LONDON, _Nov._ 25, 1710.
I WILL tell you something that’s plaguy silly: I had forgot to say on the
23d in my last, where I dined; and because I had done it constantly, I
thought it was a great omission, and was going to interline it; but at
last the silliness of it made me cry, Pshah, and I let it alone. I was
to-day to see the Parliament meet; but only saw a great crowd; and Ford
and I went to see the tombs at Westminster, and sauntered so long I was
forced to go to an eating-house for my dinner. Bromley {76a} is chosen
Speaker, _nemine contradicente_: Do you understand those two words? And
Pompey, Colonel Hill’s {76b} black, designs to stand Speaker for the
footmen. {76c} I am engaged to use my interest for him, and have spoken
to Patrick to get him some votes. We are now all impatient for the
Queen’s speech, what she will say about removing the Ministry, etc. I
have got a cold, and I don’t know how; but got it I have, and am hoarse:
I don’t know whether it will grow better or worse. What’s that to you?
I won’t answer your letter to-night. I’ll keep you a little longer in
suspense: I can’t send it. Your mother’s cakes are very good, and one of
them serves me for a breakfast, and so I’ll go sleep like a good boy.
26. I have got a cruel cold, and stayed within all this day in my
nightgown, and dined on sixpennyworth of victuals, and read and writ, and
was denied to everybody. Dr. Raymond {77a} called often, and I was
denied; and at last, when I was weary, I let him come up, and asked him,
without consequence, how Patrick denied me, and whether he had the art of
it? So by this means he shall be used to have me denied to him;
otherwise he would be a plaguy trouble and hindrance to me: he has sat
with me two hours, and drank a pint of ale cost me fivepence, and smoked
his pipe, and it is now past eleven that he is just gone. Well, my
eighth is with you now, young women; and your seventh to me is somewhere
in a post-boy’s bag; and so go to your gang of deans, and Stoytes, and
Walls, and lose your money; go, sauceboxes: and so good-night, and be
happy, dear rogues. Oh, but your box was sent to Dr. Hawkshaw by Sterne,
and you will have it with Hawkshaw, and spectacles, etc., etc.
27. To-day Mr. Harley met me in the Court of Requests, {77b} and
whispered me to dine with him. At dinner I told him what those bishops
had done, and the difficulty I was under. He bid me never trouble
myself; he would tell the Duke of Ormond the business was done, and that
he need not concern himself about it. So now I am easy, and they may
hang themselves for a parcel of insolent, ungrateful rascals. I suppose
I told you in my last, how they sent an address to the Duke of Ormond,
and a letter to Southwell, to call on me for the papers, after the thing
was over; but they had not received my letter, though the Archbishop
might, by what I writ to him, have expected it would be done. Well,
there is an end of that; and in a little time the Queen will send them
notice, etc. And so the methods will be settled; and then I shall think
of returning, although the baseness of those bishops makes me love
Ireland less than I did.
28. Lord Halifax sent to invite me to dinner; where I stayed till six,
and crossed him in all his Whig talk, and made him often come over to me.
I know he makes court to the new men, although he affects to talk like a
Whig. I had a letter to-day from the Bishop of Clogher; but I writ to
him lately, that I would obey his commands to the Duke of Ormond. He
says I bid him read the London “Shaver,” and that you both swore it was
“Shaver,” and not “Shower.” {78a} You all lie, and you are puppies, and
can’t read Presto’s hand. The Bishop is out entirely in his conjectures
of my share in the _Tatlers_.—I have other things to mind, and of much
greater importance; {78b} else I have little to do to be acquainted with
a new Ministry, who consider me a little more than Irish bishops do.
29. Now for your saucy, good dear letter: let me see, what does it say?
come then. I dined to-day with Ford, and went home early; he debauched
{78c} me to his chamber again with a bottle of wine till twelve: so
good-night. I cannot write an answer now, you rogues.
30. To-day I have been visiting, which I had long neglected; and I dined
with Mrs. Barton alone; and sauntered at the Coffee-house till past
eight, and have been busy till eleven, and now I’ll answer your letter,
saucebox. Well, let me see now again. My wax candle’s almost out, but
however I’ll begin. Well then, do not be so tedious, Mr. Presto; what
can you say to MD’s letter? Make haste, have done with your
preambles—Why, I say I am glad you are so often abroad; your mother
thinks it is want of exercise hurts you, and so do I. (She called here
to-night, but I was not within, that’s by the bye.) Sure you do not
deceive me, Stella, when you say you are in better health than you were
these three weeks; for Dr. Raymond told me yesterday, that Smyth of the
Blind Quay had been telling Mr. Leigh that he left you extremely ill; and
in short, spoke so, that he almost put poor Leigh into tears, and would
have made me run distracted; though your letter is dated the 11th
instant, and I saw Smyth in the city above a fortnight ago, as I passed
by in a coach. Pray, pray, don’t write, Stella, until you are mighty,
mighty, mighty, mighty well in your eyes, and are sure it won’t do you
the least hurt. Or come, I’ll tell you what; you, Mistress Stella, shall
write your share at five or six sittings, one sitting a day; and then
comes Dingley all together, and then Stella a little crumb towards the
end, to let us see she remembers Presto; and then conclude with something
handsome and genteel, as your most humblecumdumble, or, etc. O Lord!
does Patrick write word of my not coming till spring? Insolent man! he
know my secrets? No; as my Lord Mayor said, No; if I thought my shirt
knew, etc. Faith, I will come as soon as it is any way proper for me to
come; but, to say the truth, I am at present a little involved with the
present Ministry in some certain things (which I tell you as a secret);
and soon as ever I can clear my hands, I will stay no longer; for I hope
the First-Fruit business will be soon over in all its forms. But, to say
the truth, the present Ministry have a difficult task, and want me, etc.
Perhaps they may be just as grateful as others: but, according to the
best judgment I have, they are pursuing the true interest of the public;
and therefore I am glad to contribute what is in my power. For God’s
sake, not a word of this to any alive.—Your Chancellor? {80a} Why,
madam, I can tell you he has been dead this fortnight. Faith, I could
hardly forbear our little language about a nasty dead Chancellor, as you
may see by the blot. {80b} Ploughing? A pox plough them; they’ll plough
me to nothing. But have you got your money, both the ten pounds? How
durst he pay you the second so soon? Pray be good huswifes. Ay, well,
and Joe, why, I had a letter lately from Joe, desiring I would take some
care of their poor town, {80c} who, he says, will lose their liberties.
To which I desired Dr. Raymond would return answer, that the town had
behaved themselves so ill to me, so little regarded the advice I gave
them, and disagreed so much among themselves, that I was resolved never
to have more to do with them; but that whatever personal kindness I could
do to Joe, should be done. Pray, when you happen to see Joe, tell him
this, lest Raymond should have blundered or forgotten—Poor Mrs.
Wesley!—Why these poligyes {80d} for being abroad? Why should you be at
home at all, until Stella is quite well?—So, here is Mistress Stella
again, with her two eggs, etc. My “Shower” admired with you; why, the
Bishop of Clogher says, he has seen something of mine of the same sort,
better than the “Shower.” I suppose he means “The Morning”; {80e} but it
is not half so good. I want your judgment of things, and not your
country’s. How does MD like it? and do they taste it _all_? etc. I am
glad Dean Bolton {81a} has paid the twenty pounds. Why should not I
chide the Bishop of Clogher for writing to the Archbishop of Cashel,
{81b} without sending the letter first to me? It does not signify a —;
for he has no credit at Court. Stuff—they are all puppies. I will break
your head in good earnest, young woman, for your nasty jest about Mrs.
Barton. {81c} Unlucky sluttikin, what a word is there! Faith, I was
thinking yesterday, when I was with her, whether she could break them or
no, and it quite spoilt my imagination. “Mrs. Walls, does Stella win as
she pretends?” “No indeed, Doctor; she loses always, and will play so
_ventersomely_, how can she win?” See here now; an’t you an impudent
lying slut? Do, open Domville’s letter; what does it signify, if you
have a mind? Yes, faith, you write smartly with your eyes shut; all was
well but the _n_. See how I can do it; _Madam Stella_, _your humble
servant_. {81d} O, but one may look whether one goes crooked or no, and
so write on. I will tell you what you may do; you may write with your
eyes half shut, just as when one is going to sleep: I have done so for
two or three lines now; it is but just seeing enough to go straight.—Now,
Madam Dingley, I think I bid you tell Mr. Walls that, in case there be
occasion, I will serve his friend as far as I can; but I hope there will
be none. Yet I believe you will have a new Parliament; but I care not
whether you have or no a better. You are mistaken in all your
conjectures about the _Tatlers_. I have given him one or two hints, and
you have heard me talk about the Shilling. {81e} Faith, these answering
letters are very long ones: you have taken up almost the room of a week
in journals; and I will tell you what, I saw fellows wearing crosses
to-day, {81f} and I wondered what was the matter; but just this minute I
recollect it is little Presto’s birthday; and I was resolved these three
days to remember it when it came, but could not. Pray, drink my health
to-day at dinner; do, you rogues. Do you like “Sid Hamet’s Rod”? Do you
understand it all? Well, now at last I have done with your letter, and
so I will lay me down to sleep, and about, fair maids; and I hope merry
maids all.
Dec. 1. Morning. I wish Smyth were hanged. I was dreaming the most
melancholy things in the world of poor Stella, and was grieving and
crying all night.—Pshah, it is foolish: I will rise and divert myself; so
good-morrow; and God of His infinite mercy keep and protect you! The
Bishop of Clogher’s letter is dated Nov. 21. He says you thought of
going with him to Clogher. I am heartily glad of it, and wish you would
ride there, and Dingley go in a coach. I have had no fit since my first,
although sometimes my head is not quite in good order.—At night. I was
this morning to visit Mr. Pratt, who is come over with poor, sick Lord
Shelburne: they made me dine with them; and there I stayed, like a booby,
till eight, looking over them at ombre, and then came home. Lord
Shelburne’s giddiness is turned into a colic, and he looks miserably.
2. Steele, the rogue, has done the imprudentest thing in the world: he
said something in a _Tatler_, {82a} that we ought to use the word Great
Britain, and not England, in common conversation, as, “The finest lady in
Great Britain,” etc. Upon this, Rowe, Prior, and I sent him a letter,
turning this into ridicule. He has to-day printed the letter, {82b} and
signed it J.S., M.P., and N.R., the first letters of all our names.
Congreve told me to-day, he smoked it immediately. Congreve and I, and
Sir Charles Wager, dined to-day at Delaval’s, the Portugal Envoy; and I
stayed there till eight, and came home, and am now writing to you before
I do business, because that dog Patrick is not at home, and the fire is
not made, and I am not in my gear. Pox take him!—I was looking by chance
at the top of this side, and find I make plaguy mistakes in words; so
that you must fence against that as well as bad writing. Faith, I can’t
nor won’t read what I have written. (Pox of this puppy!) Well, I’ll
leave you till I am got to bed, and then I will say a word or two.—Well,
’tis now almost twelve, and I have been busy ever since, by a fire too (I
have my coals by half a bushel at a time, I’ll assure you), and now I am
got to bed. Well, and what have you to say to Presto now he is abed?
Come now, let us hear your speeches. No, ’tis a lie; I an’t sleepy yet.
Let us sit up a little longer, and talk. Well, where have you been
to-day, that you are but just this minute come home in a coach? What
have you lost? Pay the coachman, Stella. No, faith, not I, he’ll
grumble.—What new acquaintance have you got? come, let us hear. I have
made Delaval promise to send me some Brazil tobacco from Portugal for
you, Madam Dingley. I hope you will have your chocolate and spectacles
before this comes to you.
3. Pshaw, I must be writing to these dear saucy brats every night,
whether I will or no, let me have what business I will, or come home ever
so late, or be ever so sleepy; but an old saying, and a true one,
“Be you lords, or be you earls,
You must write to naughty girls.”
I was to-day at Court, and saw Raymond among the Beefeaters, staying to
see the Queen: so I put him in a better station, made two or three dozen
of bows, and went to church, and then to Court again, to pick up a
dinner, as I did with Sir John Stanley; and then we went to visit Lord
Mountjoy, and just now left him; and ’tis near eleven at night, young
women; and methinks this letter comes pretty near to the bottom, and ’tis
but eight days since the date, and don’t think I’ll write on the other
side, I thank you for nothing. Faith, if I would use you to letters on
sheets as broad as this room, you would always expect them from me. O,
faith, I know you well enough; but an old saying, etc.,
“Two sides in a sheet,
And one in a street.”
I think that’s but a silly old saying; and so I’ll go to sleep, and do
you so too.
4. I dined to-day with Mrs. Vanhomrigh, and then came home, and studied
till eleven. No adventure at all to-day.
5. So I went to the Court of Requests (we have had the Devil and all of
rain by the bye) to pick up a dinner; and Henley made me go dine with him
and one Colonel Bragg {84a} at a tavern; cost me money, faith. Congreve
was to be there, but came not. I came with Henley to the Coffee-house,
where Lord Salisbury {84b} seemed mighty desirous to talk with me; and,
while he was wriggling himself into my favour, that dog Henley asked me
aloud, whether I would go to see Lord Somers as I had promised (which was
a lie); and all to vex poor Lord Salisbury, who is a high Tory. He
played two or three other such tricks; and I was forced to leave my lord,
and I came home at seven, and have been writing ever since, and will now
go to bed. The other day I saw Jack Temple {84c} in the Court of
Requests: it was the first time of seeing him; so we talked two or three
careless words, and parted. Is it true that your Recorder and Mayor, and
fanatic aldermen, a month or two ago, at a solemn feast, drank Mr.
Harley’s, Lord Rochester’s, {84d} and other Tory healths? Let me know;
it was confidently said here.—The scoundrels! It shan’t do, Tom.
6. When is this letter to go, I wonder? harkee, young women, tell me
that. Saturday next for certain, and not before: then it will be just a
fortnight; time enough for naughty girls, and long enough for two
letters, faith. Congreve and Delaval have at last prevailed on Sir
Godfrey Kneller to entreat me to let him draw my picture for nothing; but
I know not yet when I shall sit. {84e}—It is such monstrous rainy
weather, that there is no doing with it. Secretary St. John sent to me
this morning, that my dining with him to-day was put off till to-morrow;
so I peaceably sat with my neighbour Ford, dined with him, and came home
at six, and am now in bed as usual; and now it is time to have another
letter from MD, yet I would not have it till this goes; for that would
look like two letters for one. Is it not whimsical that the Dean has
never once written to me? And I find the Archbishop very silent to that
letter I sent him with an account that the business was done. I believe
he knows not what to write or say; and I have since written twice to him,
both times with a vengeance. {85a} Well, go to bed, sirrahs, and so will
I. But have you lost to-day? Three shillings! O fie, O fie!
7. No, I won’t send this letter to-day, nor till Saturday, faith; and I
am so afraid of one from MD between this and that; if it comes, I will
just say I received a letter, and that is all. I dined to-day with Mr.
Secretary St. John, where were Lord Anglesea, {85b} Sir Thomas Hanmer,
Prior, Freind, etc., and then made a debauch after nine at Prior’s house,
and have eaten cold pie, and I hate the thoughts of it, and I am full,
and I don’t like it, and I will go to bed, and it is late, and so
good-night.
8. To-day I dined with Mr. Harley and Prior; but Mr. St. John did not
come, though he promised: he chid me for not seeing him oftener. Here is
a damned, libellous pamphlet come out against Lord Wharton, giving the
character first, and then telling some of his actions: the character is
very well, but the facts indifferent. {85c} It has been sent by dozens
to several gentlemen’s lodgings, and I had one or two of them; but nobody
knows the author or printer. We are terribly afraid of the plague; they
say it is at Newcastle. {86a} I begged Mr. Harley for the love of God to
take some care about it, or we are all ruined. There have been orders
for all ships from the Baltic to pass their quarantine before they land;
but they neglect it. You remember I have been afraid these two years.
9. O, faith, you are a saucy rogue. I have had your sixth letter just
now, before this is gone; but I will not answer a word of it, only that I
never was giddy since my first fit; but I have had a cold just a
fortnight, and cough with it still morning and evening; but it will go
off. It is, however, such abominable weather that no creature can walk.
They say here three of your Commissioners will be turned out, Ogle,
South, and St. Quintin; {86b} and that Dick Stewart {86c} and Ludlow will
be two of the new ones. I am a little soliciting for another: it is poor
Lord Abercorn, {86d} but that is a secret; I mean, that I befriend him is
a secret; but I believe it is too late, by his own fault and ill fortune.
I dined with him to-day. I am heartily sorry you do not go to Clogher,
faith, I am; and so God Almighty protect poor, dear, dear, dear, dearest
MD. Farewell till to-night. I’ll begin my eleventh to-night; so I am
always writing to little MD.