“I said to General Paoli, it was wonderful how much Corsica had done for me, how far I had got in the world by having been there. I had got upon a rock in Corsica and jumped into the middle of life.”
27th May, 1783.
“It was observed by somebody that Lord Dundonald attended to the church very ill. Miss Preston said that their two black servants were generally there every Sunday,—‘Ay,’ said Mr. Charles Preston, ‘but two blacks don’t make a white.’”
Valley Field, 17th October, 1778.
UXORIANA.
“When I was warm, telling of my own consequence and generosity, my wife made some cool humbling remarks upon me. I flew into a violent passion; I said if you throw cold water on a plate of iron much heated it will burst into shivers.”
“She recommended reading the ‘Arabian Nights Entertainments’ to one in bad health and low spirits; ‘not,’ said she; ‘to be taken into the mind, but to keep out disturbing thoughts; let them be like a sentry, whom we do not admit into the chamber of a sick person, but place at the door to prevent noisy intruders.’”
“She disapproved of my inviting Mr. M——sh, a man of ability but of violent manners, to make one in a genteel party at our house one evening. ‘He is,’ said she, ‘like fire and water, useful, but not to be brought into company.’”