to me as to a country girl transported from Wales to Coventry. I know I
ought to think my lot very good, that can boast of some sincere friends
among strangers."

Old age will, in the long run, have its way. Lady Mary, as pleasantly
loquacious as ever, found the manual labour of writing not always to be
endured, and she tried the experiment of dictating her correspondence.

"Thus far" (she wrote to Sir James Steuart from Padua, July 19, 1759),
"I have dictated for the first time of my life, and perhaps it will be
the last, for my amanuensis is not to be hired, and I despair of ever
meeting with another. He is the first that could write as fast as I
talk, and yet you see there are so many mistakes, it wants a comment
longer than my letter to explain my insignificant meaning, and I have
fatigued my poor eyes more with correcting it, than I should have done
in scribbling two sheets of paper. You will think, perhaps, from this
idle attempt, that I have some fluxion on my sight; no such matter; I
have suffered myself to be persuaded by such sort of arguments as those
by which people are induced to strict abstinence, or to take physic.
Fear, paltry fear, founded on vapours rising from the heat, which is now
excessive, and has so far debilitated my miserable nerves that I submit
to a present displeasure, by way of precaution against a future evil,
that possibly may never happen. I have this to say in my excuse, that
the evil is of so horrid a nature, I own I feel no philosophy that could
support me under it, and no mountain girl ever trembled more at one of
Whitfield's pathetic lectures than I do at the word blindness, though I
know all the fine things that may be said for consolation in such a case:
but I know, also, they would not operate on my constitution. 'Why, then'
(say my wise monitors), 'will you persist in reading or writing seven
hours in a day?' 'I am happy while I read and write.' 'Indeed, one would
suffer a great deal to be happy,' say the men, sneering; and the ladies
wink at each other, and hold up their fans. A fine lady of three score
had the goodness to add, 'At least, madam, you should use spectacles; I
have used them myself these twenty years; I was advised to it by a famous
oculist when I was fifteen. I am really of opinion that they have
preserved my sight, notwithstanding the passion I always had both for
reading and drawing.' This good woman, you must know, is half blind, and
never read a larger v