CHAPTER XI. Chelsea Hospital—Tour to Devonshire—Visit to Bath—Reminiscences—The Duchess of Devonshire—Return Home—Literary Pursuits resumed—Attempts at Tragedy—Social Engagements—Death of Sir Joshua Reynolds—A Public Breakfast at Mrs. Montagu’s—Mrs. Hastings—Mr. Boswell—Visit to Mrs. Crewe—The Burke Family—Meeting with Edmund Burke—Burke and the French Revolution—Charles Fox—Lord Loughborough—Mr. Erskine—His Egotism—The French Refugees in England—Bury St. Edmunds—Madame de Genlis—The Duke de Liancourt—The Settlement at Mickleham—Count de Narbonne—The Chevalier d’Arblay—Visit of Miss Burney to Norfolk—Death of Mr. Francis—Return to London. Miss Burney returned to her father, who, with his wife and his youngest daughter Sarah, was then living in Chelsea Hospital. The family at this time occupied rooms on the ground-floor, which not long afterwards were exchanged for others in the top story. After resting three weeks at home, she set out on a tour to the southwest of England, under the care of her friend Mrs. Ord. The travellers journeyed by easy stages to Sidmouth, taking Stonehenge on their way, and stopping at the principal places which had been visited by the Court in the summer of 1789. Having spent eight or nine days on the coast of South Devon, they turned northwards, and proceeded by the ruins of Glastonbury Abbey to Bath. That most famous of English watering-places was greatly altered from what it had been when Fanny passed the season there with the Thrales eleven years before. The circumference, she tells us, had trebled, though the new buildings were scattered, and most of them unfinished. “The hills are built up and down, and the vales so stocked with streets and houses, that, in some places, from the ground-floor on one side a street, you cross over to the attic of your opposite neighbour. It looks a town of hills, and a hill of towns.” But the palaces of white stone rising up on every hand interested her less than the old haunts with which she was familiar—the North Parade, where she had lived with Mrs. Thrale; the houses in the Circus, where she had visited Mrs. Montagu and Mrs. Cholmley; the Belvedere, where she had talked with Mrs. Byron and Lord Mulgrave. Nearly a month slipped away in reviving old recollections, and in making some new acquaintances to replace the many that had disappeared. The retired official was much flattered by an introduction to the celebrated Duchess of Devonshire, and amused herself with the thought that her first visit after leaving the Queen should be paid to the greatest lady of the Opposition. Another month was divided between Mickleham and Norbury Park, and by the middle of October Miss Burney was again at Chelsea.