thirty words as well as in thirty thousand rolls of musty parchment. We may find it surely in that historic note dispatched by Ann, Countess of Dorset, to Sir Joseph Williamson, Secretary of State under Charles II., who wanted her to appoint a courtier as member from Appleby. Nothing could well be shorter; nothing could possibly be more significant. This is all:—
Sir,—I have been bullied by an usurper, I have been ill-treated by a court, but I won't be dictated to by a subject. Your man shall not stand.
Now if you don't feel you know Ann Dorset pretty well after reading those four lines, you wouldn't know her if she left a diary as long as Samuel Pepys's; and if you don't feel, after reading them, that she is worth the knowing, it is hopeless for her to try and win your regard. Another and still more amusing instance of self-revelation may be found in a manuscript familiar to many who have visited the Bodleian Library at Oxford. There, among other precious treasures, is a collection of notes scribbled by Charles II. to Clarendon, and
