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LETTER LI.: Miscarriage of Presentation Copies of the History. - David Hume, Letters of David Hume to William Strahan [1756]Edition used:Letters of David Hume to William Strahan, ed. G. Birkbeck Hill (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1888).
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LETTER LI.Miscarriage of Presentation Copies of the History.
23 Augst., 17711. Dear SirI own, that I am, at this time, very much out of humour, and with you. Near two Years ago, I wrote to Lady Aylesbury2. , that I had orderd a new Edition of my History and Essays to be sent her: You wrote to me, that they were sent; but she tells me, that she never receiv’d them, and was continually in expectation of them. By what Accident this has happen’d, appears to me totally unaccountable; and the more so, as I know, that a Copy which I desird to be sent to Lord Hertford came safe to hand. I beseech you to send a Copy immediatly to Mr. Conway in little Warwick Street Charing Cross, and to enquire how the former Mistake happend: For I am certain, that it proceeded not from your Fault, notwithstanding the ill-humour with which I begun my Letter. But I desird, at that time, that a Copy shoud also be sent to Lady Holderness3. ; and I am also suspicious that this Copy has miscarryd by the same Accident; and the more so, as she never wrote me that she had receivd it, which she woud naturally have done. If you be not sure, that this Copy has been deliverd, please to inform me, that I may enquire; or rather, send a new Copy, relating the former Accident, and desiring that this Copy be returnd, in case the former Copy was deliver’d. I shall be in Town at the time which I appointed, and ready to receive the Proof Sheets. I am Dear Sir Your most obedient humble ServantDavid Hume. (Written below in another hand) Decr. 6th, 17694. . [1.]Note 1. In Nichols's Literary History, i. 141, the following passage occurs in a letter by Daniel Wray, dated Oct. 15, 1771:—’Have you heard of the Congress at Inverary?. . . Though fifty beds were made, they were so crowded that even David Hume, for all his great figure as a Philosopher and Historian, or his greater as a fat man, was obliged by the adamantine peg-maker1. to make one of three in a bed.’ Hume also visited Inverary in September, 1775. Burton's Hume, ii. 475. [2.]Note 2. See ante, p. 215, n. 3. [3.]Note 3. The Earl of Holdernesse had been a Secretary of State from 1751 to 1761. Hume wrote from Paris on April 26, 1764:—’It is almost out of the memory of man that any British has been here on a footing of familiarity with the good company except my Lord Holdernesse, who had a good stock of acquaintance to begin with, speaks the language like a native, has very insinuating manners, was presented under the character of an old Secretary of State, and spent, as is said, £10,000 this winter to obtain that object of vanity. Him, indeed, I met everywhere in the best company.’ Burton's Hume, ii. 194. Horace Walpole had written four months earlier to the Earl of Hertford, the English Ambassador at Paris:—’I have not mentioned Lady Holdernesse's presentation, though I by no means approve it, nor a Dutch woman's lowering the peerage of England. Nothing of that sort could make me more angry, except a commoner's wife taking such a step; for you know I have all the pride of [4.]Note 4. This entry, which is, I believe, in Strahan's hand, probably gives the date on which the copy of the History had been sent to Lady Holdernesse. [1.]Note 1. In Nichols's Literary History, i. 141, the following passage occurs in a letter by Daniel Wray, dated Oct. 15, 1771:—’Have you heard of the Congress at Inverary?. . . Though fifty beds were made, they were so crowded that even David Hume, for all his great figure as a Philosopher and Historian, or his greater as a fat man, was obliged by the adamantine peg-maker1. to make one of three in a bed.’ Hume also visited Inverary in September, 1775. Burton's Hume, ii. 475. [3.]Note 3. The Earl of Holdernesse had been a Secretary of State from 1751 to 1761. Hume wrote from Paris on April 26, 1764:—’It is almost out of the memory of man that any British has been here on a footing of familiarity with the good company except my Lord Holdernesse, who had a good stock of acquaintance to begin with, speaks the language like a native, has very insinuating manners, was presented under the character of an old Secretary of State, and spent, as is said, £10,000 this winter to obtain that object of vanity. Him, indeed, I met everywhere in the best company.’ Burton's Hume, ii. 194. Horace Walpole had written four months earlier to the Earl of Hertford, the English Ambassador at Paris:—’I have not mentioned Lady Holdernesse's presentation, though I by no means approve it, nor a Dutch woman's lowering the peerage of England. Nothing of that sort could make me more angry, except a commoner's wife taking such a step; for you know I have all the pride of
[2.]‘A senator of Rome, while Rome survived.’ Addison's Cate, Act v. sc. 4. |
