never attempted to perform.  He had a personal antipathy to Pitt and Lord Grenville; and one of the constant subjects of his jokes and raillery was the Grenville pedigree.  A Mr. Dallaway, a clergyman, was his private secretary, as earl-marshal; with whom I once dined at the duke’s table; a large, heavy-looking man, who, I was told, had written several books; but I presume he is deceased, as I have not seen his name announced for a long while.

* * * * *

MADAME DE STAEL.

(From Lady Blessington’s Conversations with Lord Byron.)

Talking of literary women, Lord Byron said that Madame de Stael was certainly the cleverest, though not the most agreeable woman he had ever known.  “She declaimed to you instead of conversing with you,” said he, “never pausing except to take breath; and if during that interval a rejoinder was put in, it was evident that she did not attend to it, as she resumed the thread of her discourse as though it had not been interrupted.”  This observation from Byron was amusing enough, as we had all made nearly the same observation on him, with the exception that he listened to, and noticed, any answer made to his reflections.  “Madame de Stael,” continued Byron, was very eloquent when her imagination warmed, (and a very little excited it;) her powers of imagination were much stronger than her reasoning ones, perhaps owing to their being much more frequently exercised; her language was recondite, but redundant, and though always flowery, and often brilliant there was an obscurity that left the impression that she did not perfectly understand what she endeavoured to render intelligible to others.  She was always losing herself in philosophical disquisition, and once she got entangled in the mazes of the labyrinth of metaphysics; she had no clue by which she could guide her path—­the imagination that led her into her difficulties, could not get her out of them; the want of a mathematical education, which might have served as a ballast to steady and help her into the port of reason, was always visible, and though she had great tact in concealing her defeat, and covering a retreat, a tolerable logician must have always discovered the scrapes she got into.  Poor dear Madame de Stael, I shall never forget seeing her one day, at table with a large party, when the busk (I believe you ladies call it) of her corset forced its way through the top of the corset, and would not descend though pushed by all the force of both hands of the wearer, who became crimson from the operation.  After fruitless efforts, she turned in despair to the valet de chambre behind her chair, and requested him to draw it out, which could only be done by his passing his hand from behind over her shoulder, and across her chest, when, with a desperate effort, he unsheathed the busk.  Had you seen the faces of some of the English ladies of the party, you would have been like me, almost convulsed; while Madame remained perfectly unconscious that she had committed any solecism on la decence Anglaise.  Poor Madame de Stael verified the truth of the lines—­