“My evenings at Edinburgh passed very agreeably with Doctor Robertson, Doctor Blair, Lord Kames, and divers ingenious and agreeable persons. My friend, Doctor Gregory, who was my fellow traveller, tho’ he is a mathematician, has a fine imagination, an elegant taste, and every quality to make an agreeable companion.... He came back to Denton with me, but soon left us. I detain’d his two daughters, who are still with us; they are most amiable children.... “I was told Mr. Gray was rather reserved when he was in Scotland, tho’ they were disposed to pay him great respect. I agree perfectly with him, that to endeavour to shine in conversation and to lay out for admiration is very paltry. The wit of the company, next to the butt of the company, is the meanest person in it. But at the same time, when a man of celebrated talents disdains to mix in common conversation, or refuses to talk on ordinary subjects, it betrays a latent pride. There is a much brighter character than that of a wit or a poet, or a savant, which is that of a rational and sociable being, willing to carry on the commerce of life with all the sweetness and condescension decency and virtue will permit. The great duty of conversation is to follow suit, as you do at whist. If the eldest hand plays the deuce of diamonds, let not his next neighbour dash down the king of hearts, because his hand is full of honours. I do not love to see a man of wit win all the tricks in conversation, nor yet to see him sullenly pass. I speak not this of Mr. Gray in particular; but it is the common failing of men of genius to assert a proud superiority or maintain a prouder indolence. I shall be very glad to see Mr. Gray whenever he will be pleased to do me the favour. I think he is the first poet of the age; but if he comes to my fireside, I will teach him not only to speak prose, but to talk nonsense, if occasion be.... I would not have a poet always sit on the proud summit of the forked hill. I have a great respect for Mr. Gray as well as a high admiration.” ... Whenever Mrs. Montagu got up to ride a simile, there was ground for anxiety on the part of her friends; some among them, too, must have wished that she had called a nightingale a nightingale, and not “philomel.” In travel, however, she saw what she saw, which many travellers never do. She was not at all like the wife of Sir George Cornewall mentioned by Lady Malmesbury, in a letter to her son, written at Chambéry, 1816: “She never looks at anything, but works in the carriage all day long. She will not even go to Chamouni;” or that other lady who, passing through the sublimest of mountain scenery, kept her eyes shut, declaring that it was too beautiful to look at. CHAPTER VI.