How
delightful to hear, unseen, the repartees of Lady Mary Wortley Montagu,
who comes down, it is natural to conclude, from her villa near to that
of Pope. How fine a study might one not draw of the fine gentleman and
the wit in Lord Hervey, as he is commanded by the gentle Princess
Caroline to sit on her right hand; but his heart is across the table,
with Lady Mary! How amusing to observe the dainty but not sumptuous
repast contrived with Pope's exquisite taste, but regulated by his
habitual economy--for his late father, a worthy Jacobite hatter, erst in
the Strand, disdained to invest the fortune he had amassed, from the
extensive sale of cocked-hats, in the Funds, over which an Hanoverian
stranger ruled; but had lived on his capital of L20,000 (as spendthrifts
do, without either moral, religious, or political reasons), as long as
it lasted him; yet _he_ was no spendthrift. Let us look, therefore, with
a liberal eye, noting, as we stand, how that fortune, in league with
nature, who made the poet crooked, had maimed two of his fingers, such
time as, passing a bridge, the poor little poet was overturned into the
river, and he would have been drowned, had not the postilion broken the
coach window and dragged the tiny body through the aperture.
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