Declare—­and thus your monarch saith: 
Whereas there is a noble dame,
Whom mortals Countess Temple name,
To whom ourself did erst impart
The choicest secrets of our art,
Taught her to tune the harmonious line
To our own melody divine,
Taught her the graceful negligence,
Which, scorning art and veiling sense,
Achieves that conquest o’er the heart
Sense seldom gains, and never art;
This lady, ’tis our royal will
Our laureate’s vacant seat should fill: 
A chaplet of immortal bays
Shall crown her brow and guard her lays;
Of nectar sack an acorn cup
Be at her board each year fill’d up;
And as each quarter feast comes round
A silver penny shall be found
Within the compass of her shoe;
And so we bid you all adieu!

Given at our palace of Cowslip-castle, the shortest night of the year.  Oberon.  And underneath, Hothamina.

How shall I tell you the greatest curiosity of the story?  The whole plan and execution of the second act was laid and adjusted by my Lady Suffolk herself and Will.  Chetwynd, master of the mint, Lord Bolingbroke’s Oroonoko-Chetwynd; he fourscore, she past seventy-six; and, what is more, much worse than I was, for, added to her deafness, she has been confined these three weeks with the gout in her eyes, was actually then in misery, and had been without sleep.  What spirits, and cleverness, and imagination, at that age, and under those afflicting circumstances!  You reconnoitre her old court knowledge, how charmingly she has applied it!  Do you wonder I pass so many hours and evenings with her?  Alas!  I had like to have lost her this morning!  They had poulticed her feet to draw the gout downwards, and began to succeed yesterday, but to-day it flew up into the head, and she was almost in convulsions with the agony, and screamed dreadfully; proof enough how ill she was, for her patience and good breeding makes her for ever sink and conceal what she feels.  This evening the gout has been driven back to her foot, and I trust she is out of’ danger.  Her loss would be irreparable to me at Twickenham, where she is by far the most rational and agreeable company I have.

I don’t tell you that the Hereditary Prince(430) is still expected and not arrived.  A royal wedding would be a flat episode after a re(il fairy tale, though the bridegroom is a hero.  I have not seen your brother General yet, but have called on him.  When come you yourself?  Never mind the town and its filthy politics; we can go to the gallery at Strawberry—­stay, I don’t know whether we can or not, my hill is almost drowned, I don’t know how your mountain is—­well, we can take a boat, and always be gay there; I wish we may be so at seventy-six and eighty!  I abominate politics more and more; we had glories, and would not keep them:  well! content, that there was an end of blood; then perks prerogative its ass’s ears up; we are always to be saving our liberties,