CHAPTER XXVIII.
LADY MARCHMONT TO SIR JASPER MEREDITH.
Life's best gifts are bought dearly. Wealth is won
By years of toil, and often comes too late:
With pleasure comes satiety; and pomp
Ts compassed round with vexing vanities:
And genius, earth's most glorious gift, that lasts
When all beside is perished in the dust-
How bitter is the suffering it endures!
How dark the penalty that it exacts!
My Dearest Uncle,—I return at once to the dinner at Lady Oxford's. Mr. Pope was within two of me at table. At first our meeting was a little awkward: he could not forget that I had witnessed his mortification. Pope is more pettish than the Dean of St. Patrick's. He could not, I am persuaded, even comprehend the other's deep misanthropy. He takes pleasure in what Swift would disdain. I cannot ima-
