er the notice of Mr. Murray. Lady Hervey was the daughter of
Brigadier-General Lepel, and the wife of Lord Hervey of Ickworth, author
of the "Memoirs of the Court of George II. and Queen Caroline." Her
letters formed a sort of anecdotal history of the politics and
literature of her times. A mysterious attachment is said to have existed
between her and Lord Chesterfield, who, in his letters to his son,
desired him never to mention her name when he could avoid it, while she,
on the other hand, adopted all Lord Chesterfield's opinions, as
afterwards appeared in the aforesaid letters. Mr. Walter Hamilton,
author of the "Gazetteer of India," an old and intimate friend of Mr.
Murray, who first brought the subject under Mr. Murray's notice, said,
"Lady Hervey writes more like a man than a woman, something like Lady
M.W. Montagu, and in giving her opinion she never minces matters." Mr.
Hamilton recommended that Archdeacon Coxe, author of the "Lives of Sir
Robert and Horace Walpole," should be the editor. Mr. Murray, however,
consulted his _fidus Achates_, Mr. Croker; and, putting the letters in
his hands, asked him to peruse them, and, if he approved, to edit them.
The following was Mr. Croker's answer:

_Mr. Croker to John Murray_.

_November_ 22, 1820.

DEAR MURRAY,

I shall do more than you ask. I shall give you a biographical
sketch--sketch, do you hear?--of Lady Hervey, and notes on her letters,
in which I shall endeavour to enliven a little the _sameness_ of my
author. Don't think that I say _sameness_ in derogation of dear Mary
Lepel's _powers_ of entertainment. I have been _in love_ with her a long
time; which, as she was dead twenty years before I was born, I may
without indiscretion avow; but all these letters being written in a
journal style and to one person, there is a want of that variety which
Lady Hervey's mind was capable of giving. I have applied to her family
for a little assistance; hitherto without success; and I think, as a
_lover_ of Lady Hervey's, I might reasonably resent the little
enthusiasm I find that her descendants felt about her. In order to
enable me to do this little job for you, I wish you would procure for me
a file, if such a thing exists, of any newspaper from about 1740 to
1758, at which latter date the _Annual Register_ begins, as I remember.
So many little circumstances are mentioned in letters, and forgotten in
history, that without some such guide, I shall make but blind work of
i