STRAWBERRY HILL, _Sept._ 27, 1761.
You are a mean, mercenary woman. If you did not want histories of
weddings and coronations, and had not jobs to be executed about muslins,
and a bit of china, and counterband goods, one should never hear of you.
When you don't want a body, you can frisk about with greffiers and
burgomasters, and be as merry in a dyke as my lady frog herself. The
moment your curiosity is agog, or your cambric seized, you recollect a
good cousin in England, and, as folks said two hundred years ago, begin
to write "upon the knees of your heart." Well! I am a sweet-tempered
creature, I forgive you.
[Illustration: THE LIBRARY, STRAWBERRY HILL]
My heraldry was much more offended at the Coronation with the ladies
that did walk, than with those that walked out of their place; yet I was
not so _perilously_ angry as my Lady Cowper, who refused to set a foot
with my Lady Macclesfield; and when she was at last obliged to associate
with her, set out on a round trot, as if she designed to prove the
antiquity of her family by marching as lustily as a maid of honour of
Queen Gwiniver. It was in truth a brave sight. The sea of heads in
Palace-yard, the guards, horse and foot, the scaffolds, balconies, and
procession exceeded imagination. The Hall, when once illuminated, was
noble; but they suffered the whole parade to return into it in the
dark, that his Majesty might be surprised with the quickness with which
the sconces catched fire. The Champion acted well; the other Paladins
had neither the grace nor alertness of Rinaldo. Lord Effingham and the
Duke of Bedford were but untoward knights errant; and Lord Talbot had
not much more dignity than the figure of General Monk in the Abbey. The
habit of the peers is unbecoming to the last degree; but the peeresses
made amends for all defects. Your daughter Richmond, Lady Kildare, and
Lady Pembroke were as handsome as the Graces. Lady Rochford, Lady
Holdernesse, and Lady Lyttelton looked exceedingly well in that their
day; and for those of the day before, the Duchess of Queensbury, Lady
Westmoreland and Lady Albemarle were surprising. Lady Harrington was
noble at a distance, and so covered with diamonds, that you would have
thought she had bid somebody or other, like Falstaff, _rob me the
Exchequer_. Lady Northampton was very magnificent too, and looked
prettier than I have seen her of late. Lady Spencer and Lady Bolingbroke
were not the worst figures there. The Duchess of Ancaster [Mistress of
the Robes] marched alone after the Queen with much majesty; and there
were two new Scotch peeresses that pleased everybody, Lady Sutherland
and Lady Dunmore. _Per contra_, were Lady P----, who had put a wig on,
and old E----, who had scratched hers off; Lady S----, the Dowager
E----, and a Lady Say and Sele, with her tresses coal-black, and her
hair coal-white. Well! it was all delightful, but not half so charming
as its being over. The gabble one heard about it for six weeks before,
and the fatigue of the day, could not well be compensated by a mere
puppet-show; for puppet-show it was, though it cost a million. The Queen
is so gay that we shall not want sights; she has been at the Opera, the
Beggar's Opera and the Rehearsal, and two nights ago carried the King to
Ranelagh.
Some of the peeresses were so fond of their robes, that they graciously
exhibited themselves for a whole day before to all the company their
servants could invite to see them. A maid from Richmond begged leave to
stay in town because the Duchess of Montrose was only to be seen from
two to four. The Heralds were so ignorant of their business, that,
though pensioned for nothing but to register lords and ladies, and what
belongs to them, they advertised in the newspaper for the Christian
names and places of abode of the peeresses. The King complained of such
omissions and of the want of precedent; Lord Effingham, the Earl
Marshal, told him, it was true there had been great neglect in that
office, but he had now taken such care of registering directions, that
_next coronation_ would be conducted with the greatest order imaginable.
The King was so diverted with this _flattering_ speech that he made the
earl repeat it several times.
On this occasion one saw to how high-water-mark extravagance is risen in
England. At the Coronation of George II. my mother gave forty guineas
for a dining-room, scaffold, and bedchamber. An exactly parallel
apartment, only with rather a worse view, was this time set at three
hundred and fifty guineas--a tolerable rise in thirty-three years! The
platform from St. Margaret's Roundhouse to the church-door, which
formerly let for forty pounds, went this time for two thousand four
hundred pounds. Still more was given for the inside of the Abbey. The
prebends would like a Coronation every year. The King paid nine thousand
pounds for the hire of jewels; indeed, last time, it cost my father
fourteen hundred to bejewel my Lady Orford.
_A COURT BALL--PAMPHLETS ON MR. PITT--A SONG BY GRAY._