to quarrel with. I should be obliged to change my behaviour, if I
did not intend to pursue my journey in a few days. I have been to
see the churches here, and had the permission of touching the
relicks, which was never suffered in places where I was not known. I
had, by this privilege, the opportunity of making an observation,
which I doubt not might have been made in all the other churches,
that the emeralds and rubies which they show round their relicks and
images are most of them false; though they tell you that many of the
_Crosses_ and _Madonas_ (sic), set round with these stones, have been
the gifts of emperors and other great princes. I don't doubt,
indeed, but they were at first jewels of value; but the good fathers
have found it convenient to apply them to other uses, and the people
are just as well satisfied with bits of glass amongst these relicks.
They shewed me a prodigious claw set in gold, which they called the
claw of a griffin; and I could not forbear asking the reverend priest
that shewed it, Whether the griffin was a saint? The question almost
put him beside his gravity; but he answered, They only kept it as a
curiosity. I was very much scandalised at a large silver image of
the _Trinity_, where the _Father_ is represented under the figure of
a decrepit old man, with a beard down to his knees, and triple crown
on his head, holding in his arms the _Son_, fixed on the cross, and
the _Holy Ghost_, in the shape of a dove, hovering over him.
Madam ---- is come this minute to call me to the assembly, and forces
me to tell you, very abruptly, that I am ever your, &c. &c.

LET. VII.

TO THE COUNTESS OF ----.

_Vienna, Sept_. 8. O. S. 1716.