March 8.—Last night, Laporte, the celebrated French actor from the Vaudeville, delighted a very chosen society at our petite soirée by his reading of Les Precieuses.
In the dawn of refinement there is always a tendency to the Précieuse-ism of the Hotel Rambouillet. Louis XIV., that most illiterate of men, was bored alike with the real and affected superiority of some of his courtiers; he was protector of Moliere, and even the Jesuits could not hunt down Tartuffe.
May 9.—Received in Kildare Street the Duke de Dalmatia, son of Marshal Soult, and his friend de Visconti. They were sent to me by the Duc de Montebello.
The diary is resumed in London.
July 27.—Lady
Charleville was pre-eminently agreeable to-day,—we talked
over Lady Cork; she is eighty-one, and gave
a dinner to twenty special guests
| 238 | LADY MORGAN'S MEMOIR. |
At the Duke of St. Alban’s, where there were all the opera people, she said, “Duke, now, couldn’t you send me the pack for my evening?” “Certainly,” said he, and they were sent with a grand piano forte. When they came to her, Lady Cork got frightened, and said “Je suis une pauvre veuve, je ne saurais payer de tels talents, mais vous verrez la meilleure société, la Duchesse de St. Albans, &c., &c.” The Primo Amoroso bowed, and acknowledged the honour, but intimated that the Duchess always paid them.
Lady Cork went to the Duke and accused him of taking a word at random, tout de bon.
The Duchess overhearing, came forward in a rage, and scolded the little Duke like a naughty schoolboy. The angry Duchess took all upon herself. Lady Cork was very angry at “the show up.”
Talking this morning with Lady
Charleville on the report of my having found assistance in
Brownlow’s conversations.
“Not you, child,” she said, “you have a
splendid imagination, but you have no powers of argument.” She
was right as to the fact, but wrong as to inference. Men are always more easily
convinced by images presented to their senses, than by arguments
| THE O’BRIENS AND O’FLAHERTIES—1827. | 239 |
There is nothing less amusing than writing for the amusement of the public.
Lady Cork said to me this morning, when I called Miss —— a nice person. “Don’t say nice, child, ’tis a bad word. Once I said to Dr. Johnson, ‘Sir, that is a very nice person.’ ‘A nice person,’ he replied, ‘what does that mean? Elegant is now the fashionable word, but will go out, and I see this stupid nice is to succeed to it; what does nice mean? look in my dictionary, you will see it means correct, precise.’”
Lady Cork also told me that on one occasion when Croker was dining with the King, the Duke of Clarence was present, who was always indignant at the insolence of office displayed by Croker in the Admiralty. “When I am king,” said he, “I will be my own secretary of the Admiralty.” The King overheard them and said, “What nonsense is that you are talking, Croko?” “His Royal Highness is mentioning what he will do in case he should become king.” The next morning the King sent for Croker to his bedroom, and reproached him for exposing his brother, and he was never invited to dinner again.
