[991] Horace Walpole wrote, on Jan. 15, 1775 (Letters, vi. 171):—'They [the Millers] hold a Parnassus-fair every Thursday, give out rhymes and themes, and all the flux of quality at Bath contend for the prizes. A Roman Vase, dressed with pink ribands and myrtles, receives the poetry, which is drawn out every festival: six judges of these Olympic games retire and select the brightest compositions, which the respective successful acknowledge, kneel to Mrs. Calliope Miller, kiss her fair hand, and are crowned by it with myrtle, with—I don't know what.'
[992] Miss Burney wrote, in 1780:—'Do you know now that, notwithstanding Bath-Easton is so much laughed at in London, nothing here is more tonish than to visit Lady Miller. She is a round, plump, coarse-looking dame of about forty, and while all her aim is to appear an elegant woman of fashion, all her success is to seem an ordinary woman in very common life, with fine clothes on.' Mme. D'Arblay's Diary, i. 364.
[993] 'Yes, on my faith, there are bouts-rimés on a buttered muffin, made by her Grace the Duchess of Northumberland.' Walpole's Letters, vi. 171. 'She was,' Walpole writes, 'a jovial heap of contradictions. She was familiar with the mob, while stifled with diamonds; and yet was attentive to the most minute privileges of her rank, while almost shaking hands with a cobbler.' Memoirs of the Reign of George III, i. 419. Dr. Percy showed her Goldsmith's ballad of Edwin and Angelina in MS., and she had a few copies privately printed. Forster's Goldsmith, i. 379.
[994] Perhaps Mr. Seward, who was something of a literary man, and who visited Bath (post, under March 30, 1783).
[995]
'—rerum Fluctibus in mediis et tempestatibus urbis.'
Horace, Epistles, ii. 2. 84. See ante, i. 461.
[996]
'Qui semel adspexit quantum dimissa petitis
Præstent, mature redeat repetatque relicta.'
Horace, Epistles, i. 7. 96.