The moment I was named, to my great joy I found Mr. Burke had not recollected me. He is more near-sighted, considerably, than myself. “Miss Burney!” he now exclaimed, coming forward, and quite kindly taking my hand, “I did not see you;” and then he spoke very sweet words of the meeting, and of my looking far better than “while I was a courtier,” and of how he rejoiced to see that I so little suited that station. “You look,” cried he, “quite renewed, revived, disengaged; you seemed, when I conversed with you last, at the trial, quite altered; I never saw such a change for the better as quitting a Court has brought about!”
Ah! thought I, this is simply a mistake, from reasoning according to your own feelings. I only seemed altered for the worse at the trial, because I there looked coldly and distantly, from distaste and disaffection to your proceedings; and I here look changed for the better, only because I here meet you without the chill of disapprobation, and with the glow of my first admiration of you and your talents!
BURKE’S CONVERSATIONAL POWERS.
Mrs. Crewe gave him her place, and he sat by me, and entered into a most animated conversation upon Lord Macartney and his Chinese expedition, and the two Chinese youths who were to accompany it. These last he described minutely and spoke of the extent of the undertaking in high, and perhaps fanciful, terms, but with allusions and anecdotes intermixed, so full of general information and brilliant ideas, that I soon felt the whole of my first enthusiasm return, and with it a sensation of pleasure that made the day delicious to me.
After this my father joined us, and politics took the lead. He spoke then with an eagerness and a vehemence that instantly banished the graces, though it redoubled the energies, of his discourse. “The French Revolution,” he said, “which began by authorising and legalising Injustice, and which by rapid steps had proceeded to every species of despotism except owning a despot, was now menacing all the universe and all mankind with the most violent concussion of principle and order.” My father heartily joined, and I tacitly assented to his doctrines, though I feared not with his fears.
One Speech I Must repeat, for it is explanatory of his conduct, and nobly explanatory. When lie had expatiated upon the present dangers, even to English liberty and property, from the contagion of havoc and novelty, he earnestly exclaimed, “This it is that has made ME an abettor and supporter of kings! Kings are necessary, and if we would preserve peace and prosperity, we must preserve THEM we must all put our shoulders to the work! Ay, and stoutly, too!”
This subject lasted till dinner.
At dinner Mr. Burke sat next Mrs. Crewe, and I had the happiness to be seated next Mr. Burke, and my other neighbour was his amiable son.