I dress at
half-past one, and at two (an early hour, to which I am not perfectly
reconciled) we sit down to dinner.... After dinner, and the departure
of our company, one, two, or three friends, we read together some
amusing book, or play at chess, or retire to our rooms, or make
visits, or go to the coffee-house. Between six and seven the
assemblies begin, and I am oppressed only with their number and
variety. Whist, at shillings or half-crowns, is the game I generally
play, and I play three rubbers with pleasure. Between nine and ten we
withdraw to our bread and cheese, and friendly converse, which sends
us to bed at eleven; but these sober hours are too often interrupted
by private or numerous suppers, which I have not the courage to
resist, though I practise a laudable abstinence at the best furnished
tables. Such is the skeleton of my life....
TO LORD SHEFFIELD
_A great work_
Lausanne, 20 _Jan._ 1787.
... As long as I do not inform you of my death, you have good grounds
to believe me alive and well. You have a general, and will soon have a
more particular idea of my system and arrangement here. One day glides
away after another in tranquil uniformity. Every object must have
sides and moments less luminous than others; but, upon the whole, the
life and the place which I have chosen are most happily adapted to my
character and circumstances: and I can now repeat, at the end of three
years, what I soon and sincerely affirmed, that never in a single
instant have I repented of my scheme of retirement to Lausanne.
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