Part 20
5. Morning. Now let us proceed to examine a saucy letter from one Madam MD.—God Almighty bless poor dear Stella, and send her a great many birthdays, all happy, and healthy, and wealthy, and with me ever together, and never asunder again, unless by chance. When I find you are happy or merry there, it makes me so here, and I can hardly imagine you absent when I am reading your letter, or writing to you. No, faith, you are just here upon this little paper, and therefore I see and talk with you every evening constantly, and sometimes in the morning, but not always in the morning, because that is not so modest to young ladies.—What, you would fain palm a letter on me more than you sent: and I, like a fool, must look over all yours, to see whether this was really N. 12, or more. [Patrick has this moment brought me letters from the Bishop of Clogher and Parvisol; my heart was at my mouth for fear of one from MD; what a disgrace would it be to have two of yours to answer together! But, faith, this shall go to-night, for fear; and then come when it will, I defy it.] No, you are not naughty at all, write when you are disposed. And so the Dean told you the story of Mr. Harley from the Archbishop; I warrant it never spoiled your supper, or broke off your game. Nor yet, have not you the box? I wish Mrs. Edgworth had the —. But you have it now, I suppose; and is the chocolate good, or has the tobacco spoilt it? Leigh stays till Sterne has done his business, no longer; and when that will be, God knows: I befriend him as much as I can, but Harley’s accident stops that as well as all things else. You guess, Madam Dingley, that I shall stay a round twelvemonth; as hope saved, I would come over, if I could, this minute; but we will talk of that by and by. Your affair of Vedeau I have told you of already; now to the next, turn over the leaf. Mrs. Dobbins lies, I have no more provision here or in Ireland than I had. I am pleased that Stella the conjurer approves what I did with Mr. Harley; {184} but your generosity makes me mad; I know you repine inwardly at Presto’s absence; you think he has broken his word of coming in three months, and that this is always his trick; and now Stella says she does not see possibly how I can come away in haste, and that MD is satisfied, etc. An’t you a rogue to overpower me thus? I did not expect to find such friends as I have done. They may indeed deceive me too. But there are important reasons [Pox on this grease, this candle tallow!] why they should not. {185a} I have been used barbarously by the late Ministry; I am a little piqued in honour to let people see I am not to be despised. The assurances they give me, without any scruple or provocation, are such as are usually believed in the world; they may come to nothing, but the first opportunity that offers, and is neglected, I shall depend no more, but come away. I could say a thousand things on this head, if I were with you. I am thinking why Stella should not go to the Bath, if she be told it will do her good. I will make Parvisol get up fifty pounds, and pay it you; and you may be good housewives, and live cheap there some months, and return in autumn, or visit London, as you please: pray think of it. I writ to Bernage, directed to Curry’s; I wish he had the letter. I will send the bohea tea, if I can. The Bishop of Kilmore, {185b} I don’t keep such company; an old dying fool whom I never was with in my life. So I am no godfather; {185c} all the better. Pray, Stella, explain those two words of yours to me, what you mean by _villian_ and _dainger_; {185d} and you, Madam Dingley, what is _christianing_?—Lay your letter _this way_, _this way_, and the devil a bit of difference between this way and the other way. No; I will show you, lay them _this way_, _this way_, and not _that way_, _that way_. {185e}—You shall have your aprons; and I will put all your commissions as they come, in a paper together, and do not think I will forget MD’s orders, because they are friends; I will be as careful as if they were strangers. I knew not what to do about this Clements. {186a} Walls will not let me say anything as if Mr. Pratt was against him; and now the Bishop of Clogher has written to me in his behalf. This thing does not rightly fall in my way, and that people never consider: I always give my good offices where they are proper, and that I am judge of; however, I will do what I can. But, if he has the name of a Whig, it will be hard, considering my Lord Anglesea and Hyde {186b} are very much otherwise, and you know they have the employment of Deputy Treasurer. If the frolic should take you of going to the Bath, I here send you a note on Parvisol; if not, you may tear it, and there’s an end. Farewell.
If you have an imagination that the Bath will do you good, I say again, I would have you go; if not, or it be inconvenient, burn this note. Or, if you would go, and not take so much money, take thirty pounds, and I will return you twenty from hence. Do as you please, sirrahs. I suppose it will not be too late for the first season; if it be, I would have you resolve however to go the second season, if the doctors say it will do you good, and you fancy so.
LETTER XX.
LONDON, _April_ 5, 1711.
I PUT my nineteenth in the post-office just now myself, as I came out of the City, where I dined. This rain ruins me in coach-hire; I walked away sixpennyworth, and came within a shilling length, and then took a coach, {186c} and got a lift back for nothing; and am now busy.
6. Mr. Secretary desired I would see him this morning; said he had several things to say to me, and said not one; and the Duke of Ormond sent to desire I would meet him at Mr. Southwell’s by ten this morning too, which I did, thinking it was some particular matter. All the Irish in town were there, to consult upon preventing a Bill for laying a duty on Irish yarn; so we talked a while, and then all went to the lobby of the House of Commons, to solicit our friends, and the Duke came among the rest; and Lord Anglesea solicited admirably, and I did wonders. But, after all, the matter was put off till Monday, and then we are to be at it again. I dined with Lord Mountjoy, and looked over him at chess, which put me in mind of Stella and Griffyth. {187} I came home, and that dog Patrick was not within; so I fretted, and fretted, and what good did that do me?
And so get you gone to your deans, You couple of queans.
I cannot find rhyme to Walls and Stoyte.—Yes, yes,
You expect Mrs. Walls, Be dressed when she calls, To carry you to Stoyte, Or else _honi soit_.
Henley told me that the Tories were insup-port-able people, because they are for bringing in French claret, and will not _sup-port_. Mr. Harley will hardly get abroad this week or ten days yet. I reckon, when I send away this letter, he will be just got into the House of Commons. My last letter went in twelve days, and so perhaps may this. No it won’t, for those letters that go under a fortnight are answers to one of yours, otherwise you must take the days as they happen, some dry, some wet, some barren, some fruitful, some merry, some insipid; some, etc.—I will write you word exactly the first day I see young gooseberries, and pray observe how much later you are. We have not had five fine days this five weeks, but rain or wind. ’Tis a late spring they say here.—Go to bed, you two dear saucy brats, and don’t keep me up all night.
7. Ford has been at Epsom, to avoid Good Friday and Easter Sunday. He forced me to-day to dine with him; and tells me there are letters from Ireland, giving an account of a great indiscretion in the Archbishop of Dublin, who applied a story out of Tacitus very reflectingly on Mr. Harley, and that twenty people have written of it; I do not believe it yet. {188a} I called this evening to see Mr. Secretary, who has been very ill with the gravel and pain in his back, by burgundy and champagne, added to the sitting up all night at business; I found him drinking tea while the rest were at champagne, and was very glad of it. I have chid him so severely that I hardly knew whether he would take it well: then I went and sat an hour with Mrs. St. John, who is growing a great favourite of mine; she goes to the Bath on Wednesday, for she is much out of health, and has begged me to take care of the Secretary.
8. I dined to-day with Mr. Secretary St. John; he gave me a letter to read, which was from the publisher of the newspaper called the _Postboy_; {188b} in it there was a long copy of a letter from Dublin, giving an account of what the Whigs said upon Mr. Harley’s being stabbed, and how much they abuse him and Mr. Secretary St. John; and at the end there were half a dozen lines, telling the story of the Archbishop of Dublin, and abusing him horribly; this was to be printed on Tuesday. I told the Secretary I would not suffer that about the Archbishop to be printed, and so I crossed it out; and afterwards, to prevent all danger, I made him give me the letter, and, upon further thought, would let none of it be published: and I sent for the printer, and told him so, and ordered him, in the Secretary’s name, to print nothing reflecting on anybody in Ireland till he had showed it me. Thus I have prevented a terrible scandal to the Archbishop, by a piece of perfect good fortune. I will let him know it by next post; and pray, if you pick it out, let me know, and whether he is thankful for it; but say nothing.
9. I was to-day at the House of Commons again about their yarn, at Lord Anglesea’s desire; but the business is again put off till Monday. I dined with Sir John Stanley, by an assignation I had made with Mr. St. John, and George Granville, the Secretary at War; but they let in other company, some ladies, and so we were not so easy as I intended. My head is pretty tolerable, but every day I feel some little disorders; I have left off snuff since Sunday, finding myself much worse after taking a good deal at the Secretary’s. I would not let him drink one drop of champagne or burgundy without water, and in compliment I did so myself. He is much better; but when he is well, he is like Stella, and will not be governed. So go to your Stoyte’s, and I’ll go sleep.
10. I have been visiting Lady Worsley and Mrs. Barton to-day, and dined soberly with my friend Lewis. The Dauphin is dead of an apoplexy; I wish he had lived till the finishing of this letter, that it might be news to you. Duncombe, {189} the rich alderman, died to-day, and I hear has left the Duke of Argyle, who married his niece, two hundred thousand pounds; I hope it is true, for I love that Duke mightily. I writ this evening to the Archbishop of Dublin, about what I told you; and then went to take leave of poor Mrs. St. John, who gave me strict charge to take care of the Secretary in her absence; said she had none to trust but me; and the poor creature’s tears came fresh in her eyes. Before we took leave, I was drawn in by the other ladies and Sir John Stanley to raffle for a fan, with a pox; it was four guineas, and we put in seven shillings apiece, several raffling for absent people; but I lost, and so missed an opportunity of showing my gallantry to Mrs. St. John, whom I designed to have presented it to if I had won. Is Dilly {190a} gone to the Bath? His face will whizz in the water; I suppose he will write to us from thence, and will take London in his way back.—The rabble will say, “There goes a drunken parson”; and, which is worse, they will say true. Oh, but you must know I carried Ford to dine with Mr. St. John last Sunday, that he may brag, when he goes back, of dining with a Secretary of State. The Secretary and I went away early, and left him drinking with the rest, and he told me that two or three of them were drunk. They talk of great promotions to be made; that Mr. Harley is to be Lord Treasurer, and Lord Poulett {190b} Master of the Horse, etc., but they are only conjecture. The Speaker is to make Mr. Harley a compliment the first time he comes into the House, which I hope will be in a week. He has had an ill surgeon, by the caprice of that puppy Dr. Radcliffe, which has kept him back so long; and yesterday he got a cold, but is better to-day.—What! I think I am stark mad, to write so much in one day to little saucy MD; here is a deal of stuff, indeed! can’t you bid those little dear rogues good-night, and let them go sleep, Mr. Presto? When your tongue runs there’s no ho with you, pray.
11. Again at the lobby (like a lobcock) {190c} of the House of Commons, about your Irish yarn, and again put off till Friday; and I and Patrick went into the City by water, where I dined, and then I went to the auction of Charles Barnard’s books; but the good ones were so monstrous dear, I could not reach them, so I laid out one pound seven shillings but very indifferently, and came away, and will go there no more. Henley would fain engage me to go with Steele and Rowe, etc., to an invitation at Sir William Read’s. {191a} Surely you have heard of him. He has been a mountebank, and is the Queen’s oculist; he makes admirable punch, and treats you in gold vessels. But I am engaged, and will not go, neither indeed am I fond of the jaunt. So good-night, and go sleep.
12. I went about noon to the Secretary, who is very ill with a cold, and sometimes of the gravel, with his champagne, etc. I scolded him like a dog, and he promises faithfully more care for the future. To-day my Lord Anglesea, and Sir Thomas Hammer, and Prior, and I dined, by appointment, with Lieutenant-General Webb. {191b} My lord and I stayed till ten o’clock; but we drank soberly, and I always with water. There was with us one Mr. Campain, {191c} one of the October Club, if you know what that is; a Club of country members, who think the Ministers are too backward in punishing and turning out the Whigs. I found my lord and the rest thought I had more credit with the Ministry than I pretend to have, and would have engaged me to put them upon something that would satisfy their desires, and indeed I think they have some reason to complain; however, I will not burn my fingers. I will remember Stella’s chiding, “What had you to do with what did not belong to you?” etc. However, you will give me leave to tell the Ministry my thoughts when they ask them, and other people’s thoughts sometimes when they do not ask; so thinks Dingley.
13. I called this morning at Mrs. Vedeau’s again, who has employed a friend to get the money; it will be done in a fortnight, and then she will deliver me up the parchment. I went then to see Mr. Harley, who I hope will be out in a few days; he was in excellent good humour, only complained to me of the neglect of Guiscard’s cure, how glad he would have been to have had him live. Mr. Secretary came in to us, and we were very merry till Lord Chamberlain (Duke of Shrewsbury) {192a} came up; then Colonel Masham and I went off, after I had been presented to the Duke, and that we made two or three silly compliments suitable to the occasion. Then I attended at the House of Commons about your yarn, and it is again put off. Then Ford drew me to dine at a tavern; it happened to be the day and the house where the October Club dine. After we had dined, coming down we called to inquire whether our yarn business had been over that day, and I sent into the room for Sir George Beaumont. {192b} But I had like to be drawn into a difficulty; for in two minutes out comes Mr. Finch, {192c} Lord Guernsey’s son, to let me know that my Lord Compton, {192d} the steward of this feast, desired, in the name of the Club, that I would do them the honour to dine with them. I sent my excuses, adorned with about thirty compliments, and got off as fast as I could. It would have been a most improper thing for me to dine there, considering my friendship with the Ministry. The Club is about a hundred and fifty, and near eighty of them were then going to dinner at two long tables in a great ground-room. At evening I went to the auction of Barnard’s books, and laid out three pounds three shillings, but I’ll go there no more; and so I said once before, but now I’ll keep to it. I forgot to tell that when I dined at Webb’s with Lord Anglesea, I spoke to him of Clements, as one recommended for a very honest gentleman and good officer, and hoped he would keep him. He said he had not thought otherwise, and that he should certainly hold his place while he continued to deserve it; and I could not find there had been any intentions from his lordship against him. But I tell you, hunny, the impropriety of this. A great man will do a favour for me, or for my friend; but why should he do it for my friend’s friend? Recommendations should stop before they come to that. Let any friend of mine recommend one of his to me for a thing in my power, I will do it for his sake; but to speak to another for my friend’s friend is against all reason; and I desire you will understand this, and discourage any such troubles given me.—I hope this may do some good to Clements, it can do him no hurt; and I find by Mrs. Pratt, {193} that her husband is his friend; and the Bishop of Clogher says Clements’s danger is not from Pratt, but from some other enemies, that think him a Whig.
14. I was so busy this morning that I did not go out till late. I writ to-day to the Duke of Argyle, but said nothing of Bernage, who, I believe, will not see him till Spain is conquered, and that is, not at all. I was to-day at Lord Shelburne’s, and spoke to Mrs. Pratt again about Clements; her husband himself wants some good offices, and I have done him very good ones lately, and told Mrs. Pratt I expected her husband should stand by Clements in return. Sir Andrew Fountaine and I dined with neighbour Vanhomrigh; he is mighty ill of an asthma, and apprehends himself in much danger; ’tis his own fault, that will rake and drink, when he is but just crawled out of his grave. I will send this letter just now, because I think my half-year is out for my lodging; and, if you please, I would be glad it were paid off, and some deal boxes made for my books, and kept in some safe place. I would give something for their keeping: but I doubt that lodging will not serve me when I come back; I would have a larger place for books, and a stable, if possible. So pray be so kind to pay the lodging, and all accounts about it; and get Mrs. Brent to put up my things. I would have no books put in that trunk where my papers are. If you do not think of going to the Bath, I here send you a bill on Parvisol for twenty pounds Irish, out of which you will pay for the lodging, and score the rest to me. Do as you please, and love poor Presto, that loves MD better than his life a thousand millions of times. Farewell, MD, etc. etc.
LETTER XXI.
LONDON, _April_ 14, 1711.
REMEMBER, sirrahs, that there are but nine days between the dates of my two former letters. I sent away my twentieth this moment, and now am writing on like a fish, as if nothing was done. But there was a cause for my hasting away the last, for fear it should not come time enough before a new quarter began. I told you where I dined to-day; but forgot to tell you what I believe, that Mr. Harley will be Lord Treasurer in a short time, and other great removes and promotions made. This is my thought, etc.
15. I was this morning with Mr. Secretary, and he is grown pretty well. I dined with him to-day, and drank some of that wine which the Duke of Tuscany used to send to Sir William Temple: {194} he always sends some to the chief Ministers. I liked it mightily, but he does not; and he ordered his butler to send me a chest of it to-morrow. Would to God MD had it! The Queen is well again, and was at chapel to-day, etc.