Imágenes de páginas
PDF
EPUB

you would have me add any thing: I gave you my journal of this day; and it is now nine at night, and I am going to be busy for an hour or two.

rates.

4. I left a friend's house to-day where I was invited, just when dinner was setting on, and pretended I was engaged, because I saw some fellows I did not know; and went to Sir Matthew Dudley's, where I had the same inconvenience, but he would not let me go; otherwise I would have gone home, and sent for a slice of mutton and a pot of ale, rather than dine with persons unknown, as bad, for aught I know, as your deans, parsons, and cuBad slabby weather to-day.-Now methinks I write at ease, when I have no letter of MD's to answer. But I mistook, and have got the large paper. The queen is laid up with the gout at Hampton Court; she is now seldom without it any long time together; I fear it will wear her out in a very few years. I plainly find I have less twitchings about my toes since these ministers are sick and out of town, and that I don't dine with them. I would compound for a light easy gout to be perfectly well in my head.-Pray walk when the frost comes, young ladies, go a frost-biting. It comes into my head, that, from the very time you first went to Ireland, I have been always plying you to walk and read. The young fellows here have begun a kind of fashion to walk, and many of them have got swingeing strong shoes on purpose; it has got as far as several young lords; if it hold, it would be a very good thing. Lady Lucy and I are fallen out: she rails at me, and I have left visiting her.

5. MD was very troublesome to me last night in my sleep; I was a dreamed, methought, that Stella was here. I asked her after Dingley, and she said she had left her in Ireland, because she designed her stay to be short, and

such stuff.-Monsieur Pontchartain, the secretary of state in France, and Monsieur Fontenelle, the secretary of the Royal Academy there, (who writ the Dialogues des Morts, &c.) have sent letters to Lord Pembroke, that the Academy have, with the king's consent, chosen him one of their members in the room of one who is lately dead. * But the cautious gentleman has given me the letters to show my Lord Dartmouth and Mr St John, our two secretaries, and let them see there is no treason in them; which I will do on Wednesday, when they come from Hampton Court. The letters are very The letters are very handsome, and it is a very great mark of honour and distinction to Lord Pembroke. I hear the two French ministers are come over again about the peace; but I have seen nobody of consequence to know the truth. I dined to-day with a lady of my acquaintance, who was sick, in her bedchamber, upon three herrings and a chicken; the dinner was my bespeaking. We begin now to have chesnuts and Seville oranges; have you the latter yet? 'Twas a terrible windy day, and we had processions in carts of the pope and the devil, and the butchers rang their cleavers. You know this is the fifth of November, popery and gunpowder.

6. Since I am used to this way of writing, I fancy I could hardly make out a long letter to MD without it. I think I ought to allow for every line taken up by telling you where I dined; but that will not be above seven lines in all, half a line to a dinner. Your Ingoldsby is going over, and they say here he is to be made a lord.-Here

* This token of respect was conferred upon the Earl of Pembroke as a man of taste and science, particularly eminent for his splendid collection of marbles, and other antiquities, deposited at Wilton.

was I staying in my room till two this afternoon for that puppy Sir Andrew Fountaine, who was to go with me into the city, and never came; and if I had not shot a dinner flying, with one Mr Murray, I might have fasted, or gone to an ale-house.-You never said one word of Goody Stoyte in your letter; but I suppose these winter nights we shall hear more of her.-Does the provost laugh as much as he used to do? We reckon him here a good-for-nothing fellow-I design to write to your dean one of these days, but I can never find time, nor what to say. I will think of something: but if DD* were not in Ireland, I believe seriously I should not think of the place twice a-year. Nothing there ever makes the subject of talk in any company where I am.

7. I went to-day to the city on business; but stopped at a printer's and staid there; it was a most delicious day. I hear the parliament is to be prorogued for a fortnight longer; I suppose, either because the queen has the gout, or that lord-treasurer is not well, or that they would do something more toward a peace. I called at lord-treasurer's at noon, and sat a while with Lord Harley, but his father was asleep. A bookseller has reprinted or new titled a sermon of Tom Swift's, † printed last year, and publishes an advertisement calling it Dr Swift's Sermon. Some friend of Lord Galway has, by his directions, published a four shilling book about his conduct in Spain,

* Stella and Dingley.

+ A thanksgiving sermon, under the title of " Noah's Dove, an Exhortation to Peace, set forth in a Sermon, preached on the Seventh of November 1710, a thanksgiving day, by Thomas Swift, A. M. formerly Chaplain to Sir William Temple, now Rector of Puttenham, in Surrey."

to defend him; I have but just seen it. But what care you for books, except Presto's Miscellanies? Leigh promised to call and see me, but has not yet; I hope he will take care of his cargo, and get your Chester box. A murrain take that box; every thing is spoiled that is in it. How does the strong box do? you say nothing of Raymond is his wife brought to bed again; or how? has he finished his house; paid his debts; and put out the rest of the money to use? I am glad to hear poor Joe is like to get his two hundred pounds. I suppose Trim is now reduced to slavery again. I am glad of it; the people were as great rascals as the gentlemen. But I must go to bed sirrahs ; the secretary is still at Hampton Court with my papers, or is come only to-night. They plague me with attending them.

8. I was with the secretary this morning, and we dined with Prior, and did business this afternoon till about eight; and I must alter and undo, and a clutter. I am glad the parliament is prorogued. I staid with Prior till eleven; the secretary left us at eight. Prior, I believe, will be one of those employed to make the peace, when a congress is opened. Lord Ashburnham told to-day at the coffeehouse, that Lord Harley was yesterday morning married to the Duke of Newcastle's daughter, the great heiress, and it got about all the town. But I saw Lord Harley yesterday at noon in his nightgown, and he dined in the city with Prior and others; so it is not true; but I hope it will be so; for I know it has been privately managing this long time: the lady will not have half her father's estate; for the duke left Lord Pelham's son his heir: The widow duchess will not stand to the will; and she is now at law with Pelham. However, at worst, the girl will have about ten thousand pounds a-year to

support the honour; for lord-treasurer will never save a groat for himself. Lord Harley is a very valuable young gentleman; and they say the girl is handsome, and has good sense, but red hair.

9. I designed a jaunt into the city to-day to be merry, but was disappointed; so one always is in this life; and I could not see Lord Dartmouth to-day, with whom I had some business. Business and pleasure both disappointed. You can go to your dean, and for want of him, Goody Stoyte, or Walls, or Manley, and meet every where with cards and claret. I dined privately with a friend on a herring and chicken, and half a flask of bad Florence. I begin to have fires now, when the mornings are cold. I have got some loose bricks at the back of my grate for good husbandry. Fine weather. Patrick tells me, my caps are wearing out. I know not how to get others. I want a necessary woman strangely. I am as helpless as an elephant. I had three packets from the Archbishop of Dublin, cost me four shillings, all about Higgins, printed stuff, and two long letters. His people forgot to enclose them to Lewis; and they were only directed to Doctor Swift, without naming London or any thing else. I wonder how they reached me, unless the postmaster directed them. I have read all the trash, and am weary.

10. Why; if you must have it out, something is to be published of great moment, and three or four great people are to see there are no mistakes in point of fact: and 'tis so troublesome to send it among them, and get their corrections, that I am weary as a dog. I dined to-day with the printer, and was there all the afternoon; and it plagues me, and there's an end, and what would you have? Lady Dupplin, lord-treasurer's daughter, is brought to-bed of a son. Lord-treasurer has had an ugly return of his gravel.

« AnteriorContinuar »