Chapter 300

Berkeley Square, Feb. 8, 1787. (page 390)

Dear madam, I not only send you "La Cit`e des Dames," but Christina's Life of Charles the Fifth, which will entertain you more; and which, when I wrote my brief history of her, I did not know she had actually composed. Mr. Dutens told me of it very lately, and actually borrowed it for me; and but yesterday my French bookseller sent me three-and-twenty other volumes of those M`emoires Historiques,(583) which I had ordered him to get for me, and which will keep my eyes to the oar for some time, whenever I have leisure to sail through such an ocean; and yet I shall embark with pleasure, late as it is for me to undertake such a hugeous voyage: but a crew of old gossips are no improper company, and we shall sit in a warm cabin, and hear and tell old stories of past times.

Pray keep the volume as long as you please, and borrow as many more as you please, for each volume is a detached piece. Yet I do not suppose your friends will allow you much time for reading; and I hope I shall often be the better for their hindering you.(584) Yours most sincerely.

(583) "Collection des meilleurs Ouvrages Francais compos`es par des Femmes." by Mademoiselle Keralio.

(584) Miss More, in a letter written a few days after, says--"Mr. Walpole is remarkably well: yesterday he sent me a very agreeable letter, with some very thick volumes of curious French M`emoires, desiring me, if I like them, to send for the other twenty-three volumes; a pretty light undertaking, in this mad town and this sort of life." memoirs, vol. ii. p. 49.-E.