"I have also seen Henry F----, Lord H----'s son, whom I had not looked upon since I left him a pretty, mild boy, without a neckcloth, in a jacket, and in delicate health, seven long years agone, at the period of mine eclipse--the third, I believe, as I have generally one every two or three years. I think that he has the softest and most amiable expression of countenance I ever saw, and manners correspondent. If to those he can add hereditary talents, he will keep the name of F---- in all its freshness for half a century more, I hope. I speak from a transient glimpse--but I love still to yield to such impressions; for I have ever found that those I liked longest and best, I took to at first sight; and I always liked that boy--perhaps, in part, from some resemblance in the less fortunate part of our destinies--I mean, to avoid mistakes, his lameness. But there is this difference, that _he_ appears a halting angel, who has tripped against a star; whilst I am _Le Diable Boiteux_,--a soubriquet, which I marvel that, amongst their various _nominis umbrae_, the Orthodox have not hit upon. "Your other allies, whom I have found very agreeable personages, are Milor B---- and _epouse_, travelling with a very handsome companion, in the shape of a 'French Count' (to use Farquhar's phrase in the Beaux Stratagem), who has all the air of a _Cupidon dechaine_, and is one of the few specimens I have seen of our ideal of a Frenchman _before_ the Revolution--an old friend with a new face, upon whose like I never thought that we should look again. Miladi seems highly literary,--to which, and your honour's acquaintance with the family, I attribute the pleasure of having seen them. She is also very pretty, even in a morning,--a species of beauty on which the sun of Italy does not shine so frequently as the chandelier. Certainly, English-women wear better than their continental neighbours of the same sex. M---- seems very good-natured, but is much tamed, since I recollect him in all the glory of gems and snuff-boxes, and uniforms, and theatricals, and speeches in our house--'I mean, of peers,'--(I must refer you to Pope--who you don't read and won't appreciate--for that quotation, which you must allow to be poetical,) and sitting to Stroeling, the painter, (do you remember our visit, with Leckie, to the German?) to be depicted as one of the heroes of Agincourt, 'with his long sword, saddle, bridle, Whack fal de, &c. &c.'