the letters to show my Lord Dartmouth and Mr. St. John, our two Secretaries, and let them see there is no treason in them; which I will do on Wednesday, when they come from Hampton Court.  The letters are very handsome, and it is a very great mark of honour and distinction to Lord Pembroke.  I hear the two French Ministers are come over again about the peace; but I have seen nobody of consequence to know the truth.  I dined to-day with a lady of my acquaintance, who was sick, in her bed-chamber, upon three herrings and a chicken:  the dinner was my bespeaking.  We begin now to have chestnuts and Seville oranges; have you the latter yet?  ’Twas a terrible windy day, and we had processions in carts of the Pope and the Devil, and the butchers rang their cleavers.  You know this is the Fifth of November, Popery and gunpowder.

6.  Since I am used to this way of writing, I fancy I could hardly make out a long letter to MD without it.  I think I ought to allow for every line taken up by telling you where I dined; but that will not be above seven lines in all, half a line to a dinner.  Your Ingoldsby[2] is going over, and they say here he is to be made a lord.—­Here was I staying in my room till two this afternoon for that puppy Sir Andrew Fountaine, who was to go with me into the City, and never came; and if I had not shot a dinner flying, with one Mr. Murray, I might have fasted, or gone to an alehouse.—­You never said one word of Goody Stoyte in your letter; but I suppose these winter nights we shall hear more of her.  Does the Provost[3] laugh as much as he used to do?  We reckon him here a good-for-nothing fellow.—­I design to write to your Dean one of these days, but I can never find time, nor what to say.—­I will think of something:  but if DD[4] were not in Ireland I believe seriously I should not think of the place twice a year.  Nothing there ever makes the subject of talk in any company where I am.

7.  I went to-day to the City on business; but stopped at a printer’s, and stayed there:  it was a most delicious day.  I hear the Parliament is to be prorogued for a fortnight longer; I suppose, either because the Queen has the gout, or that Lord Treasurer is not well, or that they would do something more towards a peace.  I called at Lord Treasurer’s at noon, and sat a while with Lord Harley, but his father was asleep.  A bookseller has reprinted or new-titled a sermon of Tom Swift’s,[5] printed last year, and publishes an advertisement calling it Dr. Swift’s Sermon.  Some friend of Lord Galway[6] has, by his directions, published a four-shilling book about his conduct in Spain, to defend him; I have but just seen it.  But what care you for books, except Presto’s Miscellanies?  Leigh promised to call and see me, but has not yet; I hope he will take care of his cargo, and get your Chester box.  A murrain take that box! everything is spoiled that is in it.  How does the strong box do?  You say nothing of Raymond:  is his