(781) Gray, in a letter of the 29th, relates the following anecdote:—­“Now I am talking of bishops, I must tell you that, not long ago, Bishop Warburton, in a sermon at court, asserted that all preferments were bestowed on the most illiterate and worthless objects; and, in speaking, turned himself about and stared at the Bishop of London:  he added, that if any one arose distinguished for merit and learning, there was a combination of dunces to keep him down.  I need not tell you that he expected the bishopric of London when Terrick got it:  so ends my ecclesiastical history.”  Works, vol. iv. p. 40.-E.

Letter 247 To The Earl Of Hertford.  Strawberry Hill, Easter Sunday, April 7, 1765. (page 385)

Your first wish -will be to know how the King does:  he came to Richmond last Monday for a week; but appeared suddenly and unexpected at his lev`ee at St. James’s last Wednesday; this was managed to prevent a crowd.  Next day he was at the drawing-room, and at chapel on Good Friday.  They say, he looks pale; but it is the fashion to call him very well:—­I wish it may be true.(782) The Duke of Cumberland is actually set out for Newmarket to-day:  he too is called much better; but it is often as true of the health of princes as of their prisons, that there is little distance between each and their graves.(783) There has been a fire at Gunnersbury, which burned four rooms:  her servants announced it to Princess Amalie with that wise precaution of " Madam, don’t be frightened!”—­accordingly, she was terrified.  When they told her the truth, she said, “I am very glad; I had concluded my brother was dead.”—­So much for royalties!

Lord March and George Selwyn are arrived, after being wind-bound for nine days, at Calais.  George is so charmed with my Lady Hertford, that I believe it was she detained him at Paris, not Lord March.  I am full as much transported with Schouvaloff—­I never saw so amiable a man! so much good breeding, humility, and modesty, with sense and dignity! an air of melancholy, without any thing abject.  Monsieur de Caraman is agreeable too, informed and intelligent; he supped at your brother’s t’other night, after being at Mrs. Anne Pitt’s.  As the first curiosity of foreigners is to see Mr. Pitt, and as that curiosity is one of the most difficult points in the world to satisfy, he asked me if Mr. Pitt was like his sister?  I told him, “Qu’ils se ressembloient comme deux gouttes de feu.”

The Parliament is adjourned till after the holidays, and the trial.(784) There have been two very long days in our own House, on a complaint from Newfoundland merchants on French encroachments.  The ministry made a woful piece of work of it the first day, and we the second.  Your brother, Sir George Savile, and Barr`e shone; but on the second night, they popped a sudden division upon us about nothing; some went out, and some stayed in; they were 161, we but 44, and then they flung pillows upon the question, and stifled it,—­and so the French have not encroached.