LETTER TO MR. EDEN. 309 



true pleasure this will give to them, and few I am sure can enjoy it 

 more than myself. Immediately on the receipt of your Excellency's 

 good letter, of the 25th of March, I despatched a small parcel of 

 Restoration medallions to meet you at Paris, just to show you what 

 we are doing here, despairing of their heing in time to find you at 

 Madrid ; and there they will now rest till the occasion is grown 

 old, though it will never be forgotten in this country. I have the 

 pleasure to tell you that the ladies are still so good as to continue 

 my cameos in fashion ; and in order to merit this favour as far as I 

 am able, I endeavour to introduce all the novelty, and as much good 

 work as I can procure for their subjects. I employ several modellers 

 constantly in Home, and get what I can from Paris, and am very 

 happy when I can have anything done by our own artists in Eng- 

 land ; but my works are too small and delicate for them, so that 

 little assistance can be obtained in England, except what is done 

 under my own eye at Etruria. You will perhaps wonder at your 

 not having heard something of the Barberini Yase. I was always 

 very sensible of the difficulty of attempting to copy so exquisite a 

 piece of workmanship ; but in the progress of the undertaking diffi- 

 culties have occurred which nothing but practice could have dis- 

 covered to me. The prospect, however, brightens before me, and, 

 after -having made several defective copies, I think I begin to see 

 my way to the final completion of it. I shall take the liberty of 

 troubling your Excellency with a further account of my progress 

 in this great work for such you must permit me to call it as I 

 advance nearer to the end. My son has been at home near six 

 months. He is now on a tour of discovery in his own country 

 Wales, the "West of England, as far as the Land's End along with 

 a Mr, Hawkins, an excellent mineralogist, of Cornwall, with whom 

 he became acquainted abroad otherwise, he would gladly have 

 embraced this opportunity of thanking you for your friendly notice 

 of him. "What an interesting situation the affairs of Prance have 

 lately been in! One day we are told that an express is arrived 

 from the Duke of Dorset, with an account that the King was de- 

 posed. The next post (the last) tells us that the nobles, the clergy, 

 and the commons, are happily united; that the King and Queen 

 have shown themselves to their subjects, who were happy and con- 

 tented ; that the English constitution will, in all appearance, soon 

 be established there ; and that Prance may, from the 29th of June, 

 say, what she never could say before, that liberty is established, 

 property assured, and the constitution fixed. Politicians here say, 

 that we shall have no cause to rejoice at this revolution ; for that if 



