his duty to Madam V** comes in the way, he must prefer it to any other request whatsoever. I had directed the venison beforehand just as you wished, I see, and that was a pleasure to me. I had sent also two lines to Mrs. Dr***, to tell her it came by your order, in case you had been out of town. As to the pine-apple, I wish I had had it myself, or that you had sent it to any better friend,—Mrs. Price, or any honest body.

Mr. Lyttleton is just arrived, and I set forward on Monday. On Tuesday I hope to get to his house; and, if able, to get to General Dormer's in ten days (including journey and all).

I thank you for what you told Lord Cornbury. He writ to me very warmly, and talks of finding me wherever I am. I have given him the best account I can of my return to General Dormer's, about the 20th, I believe. I wish you would go. with Mrs. Greville to Astrop (it is but fifteen miles off), and stay with Lady Cobham till Lady Gerard returned from Lancashire, and called you. She and Mrs. Speed wish extremely for any honest company at present, and you would be quite easy. But this I know is a dream; and almost every thing I wish, in relation to you, is so always! Adieu. I hope you take Spa waters, though you mention it not. God keep you! and let me hear from you.

* This letter seems to contain the first indication of the quarrel of Pope and Miss Martha Blount, with Mr. and Mrs. Allen; of which some account will be found in the Life of Pope, prefixed to the present edition, chap. x.

LETTER LX.

TO MRS. MARTHA BLOUNT.

DEAR MADAM,

(1742.)

WRITING is become very painful to me, if

I would write a letter of any length. In bed, or sitting, it hurts my breast; and in the afternoon I can do nothing, still less by candle-light. I would else tell you every thing that passed between Mr. Allen and me. He proposed to have stayed only to dinner; but recollecting the next day was Good Friday, he said he would take a bed here, and fast with me. The next morning I desired him to come into my room before I rose, and opened myself very freely upon the subject, requiring the same unreserve on his part. I told him what I thought of Mrs. Allen's conduct to me before you came, and both hers and his after. He did pretty much what you expected; utterly denied any unkindness or coolness, and protested his utmost desire, and answered for hers, to have pleased you; laid it all upon the mutual dissatisfaction between you and her, and hoped I would not be altered toward him by any misrepresentation you might make; not that he believed you would tell an untruth, but that you saw things in a mistaken light. I very strongly told him you never made any such; nor, if he considered, was it possible, since all that had passed I saw with my own eyes, and heard with my own ears. I told him I did not im

pute the unkindness shewn me, in behaving so coldly, to him originally, but to Mrs. Allen; and fairly told him I suspected it to have proceeded from some jealousy she had of some designs we had upon his house at Hampton, and confirmed it by the reports I had heard of it from several hands. But he denied this utterly too. I pressed then, that she must have had some very unjust or bad thing suggested to her against you; but he assured me it all rested upon a mutual misunderstanding between you two, which appeared in two or three days, and which he spoke to his wife about, but found he could not make her at all easy in; and that he never in his whole life was so sorry at any disappointment. I said much more, being opener than I intended at first; but finding him own nothing, but stick to this, I turned to make slighter of it, and told him he should not see my behaviour altered to Mrs. Allen so much as hers had been to me (which he declared he did not see); and that I could answer for it, Mrs. Blount was never likely to take any notice of the whole, so far from misrepresenting any particular.

There were some other particulars, which I may recollect, or tell when we meet. I thought his behaviour a little shy; but in mine, I did my very best to shew I was quite unconcerned what it was. He parted, inviting himself to come again at his return in a fortnight. He has been very ill, and looks so. I do not intend to see them in town. But God knows whether I can see any body there;

for Cheselden is going to Bath next Monday, with whom at Chelsea I thought to lodge, and so get to you in a morning.

My own condition is much at one: and to save writing to you the particulars, which I know you desire to be apprized of, I inclose my letter to the Doctor.

I assure you I do not think half so much what will become of me, as of you; and when I grow worst, I find the anxiety for you doubled. Would to God you would quicken your haste to settle,* by reflecting what a pleasure it would be to me just to see it, and to see you at ease; and then I could contentedly leave you to the providence of God in this life, and resign myself to it in the other! I have little to say to you when we meet, but I love you upon unalterable principles, which makes me feel my heart the same to you as if I saw you every hour. Adieu.

Easter day.

Pray give my services to Lady Gerard; and pray get me some answer to Dr. King, or else it

* Pope breathes a similar wish in another Letter. "I could wish you had once the constancy and resolution to act for yourself, whether before or after I leave you," &c. He had much trouble in adjusting Miss Blount's affairs, and seldom had the satisfaction to please her. C. Bowles.

The above passages in Pope's Letters, and some others of the same nature, which have been so much misinterpreted, shew only the disinterestedness of Pope's attachment to Miss Blount, and his anxiety to see her permanently and comfortably established.

will cost me a letter of excuse to have delayed it so long.

I do not understand by your note, nor by Mrs. Arbuthnot's, whether you think of coming hither to-morrow, or when. Mr. Murray's depends on his recovery, which is uncertain; and Lord Bolingbroke, the end of the week.

LETTER LXI.

TO MRS. MARTHA BLOUNT.*

(1742.)

So strange a disappointment as I met with, the extreme sensibility which I know is in your nature, of such monstrous treatment, and the bitter reflection that I was wholly the unhappy cause of it, did really so distract me, while with you, that I could neither speak, nor move, nor act, nor think. I was like a man stunned or stabbed, where he expected an embrace: and I was dejected to death, seeing I could do or say nothing to comfort, but every thing rather to hurt you. But for God's sake know that I understood it was goodness and generosity you shewed me, under the appearance of anger itself. When you bid me first go to Lord B.'s from them, and then hasten thither, I was sen

* This letter is addressed to Miss Blount, who remained on her visit to Mr. Allen's, after Pope had left Prior Park, and seems intended to persuade her to follow his example and quit the house.