he mentions having first made “a discovery, one of the most marvellous ever made.  In short, it is the original Coronation Roll of Richard, by which it appears that very magnificent robes were ordered for Edward V., and that he did or was to walk at his uncle’s coronation.”  The letter, from which this passage is an extract, was to a certain extent an answer to one from Gray, who, while praising the ingenuity of his arguments, avowed himself still unconvinced by them.]

Not only at Cambridge, but here, there have been people wise enough to think me too free with the King of Prussia!  A newspaper has talked of my known inveteracy to him.  Truly, I love him as well as I do most kings.  The greater offence is my reflection on Lord Clarendon.  It is forgotten that I had overpraised him before.  Pray turn to the new State Papers, from which, it is said, he composed his history.  You will find they are the papers from which he did not compose his history.  And yet I admire my Lord Clarendon more than these pretended admirers do.  But I do not intend to justify myself.  I can as little satisfy those who complain that I do not let them know what really did happen.  If this inquiry can ferret out any truth, I shall be glad.  I have picked up a few more circumstances.  I now want to know what Perkin Warbeck’s Proclamation was, which Speed in his history says is preserved by Bishop Leslie.  If you look in Speed perhaps you will be able to assist me.

The Duke of Richmond and Lord Lyttelton agree with you, that I have not disculpated Richard of the murder of Henry VI.  I own to you, it is the crime of which in my own mind I believe him most guiltless.  Had I thought he committed it, I should never have taken the trouble to apologize for the rest.  I am not at all positive or obstinate on your other objections, nor know exactly what I believe on many points of this story.  And I am so sincere, that, except a few notes hereafter, I shall leave the matter to be settled or discussed by others.  As you have written much too little, I have written a great deal too much, and think only of finishing the two or three other things I have begun—­and of those, nothing but the last volume of Painters is designed for the present public.  What has one to do when turned fifty, but really think of finishing?

I am much obliged and flattered by Mr. Mason’s approbation, and particularly by having had almost the same thought with him.  I said, “People need not be angry at my excusing Richard; I have not diminished their fund of hatred, I have only transferred it from Richard to Henry.”  Well, but I have found you close with Mason—­No doubt, cry prating I, something will come out....[1]

[Footnote 1:  “Something will come out.” Walpole himself points out in a note that this is a quotation from Pope:  “I have found him close with Swift.”  “Indeed?” “No doubt, (Cries prating Balbus) something will come out” (Prologue to the “Satires").]