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Royal Tunbridge Wells
old Cibber!1 Certainly in their religious, moral, and civil character, there is no relation, but in their dramatic capacity there is some. But why the reverend divine, and serious author of the melancholy Night Thoughts, should desire to appear as a persona dramatis here I cannot imagine.
The waters have raised his spirits to a fine pitch, as your Grace will imagine when I tell you how sublime an answer he made to a very vulgar question; I asked him how long he stayed at the Wells ? he said, as long as my rival staid. I was astonished how one who made no pretensions to any thing could have a rival, so I asked him for an explanation; he said, he would stay as long as the sun did. He did an admirable thing to Lady Sunderland ; 2 on my mentioning Sir Robert Sutton, he asked her where Sir Robert's Lady was; on which we all laughed very heartily; and I brought him off, half ashamed to my lodgings; where, during breakfast, he assured me he
1 Colley Cibber (1671-1751), actor and dramatist.
2 Charles Spencer, third Earl of Sunderland (1674-1722), married three times. His third wife was Judith, daughter of Benjamin Tichborne, who, after her first husband's death, married Sir Robert Sutton, K.B. She died in 1749. Her sister was Mrs. Tichborne.
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