Crusades. He was right--but I want to know the story.
[Footnote 3: Part of this passage has been already extracted, but I have
allowed it to remain here in its original position, on account of the
singularly sudden manner in which it is introduced.]
"Tuesday, March 22.
"Last night, _party_ at Lansdowne House. To-night, _party_ at Lady
Charlotte Greville's--deplorable waste of time, and something of temper.
Nothing imparted--nothing acquired--talking without ideas:--if any thing
like _thought_ in my mind, it was not on the subjects on which we were
gabbling. Heigho!--and in this way half London pass what is called life.
To-morrow there is Lady Heathcote's--shall I go? yes--to punish myself
for not having a pursuit.
"Let me see--what did I see? The only person who much struck me was Lady
S* *d's eldest daughter, Lady C.L. They say she is _not_ pretty. I don't
know--every thing is pretty that pleases; but there is an air of _soul_
about her--and her colour changes--and there is that shyness of the
antelope (which I delight in) in her manner so much, that I observed her
more than I did any other woman in the rooms, and only looked at any
thing else when I thought she might perceive and feel embarrassed by my
scrutiny. After all, there may be something of association in this. She
is a friend of Augusta's, and whatever she loves I can't help liking.
"Her mother, the Marchioness, talked to me a little; and I was twenty
times on the point of asking her to introduce me to _sa fille_, but I
stopped short. This comes of that affray with the Carlisles.
"Earl Grey told me laughingly of a paragraph in the last _Moniteur_,
which has stated, among other symptoms of rebellion, some particulars of
the _sensation_ occasioned in all our government gazettes by the 'tear'
lines,--_only_ amplifying, in its re-statement, an epigram (by the by,
no epigram except in the _Greek_ acceptation of the word) into a
_roman_. I wonder the Couriers, &c. &c., have not translated that part
of the Moniteur, with additional comments.
"The Princess of Wales has requested Fuseli to paint from 'The
Corsair,'--leaving to him the choice of any passage for the subject: so
Mr. Locke tells me. Tired, jaded, selfish, and supine--must go to bed.
"_Roman_, at least _Romance_, means a song sometimes, as in the Spanish.
I suppose this is the Moniteur's meaning, unless he has confused it with
'The Corsair.'
"Albany, March 28.
"This night got into
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