tedious to recount the names of all the men of letters
and artists whom Frances Burney had an opportunity of seeing and
hearing. Colman, Twining, Harris, Baretti, Hawkesworth, Reynolds, Barry,
were among those who occasionally surrounded the tea-table and
supper-tray at her father's modest dwelling. This was not all. The
distinction which Dr. Burney had acquired as a musician, and as the
historian of music, attracted to his house the most eminent musical
performers of that age. The greatest Italian singers who visited England
regarded him as the dispenser of fame in their art, and exerted
themselves to obtain his suffrage. Pachierotti became his intimate
friend. The rapacious Agujari, who sang for nobody else under fifty
pounds an air, sang her best for Dr. Burney without a fee; and in the
company of Dr. Burney even the haughty and eccentric Gabrielli
constrained herself to behave with civility. It was thus in his power to
give, with scarcely any expense, concerts equal to those of the
aristocracy. On such occasions the quiet street in which he lived was
blocked up by coroneted chariots, and his little drawing-room was
crowded with peers, peeresses, ministers, and ambassadors. On one
evening, of which we happen to have a full account, there were present
Lord Mulgrave, Lord Bruce, Lord and Lady Edgecumbe, Lord Barrington from
the War-Office, Lord Sandwich from the Admiralty, Lord Ashburnham, with
his gold key dangling from his pocket, and the French Ambassador, M. De
Guignes, renowned for his fine person and for his success in gallantry.
But the great show of the night was the Russian Ambassador, Count
Orloff, whose gigantic figure was all in a blaze with jewels, and in
whose demeanour the untamed ferocity of the Scythian might be discerned
through a thin varnish of French politeness. As he stalked about the
small parlour, brushing the ceiling with his toupee, the girls whispered
to each other, with mingled admiration and horror, that he was the
favoured lover of his august mistress; that he had borne the chief part
in the revolution to which she owed her throne; and that his huge hands,
now glittering with diamond rings, had given the last squeeze to the
windpipe of her unfortunate husband.

With such illustrious guests as these were mingled all the most
remarkable specimens of the race of lions--a kind of game which is
hunted in London every spring with more than Meltonian ardour and
perseverance. Bruce, who had washe