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498.
To his Stepmother

Lausanne, October 27th, 1784.

My Dear Madam,

If ever the excuse of procrastination be allowable it is when we ourselves are expecting a letter to which we are entitled in the due course of correspondence. Not that among friends the cold ideas of form and duty of debt and payment call find any admittance; but that every post that approaches and flyes away, seems to mark and postpone the natural opportunity of writing by alternately raising and disappointing our hopes. I am not indeed either surprized or angry at your long silence; the correspondence of distant friends will inevitably languish without any diminution of their mutual affection: their sentiments are still the same but their ideas become different; they no longer think or read or converse or act in the same sphere, and the object of their intercourse will be at last reduced to the reciprocal desire of being informed of each other's health and happiness. Could we persuade ourselves to convey that information every week or month in a billet of four lines, each friend would be satisfied: but the distance seems to require a longer Epistle, and the obligation of writing a great deal prevents us from writing at all, and leaves our friend in the doubt (which I now most anxiously feel) whether that silence be not occasioned by the want of health or spirits.

It is more particularly in a situation like ours that we are not prompted to write by the agitation and variety of the scenes which surround us. Nothing can be more uniform and tranquil than your Bath Life, except it be that which I lead at Lausanne. A regular alternative of Study and society carries away the hours and days in a smooth and pleasant Revolution, and I have scarcely commenced a month before I am astonished to find myself at the end of it – a sure indication of a quiet and domestic state of happiness. I am well satisfied with my union with a known and tryed friend, though (such are the infirmities of human nature) all our moments cannot partake of the Honey-moon. Among the people of the Country I have found some, I have formed many more Connections; their manners, their conversation, their style of living are perfectly adapted to my taste, and the sameness of the company is relieved in the Summer by a concourse of strangers whom health or curiosity or fashion invite to consult Tissot or to visit the Alps.

A TEMPERATE DIET AND EASY MIND.

As a kind of public character, a live Author, I am a little too much exposed to visits and compliments, but I was much delighted with the unexpected meeting of the Neckers. Tired of greatness and ambition (a polite phrase for a disgraced minister), they purchased an estate in Switzerland, and while the Castle was repairing they passed the summer in a country-house near Lausanne. Their society might diversify my life with occasional excursions; but, alas! her health is very much affected, and I think it extremely doubtful whether she will be able to revisit this country again. Of myself I can give you a much more pleasing account, nor do I remember a year in which I have enjoyed a more perfect state of health; the air though sharp is pure; it may be dangerous for weak lungs, but is excellently suited to a gouty constitution, and during the whole twelfth month I have never once been attacked by my old Enemy. Of Dr. Cadogan's three rules, I can observe two, a temperate diet and a easy mind. I am not agitated by the hopes and fears, and regrets of my London life, and whatever cares still pursue and overtake me are blown over by an English wind. I am afraid you sometimes sigh over me as an Exile. If I were fixed as a foreign Minister at Naples, or Petersburgh, you would be reconciled to my situation, yet such a splendid situation would be corroded by many a secret anxiety, and content is surely preferable to greatness. Adieu, My Dear Madam; give me a satisfactory line, and ever believe me,

Yours,

E. G.

499.
To Lord Sheffield

Lausanne, March 13th, 1785.

*My long silence (and it has been long) must not, on this occasion, be imputed to lazyness, though that little Devil may likewise have been busy. But you cannot forget how many weeks I remained in suspence, expecting every post the final sentence, and not knowing what to say in that passive uncertainty. It is now something more than a fortnight since your last letter, and that of Gosling informed me of the event. I have intended every day to write, and every day I have started back with reluctance and disgust, from the consideration of the wretched subject. Lenborough irrecoverably gone, for three-fourths of its real, at least of its ancient, Value; my seat in Parliament (for the subject now presses home upon me) sunk without the smallest equivalent in the abyss of your cursed politics, and a balance neatly cyphered and summed by Gosling, which shews me a very shallow purse, in which others have a clearer right to dip than myself.

March 21st.

Another week has now elapsed, and though nothing is changed in this too faithful state of my affairs, I feel myself able to encounter them with more spirit and resolution; to look on the future, rather than the past; on the fair, rather than on the foul side of the prospect. I shall speak in the confidence of friendship, and while you listen to the more doleful tale of my wants and wishes, You will have the satisfaction of hearing some circumstances in my present situation of a less unpleasing nature.

1. In the first place, I most heartily rejoyce in the sale, however unfavourable, of the Bucks Estate. Considering the dullness of the times, and the high interest of money, it is not a little to obtain even a tolerable price, and I am sensible how much your patience and industry have been exercised to extort the payment* from a knavish or obstinate purchaser. Without supposing a shilling of balance in Gosling's hands, my circumstances are improved by the sale to the annual amount of £150; of £50 which I was obliged to add for the interest of the mortgage, of £100 which I received from my French annuity.

*2. Your resistance to my Swiss expedition was more friendly than wise. Had I yielded, after eighteen months of suspense and anxiety, I should now, a still poorer man, be driven to embrace the same resource, which has succeeded according to, or even beyond, my most sanguine expectation. I do not pretend to have discovered the terrestrial paradise, which has not been known in this World since the fall of Adam; but I can truly declare, (now the charms of novelty are long since faded,) that I have found the plan of life the best adapted to my temper and my situation. I am now writing to you in a room as good as that in Bentinck Street, with three large windows of plate glass which command the country, the lake, and the mountains, and the opening prospect of the spring. The aforesaid room is furnished without magnificence, but with every conveniency for warmth, ease, and study, and the walls are already covered with more than two thousand volumes, the choice of a chosen library. I have health, friends, an amusing society, and perfect freedom. (A Commissioner of the Excise! the idea makes me sick).* Even in Trifles, though it is not a Trifle, I have been singularly lucky, and you will conceive an high opinion of Blondel, my new Valet de Chambre, when I assure you that, except in the knowledge of books and the Upholstery business, I no longer regret Caplen. He probably related all the minute circumstances of my state, and I find, that without any prejudice for the Country and people, he has not represented them in an unfavourable light. *If you ask me what I have saved by my retreat to Lausanne, I will fairly tell you (in the two great articles of a Carriage and a house in town, and breathing place at Hampton Court, both which were indispensable, and are now annihilated, with the difference of Clubs, public places, servants' wages, &c.) about four hundred pounds, or Guineas, a year; no inconsiderable sum, when it must be annually found as addition to an expence which is somewhat larger than my present revenue.

HIS ESTABLISHMENT AT LAUSANNE.

3. "What is then," you will ask, "my present establishment?" This is not by any means a cheap Country; and, except in the article of wine, I could give a dinner or make a coat, perhaps for the same price in London as at Lausanne. My chief advantage arises from the things which I do not want; and in some respects my style of living is enlarged by the encrease of my relative importance – an obscure batchelor in England, the master of a considerable house at Lausanne. Here I am expected to return entertainments, to receive Ladies, &c. and to perform many duties of society, which, though agreeable enough in themselves, contribute to inflame a Housekeeper's bills. From the disbursements of the first year I cannot form any just estimate; the extraordinary expences of the journey, carriage of heavy goods from England, the acquisition of many books, which it was not expedient to transport, the purchase of furniture, wine, fitting up my library, and the irregularity of a new Ménage, have consumed a pretty large sum. But in a quiet, prudent, regular course of life, I think I can support myself with comfort and honour for six or seven hundred pounds a year, instead of a thousand or eleven hundred in England.* I can look forward with strong and rational hope. The departure of the two matrons, or not to build on the ice, the mere suppression of the Bath jointure will give me more than that income, which may even be enlarged by turning Buriton into an annuity.

*Besides these uncertainties, (uncertain at least as to the time,) I have a sure and honourable supply from my own pen. I continue my history with pleasure and assiduity; the way is long and laborious, yet I see the end, and I can almost promise to land in England next September twelfthmonth, with a Manuscript of the current value of three thousand pounds, which will afford either a small income or a large capital. It is in the meanwhile that my situation is somewhat painful and difficult.* From the French and English funds and the various produce on my Copper share, I receive between two or three hundred pounds: the rent of Buriton is between six and seven hundred, but when you have deducted taxes, repairs, Mrs. G.'s jointure (£300 clear) &c., weigh the residue; it will not break down the scale. It happens unluckily enough that this year there will be an extraordinary deduction (at least one hundred guineas) of the fine which is paid every seven years for the renewal of Horn farm. Since my arrival here, I have never received a line from Hugonin, to whom I wrote a long letter last summer, and I fear his eyes and infirmities disqualify him a little for business. The sums which he has remitted to Gosling the last and the present winter fall below the most moderate computation, and I see no reason or account of the deficiency. I wish you would write to him in my name or your own, and make yourself master of that same part of my affairs. Richard Andrews, an honest attorney of Petersfield, is allowed my quitrents for holding my courts, and he might surely, without more trouble or wages, receive and remit the rents of three or four farms.

*Such are the services and revenues of the year; proceed we now, in the style of the budget, to the ways and means of extraordinary supplies.* Payne's valuation of the remaining part of my library has not perfectly answered my expectation. Yet it is approved by my friend, Elmsley, who offers on his own account to change the pounds into Guineas, and as I want the money, and esteem his integrity, I shall signify my acceptance if he will allow me to make another moderate draft from the Catalogue. That transaction (all accounts settled) will put some money in my pocket: but as I understand that kind of business I will not trouble you or myself with any farther details. A circumstance which surprized me in Gosling's account is the last six months from Lady day to Michaelmas last, during which I pay interest for the Mortgage without receiving rent from the Estate: surely that is not just or reasonable. If that half year is properly excepted in the Conveyance, you my omnipotent Attorney may draw it from the tenants, and it will serve at least to discharge Harris's bond. If it is not, I must submit with a sigh to this new deduction of two or three hundred pounds from the poor price of poor Lenborough. But this deficiency must somewhere be supplied: as I now pay interest to the Job for my horses, I can make the man wait a Couple of years till my return. But this cursed account of Newton! He is pathetic, you say, on the score of money advanced; a draft for £200 which I send you inclosed would surely discharge that advance, and you will try to manage him to stay till my labours are finished for the payment of his own. Yet perhaps the clearest and most honourable way would be to borrow £500 of the Goslings on my account and your own bond. *I will not affront your friendship, by observing that you will incur little or no risk on this occasion. Read, consider, act, and write.

PITT A FAVOURITE ABROAD.

It is the privilege of friendship to make our friend a patient hearer, and active Associate in our own affairs; and I have now written five pages on my private affairs, without saying a word either of the public, or of yourself. Of the public I have little to say; I never was a very warm Patriot, and I grow every day a Citizen of the World. The scramble for power and profit at Westminster or St. James's, and the names of Pitt and Fox, become less interesting to me than those of Cæsar and Pompey. You are not a friend of the young Minister, but he is a great favourite on the Continent, as he appears to be still; and you must own that the fairness of his character, his eloquence, his application to business, and even his youth, must prepossess at least the ignorant in his favour. Of the merit or defects of his administration I cannot pretend to speak; but I find, from the complaints of some interested persons, that his restraints on the smuggling of tea have already ruined the East India Companies of Antwerp and Sweden, and that even the Dutch will scarcely find it worth their while to send any ships to China. Your Irish friends appear to be more quiet, at least the Volunteers and national Congress seem to subside. How far that tranquillity must be purchased on our side, by any pernicious sacrifices, you will best decide; and from some hints in your last letters, I am inclined to think that you are less affected than might be supposed with national or local prejudice. Your introduction I have attentively read; the matter, though most important in itself, is out of the line of my studies and habits, and the subordinate beauties of style and arrangement you disclaim. Yet I can say with truth, that I never met with more curious and diligent investigation, more strong sense, more liberal spirit, and more cool and impartial temper in the same number of pages.⁹⁸

By this time you have probably read Necker's book on the Finances. Perhaps for you there is too much French enthusiasm and paint; but in many respects you must have gained a knowledge of his country, and on the whole, you must have been pleased with the picture of a great and benevolent mind. In your attack on Deyverdun for my picture I cannot promise you much success; he seems resolved to maintain his right of possession, and your only chance would be a personal assault. The next summer (how time slips away!) was fixed for your visit to Lausanne. We are prepared at all points to receive you, My lady, and a princess or two, with their train; and if you have a proper contempt for St. Stephen's chappel, you are perfectly free, and at leisure (can you ever be at leisure?) for the summer season. As you are now in a great measure disengaged from my affairs, you may find time to inform me of your proceedings and your projects. At present I do not even know whether you pass the winter at Sheffield-place or in Downing-street. My lady revenges herself of my long silence. Yet I embrace her and the Infants. In a few weeks we expect Miss Bristow and Mrs. Fraser from Nice. Adieu. You have deranged the decline and fall this morning. I have finished my Epistle since dinner, and am now going to a pleasant party and good supper.*

I send you enclosed a promissory note for £500. If you do not borrow the money of Gosling, you may throw it into the fire; if you do, in case of death it will serve as a remembrance. You will find that before and since the receipt of their balance I have drawn this year for £300. The change is most amazingly in my favour, and a banker of credit and substance at Lausanne allows me 4 per Cent. for all the money I leave on his hands.

500.
To his Stepmother

Lausanne, July 15th, 1785.

Indeed and indeed, my Dear Madam, I will never go to sleep again; my next letter shall be short and speedy, and I will not always put myself under the shameful necessity of employing the first page in worthless Apologies. On the present occasion I will not excuse myself by saying (what is true enough) that I waited week after week in hopes of hearing from you. As our last letters crossed each other, you might reasonably entertain the same expectation, and thus it is that poor miserable mortals try to provide a decent colour for their own lazyness. You will expect some account of the time of silence, and that account will be short and satisfactory. I am no longer in the illusions of the Honey-moon, when every deformity is concealed, and a smooth deceitful gloss is given to every object.

A YOUNG MAN AT FIFTY.

In the space of two and twenty months, the Climate and Society of Lausanne, my own situation and expence, the character of my companion and of my looser connections of both sexes are perfectly understood. The Climate in these two Winters has shewn itself to all Europe, more strongly perhaps to us, under the most hideous form, severe cold, and a continuance or repetition of snow till the middle of April. In general my health has perfectly sustained the rigour of the season; good spirits, good appetite, good sleep are my habitual state, and though verging towards fifty I still feel myself a young man. I was in hopes that my old Enemy the Gout had given over the attack, but the Villain, with his ally the winter, convinced me of my error, and about the latter end of March I found myself a prisoner in my library and my great chair. I attempted twice to rise, he twice knocked me down again, and kept possession of both my feet and knees longer (I must confess) than he had ever done before. My recovery has been proportionably tedious, and I am hardly yet in possession of my full strength; this admonition calls for some extraordinary care, and without running into sudden extremes, I consult both my reason and my taste by abstaining at night from wine and meat, and contenting myself with a bason of milk.

Such are the drawbacks on the comforts of life, yet I am pleased to think that my gout, though it has adhered somewhat longer than usual, is neither sharp nor frequent, and respectfully confines itself to the lower extremities of the Machine. Of the Country I must not complain, this dry Climate is particularly favourable to gouty constitutions; Dr. Tissot and my own observation inform me that it is rare among the natives, and among my acquaintance I can only name one old Gentleman, who by free living acquired it about the age of three score. My unpleasant and sometimes painful confinement was soothed not only by the mercenary aid of Servants and Physicians (the fee of a visit is about half a crown), but by the assiduous offices of my friends, and instead of the lonesome time an invalid who has not a family must pass amidst the crowds of London, I had the frequent visits of agreable men and women and a party of cards every evening that I chose it.

I do not suppose that real affection, especially to a stranger, is a very plentiful commodity, but here there are much fewer avocations of business or pleasure, and my style of living, my house, my table, &c., make me a man of mark and consequence. With the recovery of my strength, I now return civilities, relax my studies, and visit my acquaintance who are not gone; but so well do I like this habitation, and such is my sedentary disposition, that I have not yet lain from Home, nor gone five miles from Lausanne. You will give me credit when I say, that, though a lover of society, my library is the room to which I am the most attached. I almost hesitate whether I shall tell you that the prospect and furniture are equally agreable, that a reasonable number of my books is arrived from England, and that my whole establishment is formed upon a comfortable yet œconomical plan: in the single articles of house-rent, carriage, servants' wages, clubs, and public places I save between four and five hundred a year. And let me appeal to your reason and spirit whether such a saving be not as real and a much more honourable addition of income, than a pityful, precarious place or pension to be held or lost by the caprice of a Minister or the Revolutions of politics. When I was flattered with a distant hope of a seat at the boards of customs or excise, I was told that I need not work above five days in the week, and that I should sometimes enjoy the respite of Holydays and Vacations. Without any attendance or obligation I have given myself a state of leisure and independence, in which my labour is only employed on litterary pursuits, the objects of my choice and the foundation of my fame.

As every white spot in this life is clouded with a shade of black, I can only lament that this state is so far remote from the best and most faithful of my friends, so faithful and so true that they will enjoy my happiness though they cannot be witnesses or partakers of it. On my side, I think of them much oftener than I write to them, and warmly cherish the hope of an English Journey to them; the time must depend on the completion of my history, and I am sorry to observe that as I advance on my Journey "New Alps on Alps arise;" and I know not when I shall reach the shelter of my Inn.

CHANGES IN ENGLISH POLITICS.

After yourself and Mrs. Porten, Lord and Lady Sheffield are the persons whom I most desire to see. Among my companions of the World are undoubtedly several whom I regard and of whose good wishes I am persuaded; yet those slighter tyes are insensibly relaxed by the distance of time and place, by the interposition of new objects. My political connections have undergone such astonishing changes, a new Parliament, a new Administration, Patriots whom I left Ministers, Ministers whom I left Boys, the whole Map of the Country so totally altered, that I sometimes imagine I have been ten years absent from England. That incessant hurry of Politicks was indeed one of the things which disgusted the most, and there is nothing pleases me so much in this country as to enjoy all the blessings of a Good Government without ever talking or thinking of our Governors. In my domestic Government a great though not unexpected Revolution has happened. Caplen, unable to accustom himself to the language or manners of this country, resigned his employments and returned to England the beginning of last winter. You may easily conceive my loss and apprehension, and you will rejoyce in my good fortune that I was able to fill his place with no unworthy successor; a servant of this country, but who had lived with a Lady at Paris till her death – a man of substance and reputation, and who on the tryal of some months appears to deserve my confidence and good opinion. We are already thoroughly accustomed to each other. Adieu. My Dear Madam, may our correspondence be more frequent, and may I find you on my return in the possession of every blessing.

Most truly yours,

E. G.