however, was subsequently used to procure for Delany the deanery of Down. On his death, which occurred in 1768, Mrs. Delany settled in London, and, at the time when Miss Burney was introduced to her, had a house in St. James’s Place. Her most intimate friend was the old Duchess of Portland, with whom she regularly spent the summer at her Grace’s dower house of Bulstrode. There she was presented to George III. and his Queen, both of whom conceived a strong regard for her. The King called her his dearest Mrs. Delany, and in 1782 commissioned Opie to paint her portrait, which was placed at Hampton Court.[61] While Frances Burney was having her first interview with Mrs. Delany, the Dowager Duchess of Portland condescended to appear upon the scene. This exalted personage, we are given to understand, had a natural aversion to female novel-writers, but, at her friend’s request, consented to receive homage from the author of ‘Cecilia.’ Her curiosity, in fact, got the better of her pride. Before her arrival, the conversation turned on the flower-work for which Mrs. Delany was famous among her acquaintances. This was a kind of paper mosaic, invented by the old lady, and practised by her until her eyesight failed. Some specimens of it were thought worthy of being offered, as a tribute of humble duty, to Queen Charlotte. The admiration freely bestowed on this trumpery, and the doubtful reception accorded to literary merit in a woman, illustrate the tone which prevailed in the highest society a hundred years ago. To cut out bits of coloured paper, and paste them together on the leaf of an album so as to resemble flowers, was considered a wonderful achievement even for a paragon of her sex. To have written the best work of imagination that had proceeded from a female pen was held to confer only an equivocal title to eminence. The Duchess, however, exerted herself to be civil. ‘She was a simple woman,’ says Walpole; but she did her best. She joined Mrs. Delany in recalling the characters that had pleased them most in ‘Cecilia;’ she dwelt on the spirit of the writing, the fire in the composition, and, ‘with a solemn sort of voice,’ declared herself gratified by the morality of the book, ‘so striking, so pure, so genuine, so instructive.’ Fanny, always impressed by grandeur, eager after praise, thankful for notice, was charmed with these compliments. She found her Grace’s manner not merely free from arrogance, but ‘free also from its mortifying deputy, affability.’ Yet the worship of rank, which belonged to that age, was, in little Miss Burney, always subordinate to better feelings. In her eyes the dignified visitor appeared by no means so interesting as her hostess.[62] Nor was it any air of courtliness that attracted her in Mrs. Delany, but a simple domestic association. Though not a person of genius, or, it should seem, of any extraordinary cultivation, this veteran of English and Irish society had preserved an unsullied, gentle,