Читать книгу The Diary and Collected Letters of Madame D'Arblay, Frances Burney - Frances Burney - Страница 69

Wednesday, June 26.—Dr. Johnson, who had been in town some days, returned, and Mr. Crutchley came also, as well as my father. I did not see the two latter till summoned to dinner; and then Dr. Johnson seizing my hand, while with one of his own he gave me a no very gentle tap on the shoulder, half drolly and half reproachfully called out—

“Ah, you little baggage, you! and have you known how long I have been here, and never to come to me?”

And the truth is, in whatever sportive mood he expresses it, he really likes not I should be absent from him half a minute whenever he is here, and not in his own apartment.

Dr. Johnson, as usual, kept me in chat with him in the library after all the rest had dispersed; but when Mr. Crutchley returned again, he went upstairs, and, as I was finishing some work I had in hand, Mr. Crutchley, either from civility or a sudden turn to loquacity, forbore his books, to talk.

Among other folks, we discussed the two rival duchesses, Rutland and Devonshire.¹⁰⁹ “The former,” he said, “must, he fancied, be very weak and silly, as he knew that she endured being admired to her face, and complimented perpetually, both upon her beauty and her dress;” and when I asked whether he was one who joined in trying her—

“Me!” cried he, “no, indeed! I never complimented any body; that is, I never said to any body a thing I did not think, unless I was openly laughing at them, and making sport for other people.”

“Oh,” cried I, “if everybody went by this rule, what a world of conversation would be curtailed! The Duchess of Devonshire, I fancy, has better parts.”

“Oh yes; and a fine, pleasant, open countenance. She came to my sister’s once, in Lincolnshire, when I was there, in order to see hare-hunting, which was then quite new to her.”

“She is very amiable, I believe,” said I, “for all her friends love and speak highly of her.”

“Oh, yes, very much so—perfectly good-humoured and unaffected. And her horse was led, and she was frightened; and we told her that was the hare, and that was the dog; and the dog pointed to the hare, and the hare ran away from the dog and then she took courage, and then she was timid;—and, upon my word, she did it all very prettily! For my part, I liked it so well, that in half an hour I took to my own horse, and rode away.”