TO GEORGE MONTAGU, ESQ.

DEAR GEORGE,

Arlington Street, July 13, 1745.

We are all Cabob'd and Cocofagoed, as my Lord Denbigh says. We, who formerly, you know, could any one of us beat three Frenchmen, are now so degenerated, that three Frenchmen1 can evidently beat one Englishman. Our army is running away, all that is left to run; for half of it is picked up by three or four hundred at a time. In short, we must step out of the high pantoufles that were made by those cunning shoemakers at Poitiers and Ramillies, and go clumping about perhaps in wooden ones. My Lady Hervey, who you know dotes upon every thing French, is charmed with the hopes of these new shoes, and has already bespoke herself a pair of pigeon wood. How did the tapestry at Blenheim look? Did it glow with victory, or did all our glories look overcast?

I remember a very admired sentence in one of my Lord Chesterfield's speeches, when he was haranguing for this war; with a most rhetorical transition, he turned to the tapestry in the House of Lords, and said, with a sigh, he feared there were no historical looms at work now! Indeed, we have reason to bless the good patriots, who have been for employing our manufactures so historically. The Countess of that wise Earl, with whose two expressive words I began this letter, says, she is very happy now that my lord had never a place upon the coalition, for then all this bad situation of our affairs would have been laid upon him.

Now I have been talking of remarkable periods in our annals, I must tell you what my Lord Baltimore thinks one: -He said to the Prince t'other day, "Sir, your Royal Highness's marriage will be an area in English history."

If it were not for the life that is put into the town now and

Alluding to the success of the French army in Flanders, under the command of Mareschal Saxe.

Representing the defeat of the Spanish armada in 1588, and surrounded by portraits of the principal officers who commanded the fleet. This noble suit of hangings was wrought in Holland, at the expense of the Earl of Nottingham, lord high admiral.-E.

then by very bad news from abroad, one should be quite stupified. There is nobody left but two or three solitary regents; and they are always whisking backwards and forwards to their villas; and about a dozen antediluvian dowagers, whose carcasses have miraculously resisted the wet, and who every Saturday compose a very reverend catacomb at my old Lady Strafford's. She does not take money at the door for showing them, but you pay twelvepence a piece under the denomination of card money. Wit and beauty, indeed, remain in the persons of Lady Townshend and Lady Caroline Fitzroy; but such is the want of taste of this age, that the former is very often forced to wrap up her wit in plain English before it can be understood; and the latter is almost as often obliged to have recourse to the same artifices to make her charms be taken notice of.

Of beauty, I can tell you an admirable story. One Mrs. Comyns, an elderly gentlewoman, has lately taken a house in St. James's Street: some young gentlemen went there t'other night:-"Well, Mrs. Comyns, I hope there won't be the same disturbances here that were at your other house in Air Street."-"Lord, Sir, I never had any disturbances there: mine was as quiet a house as any in the neighbourhood, and a great deal of good company came to me: it was only the ladies of quality that envied me."—" Envied you! why, your house was pulled down about your ears."-" Oh, dear Sir! don't you know how that happened?"-" No; pray how?"— "Why, dear Sir, it was my Lady * * * who gave ten guineas to the mob to demolish my house, because her ladyship fancied I got women for Colonel Conway."

My dear George, don't you delight in this story? If poor Harry1 comes back from Flanders, I intend to have infinite fun with his prudery about this anecdote, which is full as good as if it was true. I beg you will visit Mrs. Comyns when you come to town: she has infinite humour.

The Honourable Henry Seymour Conway.

VOL. II.

E

TO SIR HORACE MANN.

July 15, 1745. You will be surprised at another from me so soon, when I wrote to you but four days ago. This is not with any news, but upon a private affair. You have never said any thing to me about the extraordinary procedure of Marquis Riccardi, of which I wrote you word. Indeed, as his letter came just upon my father's death, I had forgot it too; so much so, that

I have lost the catalogue which he sent me. Well, the other day I received his cargo. Now, my dear child, I don't write to him upon it, because, as he sent the things without asking my leave, I am determined never to acknowledge the receipt of them, because I will in no manner be liable to pay for them if they are lost, which I think highly probable; and as I have lost the catalogue, I cannot tell whether I have received all or not.

I beg you will say just what follows to him. That I am extremely amazed he should think of employing me to sell his goods for him, especially without asking my consent: that an English gentleman, just come from France, has brought me a box of things, of which he himself had no account; nor is there any letter or catalogue with them: that I suppose they may be the Marquis's collection, but that I have lost the catalogue, and consequently cannot tell whether I have received all or not, nor whether they are his: that as they came in so blind a manner, and have been opened at several custom-houses, I will not be answerable, especially having never given my consent to receive them, and having opened the box ignorantly, without knowing the contents: that when I did open it, I concluded it came from Florence, having often refused to buy most of the things, which had long lain upon the jeweller's hands on the old bridge, and which are very improper for sale here, as all the English for some years have seen them, and not thought them worth purchasing that I remember in the catalogue the price for the whole was fixed at two thousand pistoles; that they are full as much worth two-and-twenty thousand; and that I have

been laughed at by people to whom I have showed them for naming so extravagant a price: that nobody living would think of buying all together: that for myself, I have entirely left off making any collection; and if I had not, would not buy things dear now which I have formerly refused at much lower prices. That, after all, though I cannot think myself at all well used by Marquis Riccardi, either in sending me the things, in the price he has fixed on them, or in the things themselves, which to my knowledge he has picked up from the shops on the old bridge, and were no family collection, yet, as I received so many civilities at Florence from the nobility, and in particular from his wife, Madame Riccardi, if he will let me do any thing that is practicable, I will sell what I can for him. That if he will send me a new and distinct catalogue, with the price of each piece, and a price considerably less than what he has set upon the whole, I will endeavour to dispose of what I can for him. But as most of them are very indifferent, and the total value most unreasonable, I absolutely will not undertake the sale of them upon any other terms, but will pack them up, and send them away to Leghorn by the first ship that sails; for as we are at war with France, I cannot send them that way, nor will I trouble any gentleman to carry them, as he might think himself liable to make them good if they met with any accident; nor will I answer for them by whatever way they go, as I did not consent to receive them, nor am sure that I have received the Marquis's collection.

My dear Sir, translate this very distinctly for him, for he never shall receive any other notice from me; nor will I give them up to Wasner or Pucci,1 or anybody else, though he should send me an order for it; for nobody saw me open them, nor shall anybody be able to say I had them, by receiving them from me. In short, I think I cannot be too cautious in such a negotiation. If a man will send me things to the value of two thousand pistoles, whether they are really worth it or not, he shall take his chance for losing them, and

1 Ministers of the Queen of Hungary and the Great Duke.

shall certainly never come upon me for them. He must absolutely take his choice, of selling them at a proper price and separately, or of having them directly sent back by sea; for whether he consents to either or not, I shall certainly proceed in my resolution about them the very instant I receive an answer from you; for the sooner I am clear of them the better. If he will let me sell them without setting a price, he may depend upon my taking the best method for his service; though really, my dear child, it will be for my own honour, not for his sake, who has treated me so impertinently. I am sorry to give you this trouble, but judge how much the fool gives me! Adieu!

TO SIR HORACE MANN.

Arlington Street, July 26, 1745. It is a pain to me to write to you, when all I can tell you will but distress you. How much I wish myself with you! anywhere, where I should have my thoughts detached in some degree by distance and by length of time from England! With all the reasons that I have for not loving great part of it, it is impossible not to feel the shock of living at the period of all its greatness! to be one of the Ultimi Romanorum! I will not proceed upon the chapter of reflections, but mention some facts, which will supply your thoughts with all I should say.

The French make no secret of their intending to come hither; the letters from Holland speak of it as a notoriety. Their Mediterranean fleet is come to Rochfort, and they have another at Brest. Their immediate design is to attack our army, the very lessening which will be victory for them. Our six hundred men, which have lain cooped up in the river till they had contracted diseases, are at last gone to Ostend. Of all this our notable ministry still make a secret: one cannot learn the least particulars from them. This anxiety for my friends in the army, this uncertainty about ourselves, if it can be called uncertain that we are