There is not so much delicacy of wit as in M. de Choiseul’s speech to the Clairon, but I think the story I am going to tell you in return, will divert you as much:  there was a vast assembly at Marlborough-house, and a throng in the doorway.  My Lady Talbot said, “Bless me!  I think this is like the Straits of Thermopylae!” My Lady Northumberland replied, “I don’t know what Street that is, but I wish I could get my — through.”  I hope you admire the contrast.  Adieu! my dear lord!  Yours ever.

(773) This alludes, it is presumed, to a bill of indictment which was found in the beginning of March, at the sessions at Hick’s Hall, against the Count de Guerchy, for the absurd charge of a conspiracy to murder D’Eon.-C.

(774) Probably fran`cois Joseph, Count de Caraman, who married a Princess de Chimay, heiress of the house of Benin, niece of Madame de Mirepoix.-C.

(775) He had been favourite to the Empress Catherine; and, as Mr. Walpole elsewhere says, “a favourite without an enemy."-C.

(776) A tragedy by M. du Belloy, which, with little other merit than its anti-Anglicism, (which, in all times, has passed in France for patriotism,) “faisait fureur” at this time.-C.

(777) Mademoiselle Clairon was at this moment in such vogue on the French stage, that her admirers struck a medal in honour of her, and wore it as a kind of order.  A critic of the name of Fr`eron, however, did not partake these sentiments, and drew, in his journal, an injurious character of Mademoiselle Clairon.  This insult so outraged the tragedy queen, that she and her admirers moved heaven and earth to have Fr`ron sent to the Bastile, and, failing in her solicitation to the inferior departments, she at last had recourse to the prime-minister, the Duke of Choiseul, himself.  His answer, which Lord Hertford, no doubt, had communicated to Mr. Walpole, was admired for its polite persiflage of her theatric Majesty.  “I am,” said the Duke, “like yourself, a public performer, with this difference in your favour, that you choose the parts you please, and are sure to be crowned with the applause of the public (for I reckon as nothing the bad taste of one or two wretched individuals who have the misfortune of not admiring you).  I, on the other hand, am obliged to act the parts imposed on me by necessity.  I am sure to please nobody; I am satirized, criticised, libelled, hissed,—­yet I continue to do my best.  Let us both, then, sacrifice our little resentments and enmities to the public service, and serve our country each in our own station.  Besides,” he added, “the Queen has condescended to forgive Fr`eron, and you may, therefore, without compromising your dignity, imitate her Majesty’s clemency.”  M`emoires de Bachaumont, t. i. p. 61.  Such were the miserable intrigues and squabbles, and such the examples of ministerial pleasantry and prudence which occupied and amused the Parisian public!—­this; is but a straw to show which way the wind blew; but such instances moderate our surprise and our sorrow at the storm which followed.-C.