“Strawberry Hill, June 30, 1784.
“Instead of coming to you, I am thinking of packing up and going to town for winter, so desperate is the weather! I found a great fire at Mrs. Clive’s this evening, and Mr. Raftor hanging over it like a smoked ham. They tell me my hay will be all spoiled for want of cutting; but I had rather it should be destroyed by standing than by being mowed, as the former will cost me nothing but the crop, and ’tis very dear to make nothing but a water-souchy of it.
“You know I have lost a niece, and found another nephew: he makes the fifty-fourth, reckoning both sexes. We are certainly an affectionate family, for of late we do nothing but marry one another. Have not YOU felt a little twinge in a remote corner of your heart on Lady Harrington’s death?[98] She dreaded death so extremely that I am glad she had not a moment to be sensible of it. I have a great affection for sudden deaths; they save one’s self and everybody else a deal of ceremony.
“The Duke and Duchess of Marlborough breakfasted here on Monday, and seemed much pleased, though it rained the whole time with an Egyptian darkness. I should have thought there had been deluges enough to destroy all Egypt’s other plagues: but the newspapers talk of locusts; I suppose relations of your beetles, though probably not so fond of green fruit; for the scene of their campaign is Queen Square, Westminster, where there certainly has not been an orchard since the reign of Canute.
“I have, at last, seen an air-balloon; just as I once did see a tiny review, by passing one accidentally on Hounslow Heath. I was going last night to Lady Onslow at Richmond, and over Mr. Cambridge’s field I saw a bundle in the air not bigger than the moon, and she herself could not have descended with more composure if she had expected to find Endymion fast asleep. It seemed to ’light on Richmond Hill; but Mrs. Hobart was going by, and her coiffure prevented my seeing it alight. The papers say, that a balloon has been made at Paris representing the castle of Stockholm, in compliment to the King of Sweden; but that they are afraid to let it off: so, I suppose, it will be served up to him in a dessert. No great progress, surely, is made in these airy navigations, if they are still afraid of risking the necks of two or three subjects for the entertainment of a visiting sovereign. There is seldom a feu de joie for the birth of a Dauphin that does not cost more lives. I thought royalty and science never haggled about the value of blood when experiments are in the question.
“I shall wait for summer before I make you a visit. Though I dare to say that you have converted your smoke-kilns into a manufactory of balloons, pray do not erect a Strawberry castle in the air for my reception, if it will cost a pismire a hair of its head. Good-night! I have ordered my bed to be heated as hot as an oven, and Tonton and I must go into it.”
The recent invention of balloons was at this time exciting general interest. “This enormous capital,” says Walpole, “that must have some occupation, is most innocently amused with those philosophic playthings, air-balloons. An Italian, one Lunardi, is the first airgonaut that has mounted into the clouds in this country. He is said to have bought three or four thousand pounds in the stocks, by exhibiting his person, his balloon, and his dog and cat, at the Pantheon for a shilling each visitor. Blanchard, a Frenchman, is his rival; and I expect that they will soon have an air-fight in the clouds, like a stork and a kite.”
This year ended for our author with a severe attack of gout. He replies to inquiries from Lady Ossory:
“Berkeley Square, Dec. 27, 1784.
“I am told that I am in a prodigious fine way; which, being translated into plain English, means that I have suffered more sharp pain these two days than in all the moderate fits together that I have had for these last nine years: however, Madam, I have one great blessing, there is drowsiness in all the square hollows of the red-hot bars of the gridiron on which I lie, so that I scream and fall asleep by turns, like a babe that is cutting its first teeth. I can add nothing to this exact account, which I only send in obedience to your Ladyship’s commands, which I received just now: I did think on Saturday that the worst was over.”