liked to have kept her in an ermine muff this winter; is it not true?

This being all the needful, sir,-and a great deal more, you will say, by all the impertinence, and as it is pretty far advanced into Monday morning, I humbly crave leave to ease nature, by going to bed.

January, 1779.

DEAR SIR,

I KNOW not how or with what to begin; I am so filled with indignation! I thought the impudent scoundrel's letter had not gone; although, indeed, I now recollect, which I did not before, that when I came with Madame from Lady L.'s, which is the last time I saw her, she dropped some hint as if the letter was gone notwithstanding all that had passed, though in such a way that I could not suppose it to be serious, not supposing, to say the least, that she was so utterly lost to propriety and common sense. But I told you that she seemed more inclined to instigate him than not.

Your answer! Gracious heavens! I should have no doubt in the world about it, were the man in any kind of degree your equal, in which case it

would do you honour; but it appears to me, at first sight, a civility not due to a miscreant. But nothing can be said or done to-night. To-morrow everything shall be said and done which better advice and more prudence than mine can dictate. I have before me your letters of the 5th and 8th, and your letter to Sir John Lambert of the 5th. They all arrived together to-day.

I have just parted with Sir John, and he desired I would say something for him, as he cannot write to-night. But nothing can be said yet. Yes! I observed the "imaginary disappointment," when she read me the letter, but I did not understand what she meant by it, nor she herself, I believe; for I do not see how it is in the compass of possibility that you can have any disappointment in the grand object of your wishes,* real or imaginary. Thank heaven! it is not in her power to hurt you there; though she would consequently endeavour, if she could, to bring every evil upon him whose throat she wishes to be cut. From this moment how I hate her! Cordially hate her! Theologically hate her! But do not be afraid that in the rage of my resentment I shall be rash. Spy! I will be anything for you; for I am interested now, and warmly interested. What is to be done then?-The plainest thing in the world. Does any man suffer in his honour by abandoning an abandoned child?

*The regaining possession of " Mie Mie."

Lady Berkeley says she has no taste, to take such an ugly broken-nosed fellow had it been the tall footman, she could forgive her. Lady Rivers says she does well to stay abroad, for no mortal would go near her if she were at home. The same bureau d'intelligence informed me of a respectable man's being afraid to let his wife and daughters be seen with her in public. Her boar of a baron is the son of a petit procureur in Alsace. I called this morning, and left my name; she was out, really out, as I learnt afterwards from Lady L- where I dined, and to whom she was in the same story as her man of quality. I promised in my last the history of the 1,2007. name which you spell "Pattell," was not a guess, I suppose. Somebody had mentioned such a name to you. Pattle is the name of the Newgate bird who chirps in the Place Royale. But there is a man here of the name of P————, a man who was formerly in the Guards; who had formerly some property; who is brother to Lady the banker's wife in Lombard-street; who is here because he cannot be at home; who lives in the Rue Ventadour; who is distressed, who is ill; who fancies prints, and cannot buy them; who keeps a dirty

The

*Elizabeth, daughter of Henry Drax, Esq., of Charborough, in Dorsetshire, married, in 1744, to Augustus fourth Earl of Berkeley. In 1757, she remarried Robert, afterwards Earl Nugent, and died in 1792.

+ Penelope, daughter of Sir Henry Atkins, Bart., of Clapham, and wife of George first Baron Rivers.

milliner, whom he sends about to sell an old pair of ruffles for him; and this man, who has long been a crony of Madame, was to lend her 1,200%., or at least be the means of her getting it. This man was the Englishman we heard of, and you shall hear how well he has effected his purpose, by what passed between me and Mrs. Ordinary this morning. I sent thither yesterday to dine. Engaged. But I was not to be put off so. I went this morning to her, and hatched up a story of some. thing I wanted to consult her about to buy for a lady, in which she only could direct me, and got her to myself, and made her immensely happy by my confidence.

I wish, sir, you had now and then something to do with my under-strappers, to see what a tweague and a taking you would be in, when you wanted to come at a fact, at the roundabout way the b's will take to give it you, just as I am doing now, you will say. She told me then,after many Ahs! and Ohs! upon other people's vice, as guarantees for her own virtue, that, a good while ago, there was a question of her master's lending money upon the diamonds before they were gone, from which she dissuaded him, as it would not tell to his credit, and he would be called a pawnbroker. Then he would lend no money at all, for he has the ratsbane of "Security" ever ready to stop the mouth of every no-property would-be borrower with; and without it, it is as

easy to get the teeth out of his mouth as the pounds out of his pocket. This was all she knew of money-matters. They (the Baron and P. did dine together last Sunday, but it was at a third place, and of course no private concerns were talked of. But last night, they came together to Pattle. She was not present. She went into him, however, when they were gone, and found him in a fury, swearing like an Emperor at all the world, and their "unreasonable expectations." Some other person coming in at that instant prevented her knowing more; and he had not resumed the topic this morning; but she will know it all, as he keeps nothing from her, and she will keep nothing from

me.

I have a rendezvous with her on Saturday morning, and at my own lodgings, where I do not think it quite impossible, if I pleased, but that I might give her a secret of her own to keep. Good night, sir; it is very late. I could not sit down to write for a long while after I had read the letters.

THE REV. DR. WARNER TO GEORGE SELWYN.

January 27th, 1779.

DEAR SIR,

No conversation yet with the Maréchal! for, if there had been, I must infallibly have seen, or