured a seat next to the imperial ambassador. That being determined to support the dignity of his court, he (the comte de Chatelet) took the first opportunity of placing himself according to his national rank, in which he was followed by the Spanish ambassador; upon which comte Czernicheff said, “Sir, if you had desired me to give you that place, I should have consented." Whereupon de Chatelet replied, "that he did not intend to desire, nor to receive that place as a thing consented to by another, but to take it as his right, and in obedience to the commands of his master." In reply to this address, a counter-statement appeared, in which it was said the explanation would have come with a better grace had the comte (who was gone also to Paris at the time of its publication, leaving M. de Bataille de François as chargé d'affaires) staid here to justify it. "For," said the reply, "every Englishman at court knows that the count's toes were crushed, and that too with a vengeance; and there is not a Frenchman in London but knows, too, that the Russian ambassador dared him to resent the affront." [Ed.]

2 Before Choczim. The Russians were at first victorious; but, like the king of Prussia at the battle of Zorendorff, they dispatched the messenger with the news too soon; for the Turks, having recovered their surprise, returned to the charge, and repulsed the Russians with great slaughter. [Ed.]

with. I am just the same about the City and Surrey petitions. Since I have dismembered3 myself, it is incredible how cool I am to all politics.

London is the abomination of desolation; and I rejoice to leave it again this evening. Even Pam has not a levée above once or twice a week. Next winter, I suppose it will begin to be a fashion to remove into the city: for, since it is the mode to choose aldermen at this end of the town, the maccaronis will certainly adjourn to Bishopsgate-street, for fear of being fined for sheriffs. Mr. J * * * and Mr. B * * * * will die of the thought of being aldermen of Grosvenor-ward and Berkeleysquare-ward. Adam and Eve in their paradise laugh at all these tumults, and have not tasted of the tree that forfeits paradise ; which I take to have been the tree of politics, not of knowledge. How happy you are not to have your son Abel knocked on the head by his brother Cain at the Brentford election! You do not hunt the poor deer and hares that gambol around you.—If Eve has a sin, I doubt it is angling; but as she makes all other creatures happy, I beg she would not impale worms nor whisk car out of one element into another. If she repents of that guilt, I hope she will live as long as her grandson Methuselah. There is a commentator that says his life was protracted for never having boiled a lobster alive. Adieu, dear couple, that I honour as much as I could honour my first grandfather and grandmother!

Your most dutiful

HOR. JAPHEt.

TO THE HON. H. S. CONWAY.

Strawberry-hill, Friday, July 7, 1769.

You desired me to write, if I knew any thing particular, How particular will content you? Don't imagine I would send you such hash as the livery's petition. Come; would the ap

3 Mr. Walpole means, since he quitted parliament. [Or.]

1 The petition of the livery of London, complaining of the unconstitu

parition of my lord Chatham satisfy you? Don't be frighteued; it was not his ghost. He, he himself in propria persona, and not in a strait waistcoat, walked into the king's levee this morning, and was in the closet twenty minutes after the levee; and was to go out of town to-night again. The deuce is in it if this is not news. Whether he is to be king, minister, lord mayor, or alderman, I do not know; nor a word more than I have told you. Whether he was sent for to guard St. James's gate, or whether he came alone, like Almanzor, to storm it, I cannot tell: by Beckford's violence I should think the latter. I am so indifferent what he came for, that I shall wait till Sunday to learn : when I lie in town on my way to Ely. You will probably hear more from your brother before I can write again. I send this by my friend Mr. Granger, who will leave it at your park-gate as he goes through Henley home. Good-night! it is past twelve, and I am going to bed.

2

Yours ever.

DEAR SIR,

TO THE REV. MR. COLE.

Strawberry-hill, July 15, 1769.

Your fellow travellers, Rosette' and I, got home safe and perfectly contented with our expedition, and wonderfully obliged to you. Pray receive our thanks and barking; and pray say, and bark a great deal for us to Mr. and Mrs. Bentham, and all that good family.

After gratitude, you know, always comes a little self interest; for who would be at the trouble of being grateful, if he had no further expectations? Imprimis, then, here are the directions for Mr. Essex for the piers of my gates. Bp. Luda must not be offended at my converting his tomb into a gateway. Many a saint and confessor, I doubt, will be glad soon to be passed through, as it will, at least, secure his being passed over. When

tional conduct of the king's ministers, and the undue return of Mr. Luttrell, when he opposed Mr. Wilkes at the election for Middlesex. [Or.]

2 Author of the Biographical History of England. [Or]

1 A favourite dog of Mr. Walpole's. [Or.]