when I was last abroad, enquired much for him: Mrs. Fermor, the
Prioress, niece to Belinda in the Rape of the Lock, taking occasion to
tell me, comically enough, "That she believed there was but little
comfort to be found in a house that harboured _poets_; for that she
remembered Mr. Pope's praise made her aunt very troublesome and
conceited, while his numberless caprices would have employed ten
servants to wait on him; and he gave one" (said she) "no amends by his
talk neither, for he only sate dozing all day, when the sweet wine was
out, and made his verses chiefly in the night; during which season he
kept himself awake by drinking coffee, which it was one of the maids
business to make for him, and they took it by turns."

These ladies really live here as comfortably for aught I see as peace,
quietness, and the certainty of a good dinner every day can make them.
Just so much happier than as many old maids who inhabit Milman Street
and Chapel Row, as they are sure not to be robbed by a treacherous, or
insulted by a favoured, servant in the decline of life, when protection
is grown hopeless and resistance vain; and as they enjoy at least a
moral certainty of never living worse than they do to-day: while the
little knot of unmarried females turned fifty round Red Lion Square
_may_ always be ruined by a runaway agent, a bankrupted banker, or a
roguish steward; and even the petty pleasures of six-penny quadrille may
become by that misfortune too costly for their income.--_Aureste_, as
the French say, the difference is small: both coteries sit separate in
the morning, go to prayers at noon, and read the chapters for the day:
change their neat dress, eat their little dinner, and play at small
games for small sums in the evening; when recollection tires, and chat
runs low.

But more adventurous characters claim my present attention. All Paris I