hour without mention of you,
but, shall I tell you mind (sic), when Lady Carlisle tells you that
she has seen her at Chapel, and when I tell you that I have dined
with her, we certainly mean to please you; but do we not help to
keep up a flame that, in as much as that is the proper description
of it, had better be extinguished? Crescit indulgent isti. I am sure
I shall never say anything to lessen the just and natural esteem
which you have for her, but when there is grafted on that what may
make you uneasy, I must be an enemy to that or to yourself, and you
know, I am sure, how incapable I am of that. I have a long letter
almost every week from my flame also, Me du Deffand,(73) but these
are passions which non in seria ducunt. She is very importunate with
me to return to Paris, by which (?), if there is any sentiment, it
must be all of her side. I should not be sorry to make another
sejour there; but if I did, and it was with you, I should not throw
away with old women and old Presidents,(74) which is the same thing,
some of those hours which I regret very much at this instant. You
may assure Lord Kildare that I will do my best about his election at
the young club.(75)

(63) George Hobart, third Earl of Buckinghamshire (1732-1804). He
was returned to Parliament in 1761, 1768, and 1774, and he was
manager of the Opera for a time. In 1762 he was made Secretary to
the Embassy at St. Petersburg, where his half-brother John, second
Earl of Buckinghamshire, was Ambassador; in 1793 he succeeded him.
He married, in 1757, Albinia, eldest daughter of Lord Vere Bertie.

(64) The Count de Viry, Sardinian Minister to England.

(65) William Robert, Marquis of Kildare (1748-1805). He succeeded as
third Duke of Leinster in 1773.

(66) Percy Windham O'Brien, Baron of Stricheh and Earl of Thomond,
brother of Lord Egremont and of Mrs. George Grenville. He was a
Member of Parliament for Mmehead, Lord-Lieutenant of the county of
Somerset, and a member of the Privy Council.

(67) George Grenville (1712-1770). Prime Minister and Chancellor of
the Exchequer in 1763. The author of the Stamp Act. See his
Character, Lecky, "History of England," vol. III. p. 64.

(68) A dancing girl of fifteen and her family, at the moment the
object of Lord March's attention.

(69) Lady Elizabeth Seymour, Duchess of Northumberland, generally
called Lady Betty. In 1740 she married Sir Hugh Smithson, against
the will of her grandfather, the Duke of Somerse