I am now setting about the completion of my AEdes Strawberrianae.  A painter is to come hither on Monday to make a drawing of the Tribune, and finish T. Sandby’s fine view of the gallery, to which I could never get him to put the last hand.  They will Then be engraved with a few of the chimney-pieces, which will complete the plates.  I must add an appendix of curiosities, purchased or acquired since the Catalogue was printed.  This will be awkward, but I cannot afford to throw away an hundred copies.  I shall take care if I can that Mr. Gough does not get fresh intelligence from my engravers, or he will advertise my supplement, before the book appears.  I do not think it was very civil to publish such private intelligence, to which he had no right without my leave; but every body seems to think he may do what is good in his own eyes.  I saw the other day, in a collection of seats (exquisitely engraved), a very rude insult on the Duke of Devonshire.  The designer went to draw a view of Chiswick, without asking leave, and was not hindered, for he has given it; but he says he was treated illiberally, the house not being shown without tickets, which he not only censures, but calls a singularity, though a frequent practice in other places, and practised there to my knowledge for these thirty years:  so every body is to come into your house if he pleases, draw it whether you please or not, and by the same rule, I suppose, put any thing into his pockets that he likes.  I do know, by experience, what a grievance it is to have a house worth being seen, and though I submit in consequence to great inconveniences, they do not save me from many rudenesses.  Mr. Southcote(438) was forced to shut up his garden, for the savages who came as connoisseurs scribbled a thousand brutalities, in the buildings, upon his religion.  I myself, at Canons, saw a beautiful table of oriental alabaster that had been split in two by a buck in boots jumping up backwards to sit upon it.

I have placed the oaken head Of Henry the Third over the middle arch of the armoury.  Pray tell me what the church of Barnwell, near Oundle, was, which his Majesty endowed, and whence his head came.  Dear Sir, Yours most sincerely.

(434) Sir Richard Worsley is better known by his splendid work, the “Museum Worsleianum; or, a Collection of antique Basso-relievos, Bustos, Statues, and Gems; with views of places in the Levant, taken on the spot, in the years 1785-6-7;” in two volumes, folio.  Sir Richard sat many years in Parliament for the borough of Newport, and was governor of the Isle of Wight, where he died in 1805.-E.

(435) Richard Bull, Esq. a famous collector of portraits.-E.

(436) " Biographical Anecdotes of William Hogarth; and a Catalogue of his Works, chronologically arranged; with occasional Remarks."-E.

(437) Joseph Gulston, Esq. also an eminent portrait collector.-E.

(438) Philip Southcote, Esq. of Wooburn Farm, Chertsey:  one of the first places improved according to the principles of modern gardening.-E.