“... M. de Jarnac, who married an Irish beauty, in the mistaken opinion that she was also a fortune, has been stock-jobbing here prodigiously; but if we should really have a French war, he will be bit.
“A very superb theatre is going to be built in the Haymarket. It is to be in prices the same as the opera; no places taken, and the play to begin at eight o’clock, which certainly suits better the present hour of dining. Once a week, each of the other theatres, on certain conditions, are to lend their actors; so they will each save the expence of a sixth part at least of their theatrical shows. The other five nights their houses will be the fuller. If ye London apprentices of these days are half as bold as he who kill’d the lion, I think they will assault our new theatre. Neither its price, hours, nor situation will suit them. The town has been very sickly. Lady George Germaine has been dangerously ill of the measles, but is better.
“... Montagu” (her nephew and heir) “is in fine health; and as to spirits, he never wants them. He rides in the manège from eleven till twelve, and then his tutor sets him on Pegasus. The day before yesterday was the first time he had attain’d the honour of riding between the pillars, and he was as proud of it as Alexander when he had tamed Bucephalus. He dances, under the care of the celebrated M. Valonys, early every morning. These exercises make a boy more healthy as well as more graceful. On Tuesday he returns to Harrow, where his master tells me he does very well. I carried him to-day to see Mr. Lever’s museum. The collection of birds, both as to their variety and preservation, exceed that in the King of France’s collection of natural curiosities; but, not being shown me by M. de Buffons and Monsr. D’Aubenton, I did not see them with so much pleasure. The finest as well as rarest bird being a wise and learned man. Mr. Lever is gone into the country, and I was disappointed at not seeing a man who would sell in exchange an acre of good land for an extraordinary fungus.”
Hill Street, February 21, 1778.—“... The town is now full of company; full of bustle. Real business and serious occupation have their hours of retreat and rest, but the pursuits of pleasure have no intermissions. The change of objects is the delassement in that case. As to me, I am, like other light and insignificant matters, whisked about in the whirlwind.
“I approve my dear neice’s ambition to excel in dancing a minouet; not that dancing a minouet is a matter of great importance; but a desire to do everything well will carry her on to perfections of a higher kind.... A little ball, a frolick now and then, is very good for young persons, but I think you and my brother judged very well in not carrying my neice to assemblies. In our silly, dissipated town, girls never are produced into assemblies till after seventeen, and, indeed, they would never have anything but absurdity and affectation, if they were introduced into the world in their infancy.
“... I am glad my father has agreed to allow Mrs. (Morris) Robinson an hundred pounds a year, to which I have added fifty. She now knows that she will have a subsistence, and must accommodate herself to it. So far it is comfortable to her, and I am sure it is happy for the family that the world should not have a reason to be talking about it. Mr. Danne, Mr. Wilmot, and several persons of credit in the law and in other professions, came to me with strong remonstrances at the cruelty of letting Mr. Morris Robinson’s widow be destitute. So that, for the honour of the family, I would have given her what she now has, if my father had refused it. I have had only a thousand pounds out of my family, and for Mrs. (Morris) Robinson I have no partiality; but in Italy you have heard the most powerful of all arguments to do right, it is the address of beggars, their ‘Fate ben per voi!’ To be justifying bad things by others’ faults is never graceful; but in family connections there is great folly in it, and it is only giving people occasion to throw disgrace when it comes too near one.
“It has been a great mortification that Mrs. (Morris) Robinson’s name has been often mentioned at this end of the town lately. I was always desirous that it might remain on the other side Temple Bar; but my brother was so generally beloved, that, out of respect to him, his widow was an object of compassion.”
The subject is pursued in the next letter to Mrs. William Robinson.
“February 28, 1778. ... I am sure you who have a feeling and a generous heart will be pleased with Mr. Thomas Harris and Mrs. Harris’s behaviour to Mrs. M. Robinson. Besides paying her all kinds of civilities, Mr. Harris desired that when she went to a new habitation, he might present her with a hundred pounds towards furnishing it. Bad as the world is, and tho’ selfishness makes so great a part of the human composition, yet a social, kind character like my poor brother’s makes its impression on tempers of the like kind, and, indeed, one has a comfort in seeing his memory so much beloved and respected. Mrs. M. Robinson has continually some marks of attention paid to her. As hard hearts love to insult adversity, tender ones endeavour to console it. The civilities the poor woman receives are paid, not to her merits, but to her distress or my brother’s memory. In either case, they do honour to human nature.”
An incident that might have cost Mrs. Scott her life, from her cap having caught fire, is cheerfully noticed in a letter, dated Saturday, March 1, 1778, from Mrs. Scott to Mrs. Robinson: “I am burned pretty deep in the back of my neck.... From thence to my face, I have reason to hope, will be more speedy of cure, and the little damage my face received is well already, except an abridgment of eyebrow and eyelash, which, perhaps, may never come again, and I am perfectly indifferent whether they do or no; for at fifty-five (at least), half an eyebrow is just as good as a whole one. I have reason to think myself most happy in having come off so well as I did, considering all the very horrid circumstances of the affair....”