as these do
of fortunes and preferments. Pay particular court, therefore, wherever
you are, to these female sovereigns of the 'beau monde'; their
recommendation is a passport through all the realms of politeness. But
then, remember that they require minute officious attentions. You should,
if possible, guess at and anticipate all their little fancies and
inclinations; make yourself familiarly and domestically useful to them,
by offering yourself for all their little commissions, and assisting in
doing the honors of their houses, and entering with seeming unction into
all their little grievances, bustles, and views; for they are always
busy. If you are once 'ben ficcato' at the Palazzo Borghese, you twill
soon be in fashion at Rome; and being in fashion will soon fashion you;
for that is what you must now think of very seriously.

I am sorry that there is no good dancing-master at Rome, to form your
exterior air and carriage; which, I doubt, are not yet the genteelest in
the world. But you may, and I hope you will, in the meantime, observe the
air and carriage of those who are reckoned to have the best, and form
your own upon them. Ease, gracefulness, and dignity, compose the air and
address of a man of fashion; which is as unlike the affected attitudes
and motions of a 'petit maitre', as it is to the awkward, negligent,
clumsy, and slouching manner of a booby.

I am extremely pleased with the account Mr. Harte has given me of the
allotment of your time at Rome. Those five hours every morning, which you
employ in serious studies with Mr. Harte, are laid out with great
interest, and will make you rich all the rest of your life. I do not look
upon the subsequent morning hours, which you pass with your Ciceroni, to
be ill-disposed of; there is a kind of connection between them; and your
evening diversions in good company are, in their way, as useful and
necessary. This is the way for you to have both weight and lustre in the
world; and this is the object which I always had in view in your
education.

Adieu, my friend! go on and prosper.

Mr. Grevenkop has just received Mr. Harte's letter of the 19th N. S.

LETTER CVII

LONDON, March 8, O. S. 1750

Young as you are, I hope you are in haste to live; by living, I mean
living with lustre and honor to yourself, with utility to society; doing
what may deserve to be written, or writing what may deserve to be read; I
should wish both. Those who consider life in that l