d Sir Thomas
Lawrence on it _as his_; this was rather a bitter pill, and must
have been almost too much for Lawrence's courtierly equanimity.

_Wednesday, April 27th._--To the riding school, where Miss
Cavendish and I discoursed on the _stay-at-home_ sensation, and
agreed that it is bad to encourage it too far, as one may narrow
one's social circle till at last it resolves itself into _one's
self_.

Wrote to thank Dr. Thackeray [provost of King's College, Cambridge,
and father of my life-long friend A---- T----] for the Shakespeare
he has sent me, and Lady Dacre for her piece of "Wednesday
Morning." In the evening they all drove out in the open carriage to
see the illuminations; I stayed at home, for the carriage was full
and I had no curiosity about the sight. The town is one blaze of
rejoicing for the Reform Bill triumph; the streets are thronged
with people and choked up with carriages, and the air is flashing
and crashing with rockets and squibs and crackers, to the great
discomfort of the horses. So many R's everywhere that they may
stand for reform, revolution, ruin, just as those who run may
choose to read, or according to the interpretation of every
individual's politics; the most general acceptation in which they
will be taken by the popular understanding will assuredly be _row_.

_Friday, 29th._--Went off to rehearsal without any breakfast, which
was horrible! but not so horrible as my performance of Lady Teazle
promises to be. If I do the part according to my notion, it will be
mere insipidity, and yet all the traditional pokes and pats with
the fan and _business_ of the part, as it is called, is so
perfectly unnatural to me that I fear I shall execute it with a
doleful bad grace. It seems odd that Sir Peter always wears the
dress of the last century, while the costume of the rest of the
_dramatis personae_ is quite modern. Indeed, mine is a ball dress of
the present day, all white satin and puffs and clouds of white
tulle, and garlands and wreaths of white roses and jasmine; it is
very anomalous, and makes Lady Teazle of no date, as it were, for
her mariners are those of a rustic belle of seventeen hundred and
something, and her costume that of a fine lady of the present day
in the height of the present fashion, which is absurd.