and found him mighty ill, and got thirty guineas for him from lord Bolingbroke, and an order for one hundred pounds from the treasury to be paid him to morrow; and I have got him removed to Knightsbridge for air. 13th. I sent to see how he did, and he is extremely ill; and I am very much afflicted for him, as he is my own creature in a very honourable post, and very worthy of it. His mother and sister attend him, and he wants nothing. 14th. I took Parnell this morning, and we walked to see poor Harrison. I had the one hundred pounds in my pocket. I told Parnell I was afraid to knock at the door; my mind misgave me. I did knock, and his man in tears told me his master was dead an hour before. Think what grief this is to me! I could not dine with lord treasurer, nor any where else, but got a bit of meat toward evening. No loss ever grieved me so much: poor creature! Pray God Almighty bless you. Adieu. I send this away to night, and I am sorry it must go while I am in so much grief[1]."
Indeed, during that whole period, his breast seems to have contained a perpetual spring of the purest
- ↑ Lord Bolingbroke bears strong testimony to this quality in Swift, in his letter of March 17, 1719 : "I have not these several years tasted so sensible a pleasure, as your letters of the 16th of January and 16th of February gave me; and I know enough of the tenderness of your heart, to be assured, that the letter I am writing will produce much the same effect on you. I feel my own pleasure, and I feel yours. The truest reflection, and at the same time the bitterest satire, which can be made on the present age, is this, that to think as you think, will make a man pass for romantick. Sincerity, constancy, tenderness, are rarely to be found."
