CHAPTER XIV.
LADY MARY AS A READER Her fondness for reading--Her difficulty to get enough books while abroad--Lady Bute keeps her supplied--Lady Mary's catholic taste in literature--Samuel Richardson--The vogue of _Clarissa Harlowe_--Lady Mary tells a story of the Richardson type--Henry Fielding--_Joseph Andrews--Tom Jones_--Her high opinion of Fielding and Steele--Tobias Smollett--_Peregrine Pickle--_Lady Vane's _Memoirs of a Lady of Quality_--Sarah Fielding--Minor writers--Lord Orrery's _Remarks on Swift_--Bolingbroke's works--Addison and Pope--Dr.Johnson.
In her quiet retreat, Lady Mary found plenty of time for books.

"I yet retain and carefully cherish my taste for reading," she wrote to her daughter in 1752.

"If relays of eyes were to be hired like post-horses, I would never admit any but select companions: they afford a constant variety of entertainment, and is almost the only one pleasing in the enjoyment and inoffensive in the consequence." Her trouble was that she could not get books enough to occupy her time.
She was always asking Lady Bute to send her some, and was duly grateful when they reached her.

"I fancy you are now saying, 'tis a sad thing to grow old; what does my poor mamma mean by troubling me with criticisms on books that nobody but herself will ever read?
You must allow something to my solitude." And again: "I thank God my taste still continues for the gay part of reading.

Wiser people may call it trifling, but it serves to sweeten life to me, and is worst better than the generality of conversation." Lady Mary's taste in books was catholic.