Oh, Julia, what abominations have I been describing! This narrative, as I have given it to you, is as nearly as I can remember, in the very words of Mr. Bolton, our merry chronicler; and _this_ was the mystery, to which he alluded, when he hinted at _back stairs_ intelligence, but refused to explain farther, lest we should mar poetic justice, by revealing the plot. Alas! I have worse than this to tell you, and then my pen shall never be dipped again in subjects such as these. It is not good to talk, to write, to think on themes of this nature; were they simply disgusting, they would not be dangerous; but it is not in human nature to resist the ridiculous when Mr. Bolton is the Biographer, and such people as I have been introducing to your acquaintance are the subjects of a memoir compiled by him. I laughed till the tears made channels in my cheeks. Not so, when he told us a story of another neighbour, whose house I have _journalized_ you into visiting along with me. Only conceive Lady Campion’s having made proposals of marriage to Lord Thornborough, who had, after too liberal a potation of Burgundy, made _his_ to her daughter; and preparations are actually in train for this unnatural union, Lord T. having deserted his first love. The contemptible animal, miscalled _nobleman_, has made his terms: Lady Campion settles a thousand a-year upon him in perpetuity, of which she deprives her own offspring, and receives a coronet in exchange! Thank heaven that we have left Marsden, the air of which seems tainted by such corruption. Before I close my letter I must refresh myself, and obey you, by looking into Frederick’s humourous diary, and trying whether I can give you another scrap out of it in the way of _a vignette_. I told you the dear fellow diverted himself by scribbling in verse, when he reached his lodgings at night, rehearsing for his diversion the principal circumstances that had struck him ludicrously in the course of each day, while in London. I find a ball at Lady Gosling’s mentioned in the three following stanzas, which are a good specimen of Frederick’s merry vein:-- There, as each dandy _sidles_ round the room, So like a crab, both in his claws and motion, Whose head is a soft sponge to hold perfume, Whose face a platter, shining with some lotion, Who is the idol of his own devotion. And thinks that all must hold the self same creed On this important point. How little notion Has he, of all the answers matrons need, Ere with his favouring fiat they can be agreed. “Has he got brothers?” “Yes.” “Is he the heir?” “No, he’s a younger son of Viscount D----,” “What are his prospects?” “None.” “then I declare I think it very wrong of Lady E. To have invited him.” Now, as for me, I never see a younger brother’s face, Unless the second’s, should the eldest be Consumptive,--clearly a _decided_ case, For then in fact, the second soon must take his place.