MY DEAR FRIEND: I have this moment received your letter of the 10th. I
have now been here a month, bathing and drinking the waters, for
complaints much of the same kind as yours, I mean pains in my legs, hips,
and arms: whether gouty or rheumatic, God knows; but, I believe, both,
that fight without a decision in favor of either, and have absolutely
reduced me to the miserable situation of the Sphinx’s riddle, to walk
upon three legs; that is, with the assistance of my stick, to walk, or
rather hobble, very indifferently. I wish it were a declared gout, which
is the distemper of a gentleman; whereas the rheumatism is the distemper
of a hackney-coachman or chairman, who is obliged to be out in all
weathers and at all hours.
I think you will do very right to ask leave, and I dare say you will
easily get it, to go to the baths in Suabia; that is, supposing that you
have consulted some skillful physician, if such a one there be, either at
Dresden or at Leipsic, about the nature of your distemper, and the nature
of those baths; but, ‘suos quisque patimur manes’. We have but a bad
bargain, God knows, of this life, and patience is the only way not to
make bad worse. Mr. Pitt keeps his bed here, with a very real gout, and
not a political one, as is often suspected.
Here has been a congress of most of the ‘ex Ministres’. If they have
raised a battery, as I suppose they have, it is a masked one, for nothing
has transpired; only they confess that they intend a most vigorous
attack. ‘D’ailleurs’, there seems to be a total suspension of all
business, till the meeting of the parliament, and then ‘Signa canant’. I
am very glad that at this time you are out of it: and for reasons that I
need not mention: you would certainly have been sent for over, and, as
before, not paid for your journey.
Poor Harte is very ill, and condemned to the Hot well at Bristol. He is a
better poet than philosopher: for all this illness and melancholy
proceeds originally from the ill success of his “Gustavus Adolphus.” He
is grown extremely devout, which I am very glad of, because that is
always a comfort to the afflicted.
I cannot present Mr. Larpent with my New-Year’s gift, till I come to
town, which will be before Christmas at farthest; till when, God bless
you! Adieu.