Jerome K. Jerome - "Clocks"

Eleanor Hodgman Porter - "Oh, Money! Money!"

Israel Abrahams - "Judaism"

George Bernard Shaw - "Press Cuttings"

New Philadelphia Book Publisher Highlights Local Talent
Book and Publishing News from Publishers Newswire(tm)

Looking for Child to be on Cover of a New Book, 'The Model Child'
PHILADELPHIA, Pa. -- The Philadelphia literary world will celebrate the launch of two new players today, April 10th: Kay Square Press, a new publishing company focused on Philadelphia-area artists, their stories, and their art; and Kay Square's first release, 'With the Rich and Mighty: Emlen Etting of Philadelphia' (ISBN: 978-0-9815129-0-7), a critical biography by Kenneth C. Kaleta.

FlatSigned Press Alleges Don Imus Remarks Damage Legacy of President Gerald R. Ford
NEW YORK, N.Y. -- Nathan Yungerberg, an accomplished model scout and professional child photographer is launching a nation-wide casting call to find the cover model for his highly anticipated book release, 'The Model Child: A Parents Guide to the Child Modeling Industry' (ISBN: 978-0-9817018-0-6).

Books: The Letters of Horace Walpole Volume 3

H >> Horace Walpole >> The Letters of Horace Walpole Volume 3






Letter 307 To George Montagu, Esq.
Strawberry Hill, June 20, 1766. (page 481)

I don't know when I shall see you, but therefore must not I write
to you? Yet I have as little to say as may be. I could cry
through a whole page over the bad weather. I have but a lock of
hay, you know; and I cannot get it dry, unless I bring it to the
fire. I would give half-a-crown for a pennyworth of sun. It is
abominable to be ruined in coals in the middle of June.

What pleasure have you to come! there is a new thing published,
that will make you split your cheeks with laughing. It is called
the New Bath Guide.(960) It stole into the world, and for a
fortnight no soul looked into it, concluding its name was the
true name. No such thing. It is a set of letters in verse, in
all kind of verses, describing the life at Bath, and incidentally
every thing else; but so much wit, so much humour, fun, and
poetry, so much originality, never met together before. Then the
man has a better ear than Dryden or Handel. Apropos to Dryden,
he has burlesqued his St. Cecilia, that you will never read it
again without laughing. There is a description of a milliner's
box in all the terms of landscape, painted lawns and chequered
shades, a Moravian ode, and a Methodist ditty, that are
incomparable, and the best names that ever were composed. I can
say it by heart, though a quarto, and if I had time would write
it you down; for it is not yet reprinted, and not one to be had.

There are two volumes, too, of Swift's Correspondence, that will
not amuse you less in another way, though abominable, for there
are letters of twenty persons now alive; fifty of Lady Betty
Germain, one that does her great honour in which she defends her
friend Lady Suffolk, with all the spirit in the world,(961)
against that brute, who hated every body that he hoped would get
him a mitre, and did not. His own Journal sent to Stella during
the four last years of the Queen, is a fund of entertainment.
You will see his insolence in full colours, and, at the same
time, how daily vain he was of being noticed by the ministers he
affected to treat arrogantly. His panic, at the Mohocks is
comical; but what strikes one, is bringing before one's eyes the
incidents of a curious period. He goes to the rehearsal of Cato,
and says the drab that acted Cato's daughter could not say her
part. This was only Mrs. Oldfield. I was saying before George
Selwyn, that this journal put me in mind of the present time,
there was the same indecision, irresolution, and want of system;
but I added, "There is nothing new under the sun." "No," said
Selwyn, "nor under the grandson."

My Lord Chesterfield has done me much honour: he told Mrs. Anne
Pitt that he would subscribe to any politics that I should lay
down. When she repeated this to me, I said, "Pray tell him I
have laid down politics."

I am got into puns and will tell you an excellent one of the King
of France, though it does not spell any better than Selwyn's.
You must have heard of Count Lauragais, and his horserace, and
his quacking his horse till he killed it. At his return the King
asked him what he had been doing in England? "Sire, j'ai appris
`a Penser"--"Des chevaux?" replied the King.(962) Good night! I
am tired, and going to bed. Yours ever.

(960) By Christopher Anstey. This production became highly
popular for its pointed and original humour, and led to numerous
imitations. Gray, in a letter to Dr. Wharton, says--"Have you
read the New Bath Guide? It is the only thing in fashion, and is
a new and original kind of humour. Miss Prue's conversation I
doubt you will paste down, as Sir W. St. Quintyn did before he
carried it to his daughter; yet I remember you all read Crazy
Tales without pasting." Works, vol. iv. p. 84.-E.

(961) The letter in question is dated Feb. 8, 1732-3, and the
following is the passage to which Walpole refers;--"Those out of
power and place always see the faults of those in, with dreadful
large spectacles. The strongest in my memory is Sir Robert
Walpole, being first pulled to pieces in the year 1720, because
the South Sea did not rise high enough; and since that, he has
been to the full as well banged about, because it did rise too
high. I am determined never wholly to believe any side or party
against@ the other; so my house receives them altogether, and
those people meet here that have, and would fight in any other
place. Those of them that have great and good qualities and
virtues, I love and admire; in which number is Lady Suffolk,
because I know her to be a wise, discreet, honest, and sincere
courtier."-E.

(962) See ant`e, p. 389, letter 248, note 802.-E.



Letter 308 To The Right Hon. Lady Hervey.
Strawberry Hill, June 28, 1766. (page 482)

It is consonant to your ladyship's long experienced goodness, to
remove my error as soon as you could. In fact, the same post
that brought Madame d'Aiguillon's letter to you, brought me a
confession from Madame du Deffand of her guilt.(963) I am not
the less obliged to your ladyship for informing against the true
criminal. It is well for
me, however, that I hesitated, and did not, as Monsieur Guerchy
pressed me to do, constitute myself prisoner. What a ridiculous
vainglorious figure I should have made at Versailles, with a
laboured letter and my present! I still shudder when I think of
it, and have scolded(9
64) Madame du Deffand black and blue. However, I feel very
comfortable; and though it will be imputed to my own vanity, that
I showed the box as Madam de Choiseul's present, I resign the
glory, and submit to the Shame with great satisfaction. I have
no pain in receiving this present from Madame du Deffand; and
must own have great pleasure that nobody but she could write that
most charming of all letters. Did not Lord Chesterfield think it
so, Madam? I doubt our friend Mr. Hume must allow that not only
Madame de Boufflers, but Voltaire himself, could not have written
so well. When I give up Madame de S`evign`e herself, I think his
sacrifices will be trifling.

Pray, Madam, continue your waters; and, if possible, wash away
that original sin, the gout. What would one give for a little
rainbow to tell one one should never have it again! Well, but
then one should have a burning fever--for I think the greatest
comfort that good-natured divines give us IS, that we are not to
be drowned any more, in order that we may be burned. It will not
at least be this summer. here is nothing but haycocks swimming
round me. If it should cease raining by Monday se'nnight, I
think of' dining with your ladyship at Old Windsor; and if Mr.
Bateman presses me mightily, I may take a bed there.

As I have a waste of paper before me, and nothing more to say, I
have a mind to fill it with a translation of a tale that I found
lately in the Dictionnaire d'Anecdotes, taken from a German
author. The novelty of it struck me, and I put it into verse--
ill enough; but as the old Duchess of Rutland used to say of a
lie, it will do for news into the country.

"From Time's usurping power, I see,
Not Acheron itself is free.
His wasting hand my subjects feel,
Grow old, and wrinkle though in Hell.
Decrepit is Alecto grown,
Megaera worn to skin and bone;
And t'other beldam is so old,
She has not spirits left to scold.
Go, Hermes, bid my brother Jove
Send three new Furies from above."
To Mercury thus Pluto said:
The winged deity obey'd.

It was about the self same season
That Juno, with as little reason,
Rung for her abigail; and, you know,
Iris is chambermaid to Juno.
"Iris, d'ye hear? Mind what I say;
I want three maids--inquire--No, stay!
Three virgins--Yes, unspotted all;
No characters equivocal.
Go find me three, whose manners pure
Can Envy's sharpest tooth endure."
The goddess curtsey'd, and retired;
>From London to Pekin inquired;
Search'd huts and palaces in vain;
And tired, to Heaven came back again.
"Alone! are you return'd alone?
How wicked must the world be grown!
What has my profligate been doing?
On earth has he been spreading ruin?
Come, tell me all."--Fair Iris sigh'd,
And thus disconsolate replied:--
"'Tis true, O Queen! three maids I found--
The like are not on Christian ground--
So chaste, severe, immaculate,
The very name of man they hate:
These--but, alas! I came too late;
For Hermes had been there before--
In triumph off to Pluto bore
Three sisters, whom yourself would own
The true supports of Virtue's throne."
"To Pluto!--Mercy!" cried the Queen,
"What can my brother Pluto mean?
Poor man! he doats, or mad he sure is!
What can he want them for?"--"Three Furies."

You will say I am an infernal poet; but every body cannot write
as they do aux Champs Elys`ees. Adieu, Madam!

(963) Madame du Deffand had sent Mr. Walpole a snuff-box, on the
lid of which was a portrait of Madame de S`evign`e, accompanied
by a letter written in her name from the Elysian Fields, and
addressed to Mr. Walpole; who did not at first suspect Madame du
Deffand as the author, but thought both the present and the
letter had come from the Duchess of Choiseul. ("One of the
principal features, and it must be called, when carried to such
excess, one of the principal weaknesses of Mr. Walpole's
character, was a fear of ridicule--a fear which, , like most
others, often leads to greater dangers than that which it seeks
to avoid. At the commencement of his acquaintance with madame du
Deffand, he was near fifty, and she above seventy years of age,
and entirely blind. She had already long passed the first epoch
in the life of a Frenchwoman, that of gallantry, and had as long
been established as a bel esprit; and it is to be remembered
that, in the ante-revolutionary world of paris, these epochs in
life were as determined, and as strictly observed, as the changes
of dress on a particular day of the different seasons; and that a
woman endeavouring to attract lovers after she ceased to be
galante, would have been not less ridiculous as her wearing
velvet when the rest of the world were in demi-soisons. Madame
du Deffand, therefore, old and blind, had no more idea of
attracting Mr. Walpole to her as a lover than she had of the
possibility of any one suspecting her of such an intention; and
indeed her lively feelings, and the violent fancy she had taken
for his conversation and character, in every expression of
admiration and attachment which she really felt, and which she
never supposed capable of misinterpretation. By himself they
were not misinterpreted; but he seems to have had ever before his
eyes a very unnecessary dread of that being so by others--a fear
lest madame du Deffand's extreme partiality and high opinion
should expose him to suspicions of entertaining the same opinion
of himself, or of its leading her to some extravagant mark of
attachment; and all this, he persuaded himself, was to be exposed
in their letters to all the clerks of the post-office at paris
and all the idlers at Versailles. This accounts for the
ungracious language in which he often replied to the
importunities of her anxious affection; a language so foreign to
his heart, and so contrary to his own habits in friendship: this
too accounts for his constantly repressing on her part all
effusions of sentiment, all disquisitions on the human heart, and
all communications of its vexations, weaknesses, and pains."
Preface to "Letters of Madame du Deffand to Mr. Walpole."-E.

(964) Vous avez si bien fait," replied Madame du Deffand, "par vo
le`cons, vos pr`eceptes, vos gronderies, et, le pis do tous, par
vos ironies, que vous `etes presque parvenu `a me rendre fausse,
ou, pour le moins, fort dissimul`ee."-E.



Letter 309 To George Montagu, Esq.
Arlington Street, July 10, 1766. (page 485)

Don't you think a complete year enough for any administration to
last? One, who at least can remove them, though he cannot make
them, thinks so; and, accordingly, yesterday notified that he had
sent for Mr. Pitt.(965) Not a jot more is known; but as this set
is sacrificed to their resolution to have nothing to do with Lord
Bute, the new list will probably not be composed Of such hostile
ingredients. The arrangement I believe settled in the outlines;
if it is not, it may still never take place: it will not be the
first time this egg has been addled. One is very sure that many
people on all sides will be displeased, and I think no side quite
contented. Your cousins, the house of Yorke, Lord George
Sackville, Newcastle, and Lord Rockingham, will certainly not be
of the elect. What Lord Temple will do, or if any thing will be
done for George Grenville, are great points of curiosity. The
plan will probably be, to pick and cull from all quarters, and
break all parties as much as possible.(966) From this moment I
date the wane of Mr. Pitt's glory; he will want the thorough-bass
of drums and trumpets, and is not made for peace. The dismission
of a most popular administration, a leaven of Lord Bute, whom,
too, he can never trust, and the numbers he will discontent, will
be considerable objects against him.

For my own part, I am much pleased, and much diverted. I have
nothing to do but to sit by and laugh; a humour you know I am apt
to indulge. You shall hear from me again soon.

(965) On the 7th the King addressed a letter to Mr. Pitt,
expressing a desire to have his thoughts how an able and
dignified ministry might be formed, and requesting him to come to
town for that salutary purpose. The letter will be found in the
Chatham Correspondence, vol. ii. p. 436.-E.

(966) "Here are great bustles at court," writes Lord
Chesterfield, on the 11th, "and a great change of persons is
certainly very near. My conjecture is, that, be the new
settlement what it will, Mr. Pitt will be at the head of it. If
he is, I presume, qu'il aura mis de l'eau dans son vin par
rapport `a My lord Bute: when that shall come to be known, as
known it certainly Will soon be, he may bid adieu to his
popularity."-E.



Letter 310 To George Montagu, Esq.
Arlington Street, July 21, 1766. (page 485)

You may strike up your sackbut, psaltery, and dulcimer; for Mr.
Pitt(967) comes in, and Lord Temple does not. Can I send you a
more welcome affirmative or negative? My sackbut is not very
sweet, and here is the ode I have made for it:

When Britain heard the woful news,
That Temple was to be minister,
To look upon it could she choose
But as an omen most sinister?
But when she heard he did refuse,
In spite of Lady Chat. his sister,
What could she do but laugh, O Muse?
And so she did, till she ***** her.

If that snake had wriggled in, he would have drawn after him the
whole herd of vipers; his brother Demogorcon and all. 'Tis a
blessed deliverance.

The changes I should think now would be few. They are not yet
known; but I am content already, and shall go to Strawberry
to-morrow, where I shall be happy to receive you and Mr. John any
day after Sunday next, the twenty-seventh, and for as many days
as ever you will afford me. Let me know your mind by the return
of the post. Strawberry is in perfection: the verdure has all
the bloom of spring: the orange-trees are loaded with blossoms,
the gallery all sun and gold, Mrs. Clive all sun and vermilion--
in short, come away to Yours ever.

P. S. I forgot to tell you, and I hate to steal and not tell,
that my ode is imitated from Fontaine.

(967) Mr. Pitt was gazetted, on the 30th of July, Viscount Pitt,
of Burton Pynsent, and Earl of Chatham. The same gazette
contained the notification of his appointment as lord privy seal
in the room of the Duke of Newcastle. "What shall I say to you
about the ministry?" writes Gray to Wharton: "I am as angry as a
common-councilman of London about my Lord Chatham, but a little
more patient, and will hold my tongue till the end of the year.
In the mean time, I do mutter in secret, and to you, that to quit
the House of Commons, his natural strength, to sap his own
popularity and grandeur, (which no man but himself could have
done,) by assuming a foolish title; and to hope that he could win
by it, and attach him to a court that hate him, and will dismiss
him as soon as ever they dare, was the weakest thing that ever
was done by so great a man. Had it not been for this, I should
have rejoiced at the breach between him and Lord Temple, and at
the union between him and the Duke of Grafton and Mr. Conway: but
patience! we shall see!" Works, vol. iv. p. 83.-E.



Letter 311 To David Hume, Esq.(968)
Arlington Street, July 26, 1766. (page 486)

Dear Sir,
Your set of literary friends are what a set of literary men are
apt to be, exceedingly absurd. They hold a consistory to consult
how to argue with a madman; and they think it very necessary for
your character to give them the pleasure of seeing Rousseau
exposed, not because he has provoked you, but them. If Rousseau
prints, you must; but I certainly would not till he does.(969)

I cannot be precise as to the time of my writing the King of
Prussia's letter; but I do assure you with the utmost truth that
it was several days before you left Paris, and before Rousseau's
arrival there, of which I can give you a strong proof; for I not
only suppressed the letter while you stayed there, out of
delicacy to you, but it was the reason why, out of delicacy to
myself, I did not go to see him, as you often proposed to me,
thinking it wrong to go and make a cordial visit to a man, with a
letter in my pocket to laugh at him. You are at full liberty,
dear Sir, to make use of what I say in your justification, either
to Rousseau or any body else. I should be very sorry to have you
blamed on my account; I have a hearty contempt of Rousseau, and
am perfectly indifferent what the literati of Paris think of the
matter. If there is any fault, which I am far from thinking, let
it lie on me. No parts can hinder my laughing at their
possessor, if he is a mountebank. If he has a bad and most
ungrateful heart, as Rousseau has shown in your case, into the
bargain, he will have my scorn likewise, as he will of all good
and sensible men. You may trust your sentence to such who are as
respectable judges as any that have pored over ten thousand more
volumes.

P. S. I will look out the letter and the dates as soon as I go to
Strawberry Hill.

(968) On the celebrated quarrel between Hume and Rousseau,
D'Alembert, and the other literary friends of the former, met at
Paris, and were unanimous in advising him to publish the
particulars. This Hume at first refused, but determined to
collect them and for that purpose had written to Mr. Walpole
respecting the pretended letter from the King of Prussia.

(969) "Your friend Rousseau, I doubt, grows tired of Mr.
Davenport and Derbyshire: he has picked up a quarrel with David
Hume, and writes him letters of fourteen pages folio, upbraiding
him with all his noirceurs; take one only as a specimen. He says
that at Calais they chanced to sleep in the same room together,
and that he overheard David talking in his sleep, and saying,
'Ah! je le tiens, ce Jean Jacques l`a.' In short, I fear, for
want of persecution and admiration (for these are his real
complaints), be will go back to the Continent." Gray to Wharton;
Works, vol. iv. P. 82.-E.



Letter 312 To The Rev. Mr. Cole.
Arlington Street, Sept. 18, 1766. (page 487)

Dear sir,
I am exceedingly obliged to you for your very friendly letter,
and hurt at the absurdity of the newspapers that occasioned the
alarm. Sure I am not of consequence enough to be lied about! It
is true I am ill, have been extremely so, and have been ill long,
but with nothing like paralytic, as they have reported me. It
has been this long disorder alone that has prevented my profiting
of your company at Strawberry, according to the leave you gave me
of asking it. I have lived upon the road between that place and
this, never settled there, and uncertain whether I should go to
Bath or abroad. Yesterday se'nnight I grew exceedingly ill
indeed, with what they say has been the gout in my stomach,
bowels, back, and kidneys. The worst seems over, and I have been
to take the air to-day for the first time, but bore it so ill
that I don't know how soon I shall be able to set out for Bath,
whither they want me to go immediately. As that journey makes it
very uncertain when I shall be at Strawberry again, and as you
must want your cups and pastils, will you tell me if I can convey
them to you any way safely? Excuse my saying more to-day, as I
am so faint and weak; but it was impossible not to acknowledge
your kindness the first minute I was able. Adieu!



Letter 313 To George Montagu, Esq.
Strawberry Hill, Sept. 18, 1766. (page 488)

I am this moment come hither with Mr. Chute, who has showed me
your most kind and friendly letter, for which I give you a
thousand thanks. It did not surprise me, for you cannot alter.
I have been most extremely ill; indeed, never well since I saw
you. However, I think it is over, and that the gout is gone
without leaving a codicil in my foot. Weak I am to the greatest
degree, and no wonder. Such explosions make terrible havoc in a
body of paper. I shall go to the Bath in a few days. which they
tell me will make my quire of paper hold out a vast while! as to
that, I am neither credulous nor earnest. If it can keep me from
pain and preserve me the power of motion, I shall be content.
Mr. Chute, who has been good beyond measure, goes with me for a
few days. A thousand thanks and compliments to Mr. and Mrs.
Whetenhall and Mr. John, and excuse me writing more, as I am a
little fatigued with my little journey.



Letter 314 To The Hon. H. S. Conway.
Bath, Oct. 2, 1766. (page 488)

I arrived yesterday at noon, and bore my journey perfectly well,
except that I had the headache all yesterday; but it is gone
to-day, or at least made way for a little giddiness which the
water gave me this morning at first. If it does not do me good
very soon, I shall leave it; for I dislike the place exceedingly,
and am disappointed in it. Their new buildings that are so
admired, look like a collection of little hospitals; the rest is
detestable; and all crammed together, and surrounded with
perpendicular hills that have no beauty. The river is paltry
enough to be the Seine or Tiber. Oh! how unlike my lovely
Thames!

I met my Lord Chatham's coach yesterday full of such
Grenville-looking children, that I shall not go to see him this
day or two; and to-day I spoke to Lady Rockingham in the street.
My Lords Chancellor and President are here, and Lord and Lady
Powis. Lady Malpas arrived yesterday. I shall visit Miss Rich
to-morrow. In the next apartment to [nine lodges *****. I have
not seen him some years; and he is grown either mad or
superannuated, and talks without cessation or coherence: you
would think all the articles in a dictionary were prating
together at once. The Bedfords are expected this week. There
are forty thousand others that I neither know nor intend to know.
In short, it is living in a fair, and I am heartily sick of it
already. Adieu!



Letter 315 To George Montagu, Esq.
Bath, Oct. 5, 1766. (page 489)

Yes, thank you, I am quite well again; and if I had not a mind to
continue so, I would not remain here a day longer, for I am tired
to death of the place. I sit down by the waters of Babylon and
weep, when I think of thee, oh Strawberry! The elements
certainly agree with me, but I shun the gnomes and salamanders,
and have not once been at the rooms. Mr. Chute stays with me
till Tuesday; when he is gone, I do not know what I shall do; for
I cannot play at cribbage by myself, and the alternative is to
see my Lady Vane open the ball, and glimmer at fifty-four. All
my comfort is, that I lodge close to the cross bath, by which
means I avoid the pump-room and all its works. We go to dine and
see Bristol to-morrow, which will terminate our sights, for we
are afraid of your noble cousins at Badminton; and, as Mrs. Allen
is dead and Warburton entered upon the premises, you may swear we
shall not go thither.

Lord Chatham, the late and present Chancellors, and sundry more,
are here; and their graces of Bedford expected. I think I shall
make your Mrs. Trevor and Lady Lucy a visit; but it is such an
age since we met, that I suppose we shall not know one another by
sight. Adieu! These watering places, that mimic a capital, and
add vulgarisms and familiarities of their own, seem to me like
abigails in cast gowns, and I am not young enough to take up with
either. Yours ever.



Letter 316 To John Chute, Esq.
Bath, Oct. 10, 1766. (page 489)

I am impatient to hear that your charity to me has not ended in
the gout to yourself--all my comfort is, if you have it, that you
have good Lady Brown to nurse you.

My health advances faster than my amusement. However, I have
been at one opera, Mr. Wesley's.(970) They have boys and girls
with charming voices, that sing hymns, in parts, to Scotch ballad
tunes but indeed so long, that one would think they were already
in eternity, and knew how much time they had before them. The
chapel is very neat, with true Gothic windows (yet I am not
converted); but I was glad to see that luxury is creeping in upon
them before persecution: they have very neat mahogany stands for
branches, and brackets of the same in taste. At the upper end is
a broad hautpas of four steps, advancing in the middle: at each
end of the broadest part are two of my eagles, with red cushions
for the parson and clerk. Behind them rise three more steps, in
the midst of which is a third eagle for pulpit. Scarlet armed
chairs to all three. On either hand, a balcony for elect ladies.
The rest of the congregation sit on forms. Behind the pit, in a
dark niche, is a plain table within rails; so you see the throne
is for the apostle. Wesley is a lean elderly man,
fresh-coloured, his hair smoothly combed, but with a soup`con of
curls at the ends. Wondrous clean, but as evidently an actor as
Garrick. He spoke his sermon, but so fast, and with so little
accent, that I am sure he has often uttered it, for it was like a
lesson. There were parts and eloquence in it; but towards the
end he exalted his voice, and acted very ugly enthusiasm; decried
learning, and told stories, like Latimer, of the fool of his
college, who said, "I thanks God for every thing." Except a few
from curiosity, and some honourable women, the congregation was
very mean. There was a Scotch Countess Of Buchan,(971) who is
carrying a pure rosy vulgar face to heaven, and who asked Miss
Rich, if that was the author of the poets. I believe she meant
me and the Noble Authors.