was the strongest.  George Selwyn dined with her, and not thinking her affliction so serious as she pretends, talked rather jokingly of the execution.  She burst into a flood of tears and rage, told him she now believed all his father and mother had said of him; and with a thousand other reproaches flung upstairs.  George coolly took Mrs. Dorcas, her woman, and made her sit down to finish the bottle:  “And pray, sir,” said Dorcas, “do you think my lady will be prevailed upon to let me go see the execution?  I have a friend that has promised to take care of me, and I can lie in the Tower the night before.”  My lady has quarrelled with Sir Charles Windham for calling the two Lords malefactors.  The idea seems to be general; for ’tis said Lord Cromartie is to be transported, which diverts me for the dignity of the peerage.  The ministry really gave it as a reason against their casting lots for pardon, that it was below their dignity.  I did not know but that might proceed from Balmerino’S not being an earl; and therefore, now their hand is in, would have them make him one.  You will see in the papers the second great victory at Placentia.  There are papers pasted in several parts of the town, threatening your cousin Sandwich’s head if be makes a dishonourable peace.  I will bring you down Sir Charles Williams’s new Ode on the Manchester.(1277) Adieu!

(1275) In the sixth volume of “London and its Environs described,” published in 1761, a work which furnishes a curious view of the state of the metropolis on the accession of George the Third, it is not only gravely stated of Temple Bar, that, “since the erection of this gate, it has been particularly distinguished by having the heads of such as have been executed for high treason placed upon it,” but the accompanying plate exhibits it as being at that time surmounted by three such disgusting proofs of the- then semi-barbarous state of our criminal code.  The following anecdote, in reference to this exhibition, was related by Dr. Johnson in 1773:—­“I remember once being with Goldsmith in Westminster Abbey:  while we surveyed the Poet’s Corner, I said to him,

‘Forsitan et nostrum nomen miscebitur istis.’

When we got to Temple Bar, he stopped me, pointed to the heads upon it, and slily whispered me,

‘Forsitan et nostrum nomen miscebitur ISTIS."’ Life, vol. iii. p. 2@.-E

( 276) “This,” says the Quarterly Review, “is an odd illustration of the truth of the first line in the following couplet, which begins an epigram ascribed to Johnson:—­

’Pitied by gentle minds, Kilmarnock died:  The brave, Balmerino, are on thy side.’”—­E.

(1277) Isabel, Duchess of Manchester, married to Edward Hussey, Esq.-E.

501 Letter 217 To sir Horace Mann.  Windsor, Aug. 21, 1746.