...Lady G. Murray is in greater beauty than ever, and happier than anybody I ever saw. She has two sons here.”
Tuesday.
...I was so cross and stupid with a pain in my ear which I have had this week, and in such a fury with Willy Osborne[38] who made a point of dropping his shuttlecock on my paper every minute, that I was obliged to leave off writing in order to fight with him, and when that battle was ended, he insisted on playing at Blind Man’s Buff....
Mary seems quite delighted with her visit to Melbury, and even nearly reconciled to quitting Bowood, which she was very sorry to do. Sir George Paul,[39] nearly eighty years old, is very much struck with her, she says, and when she goes to the pianoforte puts on his spectacles, and sits opposite her, gazing on her beautiful countenance with great satisfaction.
He drank two glasses of wine with her at dinner, and all the other ladies insisted on his drinking one with them, that they might at least have half as much done for them as was done for Mary.
We are all in doubt whether to like Sir G. Paul best or Mr. Whishaw, a lawyer, about ten years younger, but with only one leg. But the poor man, George says, was terribly smitten, and if they had staid but two days longer at Bowood, it would have come to a happy conclusion.
I myself should prefer somebody rather older and steadier.
Lady Ilchester wrote to Mamma, to know whether she was to let this flirtation go on, as it does at present....
George writes in good spirits, and seems delighted with his tour and with Melbury, which is the pleasantest place he knows. He says Mary is in very good spirits and makes a deuce of a noise and that she is a great favourite wherever she goes, and he believes deservedly so.
They neither of them seem to have any idea that they must ever come home again; but if ever they do I will let you know. Yours affectionately,