rom him for the last time with solemn tenderness. He wished to
look on her once more; and on the day before his death she long remained
in tears on the stairs leading to his bedroom, in the hope that she
might be called in to receive his blessing. He was then sinking fast,
and though he sent her an affectionate message, was unable to see her.
But this was not the worst. There are separations far more cruel than
those which are made by death. She might weep with proud affection for
Crisp and Johnson. She had to blush as well as to weep for Mrs. Thrale.

Life, however, still smiled upon Frances. Domestic happiness,
friendship, independence, leisure, letters, all these things were hers;
and she flung them all away.

Among the distinguished persons to whom she had been introduced, none
appears to have stood higher in her regard than Mrs. Delany. This lady
was an interesting and venerable relic of a past age. She was the niece
of George Granville, Lord Lansdowne, who, in his youth, exchanged verses
and compliments with Edmund Waller, and who was among the first to
applaud the opening genius of Pope. She had married Dr. Delany, a man
known to his contemporaries as a profound scholar and an eloquent
preacher, but remembered in our time chiefly as one of that small circle
in which the fierce spirit of Swift, tortured by disappointed ambition,
by remorse, and by the approaches of madness, sought for amusement and
repose. Dr. Delany had long been dead. His widow, nobly descended,
eminently accomplished, and retaining, in spite of the infirmities of
advanced age, the vigor of her faculties and the serenity of her temper,
enjoyed and deserved the favor of the royal family. She had a pension of
three hundred a year; and a house at Windsor, belonging to the Crown,
had been fitted up for her accommodation. At this house the King and
Queen sometimes called, and found a very natural pleasure in thus
catching an occasional glimpse of the private life of English families.

In December, 1785, Miss Burney was on a visit to Mrs. Delany at Windsor.
The dinner was over. The old lady was taking a nap. Her grandniece, a
little girl of seven, was playing at some Christmas game with the
visitors, when the door opened, and a stout gentleman entered
unannounced, with a star on his breast, and "What? what? what?" in his
mouth. A cry of "The King!" was set up. A general scampering followed.
Miss Burney owns that she could not have been more terrified