The Duchess of Queensberry(1383) has at last been at court, a point she has been intriguing these two years.  Nobody gave in to it.  At last she snatched at the opportunity of her son being obliged to the King for a regiment in the Dutch service, and would not let him go to thank, till they sent for her too.  Niccolini, who is next to her in absurdity and importance, is gone electioneering with Doddington.

I expect Pucci every day to finish my trouble with Riccardi; I shall take any ring, though he has taken care I shall not take another tolerable one.  If you will pay him, which I fancy will be the shortest way to prevent any fripponnerie, I will put the money into your brother’s hands.

My eagle(1384) is arrived-my eagle tout court, for I hear nothing of the pedestal:  the bird itself was sent home in a store-ship; I was happy that they did not reserve the statue, and send its footstool.  It is a glorious fowl!  I admire it, and every body admires it as much as it deserves.  There never was so much spirit and fire preserved, with so much labour and finishing.  It stands fronting the Vespasian:  there are no two such morsels in England!

Have you a mind for an example of English bizarrerie? there is a Fleming here, who carves exquisitely in ivory, one Verskovis; he has done much for me, and where I have recommended him; but he is starving, and returning to Rome, to carve for-the English, for whom, when he was there before, he could not work fast enough.(1385)

I know nothing, nor ever heard of the Mills’s and Davisons; and know less than nothing Of whether they are employed from hence.  There is nobody in town of whom to inquire; if there were, they would ask me for what borough these men were to stand, and wonder that I could name people from any other motive.  Adieu!

(1378) Henry Hyde, only son of the last Earl of Clarendon.  He died before his father.

(1379) King’s words are, “As this Parliament would necessarily determine in a short time, I have judged it expedient speedily to call a new one."-E.

(1380) Robert Knight, eldest son of the famous cashier of the South Sea Company. (Created Lord Luxborough in Ireland 1746, and Earl of Catherlough in 1763.  He died in 1772.-D.)

(1381) Lady Yarmouth, the mistress of George II.-D.

(1382) Right Honourable Welbore Ellis.-D.

(1383) She had quarrelled with the court, in consequence of the refusal to permit Gray’s sequel to the Beggar’s Opera, called “Polly,” to be acted.-D.

(1384) The eagle found in the gardens of Boccapadugli within the precincts of Caracalla’s baths, at Rome, in the year 1742; one of the finest pieces of Greek sculpture in the world.  See Walpole’s Works, vol. ii. p. 463, and Gray’s Ode on the Progress of Poesy.-E.

(1385) Verskovis is also mentioned by Walpole in his Anecdotes of Painting. he had a son, who to the art of carving in ivory, added painting, but died young, in 1749, before his father.  The latter did not survive above a year.-E.