another letter from another stranger, equally animated by a sincere interest in the undertaking,

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though producing, for the moment, a sensation as warm of resentment, as that just mentioned had excited of gratitude, was next received by the doctor.

it was written with the most profuse praise of the musical tours; but with a view to admonish the tourist to revise the account drawn up of the expenses, the bad roads, the bad living, the bad carriages, and other various faults and deficiencies upon which the travels in germany had expatiated: all which this new correspondent was convinced were related from misinformation, or misconception; as he had himself visited the same spots without witnessing any such imperfections. he conjured the doctor, therefore, to set right these statements in his next edition; which single amendment would render the journal of his tour in germany the most delightful now in print: and, with wishes sincerely fervent for all honour and all success to the business, he signed himself, dr. burney’s true admirer,

john hutton,

of lindsey house, chelsea.

dr. burney, who felt that his veracity had that unsullied honour that, like the virtue of the wife of

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cæsar, must not be suspected, read this letter with the amazement, and answered it with the indignation, of offended integrity. he could not, he said, be the dupe of misrepresentation, for he had related only what he had experienced. his narrative was all personal, all individual; and he had documents, through letters, bills, and witnesses in fellow-travellers, and in friends or inhabitants of the several places described, that could easily be produced to verify his assertions: all which he was most able and willing to call forth; not so much, perhaps, for the satisfaction of mr. hutton, who so hastily had misjudged him, as for his own; in certifying, upon proof, how little he had deserved the mistrust of his readers, as being capable of giving hearsay intelligence to the public.

mr. hutton instantly, and in a tone of mingled alarm and penitence, wrote a humble, yet energetic apology for his letter; earnestly entreating the doctor’s pardon for his officious precipitancy; and appealing to dr. hawkesworth, whom he called his excellent friend, to intercede in his favour. he took shame, he added, to himself, for not having weighed the subject more chronologically before he wrote his strictures; as he had now made out that

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his hasty animadversion was the unreflecting result of the different periods in which the doctor and himself had travelled; his own german visit having taken place previously to the devastating war between the king of prussia and the empress queen, which had since laid waste the whole country in which, unhappily, it had been waged.

dr. burney accepted with pleasure this conceding explanation. the good offices of dr. hawkesworth were prompt to accelerate a reconciliation and an interview; and mr. hutton, with even tears of eager feelings to repair an unjust accusation, hastened to queen-square. dr. burney, touched by his ingenuous contrition, received him with open arms. and, from that moment, he became one of the doctor’s most reverential and most ardent admirers.

he made frequent visits to the house; conceived the most friendly regard for the whole family; and abruptly, and with great singularity, addressed a letter, that was as original in ideas as in diction, to one of the daughters,[39] with whom he demanded permission of the doctor to correspond. and in

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a postscript, that was nearly as long as the epistle, to obviate, probably, any ambiguous notions from his zeal—though he was already a grey and wrinkled old man—he acquainted his new young correspondent that he had been married four-and-thirty years.

mr. hutton was one of the sect of the moravians, or hurnhuters, and resided at lindsey house, chelsea, as secretary to the united brethren. he was author, also, of an essay towards giving some just ideas of the character of count zinzendorf, the inventor and founder of the sect.

mr. hutton was a person of pleasing though eccentric manners. his notions were uncommon; his language was impressive, though quaint: his imagination, notwithstanding his age, was playful, nay, poetical. he considered all mankind as his brethren, and himself, therefore, as every one’s equal; alike in his readiness to serve them, and in the frankness with which he demanded their services in return.

his desire to make acquaintance, and to converse with every body to whom any species of celebrity was attached, was insatiable, and was dauntless. he approached them without fear, and accosted them without introduction. but the genuine kindness

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of his smile made way for him wherever there was heart and observation; and with such his encounter, however uncouth, brought on, almost invariably, a friendly intercourse.

yet where, on the contrary, he met not with those delicate developers and interpreters, heart and observation, to instil into those he addressed a persuasion of the benevolence of his intentions in seeking fair and free fraternity with all his fellow-creatures, he suffered not his failures to dishearten him; for as he never meant, he never took offence. and even when turned away from with rudeness or alarm, as a man conceived to be intrusive, impertinent, or suspicious, he would neither be angry nor affronted; but, sorrowfully shaking his head, would hope that some happy accident would inspire them with softer feelings, ere some bitter misfortune should retaliate their unkindness.

the immediate, it might, perhaps, be said, the instinctive cause of any rebuff that he met with in public, namely, his extraordinary appearance, and apparel, never seemed to occur to him; for as he looked not at the finest garb of the wealthy or modish with the smallest respect, he surmised not

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that the shabbiness of his own could influence his reception. by him, the tailor and the mantua-maker were regarded merely as manufacturers of decency, not of embellishment; and he had full as much esteem for his own clumsy cobbler or second-hand patching tailor, as the finest beau or belle of almack’s could have for their parisian attirers.

nevertheless, so coarse was the large, brown, slouching surtout, which infolded his body; so rough and blowsy was the old mop-like wig that wrapt up his head; that, but for the perfectly serene mildness of his features, and the venerability of his hoary eye-brows, he might at all times have passed for some constable, watchman, or policeman, who had mistaken the day for the night, and was prowling into the mansions of gentlemen, instead of public-houses, to take a survey that all was in order.

that a man such as this, with every mark of a nature the most unstained, and of a character the most unsophisticated, could belong to a sect, which, by all popular report at least, was stampt, at that time, as dark and mystic; and as being wild and strange in some of its doctrines even to absurdity; must make every one who had witnessed the virtuous tenor of the life of mr. hutton, and shared

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in the inoffensive gaiety of his discourse, believe the sect to have been basely calumniated; for not a word was ever uttered by this singular being that breathed not good will to all mankind; and not an action is recorded, or known of him, that is irresponsive of such universal benevolence.

dr. burney, now, without a single black-ball, was elected a fellow of the royal society; of which honour his first notice was received through the amiable and zealous miss phipps,[40] who, knowing the day of election, had impatiently gathered the tidings of its success from her brother, sir constantine phipps:[41] and before either the president, or the friend who had nominated the doctor for a candidate, could forward the news, she sportively anticipated their intelligence, by sending to queen-square a letter directed in large characters, “for dr. burney, f. r. s.”