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architect's for laying out his gardens at Longleat, in Wiltshire, in the
Italian style--as a lawn, broken up into plots, with squares of turf
alternating with squares of red and yellow sand, of river shells, and of
fine coal dust. On the viscounts' benches was a group of old peers,
Essex, Ossulstone, Peregrine, Osborne, William Zulestein, Earl of
Rochford, and amongst them, a few more youthful ones, of the faction
which did not wear wigs, gathered round Prince Devereux, Viscount
Hereford, and discussing the question whether an infusion of apalaca
holly was tea. "Very nearly," said Osborne. "Quite," said Essex. This
discussion was attentively listened to by Paulet St. John, a cousin of
Bolingbroke, of whom Voltaire was, later on, in some degree the pupil;
for Voltaire's education, commenced by Père Porée, was finished by
Bolingbroke. On the marquises' benches, Thomas de Grey, Marquis of Kent,
Lord Chamberlain to the Queen, was informing Robert Bertie, Marquis of
Lindsay, Lord Chamberlain of England, that the first prize in the great
English lottery of 1694 had been won by two French refugees, Monsieur Le
Coq, formerly councillor in the parliament of Paris, and Monsieur
Ravenel, a gentleman of Brittany. The Earl of Wemyss was reading a book,
entitled "Pratique Curieuse des Oracles des Sybilles." John Campbell,
Earl of Greenwich, famous for his long chin, his gaiety, and his
eighty-seven years, was writing to his mistress. Lord Chandos was
trimming his nails.
The sitting which was about to take place, being a royal one, where the
crown was to be represented by commissioners, two assistant door-keepers
were placing in front of the throne a bench covered with purple velvet.
On the second woolsack sat the Master of the Rolls, sacrorum scriniorum
817
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