[Footnote 2:  “A fair widow.” Lady Waldegrave, a natural daughter of Walpole’s uncle, married the King’s favourite brother, the Duke of Gloucester, the great personage.  The King was very indignant at the mesalliance; and this marriage, with that of the King’s other brother, the Duke of Cumberland, to Mrs. Horton, led to the enactment of the Royal Marriage Act.]

[Footnote 3:  Elizabeth Woodville was the daughter of a Sir Richard Woodville, and his wife, the Duchess of Bedford, the widow of the illustrious brother of Henry V. Her first husband had been Sir John Grey, a knight of the Lancastrian party; and, after his death, Edward IV., attracted by her remarkable beauty, married her in 1464.]

As one of my ancient passions, formerly, was Masquerades, I had a large trunk of dresses by me.  I dressed out a thousand young Conways and Cholmondeleys, and went with more pleasure to see them pleased than when I formerly delighted in that diversion myself.  It has cost me a great headache, and I shall probably never go to another.  A symptom appeared of the change that has happened in the people.

The mob was beyond all belief:  they held flambeaux to the windows of every coach, and demanded to have the masks pulled off and put on at their pleasure, but with extreme good-humour and civility.  I was with my Lady Hertford and two of her daughters, in their coach:  the mob took me for Lord Hertford, and huzzaed and blessed me!  One fellow cried out, “Are you for Wilkes?” another said, “D—­n you, you fool, what has Wilkes to do with a Masquerade?”

In good truth, that stock is fallen very low.  The Court has recovered a majority of seventy-five in the House of Commons; and the party has succeeded so ill in the Lords, that my Lord Chatham has betaken himself to the gout, and appears no more.  What Wilkes may do at his enlargement in April, I don’t know, but his star is certainly much dimmed.  The distress of France, the injustice they have been induced to commit on public credit, immense bankruptcies, and great bankers hanging and drowning themselves, are comfortable objects in our prospect; for one tiger is charmed if another tiger loses his tail.

There was a stroke of the monkey last night that will sound ill in the ears of your neighbour the Pope.  The heir-apparent of the House of Norfolk, a drunken old mad fellow, was, though a Catholic, dressed like a Cardinal:  I hope he was scandalised at the wives of our Bishops.

So you agree with me, and don’t think that the crusado from Russia will recover the Holy Land!  It is a pity; for, if the Turks kept it a little longer, I doubt it will be the Holy Land no longer.  When Rome totters, poor Jerusalem!  As to your Count Orloff’s[1] denying the murder of the late Czar, it is no more than every felon does at the Old Bailey.  If I could write like Shakspeare, I would make Peter’s ghost perch on the dome of Sancta Sophia, and, when the Russian fleet comes in sight, roar, with a voice of thunder that should reach to Petersburg,