[221] Letters 13. 217; 13 November 1784.

[222] Diary of Madame D’Arblay 5. 50; 27 December 1791.

[223] Much earlier certainly than the date (1790) given in the New English Dictionary, ‘In the evening we had a very strong reinforcement of blues,’ wrote Hannah More in March 1783 (Roberts’ Memoirs of More 1. 275); ‘There was everything delectable in the blue way,’ writes the same author in 1784 in reference to Mrs. Ord’s conversazione (Ib. 1. 317).

[224] Diary of Madame D’Arblay 2. 236; 9 December 1783.

[225] Ib. 4. 66; 1 August 1788.

[226] Cf. Fanny Burney, ‘He had no small reverence for us blue-stockings.’ Diary 1. 403; June 1780.

[227] A Series of Letters 4. 218.

[228]

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