You would laugh if you saw in the midst of what trumpery I am writing. Two porters have just brought home my purchases from Mrs. Kennon the midwife's sale: Brobdignag combs, old broken pots, pans, and pipkins, a lantern of scraped oyster-shells, scimitars, Turkish pipes, Chinese baskets, etc. etc. My servants think my head is turned: I hope not: it is all to be called the personal estate and moveables of my great-great-grandmother, and to be reposited at Strawberry. I believe you think my letter as strange a miscellany as my purchases.
P. S. I forgot, that I was outbid for Oliver Cromwell's nightcap.
(659) John, second Earl of Ashburnham. On the 28th of June he married Elizabeth, daughter and coheiress of Ambrose Crawley, Esq.-E.
309 Letter 174 To Sir Horace Mann. Arlington Street, Feb. 23, 1756.
I can tell you with as much truth as pleasure that your brother assuredly mends, and that his physician, Dr. Pringle, who is the Duke's has told his Royal Highness, who expresses great concern, that he now will live. He goes out to take the air every day, that is not very bad: Mr. Chute and I went to see him yesterday, and saw a real and satisfactory alteration. I don't say this to flatter you; on the contrary, I must bid you, my dear child, not to be too sanguine, for Dr. Cocchi will tell you that there is nothing more fallacious than a consumptive case; don't mistake me, it is not a consumption, though it is a consumptive disposition. His spirits are evidently better.
You will have heard, before you receive this, that the King of France and Madame Pompadour are gone into devotion. Some say, that D'Argenson, finding how much her inclination for peace with us fell in with the Monarch's humanity, (and winch indeed is the only rational account one can give of their inactivity,) employed the Cardinal de la Rochefoucault and the Confessor to threaten the most Christian King with an earthquake if he did not communicate at Easter; and that his Majesty accordingly made over his mistress to his wife, by appointing the former dame du palais: others, who refine more, pretend that Madame Pompadour, perceiving how much the King's disposition veered to devotion, artfully took the turn of humouring it, desired to be only his soul's concubine, and actually sent to ask pardon of her husband, and to offer to return to him, from which he begged to be excused-the point in dispute is whether she has or has not left off rouge. In our present hostile state we cannot arrive at any certainty on this important question; though our fate seems to depend on it!
We have had nothing in Parliament but most tedious and long debates on a West Indian regiment, to be partly composed of Swiss and Germans settled in Pennsylvania, with some Dutch officers. The opposition neither increase in numbers or eloquence; the want of the former seems to have damped the fire of the latter. the reigning fashion is expectation of an invasion; I can't say I am fashionable; nor do I expect the earthquake, though they say it is landed at Dover.
The most curious history that I have to tell you, is a malicious, pretty successful, and yet most clumsy Plot executed by the papists, in which number you will not be surprised at my including some Protestant divines, against the famous Bower,(660) author of the History of the Popes. Rumours were spread of his being discovered in correspondence with the Jesuits; some even said the correspondence was treasonable, and that he was actually in the hands of a messenger. I went to Sir George Lyttelton, his great friend, to learn the truth; he told me the story: that Sir Harry Bedingfield, whom I know for a most bigoted Papist in Norfolk, pretended to have six letters from Bower (signed A. B.) in his hands, addressed to one Father Sheldon, a Jesuit, under another name, in which A. B. affected great contrition and desires of reconciliation to that church, lamenting his living in fornication with a woman, by whom he had a child, and from whom he had got fifteen hundred pounds, which he had put into Sheldon's hands, and which he affirmed he must have again if he broke off the commerce, for that the woman insisted on having either him or her money; and offering all manner of submission to holy church, and to be sent wherever she should please; for non mea voluntas sed tua fiat:- -the last letter grieved at not being able to get his money, and to be forced to continue in sin, and concluded with telling the Jesuit that something would happen soon which would put an end to their correspondence-this is supposed to allude to his history. The similitude of hands is very great-but you know how little that can weigh! I know that Mr. Conway and my Lady Ailesbury write so alike, that I never receive a letter from either of them that I am not forced to look at the name to see from which it comes; the only difference is that she writes legibly, and he does not. These letters were shown about privately, and with injunctions of secrecy: it seems Hooke, the Roman historian, a convert to Popery, and who governs my Lord Bath and that family, is deep in this plot. At last it got to the ears of Dr. Birch, a zealous but simple Than, and of Millar the bookseller, angry at Bower for not being his printer—they trumpeted the story all over the town. Lord Pultney was One who told it me, and added, "a Popish gentleman and an English clergyman are upon the scent;" he told me Sir H. Bedingfield's name, but Would not the clergyman's. I replied, then your lordship must give me leave to say, as I don't know his name, that I suppose our doctor is as angry as Sir Harry at Bower for having written against the church of Rome. Sir G. Lyttelton went to Sir Harry, and demanded to see the letters, and asked for copies, which were promised. He soon observed twenty falsehoods and inconsistencies, particulary the mention of a patent for a place, which Sir George obtained for him, but never thought of asking till a year and a half after the date of this letter; to say nothing of the inconsistence of his taking a place as a Protestant, at the same time he was offering to go whithersoever the Jesuits would send him; and the still more glaring improbability of his risking himself again under their power! Sir George desired the woman might be produced—Sir Harry shuffled, and at last said he believed it was a lie of Bower. When he was beaten out of every point, he said, he Would put it on this single fact, "Ask Mr. Bower if he was not reconciled to the church of Rome in the year '44." The whole foundation proves to be this: Bower, who is a very child in worldly matters, was weak enough, for good interest, to put fifteen hundred pounds into the hands of one Brown, a Jesuit here in London, and from that correspondence they have forged his hand; and finding the minds of men alarmed and foolish about the invasion and the earthquake, they thought the train would take like wildfire. I told Bower, that though this trusting a Jesuit did great honour to his simplicity, it Certainly did none to his judgment. Sir George begged I would advise them what to do-they were afraid to enter into a controversy, which Hooke might manage. I told him at once that their best way would be to advertise a great reward for discovery of the forgery, and to communicate their intention to Sir Harry bedington. Sir George was pleased with the thought-and indeed it succeeded beyond expectation. Sir Harry sent word that he approved the investigation of truth, be the persons concerned of what profession they would; that he was obliged to go out of town next day for his health, but hoped at his return Sir George would give him leave to cultivate an acquaintance which this little affair had renewed. Sir George answered with great propriety and spirit, that he should be very proud of his acquaintance, but must beg leave to differ with him in calling a little affair what tended to murder a man's character, but he was glad to see that it was the best way that Rome had of answering Mr. Bower's book. You see, Sir Harry is forced to let the forgery rest on himself, rather than put a chancellor of the exchequer upon the scent after priests! He has even hesitated Upon giving Bower copies of the letters.
Since I began my letter, we hear that France is determined to try a numerous invasion in several places in England and Ireland, coute qui coute, and knowing how difficult it is. We are well-prepared and strong; they have given us time. If it were easy to invade us, we should not have waited for an attack till the year 1756. I hope to give you a good account both of England and your brother. Adieu!
(660) Bower was a man of very bad character, and it is now generally believed that he intended to cheat the Jesuits out of a sum of money.-D.