I don't know what of kinde means, but to be sure it was something prodigiously expressive and gallant in those days, by its being unintelligible now. Adieu! Do the Chutes cicisb`e it?
(961) I think it was the ballet de la paix.
(962) It was for a present to Mr. Stone, the Duke of Newcastle's secretary
(963) Henry Howard, son of the Duke of Norfolk. Under a charge of high-treason, of which he was manifestly innocent, this noble soldier and accomplished poet was found guilty, and in 1547, in his thirty-first year, was beheaded on Tower Hill. History is silent as to the name of fair Geraldine.-E.
385 Letter 146 To Sir Horace Mann. London, Aug. 16, 1744.
I am writing to you two or three days beforehand, by way of settling my affairs-not that I am going to be married or to die; but something as bad as either if it were to last as long. You will guess that it can only be going to Houghton; but I make as much an affair of that, as other people would of going to Jamaica. Indeed I don't lay in store of cake and bandboxes, and citron-water, and cards, and cold meat, as country-women do after the session. My packing-up and travelling concerns lie in very small compass; nothing but myself and Patapan, my footman, a cloak-bag, and a couple of books. My old Tom is even reduced upon the article of my journey; he is at the Bath, patching together some very bad remains of a worn-out constitution. I always travel without company; for then I take my own hours and my own humours, which I don't think the most tractable to shut up in a coach with any body else. You know, St. Evremont's rule for conquering the passions, was to indulge them mine for keeping my temper in order, is never to leave it too long with another person. I have found out that it will have its way, but I make it take its way by itself. It is such sort of reflection as this, that makes me hate the country: it is impossible in one house with one set of company, to be always enough upon one's guard to make one's self agreeable, which one ought to do, as one always expects it from others. If I had a house of my own in the country, and could live there now and then alone, or frequently changing my company, I am persuaded I should like it; at least, I fancy I should; for when one begins to reflect why one don't like the country, I believe one grows near liking to reflect in it. I feel very often that I grow to correct twenty things in myself, as thinking them ridiculous at my age; and then with my spirit of whim and folly, I make myself believe that this is all prudence, and that I wish I were young enough to be as thoughtless and extravagant as I used to be. But if I know any thing of the matter, this is all flattering myself. I grow older, and love my follies less-if I did not, alas! poor prudence and reflection!
I think I have pretty well exhausted the chapter of myself. I will now go talk to YOU Of another fellow, who makes me look upon myself as a very perfect character; for as I have little merit naturally, and only pound a stray virtue now @ind then by chance, the other gentleman seems to have no vice, rather no villainy, but what he nurses in himself and metliodizes with as much pains as a stoic would patience. Indeed his pains are not thrown away. This painstaking person's name is Frederic, King of Prussia. Pray remember for the future never to speak of him and H. W. without giving the latter the preference. Last week we were all alarm! He was before Prague with fifty thousand men, and not a man in Bohemia to ask him, "What dost thou?" This week we have raised a hundred thousand Hungarians, besides vast militias and loyal nobilities. The King of Poland is to attack him on his march, and the Russians to fall on Prussia.(964) In the mean time, his letter or address to the people of England(965) has been published here: it is a poor performance! His Voltaires and his litterati should correct his works before they are printed. A careless song, with a little nonsense in it now and then, does not misbecome a monarch; but to pen manifestoes worse than the lowest commis that is kept jointly by two or three margraves, is insufferable!
We are very strong in Flanders, but still expect to do nothing this campaign. The French are so entrenched, that it is impossible to attack them. There is talk of besieging Maubeuge; I don't know how certainly.
Lord Middlesex's match is determined, and the writings signed. She proves an immense fortune; they pretend a hundred and thirty thousand pounds-what a fund for making operas!
My Lady Carteret is going to Tunbridge—there is a hurry for a son: his only one is gone mad: about a fortnight ago he was at the Duke of Bedford's, and as much in his few senses as ever. At five o'clock in the morning he waked the duke and duchess all bloody, and with the lappet of his coat held up full of ears: he had been in the stable and cropped all the horses! He is shut up.(966) My lady is in the honeymoon of her grandeur: she lives in public places, whither she is escorted by the old beaux of her husband's court; fair white-wigged old gallants, the Duke of Bolton,(967) Lord Tweedale, Lord Bathurst, and Charles Fielding;(968) and she all over knots, and small hoods, and ribands. Her brother told me the other night, "Indeed I think my thister doesth countenanth Ranelagh too mutch." They call Lord Pomfret, King Stanislaus, the queen's father.