I was to have gone to Court yesterday, I delayed writing to you until
the ceremony was over; as it is, instead of my letter being full of
royalty, peers and ribbons, you must accept nothing but the remnant of
those ideas, which the interesting hairbreadth adventures of _Tom
Jones_ have left me; in plain English the Drawing-room was put off
on account of the Queen's indisposition, and I am just at the end of
the above-mentioned delightful book. Oh! had I the wit of Partridge,
the religion of Thwackum, or the learning of Square, I might describe
with tolerable accuracy the intolerable stupidity of this great town.
The Opera is thin of company, thin of performers, thin of lights, thin
of _figurantes_, thin of scene-shifters, thin of everything! One
night we were a good deal entertained by having his R.H., & _chere
amie_ [6] in the next box to us, really they squabbled so, you
would have imagined they were man and wife....

As for Politicks, of which you ask so much, everyone here seems
discontented. All Pitt's friends, angry that he has deserted them for
Addington, and Lord Stafford, the head of them all, angry that the
ribbon should be given to Lord Abercorn--to one who has protected
rather than to one who has insulted Pitt--"Such little things are
great to little men."

The King, everyone agrees, looks charmingly and is more composed than
he has been for long. Lady de Clifford is appointed Governess to the
Princess (Charlotte)--_the bosom friend of Mrs Fitzherbert,
helas!_--and Mrs and Miss Trimmer under her; some say they will not
accept it. Dr Fisher, Bishop of Exeter, is to be Governor. I am for
making he and Mrs Trimmer disagree about Religion.