A regiment is I believe the best thing after all; for I have just discovered that Shakspeare, the mortal bird, as my son calls him, died of indisgestion, which I did not know till my new doctor told me so; he said, that poor Shakspeare was quite destroyed by common tato's, which must have been some coarse sort of the root in use in his time; and the doctor also told me, that he was attended by a Doctor Johnson and a Mr. Stevens; but I thought to myself, too many cooks spoil the broth; and even my medical said he thought he would have done better if they had left him alone. What made us talk about the great swain of Avon was my saying I thought She Stoops to Conquer a very droll play. My son-in-law has bought a beautiful picture, a Remnant undoubted; it is as black as your hat, and shines like a tea tray, and is considered, as indeed it is, what the French call, a _shade over_ of that great master; he has also bought a jem of considerable vallew; he says it is an antic of a dancing fawn, but it looks to me like a man with a tail, a jumping. He has got several very curious things at shops here; but he goes poking his nose into all the oles and corners for curiosities, and sometimes gets into sad scrapes; he is a French Mounsheer, you recollect; and at one of the sails he scraped acquaintance with a young dandy-looking man with dark musquitos on his lips, which we had seen every morning a drinking the waters regularly, and so we let him walk and talk with us; and at last we was told that he was no better than he should be, and had been convicted of purgery, which I did not think so great a crime, considering where we was; however, he is gone away, which I am glad of. I told you my son-in-law was a French Mounsheer, but I did not know till the other day that he was in the army, for he has been so sly as never to mention it; but I saw one of his letters from his elder brother, and in the direction he called him Cadet, which after all is no very high rank, you know. I should, however, have very much liked to have seen the boys from the Miliary Asslum march to the Surrey Theatre; it must have been a beautiful site; I suppose they got leave through the Egerton General's office. Have you read Lord Normandy's _Yes or No_, or Mr. Liston's _Herbert Lacy_? I should think it must be very droll, he is such a droll cretur himself; and pray tell me if you have heard any news from Portingal of the Don. Major Macpherson calls him Don _M'Gill_, and Captain O'Dogherty calls him Don _My jewel_--how do you pronounce it? I am told Lord Doodley used to call him, while he was in London, _My gull_.