much pleased.  To-day they arc gone to Blenheim by invitation.  I want to send you something from the Strawberry press; tell me how I shall convey it; it is nothing less than the most curious book that ever set its foot into the world.  I expect to hear you scream hither:  if you don’t I shall be disappointed, for I have kept it as a most profound secret from you, till I was ready to surprise you with it:  I knew your impatience, and would not let you have it piecemeal.  It is the Life of the great philosopher, Lord Herbert, written by himself.(631) Now are you disappointed?  Well, read it—­not the first forty pages, of which you will be sick—­I will not anticipate it, but I will tell you the history.  I found it a year ago at Lady Hertford’s, to whom Lady Powis had lent it.  I took it up, and soon threw it down again, as the dullest thing I ever saw.  She persuaded me to take it home.  My Lady Waldegrave was here in all her grief; Gray and I read it to amuse her.  We could not get on for laughing, and screaming.  I begged to have it to print:  Lord Powis, sensible of the extravagance, refused—­I persisted—­he persisted.  I told my Lady Hertford, it was no matter, I would print it, I was determined.  I sat down and wrote a flattering dedication to Lord Powis, which I knew he would swallow:  he did, and gave up his ancestor.  But this was not enough; I was resolved the world should not think I admired it seriously, though there are really fine passages in it, and good sense too:  I drew up an equivocal preface, in which you will discover my opinion, and sent it with the dedication.  The Earl gulped down the one under the palliative of the other, and here you will have all.  Pray take notice Of the pedigree, of which I am exceedingly proud; observe how I have clearly arranged so involved a descent:  one may boast at one’s heraldry.  I shall send you too Lady Temple’s poems.(632) Pray keep both under lock and key, for there are but two hundred copies of Lord Herbert, and but one hundred of the poems suffered to be printed.

I am almost crying to find the glorious morsel of summer, that we have had, turned into just such a watery season as the last.  Even my excess of verdure, which used to comfort me for every thing, does not satisfy me now, as I live entirely alone.  I am heartily tired of my large neighbourhood, who do not furnish me two or three rational beings at most, and the best of them have no vivacity.  London, Whither I go at least once a fortnight for a night, is a perfect desert.  As the court is gone into a convent at Richmond, the town is more abandoned than ever.  I cannot, as you do, bring myself to be content without variety, without events; my mind is always wanting new food; summer does not suit me; but I will grow old some time or other.  Adieu!

(631) Printed in quarto, This was the first edition of this celebrated piece of autobiography.  It was reprinted at Edinburgh in 1807, with a prefatory notice, understood to be by Sir Walter Scott; and a third edition, which also contained his letters written during his residence at the French court, was published in 1826.-E.