Still Genius thro’ your green Retreats shall stray;
For, from the Scene Boscawen loves to grace,
Th’ Attendant Muse shall ne’er be long away.
Brit. Mus. Add. MS. 27578.
[290] Mrs. Boscawen chose Opie to paint the portrait, though the subject, she writes (Roberts’s Memoirs of More 2. 35), ‘is worthy of Sir Joshua Reynolds’s superior skill; but I can command Opie, and make him alter, or even refaire if we do not like it.’ In her reply, Miss More stated that nothing could overcome her natural repugnance to having her portrait taken, but Mrs. Boscawen’s wishes which are to her ‘such indisputable commands.’ The portrait, which was hung in Mrs. Boscawen’s dining-room, became so popular that both Walpole and Mrs. Walsingham wished copies of it.
[291] Anne Dillingham Ord (d. 1808) was the widow of William Ord (d. 1766), who had been High Sheriff of Northumberland in 1747. She is often spoken of as ‘Mrs. Ord of Queen Anne Street.’
[292] Notably Doran, Lady of the Last Century, p. 264, and the New English Dictionary, under ‘Bluestocking.’
[293] Letters 2. 146; cf. 149.
[294] Hannah More and Fanny Burney, e.g. Rev. Montagu Pennington (Carter’s Letters to Montagu 3. 199 n.) speaks of her as one ‘of whom too much good can hardly be said, and of whom the editor believes it would be impossible to say any ill.’
[295] Early Diary of Frances Burney 2. 138.