Guerchy. Dusson, I hear, goes ambassador to Poland. Tell Lady Ailesbury that I have five or six little parcels, though not above one for her, of laces and ribands, which Lady Cecilie left with me; but how to convey them the Lord knows.

TO MR. GRAY.

Yours ever.

Paris, Nov. 19, 1765.

You are very kind to inquire so particularly after my gout. I wish I may not be too circumstantial in my answer: but you have tapped a dangerous topic; I can talk gout by the hour. It is my great mortification, and has disappointed all the hopes that I had built on temperance and hardiness. I have resisted like a hermit, and exposed myself to all weathers and seasons like a smuggler; and in vain. I have, however, still so much of the obstinacy of both professions left, that I think I shall continue, and cannot obey you in keeping myself warm. I have gone through my second fit under one blanket, and already go about in a silk waistcoat with my bosom unbuttoned. In short, I am as prejudiced to my regimen, though so ineffectual, as I could have been to all I expected from it. The truth is, I am almost as willing to have the gout as to be liable to catch cold; and must run up stairs and down, in and out of doors, when I will, or I cannot have the least satisfaction. This will convince you how readily I comply with another of your precepts, walking as soon as I am able. For receipts, you may trust me for making use of none: I would not see a physician at the worst, but have quacked myself as boldly as quacks treat others. I laughed at your idea of quality receipts, it came so apropos. There is not a man or woman here that is not a perfect old nurse, and who does not talk gruel and anatomy with equal fluency and ignorance. One instance shall serve: Madame de Bouzols, Marshal Berwick's daughter, assured me there was nothing so good for the gout, as to preserve the parings of my nails in

a bottle close stopped. When I try any illustrious nostrum, I shall give the preference to this.

So much for the gout! I told you what was coming. As to the ministry, I know and care very little about them. I told you and told them long ago, that if ever a change happened I would bid adieu to politics for ever. Do me the justice to allow that I have not altered with the times. I was so impatient to put this resolution in execution, that I hurried out of England before I was sufficiently recovered. I shall not run the same hazard again in haste; but will stay here till I am perfectly well, and the season of warm weather coming on or arrived; though the charms of Paris have not the least attraction for me, nor would keep me an hour on their own account. For the city itself, I cannot conceive where my eyes were: it is the ugliest beastliest town in the universe. I have not seen a mouthful of verdure out of it, nor have they anything green but their treillage and windowshutters. Trees cut into fire-shovels, and stuck into pedestals of chalk, compose their country. Their boasted knowledge of society is reduced to talking of their suppers, and every malady they have about them, or know of. The Dauphin is at the point of death; every morning the physicians frame an account of him; and happy is he or she who can produce a copy of this lie, called a bulletin. The night before last, one of these was produced at supper where I was; it

The following is Gray's reply, of the 13th of December:-" You have long built your hopes on temperance, you say, and hardiness. On the first point we are agreed; the second has totally disappointed you, and therefore you will persist in it by all means. But then, be sure to persist too in being young, in stopping the course of time, and making the shadow return back upon your sun-dial. If you find this not so easy, acquiesce with a good grace in my anilities; put on your understockings of yarn, or woollen, even in the night-time. Don't provoke me, or I shall order you two nightcaps, (which, by the way, would do your eyes good,) and put a little of any French liqueur into your water; they are nothing but brandy and sugar; and among their various flavours, some of them may surely be palatable enough. The pain in your feet I can bear; but I shudder at the sickness of your stomach and the weakness that still continues. I conjure you, as you love yourself,-I conjure you by Strawberry, not to trifle with these edge-tools. There is no cure for the gout, when in the stomach, but to throw it into the limbs there is no relief for gout in the limbs, but in gentle warmth and gradual perspiration." Works, vol. iv. p. 68.-E.

:

was read, and said he had had une evacuation fœtide. I beg your pardon, though you are not at supper. The old lady of the house (who by the way is quite blind, was the Regent's mistress for a fortnight, and is very agreeable) called out, "Oh! they have forgot to mention that he threw down his chamber-pot, and was forced to change his bed." There were present several women of the first rank; as Madame de la Valière, whom you remember Duchesse de Vaujour, and who is still miraculously pretty, though fifty-three; a very handsome Madame de Forcalquier, and others—nor was this conversation at all particular to that evening.

rant.

Their gaiety is not greater than their delicacy-but I will not expatiate. In short, they are another people from what they were. They may be growing wise, but the intermediate passage is dulness. Several of the women are agreeable, and some of the men; but the latter are in general vain and ignoThe savans-I beg their pardons, the philosophesare insupportable, superficial, overbearing, and fanatic: they preach incessantly, and their avowed doctrine is atheism; you would not believe how openly-Don't wonder, therefore, if I should return a Jesuit. Voltaire himself does not satisfy them. One of their lady devotees said of him, "Il est bigot, c'est un déiste."

I am as little pleased with their taste in trifles. Crébillon is entirely out of fashion, and Marivaux a proverb: marivauder and marivaudage are established terms for being prolix and tiresome. I thought that we were fallen, but they are ten times lower.

The Dumenil

Notwithstanding all I have said, I have found two or three societies that please me; am amused with the novelty of the whole, and should be sorry not to have come. is, if possible, superior to what you remember. I am sorry not to see the Clairon; but several persons whose judgments seem the soundest prefer the former. Preville is admirable in low comedy. The mixture of Italian comedy and comic operas, prettily written, and set to Italian music, at the same

I Madame du Deffand.-E.

theatre, is charming, and gets the better both of their operas and French comedy; the latter of which is seldom full, with all its merit. Petit-maîtres are obsolete, like our Lords Foppington-Tout le monde est philosophe -When I grow very sick of this last nonsense, I go and compose myself at the Chartreuse, where I am almost tempted to prefer Le Sœur to every painter I know. Yet what new old treasures are come to light, routed out of the Louvre, and thrown into new lumberrooms at Versailles !-But I have not room to tell you what I have seen! I will keep this and other chapters for Strawberry. Adieu! and thank you.

Old Mariette has shown me a print by Diepenbecke of the Duke and Duchess of Newcastle1 at dinner with their family. You would oblige me, if you would look into all their graces' folios, and see if it is not a frontispiece to some one of them. Then he has such a Petitot of Madame d'Olonne! The Pompadour offered him fifty louis for it-Alack, so would I!

TO THE RIGHT HON. LADY HERVEY.

Paris, Nov. 21, 1765.

MADAME GEOFFRIN has given me a parcel for your ladyship with two knotting-bags, which I will send by the first opportunity that seems safe: but I hear of nothing but difficulties; and shall, I believe, be saved from ruin myself, from not being able to convey any purchases into England. Thus I shall have made an almost fruitless journey to France, if I can neither fling away my money, nor preserve my health.

'Prefixed to some copies of the Duchess's work, entitled "The World's Olio,- Nature's Pictures drawn by Fancy's Pencil to the life," (folio, London, 1653,) is a print, Diepenbeck del., P. Clouvet sc., halfsheet, containing portraits of William Cavendish, Duke of Newcastle, (celebrated as a Cavalier general during the civil wars, and commonly styled the loyal Duke of Newcastle,) his Duchess, and their family.-E. 2 This miniature eventually became his property. In a letter from Madame du Deffand of the 12th of December 1775, she says:-"J'ai Madame d'Olonne entre les mains; vous voilà au comble de la joie; mais moderez-en la, en apprenant que ses galans ne la payaient pas plus cher de son vivant que vous ne la payez après sa mort; elle vous coûte trois mille deux cents livres."- E.

VOL. V.

H

I have had

I have had my house

At present, indeed, the gout is gone. swept, and made as clean as I could no very easy matter in this country; but I live in dread of seven worse spirits entering in. The terror I am under of a new fit has kept me from almost seeing anything. The damps and fogs are full as great and frequent here as in London; but there is a little frost to-day, and I shall begin my devotions to-morrow. It is not being fashionable to visit churches; but I am de la vieille cour; and I beg your ladyship to believe that I have no youthful pretensions. The Duchess of Richmond tells me that they have made twenty foolish stories about me in England; and say, that my person is admired here. I cannot help what is said without foundation; but the French have neither lost their eyes, nor I my senses. A skeleton I was born-skeleton I am and death will have no trouble in making me one. I have not made any alteration in my dress, and certainly did not study it in England. Had I had any such ridiculous thoughts, the gout is too sincere a monitor to leave one under any such error. Pray, Madam, tell Lord and Lady Holland what I say they have heard these idle tales; and they know so many of my follies, that I should be sorry they believed more of me than are true. If all arose from Madame Geoffrin calling me in joke le nouveau Richelieu, I give it under my hand that I resemble him in nothing but wrinkles.

Your ladyship is much in the right to forbear reading politics. I never look at the political letters that come hither in the Chronicles. I was sick to death of them before I set out; and perhaps should not have stirred from home, if I had not been sick of them and all they relate to. If anybody could write ballads and epigrams, à la bonne heure! But dull personal abuse in prose is tiresome indeed. A serious invective against a pickpocket, or written by a pickpocket, who has so little to do as to read?

The Dauphin continues languishing to his exit, and keeps everybody at Fontainbleau. There is a little bustle now about the parliament of Bretagne; but you may believe, Madam, that when I was tired of the squabbles at London, I did not propose to interest myself in quarrels at Hull or Liverpool.