MR. MALONE.
Dr. Burney grew closely connected, also, with that indefatigable anecdote-hunter; date-ferretter; technical difficulty-solver; and collector of various readings—Mr. Malone.
HON. FRED. NORTH.
And he had the happiness of often meeting with the Hon. Frederic North, afterwards Earl of Guildford; whose pleasant wit, practical urbanity, and persevering love of enterprise, made him full of original entertainment; whilst his unvarying gaiety of good-humour enabled him to discard spleen from pain, and to banish murmuring from even the acutest fits of the gout; though maimed by them, distorted, and crippled.
Upon his first visit to Dr. Burney, at Chelsea College, Mr. Frederick North appeared there upon crutches, and with difficulty hobbled into the library; yet he advanced with a smile, saying, that though he must obsequiously beg permission to produce himself in such a plight elsewhere, he boldly felt at home in coming with wooden legs to Chelsea Hospital.
1795.
The health of Dr. Burney was at this time most happily restored to the full exercise of all his powers of life. In a letter written to Bookham, at the close of the spring season, he says:
“I have been such an evaporé lately, that if I were near enough to accost you de vive voix, it would be with Susey’s[34] exclamation, when she was just arrived from France, at only eleven years old, after staying at Mrs. Lewis’s till ten o’clock one night, “Que je suis libertine, papa!” And thus, “Que je suis libertin, ma fille!” cry I. Three huge assemblies at Spencer House; two dinners at the Duke and Duchess of Leeds; two ditto at Mr. Crewe’s; two clubs; a dejeuner at Mrs. Crewe’s villa, at Hampstead; a dinner at Lord Macartney’s; ditto at Mr. Locke’s; ditto at Mr. Coxe’s; two ditto at Sir George Howard’s, at Chelsea; two philosophical conversationes at Sir Joseph Bankes’s; two operas; two professional concerts; Haydn’s benefit; Salomon’s three ancient musics; &c. &c. &c.
“What dissipating profligacy! But what argufies all this festivity? ’Tis all vanity, and exhalement of spirit. I was tired to death of it all before it was over: whilst your domestic occupations and pleasures are as fresh every morning as the roses of your garden.”