should be almost impossible to be understood by anybody else.

"Thus I suppose my innocent epistles are severely scrutinized; and when
I talk of my grandchildren, they are fancied to represent all the
potentates of Europe. This is very provoking. I confess there are good
reasons for extraordinary caution at this juncture; but 'tis very hard I
cannot pass for being as insignificant as I really am."

Lady Mary clearly was happy in Italy, and did not in the least hanker
after the delights of London society, which in her earlier days she had
so much enjoyed.

"By the account you give me of London, I think it very much reformed; at
least you have one sin the less, and it was a very reigning one in my
time, I mean scandal: it must be literally reduced to a whisper, since
the custom of living all together. I hope it has also banished the
fashion of talking all at once, which was very prevailing when I was in
town, and may perhaps contribute to brotherly love and unity, which was
so much declined in my memory, that it was hard to invite six people
that would not, by cold looks, or piquing reflections affront one
another. I suppose parties are at an end, though I fear it is the
consequence of the old almanac prophecy, "Poverty brings peace"; and I
fancy you really follow the French mode, and the lady keeps an assembly,
that the assembly may keep the lady, and card money pay for clothes and
equipage as well as cards and candles. I find I should be as solitary in
London as I am here in the country, it being impossible for me to submit
to live in a _drum_, which I think so far from a cure of uneasiness,
that it is, in my opinion, adding one more to the heap. There are so
many attached to humanity, 'tis impossible to fly from them all; but
experience has confirmed to me what I always thought, that the pursuit
of pleasure will be ever attended with pain, and the study of ease be
most certainly accompanied with pleasures. I have had this morning as
much delight in a walk in the sun as ever I felt formerly in the crowded
Mall, even when I imagined I had my share of the admiration of the place,
which was generally soured before I slept by the informations of my
female friends, who seldom failed to tell me, it was observed, I had
showed an inch above my shoe-heels, or some other criticism of equal
weight, which was construed affectation, and utterly destroyed all the
satisfaction my vanity had given me. I have now no other but in my