Page:Memoirs of the Lady Hester Stanhope.djvu/88

 they suppose you said it would go into a handkerchief merely as a façon de parler.'"

Lady Hester, when she told me this story, here interrupted herself—"And upon my word, doctor, if you had seen the footman bringing it over his shoulder, he himself almost covered up by it, you would have thought indeed it was only a façon de parler."

She continued. "I turned myself to James. 'Now, sir, take and tie it up directly in this pocket-handkerchief. There! does it, or does it not go into it!'

"This," concluded Lady Hester, "was the only quarrel I ever had with Charles and James. James often used to look very black, but he never said anything.

"When Mr. Pitt was going to Bath, in his last illness, he told me he had just seen Arthur Wellesley. He spoke of him with the greatest commendation, and said the more he saw of him, the more he admired him. 'Yes,' he added, 'the more I hear of his exploits in India, the more I admire the modesty with which he receives the praises he merits from them. He is the only man I ever saw that was not vain of what he had done, and had so much reason to be so.'

"This eulogium," Lady Hester said, "Mr. Pitt pronounced in his fine mellow tone of voice, and this was the last speech I heard him make in that voice;