of the Protestants was to be asserted, true or false, to blacken the reigning dynasty. . . to find this truly diabolic idea presented to him by a brother of whom he speaks as the partner of all his thoughts, etc., has consumed every spark of favour in which he was held throughout the whole nation, except, perhaps, in those whom party will make deaf and blind for ever to what opposes their own views and schemes. I do not envy Lord Grey for being a third in such an intercourse, an intercourse teeming with inventive plots and wishes for new revolutions !
Your uncle has bought the picture of my dearest father at Streatham.(294) I am truly rejoiced it will come into our family, since the collection for which it was painted is broken up. Your uncle has also bought the Garrick, which was one of the most agreeable and delightful of the set. To what recollections, at once painful and pleasing, does this sale give birth! In the library, in which those pictures were hung, we always breakfasted; and there I have had as many precious conversations with the great and good Dr. Johnson as there are days in the year. Dr. Johnson sold the highest of all! 'tis an honour to our age, that!—360 pounds! My dear father would have been mounted higher, but that his son Charles was there to bid for himself, and, everybody must have seen, was resolved to have it. There was besides, I doubt not, a feeling for his lineal claim and pious desire.
REGARDING HUSBAND AND SON.
(Madame d'Arblay to a Friend.) Bath, August 17, 1816. I have been in a state of much uncertainty and disturbance since I wrote last with respect to one of the dearest possible interests of life, the maternal: the uncertainty, however, for this epoch is over, and I will hasten to communicate to you its result, that I may demand further and frequent accounts of your own plans, and of their execution or change, success
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or failure. All that concerns you, must to me always be near and dear.
General d'Arblay is gone to France, and here at Bath rest sa femme et son fils.(295) There was no adjusting the excursion but by separation. Alexander would have been wilder than ever for his French mathematics in re-visiting Paris ; and, till his degree is taken, we must not contribute to lowering it by feasting his opposing pursuits with fresh nourishment, M. d'Arblay nevertheless could by no means forego his intention which a thousand circumstances led him to consider as right' He could not, indeed, feel himself perfectly sa place without paying his devoirs to his king, notwithstanding he has been put by his majesty himself, not by his own desire, en retraite. The exigencies of the treasury demand this, for all who are not young enough for vigorous active service; but his wounded leg prevented his returning thanks sooner for the promotion with which the king finished and recompensed his services;(296) and therefore he deems it indispensable to present himself at the foot of the throne for that purpose now that he is able to "bear his body more seemly" (like Audrey) in the royal presence. He hopes also to arrange for receiving here his half-pay, when sickness or affairs or accident may prevent his crossing the Channel. Choice and happiness will, to his last breath, carry him annually to France ; for, not to separate us from his son, or in the bud of life, to force that son's inclination in fixing his place or mode of residence, alone decides his not fixing there his own last staff. But Alexander, young as he left that country, has seen enough of it to be aware that no line is open there to ambition or importance, but the military, most especially for the son of an officer so known and marked for his military character: and I need not tell you that, with my feelings and sentiments, to see him wield a sword that could only lead him to renown by being drawn against the country of his birth and of mine, would demolish my heart, and probably my head; and, to believe in any war in which England and France will not be rivals, is to entertain Arcadian hopes, fit only for shepherds and shepherdesses of the drama.
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MATERNAL ANXIETIES.
(Madame d'Arblay to General d'Arblay.) Bath, October 28th, 1816. Certainement, et trs certainement, mon bien cher ami, your beautiful strictures upon la connoissance et l'usage du monde would have given "un autre cours mes ides"(297) were the object of our joint solicitude less singular; but our Alexander, mon ami, dear as he is to us, and big as are my hopes pour l'avenir,(298) our Alexander is far different from what you were at his age. More innocent, I grant, and therefore highly estimable, and worthy of our utmost care, and worthy of the whole heart of her to whom he shall permanently attach himself. But O, how far less aimable! He even piques himself upon the difference, as if that difference were to his advantage. He is a medley of good qualities and of faults the most extraordinary and the most indescribable. Enfin, except in years, in poetry, and in mathematics, il n'est encore qu'un enfant.(299)