name. In 1786 she visited him at Strawberry Hill. He was then a martyr
to the gout, but with spirits gay as ever: 'I never knew a man suffer
pain with such entire patience,' was Hannah More's remark. His
correspondence with her continued regularly; but that with the charming
sisters was delightfully interrupted by their residence at little
Strawberry Hill--_Cliveden_, as it was also called, where day after day,
night after night, they gleaned stores from that rich fund of anecdote
which went back to the days of George I., touched even on the anterior
epoch of Anne, and came in volumes of amusement down to the very era
when the old man was sitting by his parlour fire, happy with his _wives_
near him, resigned and cheerful. For his young friends he composed his
'Reminiscences of the Court of England.'

He still wrote cheerfully of his physical state, in which eyesight was
perfect; hearing little impaired; and though his hands and feet were
crippled, he could use them; and since he neither 'wished to box, to
wrestle, nor to dance a hornpipe,' he was contented.

His character became softer, his wit less caustic, his heart more
tender, his talk more reverent, as he approached the term of a long,
prosperous life--and knew, practically, the small value of all that he
had once too fondly prized.

His later years were disturbed by the marriage of his niece Maria
Waldegrave to the Duke of Gloucester: but the severest interruption to
his peace was his own succession to an Earldom.

In 1791, George, Earl of Orford, expired; leaving an estate encumbered
with debt, and, added to the bequest, a series of lawsuits threatened to
break down all remaining comfort in the mind of the uncle, who had