The real cathedral is very neat and has pretty tombs, besides the two windows of painted glass, given by Mrs. Ellen Gwyn.  There is a new church besides of’ St. Nicholas, neat and truly Gothic, besides a charming old church at the other end of the town.  The cathedral, or abbey, at Bath, is glaring and crowded with modern tablet-monuments; among others, I found two, of my cousin Sir Erasmus Phillips, and of Colonel Madan.  Your cousin Bishop Montagu, decked it much.  I dined one day with an agreeable family, two miles from Bath, a Captain Miller(974) and his wife, and her mother, Mrs. Riggs.  They have a small new-built house, with a bow-window, directly opposite to which the Avon falls in a wide cascade, a church behind it in a vale, into which two mountains descend, leaving an opening into the distant country.  A large village, with houses of gentry, is on one of the hills to the left.  Their garden is little, but pretty, and watered with several small rivulets among the bushes.  Meadows fall down to the road; and above, the garden is terminated by another view of the river, the city, and the mountains.  ’Tis a very diminutive principality, with large Pretensions.

I must tell you a quotation I lighted upon t’other day from Persius, the application of which has much diverted Mr. Chute.  You know my Lord Milton,(975) from nephew of the old usurer Damer, of Dublin, has endeavoured to erect himself into the representative of the ancient Barons Damory—­

“——­Momento turbinis exit Marcus Dama.”

Apropos, or rather not `apropos, I wish you joy of the restoration of the dukedom in your house, though I believe we both think it very hard upon my Lady Beaulieu.

I made a second visit to Lady Lucy and Mrs. Trevor, and saw the latter One night at the rooms.  She did not appear to me so little altered as in the dusk of her own chamber.  Adieu!  Yours ever.

(974) Captain John Miller, of Ballicasy, in the county of Clare.  In the preceding year he had married Anne, the only daughter of Edward Riggs, Esq.  In 1778, he was created an Irish baronet, and in 1784, chosen representative for Newport in parliament.  See post, Walpole’s letter to General Conway, of the 15th of January 1775.-E.

(975) Joseph Damer Lord Milton, of Shrone Hill, in the kingdom of Ireland, was created a baron of Great Britain in May 1762, by the title of Baron Milton of Milton Abbey, Dorsetshire.-E.

Letter 320 To Sir David Dalrymple.(976) Strawberry Hill, Nov. 5, 1766. (page 494)

Sir, On my return from Bath, I found your very kind and agreeable present of the papers in King Charles’s time;(977) for which and all your other obliging favours I give you a thousand thanks.