Volume 1

The Farington diary / edited by James Greig.

  • Joseph Farington
Date:
[1922?-1928]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The Farington diary / edited by James Greig. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    57/464 page 21
    the Commons. That the political distinction between the Lords and Commons places the former at a distance which causes them to be more neutral judges than it is likely they would be, or than has ever been found where equality, or rather the name of it, has been boasted. Speaking of Poetical characters, Dr. Wolcot gave his opinion in favour of Dr. Young, author of the Night Thoughts, as next in poetical powers to Shakespeare, that is, of the Poets of this country. Taylor mentioned Mrs. Billington, the singer. She has accumulated about £10,000, and has settled £5,000 of it on her husband. She is lately gone abroad, as it is supposed, to meet Mr. Brady. November 30.—Dr. Fisher told me that after the Duke of York’s appointment to be Commander-in-Chief in Flanders, Mr. Pitt waited on him and requested to know what His Royal Highness proposed as a sum to defray the expence of his table. The Duke mentioned £5,000 a year, Mr. Pitt replied that he thought £6,000 should be the sum, and that he would answer His Royal Highness’s drafts to the amount. December 1.—Taylor [the oculist] of Hatton Garden called on me this morning and sat a considerable time. He brought with him some poems written by Mrs. Robinson,* one of them on sight dedicated to him. He says Mrs. Robinson is about 38 years of age. Colonel Tarlton does not now live with her, but is very often at her house in St. James’s Place. Taylor is much acquainted with Mrs. Siddons. She related to him the singular behaviour of Combe towards her when he was at Newnham in July last. Not acknowledging her at first, and becoming suddenly at the Spinning Feast attentive to her. I told him that the first shyness of Combe might rise from his having described her in his “ Devil on two Sticks ” as penurious in the extreme. That his consciousness might make him distant in his manner. Mrs. Siddons, speaking to Taylor on the subject of the attack on her as being miserly, said she could not have expected it. She should not have been surprised if from a shyness of manner she had been called proud ; but knew no ground on which the other accusation could be founded. She was by education and necessity made careful, but that had never led her into meanness. * Mrs. Robinson (Perdita) was a Contributor to the Morning Post. Her Portrait in the Wallace Collec¬ tion by Gainsborough is one of the Master’s most beautiful creations.
    digitised image 1
    digitised image 2
    digitised image 3