[Footnote 1:  The Czarina.]

This fracas happens very luckily, as we had nothing left to talk of; for of the Pope we think no more, according to the old saying, than of the Pope of Rome.  Of Wilkes there is no longer any question, and of the war under the Pole we hear nothing.  Corsica, probably, will occasion murmurs, but they will be preserved in pickle till next winter.  I am come hither for two months, very busy with finishing my round tower, which has stood still these five years, and with an enchanting new cottage that I have built, and other little works.  In August I shall go to Paris for six weeks.  In short, I am delighted with having bid adieu to Parliament and politics, and with doing nothing but what I like all the year round.

HIS RETURN TO PARIS—­MADAME DEFFAND—­A TRANSLATION OF “HAMLET”—­MADAME DUMENIL—­VOLTAIRE’S “MEROPE” AND “LES GUEBRES.”

TO JOHN CHUTE, ESQ.

PARIS, Aug. 30, 1769.

I have been so hurried with paying and receiving visits, that I have not had a moment’s worth of time to write.  My passage was very tedious, and lasted near nine hours for want of wind.—­But I need not talk of my journey; for Mr. Maurice, whom I met on the road, will have told you that I was safe on terra firma.

Judge of my surprise at hearing four days ago, that my Lord Dacre and my lady were arrived here.  They are lodged within a few doors of me.  He is come to consult a Doctor Pomme who has prescribed wine, and Lord Dacre already complains of the violence of his appetite.  If you and I had pommed him to eternity, he would not have believed us.  A man across the sea tells him the plainest thing in the world; that man happens to be called a doctor; and happening for novelty to talk common sense, is believed, as if he had talked nonsense! and what is more extraordinary, Lord Dacre thinks himself better, though he is so.

My dear old woman [Madame du Deffand] is in better health than when I left her, and her spirits so increased, that I tell her she will go mad with age.  When they ask her how old she is, she answers, “J’ai soixante et mille ans.”  She and I went to the Boulevard last night after supper, and drove about there till two in the morning.  We are going to sup in the country this evening, and are to go to-morrow night at eleven to the puppet-show.  A protege of hers has written a piece for that theatre.  I have not yet seen Madame du Barri, nor can get to see her picture at the exposition at the Louvre, the crowds are so enormous that go thither for that purpose.  As royal curiosities are the least part of my virtu, I wait with patience.  Whenever I have an opportunity I visit gardens, chiefly with a view to Rosette’s having a walk.  She goes nowhere else, because there is a distemper among the dogs.