my fatigue. Nevertheless, when, in the midst of these wasteful
toils, the Princess Augusta entered my room, and asked me, from
the queen, if I should wish to see the ball the next day, I
preferred running the risk of that new fatigue, to declining an
honour so offered: especially as the Princess Augusta was herself
to open the ball.

A chance question this night from the queen, whom I now again
attended as usual, fortunately relieved me from my embarrassment
about the poem. She inquired of me if my father was still
writing? "A little," I answered, and the next morning, Thursday,
the 18th, when the birth-day was kept, I found her all sweetness
and serenity; mumbled out my own little compliment, which she
received as graciously as if she had understood and heard it; and
then,

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when she was dressed, I followed her through the great rooms, to
get rid of the wardrobe woman, and there taking the poem from my
pocket, I said "I told your majesty that my father had written a
little!--and here--the little is!"

She took it from me with a smile and a curtsey, and I ran off.
She never has named it since; but she has spoken of my father
with much sweetness and complacency. The modest dignity of the
queen, upon all subjects of panegyric, is truly royal and noble.

I had now, a second time, the ceremony of being entirely new
dressed. I then went to St. James's, where the queen gave a very