Chapter 304

Arlington Street, July 21, 1766. (page 485)

You may strike up your sackbut, psaltery, and dulcimer; for Mr. Pitt(967) comes in, and Lord Temple does not. Can I send you a more welcome affirmative or negative? My sackbut is not very sweet, and here is the ode I have made for it:

When Britain heard the woful news, That Temple was to be minister, To look upon it could she choose But as an omen most sinister? But when she heard he did refuse, In spite of Lady Chat. his sister, What could she do but laugh, O Muse? And so she did, till she ***** her.

If that snake had wriggled in, he would have drawn after him the whole herd of vipers; his brother Demogorcon and all. 'Tis a blessed deliverance.

The changes I should think now would be few. They are not yet known; but I am content already, and shall go to Strawberry to-morrow, where I shall be happy to receive you and Mr. John any day after Sunday next, the twenty-seventh, and for as many days as ever you will afford me. Let me know your mind by the return of the post. Strawberry is in perfection: the verdure has all the bloom of spring: the orange-trees are loaded with blossoms, the gallery all sun and gold, Mrs. Clive all sun and vermilion-- in short, come away to Yours ever.

P. S. I forgot to tell you, and I hate to steal and not tell, that my ode is imitated from Fontaine.

(967) Mr. Pitt was gazetted, on the 30th of July, Viscount Pitt, of Burton Pynsent, and Earl of Chatham. The same gazette contained the notification of his appointment as lord privy seal in the room of the Duke of Newcastle. "What shall I say to you about the ministry?" writes Gray to Wharton: "I am as angry as a common-councilman of London about my Lord Chatham, but a little more patient, and will hold my tongue till the end of the year. In the mean time, I do mutter in secret, and to you, that to quit the House of Commons, his natural strength, to sap his own popularity and grandeur, (which no man but himself could have done,) by assuming a foolish title; and to hope that he could win by it, and attach him to a court that hate him, and will dismiss him as soon as ever they dare, was the weakest thing that ever was done by so great a man. Had it not been for this, I should have rejoiced at the breach between him and Lord Temple, and at the union between him and the Duke of Grafton and Mr. Conway: but patience! we shall see!" Works, vol. iv. p. 83.-E.