almost ashamed to calculate how many have elapsed. I will endeavour for the future to be less scandalous. Only believe that my heart is innocent of the laziness of my hand. I do not mean to have recourse to the stale and absurd excuse of business, though I have really had a very considerable hurry of new parliamentary business: one day, for instance, of seventeen hours, from ten in the morning till between three and four the next morning. It is, upon the whole, an agreeable improvement in my life, and forms just the mixture of business, of study, and of society, which I always imagined I should, and now find I do like. Whether the House of Commons may ever prove of benefit to myself or country, is another question. As yet I have been mute. In the course of our American affairs, I have sometimes had a wish to speak, but though I felt tolerably prepared as to the matter, I dreaded exposing myself in the manner, and remained in my seat safe, but inglorious. Upon the whole, (though I still believe I shall try,) I doubt whether Nature, not that in some instances I am ungrateful, has given me the talents of an orator, and I feel that I came into parliament much too late to exert them. Do you hear of Port Eliot coming to Bath? and, above all, do you hear of Charles-street* coming to Bentinck-street, in its way to Essex, &c.

Adieu. Dear Madam,

I am most truly yours.

Mrs. Gibbon's residence at Bath.

N

N° LX.

EDWARD GIBBON, Esq. to Mrs. GIBBON.

House of Commons,

DEAR MADAM,

May -2d, 1775.

I ACCEPT of the Pomeranian Lady with gratitude and pleasure, and shall be impatient to form an acquaintance with her. My presentations at St. James's passed graciously. My dinner at Twickenham was attended with less ceremony and more amusement. If they turned out Lord North tomorrow, they would still leave him one of the best companions in the kingdom. By this time I suppose the Eliots are with you. I am sure you will say every thing kind and proper on the occasion. I am glad to hear of the approbation of my constituents for my vote on the Middlesex election. On the subject of America, I have been something more of a courtier. You know, I suppose, that Holroyd is just stepped over to Ireland for a fortnight. He passed three days with me on his way. Deyverdun had left me just before your letter arrived, which I shall soon have an opportunity of conveying to him. Though, I flatter myself, he broke from me with some degree of uneasiness, the engagement could not be declined. At the end of four years he has an annuity of one hundred pounds for life, and may for the remainder of his days enjoy a decent independence in that country, which a philosopher would perhaps prefer to the rest of Europe. For my own part, after the hurry of the

town and of parliament, I am now retired to my villa in Bentinck-street, which I begin to find a very pleasing solitude, at least as well as if it were two hundred miles from London; because when I am tired of the Roman Empire, I can laugh away the evening at Foote's theatre, which I could not do in Hampshire or Cornwall. I am, dear Madam, most truly yours.

N LXI.

EDWARD GIBBON, Esq. to J. B. HOLROYD, Esq. Bentinck-street, August 1st, 1775.

YOUR apprehensions of a precipitate work, &c. are perfectly groundless. I should be much more addicted to a contrary extreme. The head is now printing: true, but it was written last year and the year before. The first chapter has been composed de nouveau three times; the second twice, and all the others have undergone reviews, corrections, &c. As to the tail, it is perfectly formed and digested, and (were I so much given to self-content and haste) it is almost all written. The ecclesiastical part, for instance, is written out in fourteen sheets, which I mean to refondre from beginning to end. As to the friendly critic, it is very difficult to find one who has leisure, candour, freedom and knowledge sufficient. However, Batt and Deyverdun have read and observed, After all, the public is the best critic. I print no more than five hundred copies of the first edition; and the second

(as

(as it happens frequently to my betters) may receive many improvements. So much for Rome. We have nothing new from America. But I can venture to assure you, that administration is now as unanimous and decided as the occasion, requires. Something will be done this year; but in the spring the force of the country will be exerted to the utmost. Scotch Highlanders, Irish Papists, Hanoverians, Canadians, Indians, &c. will all in various shapes be employed. Parliament meets the first week in November. I think his Catholic Majesty may be satisfied with his summer's amusement. The Spaniards fought with great bravery, and made a fine retreat; but our Algerine friends surpassed them as much in conduct as in number. Adieu.

The Duchess has stopped Foote's piece. She sent for him to Kingston-house, and threatened, bribed, argued, and wept for about two hours. He assured her, that if the Chamberlain was obstinate, he should publish it, with a dedication to her Grace.

N° LXII.

EDWARD GIBBON, Esq. to Mrs. GIBBON, Bath.

DEAR MADAM,

London, August, 1775.

WILL you accept my present literary business as an excuse for my not writing? I think you will be in the wrong if you do, since I was just as idle before. At all events, however, it is better to say three words, than to be totally a dumb dog. A

propos

propos of dog, but not of dumb: your Pomeranian is the comfort of my life; pretty, impertinent, fantastical, all that a young lady of fashion ought to be. I flatter myself that our passion is reciprocal. I am just at present engaged in a great historical work; no less than a History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire; with the first volume of which I may very possibly oppress the public next winter. It would require some pages to give a more particular idea of it; but I shall only say in general, that the subject is curious, and never yet treated as it deserves; and that during some years it has been in my thoughts, and even under my pen. Should the attempt fail, it must be by the fault of the execution.

SIR,

Adieu, Dear Madam,

believe me most truly yours.

N° LXIII.

WILLIAM STRAHAN, Esq. to EDW. GIBBON, Esq. New-street, Sunday morning, Oct. 8th, 1775. I was desirous of taking an early opportunity of paying my respects to you, to return you my best thanks for the pleasure I have received from the perusal of your work, which I have read almost as far as it is advanced. My opinion of it, I shall beg leave, with all submission, to lay before you in a

few words.

The language is the most correct, most elegant, and most expressive I have ever read; but that, in my mind, is its least praise.

The work abounds with the justest maxims of

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