Page:Memoirs of the Lady Hester Stanhope.djvu/40

 situation—Mr. Tom Grenville, Lord Malmesbury,' and I forget who was the third: 'but you know,' I added, 'Lord Malmesbury’s health will not allow him to go to so cold a climate, and Mr., the other, is something and something, so that he is out of the question.' Next morning, doctor, there appeared in 'The Oracle,' a paper, observe, that Mr. Pitt never read—'We understand that Lord M. and Mr. T. G. are selected as the two persons best qualified for the embassy to Russia: but, owing to his lordship’s ill health, the choice will most likely fall on Mr. T. G.'

"I was highly amused the following days, to hear the congratulations that were paid to Mr. Grenville: but, when the real choice came to be known, which was neither one nor the other, oh! how black the inquisitive friend of mine looked; and what reproaches he made me for having, as he called it, deceived him! But I did not deceive him: I only told him what was true, that, if I had the choice, I should choose such and such persons.

"There are, necessarily, hundreds of reasons for ministers’ actions, that people in general know nothing