Salute My Lady and Maria.
2004.
To his Stepmother.
Bentinck Street, June 29th, 1774.
Dear Madam,
*Do you remember that there exists in the World one Edward Gibbon, a Housekeeper in Bentinck Street? If the standard of writing and of affection was the same, I am sure he would ill deserve it. I do not wish to discover how many days (I am afraid I ought to use another word) have elapsed since the date of my last, or even of your last letter; and yet such is the sluggish nature of the beast, that I am afraid nothing but the arrival of Mrs. Bonfoy, and the expectation of Mr. Eliot, could have rouzed me from my Lethargy. The Lady gave me great satisfaction, by her general account of your health and spirits, but communicated some uneasiness, by the mention of a little encounter, in the style of one of Don Quixote's, but which proved, I hope, as trifling as you at first imagined it. For my own part, I am well in mind and body, busy with my Books, (which may perhaps produce something next year, either to tire or amuse the World,) and every day more satisfied with my present mode of life, which I always believed was calculated to make me happy. My only remaining uneasiness is Lenborough, which is not terminated. By Holroyd's advice, I rather try what may be obtained by a little more patience, than rush at once into the horrors of Chancery.
SIR STANIER PORTEN.
But let us talk of something else.* You remember surely Mrs. Hobson (Miss Comarque). She is just returned to England under a different name. She is now Madame la Baronne de Bavois. Her second husband is an old Swiss Officer about seventy, a man of family, but with as little money as character, who most probably married her for a fortune which he now begins to discover was spent to his hands. They talk of leaving England very soon, and fixing themselves in some cheap Provincial town in the South of France. The Baronne is more ridiculous, and will I fear be more miserable than ever. Mrs. Porten, out of regard to the laws of Hospitality, gave them a dinner last Sunday, & insists on my doing the same to-day, and her brother Sunday next. She grows younger every day, but Sir Stanier much older. *You remember, I think in Newman Street, a good agreeable Woman, Miss Wybolt. The under Secretary[242] is seriously in love with her, and seriously uneasy that his precarious situation precludes him from happiness. We shall soon see which will get the better, Love or reason. I bet three to two on love.*
I cannot find your last letter (a sad memento); did not you ask me with whom Deyverdun was gone abroad? with young Lord Middleton. Lady Fetherston (as they are to return next spring) is mad to get him, but I should fancy Sir Harry must be consulted—I hear confusedly of strange Revolutions in the Gould family.