Memoirs of the Marquis of Rockingham and His Contemporaries: With Original Letters and Documents Now First Published, Volume 1

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Page xiii - Born and educated in this country, I glory in the name of Briton ; and the peculiar happiness of my life will ever consist in promoting the welfare of a people, whose loyalty and warm affection to me I consider as the greatest and most permanent security of my throne...
Page 214 - I venture to say, it did so happen, that persons had a single office divided between them, who had never spoke to each other in their lives, until they found themselves, they knew not how, pigging together, heads and points, in the same truckle-bed.
Page 48 - Tom Birch is as brisk as a bee in conversation ; but no sooner does he take a pen in his hand, than it becomes a torpedo to him, and benumbs all his faculties.
Page 44 - He was the man who bore his part in all societies with the most even temper and undisturbed hilarity of all the good companions whom I ever knew. He came into your house at the very moment you had put upon your card : he dressed himself, to do your party honour, in all the colours of the jay : his lace indeed had long since lost its lustre, but his coat had faithfully retained its cut since the days when gentlemen wore embroidered figured velvets...
Page 44 - ... cast him in the exact mould of an ill-made pair of stiff stays, he followed her so close in the fashion of his coat, that it was doubted if he did not wear them: because...
Page 54 - When he has wearied me for two hours, he looks at his watch to see if he may not tire me for an hour more.
Page 60 - My ear was struck with sounds I had little been accustomed to of late, virulent abuse on the last reign, and from a voice unknown to me. I turned, and saw a face equally new ; a black, robust man, of a military figure, rather...
Page 272 - We have had the great professor and founder of the philosophy of vanity in England. As I had good opportunities of knowing his proceedings almost from day to day, he left no doubt on my mind that he entertained no principle either to influence his heart.
Page 142 - Ranby 1 did not dare to propose that a hero should be tied, but was frightened out of his senses when the hero would hold the candle himself, which none of his generals could bear to do : in the middle of the operation, the Duke said, " Hold !" Ranby said, " For God's sake, Sir, let me proceed now — it will be worse to renew it" The Duke repeated, "I say, hold!
Page 119 - Scott answered her repeated inquiries with a vagueness which irritated the lady's feelings more and more ; until, at last, she could bear the thing no longer ; but one evening, just as she heard the bell ring as for the stranger's chair to carry him off, she made her appearance within the forbidden parlour with a salver in her hand, observing, that she thought the gentlemen had sat so long, they would be the better of a dish of tea, and had ventured accordingly to bring some for their acceptance.

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