I have nothing to tell Lady Ailesbury, but that I hear a deplorable account of the Opera.  There is a new puppet-show at Drury Lane, as fine as scenes can make it, called “The Maid of the Oaks,"(149) and as dull as the author could not help making it.

Except M. d’Herouville, I know all the people you name.  C. I doubt, by things I have heard formerly, may have been a concessionnaire.  The Duke, your protecteur(150) is mediocre enough; You would have been more pleased with his wife.  The Chevalier’s(151) bon-mot is excellent, and so is he.  He has as much buffonnerie as the Italians, With more wit and novelty.  His impromptu verses often admirable.  Get Madame du Deffand to show you his embassy to the Princess Christine, and his verses on his eldest uncle, beginning Si Monsieur de Veau.  His second uncle has parts, but they are not so natural.  Madame de Caraman is a very good kind of woman, but has not a quarter of her sister’s parts.(152) Madame de Mirepoix is the agreeable woman of the world when she pleases-but there, must not be a card in the room.  Lord * * * * has acted like himself; that is, unlike any body else.  You know, I believe, that I think him a very good spetcr; but I have little opinion of his judgment and knowledge of the world, and a great Opinion of his affectation and insincerity.  The Abb`e Raynal, though he wrote that fine work on the Commerce des Deux Indes, is the most tiresome creature in the world.  The first time I met him was at the dull Baron d’Olbach’s:  we were twelve at table:  I dreaded opening My Mouth in French, before so many people and so many servants:  he began questioning me, cross the table, about our colonies, which I understand as little as I do Coptic.  I made him signs I was deaf.  After dinner, he found I was not, and never forgave me.  Mademoiselle do Raucoux I never saw till you told me Madame du Deffand said she was d`emoniaque sans chaleur!  What painting!  I see her now.  Le Kain sometimes pleased me, oftener not.  Mol`e is charming in genteel, or in pathetic comedy, and would be fine in tragedy, if he was stronger.  Preville is always perfection.  I like his wife in affected parts, though not animated enough.  There was a delightful woman who did the Lady Wishforts, I don’t know if there still, I think her name Mademoiselle Drouin; and a fat woman, rather elderly, who sometimes acted the soubrette.  But you have missed the Dumenil, and Caillaut!  What irreparable losses!  Madame du Deffand, perhaps—­I don’t know—­could obtain your hearing the Clairon, yet the Dumenil was infinitely preferable.

I could now almost find in my heart to laugh at you for liking Boutin’s garden.(153) Do you know, that I drew a plan of it, as the completest absurdity I ever saw.  What! a river that wriggles at right angles through a stone gutter, with two tansy puddings that were dug out of it, and three or four beds in a row, by a corner of the wall, with samples of grass, corn, and of en friche, like a tailor’s paper of patterns!  And you like this!  I will tell Park-place—­Oh!  I had forgot your audience in dumb show—­Well, as Madame de S`evign`e said, “Le Roi de Prusse, c’est le plus grand Roi du monde still."(154) My love to the old Parliament; I don’t love new ones.