Doddington’s own wit was very ready. I will mention two instances. Lord Sundon was Commissioner of the Treasury with him and Winnington, and was very dull. One Thursday, as they left the board, Lord Sundon laughed heartily at something Doddington said; and when gone, Winnington said, “Doddington, you are very ungrateful; you call Sundon stupid and slow, and yet you see how quick he took what you said.” “Oh, no,” replied Doddington, “he was only laughing now at what I said last Treasury day.”--Mr. Trenchard, a neighbour, telling him, that though his pinery was expensive, he contrived, by applying the fire and the dung to other purposes, to make it so advantageous, that he believed he got a shilling by every pine-apple he ate. “Sir,” said Doddington, “I would eat them for half the money.”--Doddington was married to a Mrs. Behan, whom he was supposed to keep. Though secretly married, he could not own her, as he then did, till the death of Mrs. Strawbridge, to whom he had given a promise of marriage, under the penalty of ten thousand pounds. He had long made love to the latter, and, at last, obtaining an assignation, found her lying on a couch. However, he only fell on his knees, and after kissing her hand for some time, cried out, “Oh, that I had you but in a wood!” “In a wood!” exclaimed the disappointed dame; “what would you do then? Would you _rob_ me?” It was on this Mrs. Strawbridge that was made the ballad, My Strawberry--my Strawberry Shall bear away the bell; to the burthen and tune of which Lord Bath, many years afterwards, wrote his song on “Strawberry Hill.” Doddington had no children. His estate descended to Lord Temple, whom he hated, as he did Lord Chatham, against whom he wrote a pamphlet to expose the expedition to Rochfort. Nothing was more glaring in Doddington than his want of taste, and the tawdry ostentation in his dress and furniture of his houses. At Eastberry, in the great bedchamber, hung with the richest red velvet, was pasted, on every panel of the velvet, his crest (a hunting-horn supported by an eagle) cut out of gilt leather. The foot-cloth round the bed was a mosaic of the pocket-flaps and cuffs of all his embroidered clothes. At Hammersmith[256] his crest, in pebbles, was stuck into the centre of the turf before his door. The chimney-piece was hung with spars representing icicles round the fire, and a bed of purple, lined with orange, was crowned by a dome of peacock’s feathers. The great gallery, to which was a beautiful door of white marble, supported by two columns of _lapis lazuli_, was not only filled with busts and statues, but had, I think, an inlaid floor of marble; and all this weight was above stairs. One day showing it to Edward, Duke of York, Doddington said, “Sir, some persons tell me that this room ought to be on the ground.” “Be easy, Mr. Doddington,” replied the Prince, “it will soon be there.”