Dear Madam, take all poffible care of your health. How near we always are to danger! I hope your danger is now paft; but that fear, which is the neceffary effect of danger, muft remain always with us. I hope my little Miss is well. Surely I fhall be very fond of her. In a year and half she will run and talk. But how much ill may happen in a year and half! Let us however hope for the better fide of poffibility, and think that I may then and afterwards continue to be, Madam, Your, &c. LETTER XXI. To Mrs. THRAL E. MADAM, Lichfield, August 14, 1769.. T SET out on Thursday morning, and found my companion, to whom I was very much a ftranger, more agreeable than I expected. We went cheerfully forward, and passed the night at Coventry. We came in late, and went out early; and therefore I did not fend for my coufin Tom; coufin Tom; but I defign to make him fome amends for the omiffion. Next day we came early to Lucy, who was, I believe, glad to fee us. She had faved her beft gooseberries upon the tree for me; and, as Steele fays, I was neither too proud nor too wife to gather them. I have rambled a very little inter fontes et flumina nota, but I am not yet well. They have cut down the trees in George Lane. Evelyn, in his book of Foreft Trees, tells us of wicked men that cut down trees, and never profpered afterwards; yet nothing has deterred these audacious aldermen from violating the Hamadryads of George Lane. As an impartial traveller I muft however tell, that in Stow-ftreet, where I left a draw-well, I have found a pump; but the lading-well in this ill-fated George Lane lies fhamefully neglected. I am going to-day or to-morrow to Afhbourne; but I am at a loss how I fhall get back in time to London. Here are only chance coaches, fo that there is no certainty of a place. If I do not come, let it not hinder your journey. I can be but a few days behind you; and I will follow in the Brighthelmstone coach. But I hope to come. I took care to tell Miss Porter, that I have got another Lucy. I hope fhe is well. Tell Mrs. Mrs. Salufbury, that I beg her stay ac I am, &c. LETTER XXII. To Mrs. THRAL E. DEAR MADAM, Lichfield, July 7, 1770. T THOUGHT I should have heard fomething to-day about Streatham; but there is no letter; and I need fome consolation, for Rheumatism is come again, though in a less degree than formerly. I reckon to go next week to Ashbourne, and will try to bring you the dimenfions of the great bull. The skies and the ground are all fo wet, that I have been very little abroad; and Mrs. Afton is from home, so that I have no motive to walk. When she is at home, fhe lives on the top of Stow Hill, and I commonly climb up to see her once a-day. There is nothing there now, but the empty neft. I hope Streatham will long be the place. To write to you about Lichfield is of no ufe, for you never faw Stow-pool, nor Bo rowcop rowcop-hill. I believe you may find Borow or Boroughcop-hill in my Dictionary, under cop or cob. Nobody here knows what the name imports. I have taken the liberty to enclose a letter; for, though you do not know it, three groats make a fhilling. I am, Dearest Madam, Your, &c. LETTER XXIII. To Mrs. THRAL E. MADAM, Lichfield, July 11, 1770. SINCE my laft letter nothing extraordinary has happened. Rheumatifm, which has been very troublesome, is grown better. I have not yet feen Dr. Taylor, and July runs faft away. I fhall not have much time for him, if he delays much longer to come or fend. Mr. Grene, the apothecary, has found a book, which tells who paid levies in our parish, and how much they paid, above an hundred years ago. Do you not think we study this book hard? Nothing is like going to the bottom of things. Many families that paid the parish-rates are now extinct, like the race of Hercules. Pulvis et umbra fumus. What is nearest us touches us moft. The paffions rife higher at domestic than at imperial tragedies. I am not wholly unaffected by the revolutions of Sadler-ftreet; nor can forbear to mourn a little when old names vanish away, and new come into their place. Do not imagine, Madam, that I wrote this letter for the fake of these philofophical meditations; for when I began it, I had neither Mr. Grene, nor his book, in my thoughts; but was refolved to write, and did not know what I had to fend, but my refpects to Mrs. Salusbury, and Mr. Thrale, and Harry, and the Miffes. I I am, Dearest Madam, Your, &c. LETTER XXIV. To Mrs. THRA L E. DEAR MADAM, Lichfield, July 14, 1770. W WHEN any calamity is fuffered, the first thing to be remembered is, how much has been efcaped. The house might have been |