Miss Palmer hastened forward and embraced me most cordially. I then shook hands with Sir Joshua. He had a bandage over one eye, and the other shaded with a green halfbonnet. He seemed serious even to sadness, though extremely kind. “I am very glad,” he said, in a meek voice and dejected accent, “to see you again, and I wish I could see you better! but I have only one eye now,—and hardly that.”
I was really quite touched. The expectation of total blind- ness depresses him inexpressibly; not, however, inconceivably I hardly knew how to express either my concern for his altered situation since our meeting, or my joy in again being with him: but my difficulty was short; Miss Palmer eagerly drew me to herself, and recommended to Sir Joshua to go on with his cards. He had no spirit to oppose; probably, indeed, no inclination.
One other time we called again, in a morning. Sir Joshua and his niece were alone, and that invaluable man was even more dejected than before. How grievous to me It is to see him thus changed![352]
AMONG OLD FRIENDS.
December.-I most gladly accepted an invitation to my good Mrs. Ord, to meet a circle of old friends. The day proved extremely pleasant. We went to dinner, my father and I, and met Mrs. Montagu, in good spirits, and very unaffectedly agreeable. No one was there to awaken ostentation, no new acquaintance to require any surprise from her powers; she was therefore natural and easy, as well as informing and entertaining.
Mrs. Garrick embraced me again and again, to express a satisfaction in meeting me once more in this social way, that she would have thought it indecorous to express by words. I thanked her exactly in the same language; and, without a syllable being uttered, she said, “I rejoice you are no longer a courtier!” and I answered, “I love you dearly for preferring me in my old state!”
In the evening we were joined by Lady Rothes,[353] with whom I had my peace to make for a long-neglected letter upon my “restoration to society,” as she termed it, and who was very lively and pleasant....
Mr. Pepys, who came just at that instant from Twickenham, which he advanced eagerly to tell me, talked of Mr. Cambridge, and his admirable wit and spirits, and Miss Cambridge, and her fervent friendship for me, and the charm and agreeability of the whole house, with an ardour so rapid, there scarce needed any reply.