t. If it be necessary, I will go to the Museum and _grab_ them, as my
betters have done before me. My dear little Nony [Footnote: Mr. Croker's
adopted daughter, afterwards married to Sir George Barrow.] was worse
last night, and not better all to-day; but this evening they make me
happy by saying that she is decidedly improved.

Yours ever,

J.W. CROKER.

Send me "Walpoliana," I have lost or mislaid mine. Are there any memoirs
about the date of 1743, or later, beside Bubb's?

That Mr. Croker made all haste and exercised his usual painstaking
industry in doing "this little job" for Mr. Murray will be evident from
the following letters:

_Mr. Croker to John Murray_.

_December_ 27, 1820.

DEAR MURRAY,

I have done "Lady Hervey." I hear that there is a Mr. Vincent in the
Treasury, the son of a Mr. and Mrs. Vincent, to whom the late General
Hervey, the favourite son of Lady Hervey, left his fortune and his
papers. Could you find out who they are? Nothing is more surprising than
the ignorance in which I find all Lady Hervey's descendants about her.
Most of them never heard her maiden name. It reminds one of Walpole
writing to George Montagu, to tell him who his grandmother was! I am
anxious to knock off this task whilst what little I know of it is fresh
in my recollection; for I foresee that much of the entertainment of the
work must depend on the elucidations in the Notes.

Yours,

J.W.C.

The publication of Lady Hervey's letters in 1821 was so successful that
Mr. Croker was afterwards induced to edit, with great advantage, letters
and memorials of a similar character. [Footnote: As late as 1848, Mr.
Croker edited Lord Hervey's "Memoirs of the Court of George II. and
Queen Caroline," from the family archives at Ickworth. The editor in his
preface said that Lord Hervey was almost the Boswell of George II. and
Queen Caroline.]

The next important _memoires pour servir_ were brought under Mr.
Murray's notice by Lord Holland, in the following letter:

_Lord Holland to John Murray_.

HOLLAND HOUSE, _November_ 1820.

SIR,

I wrote a letter to you last week which by some accident Lord
Lauderdale, who had taken charge of it, has mislaid. The object of it
was to request you to call here some morning, and to let me know the
hour by a line by two-penny post. I am authorized to dispose of two
historical works, the one a short but admirably written and interesting
memoir of the late Lord Waldegrave, who was a fa