Those verses I sent you on Mr. Pope, I assure you, were not mine; I transcribed them from the newspapers; from whence I must send you a very good epigram on Bishop Berkeley's tar-water:
"Who dare deride what pious Cloyne has done?
The Church shall rise and vindicate her son;
She tells us, all her Bishops shepherds are-
And shepherds heal their rotten sheep with tar."
I am not at all surprised at my Lady Walpole's ill-humour to you about the messenger. If the resentments of women did not draw them into little dirty spite, their hatred would be very dangerous; but they vent the leisure they have to do mischief in a thousand meannesses, which only serve to expose themselves.
Adieu! I know nothing here but public politics, of which I have already talked to you, and which you hear as soon as I do.
Thank dear Mr. Chute for his letter; I will answer it very soon; but in the country I am forced to let my pen lie fallow between letter and letter.
(970) The Austrians had formed a scheme to surprise the Neapolitan King and general at Velletri, and their first column penetrated into the place, but reinforcements coming up, they were repulsed with considerable slaughter.-E.
(971) On the 8th of August, Louis the Fifteenth was seized at Metz, on his march to Alsace, with a malignant putrid fever, which increased so rapidly, that, in a few days, his life was despaired of. In his illness, he dismissed his reigning mistress, Madame de Chateauroux.-E.
(972) The King of Prussia.
(973) The battle of Molwitz.
388 Letter 148 To The Hon. H. S. Conway. Houghton, Oct. 6, 1744.