LETTER XLVIII.

At Challons sur la Soane, (for there is another town of the same name in Champaigne) I had the honor of a visit from Mons. le Baron Shortall, a gentleman of an ancient family, rather in distress at this time, by being kept out of six and thirty thousand a year, his legal property in Ireland; but as the Baron made his visit ala-mode de capuchin Friar, without knocking, and when only the female part of my family were in the apartment, he was dismissed rather abruptly for a man of his high rank and great fortune in expectation. This dismission, however, did not dismay him; he rallied again, with the reinforcement of Madame la Baroness, daughter, as he positively affirmed, of Mons. le Prince de Monaco; but as I had forbad his being shewn up, he desired me to come down, a summons curiosity induced me to obey. Never, surely, were two people of fashion in a more pitiable plight! he was in a russet brown black suit of cloaths; Madame la Baroness in much the same colour, wrapt up in a tattered black silk capuchin; and I knew not which to admire most, their folly or their impudence; for surely never did an adventurer set out with less capabilities about him; his whole story was so flagrant a fib, that in spite of the very respectable certificates of My Lord Mayor, John Wilkes, and Mr. Alderman Bull, I was obliged to tell him plainly, that I did not believe him to be a gentleman, nor his wife to be a relation of the Prince of Monaco. All this he took in good part, and then assured me they were both very hungry, and without meat or money; I therefore ordered a dinner at twenty sols a head; and, as I sat by while they eat it, I had reason to believe that he told me one plain truth, for in truth they eat as if they had never eaten before. After dinner the Baron did me the honour to consult with me how he should get down to Lyons? I recommended to him to proceed by water; but, said he, my dear Sir, I have no money;--an evil I did not chuse to redress; and, after several unsuccessful attempts at my purse, and some at my person,--he whispered me that even six livres would be acceptable; but I held out, and got off, by proposing that the Baroness should write a letter to the Prince her father, to whom I had the honour to be known, and that I would carry him the letter, and enforce their prayer, by making it my own. This measure she instantly complied with, and addressed her father adorable Prince; but concluded it with a name which could not belong to her either as maid, wife, or widow. I remarked this to the Baron, who acknowledged at once the mistake, said she had signed a false name, and she should write it over again; but when I observed to him that, as the Prince knew the handwriting of his own dear child, and as the name of women is often varying by marriage, or miscarriage, it was all one: to this he agreed; and I brought off the letter, and my purse too, for forty sols; yet there was so much falshood, folly, and simplicity in this simple pair of adventurers, that I sorely repented I did not give them their passage in the coche d'eau to Lyons; for he could not speak a word of French, nor Madame la Baroness a word of English; and the only insignia of distinction between them, was, a vast clumsy brass-hilted sword which the Baron, instead of wearing at his side, held up at his nose, like a Physician's gold-headed cane.--When I took my leave of this Sir James Shortall, (for he owned at last he was only a Baronet) he promised to meet me next time dressed in his blue and silver.

I verily believe my Irish adventurer at Perpignan, is a gentleman, and therefore I relieved him; I am thoroughly persuaded my Challons adventurer is not, yet perhaps he was a real object of charity, and his true tale would have produced him better success than his borrowed story. Sir James was about sixty, Lady Shortall about fifty.--Sir James too had a pretty large property in America, and would have visited his estates on that continent, had I not informed him of the present unhappy differences now subsisting between that and the mother country, of which he had not heard a single syllable.

After having said thus much, I think I must treat you with a copy of Lady Shortall's letter, a name very applicable to their unhappy situation, for they did indeed seem short of every thing;--so here it is, verbatim et literatim:

"Monsieur Thickness gentilhomme anglaise

"Adorable preince de monaco que tout mordonne deme, lise au de fus de cette lette le non deun digne homme qui me randu ser visse, je suis malade, le convan; serois preferable a mon bouneur je veux sepandant sauve non marij mais je me meure tre seve mon derinier soupire, je ne le doit qua vous.

"JULIE BARONNE DE CHATTERRE. le 18 May 1776."

"A sont altess ele preince de Monaco, dans sont hautelle rue de Vareinne a Paris."