I must go and read Spenser, and wade through his allegories, and
drawling stanzas, to get at a picture. But, good night! you see how one
gossips, when one is alone, and at quiet on one's own dunghill!--Well!
it may be trifling; yet it is such trifling as Ambition never is happy
enough to know! Ambition orders palaces, but it is Content that chats
for a page or two over a bower.


_ILLNESS OF THE KING--FRENCH AND ENGLISH ACTORS AND ACTRESSES: CLAIRON,
GARRICK, QUIN, MRS. CLIVE._

TO THE EARL OF HERTFORD.

ARLINGTON STREET, _March_ 26, 1765.

Three weeks are a great while, my dear lord, for me to have been without
writing to you; but besides that I have passed many days at Strawberry,
to cure my cold (which it has done), there has nothing happened worth
sending across the sea. Politics have dozed, and common events been fast
asleep. Of Guerchy's affair, you probably know more than I do; it is now
forgotten. I told him I had absolute proof of his innocence, for I was
sure, that if he had offered money for assassination, the men who swear
against him would have taken it.

The King has been very seriously ill, and in great danger. I would not
alarm you, as there were hopes when he was at the worst. I doubt he is
not free yet from his complaint, as the humour fallen on his breast
still oppresses him. They talk of his having a levée next week, but he
has not appeared in public, and the bills are passed by commission; but
he rides out. The Royal Family have suffered like us mortals; the Duke