partiality, flattered me so agreeably in the letter you betrayed, that I shall never write to you again without the dread of attempting the wit he is so liberal as to bestow on me; and then either way I must be dull or affected, though I hope to have the grace to prefer the former, and then you only will be the sufferer, as we both should by the latter.  But I will come to facts -. they are plain bodies, can have nothing to do with wit, and yet are not dull to those who have any thing to do with them.

According to your order, I have delivered Ghosts(653) to Mrs. Boscawen, Mrs. Garrick, Lady Juliana Penn, Mrs. Walsingham, and Mr. Pepys.  Mr. Batt, I am told, leaves London to-day; so I shall reserve his to his return.  This morning I carried his thirty to the Bishop of London, who said modestly, he should not have expected above ten.  I was delighted with the palace, with the Venerable chapel, and its painted episcopalities in glass, and the brave hall, etc. etc.  Though it rained, I would crawl to Bonner’s chair.  In short, my satisfaction would have been complete, but for wanting the presence of that jesuitess, “the good old papist.”

To-morrow departs for London, to be delivered to the Bristol coach at the White-horse-cellar in Piccadilly, a parcel containing sixty-four Ghosts, one of which is printed on brown for your own eating.  There is but one more such, so you may preserve it like a relic.  I know these two are not so good as the white:  but, as rarities, a collector would give ten times more for them; and uniquity will make them valued more than the charming poetry.  I believe, if there was but one ugly woman in the world, she would occasion a longer war than Helen did.  You will find the Bishop’s letter in the parcel.  I did not breathe a hint of my having seen it, as I could not conjure up Into my pale cheeks the blush I ought to exhibit on such flattery.

I pity you most sincerely for your almost drowned guest.  Fortune seems to delight in throwing poor Louisas in Your Way, that you may exercise your unbounded charity and benevolence.  Adieu! pray write.  I need not write to you to pray; but I wish, when your knees have what the common people call a worky-day, you would employ your hands the whole time.  Yours most cordially.

P. S. I believe I have blundered, and that your knees would call a week-day a holiday.

(652) With the view of making Bishop Porteus and Walpole better known to each other, Miss More had committed what she called a double treachery, in showing to the Bishop a letter she had received from Walpole, and to Walpole one sent her by the Bishop.-E.

(653) Though the author of this poem must have been known to so many individuals in the year 1789, the secret was so well kept, that it was actually printed in the, Gentleman’s Magazine for February, 1804, as the production of Walpole.-E.

Letter 337 To Miss Berry.  Strawberry Hill, July 29, 1789. (PAGE 428)