Page:The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 15.djvu/320

312 to day, that he cannot go till Thursday or Friday. I wish it were over. Mr. secretary tells me, he is in no fear at all that France will play tricks with us. If we have Dunkirk once, all is safe. We rail now all against the Dutch, who indeed have acted like knaves, fools, and madmen. Mr. secretary is soon to be made a viscount. He desired I would draw the preamble of his patent; but I excused myself from a work, that might lose me a great deal of reputation, and get me very little. We would fain have the court make him an earl, but it will not be; and therefore he will not take the title of Bolingbroke, which is lately extinct in the elder branch of his family. I have advised him to be called lord Pomfret; but he thinks that title is already in some other family; and, besides, he objects that it is in Yorkshire, where he has no estate; but there is nothing in that, and I love Pomfret. Don't you love Pomfret? Why? 'Tis in all our histories; they are full of Pomfret castle. But what's all this to you? You don't care for this? Is goody Stoyte come to London? I have not heard of her yet. The dean of St. Patrick's never had the manners to answer my letter. I was the other day to see Stearn and his wife. She is not half so handsome as when I saw her with you at Dublin. They design to pass the summer at a house near lord Somers's, about a dozen miles off. You never told me how my "Letter to Lord Treasurer" passes in Ireland. I suppose you are drinking at this time Temple something waters. Steele was arrested the other day for making a lottery, directly against an act of parliament. He is now under prosecution; but they think it will be dropped out of pity. I believe he will very soon lose his employment, for he has been mighty