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LETTER XCVIII.: Request to show some of Hume's Letters to the King. - 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 XCVIII.

Request to show some of Hume's Letters to the King.

Dearest Billy

I was last night at the Q’ house1 in company with the Two2 . I mentioned to Him that I had seen a strange Lr3 of David's expressing strange wishes and Hopes, it was that Lr of 1769 where there was a string of cruel wishes4 . in another there was mention made of his wishes to have all the American Charters destroyd etc.5

I told Him that I hoped I should once be able to shew him even the Originals. If I went too far—you need take no notice. If you will, I can shew them to Him.

You could oblige me if you would send by your Servant this Evening or to morrow morning a Cover6 thus frank’d

  • To Mr Meser
  • Fulneck
  • Leeds

to Mr Wollin's House No 45 Fetter Lane, who wants to send a Packet thither. No 45 is the second House from New Street.

I think to go tomorrow morning to Kew7 if fair. but I can shew those Lrs of David H. if you choose it, next Wednesday.

Yr obliged Hutton.

Nov. 1, 1776.

[James Hutton to William Strahan.]

[1]Note 1. The Queen's House was Buckingham House, which had been bought by George III for Queen Charlotte. Horace Walpole wrote on May 25, 1762:—‘The King and Queen are settled for good and all at Buckingham House, and are stripping the other palaces to furnish it.’ Letters, iii. 508. It was there that Johnson had his interview with the King. Boswell's Johnson, ii. 33. That the King was there on the day on which Hutton says that he saw him is proved by one of his letters to Lord North, with its date curiously minute according to his custom:—‘Queen's House, October 31st, 1776, 2 min. pt. 5 p.m.’ George III's Corres. ii. 37. The old house, which has been pulled down for the new palace, ‘with its little wilderness full of blackbirds and nightingales,’ is described in Dodsley's London and its Environs, ii. 39, and the Gent. Mag. 1762, p. 221.

[2]Note 2. The King and Queen.

[3]Note 3. Letter.

[4]Note 4. See ante, p. 112.

[5]Note 5. See ante, p. 289. Hutton had misread the letter.

[6]Note 6. See ante, p. 188, n. 11.

[7]Note 7. Miss Burney in her Diary thus describes the Court life at Kew:—‘July 28, 1786. As there are no early prayers, the Queen rises later; and as there is no form or ceremony here of any sort, her dress is plain, and the hour for the second toilette extremely uncertain. The Royal Family are here always in so very retired a way, that they live as the simplest country gentlefolks.’ Mme. D‘Arblay's Diary, iii. 37. It was here that the King was tended in his attack of madness in 1788. Ib. iv. 334. It was in the Gardens that, one day walking with his medical attendants, he caught sight of Miss Burney, and, on her running away, gave her chase. When he came up to her, he kissed her on the cheek, and presently pulling a paper out of his pocket-book showed her the list of the state officers whom he intended to appoint. ‘I shall be much better served (he said); and when once I get away, I shall rule with a rod of iron.’ Ib. iv. 407.