(134) Tydeus, Orosmades, Almanzor, and Plato, were names which had been given by them to some of their Eton schoolfellows.

(135) Thus as boys they had called the intimacy formed at Eton between Walpole, Gray, West, and Ashton.

1736

122 Letter 2 To George Montagu, Esq. (136) King’s College, May 2, 1736.

Dear Sir, Unless I were to be married myself, I should despair ever being able to describe a wedding so well as you have done:  had I known your talent before, I would have desired an epithalamium.  I believe the princess (137) will have more beauties bestowed on her by the occasional poets, than even a painter would afford her.  They will cook up a new Pandora, and in the bottom of the box enclose Hope, that all they have said is true.  A great many, out of excess of good breeding, having heard it was rude to talk Latin before women, propose complimenting her in English; which she will be much the better for.  I doubt most of them instead of fearing their compositions should not be understood, should fear they should:  they write they don’t know what, to be read by they don’t know who.  You have made me a very unreasonable request, which I will answer with another as extraordinary:  you desire I would burn your letters; I desire you would keep mine.  I know but of one way of making what I send you useful, which is, by sending you a blank sheet:  sure you would not grudge three-pence for a half-penny sheet, when you give as much for one not worth a farthing.  You drew this last paragraph on you by your exordium, as you call it, and conclusion.  I hope, for the future, our correspondence will run a little more glibly, with dear George, and dear Harry; not as formally as if we were playing a game at chess in Spain and Portugal; and Don Horatio was to have the honour Of specifying to Don Georgio, by an epistle, whether he would move.  In one point I would have our correspondence like a game at chess; it should last all our lives-but I hear you cry check; adieu!  Dear George, yours ever.

(136) George Montagu was the son of Brigadier-General Edward Montagu, and nephew to the Earl of Halifax.  He was member of parliament for Northampton, usher of the black rod in Ireland during the lieutenancy of the Earl of Halifax, ranger of Salsey Forest, and private secretary to Lord North when chancellor of the exchequer. [And of him “it is now only remembered,” says the “Quarterly Review,” vol. xix. p. 131, “that he was a gentleman-like body of the vieille cour, and that he was usually attended by his brother John, (the Little John of Walpole’s correspondence,) who was a midshipman at the age of sixty, and found his chief occupation in carrying about his brother’s snuff-box.”]

(137) Augusta, Princess of Saxe-Gotha, married, in April, 1736, to Frederick Lewis, Prince of Wales.

123 Letter 3 To George Montagu, Esq.  King’s College, May 6, 1736.