автордың кітабын онлайн тегін оқу The Letters of Horace Walpole, Earl of Orford — Volume 2
The Project Gutenberg Etext of The Letters of Horace Walpole, Volume 2 by Horace Walpole (#3 in our series by Horace Walpole)
Copyright laws are changing all over the world. Be sure to check the copyright laws for your country before downloading or redistributing this or any other Project Gutenberg file.
Please do not remove this header information.
This header should be the first thing seen when anyone starts to view the eBook. Do not change or edit it without written permission. The words are carefully chosen to provide users with the information needed to understand what they may and may not do with the eBook. To encourage this, we have moved most of the information to the end, rather than having it all here at the beginning.
**Welcome To The World of Free Plain Vanilla Electronic Texts**
**eBooks Readable By Both Humans and By Computers, Since 1971**
*****These eBooks Were Prepared By Thousands of Volunteers!*****
Information on contacting Project Gutenberg to get eBooks, and further information, is included below. We need your donations.
The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a 501(c)(3) organization with EIN [Employee Identification Number] 64-6221541 Find out about how to make a donation at the bottom of this file.
Title: The Letters of Horace Walpole, Volume 2
Author: Horace Walpole
Release Date: November, 2003 [Etext #4610]
[Yes, we are more than one year ahead of schedule]
[This file was first posted on February 19, 2002]
Edition: 10
Language: English
The Project Gutenberg Etext of The Letters of Horace Walpole, Volume 2
by Horace Walpole
******This file should be named 4610.txt or 4610.zip******
Project Gutenberg eBooks are often created from several printed editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the US unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we usually do not keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition.
The "legal small print" and other information about this book may now be found at the end of this file. Please read this important information, as it gives you specific rights and tells you about restrictions in how the file may be used.
*** This etext was produced by Marjorie Fulton.
For easier searching, letters have been numbered. Only the page numbers that appear in the table of contents have been retained in the text of letters. Footnotes have been regrouped as endnotes following the letter to which they relate.
THE LETTERS of HORACE WALPOLE, EARL OF ORFORD:
INCLUDING NUMEROUS LETTERS NOW FIRST PUBLISHED FROM THE ORIGINAL MANUSCRIPTS.
IN FOUR VOLUMES VOL. 2. 1749-1759.
CONTENTS OF VOL. II
[Those Letters now first collected are marked N.]
1749.
1. To Sir Horace Mann, March 4.-Proceedings in Parliament. Formidable minority headed by the Prince. Character'-of Lord Egmont. Innovations in the Mutiny Bill. New Navy Bill ;13
2. To the same, March 23.-Debates on the Military Bills. Jar at Leicester House. King Theodore of Corsica. The two black Princes of Anamaboe. Spread of Methodism. Stories of his brother Ned's envy-16
3. To the same, May 3.-Rejoicings for the peace. Jubilee masquerade. Fire-works. English credulity. Subscription masquerade. Projected chastisement of Oxford. Union between the Prince's party and the Jacobites. Disgrace of Maurepas. Epigram on Lord Egmont's opposition to the Mutiny Bill. Bon-mot by Wall; and of Lady Townshend. Increase of Methodism, drinking, and gambling.-19
4. To the same, May 17.—The Duke of Richmond's fireworks in celebration of the peace. Second jubilee masquerade. Miss Chudleigh. Lady Rochford. Death of Miss Jenny Conway. Publication of Lord Bolingbroke's letters. Anecdotes of Pope and Bolingbroke.-23
5. To George Montagu, Esq. May 18.-The Duke of Richmond's fireworks. The Violette and Garrick. Story of the Duchess of Queensberry. Mary Queen of Scots. Dignity of human nature. Anecdote of Fielding. West's Pindar. Story of Charles Townshend .-27
6. To Sir Horace Mann, June 4.-Stories of Pope, Bolingbroke, and Atterbury.-30
7. To the same, June 25.-Cambridge installation. Installation of six Knights of the Bath. Garrick's marriage to the Violette. Lord Mountford's cricket-matches.-32
8. To George Montagu, Esq. July 5.-Improvements at Mistley. Visit to the Prince of Wales. Anecdote of Lady Anson. Epigram.- 35
9. To the same, July 20.-Excursions. Layer Marney. Messing parsonage. Death of the Duke of Montagu. His will.-36
10. To Sir Horace Mann, July 24.-Death of the Duke of Montagu. Principles of the Methodists .-38
11. To the same, Aug. 17.-Fire at Kensington Palace.-40
12. To George Montagu, Esq. Aug. 26.-Expedition to Arundel Castle. Petworth. Cowdry.-42
13. To Sir Horace Mann, Sept. 12.-Madame de Mirepoix. Madame S`evign`e's Letters.-43
14. To John Chute, Esq. Sept. 22.—45
15. To George Montagu, Esq. Sept. 28.-Church at Cheneys. Tombs of the Bedfords. Latimers. Stoke church—45
16. To Sir Horace Mann, Oct. 27-Dodington first minister at Carlton House. Lady Yarmouth.-46
17. To the same, Nov. 17.-Robbery of Walpole in Hyde Park. Riots at the new French theatre.-47
1750.
18. To Sir Horace Mann, Jan. 10.-Montesquieu's Esprit des Loix. Hainault's Abr`eg`e de L'Histoire de la France. Westminster election. Death of Lord Pembroke. His character. Death of lord Crawford. Story of General Wade. Sir John Barnard's scheme for the reduction of interest.-48
19. To the same Jan. 31.-Numerous robberies. Secession on the mutiny-bill. Hurricane in the East Indies. Bon-mot of the Chevalier Lorenzi.-52
20. To the same, Feb. 25.-Ministerial quarrels. Dispute of precedence. Bon-mot of a chair-maker. Westminster election. Extraordinary wager. Death of the Duke of Somerset. Madame Munchausen. Horrors of the slave-trade. Montesquieu's Esprit des Loix. Grecian architecture.-53
21. To the same, March 11.-The earthquakes. Middlesex election. Story Of Marie Mignot.-58
22. To the same, April 2.-Terror occasioned by the earthquake. Death of Lady Bolingbroke. Death of Lady Dalkeith. Mr. Mason's pedigree. Epigram on Lady Caroline Petersham, and the Lady Bingley. Madame du Boccage.-60
23. To George Montagu, Esq. May 15.-Westminster election.-65
24. To Sir Horace Mann, May 19.-Absurdities committed after the earthquake. Westminster election. Commotion in Dublin. Bower's History of the Popes.-66
25. To George Montagu, Esq. June 23.-Character of Mr. Bentley. Account of a party of pleasure at Vauxhall.-68
26. To Sir Horace Mann, July 25.-The Houghton lantern. King Theodore of Corsica in prison for debt. Mr. Ashton. Dr. Mead.-71
27. To the same, Aug. 2.-Tuscan villas. Improvement in the seats about London. Consequences of the excessive heat of the weather. Death of Dr. Middleton, and of Tacitus Gordon. Account of M'Lean, the fashionable highwayman.-73
28. To the same, Sept. 1.-Pedigrees. Young Craggs's epitaph. Story of old Craggs. George Selwyn's passion for coffins and executions. Death of the Duke OF Richmond. Lord Granby's marriage. Hanoverian duel. Singular bet at White's.-76
29. To George Montagu, Esq. Sept. 10.-Death of General Handasyde, and of Sir Gerard Vanneck. hopes conducive to happiness.-80
30. To Sir Horace Mann, Sept. 20.-Dr. Mead. Sermon against Dr. Middleton. Ecclesiastical absurdity. Project for publishing an edition of the Bible without pointings or stops. Sir Charles William's letters. Frequency of robberies. Visit to Spence.-81
31. To the same, Oct. 18.-Treaty of commerce with Spain. M'Lean's condemnation and execution. Rage for visiting him in Newgate.-83
32. To the same, Nov. 19.-Shattered state of the ministry. State of parties.-84
33. To the same, Dec. 19.-Interministerium. Droll cause in Westminster Hall. The Duke of Cumberland and Edward Bright. Sir Ralph Gore. Bon-mots of Quin.-86
34. To the same, Dec. 22.-Miss Chudleigh. FOntenelle. Reply of Lord Cornbury. Old Cibber's soliciting the laureateship for Harry Jones. A very odd new story. Ashton's ingratitude.-88
1751.
35. To Sir Horace Mann, Feb. 9.-Debates in Parliament. "Constitutional queries." Westminster petition. Proceedings against Mr. Murray. Account of young Wortley Montagu.-91
36. To the same, March 1,3.-Further proceedings against Mr. Murray. Lady Vane's memoirs of her own life. Fashionable theatricals. The English "a grave nation".-94
37. To the same, March 21.-Death of Frederick, Prince of Wales. Conduct of the King .-95
38. To the same, April 1.-Death of Mr. Whithed; his will. Death of the Earl of Orford. Harmony between the King and Princess of Wales. Prince George. Prince Edward.-97
39. To the same, April 22.-Dodington's project of a ministry upset by the death of the Prince. Story of Bootle. Character of Dr. Lee. Prince George created Prince of Wales. His household. Bishop Hayter and Archbishop Blackburn. The young Earl of Orford.-99
40. To the same, May 30.-Emptiness and vanity of life. Match between Lord Orford and the rich Miss Nicholl broken off. Debates on the Regency bill.-103
41. To George Montagu, Esq. May 30.-Lady Orford and Mr. Shirley married.-103
42. To the Rev. Joseph Spence, June 3.-With a translation of a couplet on Tibullus. [N.]-105
43. To George Montagu, Esq. June 13.-Change of ministry.
Bon-mot on Lord North's Wedding. Spenser, with Kent's designs.
Bentley's ray. Warburton's Pope. Edwards's Canons of
Criticism.-106
44. To Sir Horace Mann, June 18.-Resignations. New ministry. Epigram on Lord Holderness. The two Miss Gunnings. Extravagant dinner at White's. Bubb de Tristibus. Dodington's bombastic eulogium on the Prince. Sale of the pictures at Houghton.-107
45. To the same, July 16.-Announcing Mr. Conway's intended visit to Florence.-109
46. To George Montagu, Esq. July 22.-Projected edition of Grammont. Visit to Wimbledon. Ragley. Warwick Castle. "Capability" Brown. Easton Neston. Stowe.-110
47. To Sir Horace Mann, Aug. 31.-Story of the Gunnings, and of Lady Mary Wortley Montagu in durance in the Brescian. Lord Orford and Miss Nicholl.-112
48. To George Montagu, Esq. Oct. 8.-Description of Woburn.-114
49. To Sir Horace Mann, Oct. 14.-Death of the Prince of Orange. Lady Pembroke. Lady Mary Wortley Montagu's Letters. Lady Russell's Letters.-115
50. To the same, Nov. 22.-Unanimity of Parliament. Plots in the
Duke of Burgundy's cradle. Verses stuck up on the Louvre. Young
Wortley Montagu's imprisonment at Paris. Bon-mot of Lord Coke.
Anecdote of the King.-118
51. To the same, Dec. 12.-Lord Stormont. Death of Lord Bolingbroke. The wonderful tooth-drawer.-119
1752.
52. To George Montagu, Esq. Jan. 9.-The St. James's Evening Post parodied.-120
53. To Sir Horace Mann, Feb. 2.-Debates on the treaty with Saxony. A black-ball at White's.-122
54. To the same, Feb. 27.-Death of Sir Horace Mann's father. Marriage of the Miss Gunnings to Lord Coventry and the Duke of Hamilton.-123
55. To the same, March 23.-Sir Horace Mann's portrait. The Duke of Argyle's Job. The Duchess of Hamilton at court. Miss Jefferies and Miss Blandy. Frequency of executions.-124
56. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, May 5.-On Mr. Conway's infant daughter.-[N.] 126
57. To George Montagu, Esq. May 12.-Irish politics. Mother Midnight's oratory. Captain Hotham's bon-mot.-127
58. To Sir Horace Mann, May 13.-Irish politics. Miss Blandy's execution.-128
59. To George Montagu, Esq. June 6.-Capture of a housebreaker at Strawberry Hill. Gray's Odes. Story of Lord Bury.-129
60. To the same.-131
61. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, June 23.-Story of Mr. Seymour and Lady Di. Egerton. Distress and poverty of France. Profligacy of the court. Births and marriages.-132
62. To George Montagu, Esq. July 20.-Alarm at the visit of a King's messenger. The "M`emoires"133
63. To Sir Horace Mann,.July @7.-Fire at Lincoln's-inn. Princess Emily and Richmond Park. Discussions concerning the tutorhood of the Prince of Wales. Portraits of Cr`ebillon and Marivaux, by Liotard.-134
64. To Richard Bentley. Aug. 5.-Excursion to Kent and Sussex.
Bishop's palace, Rochester. Knowle. Tunbridge. Summer Hill.
Bayham Abbey. Hurst Monceaux. Battle Abbey. Silver Hill.
Penshurst. Mereworth. Sissinghurst. Becton Malherbe. Leeds
Castle.-137
65. To George Montagu, Esq. Aug. 28.-Adventure at Mrs. Boscawen's. Privilege of Parliament. Standing Army. Gray's Odes.-145
66. To Sir Horace Mann, Oct. 28.-Projected trip to Florence.. Madame de Brionne. Lady Coventry at Paris. Duke Hamilton and his Duchess. Anecdotes. Parisian indecorums. Madame Pompadour's husband. Trait of Louis the Fifteenth. Epigram on the quarrel of the Pretender and his second son. Astley's pictures.-146
67. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, Nov. 8 [N.].-150
68. To George Montagu, Esq. Dec. 3. Lord Harcourt's removal from the Governorship of the Prince of Wales. Bon-mot of George Selwyn.-150
69. To Sir Horace Mann, Dec. 11.-Education of the Prince of Wales. Resignation of Lord Harcourt and the Bishop of Norwich. The Bishop of Gloucester the new preceptor. And Lord Waldegrave the new governor.-151
1753.
70. To Sir Horace Mann, Feb. 14.-Death of Sir Hans Sloane; his Museum.-155
71. To Mr. Gray, Feb. 20.-New edition of Gray's Odes with Bentley's designs.-157
72. To Sir Horace Mann, March 4.-Lord Ravensworth's accusation of Stone, Murray, and the Bishop of Gloucester, on the information of Fawcett. Liotard. Cr`ebillon's portrait.-158
73. To the same, March 27.-Debates in the Lords on the charges against Stone, Murray, and Bishop Johnson.-159
74. To the same, April 16.-161
75. To the same, April 27.-Progress of improvements at
Strawberry Hill. Account of the taking of Dr. Cameron. Paper in
"The World," to promote a subscription for King Theodore. Lord
Bath and the Craftsman.-161
76. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, May 5.-Madame de Mezi`eres. Sir Charles Williams's distich on the Queen of Hungary. Lord Bolingbroke's Works. Anecdote of Lady Harrington.-164
77. To George Montagu, Esq. May 22.-Debates on the Marriage Bill.-165
78. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, May 24.-Debates on the Marriage Bill.-167
79. To George Montagu, Esq. June 11.-Parliamentary altercations. Clandestine Marriage Bill. Bon-mot of Keith's.- 169
80. To Sir Horace Mann, June 12.-Description of Strawberry Hill. Clandestine Marriage Bill. Execution of Dr. Cameron.-170
81. To George Montagu, Esq. July 17.-Death of Miss Brown. Tom Hervey's letter to Sir William Bunbury. Story of Dr. Suckling. George Selwyn's bon-mot. Elopement. Marriage Bill.-173
82. To Sir Horace Mann, July 21.-Electioneering. Snuff-taking. Death of Lord Pomfret.-174
83. To John Chute, Esq. Aug. 4.-Visit to Greatworth. Sir Harry Danvers described. White-knights. Middleton. Wroxton. Steane Chapel. Stowe. Temple of Friendship. Warkworth.-176
84. To George Montagu, Esq. Aug. 16.-Stowe. Sir Harry Danvers.- 179
85. To Richard Bentley, Esq. Sept.-New Camden's "Britannia." Oxford. Birmingham. Hagley. Worcester. Malvern Abbey. Visit to George Selwyn at Matson. Gloucester Cathedral. Hutchinsonians.- 180
86. To Sir Horace Mann, Oct. 6.-The Modenese treaty. Gothic amusements.-186
87. To the same, Dec. 6.-Prince Heraclius. Party feuds in Ireland. Bianca Capello.-187
88. To George Montagu, Esq. Dec. 6.-Death of his uncle Erismus Shorter, and of Lord Burlington. The Opera. Glover's "Boadicea." Lord Huntingdon and Stormont.-188
89. To Richard Bentley, Esq. Dec. 19.-Eulogy on his drawings.
Deaths of Lords Clarendon, Thanet, and Burlington. "Sir Charles
Grandison." Hogarth's "Analysis of Beauty." Wood's "Palmyra."
Opera. The Niccolini.-190
1754.
90. To Sir Horace Mann, January 28.-Story of Bianca Capello. Sortes Walpolianae. Serendipity. Dissuades him from taking the name of Guise. Sir James Gray. His father's maxim. The Opera and Niccolini. Miss Elizabeth Pitt.-191
91. To Richard Bentley, Esq. March 2.-The Duke of Cumberland's visit to Strawberry Hill. Proceedings in Parliament. New Mutiny-bill. Death of Dr. Mead. Sortes Walpolianae.-194
92. To the same, March 6.-Ironical account of the death of Mr. Pelham. Francis's tragedy of "Constantine." Crisp's "Virginia." Lord Bolingbroke's works.-196
93. To Sir Horace Mann, March 7.-State of parties. The new candidates for office. Particulars of the death of Mr. Pelham.- 198
94. To Richard Bentley, Esq. March 17.-The new ministry. George Selwyn's bon-mots. Orator Henley. Beckford and Delaval at Shaftesbury.-200
95. To George Montagu, Esq. March 19.-The Newcastle administration.-201
96. To Sir Horace Mann, March 28.-,The new ministry. Resignation of Lord Gower.-202
97. To the same, April 24.-The Duke of Newcastle all-powerful. The new Parliament. Irish politics. Drummond's "Travels".-204
98. To John Chute, Esq. April 30.-Whitehead's tragedy of "Creusa." Tragi-comedy at the Opera.-205
99. To the same, May 14.-Anecdote of Prince Poniatowski and the Duchess of Gordon.-206
100. To Richard Bentley, Esq. May 18.-Progress of improvement at Strawberry Hill. Trial of Betty Canning. Regency-bill.-207
101. To George Montagu, Esq. May 21.-Death of Mr. Chute's father.-209
102. To Sir Horace Mann, May 23.-War of the Delmontis. Death of Mr. Chutes father. Regency-bill.-210
103. To the same, June 5.-Mr. Brand of the Hoo. Lady Caroline Pierpont. Affair of Lord Orford and Miss Nicholl. Election petitions.-211
104. To George Montagu, Esq. June 8.-Invitation to Strawberry Hill.-212
105. To the same, June 29.-Lady Caroline Petersham's christening.-213
106. To Sir Horace Mann, July 5.-Effects of warm Weather in England. Old courtiers. Separation between Lady Orford and Mr. Shirley. Dr. Cocchi's "Greek Physicians." French encroachments in Virginia. Revocation of the Parliament of Paris. Irish Parliament.-213
107. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, July 6.-Notice of gold fish to be sent to him.-215
108. To Richard Bentley, Esq. July 9.-Sir Charles Williams and his daughter. His mother's monument in Westminster Abbey. Story of Sampson Gideon. Nugent and the Jew-bill. An admirable curiosity.—215
109. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, Aug. 8-The Duke of Cumberland's accident [N.].-217
110. To George Montagu, Esq. Aug. 29.-218
111. To Sir Horace Mann, Oct. 6.-Prospect of an East and West
Indian war. French encroachments. Re-establishment of the
Inquisition at Florence. The Boccaneri. Major Washington.
General Guise at Carthagena.-218
112. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, Oct. 24,-Congratulation on his being appointed groom of the bedchamber. And on his choice of a wife.-[N.] 220
113. To Richard Bentley, Esq. Nov. 3.-Visit to Mr. Burret at Bellhouse. Mrs. Clive. West Indian war. The Ontaouknoucs. General Braddock.-221
114. To Richard Bentley, Esq. Nov. 11.-Ambassadorial circumspection. Death of the Queen Dowager of Prussia. New volumes of Madame S`evign`e's Letters.-224
115. To George Montagu, Esq. Nov. 16.-Parts and merit of Lord North. Marriage of Mr. Pitt with Lady Hester Grenville. A new fashion.-225
116. To Richard Bentley, Esq. Nov. 20.-On projectors. Advises him to lay aside visionary projects. Parliamentary divisions. Elections. The Prince of Hesse turned Roman Catholic. Operas. The Mingotti. Bon-mot of Madame S`evign`e.-226
117. To Sir Horace Mann, Dec. 1.-Spring-tide of politics. Mr. Pitt and the Duke of Newcastle. Lord Cork. Lord Bolingbroke's works. George the First at New Park. Dissensions in Ireland.- 228
118. To Richard Bentley, Esq. Dec. 13.-Pitt and Fox dissatisfied with the Duke of Newcastle. Ministerial changes. Mr. Pitt turned out. Sale of Dr. Mead's library.-230
119. To the same, Dec. 24.-Madame S`evign`e's new letters. Dr.
Browne's tragedy of "Barbarossa." Walpole's papers in the
"World." Turning out of Mr. Pitt. The last new madness.
Macklin's "British Inquisition".-231
1755.
120. To George Montagu, Esq. Jan. 7.-Nuptials of Mr. Harris and Miss Ashe. Countess Chamfelt.-233
121. To Richard Bentley, Esq. Jan. 9.-Death of Lord Albemarle. Story of Lord Montford's suicide. Gamesters. Insurance office for voluntary deaths. Ministerial changes. New nostrums and inventions.-234
122. To Sir Horace Mann, Jan. 9.-Congratulation on his being created a baronet. Lord Albemarle's sudden death. Lord Bury. Lady Albemarle's dream. Lord Montford's suicide. The age of abortions. The Chevalier Taylor.-236
123. To Richard Bentley, Esq. Feb. 8.-The Russian ambassador's masquerade.-238
124. To the same, Feb, 23.-Oxfordshire and Colchester elections. Sir John Bland's suicide. English Opera. "Midsummer Night's Dream." Walpole at a fire. Lady Herbert's providence. Fire at Fonthill.-239
125. To the same, March 6.-Prospect of a war with France. Lord Holderness's ball. Dancing senators.-241
126. To Sir Horace Mann, March 10.-Lord Hertford's embassy to Paris. Warlike prospects. Progress of election trials. Lord Pomfret's collection of statues. Cerberus.-242
127. To Richard Bentley, Esq, March 27.-Hume's "History of England." Motto for a ruby ring. Party struggles. Prospects of war. Sale of Dr. Mead's pictures.-243
128. To the same, April 13.-Prospects of war. French preparations for invasion. Lord Chesterfield's prophecy.-245
129. To Sir Horace Mann, April 22.-French preparations. Secret expedition. Motto-hunting.-247
130. To Richard Bentley, Esq. April 24.-Political rumours. M. Herault and Lady Harrington.-248
131. To George Montagu, Esq. May 4.-Prince of Nassau Welbourg. George Selwyn and Lady Petersham.-250
132. To Richard Bentley, Esq. May 6.-Lord Poulet's motion against the King's visiting Hanover. Mr. Legge's pun. The Regency. Ball at Bedford House. Great breakfast at Strawberry Hill. "Anecdotes Litt`eraires." "M@,is`eres des Scavans." Gray's observation on learning.-250
133. To George Montagu, Esq. May 13.-Invitation to Strawberry Hill.-252
134. To the same, MAY 19.-King of Prussia's victory near Prague.-252
135. To Richard Bentley, Esq. June 10.-Arrival of Mr. M`untz4. Deluge at Strawberry Hill. New gunpowder-plot. Venneschi apprehended.-253
136. To Sir Horace Mann, June 15.-The Countess of Orford and Mr. Shirley. Lord Orford described. Warlike preparations. Fureur des cabriolets.-256
137. To Richard Bentley, Esq. July 5.-Expostulation on his love of visionary projects. Mr. M`untz. Visit to Chaffont. Bulstrode. Latimers. First visit to Greenwich Park.-257
138. To Sir Horace Mann, July 16.-War commenced. Captain Howe's attack on the French Squadron. Chapel at the Vine.-259
139. To Richard Bentley, Esq. July 17.-Attack on the French squadron. State of parties in Ireland. Domestic news. Lord Bath's verses on Strawberry Hill. Wanstead House. Marquis de St. Simon.-260
140. To George Montagu, Esq. July 17.-Farming. Lord Bath's ballad.-263
141. To the same, July 26.-Charles Townshend's marriage.-263
142. To Richard Bentley, Esq. Aug. 4.-St. Swithin. Capture of Beau S`ejoure. Marquis de St. Simon's translation of the "Tale of a Tub." Intimacy with Garrick.-264
143. To the same, Aug. 15.-Compliments him on his drawings. P`er`efixe's "Henry the Fourth." Dinner at Garrick's. Flattery.-266
144. To Sir Horace Mann, Aug. 21.-West India expeditions. Character of General Braddock. Story of Fanny Braddock. Hessian treaty.-268
145. To the same, Aug. 28.-Defeat and death of General Braddock. Anecdotes of him.-270
146. To Richard Bentley, Esq. Aug. 28.-General Braddock's defeat and death. Quarrel between Lords Lincoln and Anson. Visit to Harwich. Orford Castle. Sudborn. Secretary Naunton's house. Ipswich and its church.-271
147. To the Rev. Henry Etough, Sept. 10.-273
148. To Richard Bentley, Esq. Sept. 18.-Jaunt to Winchester. Its cathedral. Bevismount. Netley Abbey. Capture of Governor Lyttelton. Gray's "Bard".-273
149. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, Sept. 23.-Irish politics. Russian and Hessian treaties.-275
150. To Sir Horace Mann, Sept. 29.-M. Seychelles. French finances. Opposition to the Russian and Hessian treaties. Ministerial bickerings and changes. Tranquillity of Ireland.- 277
151. To John Chute, Esq. Sept. 29.-Opposition in Parliament to the Russian and Hessian treaties [N.).-279
152. To Richard Bentley, Esq. Sept. 30.-Political sermon. Mr. Legge's opposition to the Hessian treaty. Subsidy. Pacification of Ireland. Ministerial changes.-280
153. To George Montagu, Esq. Oct. 7.-On the death of Miss Montagu.-281
154. To Richard Bentley, Esq. Oct. 19.-On the fears of invasion. Mr. Fox's ministry. Follies of the Opera. Impertinences of the Mingotti.-281
155. To John Chute, Esq. Oct. 20.-Expectations of an invasion. Parliamentary politics. Subsidiary treaties [N.].-284
156. To Sir Horace Mann, Oct. 27.-Preparations against invasion .-285
157. To Richard Bentley, Esq. Oct. 31.-Defeat of' the French in America by General Johnson. Lord Chesterfield at Bath. Suicide of Sir John Bland. Longevity of Beau Nash and Cibber.-286
158. To George Montagu, Esq. Nov. 8.-Progress of planting.-287
159. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, Nov. 15.-Debates in Parliament on the treaties. Single-speech Hamilton. Pitt's speech.-289
160. To Richard Bentley, Esq. Nov. 16.-Debates in the House of Commons on the treaties. Riots at Drury-Lane. French dancers.- 291
161. To Sir Horace Mann, Nov. 16.-Parliamentary proceedings. Changes and counter-changes. French inactivity.-292
162. To George Montagu, Esq. Nov. 25.-Earthquake at Lisbon. Political changes.-293
163. To Sir Horace Mann, Dec. 4.-Earthquake at Lisbon. State of the Opposition.-294
164. To Richard Bentley, Esq. Dec. 17.-Mr. Pitts speech on the subsidiary treaties. Ministerial changes. Postponement of the invasion.-295
165. To George Montagu, Esq. Dec. 20.-Political changes. The new Opposition.-297
166. To Sir Horace Mann, Dec. 21.-Expectations of a peace. Catalogue of ministerial alterations. Dodington again revolved to the court. Case of Lord Fitzwalter.-298
167. To George Montagu, Esq. Dec. 30.-299
1756.
168. To Richard Bentley, Esq. Jan. 6.-Attack of the gout. Overflow of the Thames. Progress of the Memoires. Mr. M`untz.- 300
169. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, Jan. 22.-Parliament and politics. French Billingsgate memorial. Guarantee with Prussia. M. Michell. Dismissal of Sir Harry Erskine. Mr. Fox's repartee (N.].-302
170. To the same, Jan. 24.-Beckford's accusation against Admiral Knowles. Sir George Lyttelton's budget-speech. Lady Petersham and her footman Richard.-303
171. To Sir Horace Mann, Jan. 25.-Health of Sir Horace's brother. Prussian guarantee. M. Rouill`e's memorial. The new Opposition nibbling, but not popular.-304
172. To Sir Horace Mann, Feb. 5.-Account of his brother's health. War considered inevitable.-306
173. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, Feb. 12.-Bickerings in
Parliament. The Pennsylvanian regiment. Story of the Duke of
Newcastle. Moral effects of the earthquake. Sir Eustace
Drawbridge-court.-307
174. To Sir Horace Mann, Feb. 23.-The King of France and Madame Pompadour gone into devotion. Debates on the West Indian regiment. Plot of the Papists against Bower. France determined to try invasion.-309
175. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, March 4.-Debates in Parliament.
Speeches of Hamilton and Charles Townshend. The Militia-bill.
The new taxes. Embargo. Old Nugent and Lady Essex. Bons-mots.
An epigram.-312
176. To Sir Horace Mann, March 18.-Progress of the armaments. Danger for Port-Mahon. Naivete of Lady Coventry.-314
177. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, March 25.-Mr. Pitt's gout. The plate tax. Projected invasion signified to Parliament. The Paddington road-bill. Lady Lincoln's assembly [N.].-315
178. To the same, April 16.-The Paddington road-bill struggle. Militia-bill. Death of Sir William Lowther. Lord Shelburne's speech. Folke GreVill'S "Maxims and Characters".-316
179. To Sir Horace Mann, April 18.-War of the turnpike-bill. Death of Lady Drumlanrig, and of Sir William Lowther.-318
180. To George Montagu, Esq. April 20.-Death of Lady Essex, Sir William Lowther's will. Lady Coventry. Billy and Bully. The new Morocco ambassador and Lady Petersham. Coat-of-arms for the clubs at White's.-319
181. To the same, May 12.-321
182. To Sir Horace Mann, May 16.-Defenceless state of Minorca. The "PuCelle".-322
183. To George Montagu, Esq. May 19.-The King and the Hanoverian troops. Lord Denbigh's bon-mot on his own marriage.- 323
184. To Sir Horace Mann, May 27.-His uncle Horatio created a peer. Death of Chief Justice Ryder. Opera contest.-323
185. To the Earl of Strafford, June 6.-Frightful catastrophe. Madame Maintenon's new Letters and Memoirs. Consternation on the behaviour of Byng.-325
186. To John Chute, Esq. June 8.-Council of war at Gibraltar. The Prince of Wales declines living at Kensington. His uncle Horatio's motto and supporters. Visit to Lady Allen with Lord and Lady Bath. General Wall's motto [N.].-327
187. To Sir Horace Mann, June 14.-Admiral Byng's letters. Prince of Wales's establishment.-328
188. To George Montagu, Esq. June 18.-330
189. To Sir Horace Mann, July 11.-Public rage against Byng.-330
190. To George Montagu, Esq. July 12.-Military preparations.- 331
191. To Sir Horace Mann, July 24.-Clamour against Byng. Public hopes in Boscawen. Lady Pomfret at Oxford University.-332
192. To George Montagu, Esq. Aug. 28.-334
193. To Sir Horace Mann, Aug. 29.-Loss of Minorca. League of Cambray. Unpopularity of Byng.-334
194. To Richard Bentley, Esq. Aug.-Tour in the North. Bugden
Palace. Newark Castle. Wentworth Castle. Old Wortley Montagu.
Pomfret. Ledstone. Kippax Park. Kirkstall Abbey. Chapel on
Wakefield bridge. Worksop. Kiveton. Welbeck.-335
195. To Sir Horace Mann, Sept. 19.-Byng's quarrels with the admiralty and ministry. Rage of addresses .-339
196. To George Montagu, Esq. Oct. 14.-Mode of passing his time. Magna Charta. Garrick's temple to Shakspeare.-341
197. To the same, Oct.-342
198. To Sir Horace Mann, Oct. 17.-Successes of the King of Prussia. Battle of Lowositz. Peace between Kensington and Kew. Lord Bute groom of the stole to the Prince. Lords Rockingham and Orford's match. The Irish Speaker at Newmarket.- 342
199. To George Montagu, Esq. Oct. 28.-Mutability of the world. The Duke of Newcastle's resignation.-344
200. To Sir Horace Mann, Nov. 4.-The Duke of Newcastle's resignation. Un-successful attempts to form a new ministry.-345
201. TO George Montagu, Esq. Nov. 6.-Mr. Pitt made secretary of state. New ministry. The three factions.-347
202. To Sir Horace Mann, Nov. 13.-Mr. Pitt appointed secretary of state. State of parties.-348
203. To George Montagu, Esq. Nov. 25.-The new ministry and opposition.-350
204. To Sir Horace Mann, Nov. 29.-Mr. Pitt's gout. The new ministry. List of the changes. The Duke of Newcastle's disinterestedness. Benedict the Fourteenth.-350
205. To the same, Dec. 8.-Proceedings in Parliament. Voltaire's epigram.-352
206. To the same, Dec. 16.-Illness of Sir Horace's brother. The Hessian troops. Breach between Fox and Pitt.-354
207. To the same, Dec. 23.-Death of Sir Horace's brother.-356
1757.
208. To Sir Horace Mann, Jan. 8.-Party squabbles. The "Test" and "Contest." Dr. Shebbeare's "Monitor." Death of King Theodore.-356
209. To the same, Jan. 17.-The King and Mr. Pitt. Damien's attempt on the King of France. King Theodore's death. Byng's trial. Miss Elizabeth Villiers Pitt.-358
210. To the same, Jan. 30.-Admiral Byng's trial. Voltaire's letter on his behalf. Death of Fontenelle. Brumoy's "Aristophanes." Lady Essex and Prince Edward.-360
211. To the same, Feb. 13.-Progress of Admiral Byng's trial. Death of his uncle Horatio Lord Walpole. Prince Edward and Lady Essex at Lady Rochford's ball.-363
212. To John Chute, Esq. Feb. 27.-Admiral Byng's court-martial. [N.].-364
213. To Sir Horace Mann, March 3.-Admiral Byng's sentence. Applications of the court-martial for mercy. German subsidy. French symptoms.-365
214. To the same, March 17.-Completion of Admiral Byng's tragedy. Mr. Pitt's health. Fears for Hanover.-367
215. To the same, April 7.-Dismissal of the ministry. Inter- ministerium. Court changes.-368
216. To the same, April 20.-Inquiries into the naval miscarriages. Freedoms in gold boxes to Mr. Pitt and Mr. Legge. Damien's execution.-370
217. To the same, May 5.-Result of the naval inquiries. Epigrams 372
218. To the same, May 19.-Inter-ministerium. King of Prussia's victory. Battle of Prague.-374
219. To George Montagu, Esq. May 27.-375
220. To Sir Horace Mann, June 1.-Ministerial negotiations. King of Prussia's victories.-376
221. To George Montagu, Esq. June 2.-Projected ministry.-377
222. To Sir Horace Mann, June 9.-Ministerial arrangements. Lord Waldegrave first lord of the treasury.-378
223. To the same, June 14.-New ministerial revolution. The three factions. Scramble for power.-379
224. To the same, June 20.-Mr. Pitt accepts the seals. The new ministry. Inscription for a bas-relief in wax of Benedict the Fourteenth.-380
225. To the same, July 3. -Settlement of the ministry.-382
226. To the Earl of Strafford, July 4.-New volumes of Voltaire's "Universal history".-383
227. To John Chute, Esq. July 12.-Gray's "Odes" to be printed at the Strawberry Hill press.-385
228. To George Montagu, Esq. July 16.-386
229. To the same, July 17.-386
230. To Sir Horace Mann, July 25.-Secret expedition.-387
231. To John Chute, Esq. July 26.-Picture of Ninon de l'Enclos. Mrs. Clive's legacy.-387
232. To Sir Horace Mann, Aug. 4.-Disasters in Flanders. Gray's "Odes." His printer's letter to a friend in Ireland.-388
233. To George Montagu, Esq. Aug. 4.-Defeat of the Duke of Cumberland at Hastenbeck.-390
234. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, Aug. 14.-Cause of the defeat at Hastenbeck.-391
235. To George Montagu, Esq. Aug. 25.-His opinion of Gray's "Odes." His printing-office.-392
236. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, Sept. 2.-Charles Townshend. Lord Chesterfield and Lord Bath [N.].-393
237. To Sir Horace Mann, Sept. 3.-Visit to Linton. Urn to the memory of Sir Horace's brother. Lord Loudon abandons the design on Louisbourg.-393
238. To George Montagu, Esq. Sept. 8.-395
239. To the Right Hon. Lady Hervey, Sept. 13.-Ninon de l'Enclos's picture.-396
240. To George Montagu, Esq. Sept. 20.-Death of' Sir John Bland.-396
241. To Sir Horace Mann, Sept. 29.-Convention of Closter-Severn. Disturbances occasioned by the Militia-bill. Inscription to the memory of King Theodore.-397
242. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, Oct. 8.-Expedition to Rochfort (N].-400
243. To the Earl of Strafford, Oct. 11.-Return of the expedition to Rochfort. Militia-bill.-401
244. To Sir Horace Mann, Oct 12.-Rochfort expedition. Return of the Duke of Cumberland.-402
245. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, Oct. 13.-Inquiry into the failure of the Rochfort expedition.-403
246. To George Montagu, Esq. Oct. 18.-Resignation of the Duke of Cumberland.-404
247. To Sir Horace Mann, Oct. 24.-The Duke of Cumberland's resignation. Failure at Rochfort.-404
248. To the same, Nov. 20.-King of Prussia's victory at Rosbach. General dissatisfaction. Troubles in Ireland. Inquiry into the failure at Rochfort. Characteristic traits of' Mr. Conway. Richard the First's poetry. Bon-mot of Lord Tyrawley.- 405
249. To George Montagu, Esq.—-408
250. To the same, Dec. 23.-Death of Mr. Mann.-408
251. To Dr. Ducarel, Dec. 25.-"Dictes and sayings of the Philosophers".-409
1758.
252. To Sir Horace Mann, Jan. 11.-Court-martial on Sir John Mordaunt. Death of Princess Caroline. And of Sir Benjamin Keene.-409
253. To Dr. Ducarel, Jan. 12.-411
254. To Sir Horace Mann, Feb. 9.-Politics gone into winter quarters. Duke of Richelieu's banishment. Rage of expense in our pleasures.-412
255. To the same, Feb. 10.-Opening of the campaign. Fame. Saying of one of the Duke of Marlborough's generals. New secret expedition. Debate on the Habeas Corpus extension bill. Sir Luke Schaub's pictures. Swift's "Four last Years of Queen Anne." Dr. Lucas.-413
256.To the same, Feb. 23.-Acquittal of General Mordaunt. Death of Dr. Cocchi. Richard the First's poems.-415
257. To the same, March 21.-The East Indian here, Clive.
Hanover retaken. George Grenville's Navy-bill. Sir Charles
Williams's return from Russia, and mental indisposition.
Frantic conduct of Lord Ferrers. Swift's "Four last Years".-416
258. To the same, April 14.-Convention with Prussia. Sir Charles Williams. Lord Bristol appointed ambassador to Spain.- 418
259. To the Rev. Dr. Birch, May 4.-Soliciting observations on his "Royal and Noble Authors".-419
260. To George Montagu, Esq. May 4.-Flattering reception of his "Royal and Noble Authors." Story of Dr. Browne and Sir Charles Williams.-420
261. To Sir Horace Mann, May 31.-Expedition to St. Maloes. Extension of the Habeas Corpus act.-422
262. To the Hon. H. S, Conway, June 4.-Debates on the Habeas Corpus extension bill. Expedition to St. Maloes. Ninon de l'Enclos's portrait.-423
263. To Dr. Ducarel, June.-Thanks for his remarks on the "Noble Authors".-424
264. To Sir Horace Mann, June 11.-Departure of the expedition to St. Maloes. Prince Ferdinand's passage of the Rhine.-425
265. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, June 16.-Return of the expedition to St. Maloes.-426
266. To the Earl of Strafford, June 16.-Failure of the expedition against St. Maloes.-427
267. To Sir Horace Mann, June 18.-Expedition to St. Maloes.-428
268. To Sir David Dalrymple, June 29.-Thanks for his approbation of the "Noble Authors." queen Elizabeth's fondness for praise. Pope's "Bufo" and "Bubb." Lord Orrery's "Parthenissa" [N.).-430
69. To John Chute, Esq. June 29.-Prince Ferdinand's victory.- 431
270. To George Montagu, Esq. July 6.-431
271. To the Rev. Dr. Birch, July 8.-432
272. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, July 8.-Dedication to him of the "Fugitive Pieces." Fate of our expeditions [N.].-432
273. To Sir Horace Mann, July 8.-Prince Ferdinand's victory at Crevelt. Return of our armada from St. Maloes.-433
274. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, July 21.-Appointment of General Blighe. Fate of the expeditions. [N.].-434
275. To the Rev. Henry Zouch, Aug. 3.-Thanks for his remarks on the Royal and noble Authors," and for his information.-436
276. To the same, Aug. 12.-439
277. To Sir Horace Mann, Aug. 12.-Expedition against Cherbourg.-440
278. To George Montagu, Esq. Aug. 20.-Visit to the Grange. Ragley. The Conway papers.-441
279. To John Chute, Esq. Aug. 22.-Account of the Conway papers [N.).-443
280. To Sir Horace Mann, Aug. 24.-Expedition against Cherbourg. Taking of Cape Breton. Failure of the attack on Crown-point. Death of Lord Howe. Defeat at Ticonderoga.-444
281. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, Sept. 2.-Defeat of the Russians at Zorndorf. Repulse of General Abercrombie at Ticonderoga.-445
282. To Sir Horace Mann, Sept. 8.-Battle of Zorndorf. Marriage of his niece Laura to Dr. Frederick Keppel.-446
283. To the Rev. Henry Zouch, Sept. 14,-Soliciting information for a new edition of his "Noble Authors".-448
284. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, Sept. 19.-On the failure of the late expeditions to the coast of France [N.].-449
285. To Sir Horace Mann, Sept. 22. Failure of the expedition against Cherbourg.-451
286. To George Montagu, Esq. Oct. 3.-Disappointment and loss at St. Cas.-453
287. To the Rev. Henry Zouch, Oct. 5.-Progress of the new edition of "Noble Authors." Discovery of the Conway papers.-454
288. To the Right Hon. Lady Hervey, Oct. 17.-Rumoured assassination of the King of Portugal. Epigram on the Chevalier Taylor.-456
289. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, Oct. 17.-On the general's not being employed by Mr. Pitt [N.].-457
290. To the Rev. Henry Zouch, Oct. 21.-Thanks for further information. Lord Clarendon and Polybius. Dr. Jortin's "Erasmus." Reasons for not writing the life of his father.-459
291. To George Montagu, Esq. Oct. 24.-Reasons for leaving off authorship.-462
292. To Sir Horace Mann, Oct. 24.-On sending a drawing Of his monument to the memory of Sir Horace s brother. Reported assassination of the King of Portugal. The Duc d'Aiguillon's amiable behaviour to our prisoners.-463
293. To George Montagu, Esq. Nov. 26.-465
294. To Sir Horace Mann, Nov. 27.-Illness of the king. Harmony in parliament. Death of the Duke of Marlborough.-465
295. To the Rev. Henry Zouch, Dec. 9.-On sending the second edition of "Noble Authors." Lucan and Virgil. Helvetius de l'Esprit.-467
296. To Sir Horace Mann, Dec. 25.-Prospects of a Dutch war. Enormous supplies. Unanimity of Parliament. Fall of Cardinal de Bernis.-468
297. To George Montagu, Esq. Dec. 26.-Intended marriage of Colonel York.-470
1759.
298. To the Rev. Henry Zouch, Jan. 12.-Lord Lonsdale's treatise on Economics. Lucan. Vertua's MS. collections.-471
299. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, Jan. 19.-State of the House of Commons.-473
300. To the same, Jan. 28.-Match between Colonel Campbell and the Duchess of Hamilton. Prussian and Hessian treaties.-473
301. To John Chute, Esq. Feb. 1.-The Opera. Prussian cantata. Gothic antiquities (N.].-477
302. To the same, Feb. 2.-Spence's Comparison of Magliabechi and Bill. Story of Carr's Cousin.-475
303. To Sir Horace Mann, Feb. 9.-Quebec expedition.-478
304. To Mr. Gray, Feb. 15.-Literary queries. Critical Review.- 478
305. To the Right Hon. Lady Hervey, Feb. 20.-479
306. To Sir David Dalrymple, Feb. 25.-Robertson's History of Scotland. Ramsay the painter.-479
307. To Sir Horace Mann, march 4.-Projects a History of the House of Medici.-480
308. To John Chute, Esq. March 13.-Fears for his health. Recommends him to leave the Vine, lest he should die of mildew.-481
309. To the Rev. Henry Zouch, March 15.-Vertue's MSS. Hume's History.-482
310. To Sir David Dalrymple, March 25.-House of Medici. leo the Tenth [N.].-482
311. To Sir Horace Mann, April 11.-Marriage of his niece Maria to Lord Waldegrave. Prince Ferdinand's victory over the Austrians.-484
312. To George Montagu, Esq. April 26.-His niece's marriage to Lord Waldegrave. Ball at Bedford House.-485
313. To Sir Horace Mann, May 10,-General Hobson. Canada. House of Medici.-487
314. To the Rev. Henry Zouch, May 14.-Vertue's MSS. Hume and Smollett's Histories.-488
315. To George Montagu, Esq. May 16.-His niece's marriage. Judges' salaries. Charles Townshend's bon-mot.-490
316. To Sir Horace Mann, June 1.-The comet. King of Prussia's victories. Fame.-491
317. To George Montagu, Esq. June 1.-The invasion. Mason's "Caractacus".-492
318. To Sir Horace Mann, June 8.-493
319. To the Earl of' Strafford, June 12.-494
320. To Sir Horace Mann, June 22.-Invasion. Militia. Quebec. Death of Lady Murray.-495
321. To George Montagu, Esq. June 23.-496
322. To Sir Horace Mann, July 8.-Rumours of invasion.-497
323. To Sir David Dalrymple, July 11.-Mary Queen of Scots. Hume's History. Christina of Sweden [N.].-498
324.. To George Montagu, Esq. July 19.-Review of the Militia. Butler's "Remains".-499
325. To the same, July 26.-Visit to Navestock.-500
326. To Sir Horace Mann, Aug. 1.-Invasion. Militia.-501
327. To the same, Aug. 8.-Battle of Minden.-502
328. To George Montagu, Esq. Aug. 9.-Battle of Minden.-504
329. To the Earl of Strafford, Aug. 9.-Battle of Minden.-505
330. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, Aug. 14.-Battle of Minden. Prince Ferdinand and Lord George Sackville [N.).-506
331. To Sir Horace Mann, Aug. 29.-Minden. Illuminations. Lord George Sackville.-507
332. To the same, Sept. 13.-Death of the Princess Elizabeth. Lord George Sackville.-508
333. To the Earl of Strafford, Sept. 13.-Our victories.-510
334. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, Sept. 13.-Lord George Sackville [N.].-511
335. To George Montagu, Esq. Oct. 11.-512
336. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, Oct. 14.-The invasion getting out of fashion. Lord George Sackville (N.].-513
337. To Sir Horace Mann, Oct. 16.-Quebec. East India conquests.-514
338. To the Hon. H. S. Conway, Oct. 18.-Quebec. Death of General Wolfe.-514
339. To Sir Horace Mann, Oct. 19.-Conquest of Quebec.-516
340. To George Montagu, Esq. Oct. 21.-Public rejoicings for the conquest of Quebec.-517
341. To the Earl of Strafford, Oct. 30.-Quebec.-518
342. To the Right Hon. Lady Hervey, Nov. 3.-Poor Robin's Almanac. High Life below Stairs.-519
343. To George Montagu, Esq. Nov. 8.-French bankruptcy. Mrs. Montagu and Lord Lyttelton.-519
344. To Sir Horace Mann, Nov. 16.-Lord George Sackville. Lord Temple's resignation of the privy-seal on being refused the Garter.-521
Correspondence of the Honourable Horace Walpole
1749
13 Letter 1 To Sir Horace Mann. Strawberry Hill, March 4, 1749.
I have been so shut up in the House of Commons for this last fortnight or three weeks, that I have not had time to write you a line: we have not had such a session since the famous beginning of last Parliament. I am come hither for a day or two of rest and air, and find the additional pleasure of great beauty in my improvements: I could talk to you through the whole sheet, and with much more satisfaction, upon this head; but I shall postpone my own amusement to yours, for I am sure you want much more to know what has been doing in Parliament than at Strawberry Hill. You will conclude that we have been fighting over the peace; but we have not. It is laid before Parliament, but will not be taken up; the Opposition foresee that a vote of approbation would pass, and therefore will not begin upon it, as they wish to reserve it for censure in the next reign—or perhaps the next reign does not care to censure now what he must hereafter maintain—and the ministry do not seem to think their treaty so perfect as not to be liable to blame, should it come to be canvassed. We have been then upon several other matters: but first I should tell you, that from the utmost tranquillity and impotence of a minority, there is at once started up so formidable an Opposition as to divide 137 against 203.(1) The minority is headed by the Prince, who has continued opposing, though very unsuccessfully, ever since the removal of Lord Granville, and the desertion of the patriots. He stayed till the Pelhams had brought off every man of parts in his train, and then began to form his party. Lord Granville has never come into it., for fear of breaking with the King; and seems now to be patching up again with his old enemies. If Lord Bath has dealt with the Prince, it has been underhand. His ministry has had at the head of it poor Lord Baltimore, a very good-natured, weak, honest man; and Dr. Lee, a civilian, who was of Lord Granville's admiralty, and is still much attached to him. He is a grave man, and a good speaker, but of no very bright parts, and, from his way of life and profession, much ignorant of, and unfit for, a ministry. You will wonder what new resources the Prince has discovered-why, he has found them all in Lord Egmont, whom you have heard of under the name of Lord Perceval; but his father, an Irish Earl, is lately dead. As he is likely to make a very considerable figure in our history, I shall give you a more particular account of him. He has always earnestly studied our history and constitution and antiquities, with very ambitious views; and practised speaking early in the Irish Parliament. Indeed, this turn is his whole fund, for though he is between thirty and forty, he knows nothing of the world, and is always unpleasantly dragging the conversation to political dissertations. When very young, as he has told me himself, he dabbled in writing Craftsmen and penny-papers; but the first event that made him known, was his carrying the Westminster election at the end of my father's ministry,-which he amply described in the history of his own family, a genealogical work called "The History of the House of Yvery,"(2) a work which cost him three thousand pounds, as the heralds informed Mr. Chute and me, when we went to their office on your business; and which was so ridiculous, that he has since tried to suppress all the copies. It concluded with the description of the Westminster election, in these or some such words, "And here let us leave this young nobleman struggling for the dying liberties of his country!" When the change in the ministry happened, and Lord Bath was so abused by the remnant of the patriots, Lord Egmont published his celebrated pamphlet, called "Faction Detected," a work which the Pitts and Lytteltons have never forgiven him; and which, though he continued voting and sometimes speaking with the Pelhams, made him quite unpopular during all the last Parliament. When the new elections approached, he stood on his own bottom at Weobly in Herefordshire; but his election being contested, be applied for Mr. Pelham's support, who carried it for him in the House of Commons. This will always be a material blot in his life; for he had no sooner secured his seat, than he openly attached himself to the Prince, and has since been made a lord of his bedchamber. At the opening of this session, he published an extreme good pamphlet, which has made infinite noise, called "An Examination of the Principles and Conduct of the two Brothers," (the Pelhams,) and as Dr. Lee has been laid up with the gout, Egmont has taken the lead in the Opposition, and has made as great a figure as perhaps was ever made in so short a time. He is very bold and resolved, master of vast knowledge, and speaks at once with fire and method. His words are not picked and chosen like Pitt's, but his language is useful, clear, and strong. He has already by his parts and resolution mastered his great unpopularity, so far as to be heard with the utmost attention, though I believe nobody had ever more various difficulties to combat. All the old corps hate him on my father and Mr. Pelham's account; the new part of the ministry on their own. The Tories have not quite forgiven his having left them in the last Parliament: besides that, they are now governed by one Prowse, a cold, plausible fellow. and a great well-wisher to Mr. Pelham. Lord Strange,(3) a busy Lord of a party by himself, yet voting generally with the Tories, continually clashes with Lord Egmont; and besides all this, there is a faction in the Prince's family, headed by Nugent, who are for moderate measures.
Nugent is most affectedly an humble servant of Mr. Pell)afn, and seems only to have attached himself to the Prince, in order to make the better bargain with the ministry; he has great parts, but they never know how to disentangle themselves from bombast and absurdities. Besides those, there are two young men who make some figure in the rising Opposition, Bathurst(4) attorney to the Prince; and Potter, whom I believe you have had mentioned in my letters of last year; but he has a bad constitution, and is seldom able to be in town. Neither of these are in the scale of moderation.
The Opposition set out this winter with trying to call for several negotiations during the war; but the great storm which has so much employed us of late, was stirred up by Colonel Lyttelton;(5) who, having been ill-treated by the Duke, has been dealing with the Prince. He discovered to the House some innovations in the Mutiny-bill, of which, though he could not make much, the Opposition have, and fought the bill for a whole fortnight; during the course of which the world has got much light into many very arbitrary proceedings of the Commander-in-chief,(6) which have been the more believed too by the defection of my Lord Townshend's(7) eldest son, who is one of his aide-de-camps. Though the ministry, by the weight of numbers, have carried their point in a great measure, yet you may be sure great heats have been raised; and those have been still more inflamed by a correspondent practice in a new Navy-bill, brought in by the direction of Lord Sandwich and Lord Anson, but vehemently opposed by half the fleet, headed by Sir Peter Warren, the conqueror of Cape Breton, richer than Anson, and absurd as Vernon. The bill has even been petitioned against, and the mutinous were likely to go great lengths, if' the admiralty had not bought off some by money, and others by relaxing in the material points.- We began upon it yesterday, and are still likely to have a long affair of it-so much for politics: and as for any thing else, I scarce know any thing else. My Lady Huntingdon,(8) the Queen of the Methodists, has got her daughter named for lady of the bedchamber to the Princesses; but it is all off again. as she will not let her play at cards on Sundays. It is equally absurd on both sides, to refuse it, or to insist upon it.
Pray tell Dr. Cocchi that I shall be extremely ready to do him any service in his intended edition of the old Physicians,(9) but that I fear it is a kind of work that will lie very little within my sphere to promote. Learning is confined to very narrow bounds at present, and those seldom within the circle in which I necessarily live; but my regard for him and for you would make me take any pains. You see, I believe, that I do take pains for you—I have not writ such a letter to any body these three years. Adieu!
P. S. I am very sorry for your sake that the Prince and
Princess(10) are leaving Florence; if ever I return thither, as
I always flatter myself I shall, I should miss them extremely.
Lord Albemarle goes ambassador to Paris.
(1) Upon the last clause of the Mutiny-bill, an amendment to render half pay officers subject to the act, only in case of actual war, insurrection, rebellion, or invasion, was rejected by 203 to 137.-E.
(2) Compiled principally for Lord Egmont by Anderson, the genealogist. It was printed, but not published, in 1742. " Some," says Boswell, in his Life of Johnson, "have affected to laugh at the History of the House of Very: it would be well if many others would transmit their pedigrees to posterity, with the same accuracy and generous zeal with which the noble Lord who compiled that work has honoured and perpetuated his ancestry. Family histories, likv, the imagines majorum of the ancients, excite to virtue." Vol. viii. p. 188.-E.
(3) James, Lord Strange, eldest son of Edward Stanley, eleventh Earl of Derby. In 1762 he was made Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, and died during his father's life-time, in 1771. He always called himself Lord Strange; though the title, which was a barony in fee, had in fact descended to the Duke of Atholl, as heir general of James, seventh Earl of Derby.-]). (4) The Hon. Henry Bathurst, second heir of Allen, first Lord Bathurst, He became heir to the title upon the death, without issue, of his elder brother, the Hon. Benjamin Bathurst, in 1761. In 1746 he was appointed Attorney-General to Frederick, Prince of Wales; in 1754, one of the puisne judges of the Court of Common Pleas, and in 1771, Lord Chancellor. He was, upon this occasion, created a peer, by the title of Lord Apsley. He succeeded his father as second Earl Bathurst in 1775, and died in 1794.-D.
(5) Richard, third son of Sir Thomas, and brother of Sir George Lyttelton: he married the Duchess-dowager of Bridgewater, and was afterwards made a knight of the Bath.
(6) William Duke of Cumberland. He was "Captain-general of the Forces," having been so created in 1745.-D.
(7) George Townshend, afterwards the first Marquis of that name and title.-D.
(8) Selina, daughter of Washington, Earl Ferrers, and widow of Theophilus, Earl of Huntingdon.
(9) In 1754, Dr. Cocchi published his "Chirurgici Veteres," a very curious work, containing numerous valuable extracts from the Greek physicians.-E.
(10) Craon.
16 Letter 2 To Sir Horace Mann. Arlington Street, March 23, 1749.
Our debates on the two military bills, the naval one of which is not yet finished, have been so tedious, that they have rather whittled down the Opposition than increased it. In the Lords, the Mutiny-bill passed pretty easily, there happening no quarrel between Lord Bathurst and Lord Bath on the method of their measures; so there never divided above sixteen in the minority, and those scarce any of the Prince's Lords. Duke William was there and voted, which was too indecent in a rigorous bill calculated for his own power. There is a great disunion among the ministers on the Naval bill: Mr. Pelham and Pitt (the latter out of hatred and jealousy of Lord Sandwich) gave up the admiralty in a material point, but the paramount little Duke of Bedford has sworn that they shall recant on the report-what a figure they will make! This bill was chiefly of Anson's projecting, who grows every day into new unpopularity.(11) He has lately had a sea-piece drawn of the victory for which he was lorded, in which his own ship in a cloud of cannon was boarding the French Admiral. This circumstance, which was as true as if Mademoiselle Scudery had written his life (for he was scarce in sight when the Frenchman struck to Boscawen)(12) has been so ridiculed by the whole tar-hood, that the romantic part has been forced to be cancelled, and one only gun remains firing at Anson's ship. The two Secretaries of State(13) grow every day nearer to a breach; the King's going abroad is to decide the contest. Newcastle, who Hanoverizes more and more every day, pushes on the journey, as he is to be the attendant minister: his lamentable brother is the constant sacrifice of all these embroils.
At the Leicester-house the jars are as great: Doddington, who has just resigned the treasuryship of the navy, in hopes of once more governing that court (and there is no court where he has not once or twice tried the same scheme!) does not succeed: Sir Francis Dashwood and Lord Talbot are strongly for him-could one conceive that he could still find a dupe? Mr. Fox had a mind to succeed him, but both King and Duke have so earnestly pressed him to remain secretary at war, that he could not refuse. The King would not hear of any of the newer court; and Legge, who of the old was next oars, has managed in the Prussian business so clumsily, that the King would not bear him in his closet: but he has got the navy-office, which Lyttelton would have had, but could not be rechosen at his borough, which he had stolen by surprise from his old friend and brother Tom Pitt. The treasury is to be filled up with that toad-eater and spy to all parties, Harry Vane:(14) there is no enumerating all the circumstances that make his nomination scandalous and ridiculous!-but such is our world! General Charles Howard and a Mr. Saville are named to the red riband. My friend the Duke of Modena is again coming hither, which astonishes me, considering how little reason he had to be satisfied with his first visit; and sure he will have less now! I believe I told you that King Theodore(15) is here: I am to drink coffee with him to-morrow at Lady Schaub's. I have curiosity to see him, though I am not commonly fond of sights, but content myself with the oil-cloth picture of them that is hung out, and to which they seldom come up. There are two black Princes of Anamaboe here, who are in fashion at all the assemblies, of whom I scarce know any particulars, though their story(16) is very like Oroonoko's: all the women know it-and ten times more than belongs to it. Apropos to Indian historians, half our thoughts are taken up—that is, my Lord Halifax's are—with colonizing in Nova Scotia: my friend Colonel Cornwallis is going thither commander-in-chief. The Methodists will scarce follow him as they did Oglethorpe; since the period of his expedition,(17) their lot is fallen in a better land. Methodism is more fashionable than any thing but brag; the women play very deep at both—as deep, it is much suspected, as the matrons of Rome did at the mysteries of the Bona Dea. If gracious Anne was alive, she would make an admirable defendress of the new faith, and build fifty more churches for female proselytes.
If I had more paper or time, I could tell you an excellent long history of my brother Ned'S(18) envy, which was always up at highwater-mark, but since the publication of my book of Houghton (one should have thought a very harmless performance), has overflowed on a thousand ridiculous occasions. Another great object of his jealousy is my friendship with Mr. Fox: my brother made him a formal visit at nine o'clock the other morning, and in a set speech of three quarters of an hour, begged his pardon for not attending the last day of the Mutiny bill, which, he said was so particularly brought in by him, though Mr. Fox assured him that he had no farther hand in it than from his office. Another instance: when my brother went to live at Frogmore, Mr. Fox desired him to employ his tradesmen at Windsor, by way of supporting his interest in that borough. My brother immediately went to the Duke of St. Albans, to whom he had never spoke, (nor indeed was his acquaintance with Mr. Fox much greater), and notified to him, that if seven years hence his grace should have any contest with Mr. Fox about that borough, he should certainly espouse the latter. Guess how the Duke stared at so strange and unnecessary a declaration!
Pigwiggin's Princess has mis-pigged, to the great joy, I believe, of that family, for you know a child must have eaten. Adieu!
(11) It was entitled, A bill for amending, explaining, and reducing into one act, the laws relating to the Navy. "it was," says Sir John Barrow, "a most desirable and highly useful measure. The principal and , indeed, the only novelties attempted to be introduced, were, first, that of subjecting half pay officers to courts-martial, which after much opposition was thrown out; the second was the administration of an oath of secrecy to the members, which was carried, and continues to the present time." See Life of Lord Anson, p. 218.—E.
(12) The Hon. Edward Boscawen, third son of Hugh, first Viscount Falmouth. He was a distinguished naval commander, and had a large share in the success of Lord Anson's engagement with the French fleet off Cape Finisterre in 1747. He died in 1761.-D.
(13) The Dukes of Bedford and Newcastle.-D.
(14) Eldest son of Lord Barnard, and afterwards first Earl of Darlington. he died in 1758.-E.
(15) Theodore, King of Corsica.-D.
(16) Their story is briefly this: A Moorish king, who had entertained with great hospitality a British captain trafficking on the coast of Africa, reposed such confidence in him, as to intrust him with his son, about eighteen years of age, and another sprightly youth, to be brought to England and educated in the European manners. The captain received them, and basely sold them for slaves. He shortly after died; and, the ship coming to England, the officers related the whole affair: upon which the government sent to pay their ransom, and they were brought to England and put under the care of the Earl of Halifax, then at the head of the board of trade, who had them clothed and educated in a suitable manner. They were afterwards received in the higher circles, and introduced to the King. On the first of February in this year, they appeared at the Covent-Garden theatre, to see the tragedy of Oroonok; where they were received with a loud clap of applause, which they returned with a genteel bow. The tender interview between Imoinda and Oroonoko so affected the Prince, that he was obliged to retire at the end of the fourth act. His companion remained, but wept all the time so bitterly that it affected the audience more than the play.-E.
(17) General Oglethorpe was the great promoter of the colony of Georgia. See vol. i.-E.
(18) Sir Edward Walpole, K. B.-D.
19 Letter 3 To Sir Horace Mann. Strawberry Hill, May 3, 1749.
I am come hither for a few days, to repose myself after a torrent of diversions, and am writing to you in my charming bow-window with a tranquillity and satisfaction which, I fear, I am grown old enough to prefer to the hurry of amusements, in which the whole world has lived for this last week. We have at last celebrated the peace, and that as much in extremes as we generally do everything, whether we have reason to be glad or sorry, pleased or angry. Last Tuesday it was proclaimed: the King did not go to St. Paul's, but at night the whole town was illuminated. The next day was what was called "a jubilee-masquerade in the Venetian manner" at Ranelagh: it had nothing Venetian in it, but was by far the best understood and the prettiest spectacle I ever saw: nothing in a fairy tale ever surpassed it. One of the proprietors, who is a German, and belongs to court, had got my Lady Yarmouth to persuade the King to order it. It began at three o'clock, and, about five, people of fashion began to go. When you entered, you found the whole garden filled with masks and spread with tents, which remained all night very commodely. In one quarter was a May-pole dressed with garlands, and people dancing round it to a tabor and pipe and rustic music, all masqued,'as were all the various bands of music that were disposed in different parts of the garden; some like huntsmen with French-horns, some like peasants, with a troop of harlequins and scaramouches in the little open temple on the mount. On the canal was a sort of gondola, adorned with flags and streamers, and filled with music, rowing about. All round the outside of the amphitheatre were shops, filled with Dresden china, Japan, etc. and all the shop-keepers in mask. The amphitheatre was illuminated; and in the middle was a circular bower, composed of all kinds of firs in tubs from twenty to thirty feet high: under them orange-trees, with small lamps in each orange, and below them all sorts of the finest auriculas in pots; and festoons of natural flowers hanging from tree to tree. Between the arches too were firs, and smaller ones in the balconies above. There were booths for tea and wine, gaming-tables and dancing, and about two thousand persons. In short, it pleased me more than any thing I ever saw. It is to be once more, and probably finer as to dresses, as there has since been a subscription-masquerade, and people will go in their rich habits. The next day were the fire-works, which by no means answered the expense, the length of preparation, and the expectation that had been raised; indeed, for a week before, the town was like a country fair, the streets filled from morning to night, scaffolds building wherever you could or could not see, and coaches arriving from every corner of the kingdom. This hurry and lively scene, with the sight of the immense crowd in the Park and on every house, the guards, and the machine itself, which was very beautiful, was all that was worth seeing. The rockets, and whatever was thrown up into the air, succeeded mighty well; but the wheels, and all that was to compose the principal part, were pitiful and ill-conducted, with no changes of coloured fires and shapes: the illumination was mean, and lighted so slowly that scarce any body had patience to wait the finishing; and then, -what contributed to the awkwardness of the whole, was the right pavilion catching fire, and being burnt down in the middle of the show. The King, the Duke, and Princess Emily saw it from the library,(19) with their courts: the Prince and Princess, with their children, from Lady Middlesex's; no place being provided for them, nor any invitation given to the library. The lords and Commons had galleries built for them and the chief citizens along the rails of the mall: the lords had four tickets a-piece, and each Commoner, at first, but two, till the Speaker bounced and obtained a third. Very little mischief was done, and but two persons killed: at Paris, there were forty killed and near three hundred wounded, by a dispute between the French and Italians in the management, who, quarrelling for precedence in lighting the fires, both lighted at once and blew up the whole. Our mob was extremely tranquil, and very unlike those I remember in my father's time, when it was a measure in the Opposition to work up every thing to mischief, the excise and the French players, the convention and the gin-act. We are as much now in the opposite extreme, and in general so pleased with the peace, that I could not help being struck with a passage I read lately in Pasquier an old French author, who says, "that in the time of Francis 1. the French used to call their creditors 'Des Anglois,' from the facility with which the English gave credit to them in all treaties, though they had broken so many." On Saturday we had a serenata at the Opera-house, called Peace in Europe, but it was a wretched performance. On Monday there was a subscription-masquerade, much fuller than that of last year, but not so agreeable or so various in dresses. The King was well disguised in an old-fashioned English habit, and much pleased with somebody who desired him to hold their cup as they were drinking tea. The Duke had a dress of the same kind, but was so immensely corpulent that he looked like Cacofogo, the drunken captain, in Rule a Wife and Have a Wife. The Duchess of Richmond was a lady mayoress in the time of James I.; and Lord Delawarr,(20) Queen Elizabeth's porter, from a picture in the guard-chamber at Kensington; they were admirable masks. Lady Rochford, Miss Evelyn, Miss Bishop, Lady Stafford,(21) and Mrs. Pitt,(22) were in vast beauty; particularly the last, who had a red veil, which made her look gloriously handsome. I forgot Lady Kildare. Mr. Conway was the Duke in Don Quixote, and the finest figure I ever saw. Miss Chudleigh(23) was Iphigenia, but so naked that you would have taken her for Andromeda; and Lady Betty Smithson had such a pyramid of baubles upon her head, that she was exactly the Princess of Babylon in Grammont.
You will conclude that, after all these diversions, people begin to think of going out of town—no such matter: the Parliament continues sitting, and will till the middle Of June; Lord Egmont told us we should sit till Michaelmas. There are many private bills, no public ones of any fame. We were to have had some chastisement for Oxford, where, besides the late riots, the famous Dr. King,(24) the Pretender's great agent, made a most violent speech at the opening of the Ratcliffe library. The ministry denounced judgment, but, in their old style, have grown frightened, and dropped it. However, this menace gave occasion to a meeting and union between the Prince's party and the Jacobites, which Lord Egmont has been labouring all the winter. They met at the St. Alban's tavern, near Pall-mall, last Monday morning, an hundred and twelve Lords and Commoners. The Duke of Beaufort(25) opened the assembly with a panegyric on the stand that had been made this winter against so corrupt an administration, and hoped it would continue, and desired harmony. Lord Egmont seconded this strongly, and begged they would come up to Parliament early next winter. Lord Oxford(26) spoke next; and then Potter, with great humour, and to the great Abashment of the Jacobites, said he was very glad to see this union, and from thence hoped, that if another attack like the last rebellion should be made on the Royal Family, they would all stand by them. No reply was made to this. Then Sir Watkyn Williams spoke, Sir Francis Dashwood, and Tom Pitt,(27) and the meeting broke up. I don't know what his coalition may produce; it will require time with no better heads than compose it at present, though great Mr. Doddington had carried to the conference the assistance of his. In France a very favourable event has happened for us, the disgrace of Maurepas,(28) one of our bitterest enemies, and the promoter of their marine. Just at the beginning of the war, in a very critical period, he had obtained a very large sum for that service, but which one of the other factions, lest he should gain glory and credit by it, got to be Suddenly given away to the King of Prussia.
Sir Charles Williams is appointed envoy to this last King: here is an epigram which he has just sent over on Lord Egmont's opposition to the Mutiny-bill;
"Why has lord Egmont 'gainst this bill
So much declamatory skill
So tediously exerted?
The reason's plain: but t'other day
He mutinied himself for pay,
And he has twice descried."
I must tell you a bon-mot that was made the other night at the serenata of "Peace in Europe" by Wall,(29) who is Much in fashion, and a kind of Gondomar. Grossatesta, the Modenese minister, a very low fellow, with all the jackpuddinghood of an Italian, asked, "Mais qui est ce qui repres`ente mon maitre>" Wall replied, "Mais, mon Die, l'abb`e, ne scavez vous pas que ce n'est pas un op`era boufon!" And here is another bon-mot of my Lady Townshend: We were talking of the Methodists: somebody said, "Nay, Madam, is it true that Whitfield has recanted?" "No, Sir, he has only canted."
If you ever think of returning to England, as I hope it will be long first, you must prepare yourself with Methodism. I really believe that by that time it will be necessary; this sect increases as fast as almost ever any religious nonsense did.
Lady Fanny Shirley has chosen this way of bestowing the dregs of her beauty; and Mr. Lyttelton is very near making the same sacrifice of the dregs of all those various characters that he has worn. The Methodists love your big sinners as proper subjects to work upon—and indeed they have a plentiful harvest—I think what you call flagrancy was never more in fashion. Drinking is at the highest wine-mark; and gaming joined with it so violent, that at the last Newmarket meeting, in the rapidity of both, a bank-bill was thrown down, and nobody immediately claiming it, they agreed to give it to a man that was standing by.
I must tell you of Stosch's letter, which he had the impertinence to give you without telling the contents. It was to solicit the arrears of his pension, which I beg you will Tell him I have no manner of interest to procure; and to tell me of a Galla Placidia, a gold medal lately found. It is not for myself, but I wish you would ask him the price for a friend of mine who would like to buy it. Adieu! my dear child; I have been long in arrears to you, but I trust you will take this huge letter as an acquittal. You see my villa makes me a good correspondent; how happy I should be to show it you, if I could, with no mixture of disagreeable circumstances to you. I have made a vast plantation! Lord Leicester told me the other day that he heard I would not buy some old china, because I was laying out all my money in trees; "Yes," said I, my Lord, I used to love blue trees, but Now I like green ones."
(19) Probably the old brick building near the bottom of the Green Park, which was called the Queen's Library," and which was pulled down by the late Duke of York when he built his new house in the Stable-yard, St. James's.-D.
(20) John West, seventh Lord Delawarr, created Earl Delawarr, in 1761-D.
(21) Henrietta Cantillon, wife of Matthias Howard, third Earl of Stafford.-D.
(22) Penelope Atkyns a celebrated beauty, wife of George Pitt, Esq. of Strathfieldsaye, in Hants, created in 1776 Lord Rivers.-D.
(23) Afterwards Duchess of Kingston.-D.
(24) last conspicuous Jacobite at Oxford. He was public orator of that University and principal of St. Mary Hall.-D.
(25) Lord Noel Somerset,- who, in 1746 succeeded his brother in the dukedom.
(26) Edward Harley, of Eywood, in the county of Hereford, to whom, pursuant to the limitations of the patent, the earldoms of Oxford and Mortimer descended, upon the death, without male issue, of the Lord Treasurer's only son, Edward, the second Earl. Lord Oxford was of the Jacobite party. He died in 1755.—D.
(27) Thomas Pitt, Esq. of Boconnock, in Cornwall, warden of the Stannaries. He married the sister of George, Lord Lyttelton, and was the father of the first Lord Camelford.-D.
(28) Phelypeaux, Count de Maurepas, son of the Chancellor de Pontchartrain. He was disgraced in consequence of some quarrel with the King's mistress. He returned to office, unhappily for France, in the commencement of the reign of louis the Sixteenth.-D.
(29) General Wall, the Spanish ambassador. Gondomar was the able Spanish ambassador in England in the reign of james the First.-D.
23 Letter 4 To Sir Horace Mann. Arlington Street, May 17, 1749.
We have not yet done diverting ourselves: the night before last the Duke of Richmond gave a firework; a codicil to the peace. He bought the rockets and wheels that remained in the pavilion which miscarried, and took the pretence of the Duke of Modena being here to give a charming entertainment. The garden(30) lies with a slope down to the Thames, on which were lighters, from whence were thrown up, after a concert of water-music, a great number of rockets. Then from boats on every side were discharged water-rockets and fires of that kind; and then the wheels Which were ranged along the rails of the terrace were played off; and the whole concluded with the illumination of a pavilion on the top of the slope, of two pyramids on each side, and of the whole length of the balustrade to the water. You can't conceive a prettier sight; the garden filled with every body of fashion, the Duke, the Duke of Modena, and the two black Princes. The King and Princess Emily were in their barge under the terrace; the river was covered with boats, and the shores and adjacent houses with crowds. The Duke of Modena played afterwards at brag, and there was a fine supper for him and the foreigners, of whom there are numbers here; it is grown as much the fashion to travel hither as to France or Italy. Last week there was a vast assembly and music at Bedford-house for this Modenese; and to-day he is set out to receive his doctor's degree at the two Universities. His appearance is rather better than it used to be, for, instead of wearing his wig down to his nose to hide the humour in his face, he has taken to paint his forehead white, which, however, with the large quantity of red that he always wears on the rest of his face, makes him ridiculous enough. I cannot say his manner is more polished; Princess Emily asked him if he did not find the Duke much fatter than when he was here before? He replied, "En verit`e il n'est pas si effroiable qu'on m'avoit dit." She commended his diamonds; he said, "Les v`otres sont bien petits." As I had been graciously received at his court, I went into his box the first night at the Opera: the first thing he did was to fall asleep; but as I did not choose to sit waiting his reveil in the face of the whole theatre, I waked him, and would discourse him: but here I was very unlucky, for of the only two persons I could recollect at his court to inquire after, one has been dead these four years, and the other, he could not remember any such man. However, Sabbatini, his secretary of state, flattered me extremely: told me he found me beaucoup mieux, and that I was grown very fat-I fear, I fear it was flattery! Eight years don't improve one,-and for my corpulence, if I am grown fat, what must I have been in my Modenese days!
I told you we were to have another jubilee masquerade: there was one by the King's command for Miss Chudleigh, tire maid of honour, with whom our gracious monarch has a mind to believe himself in love,—so much in love, that at one of the booths he gave her a fairing for her watch, which cost him five-and-thirty guineas,—actually disbursed out of his privy purse, and not charged on the civil list. Whatever you may think of it, this is a more magnificent present than the cabinet which the late King of Poland sent to the fair Countess Konismark, replete with all kinds of baubles and ornaments, and ten thousand ducats in one of the drawers. I hope some future Hollinshed or Stowe will acquaint posterity "that five-and-thirty guineas were an immense sum in those days!"
You are going to see one of our court-beauties in Italy, my Lady Rochford:(31) they are setting Out on their embassy to Turin. She is large, but very handsome, with great delicacy and address. All the Royals have been in love with her; but the Duke was so in all the forms, till she was a little too much pleased with her conquest of his brother-in-law the Prince of Hesse. You will not find much in the correspondence of her husband: his person is good, and he will figure well enough as an ambassador; better as a husband where cicisb`es don't expect to be molested. The Duke is not likely to be so happy with his new passion, Mrs. Pitt,(32) who, besides being in love with her husband, whom you remember (,lady Mary Wortley's George Pitt), is going to Italy with him, I think you will find her one of the most glorious beauties you ever saw. You are to have another pair of our beauties, the Princess Borghese's, Mr Greville(33) and his wife, who was the pretty Fanny M'Cartney.
Now I am talking scandal to you, and court-scandal, I must tell you that Lord Conway's sister, Miss Jenny, is dead suddenly with eating lemonade at the last subscription masquerade.,(34) It is not quite unlucky for her: she had outlived the Prince's love and her own face, and nothing remained but her love and her person, which was exceedingly bad.
The graver part of the world, who have not been given up to rockets and masquing, are amused with a book of Lord Bolinbroke's, just published, but written long ago. It is composed of three letters, the first to Lord Cornbury on the Spirit of Patriotism; and two others to Mr. lyttelton, (but with neither of their names,) on the Idea of a patriot King, and the State of Parties on the late King's accession. Mr. Lyttelton had sent him word, that he begged nothing might be inscribed to him that was to reflect on Lord Orford, for that he was now leagued with all Lord Orford's friends: a message as abandoned as the book itself: but indeed there is no describing the impudence with which that set of people unsay what they have been saying all their lives,-I beg their pardons, I mean the honesty with which they recant! Pitt told me coolly, that he had read this book formerly, when he admired Lord Bolinbroke more than he does now. The book by no means answered my expectation: the style, which is his fort, is very fine: the deduction and impossibility of drawing a consequence from what he is saying, as bad and obscure as in his famous Dissertation on Parties: Von must know the man, to guess his meaning. Not to mention the absurdity and impracticability of this kind of system, there is a long speculative dissertation on the origin of government, and even that greatly stolen from other writers, and that all on a sudden dropped, while he hurries into his own times, and then preaches (he of all men!) on the duty of preserving decency! The last treatise would not impose upon an historian of five years old: he tells Mr. Lyttelton, that he may take it from him, that there was no settled scheme at the end of the Queen's reign to introduce the Pretender; and he gives this excellent reason: because, if there had been, he must have known it; and another reason as ridiculous, that no traces of such a scheme have since come to light. What, no traces in all cases of himself, Atterbury, the Duke of Ormond, Sir William Windham, and others! and is it not known that the moment the queen was expired, Atterbury proposed to go in his lawn sleeves and proclaim the Pretender at Charing-cross, but Bolinbroke's heart failing him, Atterbury swore, "There was the best cause in Europe lost for want of spirit!" He imputes Jacobitism singly to Lord Oxford, whom he exceedingly abuses; and who, so far from being suspected, was thought to have fallen into disgrace with that faction for refusing to concur with them. On my father he is much less severe than I expected; and in general, so obliquely, that hereafter he will not be perceived to aim at him, though at this time one knows so much what was at his heart, that it directs one to his meaning.
But there is a preface to this famous book, which makes much more noise than the work itself. It seems, Lord Bolinbroke had originally trusted Pope with the copy, to have half-a-dozen printed for particular friends. Pope, who loved money infinitely beyond any friend, got fifteen hundred Copies(35) printed privately, intending to outlive Bolingbroke and make great advantage of them; and not only did this, but altered the copy at his Pleasure, and even made different alterations in different copies. Where Lord Bolingbroke had strongly flattered their common friend lyttelton, Pope suppressed the panegyric: where, in compliment to Pope, he had softened the satire on Pope's great friend, Lord Oxford, Pope reinstated the abuse. The first part of this transaction is recorded in the preface; the two latter facts are reported by Lord Chesterfield and Lyttelton, the latter of whom went to Bolingbroke to ask how he had forfeited his good opinion. In short, it is comfortable to us people of moderate virtue to hear these demigods, and patriots, and philosophers, inform the world of each other's villanies.(36) What seems to make Lord Bolinbroke most angry, and I suppose does, is Pope's having presumed to correct his work. As to his printing so many copies, it certainly was a compliment, and the more profit (which however could not be immense) he expected to make, the greater opinion he must have conceived of the merit of the work: if one had a mind to defend Pope, should not one ask,(37) if any body ever blamed Virgil's executors for not burning the AEneid, as he ordered them? Warburton, I fear, does design to defend Pope: and my uncle Horace to answer the book; his style, which is the worst in the world, must be curious, in opposition to the other. But here comes full as bad a part of the story as any: Lord Bolinbroke, to buy himself out of the abuse in the Duke of Marlborough's life, or to buy himself into the supervisal of it, gave those letters to Mallet, who is writing this life for a legacy in the old Duchess's will, (and which, with much humour, she gave, desiring it might not be written in verse,) and Mallet sold them to the bookseller for a hundred and fifty pounds. Mallet had many obligations to Pope, no disobligations to him, and was one of his grossest flatterers; witness the sonnet on his supposed death, printed in the notes to the Dunciad. I was this morning told an anecdote from the Dorset family that is no bad collateral evidence of the Jacobitism Of the Queen'S four last years. They wanted to get Dover Castle into their hands, and sent down Prior to the present Duke of Dorset, who loved him, and probably was his brother,(38) to persuade him to give it up. He sent Prior back with great an(-,er, and in three weeks was turned out of the government himself but it is idle to produce proofs; as idle as to deny the scheme.
I have just been with your brother Gal. who has been laid up these two days with the gout in his ankle; an absolute professed gout in all the forms, and with much pain. Mr. Chute is out of town; when he returns, I shall set him upon your brother to reduce him to abstinence and health. Adieu!
(30 At Whitehall.
(31) Daughter of Edward Young' Esq. and wife of William, Earl of Rochford. She had been maid of honour to the Princess of Wales.
(32) Penelope, sister of Sir Richard Atkyns.
(33) Fulke Greville, Esq. son of the Hon. Algernon Greville, second son of Fulke, fifth Lord Brooke. His wife was the authoress of the pretty poem entitled "an Ode to Indifference."-D.
(34) This event was commemorated in the following doggrel lines:—
"Poor Jenny Conway
She drank lemonade,
At a masquerade,
So now she's dead and gone away."-D.
(35) Lord Bolingbroke discovered what Pope had done during his lifetime, and never forgave him for it. He-obliged him to give up the copies, and they were burned on the terrace of Lord Bolingbroke's house at Battersea, in the presence of Lord B. and Pope.-D.
(36) In reference to this publication, Lord Bolingbroke himself, in a letter to Lord Marchmont, written on the 7th of June, says, "The book you mention has brought no trouble upon me, though it has given occasion to many libels upon me. They are of the lowest form, and seem to be held in the contempt they deserve. There I shall leave them, nor suffer a nest of hornets to disturb the quiet of my retreat. If these letters of mine come to your hands, your lordship will find that I have left out all that was said of our friend Lord Lyttelton in one of them. He desired that it might be so; and I had at once the double mortification of concealing the good I had said of one friend, and of revealing the turpitude of another. I hope you will never have the same treatment that I have met with; neither will you. I am single in my circumstances—a species apart in the political society; and they, who dare to attack no one else, may attack me. Chesterfield says, I have made a coalition of Wig, Tory, Trimmer, and Jacobite against myself. Be it so. I have Truth, that is stronger than all of them, on my side; and, in her company, and avowed by her, I have more satisfaction than their applause and their favour could give me." Marchmont Papers.-E.
(37) This thought was borrowed by Mr. Spence, in a pamphlet published on this occasion in defence of Pope.
(38) Burnet relates that the Earl of Dorset, celebrated for patronage of Genius, found Prior by chance reading Horace, and was so well pleased with his proficiency, that he undertook the care and cost of academical education.
27 Letter 5 To George Montagu, Esq. Arlington Street, May 18, 1749,.
Dear George, Whatever you hear of the Richmond fireworks, that is short of the prettiest entertainment in the world, don't believe it - I really never passed a more agreeable evening. Every thing succeeded; all the wheels played in time; Frederick was fortunate, and all the world in good humour. Then for royalty—Mr. Anstis himself would have been glutted; there were all the Fitzes upon earth, the whole court of St. Germains, the Duke,(39) the Duke of Modena, and two Anamaboes. The King, and Princess Emily bestowed themselves upon the mob on the river and as soon as they were gone, the Duke had the music into the garden, and himself, with my Lady Lincoln, Mrs. Pitt, Peggy Banks, and Lord Holderness, entertained the good subjects with singing God save the King to them over the rails of the terrace. The Duke of Modena supped there, and the Duke was asked, but he answered, it was impossible; in short, he could not adjust his dignity to a mortal banquet. There was an admirable scene: Lady Burlington brought the Violette, and the Richmonds had asked Garrick who stood ogling and sighing the whole time, while my Lady kept a most fierce look-out. Sabbatini, one of the Duke of Modena's court, was asking me who all the people were? and who is that? "C'est miladi Hartington, la belle fille du Duc de Devonshire." "Et qui est cette autre dame!" It was a distressing question; after a little hesitation, I replied, "Mais c'est Mademoiselle Violette?" "Et comment Mademoiselle Violette! j'ai connu une Mademoiselle Violette, par exemple."(40) I begged him to look at Miss Bishop.
In the middle of all these principalities and powers was the Duchess of Queensbury, in her forlorn trim, a white apron and a white hood, and would make the Duke swallow all her undress. T'other day she drove post to Lady Sophia Thomas, at Parsons-green, and told her that she was come to tell her something of importance. " What is it!" "Why take a couple of beef-steaks, clap them together as if they were for a dumpling, and eat them with pepper and salt; it is the best thing you ever tasted: I could not help coming to tell you this:" and away she drove back to town. Don't a course of folly for forty years make one very sick?
The weather is SO hot, and the roads so dusty, that I can't get to Strawberry; but I shall begin negotiating with you now about your coming. You must not expect to find it in beauty. I hope to get my bill finished in ten days; I have scrambled it through the lords; but altogether, with the many difficulties and plagues, I am a good deal out of humour; my purchases hitch, and new proprietors start out of the ground, like the crop of soldiers in the Metamorphosis. I expect but an unpleasant summer; my indolence and inattention are not made to wade through leases and deeds. Mrs. Chenevix brought me one yesterday to sign, and her sister Bertrand, the toy-woman of Bath, for a witness. I showed them my cabinet of enamels instead of treating them with white wine. The Bertrand said, "Sir, I hope you don't trust all sorts of ladies with this cabinet!" What an entertaining assumption of dignity! I must tell you an anecdote that I found t'other day in an old French author, which is a great drawback on beaux sentiments and romantic ideas. Pasquier, in his "Recherches de la France," is giving an account of the Queen of Scots' execution; he says, the night before, knowing her body must be stripped for her shroud, she would have her feet washed, because she used ointment to one of them which was sore. I believe I have told you, that in a very old trial of her, which I bought from Lord Oxford's collection, it is said that she was a large lame woman. Take sentiments out of their pantoufles, and reduce them to the infirmities of mortality, what a falling off there is! I could not help laughing in myself t'other day, as I went through Holborn in a very hot day, at the dignity of human nature; all those foul old-clothes women panting without handkerchiefs, and mopping themselves all the way down within their loose jumps. Rigby gave me a strong picture of human nature; he and Peter Bathurst t'other night carried a servant of the latter's, who had attempted to shoot him, before Fielding; who, to all his other vocations, has, by the grace of Mr. Lyttelton, added that of Middlesex justice. He sent them word he was at supper, that they must come next morning. They did not understand that freedom, and ran up, where they found him banqueting with a blind man,(41) a whore, and three on some cold mutton and a bone of ham, both in One dish, and the dirtiest cloth. He never stirred nor asked them to sit. Rigby, who had seen him so often come to beg a guinea of Sir C. Williams, and Bathurst, at whose father's he had lived for victual,,, understood that dignity as little, and pulled themselves chairs; on which he civilized.(42)
Millar the bookseller has done generously by him: finding Tom Jones, for which he had given him six hundred pounds, sell So greatly, he has since given him another hundred.(43) Now I talk to you of authors, Lord Cobham's West(44) has published his translation of Pindar; the poetry is very stiff, but prefixed to it there is a very entertaining account of the Olympic games, and that preceded by an affected inscription to Pitt and Lyttelton. The latter has declared his future match with Miss Rich. George Grenville has been married these two days to Miss Windham. Your friend Lord North is, I suppose you know, on the brink with the countess of Rockingham;(45) and I think your cousin Rice is much inclined to double the family alliance with her sister Furnese. It went on very currently for two or three days, but last night at Vauxhall his minionette face seemed to be sent to languish with Lord R. Berties's.
Was not you sorry for poor Cucumber? I do assure you I was; it was shocking to be hurried away so suddenly, and in so much torment. You have heard I suppose of Lord Harry Beauclerc's resignation, on his not being able to obtain a respite till November, though the lowest officer in his regiment has got much longer leave. It is incredible how Nolkejumskoi has persecuted this poor man for these four years, since he could not be persuaded to alter his vote at a court-martial for the acquittal of a man whom the Duke would have condemned. Lord Ossulston, too, has resigned his commission.
I must tell you a good story of Charles Townshend: you know his political propensity and importance; his brother George was at supper at the King's Arms with some more young men. The conversation somehow or other rambled into politics, and it was started that the national debt was a benefit. "I am sure it is not," said Mr. Townshend; I can't tell why, but my brother Charles can, and I will send to him for arguments." Charles was at supper at another tavern, but so much the dupe of this message, that he literally called for ink and paper, wrote four long sides of arguments, and sent word that when his company broke up, he would come and give them more, which he did at one o'clock in the morning. I don't think you will laugh much less at what happened to me: I wanted a print out of a booth, which I did not care to buy at Osborn's shop: the next day he sent me the print, and begged that when I had any thing to publish, I would employ him.
I will now tell you, and finish this long letter, how I shocked Mr. Mackenzie inadvertently at Vauxhall: we had supped there a great party, and coming out, Mrs. More, who waits at the gate, said, "Gentlemen and ladies, you will walk in and hear the surprising alteration of voice?" I forgetting Mackenzie's connexions, and that he was formerly of the band, replied, "No, I have seen patriots enough."
I intend this letter shall last you till you come to Strawberry Hill. one might have rolled it out into half-a-dozen. My best compliments to your sisters.
(39) The Duke of Cumberland.
(40) Garrick's; marriage with Mademoiselle Eva Maria Violette took place four days after the date of this letter.-E.
(41) Sir Walter Scott suggests, that this blind man was probably Fielding's brother.-E.
(42) "Allen, the friend of Pope," says Sir Walter Scott, "was also one of his benefactors, but unnamed at his own desire; thus confirming the truth of the poet's beautiful couplet,
'Let humble Allen, with an awkward shame,
Do good by stealth, and blush to find it fame.'
It is said that this munificent and modest patron made Fielding a present of two hundred pounds at one time, and that even before he was personally acquainted with him."-E.
(43) "This," observes Sir Walter Scott, in his biographical notice of Fielding, " is a humiliating anecdote, even after we have made allowance for the aristocratic exaggeration of Walpole; yet it is consoling to observe that Fielding's principles remained unshaken, though the circumstances attending his official situation tended to increase the careless disrespectability of his private habits. His own account of his conduct respecting the dues of the office on which he depended for subsistence, has never been denied or doubted: 'I confess,' says he, 'that my private affairs at the beginning of the winter had but a gloomy aspect; for I had not plundered the public or the poor of those sums which they who are always ready to plunder both as much as they can, have been pleased to suspect me of taking: on the contrary, by composing, instead of inflaming, the quarrels of porters and beggars, and by refusing to take a shilling from a man who most undoubtedly would not have had another left, I had reduced an income of about five hundred a year, of the dirtiest money upon earth, to a little more than three hundred; a considerable portion of which remained with my clerk."'-E.
(44) West's mother was sister to Sir Richard Temple, afterwards Lord Cobham. Of his translation of Pindar, Dr. Johnson states, that he found his expectations surpassed, both by its elegance and its exactness. For his "Observations on the Resurrection," the University of Oxford, in March 1748, created him a Doctor of Laws by diploma. At his residence at Wickham, where he was often visited by Lyttelton and Pitt, there is a walk designed by the latter; while the former received at this place that conviction which produced his "Dissertation on St. Paul."-E.
(45) Daughter of Sir Robert Furnese, and widow of Lewis, Earl of Rockingham.
30 Letter 6 To Sir Horace Mann. Strawberry Hill, June 4, 1749.
As summery as June and Strawberry Hill may sound, I assure you I am writing to you by the fire-side: English weather will give vent to its temper, and whenever it is out of humour it will blow east and north and all kinds of cold. Your brothers Ned and Gal. dined with me to-day, and I carried the latter back to Richmond: as I passed over the green, I saw Lord Bath, Lord Lonsdale,(46) and half-a-dozen more of the White's club sauntering at the door of a house which they have taken there, and come to every Saturday and Sunday to play at whist. You will naturally ask why they can't play at whist in London on those two days as well as on the other five; indeed I can't tell you, except that it is so established a fashion to go out of town at the end of the week, that people do go, though it be only into another town. It made me smile to see Lord Bath sitting there, like a citizen that has left off trade.
Your brother Ned has not seen Strawberry Hill since my great improvements; he was astonished: it is pretty: you never saw so tranquil a scene, without the least air of melancholy: I should hate it, if it was dashed with that. I forgot to ask Gal. what is become of the books of Houghton which I gave him six months ago for you and Dr. Cocchi. You perceive I have got your letter of May 23rd, and with it Prince Craon's simple epistle to his daughter:(47) I have no mind to deliver it: it would be a proper recommendation of a staring boy on his travels, and is consequently very suitable to my colleague, Master St. Leger; but one hates to be coupled with a romping grayhound puppy, "qui est moins prudent que Monsieur Valpol!" I did not want to be introduced to Madame de Mirepoix's assemblies, but to be acquainted with her, as I like her family: I concluded, simple as he is, that an old Frenchman knew how to make these distinctions. By thrusting St. Leger into the letter with me, and talking of my prudence, I shall not wonder if she takes me for his bear-leader, his travelling governor!
Mr. Chute, who went from hence this morning, and is always thinking of blazoning your pedigree(48) in the noblest colours, has turned over all my library, till he has tapped a new and very great family for you: in short, by your mother it is very clear that you are descended from Hubert de Burgh, Grand Justiciary to Richard the Second: indeed I think he was hanged; but that is a misfortune that ill attend very illustrious genealogies; it is as common to them as to the pedigrees about Paddington and Blacieheath. I have had at least a dozen great-great-grandfathers that came to untimely ends. All your virtuosos in heraldry are content to know that they had ancestors who lived five hundred years ago, no matter how they died. A match with a low woman corrupts a stream of blood as long as the Danube, tyranny, villainy, and executions are mere fleabites, and leave no stain. The good Lord of Bath, whom I saw on Richmond-green this evening, did intend, I believe, to ennoble my genealogy with another execution: how low is he sunk now from those views! and how entertaining to have lived to see all those virtuous patriots proclaiming their mutual iniquities! Your friend Mr. Doddington, it seems, is so reduced as to be relapsing into virtue. In my last I told you some curious anecdotes of another part of the band, of Pope and Bolingbroke. The friends of the former have published twenty pamphlets against the latter; I say against the latter, for, as there is no defending Pope, they are reduced to satirize Bolingbroke. One of them tells him how little he would be known himself from his own writings, if he were not immortalized in Pope's; and still more justly, that if be destroys Pope's moral character, what will become of his own, which has been retrieved and sanctified by the embalming art of his friend? However, there are still new discoveries made every day of Pope's dirty selfishness. Not content with the great profits which he proposed to make of the work in question, he could not bear that the interest of his money should be lost till Bolingbroke's death; and therefore told him that it would cost very near as much to have the press set for half-a-dozen copies as it would for a complete edition, and by this means made Lord Bolingbroke pay very near the whole expense of the fifteen hundred. Another story I have been told on this occasion, was of a gentleman who, making a visit to Bishop Atterbury in France, thought to make his court by commending Pope. The Bishop replied not: the gentleman doubled the dose - at last the Bishop shook his head, and said, "Mens curva in corpore curvo!" The world will now think justly of these men: that Pope was the greatest poet, but not the most disinterested man in the world; and that Bolingbroke had not all those virtues and not all those talents which the other so proclaimed; and that be did not even deserve the friendship which lent him so much merit; and for the mere loan of which he dissembled attachment to Pope, to whom in his heart he was as perfidious and as false as he has been to the rest of the world.
The Duke of Devonshire has at last resigned, for the unaccountable and unenvied pleasure of shutting himself up at Chatsworth with his ugly mad Duchess;(49) the more extraordinary sacrifice, as he turned her head, rather than give up a favourite match for his son. She has consented to live with him there, and has even been with him in town for a few days, but did not see either her son or Lady Harrington. On his resignation he asked and obtained an English barony for Lord Besborough, whose son Lord Duncannon, you know, married the Duke's eldest daughter. I believe this is a great disappointment to my uncle, who hoped he would ask the peerage for him or Pigwiggin. The Duke of Marlborough succeeds as lord steward. Adieu!
(46) Henry Lowther, third Viscount Lonsdale, of the first creation. He was the second son of John, the first Viscount, and succeeded his elder brother Richard in the title in 1713. He was a lord of the bedchamber, and at one period of his life was privy seal.-D.
(47) Madame de Mirepoix, French ambassadress in England, to whom her father, Prince Craon, had written a letter of introduction for Horace Walpole.- D.
(48) Count Richcourt, and some Florentines, his creatures, had been very impertinent about Mr. Mann's family, which was very good, and which made it necessary to have his pedigree drawn out, and sent over to Florence.
(49) Coxe, in his Memoirs of Lord Walpole, vol ii. p. 264, says that the Duke of Devonshire resigned, because be was disgusted with the feuds in the cabinet, and perplexed with the jealous disposition of Newcastle and the desponding spirit of Pelham. He adds, " that the Duke was a man of sound judgment and unbiased integrity, and that Sir Robert Walpole used to declare, that, on a subject which required mature deliberation, he would prefer his sentiments to those of any other person in the kingdom."-E.
32 Letter 7 To Sir Horace Mann. Arlington Street, June 25, 1749.
Don't flatter yourself with your approaching year of jubilee; its pomps and vanities will be nothing to the shows and triumphs we have had, and are having. I talk like an Englishman: here you know we imagine that a jubilee is a season of pageants, not of devotion but our Sabbath has really been all tilt and tournament. There have been, I think, no less than eight masquerades, the fire-works, and a public act at Oxford: to-morrow is an installation of six Knights of the Bath, and in August of as many Garters: Saturday, Sunday, and Monday next, are the banquets(50) at Cambridge, for the instalment of the Duke of Newcastle as chancellor. The whole world goes to it: he has invited, summoned, pressed the entire body of nobility and gentry from all parts of England. His cooks have been there these ten days, distilling essences of every living creature, and massacring and confounding all the species that Noah and Moses took such pains to preserve and distinguish. It would be pleasant to see the pedants and professors searching for etymologies of strange dishes, and tracing more wonderful transformations than any in the Metamorphoses. How miserably Horace's unde et quo Catius will be hacked about in clumsy quotations! I have seen some that will be very unwilling performers at the creation of this ridiculous MaMaMOUChi.(51) I have set my heart on their giving a doctor's degree to the Duchess of Newcastle's favourite—this favourite is at present neither a lover nor an apothecary, but a common pig, that she brought from Hanover: I am serious; and Harry Vane, the new lord of the treasury, is entirely employed, when he is not -,it the Board, in opening and shutting the door for it. Tell me, don't you very often throw away my letters in a passion, and believe that I invent the absurdities I relate! Were not we as mad when you was in England?
The King, who has never dined out of his own palaces, has just determined to dine at Claremont to-morrow—all the cooks are at Cambridge; imagine the distress!
Last Thursday, the Monarch of my last paragraph gave away the six vacant ribands; one to a Margrave of Anspach, a near relation of the late Queen; others to the Dukes of leeds(52) and Bedford, lords Albemarle and Granville: the last, you may imagine gives some uneasiness. The Duke of Bedford has always been unwilling to take one, having tied himself up in the days of his patriotism to forfeit great sums if ever he did. The King told him one day this winter, that he would give none away but to him and to Anspach. This distinction struck him: he could not refuse the honour; but he has endeavoured to waive it, as one imagines, by a scruple he raised against the oath, which obliges the knights, whenever they are within two miles of Windsor, to go and offer. The King would not abolish the oath, but has given a general dispensation for all breaches of it, past, present, and to come. Lord Lincoln and Lord Harrington are very unhappy at not being in the list. The sixth riband is at last given to Prince George; the ministry could not prevail for it till within half an hour of the ceremony; then the Bishop of Salisbury was sent to notify the gracious intention. The Prince was at Kew, so the message was delivered to Prince George(53) himself. The child, with great good sense, desired the Bishop to give his duty and thanks, and to assure the King that he should always obey him; but that, as his father was out of town, he could send no other answer. Was not it clever? The design of not giving one riband to the Prince's children had made great noise; there was a Remembrancer(54) on that subject ready for the press. This is the Craftsman of the present age, and is generally levelled at the Duke,(55) and filled with very circumstantial cases of his arbitrary behaviour. It has absolutely written down Hawly, his favourite general and executioner, who was to have been upon the staff.
Garrick is married to the famous Violette, first at a Protestant, and then at a Roman Catholic chapel. The chapter of this history is a little obscure and uncertain as to the consent of the protecting Countess,(56) and whether she gives her a fortune or not.
Adieu! I believe I tell you strange rhapsodies; but you must consider that our follies are not only very extraordinary, but are our business and employment; they enter into our politics, nay, I think They are our politics(57)—and I don't know which are the simplest. they are Tully's description of poetry, "haec studia juventutem alunt, senectutem oblectant; pernoctant nobiscum, peregrinantur, rusticantur:" so if you will that I write to you, you must be content with a detail of absurdities. I could tell you of Lord Mountford's(58) making cricket-matches, and fetching up parsons by express from different parts of England to play matches on Richmond-green; of his keeping aide-de-camps to ride to all parts to lay bets for him at horse-races, and of twenty other peculiarities; but I fancy you are tired: in short, you, who know me, will comprehend all best when I tell you that I live in such a scene of folly as makes me even think myself a creature of common sense.
(50) Gray, in giving an account of the installation to his friend Wharton, says, "Every one, while it lasted, was very gay and very busy in the morning, and very owlish and very tipsy at night. I make no exceptions, from the Chancellor to Blewcoat. Mason's Ode was the only entertainment that had any tolerable elegance, and for my own part, I think it (with some little abatements) uncommonly well on such an occasion. Works, vol. iii. p. 67.-E.
(51) See Moli`ere's Bourgeois Gentilhomme; in which the nouveau riche is persuaded that the Grand Seigneur has made him a mamamouchi, a knight of an imaginary order, and goes through the ceremony of a mock installation.-E.
(52) Thomas Osborne, fourth Duke of Leeds.—D.
(53) Afterwards George the Third.-D.
(54) A weekly paper edited by Ralph. It was undertaken a short time previous to the rebellion, to serve the purposes of Bubb Doddington; in whose Diary Ralph is frequently mentioned with especial approbation.—E.
(55) The Duke of Cumberland-D.
(56) Dorothy, Countess of Burlington. The Violette was a German dancer, first at the Opera and then at the playhouse; and in such favour at Burlington-house, that the tickets for her benefits were designed by Kent, and engraved by Vertue. [In the Gentleman's Magazine, the lady is stated to have brought Garrick a fortune of ten thousand pounds.)
(57) This was frequently the case while the Duke of Newcastle and Mr.-Pelham were ministers; it was true, that in the case of the Violette just mentioned, one night that she had advertised three dances and danced but two, Lord Bury and some young men of fashion began a riot, and would have had her sent from Burlington-House. It being feared that she would be hissed on her next appearance, and Lord Hartington, the cherished of Mr. Pelham, being son-in-law of Lady Burlington, the ministry were in great agitation to secure a good reception for the Violette from the audience, and the Duke was even desired to order Lord Bury (one of his lords) not to hiss.
(58) Henry Bromley, first Lord Montfort, so created in 1741. He died in 1755.-D.
35 Letter 8 To George Montagu, Esq. Mistley, July 5, 1749.
Dear George, I have this moment received your letter, and it makes me very unhappy,. You will think me a brute for not having immediately told you how glad I should be to see you and your sisters; but I trust that you will have seen Mrs. Boscawen, by whom I sent you a message to invite you to Strawberry Hill, when we should be returned from Roel and Mistley. I own my message had rather a cross air; but as you have retrieved all your crimes with me by your letter, I have nothing to do but to make myself as well with you as you are with me. Indeed I am extremely unlucky, but I flatter myself that Messrs. Montagus will not drop their kind intention, as it is not in my power to receive it now: they will give me infinite pleasure by a visit. I stay there till Monday se'nnight; will that be too late to see you before your journey to Roel? You must all promise, at least, to be engaged to me at my return. If the least impediment happens afterwards, I shall conclude my brother has got you from me; you know jealousy is the mark of my family.
Mr. Rigby makes you a thousand compliments, and wishes you would ever think his Roel worth your seeing: you cannot imagine how he has improved it! You have always heard me extravagant in the praises of the situation. he has demolished all his paternal intrenchments of walls and square gardens, opened lawns, swelled out a bow-window, erected a portico, planted groves, stifled ponds, and flounce himself with flowering shrubs and Kent fences. You may imagine that I have a little hand in all this. Since I came hither, I have projected a colonnade to join his mansion to the offices, have been the death of a tree that intercepted the view of the bridge, for which, too, I have drawn a white rail, and shall be absolute travelling Jupiter at Baucis and Philemon's; for I have persuaded him to transform a cottage into a church, by exalting a spire upon the end of it, as Talbot has done. By the way, I have dined at the Vineyard.(59) I dare not trust you with what I think, but I was a little disappointed. To-morrow we go to the ruins of the Abbey of St. Osyth; it is the seat of the Rochfords, but I never chose to go there while they were there. You will probably hear from Mr. Lyttelton (if in any pause of love he rests) that I am going to be first minister to the Prince: in short, I have occasioned great speculation, and diverted myself with the important mysteries that have been alembicked out of a trifle. In short, he had seen my AEdes Walpolianae at Sir Luke Schaub's, and sent by him to desire one. I sent him one bound quite in coronation robes, and went last Sunday to thank him for the honour. There were all the new knights of the garter. After the prince had whispered through every curl of lord Granville's periwig, he turned to me, and said such a crowd of civil things that I did not know what to answer; commended the style and the quotations; said I had sent him back to his Livy; in short, that there were but two things he disliked—one, that I had not given it to him of my own accord, and the other, that I had abused his friend Andrea del Sarto; and that he insisted, when I came to town again, I should come and see two very fine ones that he has lately bought of that master. This drew on a very long conversation on painting, every word of which I suppose will be reported at the other court as a plan of opposition for the winter. Prince George was not there: when he went to receive the riband, the Prince carried him to the closet door, where the Duke of Dorset received and carried him. Ayscough,(60) or Nugent. or some of the geniuses, had taught him a speech; the child began it', the Prince cried "No, no!" When the boy had a little recovered his fright, he began again; but the same tremendous sounds were repeated, and the oration still-born.
I believe that soon I shall have a pleasanter tale to tell you; it is said my Lady Anson, not content with the profusion of the absurdities she utters, (by the way, one of her sayings, and extremely in the style of Mr. Lyttelton's making love, was, as she sat down to play at brag at the corner of a square table: Lady Fitzwalter said she was sorry she had not better room; "O! Madam," said my Lady Anson, "I can sit like a nightingale, with my breast against a thorn;") in short, that, not content with so much wit, she proposes to entertain the town to the tune of Doctors' Commons. She does not mince her disappointments: here is an epigram that has been made on the subject:-
"As Anson his voyage to my lady was reading,
And recounting his dangers—thank God she's not breeding!
He came to the passage, where, like the old Roman,
He stoutly withstood the temptation of woman;
The Baroness smiled; when continuing, he said,
"Think what terror must there fill the poor lover's head."
"Alack!" quoth my lady, "he had nothing to fear,
Were that Scipio as harmless as you are, my dear."
(59) Mr. Chute's.
(60) Francis Ayscough, Dean of Bristol, tutor to Prince George.-E.
36 Letter 9 To George Montagu, Esq. Strawberry Hill, July 20th, 1749.
I am returned to my Strawberry, and find it in such beauty, that I shall be impatient till I see you and your sisters here. They must excuse me if I don't marry for their reception; for it is said the Drax's have impeached fifteen more damsels, and till all the juries of matrons have finished their inquest, one shall not care to make one's choice: I was going to say, "throw one's handkerchief," but at present that term would be a little equivocal.
As I came to town I was extremely entertained with some excursions I made out of the road in search of antiquities. At Layer Marney is a noble old remnant of the palace of the Lords of Marney, with three very good tombs in the church well preserved. At Messing I saw an extreme fine window of painted glass in the church; it is the duties prescribed in the Gospel of visiting the sick and prisoners, etc. I mistook, and called it the seven deadly sins. There is a very old tomb of Sir Robert Messing, that built the church. The hall-place is a fragment of an old house belonging to Lord Grimston;(61) Lady Luckyn his mother, of fourscore and six, lives in it with an old son and daughter. The servant who showed it told us much history of another brother that had been parson there: this history was entirely composed of the anecdotes of the doctor's drinking. who, as the man told us, had been a blood. There are some Scotch arms taken from the rebels in the '15, and many old coats of arms on glass brought from Newhall, which now belongs to Olmius. Mr. Conyers bought a window(62) there for only a hundred pounds, on which is painted Harry the Eighth and one of his queens at full length: he has put it up at Copt-hall, a seat which he has bought that belonged to Lord North and Grey. You see I persevere in my heraldry. T'other day the parson of Rigby's parish dined with us; he has conceived as high an opinion of my skill in genealogies, as if I could say the first chapter of Matthew by heart. Rigby drank my health to him, and that I might come to be garter king at arms: the poor man replied with great zeal, "I wish he may with all my heart." Certainly, I am born to preferment; I gave an old woman a penny once, who prayed that I might live to be lord mayor of London! What pleased me most in my travels was Dr. Sayer's parsonage at Witham, which, with Southcote's help, whose old Roman Catholic father lives just by him, he has made one of the most charming villas in England. There are sweet meadows falling down a hill, and rising again on t'other side of the pretiest little winding stream you ever saw. You did not at all surprise me with the relation of the keeper's brutality to your family, or of his master's to the dowager's handmaid. His savage temper increases every day. George Boscawen is in a scrape with him by a court-martial, of which he is one; it was appointed on a young poor soldier, who to see his friends had counterfeited a furlough only for a day. They ordered him two hundred lashes; but Molkejunskoi, who loves blood like a leech, insisted it was not enough-has made them sit three times (though every one adheres to the first sentence,) and swears they shall sit these six months till they increase the punishment. The fair Mrs. Pitt has been mobbed in the Park, and with difficulty rescued by some gentlemen, only because this bashaw is in love with her. You heard, I suppose, of his other amour with the Savoyard girl. He sent her to Windsor and offered her a hundred pounds, which she refused because he was a heretic; he sent her back on foot. Inclosed is a new print on this subject, which I think has more humour than I almost ever saw in one of that sort.
Should I not condole with you upon the death of the head of the Cues?(63) If' you have not heard his will, I will tell you. The settled estate of eight thousand a year is to go between the two daughters, out of which is a jointure of three thousand a year to the Duchess-dowager, and to that he has added a thousand more out of the unsettled estate, which is nine thousand. He gives, together with his blessing, four thousand per annum rent-charge to the Duchess of Manchester in present, provided she will contest nothing with her sister, who is to have all the rest, and the reversion of the whole after Lady Cardigan and her children; but in case she disputes, Lady Hinchinbrooke and hers are in the entail next to the Cardigans, who are to take the Montagu name and livery. I don't know what Mr. Hussey will think of the blessing, but they say his Duchess will be inclined to mind it; she always wanted to be well with her father, but hated her mother. There are two codicils, one in favour of his servants, and the other of' his dogs, cats, and creatures; which was a little unnecessary, for lady Cardigan has exactly his turn for saving every thing's life. As he was making the codicil, One of his cats jumped on his knee; "What," says he, "have you a mind to be a witness too! You can't, for you are a party concerned." Lord Stafford is going to send his poor wife with one maid and one horse to a farm-house in Shropshire for ever. The Mirepoix's are come; but I have not yet seen them. A thousand compliments to your sisters.
(61) Sir Samuel Grimston, Bart. left an heiress, who married Sir Capel Luckyn, bart. Their son changed his name to Grimston, and was created a baron and a Viscount.
(62) This window is now in St. Margaret's Church, Westminster.
(63) John, Duke of Montague.
38 letter 10 To Sir Horace Mann. Arlington Street, July 24, 1749.
You and Dr. Cocchi have made me ashamed with the civilities you showed to my book-I hope it blushed!
You have seen the death of the Duke of Montagu(64) in all the papers. His loss will be extremely felt! he paid no less than 2700 pounds a year in private pensions, which ought to be known, to balance the immense history of his places; of which he was perpetually obtaining new, and making the utmost of all: he had quartered on the great wardrobe no less than thirty nominal tailors and arras-workers. - This employment is to be dropped; his others are not yet given away. My father had a great opinion of his understanding, and at the beginning of the war was most desirous of persuading him to be Generalissimo; but the Duke was very diffident of himself, and, having seen little service, would not accept it, In short, with some foibles, he was a most amiable man, and one of the most feeling I ever knew. His estate is 17,000 pounds a year; the Duchess of Manchester must have four of it; all the rest he has given, after four thousand a year to the Duchess-dowager shall fall in, to his other daughter Lady Cardigan. Lord Vere Beauclerc(65) has thrown his into the list of vacant employments: he resigned his lordship of the admiralty on Anson's being preferred to him for vice-admiral of England; but what heightened the disgust, was Lord Vere's going to a party to visit the docks with Sandwich and Anson, after this was done, and yet they never mentioned it to him. It was not possible to converse with them upon good terms every day afterwards. You perceive our powers and places are in a very fluctuating situation: the Prince will have a catalogue of discontented ready to fill the whole civil list. My Lord Chancellor was terrified the other day with a vision of such a revolution; he saw Lord Bath kiss hands, and had like to have dropped the seals with the agony of not knowing what it was for—it was only for his going to Spa. However, as this is an event which the Chancellor has never thought an impossible one, he is daily making Christian preparation against it. He has just married his other daughter to Sir John Heathcote's son;(66) a Prince little inferior to Pigwiggin in person; and procreated in a greater bed of money and avarice than Pigwiggin himself: they say, there is a peerage already promised to him by the title of Lord Normanton. The King has consented to give two earldoms to replace the great families of Somerset and Northumberland in their descendants; Lady Betty Smithson is to have the latter title after the Duke of Somerset's death, and Sir Charles Windham any other appellation he shall choose. You know Lord Granville had got a grant of Northumberland for him, but it was stopped. These two hang a little, by the Duke of Somerset's wanting to have the earldom for his son-in-law,(67) instead of his daughter.(68)
You ask me about the principles of the Methodists: I have tried to learn them, and have read one of their books. The visible part seems to be nothing but stricter practice than that of our church, clothed in the old exploded cant of mystical devotion. For example, you take a metaphor; we will say our passions are weeds; you immediately drop every description of the passions, and adopt every thing peculiar to weeds: in five minutes a true Methodist will talk with the greatest compunction of hoeing—this catches women of fashion and shopkeepers.
I have now a request to make to you: Mrs. Gibberne is extremely desirous of having her son come to England for a short time. There is a small estate left to the family, I think by the uncle; his presence is absolutely necessary: however, the poor woman is so happy in his situation with you, that she talks Of giving up every thing rather than disoblige you by fetching him to England. She has been so unfortunate as to lose a favourite daughter ' that was just married greatly to a Lisbon merchant: the girl was so divided in her affections, that she had a mind not to have followed her husband to Portugal. Mrs. Leneve, to comfort the poor woman, told her what a distress this would have been either way: she was so struck with this position, that she said, "Dear Madam, it is very lucky she died!"—and since that, she has never cried, but for joy! Though it is impossible not to smile at these awkward sensations of unrefined nature, yet I am sure your good nature will agree with me in giving the poor creature this satisfaction; and therefore I beg it. Adieu!
(64) John, the last Duke of Montague, was knight of the garter, great master of the order of the Bath, master of the great wardrobe, Colonel of the Blues, etc. etc.
(65) Lord Vere Beauclerc, brother of the Duke of St. Albans, afterwards created Lord Vere of Hanworth.
(66) Sir John Heathcote, Bart. of Normanton Park, in Rutlandshire. He was the son of Sir Gilbert Heathcote, Lord Mayor of London, who acquired a vast fortune, and was created a baronet in 1733. Sir John's son, Sir Gilbert, the third baronet, married to his first wife, Margaret, youngest daughter of the Lord Chancellor Hardwicke.-D.
(67) Sir Hugh Smithson.
(68) The Duke of Somerset was eventually created Earl of Northumberland with remainder to Sir Hugh Smithson, and Earl of Egremont with remainder to Sir Charles Wyndham.-D.
40 Letter 11 To Sir Horace Mann. Strawberry Hill, Aug. 17, 1749.
I hear of nothing but your obliging civilities to the Barrets:(69) I don't wonder you are attentive to please; my amazement is, when I find it well distributed: you have all your life been making Florence agreeable to every body that came there, who have almost all forgot it—or worse. But Mr. and Mrs. Barret do you justice, and as they are very sensible and agreeable, I am persuaded you will always find that they know how to esteem such goodness as yours. Mr. Chute has, this morning received here a letter from Mr. ]Barret, and will answer it very soon. Mr. Montagu is here too, and happy to hear he is so -well, and recommends several compliments to your conveyance.
Your brother mentions your being prevented writing to me, by the toothache: I hate you should have any pain.
You always let us draw upon you for such weight of civilities to any body we recommend, that if I did not desire to show my attention, and the regard I have for Count LorenZi,(70) yet it would be burning ingratitude not to repay you. I have accordingly been trying to be very civil to the Chevalier; I did see him Once at Florence. To-morrow I am to fetch him hither to dinner, from Putney, where the Mirepoix's have got a house. I gave Madame her father's simple\ letter, of which she took no more notice than it deserved; but Prince Beauvau(71) has written her a very particular one about me, and is to come over himself in the winter to make me a visit: this has warmed their politesse. I should have known the Ambassadress any where by the likeness to her family. He is cold and stately, and not much tasted here. She is very sensible; but neither of them satisfy me in one point; I wanted to see something that was the quintessence of the newest bon ton, that had the last bel air, and spoke the freshest jargon. These people have scarce ever lived at Paris, are reasonable, and little amusing with follies. They have brought a cousin of' his, a Monsieur de Levi, who has a tantino of what I wanted to see. You know they pique themselves much upon their Jewish name, and call cousins with the Virgin Mary. They have a picture in the family, where she is made to say to the founder of the house, "Couvrez vous, Mon cousin." He replies, "Non pas, ma tr`es sainte cousine, je scai trop bien le respect que je vous dois."(72)
There is nothing like news: Kensington Palace was like to have made an article the other night; it was on fire: my Lady Yarmouth has an ague, and is forced to keep a constant fire in her room against the damps. When my Lady Suffolk lived in that apartment, the floor produced a constant crop of mushrooms. Though there are so many vacant chambers, the King hoards all he can, and has locked up half the palace since the queen's death: so he does at St. James's, and I believe would put the rooms out on interest, if he could get a closet a year for them! Somebody told my Lady Yarmouth they wondered she could live in that unwholesome apartment, when there are so many other rooms: she replied, "Mais pas pour moy."
The scagliola tables are arrived, and only one has suffered a little on the edge: the pattern is perfectly pretty. It would oblige me much if you could make the Friar make a couple more for me, and with a little more expedition.
Don't be so humble about your pedigree: there is not a pipe of good blood in the kingdom but we will tap for you: Mr. Chute has it now in painting; and you may depend on having it with the most satisfactory proofs, as soon as it can possibly be finished. He has taken great pains, and fathomed half the genealogies in England for you.
You have been extremely misinformed about my father's writing his own history: I often pressed it, but he never once threw a thought that way. He neither loved reading nor writing; and at last, the only time he had leisure, was not well enough. He used to say, "that but few men should ever be ministers, for it let them see too much of the badness of mankind." Your story, I imagine, was inoculated on this speech. Adieu!
(69) Thomas Barrett-Lennard, afterwards Lord Dacre of the South, and his wife, Anne, daughter of Lord Chief Justice Pratt, afterwards Lord Camden.
(70) The French minister at Florence.
(71) The brother of Madame de Mirepoix, afterwards a marshal of France.-D.
(72) There is said to have been another equally absurd picture in the same family, in which Noah is represented going into the ark, carrying under his arm a small trunk, on which was written "Papiers de la maison de Levis."-D.
42 Letter 12 To George Montagu, Esq. Strawberry Hill, August 26, 1749.
Dear George, I flatter myself that you are quite recovered of your disorder, and that your sisters will not look with an evil eye on Strawberry Hill. Mr. Chute and I are returned from our expedition miraculously well, considering all our distresses. If you love good roads, conveniences, good inns, plenty of postilions and horses, be so kind as never to go into Sussex. We thought ourselves in the northest part of England; the whole country has a Saxon air, and the inhabitants are savage, as if King George the Second had been the first monarch of the East Angles. Coaches grow there no more than balm and spices; we were forced to drop our postchaise, that resembled nothing so much as harlequin's calash, which was occasionally a chaise or a baker's cart. We journeyed over Alpine mountains, drenched in clouds, and thought of harlequin again, when he was driving the chariot of the sun through the morning clouds, and so was glad to hear the aqua vitae man crying a dram. At last we got to Arundel Castle, which was visibly built for defence in an impracticable country. It is now only a heap of ruins, with a new indifferent apartment clapt up for the Norfolks, when they reside there for a week or a fortnight. Their priest showed us about. There are the walls of a round tower where the garrison held out against Cromwell; he planted a battery on the top of the church, and reduced them. There is a gloomy gateway and dunccons, in one of which I conclude is kept the old woman who, in the time of the late rebellion, offered to show Lord Robert Sutton(73) where arms were hidden at Worksop.(74) The Duchess complimented him into dining before his search, and in the mean time the woman was spirited away, and adieu the arms. There are fine monuments of the old Fitzalans, Earls of Arundel, in the church. Mr. Chute, whom I have created Strawberry king at arms, has had brave sport a la chasse aux armes.
We are charmed with the magnificence of the park at Petworth,(75) which is Percy to the backbone; but the house and garden did not please our antiquarian spirit. The house is entirely new-fronted in the style of the Tu'lleries, and furnished exactly like Hampton Court. There is one room gloriously flounced all round whole-length pictures, with much the finest carving of Gibbins that ever my eyes beheld. There are birds absolutely feathered; and two antique vases with bas relieves, as perfect and beautiful as if they were carved by a Grecian master. There is a noble Claude Lorrain, a very curious Picture of the haughty Anne Stanhope, the Protector's wife,(76) pretty but not giving one an idea of her character, and many old portraits; but the housekeeper was at London, and we did not learn half. The chapel is grand and proper. At the inn we entertained ourselves with the landlord, whom my Lord Harvey had cabineted when he went to woo one of the Lady Seymours.
Our greatest pleasure was in seeing Cowdry, which is repairing; Lord Montacute(77) will at last live in it. We thought of old Margaret of Clarence, who lived there; one of her accusations was built on the bulls found there. It was the palace of her great uncle, the Marquis of Montacute. I was charmed with the front, and the court, and the fountain; but the room called Holbein's, except the curiosity of it, is wretchedly painted, and infinitely inferior to those delightful stories of Harry the Eighth in the private apartment at Windsor. I was much pleased with a whole length picture of Sir Anthony Brown in the very dress in which he wedded Anne of Cleves by proxy. He is in blue and white, only his right leg is entirely white, which was certainly robed for the act of putting into bed to her; but when the King came to marry her, he only put his leg into bed to kick her out of it.
I have set up my staff, and finished my pilgrimages for this year. Sussex is a great damper of curiosity. Adieu! my compliments to your sisters.
(73) lord Robert Sutton, third son of the Duke of rutland.
(74) A seat of the Duke of Norfolk in Nottinghamshire.
(75) A seat of Sir Charles Wyndham, who succeeded to the title of Earl of Egremont on the death of his uncle Algernon, Duke of Somerset.
(76) Second wife of Edward, Duke of Somerset, Protector in the reign of his nephew, Edward VI.-E.
(77) Anthony, the sixth Viscount Montagu, descended from Anthony Brown, created Viscount Montagu in 1554, being descended from John Neville, Marquis of Montagu.
43 Letter 13 To Sir Horace Mann. Strawberry Hill, Sept. 12, 1749,
I have your two letters to answer of August 15th and 26, and, as far as I see before me, have a great deal of paper, which I don't know how to fill. The town is notoriously empty; at Kensington they have scarce company enough to pay for lighting the candles. The Duke has been for a week with the Duke of Bedford at Woburn; Princess Emily remains, saying civil things; for example, the second time she saw Madame de Mircpoix, she cried out, "Ah! Madame, vous n'avez pas tant de rouge aujourd'hui: la premi`ere fois que vous `etes `a not venue ici, vous aviez une quantit`e horrible." This the Mirepoix herself repeated to me; you may imagine her astonishment,—I mean, as far as your duty will give you leave. I like her extremely; she has a great deal of quiet sense. They try much to be English and whip into frocks without measure, and fancy they are doing the fashion. Then she has heard so much of that villanous custom of giving money to the servants of other people, that there is no convincing her that women of fashion never give; she distributes with both hands. The Chevalier Lorenzi has dined with me here: I gave him venison, and, as he was determined to like it, he protested it was "as good as beef." You will be delighted with what happened to him: he was impatient to make his brother's compliments to Mr. Chute, and hearing somebody at Kensington call Mr. Schutz, he easily mistook the sound, and went up to him, and asked him if he had not been at Florence! Schutz with the utmost Hanoverian gravity, replied, "Oui, oui, J'ai `et`e `a Florence, oui, oui:—mais o`u est-il, ce Florence?"
The Richcourts(78) are arrived, and have brought with them a strapping lad of your Count; sure, is it the boy my Lady O. used to bring up by hand? he is pretty picking for her now. The woman is handsome, but clumsy to a degree, and as much too masculine as her lover Rice is too little so. Sir Charles Williams too is arrived, and tells me how much he has heard in your praise in Germany. Villettes is here, but I have had no dealings with him. I think I talk nothing but foreign ministers to-day, as if I were just landed from the Diet of Ratisbon. But I shall have done on this chapter, and I think on all others, for you say such extravagant things of my letters, which are nothing but Gossiping gazettes, that I cannot bear it. Then you have undone yourself with me, for you compare them to Madame Sevign`e,'s; absolute treason! Do you know, there is scarce a book in the world I love so much as her letters?
How infinitely humane you are about Gibberne! Shall I amuse you with the truth of that history, which I have discovered? The woman, his mother, has pressed his coming for a very private reason—only to make him one of the most considerable men in this country!-and by what wonderful means do you think this mighty business is to be effected? only by the beauties of his person! As I remember, he was as little like an Adonis as could be: you must keep this inviolably; but depend upon the truth of it-I mean, that his mother really has this idea. She showed his picture to—why, to the Duchess of Cleveland, to the Duchess of Portsmouth, to Madame Pompadour; in short, to one of them, I don't know which, I only know it was not to my Lady Suffolk, the King's former mistress. "Mon Dieu! Madame, est-il frai que fotrc fils est si sholi que ce bortrait? il faut que je le garte; je feux apsolument l'afoir." The woman protested nothing ever was so handsome as her lad, and that the nasty picture did not do him half justice. In short, she flatters herself that the Countess(79) will do him whole justice-. I don't think it impossible but, out of charity, she may make him groom of the chambers. I don't know, indeed, how the article of beauty may answer; but if you should lose your Gibberne, it is good to have @ a friend at court.
Lord Granby is going to be married to the eldest of the Lady
Seymours; she has above a hundred and thirty thousand pounds.
The Duke of Rutland will take none of it, but gives at present
six thousand a-year.
That I may keep my promise to myself of having nothing to tell you I shall bid you good night; but I really do know no more. Don't whisper my anecdote even to Gibberne, if he is not yet set out; nor to the Barrets. I wish you a merry, merry baths of Pisa, as the link-boys say at Vauxhall. Adieu!
(78) Count Richcourt, brother of the minister at Florence, and envoy from the Emperor; his wife was a Piedmontese.
(79) Lady Yarmouth.
45 Letter 14 To John Chute, Esq. Strawberry Hill, Sept. 22, 1749.
My dear sir, I expect Sir Charles Williams to scold me excessively. He wrote me a letter, in which he desired that I would send you word by last Post, that he expected to meet you here by Michaelmas, according to your promise. I was unfortunately at London; the letter was directed hither from Lord Ilchester's, where he is; and so I did not receive it till this morning. I /hope, however, this will be time enough to put you in mind of your appointment; but while I am so much afraid of Sir Charles's anger, I seem to forget the pleasure I shall have in seeing you myself; I hope you know that: but he is still The more pressing, as he will stay so little time in England. Adieu!
45 Letter 15 To George Montagu, Esq. Strawberry Hill, Sept. 28, 1749.
I am much obliged to you, dear sir, and agree with your opinion about the painting of Prince Edward, that it cannot be original and authentic, and consequently not worth copying. Lord Cholmondeley is, indeed, an original; but who are the wise people that build for him? Sir Philip Harvey seems to be the only person likely to be benefited by this new extravagance. I have just seen a collection of tombs like those you describe— the house of Russel robed in alabaster and painted. There are seven monuments in all; one is immense, in marble, cherubim'd and seraphim'd, crusted with bas-reliefs and titles, for the first Duke of Bedford and his Duchess.(80) All these are in a chapel of the church at Cheneys, the seat of the first Earls. There are but piteous fragments of the house remaining, now a farm, built round three sides of a court. It is dropping down, in several places without a roof, but in half the windows are beautiful arms in painted glass. As these are so totally neglected, I propose making a push, and begging them of the Duke of Bedford. They would be magnificent for Strawberry-castle. Did I tell you that I have found a text in Deuteronomy to authorize my future battlements? "When thou buildest a new house, then shalt thou make a battlement for thy roof, that thou bring not blood upon thy house, if any man fall from thence."
I saw Cheneys at a visit I have been making to Harry Conway at Latimers. This house, which they have hired, is large, and bad, and old, but of a bad age; finely situated on a hill in a beech wood, with a river at the bottom, and a range of hills and woods on the opposite side belonging to the Duke of Bedford. They are fond of it; the view is melancholy. In the church at Cheneys Mr. Conway put on an old helmet we found there: you cannot imagine how it suited him, how antique and handsome he looked; you would have taken him for Rinaldo. Now I have dipped you so deep in heraldry and genealogies, I shall beg you to step into the church of Stoke; I know it is not asking you to do, a disagreeable thing to call there; I want an account of the tomb of the first Earl of Huntingdon, an ancestor of mine, who lies there. I asked Gray, but he could tell me little about it. You know how out of humour Gray has been about our diverting ourselves with pedigrees, which is at least as wise as making a serious point of haranguing against the study. I believe neither Mr. Chute nor I ever contracted a moment's vanity from any of our discoveries, or ever preferred them to any thing but brag and whist. Well, Gray has set himself to compute, and has found out that there must go a million of ancestors in twenty generations to every body's composition.
I dig and plant till it is dark; all my works are revived and proceeding. When will you come and assist? You know I have an absolute promise, and shall now every day expect you. My compliments to your sisters.
(80) Anne, daughter of Robert Carr, Earl of Somerset.
46 Letter 16 To Sir Horace Mann. Strawberry Hill, October 27, 1749.
You never was more conveniently in fault in your life: I have been going to make you excuses these ten days for not writing; and while I was inventing them, your humble letter of Oct. 10th arrives. I am so glad to find it is you that are to blame, not I. Well, well, I am all good nature, I forgive you; I can overlook such little negligences.
Mr. Chute is indefatigable in your service, but Anstis(81) has been very troublesome; he makes as many difficulties in signing a certificate about folks that are dead as if they were claiming an estate. I am sorry you are so pressed, for poor Mr. Chute is taken off from this pursuit: he was fetched from hence this day se'nnight to his infernal brother's, where a Mrs. Mildmay, whom you must have heard him mention, is dead suddenly: this may turn out a very great misfortune to our friend.
Your friend, Mr. Doddington, has not quite stuck to the letter of the declaration he sent you: he is first minister at Carlton-house, and is to lead the Opposition; but the misfortune is, nobody will be led by him. That whole court is in disorder by this event: every body else laughs.
I am glad the Barrets please you, and that I have pleased Count Lorenzi. I must tell a speech of the Chevalier, which you will reconnoitre for Florentine; one would think he had seen no more of the world than his brother.(82) He was visiting Lady Yarmouth with Mirepoix: he drew a person into a window, and whispered him; Dites moi un peu en ami, je vous en prie; qu'est ce que c'est que Miledi Yarmouth."—"Eh! bien, vous ne savez pas?"—"Non, ma foi: nous savons ce que c'est que Miledi Middlesex.,"
Gibberne is arrived. I don't tell you this apropos to the foregoing paragraph: he has wanted to come hither, but I have waived his visit till I am in town.
I announce to you the old absurd Countess—not of Orford, but Pomfret. Bistino will have enough to do: there is Lady Juliana,(83) who is very like, but not so handsome as Lady Granville; 'and Lady Granville's little child. They are actually in France; I don't doubt but you will have them. I shall pity you under a second edition of her follies. Adieu! Pray ask my pardon for my writing you so short a letter.
(81) Garter King at Arms. (It was to him Lord Chesterfield said, "You foolish man, you do not know your own foolish business."-D.)
(82) Who had never been out of Tuscany.
(83) In 1751 married to Thomas Penn, Esq. of Stoke Pogies. See ant`e, p. 13, letter 1.-E.
47 Letter 17 To Sir Horace Mann. Arlington Street, Nov. 17, 1749.
At last I have seen le beau Gibberne: I was extremely glad to see him, after I had done contemplating his person, which surely was never designed to figure in a romance. I never saw a creature so grateful! It is impossible not to be touched with the attachment he has for you. He talks of returning; and, indeed, I would advise it for his sake: he is quite spoiled for living in England, and had entirely forgot what Visigoths his countrymen are. But I must drop him to thank you for the charming intaglio which you have stolen for me by his means: it is admired as much as it deserves; but with me it has all the additional merit of coming from you. Gibberne says you will be frightened at a lamentable history(84 that you will read of me in the newspapers; but pray don't be frightened: -the danger, great as it was, was over before I had any notion of it; and the hurt did not deserve mentioning. The relation is so near the truth, that I need not repeat it; and, indeed, the frequent repetition has 'Been much worse than the robbery. I have at last been relieved by the riots(85) at the new French theatre, and by Lord Coke's lawsuit.(86) The first has been opened twice; the latter to-day. The young men of fashion, who espouse the French players, have hitherto triumphed: the old ladies, who countenance Lady Mary Coke, are likely to have their gray beards brought with sorrow to the grave. It will ,be a new aera, (or, as my Lord Baltimore calls it, a new area,) in English history, to have the mob and the Scotch beat out of two points that they have endeavoured to make national. I dare say the Chevalier Lorenzi will write ample accounts to Florence of these and all our English phenomena. I think, if possible, we brutalize more and more: the only difference is, that though every thing is anarchy, there seems to be less general party than ever. The humours abound, but there wants some notable physician to bring them to a head.
The Parliament met yesterday: we had opposition, but no division on the address.
Now the Barrets have left you, Mr. Chute and I will venture to open our minds to you a little; that is, to comfort you for the loss of your friends - we will abuse them—that is enough in the way of the world. Mr. Chute had no kind of acquaintance with Mr. Barret till just before he set out: I, who have known him all my life, must tell you that all those nerves are imaginary, and that as long as there are distempers in the world, he will have one or two constantly upon his list. I don't know her; I never heard much of her understanding, but I had rather take your opinion; or at least, if I am not absolutely so complaisant, I will believe that you was determined to like them on Mr. Chute's account. I would not speak so plainly to you (and have not I been very severe?) if I were not sure that your good nature would not relax any offices of friendship to them. You will scold me black and blue; but you know I always tell you when the goodness of your heart makes you borrow a little from that of other people to lend to their heads. Good night!
(84) Mr. Walpole had been robbed the week before in Hyde Park, and narrowly escaped being killed by the accidental going off of the highwayman's pistol, which did stun him, and took off the skin of his cheekbone.
(85) The mob was determined not to suffer French Players; and Lord Trentham's engaging in their defence was made great use, of against him at the ensuing election for Westminster; where he was to be rechosen, on being appointed a lord of the admiralty.
(86) Lady Mary Coke swore the peace against her husband.
48 letter 18 To Sir Horace Mann. Arlington Street, Jan. 10, 1750.
I don't at all know what to say to you, for not having writ to you since the middle of November: I only know that nothing has happened, and so I have omitted telling you nothing. I have had two from you in the interim, one of Nov. @8th, and one without a date, in which you are extremely kind about my robbery, of which in my last I assured you there were no consequences: thank you a thousand times for having felt so much on my account. Gibberne has been with me again to-day, as his mother was a fortnight ago: she talked me to death, and three times after telling me her whole history, she said, "Well then, Sir, upon the whole," and began it all again. Upon the whole, I think she has a mind to keep her son in England; (-ind he has a mind to be kept, though in my opinion he is very unfit for living in England—he is too polished! For trade, she says, he is in a cold sweat if she mentions it; and so they propose, by the acquaintance, he says,. his mother has among the quality, to get him that nothing called something. I assured them, you had too much friendship for him to desire his return, if it would be a prejudice to his interest—did not I say right? He seems a good creature; too good to make his way here.
I beg you will not omit sending me every tittle that happens to compose my Lady Pomfret's second volume. We see perpetual articles of the sale of the furniture in the Great Duke's villas: is there any truth in it? You would know me again, if you saw me playing at pharaoh on one side of Madame de Mirepoix, as I used to do by her mother: I like her extremely, though she likes nothing but gaming. His pleasure is dancing: don't you envy any body that can have spirits to be so simple as to like themselves in a minuet after fifty? Don't tell his brother, but the Chevalier Lorenzi is the object of the family's entertainment. With all the Italian thirst for English knowledge, he vents as many absurdities as if he had a passion for Ireland too. He saw some of the Florentine Gesses at Lord Lincoln's; he showed them to the Ambassadress with great transport, and assured her that the Great Duke had the originals, and that there never had been made any copies of them. He told her the other day that he had seen a sapphire of the size of her diamond ring,,, and worth more: she said that could not be. "Oh!" said he, "I mean, supposing your diamond were a sapphire."
I want to know Dr. Cocchi's and your opinion of two new French books, if you have seen them. One is Montesquieu's "Esprit des Loix;" which I think the best book that ever was written—at least I never learned half so much from all I ever read. There is )s much wit as useful knowledge. He is said to have hurt his reputation by it in France, which I can conceive, for it is almost the interest of every body there that can understand it to decry it. The other, far inferior, but entertaining,, is Hainault's "Abrege Chronologique de l'Histoire de France." It is very amusing, though very full of Frenchisms; and though an abridgment, often so minute as to tell you when the Quinzevingts first wore flower-de-luces on their shoulders: but there are several little circumstances that give one an idea of the manners of old time, like Dr. Cocchi's treatise on the old rate of expenses.
There has been nothing particular in Parliament - all our conversation has turned on the Westminster election, on which, after a vast struggle, Lord Trentham had the majority. Then came on the scrutiny: after a week's squabbling on the right of election, the High-bailiff declared what he would take to be the right. They are now proceeding to disqualify votes on that foot; but as his decision could not possibly please both sides, I fear it will come to us at last.
Lord Pembroke(87) died last night: he had been at the Bridge Committee,(88) in the morning, where, according to custom, he fell into an outrageous passion; as my Lord Chesterfield told him, that ever since the pier sunk he has constantly been damming and sinking. The watermen say to-day, that now the great pier (peer) is quite gone. Charles Stanhope carried him home in his chariot; he desired the coachman to drive gently, for he could not avoid those passions; and afterwards, between shame and his asthma, he always felt daggers, and should certainly one day or other die in one of those fits. Arundel,(89) his great friend and relation, came to him soon after: he repeated the conversation, and said, he did not know but he might die by night. "God bless you! If I see you no more, take this as my last farewell!" He died in his chair at seven o'clock. He certainly is a public loss; for he was public-spirited and inflexibly honest, though prejudice and passion were so predominant in him that honesty had not fair play, whenever he had been set upon any point that had been given him for right. In his lawsuit with my Lady Portland he was scurrilously indecent, though to a woman; and so blasphemous at tennis, that the present primate of Ireland(90) was forced to leave off playing with him. Last year he went near to destroy post-chaises, on a quarrel with the postmaster at Hounslow, who, as he told the Bishop of Chichester, had an hundred devils and Jesuits in his belly. In short, he was one of the lucky English madmen who get people to say, that whatever extravagance they commit "Oh, it is his way." He began his life with boxing, and ended it with living upon vegetables, into which system avarice a little entered. At the beginning of the present war, he very honourably would resign his regiment, though the King pressed him to keep it, because his rupture hindered his serving abroad. My father, with whom he was always well, would at any time have given him the blue riband; but he piqued himself on its being offered to him without asking it. the truth was, he did not care for the expense of the instalment. His great excellence was architecture: the bridge at Wilton is more beautiful than any thing of Lord Burlington or Kent. He has left an only son, a fine boy about sixteen.(91) Last week, Lord Crawford(92) died too, as is supposed, by taking a large quantity of laudanum, under impatience at the badness of his circumstances, and at the seventeenth opening of the wound which he got in Hungary, in a battle with the Turks. I must tell you a story apropos of two noble instances of fidelity and generosity. His servant, a French papist, saw him fall; watched, and carried him off into a ditch. Lord Crawford told him the Turks would certainly find them, and that, as he could not live himself, it was in vain for him to risk his life too, and insisted on the man making his escape. After a long contest, the servant retired, found a priest, confessed himself, came back, and told his lord that he was now prepared to die, and would never leave him. The enemy did not return, and both were saved. After Lord Crawford's death, this story was related to old Charles Stanhope, Lord Harrington's brother, whom I mentioned just now: he sent for the fellow, told him he could not take him himself, but, as from his lord's affairs he concluded he had not been able to provide for him, he would give him fifty pounds, and did.
To make up for my long silence, and to make up for a long letter, I will string another old story, which I have just heard, to this. General Wade was at a low gaming-house, and had a very fine snuffbox, which on a sudden he missed. Every body denied having taken it: he insisted on searching the company. He did: there remained only one man, who had stood behind him, but refused to be searched, unless the general would go into another room alone with him: there the man told him, that he was born a gentleman, was reduced, and lived by what little bets he could pick up there, and by fragments which the waiters sometimes gave him. "At this moment I have half a fowl in my pocket; I was afraid of being exposed; here it is! Now, Sir, you may search me." Wade was so struck, that he gave the man a hundred pounds; and immediately the genius of generosity, whose province is almost a sinecure, was very glad of the opportunity of making him find his own snuff-box, or another very like it, in his own pocket again.
Lord Marchmont is to succeed Lord Crawford as one of the sixteen: the House of Lords is so inactive that at last the ministry have ventured to let him in there. His brother Hume Campbell, who has been in a state of neutrality, begins to frequent the House again.
It is plain I am no moneyed man; as I have forgot, till I came to My last paragraph, what a ferment the money-changers are in! Mr. Pelham, who has flung himself entirely into Sir John Barnard's(93) hands, has just miscarried in a scheme for the reduction of interest, by the intrigues of the three great companies and other usurers. They all detest barnard, who, to honesty and abilities, joins the most intolerable pride. @By my next, I suppose, you will find that Mr. Pelham is grown afraid of somebody else, of some director, and is governed by him. Adieu!—Sure I am out of debt now!
P.S. My dear Sir, I must trouble you with a commission, which I don't know whether you can execute. I am going to build a little Gothic castle at Strawberry Hill. If you can pick me up any fragments of old painted glass, arms, or any thing, I shall be excessively obliged to you. I can't say I remember any such things in Italy; but out of old chateaus, I imagine, one might get it cheap, if there is any.
(87) Henry Herbert, Earl of Pembroke, and Groom of the stole. For Walpole's character of him, see ant`e.-E.
(88) The committee under whose superintendence Westminster Bridge had been built.-D.
(89) Richard Arundel, treasurer to the chambers: his mother, the Dowager Lady Arundel, was second wife of Thomas, Earl of Pembroke, father of Earl Henry.
(90) Dr. George Stone.
(91) Henry, tenth Earl of Pembroke, and seventh Earl of Montgomery, He died in 1794.-D.
(92) John Lindsey Earl of Crawford, premier Earl of Scotland. His life, which indeed had little remarkable in it, was published afterwards, in a large quarto.
(93) An eminent citizen, and long member of Parliament for the city of London. He at length accomplished his plan for the reduction of the Interest of the National Debt.-D.
52 Letter 19 To Sir Horace Mann. Arlington Street, Jan. 31, 1750.
You will hear little news from England, but of robberies;(94) the numbers of disbanded soldiers and sailors have all taken to the road, or rather to the street: people are almost afraid of stirring after it is dark. My Lady Albemarle(95) was robbed the other night in Great Russell Street, by nine men: the King gave her a gold watch and chain the next day. She says, "the manner was all"-and indeed so it was, for I never saw a more frippery present; especially considering how great a favourite she is, and my Lady Yarmouth's friend. The monarch is never less generous than when he has a mind to be so: the only present he ever made my father was a large diamond, cracked quite through. Once or twice, in his younger and gallant days, he has brought out a handful of maimed topazes and amethysts, and given them to be raffled for by the maids of honour. I told my Lady Yarmouth it had been a great loss to me that there was no queen, for then I suppose I should have had a watch too when I was robbed.
We have had nothing remarkable in Parliament, but a sort of secession the other day on the Mutiny-bill, when Lord Egmont and the Opposition walked out of the House, because the ministry would go upon the Report, when they did not like It. It is a measure of the Prince's court to lie by, and let the ministry demolish one another, which they are hurrying to do. The two secretaries(96) are on the brink of declaring war: the occasion is likely to be given by a Turnpike-bill, contested between the counties of Bedford and Northampton; and it (,rows almost as vehement a contest as the famous one between Aylesbury and Buckingham. The Westminster election is still hanging in scrutiny: the Duke of Bedford paid the election,(97) which he owns to have cost seven thousand pounds; and Lord Gower pays the scrutiny, which will be at least as much. This bustling little Duke has just had another miscarriage in Cornwall, where he attacked a family-borough of the Morrices. The Duke(97) espouses the Bedford; and Lord Sandwich is espoused by both. He goes once or twice a-week to hunt with the Duke; and as the latter has taken a turn of gaming, Sandwich, to make his court and fortune carries a box and dice in his pocket; and so they throw a main, whenever the hounds are at a fault, "upon every green hill, and under every green tree."
But we have one shocking piece of news, the dreadful account of the hurricane in the East Indies: you will see the particulars in the papers; but we reckon that we don't yet know the worst.. Poor Admiral Boscawen(99) has been most unfortunate during his whole expedition; and what increases the horror is, that I have been assured by a very intelligent person, that Lord Anson projected this business on purpose to ruin Boscawen, who, when they came together from the victory off Cape Finisterre, complained loudly of Anson's behaviour. To silence and to hurt him, Anson despatched him to Pondicherry, upon slight intelligence and upon improbable views.
Lord Coke's suit is still in suspense; he has been dying; she was to have died, but has recovered wonderfully on his taking the lead. Mr. Chute diverted me excessively with a confidence that Chevalier Lorenzi made him the other night-I have told you the style of his bon-mots! He said he should certainly return to England again, and that whenever he did, he would land at Bristol, because baths are the best places to make acquaintance, just as if Mr. Chute, after living seven years in Italy, and keeping the best company, should return thither, and land at Leghorn, in order to make Italian acquaintance at Pisa!
Among the robberies, I might have told you of the eldest Miss Pelham leaving a pair of diamond earrings, which she had borrowed for the birth-day, in a hackney chair; she had put them under the seat for fear of being attacked, and forgot them. The chairmen have sunk them. The next morning, when they were missed, the damsel began to cry: Lady Catherine(100) grew frightened, lest her infanta should vex herself sick, and summoned a jury of matrons to consult whether she should give her hartshorn or lavender drops? Mrs. Selwyn,(101) who was on the panel, grew very peevish, and said, "Pho! give her brilliant drops." Such are the present anecdotes of the court of England! Adieu!
(94) On the preceding day, in consequence of the number of persons of distinction who had recently been robbed in the streets, a proclamation appeared in the London Gazette, offering a reward of one hundred pounds for the apprehension of any robber.-E.
(95) Lady Anne Lenox, sister of the Duke of Richmond, wife of William Anne Keppel, Earl of Albemarle, ambassador at Paris, and lady of the bedchamber to Queen Caroline.
(96) the Dukes of Newcastle and Bedford.
(97) The Duke of Bedford's second wife was sister of Lord Trentham, the candidate.
(98) Of Cumberland.
(99) Edward, next brother of Lord Falmouth.
(100) Lady Catherine Manners, sister of John, Duke of Rutland, and wife of Henry Pelham, Chancellor of the exchequer.
(101) Mary Farenden, wife of John Selwyn, treasurer to Queen Caroline, and woman of the bedchamber.
53 letter 20 To Sir Horace Mann. Strawberry Hill, Feb. 25, 1750.
I am come hither for a little repose and air. The fatigue of a London winter, between Parliaments and rakery, is a little too much without interruption for an elderly personage, that verges towards—I won't say what. This accounts easily for my wanting quiet—but air in February will make you smile—yet it is strictly true, that the weather is unnaturally hot: we have had eight months of' warmth beyond what was ever known in any other country; Italy is quite north with respect to us!-You know we have had an earthquake. Mr. Chute's Francesco says, that a few evenings before it there was a bright cloud, which the mob called the bloody cloud; that he had been told there never were earthquakes in England, or else he should have known by that symptom that there would be one within a week. I am told that Sir Isaac Newton foretold a great alteration in Our climate in the year '50, and that he wished he could live to see it. Jupiter, I think, has jogged us three degrees nearer to the sun.
The Bedford Turnpike, which I announced to you in my last, is thrown out by a majority of fifty-two against the Duke of Bedford. The Pelhams, who lent their own persons to him, had set up the Duke of Grafton, to list their own dependents under against their rival. When the Chamberlain would head a party, you may be sure the opposite power is in the wane. The Newcastle is at open war, and has left off waiting on the Duke, who espouses the Bedfords. Mr. Pelham tries to patch it up, and is getting the Ordnance for the Duke; but there are scarce any terms kept. Lord Sandwich, who governs the little Duke through the Duchess, is the chief object of the Newcastle hatred. Indeed there never was such a composition! he is as capable of all little knavery, as if he was not practising all great knavery. During the turnpike contest, in which he laboured night and day against his friend Halifax, he tried the grossest tricks to break agreements, when the opposite side were gone away on the security of a suspension of action: and in the very middle of that I came to the knowledge of a cruel piece of flattery which he paid to his protector. He had made interest for these two years for one Parry, a poor clergyman, schoolfellow and friend of his, to be fellow of Eton, and had secured a majority for him. A Fellow died: another wrote to Sandwich to know if he was not to vote for Parry according to his engagement,—"No, he must vote for one who had been tutor to the Duke of Bedford," who by that means has carried it. My Lady Lincoln was not suffered to go to a ball which Sandwich made the other night for the Duke, who tumbled down in the middle of a country dance; they imagined he had beat his nose flat, but he lay like a tortoise on the topshell, his face could not touch the ground by some feet. My Lady Anson was there, who insisted on dancing minuets, though against the rule of the night, with as much eagerness as you remember in my Lady Granville. Then she proposed herself for a Louvre; all the men vowed they had never heard of such a dance, upon which she dragged out Lady Leveson,(102) and made her dance one with her.
At the last ball at the same house, a great dispute of precedence, which the Duchess of Norfolk had set on foot but has dropped, came to trial. Lord Sandwich contrived to be on the outside of the door to hand down to supper whatever lady came out first. Madame de Mirepoix and the Duchess of Bedford were the rival queens; the latter made a faint offer to the ambassadress to go first; she returned it, and the other briskly accepted it; upon which the ambassadress, with great cleverness, made all the other women go before her, and then asked the Duke of Bedford if he would not go too. However, though they continue to visit, the wound is incurable: you don't imagine that a widow(103) of the House of Lorraine, and a daughter of Princess Craon, can digest such an affront. It certainly was very absurd, as she is not only an ambassadress but a stranger; and consequently all English women, as being at home, should give her place. King George the Second and I don't agree in our explication of this text of ceremony; he approves the Duchess-so he does Miss Chudleigh, in a point where ceremony is out of the question. He opened the trenches before her a fortnight ago, at the masquerade- but at the last she had the gout, and could not come; he went away flat, cross. His son is not so fickle. My Lady Middlesex has been miscarrying; he attends as incessantly as Mrs. Cannon.(104) The other morning the Princess came to call him to go to Kew; he made her wait in her coach above half an hour at the door. You will be delighted with a bon-mot of a chair-maker, whom he has discarded for voting for Lord Trentham; one of his black-caps was sent to tell this Vaughan that the Prince would employ him no more: "I am going to bid another person make his Royal Highness a chair."—"With all my heart," said the chair-maker; "I don't care what they make him, so they don't make him a throne."
The Westminster election, which is still scrutinizing, produced us a parliamentary event this week, and was very near producing something much bigger. Mr. Fox and Mr. Pitt moved to Send for the High-bailiff to inquire into the delay. The Opposition took it up very high, and on its being carried against them, the Court of Requests was filled next day with the mob, and the House crowded, and big with expectation. Nugent had flamed and abused Lord Sandwich violently, as author of this outrageous measure. When the Bailiff appeared, the pacific spirit of the other part of the administration had operated so much, that he was dismissed with honour; and Only instructed to abridge all delays by authority of the House-in short, "we spit in his hat on Thursday, and wiped it off on Friday." This is a now fashionable proverb, which I must construe to you. About ten days ago, at the new Lady Cobham's(105) assembly, Lord Hervey(106) was leaning over a chair, talking to some women, and holding his hat in his hand. Lord Cobham came up and spit in it—yes, spit in it!—and then, with a loud laugh, turned to Nugent, and said, "Pay me my wager." In short, he had laid a guinea that he committed this absurd brutality, and that it was not resented. Lord Hervey, with great temper and sensibility, asked if he had any farther occasion for his hat?—"Oh! I see you are angry!"—"Not very well pleased." Lord Cobham took the fatal hat and wiped it, made a thousand foolish apologies, and wanted to pass it for a joke. Next morning he rose with the sun, and went to visit Lord Hervey; so did Nugent: he would not see them, but wrote to the Spitter, (or, as he is now called, Lord Gob'em,) to say, that he had affronted him very grossly before company, but having involved Nugent in it, he desired to know to which he was to address himself for satisfaction. Lord Cobham wrote him a most submissive answer, and begged pardon both in his own and Nugent's name. Here it rested for a few days; till getting wind, Lord Hervey wrote again to insist on an explicit apology under Lord Cobham's own hand, with a rehearsal of the excuses that had been made to him. This, too, was complied with, and the fair conqueror(107) shows all the letters.(108) Nugent's disgraces have not ended here: the night of his having declaimed so furiously he was standing by Lady Catherine Pelham, against Lord Sandwich at the masquerade, without his mask: she was telling him a history of a mad dog, (which I believe she had bit herself.) young Leveson, the Duchess of Bedford's brother, came up, without his mask too, and looking at Nugent, said, , I have seen a mad dog to-day, and a silly dog too."—"I suppose, Mr. Leveson,(109) you have been looking in a glass."—"No, I see him now." Upon which they walked off together, but were prevented from fighting, (if Nugent would have fought,) and were reconciled at the side-board. You perceive by this that our factions are ripening. The Argyll(110) carried all the Scotch against the turnpike: they were willing to be carried, for the Duke of Bedford, in case it should have come into the Lords, had writ to the sixteen Peers to solicit their votes; but with so little deference, that he enclosed all the letters under one cover, directed to the British Coffee-house!
The new Duke of Somerset(111) is dead: that title is at last restored to Sir Edward Seymour, after his branch had been most unjustly deprived of it for about one hundred and fifty years. Sir Hugh Smithson and Sir Charles Windham are Earls of Northumberland and Egremont, with vast estates; the former title, revived for the blood of Percy, has the misfortune of being coupled with the blood of a man that either let or drove coaches—such Was Sir Hugh's grandfather! This peerage vacates his seat for Middlesex, and has opened a contest for the county, before even that for Westminster is decided. The Duchess of Richmond takes care that house shall not be extinguished: she again lies in, after having been with child seven-and-twenty times: but even this is not so extraordinary as the Duke's fondness for her, or as the vigour of her beauty: her complexion is as fair and blooming as when she was a bride.
We expect some chagrin on the new regency, at the head of which is to be the Duke; "Au Augustum fess`a aetate totiens in Germaniam commeare potuisse," say the mutineers in Tacitus— Augustus goes in April. He has notified to my Lord Orford his having given the reversion of New Park to his daughter Emily; and has given him leave to keep it in the best repair. One of the German women, Madame Munchausen, his minister's wife, contributes very kindly to the entertainment of the town. She is ugly, devout, and with that sort of coquetry which proceeds from a virtue that knows its own weakness so much as to be alarmed, even when nothing is meant to its prejudice.(112) At a great dinner which they gave last -week, somebody observed that all the sugar figures in the dessert were girls: the Baron replied, "Sa est frai; ordinairement les petits cupitons sont des garsons; mais ma femme s'est amus`ee toute la matin`ee `a en `oter tout sa par motestie." This improvement of hers is a curious refinement, though all the geniuses of the age are employed in designing new plans for desserts. The Duke of Newcastle's last was a baby Vauxhall, illuminated with a million of little lamps of various colours.
We have been sitting this fortnight on the African Company: we, the British Senate, that temple of liberty, and bulwark of Protestant Christianity, have this fortnight been pondering methods to make more effectual that horrid traffic of selling negroes. It has appeared to us that six-and-forty thousand of these wretches are sold every year to our plantations alone!— It chills one's blood. I would not have to say that I voted in it for the continent of America!(113) The destruction of the miserable inhabitants by the Spaniards was but a momentary misfortune, that flowed from the discovery of the New World, compared to this lasting havoc which it brought upon Africa. We reproach Spain, and yet do not even pretend the nonsense of butchering these poor creatures for the good of their souls!
I have just received your long letter of February 13th, and am pleased that I had writ this volume to return it. I don't know how almost to avoid wishing poor Prince Craon dead, to see the Princess upon a throne.(114) I am sure she would invert Mr. Vaughan's wish, and compound to have nothing else made for her, provided a throne were.
I despise your literati enormously for their opinion of Montesquieu's book. Bid them read that glorious chapter on the subject I have been mentioning, the selling of African slaves. Where did he borrow that? In what book in the world is there half so much wit, sentiment, delicacy, humanity?
I shall speak much more gently to you, my dear child, though you don't like Gothic architecture. The Grecian is only proper for magnificent and public buildings. Columns and all their beautiful ornaments look ridiculous when crowded into a closet or a cheesecake-house. The variety is little, and admits no charming irregularities. I am almost as fond of the Sharavaggi, or Chinese want of symmetry, in buildings, as in grounds or gardens. I am sure, whenever you come to England, you will be pleased with the liberty of taste into which we are struck, and of which you can have no idea! Adieu!
(102) Daughter of John, second Lord Gower. Married in 1751 to the Hon. John Waldegrave.-D.
(103) madame de Mirepoix, eldest daughter of Prince Craon, and widow of the Prince of Lixin.
(104) The midwife.
(105) Atina Chamber, wife of Richard Temple, Lord Cobham, afterwards Earl Temple.
(106) George, eldest son of John, late Lord Hervey, son of the Earl of Bristol, whom this George succeeded in the title.
(107) George, Lord Hervey, was a very effeminate-looking man; which probably encouraged Lord Temple to risk this disgusting act of incivility.-D.
(108) Wraxall, in his historical Memoir Vol:'I. p. 139, relates the same story, with a few trifling alterations.-E.
(109) The Hon. Richard Leveson Gower, second son of John, second Lord Gower, member for Lichfield. Born 1726; died 1753.-D.
(110) Archibald Campbell, third Duke of Argyll, during the lifetime of bis elder brothers Duke John, Earl of Islay. He died in 1765.-D.
(111) Algernon, last Duke of Somerset, of the younger branch.-D.
(112) Dodington, in his Diary of the 25th of February, says, " I met the Prince and Princess, by order, at Lady Middlesex's where came Madame de Munchausen: we went to a fortune-teller's, who was young Des Noyers, disguised and instructed to surprise Madame de Munchausen, which he effectually did."-E.
(113) This sentiment is highly creditable to Walpole's humanity. It will remind the reader of a passage in Cowper's Task, written thirty years after:—
" And what man seeing this,
And having human feelings, does not blush,
And hang his head, to think himself a man!
I would not have a slave to till my ground,
To carry me, to fan me while I sleep,
And tremble when I wake, for all the wealth
That sinews bought and sold have ever earned,"-E.
(114) There was a notion that King Stanislaus, who lived in Lorraine, was in love with her.
58 Letter 21 To Sir Horace Mann. Arlington Street, March 11, 1750.
"Portents and prodigies are grown so frequent,
That they have lost their name."(115)
My text is not literally true; but as far -,is earthquakes go towards lowering the price of wonderful commodities, to be sure we are overstocked. We have had a second much more violent than the first; and you must not be surprised if by next post you hear of' a burning mountain sprung up in Smithfield. In the night between Wednesday and Thursday last, (exactly a month since the first shock,) the earth had a shivering fit between one and two; but so slight that, if no more had followed, I don't believe it would have been noticed. I had been awake, and had scarce dozed again-on a sudden I felt my bolster lift up my head; I thought somebody was getting from under my bed, but soon found it was a strong earthquake, that lasted near half a minute, with a violent vibration and great roaring. I rang my bell; my servant came in, frightened out of his senses- - in an instant we heard all the windows in the neighbourhood flung up. I got up and found people running into the streets, but saw no mischief done: there has been some; two old houses flung down, several chimneys, and much china-ware. The bells rung in several houses. Admiral Knowles, who has lived long in Jamaica, and felt seven there, says this was more violent than any of them; Francesco prefers it to the dreadful one at Leghorn. The wise say, that if we have not rain soon, we shall certainly have more. Several people are going out of town, for it has nowhere reached above ten miles from London: they say, they are not frightened, but that it is such fine weather, "Lord! one can't help going into the country!" The only visible effect it has had, was on the Ridotto, at which, being the following night, there were but four hundred people. A parson, who came into White's the morning of earthquake the first, and heard bets laid on whether it was an earthquake or the blowing up of powder-mills, went away exceedingly scandalized, and said, "I protest, they are such an impious set of people, that I believe if the last trumpet was to sound, they would bet puppet-show against Judgment." If we get any nearer still to the torrid zone, I shall pique myself on sending you a present of cedrati and orange-flower water: I am already planning a terreno for Strawberry Hill.
The Middlesex election is carried against the court: the Prince, in a green frock, (and I won't swear, but in a Scotch plaid waistcoat,) sat under the park-wall in his chair, and hallooed the voters on to Brentford. The Jacobites are so transported, that they are opening subscriptions for all boroughs that shall be vacant—this is wise! They will spend their money to carry a few more seats in a Parliament where they will never have the majority, and so have none to carry the general elections. The omen, however, is bad for Westminster; the High-bailiff went to vote for the Opposition.
I now jump to another topic; I find all this letter will be detached scraps; I can't at all contrive to hide the scams: but I don't care. I began my letter merely to tell you of the earthquake, and I don't pique myself upon doing any more than telling you what you would be glad to have told you. I told you too how pleased I was with the triumphs of another old beauty, our friend the Princess.(116) Do you know, I have found a history that has a great resemblance to hers; that is, that will be very like hers, if hers is but like it. I will tell it you in as few words as I can. Madame la Marechale de l'H`opital was the daughter of a sempstress;(117) a young gentleman fell in love with her, and was going to be married to her, but the match was broken off. An old fermier-general, who had retired into the province where this happened, hearing the story, had a curiosity to see the victim; he liked her, married her, died, and left her enough not to care for her inconstant. he came to Paris, where the Marechal de l'H`opital married her for her riches. After the Marechal's death, Casimir, the abdicated King of Poland, who was retired into France, fell in love with the Marechale, and privately married her. If the event ever happens, I shall certainly travel to Nancy, to hear her talk of ma belle-fille la Reine de France. What pains my lady Pomfret would take to prove(118) that an abdicated King's wife did not take place of an English countess; and how the Princess herself would grow still fonder of the Pretender(119) for the similitude of his fortune with that of le Roi mon mari! Her daughter, Mirepoix, was frightened the other night, with Mrs. Nugent's calling out, un voleur! un voleur! The ambassadress had heard so much of robbing, that she did not doubt but dans ce pais cy, they robbed in the middle of an assembly. It turned out to be a thief in the candle! Good night!
(115) Dryden's All for Love."
(116) The Princess Craon, who, it had been reported, was to marry Stanislaus Leczinsky, Duke of Loraine and ex-King of Poland, whose daughter Maria Leczinska was married to Louis the Fifteenth, King of France.-D.
(117) "This is the story of a woman named Mary Mignot. She was near marrying a young man of La Gardie, who afterwards entered the Swedish service, and became a field-marshal in that country. Her first husband was, if I mistake not, a Procureur of Grenoble; her second was the Marshal de l'H`opital; and her third is supposed to have been Casimir, the ex-King of Poland, who had retired, after his abdication, to the monastery of St Germain des Pr`es. It does not, however, appear certain whether Casimir actually married her or not.-D.
(118) Lady Pomfret and Princess Craon did not visit at Florence, upon a dispute of precedence.
(119) The Pretender, when in Lorraine, lived in Prince Craon's house.
60 Letter 22 To Sir Horace Mann. Arlington Street, April 2, 1750.
You will not wonder so much at our earthquakes as at the effects they have had. All the women in town have taken them up upon the foot of Judgments; and the clergy, who have had no windfalls of a long season, have driven horse and foot into this opinion. There has been a shower of sermons and exhortations; Secker, the jesuitical Bishop of Oxford, began the mode. He heard the women were all going out of town to avoid the next shock; and so: for fear of losing his Easter offerings, he set himself to advise them to await God's good pleasure in fear and trembling. But what is more astonishing, Sherlock,(120) who has much better sense, and much less of the Popish confessor has been running a race with him for the old ladies, and has written a pastoral letter, of which ten thousand were sold in two days; and fifty thousand have been subscribed for, since the two first editions.
I told you the women talked of going out of town: several families are literally gone, and many more going to-day and to-morrow; for what adds to the absurdity, is, that the second shock having happened exactly a month after the former, it prevails that there will be a third on Thursday next, another month, which is to swallow up London. I am almost ready to burn my letter now I have begun it, lest you should think I am laughing at you: but it is so true, that Arthur of White's told me last night, that he should put off the last ridotto, which was to be on Thursday, because he hears nobody would come to it. I have advised several who are going to keep their next earthquake in the country, to take the bark for it, as it is so periodic.(121) Dick Leveson and Mr. Rigby, who had supped and strived late at Bedford House the other night, knocked at several doors, and in a watchman's voice cried, "Past four o'clock, and a dreadful earthquake!" But I have done with this ridiculous panic: two pages were too much to talk of it.
We have had nothing in Parliament but trade-bills, on one of which the Speaker humbled the arrogance of Sir John Barnard, who had reflected upon the proceedings of the House. It is to break up on Thursday Se'nnight, and the King goes this day fortnight. He has made Lord Vere Beauclerc a baron,(122) at the solicitation of the Pelhams, as this Lord had resigned upon a pique with Lord Sandwich. Lord Anson, who is treading in the same path, and leaving the Bedfords to follow his father-in-law, the Chancellor, is made a privy councillor, with Sir Thomas Robinson and Lord Hyndford. Lord Conway is to be an earl,(123) and Sir John Rawdon(124) (whose follies you remember, and whose boasted loyalty of having been kicked downstairs for not drinking the Pretender's health, though even that was false, is at last rewarded,) and Sir John Vesey are to be Irish lords; and a Sir William Beauchamp Proctor, and a Mr. Loyd, Knights of the Bath.
I was entertained the other night at the house of much such a creature as Sir John Rawdon, and one whom you remember too, Naylor. he has a wife who keeps the most indecent house of all those that are called decent: every Sunday she has a contraband assembly: I had had a card for Monday a fortnight before. As the day was new, I expected a great assembly, but found scarce six persons. I asked where the company was—I was answered, "Oh! they are not come yet: they will be here presently; they all supped here last night, stayed till morning, and I suppose are not up yet."
My Lord Bolinbroke has lost his wife. When she was dying, he acted grief; flung himself upon her bed, and asked her if she could forgive him. I never saw her, but have heard her wit and parts excessively commended.(125) Dr. Middleton told me a compliment she made him two years ago, which I thought pretty. She said she was persuaded that he was a very great writer, for she understood his works better than any other English book, and that she had observed that the best writers were always the most intelligible.
Wednesday.
I had not time to finish my letter on Monday. I return to the earthquake, which I had mistaken; it is to be to-day. This frantic terror is so much, that within these three days seven hundred and thirty coaches have been counted passing Hyde Park corner, with whole parties removing into the country. Here is a good advertisement which I cut out of the papers to-day;
"On Monday next will be published (price 6d.) A true and exact List of all the Nobility and Gentry who have left, or shall leave, this place through fear of another Earthquake."
Several women have made earthquake gowns; that is, warm gowns to sit out of doors all to-night. These are of the more courageous. One woman, still more heroic, is come to town on purpose: she says, all her friends are in London, and she will not survive them. But what will you think of Lady Catherine Pelham, Lady Frances Arundel,(126) and Lord and Lady Galway,(127) who go this evening to an inn ten miles out of town, where they are to play at brag till five in the morning, and then come back-I suppose, to look for the bones of their husbands and families under the rubbish.(128) The prophet of all this (next to the Bishop of London) is a trooper of Lord Delawar's who was yesterday sent to Bedlam. His colonel sent to the man's wife, and asked her if her husband had ever been disordered before. She cried, "Oh dear! my lord, he is not mad now; if your lordship would but get any sensible man to examine him, you would find, he is quite in his right mind."
I shall now tell you something more serious: Lord Dalkeith(129) is dead of the small-pox in three days. It is so dreadfully fatal in his family, that besides several uncles and aunts, his eldest boy died of it last year; and his only brother, who was ill but two days, putrefied so fast that his limbs fell off as they lifted the body into the coffin. Lady Dalkeith is five months gone with child; she was hurrying to him, but was stopped on the road by the physician, who told her that it was a miliary fever. They were remarkably happy.
The King goes on Monday se'nnight;(130) it is looked upon as a great event that the Duke of Newcastle has prevailed on him to speak to Mr. Pitt, who has detached himself from the Bedfords. The Monarch, who had kept up his Hanoverian resentments, though he had made him paymaster, is now beat out of the dignity of his silence: he was to pretend not to know Pitt, and was to be directed to him by the lord in waiting. Pitt's jealousy is of Lord Sandwich, who knows his own interest and unpopularity so well, that he will prevent any breach, and thereby what you fear, which yet I think you would have no reason to fear. I could not say enough of my anger to your father, but I shall take care to say nothing, as I have not forgot how my zeal for you made me provoke him once before.
Your genealogical affair Is in great train, and will be quite finished in a week or two. Mr. Chute has laboured at it indefatigably: General Guise has been attesting the authenticity of it to-day before a justice of peace. You will find yourself mixed with every drop of blood in England that is worth bottling up-. the Duchess of Norfolk and you grow on the same bough of the tree. I must tell you a very curious anecdote that Strawberry King-at-Arms(131) has discovered by the way, as he was tumbling over the mighty dead in the Heralds' office. You have heard me speak of the great injustice that the Protector Somerset did to the children of his first wife, in favour of those by his second; so much, that he not only had the dukedom settled on the younger brood, but to deprive the eldest of the title of Lord Beauchamp, which he wore by inheritance, he caused himself to be anew created Viscount Beauchamp. Well, in Vincent's Baronage, a book of great authority, speaking of the Protector's wives, are these remarkable words: "Katherina, filia et una Coh. Gul: Fillol de Fillol's hall in Essex, uxor prima; repudiata, quia Pater ejus post nuptias eam cognovit." The Speaker has since referred me to our journals, where are some notes of a trial in the reign of James the First, between Edward, the second son of Katherine the dutiful, and the Earl of Hertford, son of Anne Stanhope, which in some measure confirms our MS; for it says, the Earl of Hertford objected, that John, the eldest son of all, was begotten while the Duke was in France. This title, which now comes back at last to Sir Edward Seymour is disputed: my Lord Chancellor has refused him the writ, but referred his case to the Attorney General,(132) the present great Opinion of England, who, they say, is clear for Sir Edward's succession.(133)
I shall now go and show you Mr. Chute in a different light from heraldry, and in one in which I believe you never saw him. He will shine as usual; but, as a little more severely than his good-nature is accustomed to, I must tell you that he was provoked by the most impertinent usage. It is an epigram on Lady Caroline Petersham, whose present fame, by the way, is coupled with young Harry Vane.
WHO IS THIS?
Her face has beauty, we must all confess,
But beauty on the brink of ugliness:
Her mouth's a rabbit feeding on a rose;
With eyes-ten times too good for such a nose!
Her blooming cheeks-what paint could ever draw 'em?
That Paint, for which no mortal ever saw 'em.
Air without shape—of royal race divine—
'Tis Emily—oh! fie!—It'S Caroline.
Do but think of my beginning a third sheet! but as the Parliament is rising, and I shall probably not write you a tolerably long letter again these eight months, I will lay in a stock of merit with you to last me so long Mr. Chute has set me too upon making epigrams; but as I have not his art, mine is almost a copy of verses: the story he told me, and is literally true, of an old Lady Bingley.(134)
Celia now had completed some thirty campaigns,
And for new generations was hammering chains;
When whetting those terrible weapons, her eyes,
To Jennny, her handmaid, in anger she cries,
"Careless creature! did mortal e'er see such a glass!
Who that saw me in this, could e'er guess what I was!
Much you mind what I say! pray how oft have I bid you
Provide me a new one? how oft have I chid you?"
"Lord, Madam!" cried Jane, "you're so hard to be pleased
I am sure every glassman in town I have teased:
I have hunted each shop from Pall-mall to Cheapside:
Both Miss Carpenter's(135) man and Miss Banks's(136) I've
tried."
"Don't tell me of those girls!-all I know, to my cost,
Is, the looking-glass art must be certainly lost!
One used to have mirrors so smooth and so bright,
They did one's eyes justice, they heighten'd one's white,
And fresh roses diffused o'er ones bloom—but, alas!
In the glasses made now, one detests one's own face;
They pucker one's cheeks up and furrow one's brow,
And one's skin looks as yellow as that of Miss(137) Howe!"(138)
After an epigram that seems to have found out the longitude, I shall tell you but one more, and that wondrous short. It is said to be made by a cow. YOU Must not wonder; we tell as many strange stories as Baker and Livy:
"A warm winter, a dry spring,
A hot summer, a new King."
Though the sting is very epigrammatic, the whole of the distitch has more of the truth than becomes prophecy; that is, it is false, for the spring is wet and cold.
There is come from France a Madame Bocage, who has translated Milton. my Lord Chesterfield prefers the copy to the original; but that is not uncommon for him to do, who is the patron of bad authors and bad actors. She has written a play too, which was damned, and worthy my lord's approbation.' You would be more diverted with a Mrs. Holman, whose passion is keeping an assembly, and inviting literally every body to it. She goes to the drawing-room to watch for sneezes; whips out a curtsey, and then sends next morning to know how your cold does, and to desire your company next Thursday.
Mr. Whithed has taken my Lord Pembroke's house at Whitehall; a glorious situation, but as madly built as my Lord himself was. He has bought some delightful pictures too, of Claude, Gaspar, and good masters, to the amount of four hundred pounds.
Good night! I have nothing more to tell you, but that I have lately seen a Sir William Boothby, who saw you about a year ago, and adores you, as all the English you receive ought to do. He is much in my favour.
(120) Thomas Sherlock, Master of the Temple; first, Bishop of Salisbury, and afterwards of London.
(121) " I remember," says Addison, in the 240th Tatler, "when our whole island was Shaken With an earthquake some years ago, that there was an impudent mountebank, who sold pills, which, as he told the country people, were "very good against an earthquake."'-E.
(122) lord Vere of Haworth, in Middlesex.-D.
(123( Lord Conway was made Earl of Hertford.-D.
(124) Sir John Rawdon was created in this year Baron Rawdon, and in 1761 Earl of Moira, in Ireland. Sir John Vesey was created Lord Knapton; and his son was made Viscount de Vesey in Ireland, in 1766.-D.
(125) She was a Frenchwoman, of considerable fortune and accomplishments, the widow of the Marquis de Villette, and niece to Madame de Maintenon. She died on the 15th of March. >From the following passage in a letter written by Bolingbroke to Lord Marchmont a few days before her death, it is difficult to believe that he "acted grief" upon this occasion:—"You are very good to take my share in that affliction which has lain upon me so long, and which still continues, with the fear of being increased by a catastrophe I am little able to bear. Resignation is a principal duty in my system of religion: reason shows that it ought to be willing if not cheerful; but there are passions and habitudes in human nature which reason cannot entirely subdue. I should be ashamed not to feel them in the present case."-E.
(126) Lady Frances Arundell was the daughter of John Manners, second Duke of Rutland, and was married to the Hon. Richard Arundell, second son of John, Lord Arundell of Trerice, and a lord of the treasury. Lady Frances was sister of Lady Catherine Pelham, the wife of the minister.-D.
(127) John Monckton, first Viscount Galway in Ireland. The Lady Galway mentioned here was his second wife, Jane, daughter of henry Westenra, Esq., of Dublin. His first wife, who died in 1730, was Lady Elizabeth Manners, the sister of Lady Catherine Pelham and Lady Frances Arundell.-D.
(128) " Incredible numbers of people left their houses, and walked in the fields or lay in boats all night: many persons of fashion in the neighbouring villages sat in their coaches till daybreak; others went to a greater distance, so that the roads were never more thronged." Gentleman's Magazine.-E.
(129) Francis Scott, eldest son of the Duke of Buccleugh.
(130) To Hanover.
(131) Mr. Chute.
(132) Sir Dudley Ryder.
(133) Sir Edward Seymour, when he became Duke of Somerset, did not inherit the title of Beauchamp.-D.
(134) Lady Elizabeth Finch, eldest daughter of Heneage, Earl of Aylesford, and widow of Robert Benson, Lord Bingley.
(135) Countess of Egremont.
(136) Miss Margaret Banks, a celebrated beauty.
(137) Charlotte, sister of Lord Howe, and wife of Mr. Fettiplace.
(138) These lines are published in Walpole's Works.-D.
(139) Madame du Boccage published a poem in imitation of Milton, and another founded on Gesner's Death of Abel. She also translated Pope's Temple of Fame; but her principal work was ,La Columbiade." It was at the house of this lady, at Paris, in 1775, that Johnson was annoyed at her footman's taking the sugar in his fingers and throwing it into his coffee. "I was going," says the Doctor, "to put it aside, but hearing it was made on purpose for me, I e'en tasted Tom's fingers." She died in 1802.-E.
65 Letter 23 To George Montagu, Esq. Arlington Street, May 15, 1750.
The High-bailiff, after commending himself and his own impartiality for an hour this morning, not unlike your cousin Pelham, has declared Lord Trentham. The mob declare they will pull his house down to show their impartiality. The Princess has luckily produced another boy; so Sir George Vandeput may be recompensed with being godfather. I stand to-morrow, not for a member, but for godfather to my sister's girl, with Mrs. Selwyn and old Dunch: were ever three such dowagers? when shall three such meet again? If the babe has not a most sentimentally yellow complexion after such sureties, I will burn my books, and never answer for another skin.
You have heard, I suppose, that Nugent must answer a little more seriously for Lady Lymington's child. Why, she was as ugly as Mrs. Nugent, had had more children, and was not so young. The pleasure of wronging a woman, who had bought him so dear, could be the only temptation.
Adieu! I have told you all I know, and as much is scandal, very possibly more than is true. I go to Strawberry on Saturday, and so shall not know even scandal.
66 Letter 24 To Sir Horace Mann. Arlington Street, May 19, 1750.
I did not doubt but you would be diverted with the detail of absurdities that were committed after the earthquake: I could have filled more paper with such relations, If I had not feared tiring you. We have swarmed with sermons, essays, relations, poems, and exhortations On that subject. One Stukely, a parson, has accounted for it, and I think prettily, by electricity—but that is the fashionable cause, and every thing is resolved into electrical appearances, as formerly every thing was accounted for by Descartes's vortices, and Sir Isaac's gravitation. But they all take care, after accounting for the earthquake systematically, to assure you that still it was nothing less than a judgment. Dr. Barton, the rector of St. Andrews, was the only sensible, or at least honest divine, upon the occasion. When some women would have had him to pray to them in his parish church against the intended shock, he excused himself on having a great cold. "And besides," said he, "you may go to St. James's church; the Bishop of Oxford is to preach there all night about earthquakes." Turner, a great china-man, at the corner of Dext street, had a jar cracked by the shock: he originally asked ten guineas for the pair; he now asks twenty, "because it is the only jar in Europe that has been cracked by an earthquake." But I have quite done with this topic. The Princess of Wales is lowering the price of princes, as the earthquake has raised old china; she has produced a fifth boy. In a few years we shall have Dukes of York and Lancaster popping out of bagnios and taverns as frequently as Duke Hamilton.(140) George Selwyn said a good thing the other day on another cheap dignity: he was asked who was playing at tennis, He replied, "Nobody but three markers and a Regent." your friend Lord Sandwich. While we are undervaluing all principalities and powers, you are making a rout with them, for which I shall scold you. We had been diverted with the pompous accounts of the reception of the Margrave of Baden Dourlach at Rome; and now you tell me he has been put upon the same foot at Florence! I never heard his name when he was here, but on his being mob'd as he was going to Wanstead, and the people's calling him the Prince of Bad-door-lock. He was still less noticed than he of Modena.
Lord Bath is as well received at Paris as a German Margrave in Italy. Every body goes to Paris: Lord Mountford was introduced to the King, who only said brutally enough, "Ma foi! il est bien nourri!" Lord Albemarle keeps an immense table there, with sixteen people in his kitchen; his aide-de-camps invite every body, but he seldom graces the banquet himself, living retired out of the town with his old Columbine.(141) What an extraordinary man! with no fortune at all, and with slight parts, he has seventeen thousand a year from the government, which he squanders away, though he has great debts, and four or five numerous broods of children of one sort or other!
The famous Westminster election is at last determined, and Lord Trentham returned: the mob were outrageous, and pelted Colonel Waldegrave, whom they took for Mr. Leveson, from Covent-garden to the Park, and knocked down Mr. Offley, who was with him. Lord Harrington(142) was scarce better treated when he went on board a ship from Dublin. There are great commotions there about one Lucas, an apothecary, and favourite of the mob. The Lord Lieutenant bought off a Sir Richard Cox, a patriot, by a place in the revenue, though with great opposition from that silly mock-virtuoso, Billy Bristow, and that sillier Frederick Frankland, two oafs, whom you have seen in Italy, and who are commissioners there. Here are great disputes in the Regency, where Lord Harrington finds there is not spirit enough to discard these puppet-show heroes!
We have got a second volume of Bower'S(143) History of the Popes, but it is tiresome and pert, and running into a warmth and partiality that he had much avoided in his first volume. He has taken such pains to disprove the Pope's supremacy being acknowledged pretty early, that he has convinced me it was acknowledged. Not that you and I care whether it were or not. He is much admired here; but I am not good Christian enough to rejoice over him, because turned Protestant; nor honour his confessorship, when he ran away with the materials that were trusted to him to write for the papacy, and makes use of them to write against it. You know how impartial I am; I can love him for being shocked at a system of cruelty supporting nonsense; I can be pleased with the truths he tells; I can and do admire his style, and his genius in recovering a language that he forgot by six years old, so well as to excel in writing it, and yet I wish that all this had happened without any breach of trust!
Stosch has grievously offended me; but that he will little regard, as I can be of no use to him: he has sold or given his charming intaglio of the Gladiator to Lord Duncannon. I must reprove you a little who sent it; you know how much I pressed you to buy it for me, and how much I offered. I still think it one of the finest rings(144) I ever saw, and am mortified at not having it.
Apropos to Bower; Miss Pelham had heard that he had foretold the return of the earthquake-fit: her father sent for him, to COnVince her that Bower was too sensible; but had the precaution to talk to him first: he replied gravely, that a fire was kindled under the earth, and he could not tell when it would blaze out. You may be sure he was not carried to the girl! Adieu!
(140) Jonas, sixth Duke of Hamilton, the Husband of the beautiful Miss Gunning. he died in 1758.-D.
(141) Mademoiselle Gauchet.
(142) William Stanhope, Earl of Harrington, Lord Lieutenant.
(143) Archibald Bow(@r, a man of disreputable character, who was born in Scotland, of a Roman Catholic family, was educated at Douay and Rome, and became a Jesuit. Having been detected, as it is said, in an intrigue with a nun, he was forced to fly from Perugia, where he resided: and after a series of strange and not very creditable adventures, he arrived in England. Here he declared himself a Protestant; but, after some years, wishing to swindle the English Jesuits out of an annuity, be again returned to their order. Having got all he could from them, he again returned to Protestantism, and wrote his "History of the Popes," which was his principal literary work.-D. (Gibbon, speaking of Bower, in his Extraits (le mon Journal for 1764, says, " He is a rogue unmasked, who enjoyed, for twenty years, the favour of the public, because he had quitted a sect to which he still secretly adhered; and because he had been a counsellor of the inquisition in the town of Macerata, where an inquisition never existed." Bower died in Bond Street, in September, 1766, in his eighty-first year, and was buried in Mary-le-bone churchyard, where there is a monument to his memory.]
(144) It is engraved in Stosch's book: it is a Gladiator standing, with a vase by him on a table, on an exceedingly fine garnet.
68 Letter 25 To George Montagu, Esq. Arlington Street, June 23, 1750.
Dear George, As I am not Vanneck'd(145) I have been in no hurry to thank you for your congratulation, and to assure you that I never knew what solid happiness was till I was married. Your Trevors and Rices dined with me last week at Strawberry Hill, and would have had me answer you upon the matrimonial tone, but I thought I should imitate cheerfulness in that style as ill as if I were really married. I have had another of your friends with me here some time, whom I adore, Mr. Bentley; he has more sense, judgment, and wit, more taste, and more misfortunes, than sure ever met in any man. I have heard that Dr. Bentley, regretting his want of taste for all such learning as his, which is the very want of taste, used to sigh and say, "Tully had his Marcus." If the sons resembled as much as the fathers did, at least in vanity, I would be the modest agreeable Marquis. Mr. Bentley tells me that you press him much to visit you at Hawkhurst. I advise him, and assure him he will make his fortune under you there; that you are an agent from the board of trade to the smugglers, and wallow in contraband wine, tea, and silk handkerchiefs. I found an old newspaper t'other day, with a list of outlawed smugglers; there were John Price, alias Miss Marjoram, Bob Plunder, Bricklayer Tom, and Robin Cursemother, all of Hawkhurst, in Kent. When Miss Harriet is thoroughly hardened at Buxton, as I hear she is being,, in a public room with the whole Wells, from drinking waters, I conclude she will come to sip nothing but new brandy.
As jolly and as abominable a life as she may have been leading, I defy all her enormities to equal a party of pleasure that I had t'other night. I shall relate it to you to show you the manners of the age, which are always as entertaining to a person fifty miles off, as to one born an hundred and fifty years after the time. I had a card from Lady Caroline Petersham to go with her to Vauxhall. I went accordingly to her house, and found her and the little Ashe,(146) or the Pollard Ashe, as they call her; they had just finished their last layer of red, and looked as handsome as crimson could make them. On the cabinet-door stood a pair of Dresden candlesticks, a present from the virgin hands of Sir John Bland: the branches of each formed a little bower over a cock and hen * * * * We issued into the mall to assemble our company, which was all the town, if we could get it; for just so many had been summoned, except Harry Vane(147) whom we met by chance. We mustered the Duke of Kingston, whom Lady Caroline says she has been trying for these seven years; but alas! his beauty is at the fall of the leaf; Lord March,(148) Mr. Whitehead, a pretty Miss Beauclerc, and a very foolish Miss Sparre. These two damsels were trusted by their mothers for the first time of their lives to the matronly care of Lady Caroline. As we sailed up the mall with all our colours flying, Lord Petersham,(149) with his hose and legs twisted to every point of crossness, strode by us on the outside, and repassed again on the return. At the end of' the mall she called to him; he would not answer: she gave a familiar spring and, between laugh and confusion, ran up to him, "My lord! my lord! why, you don't see us!" We advanced at a little distance, not a little awkward in expectation how all this would end, for my lord never stirred his hat, or took the least notice of any body; she said, "Do you go with us, or are you going any where else?"—"I don't go with you, I am going somewhere else;" and away he stalked. as sulky as a ghost that nobody will speak to first. We got into the best order we could, and marched to our barge, with a boat of French horns attending, and little Ashe singing. We paraded some time up the river, and at last debarked at Vauxhall - there, if we had so pleased, we might have had the vivacity of our party increased by a quarrel; for a Mrs. Loyd,(150)Who is supposed to be married to Lord Haddington, seeing the two girls following Lady Petersham and Miss Ashe, said aloud, "Poor girls, I am sorry to see them in such bad company!" Miss Sparre, who desired nothing so much as the fun of seeing a duel,—a thing which, though she is fifteen, she has never been so lucky to see,—took due pains to make Lord March resent this; but he, who is very lively and agreeable, laughed her out of this charming frolic with a great deal of humour. Here we picked up Lord Granby, arrived very drunk from Jenny's Whim;(151) where, instead of going to old Strafford's(152) catacombs to make honourable love, he had dined with Lady Fanny,(153) and left her and eight other women and four other men playing at brag. He would fain have made over his honourable love upon any terms to poor Miss Beauclerc, who is very modest, and did not know at all what to do with his whispers or his hands. He then addressed himself to the Sparre, who was very well disposed to receive both; but the tide of champagne turned, he hiccupped at the reflection of his marriage (of which he is wondrous sick), and only proposed to the girl to shut themselves up and rail at the world for three weeks. If all the adventures don't conclude as you expect in the beginning of a paragraph, you must not wonder, for I am not making a history, but relating one strictly as it happened, and I think with full entertainment enough to content you. At last, we assembled in our booth, Lady Caroline in the front, with the vizor of her hat erect, and looking gloriously jolly and handsome. She had fetched my brother Orford from the next box, where he was enjoying himself with his petite partie, to help us to mince chickens. We minced seven chickens into a china dish, which Lady Caroline stewed over a lamp with three pats of butter and a flagon of water, stirring and rattling, and laughing, and we every minute expecting to have the dish fly about our ears. She had brought Betty, the fruit-girl, with hampers of strawberries and cherries from Rogers's, and made her wait upon us, and then made her sup by us at a little table. The conversation was no less lively than the whole transaction. There was a Mr. O'Brien arrived from Ireland, who would get the Duchess of Manchester from Mr. Hussey, if she were still at liberty. I took up the biggest hautboy in the dish, and said to Lady Caroline, "Madam, Miss Ashe desires you would eat this O'Brien strawberry:" she replied immediately, "I won't, you hussey." You may imagine the laugh this reply occasioned. After the tempest was a little calmed, the Pollard said, "Now, how any body would spoil this story that was to repeat it, and say, "I won't, you jade!" In short, the whole air of our party was sufficient, as you will easily imagine, to take up the whole attention of the garden; so much so, that from eleven o'clock till half an hour after one we had the whole concourse round our booth: at last, they came into the little gardens of each booth on the sides of ours, till Harry Vane took up a bumper, and drank their healths, and was proceeding to treat them with still greater freedom. It was three o'clock before we got home. I think I have told you the chief passages. Lord Granby's temper had been a little ruffled the night before; the Prince had invited him and Dick Lyttelton to Kew, where he won eleven hundred pounds of the latter, and eight of the former, then cut and told them @e would play with them no longer, for he saw they played so idly, that they were capable of "losing more than they would like." Adieu! I expect in return for this long tale that you will tell me some of your frolics with Robin Cursemother, and some of Miss Marjoram's bon-mots.
P. S. Dr. Middleton called on me yesterday: he is come to town to consult his physician for a jaundice and swelled legs, symptoms which, the doctor tells him, and which he believes, can be easily cured: I think him visibly broke, and near his end.(154) He lately advised me to marry, on the sense of his own happiness; but if any body had advised him to the contrary, at his time of life,(155) I believe he would not have broke so soon.
(145) Alluding to the projected marriages, which soon after took place, between two of the sons of his uncle Lord Walpole: who each of them married a daughter of Sir Joshua Vanneck.-E.
(146 Miss Ashe was said to have been of very high parentage. She married Mr. Falconer; an officer in the navy.-E.
(147) Eldest son of Lord Barnard, created Earl of Darlington in 1754.-E.
(148) Upon the death of Charles, Duke of Queensbury and Dover, he succeeded, in 1778, to the title of Queensbury, and died unmarried in 1810.-E.
(149) Afterwards Earl of Harrington. His gait was so singular, that he was generally known by the nickname of Peter Shamble.-E.
(150) She was afterwards married to Lord Haddington.-E.
(151) A tavern at the end of the wooden bridge at Chelsea, at that period much frequented by his lordship and other men of rank.-E.
(152) Anne, daughter and Heiress of Sir Henry Johnson, widow of Thomas Lord Raby, created Earl of Strafford in 1711.
(153) Lady Frances Seymour, eldest daughter of Charles, Duke of Somerset (known by the name of the Proud Duke), by his second Duchess, Lady Charlotte Finch. She was married in the following September to the Marquis of Granby.-E.
(154) Warburton, in a letter to Hurd, of the 11th of July, says, "I hear Dr. Middleton has been lately in London, (I suppose, to consult Dr. Heberden about his health,) and is returned in an extreme bad condition. The scribblers against him will say they have killed him; but by what Mr. Yorke told me, his bricklayer will dispute the honour of his death with them.',-E.
(155) The Doctor had recently taken a third wife, the relict of a Bristol merchant. On making her a matrimonial visit, Bishop Gooch told Mrs. Middleton that ,he was glad she did not dislike the Ancients so much as her husband did." She replied, "that she hoped his lordship did not reckon her husband among the Ancients yet." The Bishop answered, "You, Madam, are the best judge of that" Nichols's literary Anecdotes, Vol. v. p. 422.-E.
71 Letter 26 To Sir Horace Mann. Arlington Street, July 25, 1750.
I told YOU my idle season was coming on, and that I should have great intervals between my letters; have not I kept my word? For any thing I have to tell you, I might have kept it a month longer. I came out of Essex last night, and find the town quite depopulated: I leave it to-morrow, and go to Mr. Conway's(156) in Buckinghamshire, with only giving a transient glance on Strawberry Hill. Don't imagine I am grown fickle; I thrust all my visits into a heap, and then am quiet for the rest of the season. It is so much the way in England to jaunt about, that one can't avoid it; but it convinces me that people are more tired of themselves and the country than they care to own.
Has your brother told you that my Lord Chesterfield has bought the Houghton lantern? the famous lantern, that produced so much patriot Wit;(157) and very likely some of his lordship's? My brother had bought a much handsomer at Lord Cholmondeley's sale; for, with all the immensity of the celebrated one, it was ugly, and too little for the hall. He would have given it to Lord Chesterfield rather than he should not have had it.
You tell us nothing of your big events, of the quarrel of the
Pope and the Venetians, on the Patriarchate of Aquileia. We
look upon it as so decisive that I should not wonder if Mr.
Lyttelton, or Whitfield the Methodist, were to set out for
Venice, to make them a tender of some of our religions.
Is it true too what we hear, that the Emperor has turned the tables on her Caesarean jealousy,(158) and discarded Metastasio the poet, and that the latter is gone mad upon it, instead of hugging himself on coming off so much better than his predecessor in royal love and music, David Rizzio? I believe I told you that one of your sovereigns, and an intimate friend of yours, King Theodore, is in the King's Bench prison. I have so little to say, that I don't care if I do tell you the same thing twice. He lived in a privileged place; his creditors seized him by making him believe lord Granville wanted him on business of importance; he bit at it, and concluded they were both to be reinstated at once. I have desired Hogarth to go and steal his picture for me; though I suppose one might easily buy a sitting of him. The King of Portugal (and when I have told you this, I have done with kings) has bought a handsome house here,(159) for the residence of his ministers.
I believe you have often heard me mention a Mr. Ashton,(160) a clergyman, who, in one word, has great preferments, and owes every thing upon earth to me. I have long had reason to complain of his behaviour; in short, my father is dead, and I can make no bishops. He has at last quite thrown off the mask, and in the most direct manner, against my will, has written against my friend Dr. Middleton,(161) taking for his motto these lines,
"Nullius addictus jurare in verba Magistri,
Quid verum atque decens curo et rogo, et omnis in hoc sum".
I have forbid him my house, and wrote this paraphrase upon his picture,
"Nullius addictus munus meminisse Patroni,
Quid vacat et qui dat, curo et rogo, et omnis in hoc sum."
I own it was pleasant to me the other day, on meeting Mr. Tonson, his bookseller, at the Speaker's, and asking him if he had sold many of Mr. Ashton's books, to be told, "Very few indeed, Sir!"
I beg you will thank Dr. Cocchi much for his book; I will thank him much more when I have received and read it. His friend, Dr. Mead, is undone; his fine collection is going to be sold: he owes about five-and-twenty thousand Pounds. All the world thought himimmensely rich; but, besides the expense of his collection, he kept a table for which alone he is said to have allowed seventy pounds a-week.
(156) Mr. Conway had hired Latimers, in Buckinghamshire, for three years.
(157) In one pamphlet, the noise of this lantern, was so exaggerated, that the author said, on a journey to Houghton, he was first carried into a glass-room, which he supposed was the porter's lodge, but proved to be the lantern. [This lantern, which hung from the ceiling of the hall, was for eighteen candles, and of copper gilt. It was the Craftsman which made so much noise about it.]
(158) The Empress Maria Theresa, who was very jealous, and with reason, of her husband, the Emperor Francis.-D.
(159) In South Audley Street. (It continued to be the residence of the Portuguese ambassadors till the year 1831.-D.
(160) Thomas Ashton, fellow of Eton College, and rector of St. Botolph's, Bishopsgate.
(161) Dr. Conyers Middleton, author of the Life of Cicero. [The Doctor died three days after the date of this letter, in his sixty-seventh year.]
73 Letter 27 To sir Horace Mann. Strawberry Hill, August 2, 1750.
I had just sent my letter to the '@Secretary's office the other day, when I received yours: it would have prevented my reproving you for not mentioning the quarrel between the Pope and the Venetians; and I should have had time to tell you that Dr. Mead's bankruptcy is contradicted. I don't love to send you falsities, so I tell you this is contradicted, though it is by no means clear that he is not undone-he is scarce worth making an article in two letters.
I don't wonder that Marquis Acciaudi's villa did not answer to you; by what I saw in Tuscany, and by the prints, their villas are strangely out of taste, and laboured by their unnatural regularity and art to destroy the romanticness of the situations. I wish you could see the villas and seats here! the country wears a new face; every body is improving their places, and as they don't fortify, their plantations with intrenchments of walls and high hedges, one has the benefit of them even in passing by. The dispersed buildings, I mean temples, bridges, etc. are generally Gothic or Chinese, and give a whimsical air of novelty that is very pleasing. You would like a drawing-room in the latter style that I fancied and have been executing at Mr. Rigby's, in Essex. it has large and Very fine Indian landscapes, with a black fret round them, and round the whole entablature of the room, and all the ground or hanging is of pink paper. While I was there, we had eight of the hottest days that ever were felt; they say, some degrees beyond the hottest in the East Indies, and that the Thames was more so than the hot well at Bristol. The guards died )n their posts at Versailles: and here a captain Halyburton, brother-in-law of lord Moncton, went mad with the excess
Your brother Gal. will, I suppose, be soon making improvements like the rest of the world: he has bought an estate in Kent, called Bocton Malherbe, famous enough for having belonged to two men who, in my opinion, have very little title to fame, Sir Harry Wotton and my lord Chesterfield. I must have the pleasure of being the first to tell you that your pedigree is finished at last; a most magnificent performance, and that will make a pompous figure in a future great hall at Bocton Malherbe when your great nephews or great-grandchildren shall be Earls, etc. My cousin Lord Conway is made Earl of Hertford, as a branch of the somersets: Sir Edward Seymour gave his approbation handsomely. He has not yet got the dukedom himself, as there is started up a Dr. Seymour who claims it, but will be able to make nothing out.
Dr. Middleton is dead—not killed by Mr. Ashton—but of a decay that came Upon him at once. The Bishop of London(162) will perhaps make a jubilee(163) for his death, and then We shall draw off some Of your crowds of travellers. Tacitus Gordon(164) died the same day; he married the widow of Trenchard(165) (with whom he wrote Cato's letters,) at the same time that Dr. Middleton married her companion. The Bishop of Durham (Chandler),(166) another great writer of controversy, is dead too, immensely rich; he is succeeded by Butler(167) of Bristol, a metaphysic author, much patronized by the late Queen; she never could make my father read his book, and -which she Certainly did not understand herself: he told her his religion was fixed, and that he did not want to change Or improve it. A report is come of the death of the King of Portugal, and of the young Pretender; but that I don't believe.
I have been in town for a day or two, and heard no conversation but about M'Lean, a fashionable highwayman, who is just taken, and who robbed me among others; as Lord Eglinton, Sir Thomas Robinson, Of Vienna, Mrs. Talbot, etc. He took an odd booty from the Scotch Earl, a blunderbuss, which lies very formidably upon the justice's table. He was taken by selling a laced waistcoat to a pawnbroker, who happened to carry it to the very man who had just sold the lace. His history is very Particular, for he confesses every thing, and is so little of a hero that he cries and begs, and I believe, if Lord Eglinton had been in any luck, might have been robbed of his own blunderbuss. His father was an Irish Dean; his brother is a Calvinist minister in great esteem at the Hague. He himself was a grocer, but losing a wife that he loved extremely about two years ago, and by whom he has one little girl, he quitted his business with two hundred pounds in his pocket, which he soon spent, and then took to the road with only one companion, Plunket, a journeyman apothecary, my other friend, whom he has impeached, but who is not taken. M'Lean had a lodging in St. James's Street, over against White's, and another at Chelsea; Plunket one in Jermyn Street; and their faces are as known about St. James's as any gentleman's who lives in that quarter, and who perhaps goes upon the road too. M'Lean had a quarrel at Putney bowling-green two months ago with an officer, whom he challenged for disputing his rank; but the captain declined, till M'Lean should produce a certificate of his nobility, which he has just received. If he had escaped a month longer, he might have heard of Mr. Chute's genealogic expertness, and come hither to the college of Arms for a certificate. There was a wardrobe of clothes, three-and-twenty purses, and the celebrated blunderbuss found at his lodgings, besides a famous kept mistress. As I conclude he will suffer, and wish him no ill, I don't care to have his idea, and am almost single in not having been to see him. Lord Mountford, at the head of half White's, went the first day - his aunt was crying over him: as soon as they were withdrawn, she said to him, knowing they were of White's, "My dear, what did the lords say to you? have you ever been concerned with any of them?"-Was not that admirable? what a favourable idea people must have of White's!—and what if White's should not deserve a much better! But the chief personages who have been to comfort and weep over this fallen hero are Lady Caroline Petersham and Miss Ashe: I call them Polly and Lucy, and asked them if he did not sing
Thus I stand like the Turk with his doxies around."(168)
Another celebrated Polly has been arrested for thirty pounds, even old Cuzzoni.(169) The Prince Of Wales bailed her—who will do as much for him?
I am much obliged to you for your intended civilities to my liking Madame Capello; but as I never liked any thing of her, but her prettiness, for she is an idiot, I beg you will dispense with them on my account: I should even be against your renewing your garden assemblies. you would be too good to pardon the impertinence of the Florentines, and would very likely expose yourself to more: besides, the absurdities which English travelling boys are capable of, and likely to act or conceive, always gave me apprehensions of your meeting with disagreeable scenes-and then there is another animal still more absurd than Florentine men or English boys, and that is, travelling governors, who are mischievous into the bargain, and whose pride is always hurt because they are sure of its never being indulged: they will not learn the world, because they are sent to teach it, and as they come forth more ignorant of it than their pupils, take care to return with more prejudices, and as much care to instil all theirs into their pupils. Don't assemble them!
Since I began my letter, the King of Portugal's death is contradicted: for the future, I will be as circumspect as one of your Tuscan residents was, who being here in Oliver's time, wrote to his court, "Some say the Protector is dead; others that he is not: for my part, I believe neither one nor t'other."
Will u send me some excellent melon seeds? I have a neighbour who shines in fruit, and have promised to get him some: Zatte`e, I think he says, is a particular sort. I don't know the best season for sending them, but you do, and will oblige me by some of the best sorts.
I suppose you know all that execrable history that occasioned an insurrection lately at Paris, where they were taking up young children to try to people one of their colonies, in which grown persons could never live. You have seen too, to be sure, in the papers the bustle that has been all this winter about purloining some of our manufacturers to Spain. I was told to-day that the informations, if they had had rope given them, would have reached to General Wall.(170) Can you wonder? Why should Spain prefer a native of England(171) to her own subjects, but because he could and would do us more hurt than a Spaniard could? a grandee is a more harmless animal by far than an Irish Papist. We stifled this evidence: we are in their power; We forgot at the last peace to renew the most material treaty! Adieu! You would not forget a material treaty.
(162) Thomas Sherlock, translated from the see of Salisbury in 1748. He died in 1761.-D.
(163) This alludes to the supposed want of orthodoxy shown by Dr. Middleton in some of his theological writings.-D.
(164) Thomas Gordon, the translator of Sallust and Tacitus; and also a political writer of his day of considerable notoriety. His death happening at the same time as that of Dr. Middleton, Lord Bolingbroke said to Dr. Heberden, "then there is the best writer in England gone, and the worst."-E.
(165) John Trenchard, son of Sir John Trenchard, secretary of state to King William the Third, was born in 1669. He wrote various political pamphlets of a democratic cast. In 1720 he published, in conjunction with Thomas Gordon, @ a series of political letters, under the signature of "Cato." They appeared at first in the " London Journal," and afterwards in the "British Journal," two newspapers of the day. They obtained great celebrity, as well from the merit of their composition, as from -the boldness of the principles they advocated. These consisted in an uncompromising hostility to the Government and to the Church. Trenchard was member of parliament for Taunton, and died in 1723.-D.
(166) Edward Chandler, a learned prelate, and author of various polemical works. He had been raised to the see of Durham in 1730, as it was then said, by simoniacal means.-D.
(167) Joseph Butler, the learned and able author of "The Analogy of Religion, Natural and Revealed, to the Constitution and Cause of Nature." This is the "Book," here alluded to, of which Queen Caroline was so fond that she made the fortune of its author. Bishop Butler died much regretted in 1752.-D.
(168) The last song in The Beggar's Opera.
(169) A celebrated Italian singer.-D.
(170) The Spanish ambassador to the court of London.-E.
(171) General Richard Wall was of Irish parents, but I believe not born in these dominions. [He came to England in 1747, on a secret mission from Ferdinand, and continued as ambassador at the British court till 1754, when he was recalled, to fill the high office of minister for foreign affairs.]
76 Letter 28 To Sir Horace Mann. Arlington Street, Sept. 1, 1750.
Here, my dear child, I have two letters of yours to answer. I will go answer them; and then, if I have any thing to tell you, I will. I accept very thankfully all the civilities you showed to Madame Capello on my account, but don't accept her on my account: I don't know who has told you that I liked her, but you may believe me, I never did. For the Damers,(172)they have lived much in the same world that I do. He is moderately sensible, immoderately proud, self-sufficient, and whimsical. She is very sensible, has even humour, if the excessive reserve and silence that she draws from both father and mother -would let her, I may almost say, ever show it. You say, "What people do we send you!" I reply, "What people we do not send you!" Those that travel are reasonable, compared with those who can never prevail on themselves to stir beyond the atmosphere of their own whims. I am convinced that the Opinions I give you about several people must appear very misanthropic; but yet, you see, are generally forced to own at last that I did not speak from prejudice - but I won't triumph, since you own that I was in the right about the Barrets. I was a little peevish with 'you in your last, when I came to the paragraph where you begin to say "I have made use of all the Interest I have with Mr. Pelham."(173) I concluded you was proceeding to say, "to procure your arrears;" instead of that, it was to make him serve Mr. Milbank—will you never have done obliging people? do begin to think of being obliged. I dare say Mr. Milbank is a very pretty sort of man, very sensible of your attentions, and who will never forget them-till he is past the Giogo.(174) You recommend him to me: to show you that I have not naturally an inclination to hate people, I am determined not to be acquainted with him, that I may not hate him for forgetting you. Mr. Pelham will be a little surprised at not finding his sister(175) at Hanover. That was all a pretence of his wise relations here, who grew uneasy that he was happy in a way that they had not laid out for him: Mrs. Temple is in Sussex. They looked upon the pleasure of an amour of choice as a transient affair; so, to Make his satisfaction permanent, they propose to marry him, and to a girl(176) he scarce ever saw!
I suppose you have heard all the exorbitant demands of the heralds for your pedigree! I have seen one this morning, infinitely richer and better done, which will not cost more; it is for my Lady Pomfret. You would be entertained with all her imagination in it. She and my lord both descend from Edward the First, by his two Queens. The pedigree is painted in a book: instead of a vulgar genealogical tree, she has devised a pine-apple plant, sprouting out of a basket, on which is King Edward's head; on the other leaves are all the intermediate arms; the fruit is sliced open, and discovers the busts of the Earl and Countess, from whence issue their issue! I have had the old Vere pedigree lately In my hands, which derives that house from Lucius Verus; but I am now grown to bear no descent but my Lord Chesterfield's, who has placed among the portraits of his ancestors two old heads, inscribed Adam de Stanhope and Eve de Stanhope; the ridicule is admirable. Old Peter Leneve, the herald, who thought ridicule consisted in not being of an old family, made this epitaph, and it was a good one, for young Craggs, whose father had been a footman, "Here lies the last who died before the first of his family!" Pray mind, how I string old stories together to-day. This old Craggs,(177) who was angry with Arthur More, who had worn a 78 livery too, and who was getting into a coach with him, turned about and said, "Why, Arthur, I am always going to get up behind; are not you!" I told this story the other day to George Selwyn, whose passion is to see coffins and corpses, and executions: he replied, "that Arthur More had had his coffin chained to that of his mistress."—"Lord!" said I, "how do you know!"—"Why, I saw them the other day in a vault at St. Giles's." He was walking this week in Westminster Abbey with Lord Abergavenny, and met the man who shows the tombs, "Oh! your servant, Mr. Selwyn; I expected to have seen you here the other day, when the old Duke of Richmond's body was taken up." Shall I tell you another story of George Selwyn before I tap the chapter of Richmond, which you see opens here very apropos? With this strange and dismal turn, he has infinite fun and humour in him. He went lately on a party of pleasure to see places with Lord Abergavenny and a pretty Mrs. Frere, who love one another a little. At Cornbury there are portraits of all the royalists and regicides, and illustrious headless.(178) Mrs. Frere ran about, looked at nothing, let him look at nothing, screamed about Indian paper, and hurried over all the rest. George grew peevish, called her back, told her it was monstrous. when he had come so far with her, to let him see nothing; "And you are a fool, you don't know what you missed in the other room."—"Why, what?"—"Why, my Lord Holland'S(179) picture."—"Well! what is my Lord Holland to me?"—"Why, do you know," said he, ,that my Lord Holland's body lies in the same vault in Kensington church with my Lord Abergavenny's mother?" Lord! she 'was so obliged, and thanked him a thousand times.
The Duke of Richmond is dead, vastly lamented: the Duchess is left in great circumstances. Lord Albemarle, Lord Lincoln, the Duke of Marlborough, Duke of Leeds, and the Duke of Rutland, are talked of for master of the horse. The first is likeliest to succeed; the Pelhams wish most to have the last: you know he is Lady Catherine's brother, and at present attached to the Prince. His son Lord Granby's match, which is at last to be finished to-morrow, has been a mighty topic of conversation lately. The bride is one of the great heiresses of old proud Somerset. Lord Winchilsea, who is her uncle, and who has married the other sister very loosely to his own relation, Lord Guernsey, has tied up Lord Granby so rigorously that the Duke of Rutland has endeavoured to break the match. She has four thousand pounds a year: he is said to have the same in present, but not to touch hers. He is in debt ten thousand pounds. She was to give him ten, which now Lord Winchilsea refuses. Upon the strength of her fortune, Lord Granby proposed to treat her with presents of twelve thousand pounds; but desired her to buy them. She, who never saw nor knew the value of ten shillings while her father lived, and has had no time to learn it, bespoke away so roundly, that for one article of the plate she ordered ten sauceboats: besides this, she and her sister have squandered seven thousand pounds apiece in all kind of baubles and frippery; so her four thousand pounds a-year is to be set apart for two years to pay her debts. Don't you like this English management? two of the greatest fortunes meeting and setting out with poverty and want! Sir Thomas Bootle, the Prince's chancellor, who is one of the guardians, wanted to have her tradesmen's bills taxed; but in the mean time he has wanted to marry her Duchess-mother: his love-letter has been copied and dispersed every where. To give you a sufficient instance of his absurdity, the first time he went with the Prince of Wales to Cliefden, he made a nightgown, cap, and slippers of gold brocade, in which he came down to breakfast the next morning.
My friend M'Lean is still the fashion: have not I reason to call him my friend? He says, if the pistol had shot me, he had another for himself. Can I do less than say I will be hanged if he is? They have made a print, a very dull one, of what I think I said to Lady Caroline Petersham about him,
,Thus I stand like the Turk with his doxies around!"
You have seen in the papers a Hanoverian duel, but may be you don't know that it was an affair of jealousy. Swiegel, the slain, was here two years ago, and paid his court so Assiduously to the Countess(180) that it was intimated to him to return; and the summer we went thither afterwards, he was advised to stay at his villa. Since that, he has grown more discreet and a favourite. Freychappel came hither lately, was proclaimed a beauty by the monarch, and to return the compliment, made a tender of all his charms where Swiegel had. the latter recollected his own passion Jostled Freychappel, fought, and was killed. I am glad he never heard what poor Gibberne was intended for.
They have put in the papers a good story made on White's: a man dropped down dead at the door, was carried in: the club immediately made bets whether he was dead or not, and when they were going to bleed him, the wagerers for his death interposed, and said it would affect the fairness of the bet.
Mr. Whithed has been so unlucky as to have a large part of his seat,(181) which he had just repaired, burnt down: it is a great disappointment to me, too, who was going thither Gothicizing. I want an act of parliament to make master-builders liable to pay for any damage occasioned by fire before their workmen have quitted it. Adieu! This I call a very gossiping letter; I wish you don't call it worse.
(172) Joseph Damer, afterwards created Lord Milton in Ireland, married Lady Caroline Sackville, daughter of Lionel, Duke of Dorset.
(173) Thomas Pelham, of Stanmer; a young gentleman who travelled with Mr. Milbank.
(174) The highest part of the Apennine between Florence and Bologna.
(175) Mrs. Temple, widow of Lord Palmerston's son: she was afterwards married to Lord Abergavenny.
(176) Frances, second daughter of Henry Pelham, chancellor of the exchequer. Mr. Thomas Pelham married Miss Frankland.
(177) The two Craggs, father and son, were successively members of the administration during the reign of George the First, in the post of secretary of state. The father died in 1718, and the son in 1720; and Pope consecrated a beautiful epitaph to the memory of the latter. They are both supposed to have been deeply implicated in the iniquities of the South Sea bubble.-D.
(178) This was the celebrated collection of portraits, principally by Vandyck, which Lord Dartmouth, in his notes on Burnet, distinctly accuses the Lord Chancellor Clarendon of having obtained by rapacious and corrupt means; that is, as bribes from the "old rebels," who had plundered them from the houses of the royalists, and who, at the Restoration, found it necessary to make fair weather with the ruling powers. The extensive and miscellaneous nature of the collection (now divided between Bothwell Castle, in Scotland, and The Grove, in Hertfordshire) very strongly confirms this accusation. An additional confirmation is to be found in a letter of Walpole, addressed to Richard Bentley, Esq. and dated Sept. 1753, in which he says, "At Burford I saw the house of Mr. Lenthal, the descendant of the Speaker. The front is good; and a chapel, connected by two or three arches, which let the garden appear through, has a pretty effect; but the inside of the mansion is bad, and ill-furnished. Except a famous picture of Sir Thomas More's family, the portraits are rubbish, though celebrated. I am told that the Speaker, who really had a fine collection, made his peace by presenting them to Cornbury, where they were well known, till the Duke of Marlborough bought that seat."-D.
(179) Henry Rich, Earl of Holland, the favourite of Queen Henrietta Maria.-D.
180) Lady Yarmouth.
(181) Southwick, in Hampshire.
80 Letter 29 To George Montagu, Esq. Strawberry Hill, Sept. 10, 1750.
You must not pretend to be concerned at having missed one here, when I had repeatedly begged you, to let me know what day you would call; and even after you had learnt that I was to come the next day, you paraded by my house with all your matrimonial streamers flying, without even saluting the future castle. To punish this slight, I shall accept your offer of a visit on the return of your progress; I shall be here, and Mrs. leneve will not.
I feel for the poor Handasyde.(182) If I wanted examples for to deter one from making all the world happy, from obliging, from being always in good-humour and spirits, she should be my memento. You find long wise faces every day, that tell you riches cannot make one happy. No, can't they? What pleasantry is that poor woman fallen from! and what a joyous feel must Vanneck(183) have expired in, Who could call and think the two Schutzes his friends, and leave five hundred pounds apiece to their friendship-. nay, riches made him so happy, that, in the overflowing of his satisfaction, he has bequeathed a hundred pounds apiece to eighteen fellows, whom he calls his good friends, that favoured him with their company on Fridays. He took it mighty kind that Captain James de Normandie, and twenty such names, that came out of the Minories, would constrain themselves to live upon him once a week.
I should like to visit the castles and groves of your old Welsh ancestors with you: by the draughts I have seen, I have always imagined that Wales preserved the greatest remains of ancient days, and have often wished to visit Picton Castle, the seat of my Philipps-progenitors.
Make my best compliments to your sisters, and with their leave make haste to this side of the world; you will be extremely welcome hither as soon and for as long as you like; I can promise you nothing very agreeable, but that I will try to get our favourite Mr. Bentley to meet you. Adieu!
(182) The widow of Brigadier-General Handasyde.-E.
(183) The legacies bequeathed by Gerard Vanneck amounted altogether to more than a hundred thousand pounds. The residue of his property he left to his brother, Joshua Vanneck, ancestor of Lord Huntingfield.-E.
81 Letter 30 To Sir Horace Mann. Arlington Street, September 20, 1750.
I only write you a line to answer some of your questions, and to tell you that I can't answer others.
I have inquired much about Dr. Mead, but can't tell you any thing determinately: his family positively deny the foundation of the reports, but every body does 'not believe their evidence. Your brother is positive that there is much of truth in his being undone, and even that there will be a sale of his collection(184) when the town comes to town. I wish for Dr. Cocchi's sake it be false. I have given your brother Middleton's last piece to send you. Another fellow of Eton(185) has popped out a sermon against the Doctor since his death, with a note to one of the pages, that is the true sublime of ecclesiastic absurdity. He is speaking against the custom of dividing the Bible into chapters and verses, and says it often encumbers the sense. This note, though long, I must transcribe, for it would wrong the author to paraphrase his nonsense:—"It is to be wished, therefore, I think, that a fair edition were set forth of the original Scriptures, for the use of learned men in their closets, in which there should be no notice, either in text or margin, of chapter, or verse, or paragraph, or any such arbitrary distinctions, (now mind,) and I might go so far as to say even any pointing or stops. It could not but be matter of much satisfaction, and much use, to have it in our power to recur occasionally to such an edition, where the understanding might have full range, free from any external influence from the eye, and the continual danger of being either confined or misguided by it." Well, Dr. Cocchi, do English divines yield to the Romish for refinements in absurdity! did one ever hear of a better way (if making sense of any writing than by reading it without stops! Most of the parsons that read the first and second lessons practise Mr. Cooke's method of making them intelligible, for they seldom observe any stops. George Selwyn proposes to send the man his own sermon, and desire him to scratch out the stops, in order to help it to some sense.
For the questions in Florentine politics, and who are to be your governors, I am totally ignorant, you must ask Sir Charles Williams; he is the present ruling star of our negotiations. His letters are as much admired as ever his verses were. He has met the ministers of the two angry empresses, and pacified Russian savageness and Austrian haughtiness. He is to teach the monarch of Prussia to fetch and carry, .@;, unless they happen to treat in iambics, or begin to settle the limits of' Parnassus instead of' those of Silesia. As he is so good a pacifier, I don't know but we may want his assistance at home before the end of the winter:
"With secretaries, secretaries jar,
And rival bureaus threat approaching war."
Those that deal in elections look still higher, and snuff a new Parliament; but I don't believe the King ill, for the Prince is building baby-houses at Kew; and the Bishop of Oxford has laid aside his views on Canterbury, and is come roundly back to St. James's for the deanery of St. Paul's.(186) I could not help being diverted the other day with the life of another Bishop of Oxford, one Parker, who, like Secker, set out a Presbyterian, and died King James the Second's arbitrary master of Maudlin College.(187)
M'Lean is condemned, and will hang. I am honourably mentioned in a Grub-street ballad for not having contributed to his sentence. There are as many prints and pamphlets about him as about the earthquake. His profession grows no joke: I was sitting in my own dining-room on Sunday night, the clock had not struck eleven, when I heard a loud cry of "Stop thief!" a highwayman had attacked a postchaise in Picadilly, within fifty yards of this house: the fellow was pursued, rode over the watchman, almost killed him, and escaped. I expect to be robbed some night in my own garden at Strawberry; I have a pond of gold fish, that to be sure they will steal to burn like old lace; and they may very easily, for the springs are so much sunk with this hot summer that I am forced to water my pond once a week! The season is still so fine, that I yesterday, in Kensington town, saw a horse-chestnut tree in second bloom.
As I am in town, and not within the circle of Pope's walks, I may tell you a story without fearing he should haunt me with the ghost of a satire. I went the other day to see little Spence,(188) who fondles an old mother in imitation of Pope. The good old woman was mighty civil to me, and, among other chat, said she supposed I had a good neighbour in Mr. Pope. "Lord! Madam, he has been dead these seven years!"—"Ah! ay, Sir, I had forgot." When the poor old soul dies, how Pope will set his mother's spectre upon her for daring to be ignorant "if Dennis be alive or dead!"(189)
(184) His collection was not sold till after his death, in the years 1754 and 1755.
(185) William Cooke.
(186) Dr. Secker. In November he was appointed to the said deanery.-E.
(187) There is the following entry in Evelyn's Diary for March 23, 1687-8: "Dr. Parker, Bishop of Oxford, who so lately published his extraordinary treatise about transubstantiation, and for abrogating the test and penal laws, died. He was esteemed a violent, passionate, haughty man; but yet being pressed to declare for the church of Rome, he utterly refused it. A remarkable end."-E.
(188) The Rev. Joseph Spence, author of an Essay on Pope's Odyssey, Polymetus, etc. See vol. i. pp. 27, 65. (He was always strongly attached to his mother. When on his travels, in 1739, he thus wrote to her:—"I am for happiness in my own way, and according to my notions of it, I might as well, and better, have it in living with you, at our cottage in Birchanger, than in any palace. As my affairs stand at present, 'tis likely that we shall have enough to live quite at our ease: when I desire more than that, may I lose what I have!"-E.)
(189) "I was not born for courts or great affairs;
I pay my debts, believe, and say my prayers;
Can sleep without a poem in my head,
Nor know if Dennis be alive or dead."
Pope, Prologue to Satires.-E.
83 Letter 31 To Sir Horace Mann. Arlington Street, Oct. 18, 1750.
I had determined so seriously to write to Dr. Cocchi a letter myself to thank him for his Baths of Pisa, that it was impossible not to break my resolution. It was to be in Italian, because I thought their superlative issimos would most easily express how much I like it, and I had already gathered a tolerable quantity together, of entertaining, charming, useful, agreeable, and had cut and turned them into the best sounding! Tuscan adjectives I could find in my memory or my Crusca: but, alack! when I came to range them, they did not fadge at all; they neither expressed what I would say, nor half what I would say, and so I gave it all up, and am reduced to beg you would say it all for me; and make as many excuses and as many thanks for me as you can, between your receiving this, and your next going to bully Richcourt, or whisper Count Lorenzi. I laughed vastly at your idea of the latter's hopping into matrimony; and I like as much Stainville's jumping into Richcourt's place. If your pedigree, which is on its journey, arrives before his fall, he will not dare to exclude YOU from the libro d'oro— -why, child, you will find yourself as sumptuously descended as
—"All the blood of all the Howards."
or as the best-bred Arabian mare, that ever neighed beneath Abou-al-eb-saba-bedin-lolo-ab-alnin! But pray now, how does cet homme l`a, as the Princess used to call him, dare to tap the chapter of birth! I thought he had not had a grandfather since the creation, that was not born within these twenty years!-But come, I must tell you news, big news! the treaty of commerce with Spain is arrived signed. Nobody expected it would ever come, which I believe is the reason it is reckoned so good; for autrement one should not make the most favourable conjectures, as they don't tell us how good it is. In general, they say, the South Sea Company is to have one hundred thousand pounds in lieu of their annual ship; which, if it is not over and above the ninety-five thousand pounds that was allowed to be due to them, it appears to me only as if there were some halfpence remaining when the bill was paid, and the King of Spain had given them to the company to drink his health. What does look well for the treaty is, that stocks rise to highwater mark; and what is to me as clear, is, that the exploded Don Benjamin(190) has repaired what the patriot Lord Sandwich had forgot, or not known to do at Aix-la-Chapelle. I conclude Keene will now come over and enjoy the Sabbath of his toils. He and Sir Charles are the plenipotentiaries in fashion. Pray, brush up your Minyhood and figure too: blow the coals between the Pope and the Venetians, till the Inquisition burns the latter, and they the Inquisition. If you should happen to receive instructions on this head, don't wait for St. George's day before you present your memorial to the Senate, as they say Sir Harry Wotton was forced to do for St. James's, when those aquatic republicans had quarrelled with Paul the Fifth, and James the First thought the best way in the world to broach a schism was by beginning it with a quibble. I have had some Protestant hopes too of a civil war in France, between the King and his clergy: but it is a dull age, and people don't set about cutting one another's throats with any spirit! Robbing is the only thing that goes on with any vivacity, though my friend Mr. M'Lean is hanged. The first Sunday after his condemnation, three thousand people went to see him; he fainted away twice with the heat of his cell. You can't conceive the ridiculous rage there is of going to Newgate; and the prints that are published of the malefactors, and the memoirs of their lives and deaths set forth with as much parade as—as—Marshal Turenne's—we have no General's worth making a parallel.
The pasquinade was a very great one.(191) When I was desiring YOU to make speeches for me to Dr. Cocchi, I might as well have drawn a bill upon you too in Mr. Chute's name: for I am sure he will never write himself. Indeed, at present he is in his brother's purgatory, and then you will not wonder if he does nothing but pray to get Out of it. I am glad you are getting into a villa: my castle will, I believe, begin to rear its battlements next spring. I have got an immense cargo of painted glass from Flanders: indeed, several of the pieces are Flemish arms; but I call them the achievements of the old Counts of Strawberry. Adieu!
(190) Benjamin Keene, afterwards knight of the bath, ambassador at Madrid, was exceedingly abused by the Opposition in Sir Robert Walpole's time, under the name of Don Benjamin, for having made the convention in 1739. [Mr. Pelham, in a letter to Mr. Pitt of the 12th of October 1750, announcing the signing of the treaty with Spain, says, "I hope and believe, when you see it and consider the whole, you will be of opinion, that my friend Keene has acted ably, honestly, and bravely; but, poor man! he is so sore with old bruises, that he still feels the smart, and fears another thrashing." See Chatham Correspondence, vol. i. P. 50.)
(191) It alluded to the quarrel between the Pope and the Venetians. Marforio asked Pasquin, "Perche si triste?"- -"Perche mon avremo pi`u Comedia, Pantalone `e partito."-D.
84 letter 32 To Sir Horace Mann. Arlington Street, Nov. 19, 1750.
I stayed to write to you, till I could tell you that I had seen Mr. Pelham and Mr. Milbank, and could give you some history of a new administration—but I found it was too long to wait for either. I pleaded with your brother as I did with you against visiting your friends, especially when, to encourage me, he told me that you had given them a very advantageous opinion of me. That is the very reason, says I, why I don't choose to see them: they will be extremely civil to me at first; and then they will be told I have horns and hoofs., and they will shun me, which I should not like. I know how unpopular I am with the people with whom they must necessarily live; and, not desiring to be otherwise, I must either seek your friends where I would most avoid them, or have them very soon grow to avoid me. However, I went and left my name for Mr. Pelham, where your brother told me he lodged, eight days ago; he was to come but that night to his lodgings, and by his telling your brother he believed I had not been, I concluded he would not accept that for a visit; so last Thursday, I left my name for both—to-day is Monday, and I have heard nothing of them—very likely I shall before you receive this—I only mention it to show you that you was in the wrong and I in the right, to think that there would be no empressement for an acquaintance. Indeed, I would not mention it, as you will dislike being disappointed by any odd behaviour of your friends, if it were not to justify myself, and convince you of my attention in complying with whatever you desire of me. The King, I hear, commands Mr. Pelham's dancing; and he must like Mr. Milbank, as he distinguished himself much in a tournament of bears at Hanover.
For the Ministry, it is all in shatters: the Duke of Newcastle is returned more averse to the Bedfords than ever: he smothered that Duke with embraces at their first meeting, and has never borne to be in the room with him since. I saw the meeting of Octavia and Cleopatra;(192) the Newcastle was all haughtiness and coldness. Mr. Pelham, who foresaw the storm, had prudently prepared himself for the breach by all kind of invectives against the house of Leveson. The ground of all, besides Newcastle's natural fickleness and jealousy, is, that the Bedford and Sandwich have got the Duke. A crash @as been expected, but people now seem to think that they will rub on a little longer, though all the world seems indifferent whether they will or not. Mankind is so sick of all the late follies and changes, that nobody inquires or cares whether the Duke of Newcastle is prime minister, or whom he will associate with him. The Bedfords have few attachments, and Lord Sandwich is universally hated. The only difficulty is, who shall succeed them; and it is even a question whether some of the old discarded must not cross over and figure in again. I mean, it has even been said, that Lord Granville(193) will once more be brought upon the stage:-if he should, and should push too forward, could they again persuade people to resign with them? The other nominees for the secretaryship are, Pitt, the Vienna Sir Thomas Robinson, and even that formal piece of dulness -,it the Hague, Lord Holderness. The talk of the Chancellor's being president, in order to make room, by the promotion of the Attorney to the seals, for his second son(194) to be solicitor, as I believe I once mentioned to you, is revived; though he told Mr. Pelham, that if ever he retired, it should be to Wimple.(195) In the mean time, the Master of the Horse, the Groom of the Stole, the Presidentship, (vacant by the nomination of Dorset to Ireland in the room of Lord Harrington, who is certainly to be given up to his master's dislike,) and the Blues, are still vacant. Indeed, yesterday I heard that Honeywood(196) was to have the latter. Such is the Interregnum of our politics! The Prince's faction lie still, to wait the event, and the disclosing of the new treaty. Your friend Lord Fane,(197) some time ago had a mind to go to Spain: the Duke of Bedford, who I really believe is an honest man, said very bluntly, "Oh! my lord, nobody can do there but Keene." Lord North is made governor to Prince George with a thousand a-year, and an earl's patent in his pocket; but as the passing of the patent is in the pocket of time, it would not sell for much. There is a new preceptor, one Scott,(198) recommended by Lord Bolingbroke. You may add that recommendation to the chapter of our wonderful politics. I have received your letter from Fiesoli Hill; poor Strawberry blushes to have you compare it with such a prospect as yours. I say nothing to the abrupt sentences about Mr. B. I have long seen his humour—and a little of your partiality to his wife.
We are alarmed with the distemper being got among the horses: few have died yet, but a farrier who attended General Ligonier's dropped down dead in the stable. Adieu!
(192) The DUCHESSES of Newcastle and Bedford.
(193) "So anxious was the Duke of Newcastle to remove his colleague, that he actually proposed either to open a negotiation with Earl Granville for settling a new administration, or to conciliate the Duke of Cumberland, without the interposition of Mr. Pelham, by agreeing to substitute Lord Sandwich in the room of the Duke of Bedford." Coxe's Pelham, vol. ii. p. 137.-E.
(194) Charles Yorke.-D.
(195) Wimpole the Chancellor's seat in Cambridgeshire.
(196) Sir Philip Honeywood, knight of the bath.
(197) Lord Viscount Fane, formerly minister at Florence.
(198) Coxe states, that Mr. Scott was recommended to the Prince of Wales by Lord Bathurst, at the suggestion of Lord Bolingbroke, and that he was favoured by the Princess.-E.
86 Letter 33 To Sir Horace Mann. Arlington Street, Dec. 19, 1750.
Well! you may be easy; your friends have been to see me at last, but it has so happened that we have never once met, nor have I even seen their persons. They live at Newcastle-house; and though I give you my word my politics are exceedingly neutral, I happen to be often at the court of Bedford. The Interministerium still subsists; no place is filled up but the Lieutenancy of Ireland; the Duke of Dorset was too impatient to wait. Lord Harrington remains a melancholy sacrifice to the famous general Resignation,(199) which he led up, and of which he is the only victim. Overtures have been made to Lord Chesterfield to be president; but he has declined it; for he says he cannot hear causes, as he is grown deaf. I don't think the proposal was imprudent, for if they should happen, as they have now and then happened, to want to get rid of him again, they might without consequence; that is, I suppose nobody would follow him out, any more than they did when he resigned voluntarily. For these two days every body has expected to see Lord Granville president, and his friend the Duke of Bolton, colonel of the Blues; two nominations that would not be very agreeable, nor probably calculated to be so to the Duke, who favours the Bedford faction. His old governor Mr. Poyntz(200) is just dead, ruined in his circumstances by a devout brother, whom he trusted, and by a simple wife, who had a devotion of marrying, dozens of her poor cousins at his expense: you know she was the Fair Circassian.(201) Mr. Poyntz was called a very great man, but few knew any thing of his talents, for he was timorous to childishness. The Duke has done greatly for his family, and secured his places for his children, and sends his two sons abroad, allowing them eight hundred pounds a year. The little Marquis of Rockingham has drowned himself in claret; and old Lord Dartmouth is dead of ague.(202) When Lord Bolingbroke's last work was published, on the State of Parties at the late King's accession, Lord Dartmouth said, he supposed Lord Bolingbroke believed every body was dead who had lived at that period.
There has been a droll cause in Westminster Hall: a man laid another a wager that he produced a person who should weigh as much again as the Duke. When they had betted, they recollected not knowing how to desire the Duke to step into a scale. They agreed to establish his weight at twenty stone, which, however, is supposed to be two more than he weighs. One Bright was then produced, who is since dead, and who actually weighed forty-two stone and a half.)203) As soon as he was dead, the person who had lost objected that he had been weighed in his clothes, and thought it was impossible to suppose that his clothes could weigh above two stone, they went to law. There were the Duke's twenty stone bawled over a thousand times,-but the righteous law decided against the man who had won!
Poor Lord Lempster(204) is more Cerberus(205) than ever; (you remember his bon-mot that proved such a blunder;) he has lost twelve thousand pounds at hazard to an ensign of the Guards-but what will you think of the folly of a young Sir Ralph Gore,(206) who took it into his head that he would not be waited on by drawers in brown frocks and blue aprons, and has literally given all the waiters at the King's Arms rich embroideries and laced clothes! The town is still empty: the parties for the two playhouses are the only parties that retain any spirit. I will tell you one or two bon-mots of Quin the actor. Barry would have had him play the ghost in Hamlet, a part much beneath the dignity of Quin, who would give no other answer but, "I won't catch cold behind." I don't know whether you remember that the ghost is always ridiculously dressed, with a morsel of armour before, and only a black waistcoat and breech behind. The other is an old one, but admirable. When Lord Tweedale was nominal secretary of State for Scotland, Mitchell,(207) his secretary, was supping With Quin, who wanted him to stay another bottle; but he pleaded my lord's business. "Then," said Quin, "only stay till I have told you a story. A vessel was becalmed: the master called to one of the cabin-boys at the top of the mast, 'Jack, what are you doing?' 'Nothing, Sir.' He called to another boy, a little below the first, 'Will, what are you doing?' 'Helping Jack, sir.'" Adieu!
(199) In the year 1746.
)200) Stephen Poyntz, formerly British minister in Sweden, after being tutor to Lord Townshend's sons.
(201) Anna maria Mordaunt, maid of honour to Queen Caroline. A young gentleman at Oxford wrote the "Fair Circassian" on her, and died for love of her. [The "Fair Circassian," a dramatic performance which appeared in 1720, Has been generally attributed to the Rev. Dr. Samuel Croxall, author of "Fables of Esop and others, translated into English, with instructive applications," who died in 1752, at an advanced age.]
(202) William, first Earl of Dartmouth, secretary of state to Queen Anne. He died on the 15th of December, in his seventy-ninth year.-E.
(203) Edward bright died at Malden in Essex, on the 10th of November, at the age of thirty. He was an active man till a year or two before that event; when his corpulency so overpowered his strength, that his life was a burthen to him.-E.
(204) Eldest son of Thomas Fermor, Earl of Pomfret, whom, in 1753, he succeeded in the title.
(205) When he was on his travels, and run much in debt, his parents paid his debts: Some more came out afterwards; he wrote to his mother, that he could only compare himself to Cerberus, who, when one head was cut off, had another spring up in its room.
(206) In 1747, when only a captain, Sir Ralph distinguished himself at the battle Of Laffeldt. In 1764, he was created Baron Gore, and in 1771, Earl of Ross: in 1788, he was appointed commander-in-chief in Ireland, and died in 1802.-E.
(207) Andrew Mitchell, afterwards commissary at Antwerp. [And, for many years, envoy from England to the court of Prussia. In 1765 he was created a knight of the bath, and died at Berlin in 1771. His valuable collection of letters, forming sixty-eight volumes, was purchased in 1810, by the trustees of the British Museum.-E.
88 Letter 34 To Sir Horace Mann. Strawberry Hill, Dec. 22, 1750.
As I am idling away some Christmas days here, I begin a letter to you, that perhaps will not set out till next year. Any changes in the ministry will certainly be postponed till that date: it is even believed that no alteration will be made till after the session; they will get the money raised -,And the new treaty ratified in Parliament before they break and part. The German ministers arc more alarmed, and seem to apprehend themselves in as tottering a situation as some of the English: not that any secretary of state is jealous of them—their Countess(208) is on the wane. The housekeeper(209) at Windsor, an old monster that Verrio painted for one of the Furies, is dead. The revenue is large, and has been largely solicited. Two days ago, at the drawing-room, the gallant Orondates strode up to Miss Chudleigh, and told her he was glad to have an opportunity of obeying her commands, that he appointed her mother housekeeper at Windsor, and hoped she would not think a kiss too great a reward—against all precedent he kissed her in the circle. He has had a hankering these two years. Her life, which is now of thirty years' standing, has been a little historic.(210) Why should not experience and a charming face on her side, and near seventy years on his, produce a title?
Madame de Mirepoix is returned: she gives a lamentable account of another old mistress,(211) her mother. She has not seen her since the Princess went to Florence, which she it seems has left with great regret; with greater than her beauty, whose ruins she has not discovered: but with few teeth, few hairs, sore eyes, and wrinkles, goes bare-necked and crowned with jewels! Madame Mirepoix told me a reply of Lord Cornbury, that pleased me extremely. They have revived at Paris old Fontenelle's opera of Peleus and Thetis: he complained of being dragged upon the stage again for one of his juvenile performances, and said he could not bear to be hissed now: Lord Cornbury immediately replied to him out of the very opera,
"Jupiter en courroux
'
Ne peut rien contre vous,
Vous `etes immortel."
Our old laureat has been dying: when he thought himself at the extremity, he wrote this lively, good-natured letter to the Duke of Grafton:-
""May it please your Grace: "I know no nearer way of repaying your favours for these last twenty years than by recommending the bearer, Mr. Henry Jones, for the vacant laurel: Lord Chesterfield will tell you more of him. I don't know the day of my death, but while I live, I shall not cease to be, your Grace's, etc.
"Colley Cibber." '
I asked my Lord Chesterfield who this Jones(212) is; he told me a better poet would not take the post, and a worse ought not to have it. There are two new bon-mots of his lordship much repeated, better than his ordinary. He says, he would not be president, because he would not be between two fires;(213) and that"the two brothers are like Arbuthnot's Lindamira and Indamora;(214) the latter was an able, tractable gentlewoman, but her sister was always quarrelling and kicking and as they grew together, there was no parting them.
You will think my letters are absolute jest-and-story books, unless you will be so good as to dignify them with the title of Walpoliana. Under that hope, I will tell you a very odd new story. A citizen had advertised a reward for the discovery of a person who had stolen sixty guineas out of his scrutoire. He received a message from a condemned criminal in Newgate, with the offer of revealing the thief. Being a cautious grave personage, he took two friends along with him. The convict told him that he was the robber; and when he doubted, the fellow began with these circumstances; You came home such a night, and put the money into your bureau: I was Under your bed: you undressed, and then went to the foot of the garret stairs, and cried, 'Mary, come to bed to me-'" "Hold, hold," said the citizen, "I am convinced." "Nay," said the fellow, "you shell hear all, for our intrigue saved your life. Mary replied, 'If any body wants me, they may come up to me:' you went: I robbed your bureau in the mean time, but should have cut your throat, if you had gone into your bed instead of Mary S."
The conclusion of my letter will be a more serious story, but very proper for the Walpoliana. I have given you scraps of Ashton's history. To perfect his ingratitude, he has struck up an intimacy with my second brother, and done his utmost to make a new quarrel between us, on the merit of having broke with me on the affair of Dr. Middleton. I don't know whether I ever told you that my brother hated Middleton, who was ill with a Dr. Thirlby,(215) a creature of his. He carried this and his jealousy of me so far, that once when Lord Mountford brought Middleton for one night only to Houghton my brother wrote my father a most outrageous letter, telling him that he knew I had fetched Middleton to Houghton to write my father's life, and how much more capable Thirlby was of this task. Can one help admiring in these instances the dignity of human nature! Poor Mrs. Middleton is alarmed with a scheme that I think she very justly suspects as a plot of the clergy to get at and suppress her husband's papers. He died in a lawsuit with a builder, who has since got a monition from the Commons for her to produce all the Doctor's effects and papers. The whole debt is but eight hundred pounds. She offered ten thousand pounds security, and the fellow will not take it. Is there clergy in it, or no? Adieu!
(208) Lady Yarmouth. The new amour did not proceed.
(209) Mrs. Marriot.
(210) She was, though maid of honour, privately married to Augustus, second son of the late Lord Hervey, by whom she had two children; but disagreeing, the match was not owned. She afterwards, still maid of honour, lived very publicly with the Duke of Kingston, and at last married him during Mr. Hervey's life.
(211) Princess Craon, formerly mistress of Leopold, Duke of Lorraine.
(212) I think he was an Irish bricklayer; he wrote an "Earl of Essex." ["Having a natural inclination for the Muses," says his biographer, "he pursued his devotions to them even during the labours of his more mechanical avocations, and composing a line of brick and a line of verse alternately, his wall and poems rose up in growth together." His tragedy of the "Earl of Essex" came out at Covent Garden in 1753, and met with considerable success. He died in great want, in 1770.-E.]
(213) Meaning President of the Council. The two fires were the Pelham brothers; between whom all private intercourse was at this time suspended.-E.
(214) See the Memoirs of Martinus Scriblerus in Swift's Works; Indamora alludes to Mr. Pelham, Lindamira to the Duke of Newcastle.
(215) For a notice of the Doctor, see ant`e.-E.
89 Letter 35 To Sir Horace Mann. Arlington Street, Feb. 9, 1751.
You will wonder that I, who am pretty punctual, even when I have little to say, should have been so silent at the beginning of a session: I will tell you some reasons why; what I had to tell you was not finished; I wished to give you an entire account: besides, we have had so vigorous an attendance, that with that, and the fatigue, it was impossible to write. Before the Parliament met, there was a dead tranquillity, and no symptoms of party spirit. What is more extraordinary, though the Opposition set out vehemently the very first day, there has appeared ten times greater spirit on the court side, a Whig vehemence that has rushed on heartily. I have been much entertained-what should I have been, if I had lived in the times of the Exclusion-bill, and the end of queen Anne's reign, when votes and debates really tended to something! Now they tend but to the alteration of a dozen places, perhaps, more or less-but come, I'll tell you, and you shall judge for yourself. The morning the Houses met, there was universally dispersed, by the penny post, and by being dropped into the areas of houses, a paper called Constitutional Queries, a little equivocal, for it is not clear whether they were levelled at the Family, or by Part of the Family at the Duke.(216) The Address was warmly opposed, and occasioned a remarkable speech of Pitt, in recantation of his former orations on the Spanish, war, and in panegyric on the Duke of Newcastle, wit whom e is pushing himself, and by whom he is pushed at all rates, in opposition to Lord Sandwich and the Bedfords. Two or three days afterwards there were motions in both Houses to have the Queries publicly burnt. That too occasioned a debate with us, and a fine speech of Lord Egmont, artfully condemning the paper, though a little suspected of it, and yet supporting some of the reasonings in it. There was no division on the resolution; but two days afterwards we had a very extraordinary and unforeseen one. Mr. Pelham had determined to have 'but 8,000 seamen this year, instead of 10,000. Pitt and his cousins, without any notice given, declared with the Opposition for the greater number. The key to this you will find in Pit'S whole behaviour; whenever he wanted new advancement, he used to go off He has openly met with great discouragement now; though he and we know Mr. Pelham so -well, that it Will not be surprising if, though baffled, he still carries his point of secretary of state. However, the old corps resented this violently, and rushed up their old anger: Mr. Pelham was inclined to give way, but Lord Hartington, at the head of the young Whigs, divided the House, and Pitt had the mortification of being followed into the minority by only fifteen persons. The King has been highly pleased with this event; and has never named the Pitts and Grenvilles to the Duke of Newcastle, but to abuse them, and to commend the spirit of the young people. It has not weakened the Bedford faction, who have got more strength by the clumsy politics of another set of their enemies. There has all the summer been a Westminster petition in agitation, driven on by the independent electors, headed by Lord Elibank, Murray his brother, and one or two gentlemen. Sir John Cotton, and Cooke the member for Middlesex, discouraged it all they could, and even stifled the first drawn, which was absolutely treason. However, Cooke at last presented one from the inhabitants, and Lord Egmont another from Sir George Vandeput; and Cooke even made a strong invective against the High-bailiff; on which Lord Trentham produced and read a letter written by Cooke to the High-bailiff, when he was in their interest, and stuffed with flattery to him. Lord Trentham's friends then called in the High-bailiff, who accused some persons of hindering and threatening him on the scrutiny, and, after some contention, named Crowle, counsel for Sir George Vandeput, Gibson, an upholsterer and independent, and Mr. Murray.(217) These three were ordered to attend on the following Thursday to defend themselves. Before that day came, we had the report on the eight thousand seamen, when Pitt and his associates made speeches of lamentation on their disagreement with Pelham, whom they flattered inordinately. This ended in a burlesque quarrel between Pitt and Hampden,(218) a buffoon who hates the cousinhood, and thinks his name should entitle him to Pitt's office. We had a very long day on Crowle's defence, who had called the power of the House brutum fulmen: he was very submissive, and was dismissed with a reprimand on his knees. Lord Egmont was so severely handled by Fox, that he has not recovered his spirits since. He used to cry up Fox against Mr. Pelham, but since the former has seemed rather attached to the Duke and the Duke of Bedford, the party affect to heap incense on Pelham and Pitt—and it is returned.
The day that Murray came to the bar he behaved with great confidence, but at last desired counsel, which was granted: in the mean time we sent Gibson to Newgate. Last Wednesday was the day of trial: the accusation was plentifully proved against Murray, and it was voted to send him close prisoner to Newgate. His party still struggling against the term close, the Whigs grew provoked, and resolved he should receive his sentence on his knees at the bar. To this he refused to submit. The Speaker stormed, and the House and its honour grew outrageous at the dilemma they were got into, and indeed out of which we are not got yet. If he gets the better, he will indeed be a meritorious martyr for the cause: en attendant, he is strictly shut up in Newgate.(219)
By these anecdotes you will be able to judge a little of the news you mention in your last, of January 29th, and will perceive that our ministerial vacancies and successions are not likely to be determined soon. Niccolini's account of the aversion to Lord Sandwich is well grounded, though as to inflexible resentments, there cannot easily be any such thing, where parties and factions are so fluctuating as in this country. I was to have dined the other day at Madame de Mirepoix's with my Lord Bolingbroke, but he was ill. She said, she had repented asking me, as she did not know if I should like it. , Oh! Madam, I have gone through too many of those things to make any objection to the only one that remains!"
I grieve much for the return of pains in your head and breast;
I flattered myself that you had quite mastered them.
I have seen your Pelham and Milbank, not much, but I like the latter; I have some notion, from thinking that he resembles you in his manner. The other seems very good-humoured, but he is nothing but complexion. Dame is returned; he looks ill; but I like him better than I used to do, for he commends you. My Lord Pomfret is made ranger of the parks, and by consequence my Lady is queen of the Duck Island.(220) Our greatest miracle is Lady Mary Wortley's son,(221) whose adventures have made so much noise- his parts are not proportionate, but his expense is incredible. His father scarce allows him any thing: yet he plays, dresses, diamonds himself, even to distinct shoe-buckles for a frock, and has more snuff-boxes than would suffice a Chinese idol with an hundred noses. But the most curious part of his dress, which he has brought from Paris, is an iron wig; you literally would not know it from hair—I believe it is on this account that the Royal Society have just chosen him of their body. This may surprise you: what I am now going to tell you will not, for you have only known her follies - the Duchess of Queensbury told Lady Di. Egerton,(222) a pretty daughter of the Duchess of Bridgewater, that she was going to make a ball for her: she did, but did not invite her: the girl was mortified, and Mr. Lyttelton, her father-in-law, sent the mad Grace a hint of it. She sent back this card-. "The advertisement came to hand; it was very pretty and very ingenious; but every thing that is pretty and ingenious does not always succeed; the Duchess of Q. piques herself on her house being unlike Socrates's; his was small and held all his friends; hers is large, but will not hold half of hers: postponed, but not forgot: unalterable." Adieu!
(217) The Hon. Alexander Murray, fourth son of Alexander, fourth Lord Elibank. This family was for the most part Jacobite in its principles.-D.
(218) John Hampden, Esq., the last descendant in the file line of the celebrated Hampden. On his death in 1754, he left his estates to the Hon. Robert Trevor, son of Lord Trevor, who was descended from Ruth, the daughter of the Patriot.-D.
(219) mr Murray's health appearing to be in danger, the House, upon the report of his physician, offered to remove him from Newgate into the custody of the sergeant-at-arms: but he had the resolution to reject the offer, and to continue in Newgate till the end of the session; when he made a kind of triumphal procession to his own house, attended by the sheriffs of London, a large train of coaches, and the declamations of the populace.-E.
(220) Duck Island was a spot in St. James's Park, near the Bird-cage Walk; and was so called, because Charles the Second had established a decoy of ducks upon it. It was destroyed when the improvements and alterations took place in this park, about the year 1770.-D.
(221) Edward Wortley Montague, whose singular adventures and eccentricities are so well known. In 1747, he was chosen member for the county of Huntingdon; but in his senatorial capacity he did not distinguish himself. His expenses greatly exceeding his income, towards the end of this year he quitted the kingdom and went to Paris.-E.
(222) Daughter of Scroop, Duke of Bridgewater, by the Lady Rachel Russel, sister of the Duke of Bedford. Lady Diana Egerton was afterwards married to Lord Baltimore.
94 Letter 36 To Sir Horace Mann. Arlington Street, March 13, 1751.
You will be expecting the conclusion of Mr. Murray's history, but as he is too great a hero to submit, and not hero enough to terminate his prison in a more summary, or more English way, you must have patience, as we shall have, till the end of the session. His relations, who had leave to visit him, are excluded again: rougher methods with him are not the style of the age: in the mean time he is quite forgot. General Anstruther is now the object in fashion, or made so by a Sir Harry Erskine, a very fashionable figure in the world of politics, who has just come into Parliament, and has been laying a foundation for the next reign by attacking the Mutiny-bill, and occasionally General Anstruther, who treated him hardly ten years ago in Minorca. Anstruther has mutually persecuted and been persecuted by the Scotch ever since Porteous's affair, when, of all that nation, he alone voted for demolishing part of Edinburgh. This affair would be a trifle, if it had not opened the long-smothered rivalship between Fox and Pitt: for these ten days they have been civilly at war together; and Mr. Pelham is bruised between both. However, this impetuosity of Pitt has almost overset the total engrossment that the Duke of Newcastle had made of all power, and if they do not, as it is suspected, league with the Prince, you will not so soon hear of the fall of the Bedfords, as I had made you expect. With this quantity of factions ind infinite quantity of speakers, we have had a most fatiguing session, and seldom rise before nine or ten at night.
There have been two events, not political, equal to any absurdities or follies of former years. My Lady Vane(223) has literally published the memoirs of her own life, Only suppressing part of her lovers, no part of the success of the others with her: a degree of profligacy not to be accounted for; she does not want money, none of her lovers will raise her credit; and the number, all she had to brag of, concealed! The other is a play that has been acted by people of some fashion at Drury Lane, hired on purpose. They really acted so well that it is astonishing they should not have had sense enough not to act at all. You would know none of their names, should I tell you; but the chief were a family of Delavals, the eldest of which was married by one Foote, a player, to Lady Nassau Poulett,(224) who had kept the latter. The rage was so great to see this performance that the House of Commons literally adjourned at three o'clock on purpose: the footman's gallery was strung with blue ribands. What a wise people! what an august Senate! yet my Lord Granville once told the Prince, I forget on occasion of what folly, "Sir, indeed your Royal Highness is in the wrong to act thus; the English are a grave nation."
The King has been much out of order, but he is quite well again, and they say, not above sixty-seven! Adieu!
(223) Anne, second daughter of Mr. Hawes, the wife of William, Lord Viscount Vane. The history of her intrigues, communicated by herself, had just been published in Smollett's Adventures of Peregrine Pickle. See vol. i. Gray, in a letter to Walpole, of the 3d of March, writes, "Has that miracle of tenderness and sensibility (as she calls it), given you any amusement? Peregrine, whom she uses as a vehicle, is very poor indeed, with a few exceptions."-E.
(224) Isabella, youngest daughter and co-heiress of Thomas Tufton, Earl of Thanet, and widow of Lord Nassau Poulett, youngest brother of the Duke of Bolton. She was mad.
95 Letter 37 To Sir Horace Mann. Arlington Street, March 21, 1751.
What, another letter, -when I wrote to you but last week!- -Yes—and with an event too big to be kept for a regular interval. You will imagine from the conclusion of my last letter that our King is dead—or, before you receive this, you will probably have heard by flying couriers that it is only our King that was to be. In short, the Prince died last night between nine and ten. If I don't tell you ample details, it is because you must content yourself with hearing nothing but what I know true. He had had a pleurisy, and was recovered. Last Tuesday was se'nnight he went to attend the King's passing some bills in the House of Lords; from thence to Carlton House, very hot, where he unrobed, put on a light unaired frock and waistcoat, went to Kew, walked in a bitter day, came home tired, and lay down for three hours, upon a couch in a very cold room at Carlton House, that opens into the garden. Lord Egmont told him how dangerous it was, but the Prince did not mind him. My father once said to this King, when he was ill and royally untractable, "Sir, do you know what your father died of? of thinking he could not die." In short, the Prince relapsed that night, has had three physicians ever since, and has never been supposed out of danger till yesterday: a thrush had appeared, and for the two or three last evenings he had dangerous suppressions of breath. However, his family thought him so well yesterday, that there were cards in his outward room. Between nine and ten he was seized with a violent fit of coughing. Wilmot, and Hawkins the surgeon, were present: the former said, ,Sir, have you brought up all the phlegm? I hope this will be over in a quarter of an hour, and that your Royal Highness will have a good night." Hawkins had occasion to go out of the room, and said, "Here is something I don't like." The cough continued; the prince laid his hand upon his stomach, and said, "Je sens la mort." The page who held him up, felt him shiver, and cried out, The Prince is going!" The Princess was at the feet of the bed; she catched up a candle and ran to him, but before she got to the head of the bed, he was dead.(225)
Lord North was immediately sent to the King, who was looking over a table, where Princess Emily, the Duchess of Dorset, and Duke of Grafton were playing. He was extremely surprised, and said, "Why, they told me he was better!" He bid Lord North tell the Princess, he would do every thing she could desire; and has this morning sent her a very kind message in writing. He is extremely shocked—but no pity is too much for the Princess; she has eight children, and is seven months gone with another. She bears her affliction with great courage and sense. They asked her if the body was to be opened; she replied, what the King pleased.
This is all I know yet; you shall have fresh and fresh intelligence—for reflections on minorities, Regencies, Jacobitism, Oppositions, factions, I need not help you to them. You will make as many as any body, but those who reflect on their own disappointments. The creditors are no inconsiderable part of the moralists. They talk of fourteen hundred thousand pounds on post-obits. This I am sure I don't vouch; I Only know that I never am concerned to see the tables of the money-changers overturned and cast out of the temple.(226)
I much fear, that by another post I shall be forced to tell you news that will have much worse effects for my own family, My Lord Orford has got such another violent boil as he had two years ago—and a thrush has appeared too along with it. We are in the utmost apprehensions about him, the more, because there is no possibility of giving him any about himself. He has not only taken an invincible aversion to physicians, but to the bark, and we have no hopes from any thing else. It will be a fatal event for me, for your brother, and for his own son. Princess Emily,(227) Mr. Pelham(228) and my Lady Orford, are not among the most frightened.
Your brother, who dines here with Mr. Chute and Gray,(229) has just brought me your letter of March 12th. The libel you ask about was called "Constitutional Queries:" have not you received mine of February 9th? there was some account of our present history. Adieu! I have not time to write any longer to you; but you may well expect our correspondence will thicken.
(225) Frederick, Prince of Wales, was a man in no way estimable, though his understanding and disposition were cried up by those who were in opposition to his father's government. Walpole says of him, "His best quality was generosity; his worst, insincerity and indifference to truth, which appeared so early, that Earl Stanhope wrote to Lord Sunderland from Hanover, "He has his father's head, and his mother's heart." His death was undoubtedly a deliverance for those who, had he lived, would have become his subjects.-D.
(226) Frederick, Prince of Wales's debts were never paid.-D.
(227) Princess Emily had the reversion of New-park.
(228) The auditor of the exchequer, was in the gift of Mr. Pelham, as chancellor of the exchequer, and first lord of the treasury.
(229) Thomas Gray, author of the Elegy in a Churchyard, and other poems.
97 Letter 38 To Sir Horace Mann. Arlington Street, April 1, 1751.
How shall I begin a letter that will-that must give you as much pain as I feel myself? I must interrupt the story of the Prince's death, to tell you of two more, much more important, God knows! to you and me! One I had prepared you for-but how will you be shocked to hear that our poor Mr. Whithed is dead(230) as well as my brother! Whithed had had a bad cough for two months: he was going out of town to the Minchester assizes; I persuaded and sent him home from hence one morning to be blooded. However, he went, in extreme bad weather. His youngest brother, the clergyman, who is the greatest brute in the world, except the elder brother, the layman, dragged him out every morning to hunt, as eagerly as if it had been to hunt heretics. One day they were overturned in a water, and then the parson made him ride forty miles: in short, he arrived it the Vine half dead, and soon grew delirious. Poor Mr. Chute was sent for to him last Wednesday, and sent back for two more physicians, but in vain; he expired on Friday night! Mr. Chute is come back half distracted, and scarce to be known again. You may easily believe that my own distress does not prevent my doing all in my power to alleviate his. Whithed, that best of hearts, had forgiven all his elder brother's beastliness, and has left him the Norton estate, the better half; the rest to the clergyman, with an annuity of one hundred and twenty pounds a year to his Florentine mistress, and six hundred pounds to their child. He has left Mr. Chute one thousand pounds, which, if forty times the sum, would not comfort him, and, little as it is, does not in the least affect or alter his concern. Indeed, he not only loses an intimate friend, but in a manner an only child; he had formed him to be one of the prettiest gentlemen in England, and had brought about a match for him, that was soon to be concluded with a Miss Nicholl, an immense fortune; and I am persuaded had fixed his heart on making him his own heir, if he himself outlived his brother. With such a fortune, and with such expectations, how hard to die!—or, perhaps, how lucky, before he had tasted misfortune and mortification.
I must now mention my own misfortune, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday mornings, the physicians and all the family of painful death,(231) (to alter Gray's phrase,) were persuaded and persuaded me, that the bark, which took great place, would save my brother's life —but he relapsed at three o'clock on Thursday, and died last night. He ordered to be drawn and executed his will with the greatest tranquillity and satisfaction on Saturday morning. His spoils are prodigious-not to his own family! indeed I think his son the most ruined young man in England. My loss, I fear, may be considerable, which is not the only motive of my concern, though, as you know, I had much to forgive, before I could regret: but indeed I do regret. It is no small addition to my concern, to fear or foresee that Houghton and all the remains of my father's glory will be pulled to pieces! The widow-Countess immediately marries—not Richcourt, but Shirley, and triumphs in advancing her son's ruin by enjoying her own estate, and tearing away great part of his.
Now I shall divert your private grief by talking to you of what is called the public. The King and Princess are grown as fond as it they had never been of different parties, or rather as people who always had been of different. She discountenances all opposition, and he all ambition. Prince George, who, with his two eldest brothers, is to be lodged at St. James's, is speedily to be created Prince of Wales. Ayscough, his tutor, is to be removed, with her entire inclination as well as with every body's approbation. They talk of a Regency to be established (in case of a minority) by authority of Parliament, even this session, with the Princess at the head of it. She and Dr. lee, the only one she consults of the late cabal, very sensibly burned the late Prince's papers the moment he was dead. lord Egmont, by seven o'clock the next morning, summoned (not very decently) the faction to his house: all was whisper! at least he hinted something of taking the Princess and her children under their protection, and something of the necessity of harmony. No answer was made to the former proposal. Somebody said, it was very likely indeed they should agree now, when the Prince could never bring it about: and so every body went away to take care of himself. The imposthumation is supposed to have proceeded, not from his fall last year, but from a blow with a tennis-ball some years ago. The grief for the dead brother is affectedly great; the aversion to the living one as affectedly displayed. They cried about an elegy,(232) and added, "Oh, that it were but his brother!" On 'Change they said, "Oh, that it were but the butcher!(233)"
The Houses sit, but no business will be done till after the holidays. AnStruther's affair will go on, but not with MUCH spirit. One wants to see faces about again! Dick lyttelton, one of the patriot officers, had collected depositions on oath against the Duke for his behaviour in Scotland, but I suppose he will now throw his papers into Ham/let's grave?
Prince George, who has a most amiable countenance, behaved excessively well on his father's death. When they told him of it, he turned pale, and laid his hand on his breast. Ayscough said, "I am afraid, Sir, you are not well!"-he replied, "I feel something here, just as I did when I saw the two workmen fall from the scaffold at Kew." Prince Edward is a very plain boy, with strange loose eyes, but was much the favourite. He is a sayer of things! Two men were heard lamenting the death in Leicester-fields: one said, "He has left a great many small children!"-"Ay," replied the other, "and what is worse, they belong to our parish!" But the most extraordinary reflections on his death were set forth in a sermon at Mayfair chapel. "He had no great parts, (pray mind, this was the parson said so, not I,) but he had great virtues; indeed, they degenerated into vices - he was very generous, but I hear his generosity has ruined a great many people: and then his condescension was such, that he kept very bad company."
Adieu! my dear child; I have tried, you see, to blend so much public history with our private griefs, as may help to interrupt your too great attention to the calamities in the former part of my letter. You will, with the properest good-nature in the world, break the news to the poor girl, whom I pity, though I never saw. Miss Nicholl is, I am told, extremely to be pitied too; but so is every body that knew Whithed! Bear it yourself as well as you can!
(230) Francis Thistlethwaite, who took the name of Whithed for his uncle's estate and, as heir to him, recovered Mr. Norton's estate, which he had left to the Parliament for the use of the poor, etc,; but the will was set aside for insanity. [See ant`e.)
(231) Vide Gray's Ode on a distant prospect of Eton College.
(232) Walpole, in his Memoires, vol. i. p. 504, says, "The following which is the elegy alluded to, was probably the effusion of some Jacobite royalist. That faction could not, forgive the Duke of Cumberland his excesses or successes in Scotland; and not content with branding the parliamentary government of the country as usurpation, indulged in frequent unfailing and scurrilous personalities on every branch of the reigning family.
"Here lies Fred,
Who was alive and is dead:
Had it been his father,
I had much rather:
Had it been his brother,
Still better than another;
Had it been his sister,
No one would have missed her;
Had it been the whole generation,
Still better for the nation;
But since 'tis only Fred,
Who was alive and is dead-
There is no more to be said."-E.
(233) The Duke of Cumberland, by his friends styled the Hero of culloden, by his opponents nicknamed Billy the Butcher.-E.
99 Letter 39 To Sir Horace Mann. Arlington Street, April 22, 1751.
I could not help, my dear child, being struck with the conclusion of your letter of the 2d of this month, which I have just received; it mentions the gracious assurances you had received from the dead Prince—indeed, I hope you will not want them. The person(234) who conveyed them was so ridiculous as to tell your brother that himself was the most disappointed of all men, he and the Prince having settled his first ministry in such a manner that nothing could have defeated the plan.(235) An admirable scheme for power in England, founded only on two persons! Some people say he was to be a duke and secretary of state. I would have him drawn like Edward V. with the coronet hanging over his head. You will be entertained with a story of Bootle: his washerwoman came to a friend of hers in great perplexity, and said, "I don't know what to do, pray advise me; my master is gone the circuit, and left me particular orders to send him an express if the King died: but here's the Prince, dead and he said nothing about him." You would easily believe this story, if you knew what a mere law-pedant it is!
The Lord(236) you hint at, certainly did not write the Queries, nor ever any thing so well: he is one of the few discarded; for almost all have offered their services, and been accepted. The King asked the Princess if she had a mind for a master of the horse; that it must be a nobleman, and that he had objections to a particular One, Lord Middlesex. I believe she had no objection to his objections, and desired none. Bloodworth is at the head of her stables; of her ministry, Dr. Lee; all knees bow to him. The Duke of Newcastle is so charmed with him, and so sorry he never knew him before, and can't live without him! He is a grave, worthy man; as a civilian, not much versed in the world of this end of the town, but much a gentleman. He made me a visit the other day on my brother's death, and talked much of the great and good part the King had taken, (who by the way, has been taught by the Princess to talk as much of him,) and that the Prince's servants could no longer oppose, if they meant to be consistent. I told this to Mr. Chute, who replied instantly, , "Pho! he meant to be subsistent." You will not be surprised, though you will be charmed, with a new instance of our friend's disinterested generosity: so far from resenting Whithed's neglect of him, he and your brother, on finding the brute-brothers making difficulties about the child's fortune, have taken upon them to act as trustees for her, and to stand all risks. Did not Mr. Whithed know that Mr. Chute would act just so?
Prince George is created Prince of Wales, and his household is settle(]. Lord Harcourt is his governor, in the room of Lord North, to whom there was no objection but his having a glimpse of parts more than the new one, who is a creature of the Pelhams, and very fit to cipher where Stone is to figure. This latter is sub-governor, with the Bishop of Norwich,(237) preceptor; and Scott sub-preceptor. The Bishop is a sensible, good-humoured gentleman, and believed to be a natural son of the old Archbishop of York.(238) Lord Waldegrave, long a personal favourite of the King, who has now got a little interest at his own court, is warden of the stannaries, in the room of Tom Pitt; old Selwyn, treasurer; Lord Sussex,(239) Lord Downe,(240) and Lord Robert Bertle,(241) lords of the bedchamber; Peachy, a young Schutz, and Digby, grooms: but those of the House of Commons have not kissed hands yet, a difficulty being started, whether, as they are now nominated by the King, it will not vacate their Seats.(242) Potter has resigned as secretary to the Princess, and is succeeded by one Cressett, his predecessor, her chief favourite, and allied to the house of Hanover by a Duchess of Zell,(243) who was of a French family-not of that of Bourbon. I was going on to talk to you of the Regency; but as that measure is not complete, I shall not send away my letter till the end of next week.
My private satisfaction in my nephew of Orford is very great indeed; he has an equal temper of reason and goodness that is most engaging. His mother professes to like him as much as every body else does, but is so much a woman that she will not hurt him at all the less. So far from contributing to retrieve his affairs, she talks to him of nothing but mob stories of his grandfather's having laid up—the Lord knows where!—three hundred thousand pounds for him; and of carrying him with her to Italy, that he may converse with sensible people! In looking over her husband's papers, among many of her intercepted billets-doux, I was much entertained with one, which was curious for the whole orthography, and signed Stitara: if Mr. Shirley was to answer it in the same romantic tone, I am persuaded he would subscribe himself the dying Hornadatus. The other learned Italian Countess(244) is disposing of her fourth daughter, the fair Lady Juliana, to Penn, the wealthy sovereign of Pennsylvania;(245) but the nuptials are adjourned till he recovers of a wound in his thigh, which he got by his pistol going off as he was overturned in his post-chaise. Lady Caroline Fox has a legacy of five- thousand pounds from Lord Shelburne,(246) a distant relation, who never saw her but once, and that three weeks before his death. Two years ago Mr. Fox got the ten thousand pound prize.
May 1, 1751.
I find I must send away my letter this week, and reserve the history of the Regency for another post. The bill was to have been brought into the House of lords to-day, but Sherlock, the Bishop of London, has raised difficulties against the limitation of the future Regent's authority, which he asserts to be repugnant to the spirit of our Constitution. Lord Talbot had already determined to oppose it; and the Pitts and Lyttelton's, who are grown very mutinous on the Newcastle's not choosing Pitt for his colleague, have talked loudly against it without doors. The preparatory steps to this great event I will tell you. The old Monarch grandchildizes exceedingly: the Princess, who is certainly a wise woman, and who, in a course of very difficult situations, has never made an enemy nor had a detractor, has got great sway there. The Pelhams, taking advantage of this new partiality, of the universal dread of the Duke, and of the necessity of his being administrator of Hanover, prevailed to have the Princess Regent, but with a council of nine of the chief great officers, to be continued in their posts till the majority, which is fixed for eighteen; nothing to be transacted without the assent of the greater number; and the Parliament that shall find itself existing at the King's death to subsist till the minority ceases: such restrictions must be almost as unwelcome to the Princess as the whole regulation is to the Duke. Judge of his resentment: he does not conceal it. The divisions in the ministry are neither closed nor come to a decision. Lord Holderness arrived yesterday, exceedingly mortified at not finding himself immediate secretary of state, for which purpose he was sent for; but Lord Halifax would not submit to have this cipher preferred to him. An expedient was proposed of flinging the American province into the Board of Trade, but somehow or other, that has miscarried, and all is at a stand. It is known that Lord Granville is designed for president-and for what more don't you think?-he has the inclination of the King—would they be able again to persuade people to resign unless he is removed?-and will not all those who did resign with that intention endeavour to expiate that insult?
Amid all this new clash of politics Murray has had an opportunity for one or two days of making himself talked of. A month ago his brother(247) obtained leave, on pretence of his health, to remove him into the custody of the sergeant-at-arms; but he refused to go thither, and abused his brother for meanness in making such submissive application. On this his confinement was straitened. Last week, my worthy cousin, Sir John Philips, moved the King's Bench for a rule to bring him thither, in order to his having his habeas corpus. He was produced there the next day; 'but the three Judges, onhearing he was committed by the House of Commons, acknowledged the authority, and remanded him back. There was a disposition to commit Sir John, but we have liked to be-pleased with this acknowledgment of our majesty.
Stitara(248) has declared to her son that she is marrying Shirley, but ties him up strictly. I am ready to begin again with a panegyric of My nephew, but I will rather answer a melancholy letter I have Just received from you. His affairs are putting into the best situation we can, and we are agitating a vast match for him, which, if it can be brought to bear, will even save your brother, whose great tenderness to mine has left him exposed to greater risks than any of the creditors. For myself, I think I shall escape tolerably, as my demands are from my father, whose debts are likely to be satisfied. My uncle Horace is indefatigable in adjusting all this confusion. Do but figure him at seventy-four, looking, not merely well for his age, but plump, ruddy, and without a wrinkle or complaint; doing every body's business, full of politics as ever, from morning till night, and then roaming the town to conclude with a party at whist! I have no apprehensions for your demands on Doddington; but your brother, who sees him, will be best able to satisfy you on that head.
Madame de Mirepoix's brother-in-law was not Duke, but Chevalier de Boufflers. Here is my uncle come to drop me a bit of marriage-settlements on his road to his rubbers, so I must finish—you will not be sorry; at least I have given you some light to live upon. Adieu!
(234) George Bubb Dodington.
(235) The following is Dodington's own account of this plan:- -"March 21. When this unfortunate event happened, I had set on foot a project for a union between the independent Whigs and Tories, by a writing, renouncing all tincture of Jacobitism, and affirming short constitutional Revolution principles. These parties, so united, were to lay this paper, containing these principles, before the Prince, offering to appear as his party now, and upon those principles to undertake the administration when he was King, in the subordination and rank among themselves that he should please to appoint. Father of mercy! thy hand that wounds alone can save!" Diary, P. 88.-E.
(236) Lord Middlesex.
(237) Thomas Hayter, Bishop of Norwich.
(238) Dr. Lancelot Blackburne. (See vol. i. The Quarterly Reviewer of Walpole's Memoires, alluding to a similar statement made in that work says,—"As to the accusations of bastardy and profligacy brought against the Bishop and Archbishop, they were, probably, either the creatures of Walpole's own anxiety to draw striking characters, or the echoes of some of those slanderous murmurs which always accompany persons who rise from inferior stations to eminence. He tells us without any hesitation, that Bishop Hayter was a natural son of archbishop Blackburne's. Now we have before us extracts from the registers of the parish of Chagford, in Devonshire, which prove that the Bishop Thomas Hayter was 'the son of George Hayter, rector of this parish, and of Grace his wife,' and that Thomas was one of a family of not fewer, we believe, than ten children Vol. xxvii. p. 186.-E.)
(239) George Augustus Yelverton, second Earl of Sussex, died 1758.-D.
(240) Henry Pleydell Dawnay, third Viscount Downe in Ireland. He distinguished himself greatly in the command of a regiment at the battle of Minden; and died Dec. 9th, 1760, of the wounds he had received at the battle of Campen, Oct. 16th of that year.-D.
(241) The third son of Robert, first Duke of Ancaster and Kesteven. He died in 1782.-D.
(242) "May 3.-Sense of the House taken, if the young Prince of Wales's new servants should be reelected: it was agreed not. The act was read; but those who seemed to favour a re-election forgot to call for the warrants that appointed them servants to the Prince: by whom are they signed? if by the King, the case would not have admitted a word of dispute." Dodington, p. 104.-E.
(243) Mademoiselle d'Olbreuse. It is this m`esalliance which prevents our Royal Family from being what is called chapitrate in Germany. Mademoiselle d'Olbreuse was the mother of George the First's unhappy wife.-D.
(244) Lady Pomfret.
(245) See ant`e.-E.
(246) Henry Petty, Earl of Shelburne in Ireland, the last of the male descendants of Sir William Petty. Upon his death his titles extinguished; but his estates devolved on his nephew, the Lord John Fitz Maurice, in whose favour the title of Shelburne was revived.-D.
(247) Lord Elibank.
(248) Lady Orford. She did marry Mr. Shirley.
103 Letter 40 To Sir Horace Mann. Arlington Street, May 30, 1751.
In your last of May 14th, you seem uneasy at not having heard from me in two posts. I have writ you so exactly all the details that I know you would wish to hear, that I think my letters must have miscarried. I will mention all the dates of this year; Feb. 8th, March 14th and 21st, April 1st, and May 1st; tell me if you have received all these. I don't pretend to say any thing to alleviate your concern for the late misfortunes, but will only recommend to you to harden yourself against every accident, as I endeavour to do. The mortifications and disappointments I have experienced have taught me the philosophy that dwells not merely in speculation. I choose to think about the world, as I have always found, when I most wanted its comfort, it thought about me, that is, not at all. It is a disagreeable dream which must end for every body else as well as for oneself. Some try to supply the emptiness and vanity of present life by something still more empty, fame. I choose to comfort myself, by considering that even while I am lamenting any present uneasiness it is actually passing away. I cannot feel the comfort of folly, because I am not a fool, and I scarce know any other being that it is worth one's while to wish to be. All this looks as if it proceeded from a train of melancholy ideas—it does so: but misfortunes have that good in them that they teach one indifference.
if I Could be mortified anew, I should be with a new disappointment, The immense and uncommon friendship of Mr. Chute had found a method of saving both my family and yours. In short, in the height of his affliction for Whithed, whom he still laments immoderately, he undertook to get Miss Nicholl, the vast fortune, a fortune of above 150,000 pounds, whom Whithed was to have had, for Lord Orford. He actually persuaded her to run away from her guardians, who used her inhumanly, and are her next heirs. How clearly he is justified, you will see, when I tell you that the man, who has eleven hundred a-year for her maintenance, with which he stopped the demands Of his own creditors, instead of employing it for her maintenance and education, is since gone into the Fleet. After such fair success, Lord Orford has refused to marry her; why, nobody can guess. Thus had I placed him in a greater situation than even his grandfather hoped to bequeath to him, had retrieved all the oversights of my family, had saved Houghton and all our glory!-Now, all must go!-and what shocks me infinitely more, Mr. Chute, by excess of treachery, (a story too long for a letter,) is embroiled with his own brother the story, with many others, I believe I shall tell you in person; for I do not doubt but the disagreeable scenes which I have still to go through, will at last drive me to where I have long proposed to seek some peace. But enough of these melancholy ideas!
The Regency-bill has passed with more ease than could have been expected from so extraordinary a measure; and from the warmth with which it was taken up one day in the House of Commons. In the Lords there were but 12 to 106, and the former, the most inconsiderable men in that House. Lord Bath and Lord Grenville spoke vehemently for it: the former in as wild a speech, with much parts, as ever he made in his patriot days; and with as little modesty he lamented the scrambles that he had seen for power! In our House, Mr. Pelham had four signal mortifications: the Speaker, in a most pathetic and fine speech, Sir John Barnard, and Lord Cobham,(249) speaking against, and Mr. Fox, though voting for it, tearing it to pieces. Almost all the late Prince's people spoke or voted for it; most, pretending deference to the Princess, though her power is so much abridged by it. However, the consolation that resides in great majorities balanced the disagreeableness of particular oppositions. We sit, and shall sit, till towards the end of June, though with little business of importance. If there happens any ministerial struggle, which seems a little asleep at present, it will scarce happen till after the prorogation.
Adieu! my dear child; I have nothing else worth telling you at present—at least, the same things don't strike me that used to do; or what perhaps is more true, when things of consequence takes one up, one can't attend to mere trifling. When I say this, you will ask me, where is my philosophy! Even where the best is: I think as coolly as I can, I don't exaggerate what is disagreeable, and I endeavour to lessen it, by undervaluing what I am inclined to think would be a happier state.
(249) Richard Grenville, eldest son of Richard Grenville, of Wotton, Esq. and of Esther Temple, Countess Temple and Viscountess Cobham, in her own right. Lord Cobham became well known in the political world as Earl Temple; which title he succeeded to on the decease of his mother in 1752.-D.
105 Letter 41 To George Montagu, Esq. Arlington Street, May 30, 1751.
Mrs. Boscawen says I ought to write to you. I don't think so. you desired I would, if I had any things new to tell you; I have not. Lady Caroline and Miss Ashe had quarrelled, about reputations before you went out of town. I suppose you would not give a straw to know all the circumstances of a Mr. Paul killing a Mr. Dalton, though the town, who talks of any thing, talks of nothing else. Mrs. French and her Jeffery are parted again. Lady Orford and Shirley married: they say she was much frightened; it could not be for fear of what other brides dread of happening, but for fear it should not happen.
My evening yesterday was employed, how wisely do You think? in trying to procure for the Duchess of Portland a scarlet spider from Admiral Boscawen. I had just seen her collection, which is indeed magnificent, chiefly composed of the spoils of her father's, and the Arundel collections. The gems of all sorts are glorious. I was diverted with two relics of St. Charles the Martyr; one, the pearl you see in his pictures, taken out of his ear after his foolish head was off; the other, the cup out of which he took his last sacrament. They should be given to that nursery of nonsense and bigotry, Oxford.
I condole with you on your journey, am glad Miss Montagu is in better health, and am yours sincerely.
105 Letter 42 To The Rev. Joseph Spence.(250) Arlington Street, June 3, 1751.
Dear sir, I have translated the lines, and send them to you; but the expressive conciseness and beauty of the original, and my disuse of turning 106 verses, made it so difficult, that I beg they may be of no other use than that of showing you how readily I complied with your request.
"Illam, quicquid agit, quoquo vestilia vertit,
Componit furtim subsequiturque decor."
"If she but moves or looks, her step, her face,
By stealth adopt unmeditated grace."
There are twenty little literal variations that may be made, and are of no consequence, as 'move' or 'look'; 'air' instead of 'step', and 'adopts' instead of 'adopt': I don't know even whether I would not read 'steal and adopt', instead of 'by stealth adopt'. But none of these changes will make the copy half so pretty as the original. But what signifies that? I am not obliged to be a poet because Tibullus was one; nor is it just now that I have discovered I am not. Adieu!
(250) Now first collated. See Singer's edition of Spence's Anecdotes, p. 349.-E.
106 Letter 43 To George Montagu, Esq. Arlington Street, June 13, 1751.
You have told me that it is charity to write you news into Kent; but what if my news should shock you! Won't it rather be an act of cruelty to tell you, your relation, Sandwich,(251) is immediately to be removed; and that the Duke of Bedford and all the Gowers will resign to attend him? Not quite all the Gowers, for the Earl himself keeps the privy-seal and plays on at brag, with Lady Catherine Pelham, to the great satisfaction of the Staffordshire Jacobites, who desire, at least expect, no better diversion than a division in that house. Lord Trentham does resign. Lord Hartington is to be master of the horse, and called up to the House of Peers. Lord Granville is to be president; if he should resent any former resignations and insist on victims, will Lord Hartington assure the menaced that they shall not be sacrificed?
I hear your friend Lord North is wedded: somebody said it is very hot weather to marry so fat a bride; George Selwyn replied, "Oh! she was kept in ice for three days before."
The first volume of Spenser is published with prints, designed by Kent; but the most execrable performance you ever beheld. The graving not worse than the drawing; awkward knights, scrambling Unas, hills tumbling down themselves, no variety Of prospect and three or four perpetual spruce firs.
Our charming Mr. Bentley is doing Gray as much more honour as he deserves than Spencer. He is drawing vignettes for his Odes; what a valuable MS. I shall have! Warburton publishes his edition of Pope next week, with the famous piece of prose on Lord Hervey,(252) which he formerly suppressed at my uncle's desire; who had got an abbey from Cardinal Fleury for one Southcote, a friend of Pope's.(253) My Lord Hervey pretended not to thank him. I am told the edition has waited, because Warburton has cancelled above a hundred sheets (in which he had inserted notes) since the publication of the Canons of Criticism.(254) The new history of Christina is a most wretched piece of trumpery, stuffed with foolish letters and confutations of Mademoiselle de Montpensier and Madame de Motteville. Adieu! Yours ever.
(251) John Montagu, fourth Earl of Sandwich.
(252) Entitled "A Letter to a Noble Lord, on occasion of some libels written and propagated at court, in the year 1732-3."-E.
(253) According to Spence, the application was made by Pope to Sir Robert Walpole; but Dr. Warton states, that, "in gratitude for the favour conferred on his friend, Pope presented to Horatio Walpole, afterwards Lord Walpole, a set of his works in quarto, richly bound; which are now in the library at Wollerton."-E.
(254) Edwards's "Canons of Criticism;" a series of notes on Warburton's edition of Shakspeare. Johnson thought well of it; but upon some one endeavouring to put the author upon a level with Warburton, "Nay," said the Doctor, "he has given him some smart hits, but the two men must not be named together: a fly, sir, may sting a stately horse, and make him wince; but one is but an insect, and the other is a horse still."-E.
107 Letter 44 To Sir Horace Mann. Arlington Street, June 18, 1751.
I sent my letter as usual from the secretary's office, but of what secretary I don't know. Lord Sandwich last week received his dismission, on which the Duke of Bedford resigned the next day, and Lord Trentham with him, both breaking with old Gower, who is entirely in the hands of the Pelhams, and made to declare his quarrel with Lord Sandwich (who gave away his daughter to Colonel Waldegrave) the foundation 4 his detaching himself from the Bedfords. Your friend Lord Fane(255) comforts Lord Sandwich with an annuity of a thousand a-year-scarcely for his handsome behaviour to his sister! Lord Hartington is to be master of the horse, and Lord Albemarle groom of the stole; Lord Granville is actually lord president, and, by all outward and visible signs, something more-in short, if he don't overshoot himself, the Pelhams have; the King's favour to him is visible, and so much credited, that all the incense is offered to him. It is believed that Impresario Holderness will succeed the Bedford in the foreign seals, and Lord Halifax in those for the plantations. If the former does, you will have ample instructions to negotiate for singers and dancers! Here is an epigram made upon his directorship.
"That secrecy will now prevail
In politics, is certain;
Since Holderness, who gets the seals,
Was bred behind the curtain."
The Admirals Rowley and Boscawen are brought into the admiralty under Lord Anson, who is advanced to the head of the board. Seamen are tractable fishes! especially it will be Boscawen's case, whose name in Cornish signifies obstinacy, and who brings along with him a good quantity of resentment to Anson. In short, the whole present system is equally formed for duration!
Since I began my letter, Lord Holderness has kissed hands for the seals. It is said that Lord Halifax is to be made easy, by the plantations being put under the Board of Trade. Lord Granville comes into power as boisterously as ever, and dashes at every thing. His lieutenants already beat up for volunteers; but he disclaims all connexions with Lord Bath, who, he says, forced him upon the famous ministry of twenty-four hours, and by which he says he paid all his debts to him. This will soon grow a turbulent scene-it 'Is not unpleasant to sit upon the beach and see it; but few people have the curiosity to step out to the sight. You, who knew England in other times, will find it difficult to conceive what an indifference reigns with regard to ministers and their squabbles. The two Miss Gunnings,(256) and a late extravagant dinner at White's, are twenty times more the subject of conversation than the two brothers and Lord Granville. These are two Irish girls, of no fortune, who are declared the handsomest women alive. I think their being two so handsome and both such perfect figures is their chief excellence, for singly I have seen much handsomer women than either; however, they can't walk in the park, or go to Vauxhall, but such mobs follow them that they are generally driven away. The dinner was a folly of seven young men, who bespoke it to the utmost extent of expense: one article was a tart made of duke cherries from a hothouse; and another, that they tasted but one glass out of each bottle of champagne. The bill of fare has got into print, and with good people has produced the apprehension of another earthquake. Your friend St. Leger, was at the head of these luxurious heroes—he is the hero of all fashion. I never saw more dashing vivacity and absurdity, with some flashes of parts. He had a cause the other day for duelling a sharper, and was going to swear: the judge said to him, "I see, Sir, you are very ready to take an oath." "Yes, my lord," replied St. Leger, "my father was a judge."
We have been overwhelmed with lamentable Cambridge and Oxford dirges on the Prince's death: there is but one tolerable copy; it is by a young Lord Stormont,(257) a nephew of Murray, who is much commended. You may imagine what incense is offered to Stone by the people of Christ Church: they have hooked in, too poor Lord Harcourt, and call him Harcourt the Wise! his wisdom has already disgusted the young Prince; "Sir, pray hold up your head. Sir, for Cod's sake, turn out your toes!" Such are Mentor's precepts!
I am glad you receive my letters; as I knew I had been punctual, it mortified me that you should think me remiss. Thank you for the transcript from Bubb de tribes!(258) I will keep your secret, though I am persuaded that a man who had composed such a funeral oration on his master and himself fully intended that its flowers should not bloom and wither in obscurity.
We have already begun to sell the pictures that had not found place at Houghton: the sale gives no great encouragement to proceed; (though I fear it must come to that!) the large pictures were thrown away: the whole length Vandykes went for a song! I am mortified now at having printed the catalogue. Gideon the Jew, and Blakiston(259) the independent grocer, have been the chief purchasers of the pictures sold already—there, if you love moralizing! Adieu! I have no more articles to-day for my literary gazette.
(255) Lord Sandwich married Dorothy, sister of Charles, Lord Viscount Fane.
(256) Afterwards Countess of Coventry, and Duchess of Hamilton and Argyll.-D.
(257) David Murray, seventh Viscount Stormont, ambassador at Vienna and Paris, and president of the council. He died in 1796.-D.
(258) A letter to Mr. Mann from Bubb Doddington on the Prince's death. It is dated June 4, and contains the following bombastic and absurd passage: which, however, proves how great were the expectations of Doddington, if the prince had lived to succeed his father: ,We have lost the delight and ornament of the age he lived in, the expectations of the public-in this light I have lost more than any subject in England, but this is light; public advantages confined to myself do not, ought not, to weigh with me. But we have lost the refuge of private distress, the balm of the afflicted heart, the shelter of the miserable against the fang of private calamity; the arts, the graces, the anguish, the misfortunes of society have lost their patron and their remedy. I have lost my protector, my companion, my friend that loved me, that condescended to bear, to communicate, and to share in all the pleasures and pains of the human heart, where the social affections and emotions of the mind only presided, without regard to the infinite disproportion of our rank and condition. This is a wound that cannot, ought not, to heal—if I pretended to fortitude here I should be infamous, a monster of ingratitude; and unworthy of all consolation, if I was not inconsolable.-D.
(259) Blakiston has been caught in smuggling, and pardoned by Sir Robert Walpole; but continuing the practice, and being again detected was fined five thousand pounds; on which he grew a violent party man, and a ringleader of the Westminster independent electors, and died an alderman of London.
109 Letter 45 To Sir Horace Mann. Arlington Street, July 16, 1751.
I shall do little more to-day than answer your last letter of the 2d of this month; there is no kind of news. My chief reason for writing to you is to notify a visit that you will have at Florence this summer from Mr. Conway, who is forced to go to his regiment at Minorca, but is determined to reckon Italy within his quarters. You know how, particularly he is my friend; I need not recommend him to you; but you will see something very different from the staring boys that come in flocks to you new, once a year, like woodcocks. Mr. Conway is deservedly reckoned one of the first and most rising young men in England. He has distinguished himself in the greatest style both in the army and in Parliament. This is for you. for the Florentine ladies, there is still the finest person and the handsomest face I ever saw—no, I cannot say that all this will be quite for them; he will not think any of them so handsome as my Lady Aylesbury.
It is impossible to answer you why my Lord Orford would not marry Miss Nicholl. I don't believe there was any particular reason or attachment any where else; but unfortunately for himself and for us, he is totally insensible to his situation, and talks of selling Houghton with a coolness that wants nothing but being intended for philosophy to be the greatest that ever was. Mind, it is a virtue that I envy more than I honour.
I am going into Warwickshire to Lord Hertford, and set out this evening, and have so many things to do that you must excuse me, for I neither know what I write, nor have time to write more. Adieu!
110 Letter 46 To George Montagu, Esq. Daventry, July 22, 1751.
You will wonder in what part of the county of Twicks lies this Daventry. It happens to be in Northamptonshire. My letter will scarce set out till I get to London, but I choose to give it its present date lest you should admire, that Mr. Usher of the exchequer, the lord treasurer of pen, ink, and paper, should write with such coarse materials. I am on my way from Ragley,(260) and if ever the waters subside and my ark rests upon dry land again, I think of stepping over to TOnghes: but your journey has filled my postchaise's head with such terrible ideas of your roads, that I think I shall let it have done raining for a month or six weeks, which it has not done for as much time past, before I begin to grease my wheels again, and lay in a provision of French books, and tea, and blunderbusses, for my journey.
Before I tell you a word of Ragley, you must hear how busy I have been upon Grammont. You know I have long had a purpose of a new edition, with notes, and cuts of the principal beauties and heroes, if I could meet with their portraits. I have made out all the people at all remarkable except my Lord Janet, whom I cannot divine unless he be Thanet. Well, but what will entertain you is, that I have discovered the philosophe Whitnell; and what do you think his real name was? Only 'Whetenhall! Pray do you call cousins?(261) Look in Collins's Baronets, and under the article Bedingfield you will find that he was an ingenious gentleman, and la blanche Whitnell, though one of the greatest beauties of the age, an excellent wife. I am persuaded the Bedingfields crowded in these characters to take off the ridicule in Grammont; they have succeeded to a miracle. Madame de Mirepoix told me t'other day, that she had known a daughter of the Countess de Grammont, an Abbess in Lorrain, who, to the ambassadress's great scandal, was ten times more vain of the blood of Hamilton than of an equal quantity of that of Grammont. She had told her much of her sister my Lady Stafford,(262) whom I remember to have seen when I was a child. She used to live at Twickenham when Lady Mary Wortley(263) and the Duke of Wharton lived there; she had more wit than both of them. What would I give to have had Strawberry Hill twenty years ago! I think any thing but twenty years. Lady Stafford used to say to her sister, "Well, child, I have come without my wit to-day;" that is, she had not taken her opium, which she was forced to do if she had any appointment, to be in particular spirits. This rage of Grammont carried me a little while ago to old Marlborough's,(264) at Wimbledon, where I had heard there was a picture of Lady Denham;(265) it is a charming one. The house you know stands in a hole, or, as the whimsical old lady said, seems to be making a courtesy. She had directed my Lord Pembroke not to make her go up any steps; "I wont go up steps;"—and so he dug a saucer to put it in, and levelled the first floor with the ground. There is a bust of Admiral Vernon, erected I suppose by Jack Spencer, with as many lies upon it as if it was a tombstone; and a very curious old picture up-stairs that I take to be Louis Sforza the Moor, with his nephew Galeazzo. There are other good pictures in the house, but perhaps you have seen them. As I have formerly seen Oxford and Blenheim, I did not stop till I came to Stratford-upon-Avon, the wretchedest old town I ever saw, which I intended for Shakspeare's sake, to find snug and pretty, and antique, not old. His tomb, and his wife's, and John Combes', are in an agreeable church, with several other monuments; as one of the Earl of Totness,(266) and another of Sir Edward Walker, the memoirs writer. There are quantities of Cloptons, too but the bountiful corporation have exceedingly bepainted Shakspeare and the principal personages.
I was much struck with Ragley; the situation is magnificent; the house far beyond any thing I have seen of that bad age: for it was begun, as I found by an old letter in the library from Lord Ranelagh to Earl Conway, in the year 1680. By the way, I have had, and am to have, the rummaging of three chests of pedigrees and letters to that secretary Conway, which I have interceded for and saved from the flames. The prospect is as fine as one destitute of a navigated river can be, ind hitherto totally unimproved; so is the house, which is but just covered in, after so many years. They have begun to inhabit the naked walls of the attic story; the great one is unfloored and unceited - the hall is magnificent, sixty by forty, and thirty-eight high. I am going to pump Mr. Bentley for designs. The other apartments are very lofty, and in quantity, though I had suspected that this leviathan hall must have devoured half the other chambers.
The Hertfords carried me to dine at Lord Archer's,(267) an odious place. On my return, I saw Warwick, a pretty old town, small, and thinly inhabited, in the form of a cross. The castle is enchanting; the view pleased me more than I can express; the river Avon tumbles down a cascade at the foot of it. It is well laid out by one Brown(268 who has set up on a few ideas of Kent and Mr. Southcote. One sees what the prevalence of taste does; little Brooke, who would have chuckled to have been born in an age of clipt hedges and cockle-shell avenues, has submitted to let his garden and park be natural. Where he has attempted Gothic in the castle, he has failed; and has indulged himself in a new apartment, that is paltry. The chapel is very pretty, and smugged up with tiny pews, that look like `etuis for the Earl and his diminutive Countess. I shall tell you nothing of the glorious chapel of the Beauchamps in St. Mary's church, for you know it is in Dugdale; nor how ill the fierce bears and ragged staves are succeeded by puppets and corals. As I came back another road, I saw Lord Pomfret's,(269) by Towcester, where there are a few good pictures, and many masked statues; there is an exceeding fine Cicero, which has no fault, but the head being modern. I saw a pretty lodge. just built by the Duke of Grafton, in Whittleberry-forest; the design is Kent's, but, as was his manner, too heavy. Iran through the gardens at Stowe, which I have seen before, and had only time to be charmed with the variety of scenes. I do like that Albano glut of buildings, let them be ever so much condemned.
(260) The seat of the Earl of Hertford in Warwickshire.
(261) A sister of Mr. Montagu's was married to Nathaniel Whetenhall, Esq.
(262) Claude Charlotte, Countess of Stafford, wife of Henry, Earl of Stafford, and daughter of Philibert, Count of Grammont, and Elizabeth Hamilton, his wife.
(263) Lady Mary Wortley Montagu.
(264) Sarah, Duchess of Marlborough.
(265) Miss Brooke, one of the beauties of the court of Charles II., second wife of Sir John Denham the poet. This second marriage brought upon him so much disquiet, as for a time to disorder his understanding, and Butler lampooned him for his lunacy. In Grammont's Memoirs many circumstances are related, both of his marriage and his frenzy, very little favourable to his character.-E.
(266) George Carew, Earl of Totness, died without heirs male in 1629, leaving an only daughter, married to Sir Allen Apsley.-E.
(267) Umberslade, near Stratford-upon-Avon.
(268) Lancelot Brown, generally called "Capability Brown," from his frequent use of that word. He rose by his merit, from a low condition, to be head gardener at Stowe; and was afterwards appointed to the same situation at Hampton Court. Lord Chatham, who had a great regard for him, thus speaks of him, in a letter to Lady Stanhope:—"The chapter of my friend's dignity must not be omitted. He writes Lancelot Brown, Esquire, en titre d'affic: please to consider, he shares the private hours of Majesty, dines familiarly with his neighbour of Sion, and sits down to the tables of all the House of Lords, etc. To be serious, he is deserving of the regard shown to him; for I know him, upon very long acquaintance to be an honest man, and of sentiments much above his birth." see Chatham Correspondence, vol. iv. p. 430.-E.
(269) Easton Neston.
112 letter 47 To Sir Horace Mann. Mistley, Aug. 31, 1751.
I am going to answer two of your letters, without having the fear of Genoa(270) before my eyes. Your brother sent to me about this embassy the night before I came out of town, and I had not time nor opportunity to make any inquiry about it. Indeed, I am persuaded it is all a fable, some political nonsense of Richcourt. How should his brother know any thing of it? or, to speak plainly, what can we bring about by a sudden negotiation with the Genoese? Do but put these two things together, that we can do nothing, and the Richcourts can know nothing, and you will laugh at this pretended communication of a secret that relates to yourself' from one who is ignorant of what relates to you, and who would not tell you if he did know. I have had a note from your brother since I came hither, which confirms my opinion; and I find Mr. Chute is of the same. Be at peace, my dear child: I should not be so if I thought you in the least danger.
I imagined you would have seen Mr. Conway before this time; I have already told you how different you will find him from the raw animals that you generally see. As you talk of our Beauties, I shall tell you a new story of the Gunnings, who make more noise than any of their predecessors since the days of Helen, though neither of them, nor any thing about them, have yet been teterrima belli causa. They went the other day to see Hampton Court; as they were going Into the Beauty-room, another company arrived; the housekeeper said, "This way, ladies; here are the Beauties." The Gunnings flew into a passion, and asked her what she meant; that they came to see the palace, not to be showed as a sight themselves.
I am charmed with your behaviour to the Count on the affair of the Leghorn allegiance; I don't wonder he is willing to transport you to Genoa! Your priest's epigram is strong; I suppose he had a dispensation for making a false quantity in secunda.
Pray tell me if you know any thing of Lady Mary Wortley: we have an obscure history here of her being in durance in the Brescian, or the Bergamasco: that a young fellow whom she set out with keeping has taken it into his head to keep her close prisoner, not permitting her to write or receive any letters but what he sees: he seems determined, if her husband should die, not to lose her, as the Count lost my Lady Orford.(271)
Lord Rockingham told me himself of his Guercino, and seemed obliged for the trouble you had given yourself in executing the commission. I can tell you nothing farther of the pictures at Houghton; Lord Orford has been ill and given over, and is gone to Cheltenham.
The affair of Miss Nicholl is blown up by the treachery of my uncle Horace and some lawyers, that I had employed at his recommendation. I have been forced to write a narrative of the whole transaction, and was with difficulty kept from publishing it. You shall see it whenever I have an opportunity. Mr. Chute, who has been still worse used than I have been, is, however, in better spirits than he was, since he got rid of all this embroil. I have brought about a reconciliation with his brother, which makes me less regard the other disappointments. I must bid you good night, for I am at too great a distance to know any news, even if there were any in season. I shall be in town next week, and will not fail you in inquiries, though I am persuaded you will before that have found that all this Genoese mystery was without foundation. Adieu!
(270) Count Richcourt pretended that he had received intelligence from his brother, then minister in London, that Mr. Mann was to be sent on a secret commission to Genoa.
(271) Lord Wharncliffe, in his edition of Lady Mary's Works, vol. iii. p. 435, makes the following observation on this passage:—"Among Lady Mary's papers there is a long paper, written in Italian, not by herself, giving an account of her having been detained for some time against her will in a country-house belonging to an Italian Count, and inhabited by him and his mother. This paper seems to have been submitted to a lawyer for his opinion, or to be produced in a court of law. There is nothing else to be found in Lady Mary's papers referring in the least degree to this circumstance. It would appear, however, that some such forcible detention as is alluded to did take place, probably for some pecuniary or interested object; but, like many of Horace Walpole's stories, he took care not to let this lose any thing that might give it zest, and he therefore makes the person by whom Lady Mary was detained a young fellow whom she set out with keeping.' Now, at the time of this transaction, Lady Mary was sixty-one years old. The reader, therefore, may judge for himself, how far such an imputation upon her is likely to be founded in truth."-E.
114 Letter 48 To George Montagu, Esq. Arlington Street, Oct. 8, 1751.
So you have totally forgot that I sent you the pedigree of the Crouches, as long ago as the middle of last August, and that you promised to come to Strawberry Hill in October. I shall be there some time in next week, but as my motions neither depend on resolutions nor almanacs, let me know beforehand when you intend to make me a visit; for though keeping an appointment is not just the thing you ever do, I suppose you know you dislike being disappointed yourself, as much as if you were the most punctual person in the world to engagements.
I came yesterday from Woburn, where I have been a week. The house is in building, and three sides of the quadrangle finished. The park is very fine, the woods glorious, and the plantations of evergreens sumptuous; but upon the whole, it is rather -what I admire than like-I fear that is what I am a little apt to do at the finest places in the world where there is not a navigable river. You would be charmed, as I was, with an old gallery, that is not yet destroyed. It is a bad room, powdered with little gold stars, and covered with millions of old portraits. There are all the successions of Earls and Countesses of Bedford, and all their progenies. One countess is a whole-length drawing in the drollest dress you ever saw; and another picture of the same woman leaning on her hand, I believe by Cornelius Johnson, is as fine a head as ever I saw. There are many of Queen Elizabeth's worthies, the Leicesters, Essexes, and Philip Sidneys, and a very curious portrait of the last Courtney, Earl of Devonshire, who died at Padua. Have not I read somewhere that he was in love with Queen Elizabeth, and Queen Mary -with him? He is quite in the style of the former's lovers, red-bearded, and not comely. There is Essex's friend, the Earl of Southampton; his son the Lord Treasurer; and Madame l'Empoisonneuse,(273) that married Carr,(274) Earl of Somerset—she is pretty. Have not you seen a copy Vertue has made of Philip and Mary? That is in this gallery too, but more curious than good. They showed me two heads, who, according to the tradition of the family, were the originals of Castalio and Polydore. They were sons to the second Earl of Bedford; and the eldest, if not both, died before their father. The eldest has vipers in his hand, and in the distant landscape appears in a maze, with these words, Fata viam invenient. The other has a woman behind him, sitting near the sea, with strange monsters surrounding her. I don't pretend to decipher this, nor to describe half the entertaining morsels I found here; but I can't omit, as you know I am Grammont-mad, that I found "le vieux Roussel, qui `etoit le plus fier danseur d'Angleterre." The portrait is young, but has all the promise of his latter character. I am going to send them a head of a Countess of Cumberland,(275) sister to Castalio and Polydore, and mother of a famous Countess of Dorset,(276) who Afterwards married the Earl of Pembroke,(277) of Charles the First's time. She was an authoress, and immensely rich. After the restoration, Sir Joseph Williamson, the secretary of state, wrote to her to choose a courtier at Appleby: she sent him this answer: "I have been bullied by an usurper, I have been ill-treated by a court, but I won't be dictated to by a subject; your man shall not stand. Ann Dorset, Pembroke and Montgomery." Adieu! If you love news a hundred years old, I think you can't have a better correspondent. For any thing that passes now, I shall not think it worth knowing these fifty years.
(273 Lady Frances Howard, daughter of the Earl of Suffolk, and married to the Earl of Essex, from whom she was divorced. She then married her lover, the Earl of Somerset. She poisoned Sir Thomas Overbury, because he had endeavoured to dissuade his friend the Earl of Somerset from this alliance. She was tried and condemned, but was pardoned by King James.
(274) Robert Carr, a favourite of King James the First, who created him Viscount Rochester and Earl of Somerset. He was tried and condemned, but was pardoned by James the First.
(275) Margaret, Countess of Cumberland, daughter of Francis Russell, second Earl of Bedford, and married to George Clifford, third Earl of Cumberland.
(276)) Ann Clifford, daughter of George, Earl of Cumberland, first married to Richard Sackville, Earl of Dorset, and afterwards to Philip, Earl of Pembroke.
(277) Philip, Earl of Pembroke, son of Henry, second Earl of Pembroke. He was chamberlain to Charles the First.
115 Letter 49 To Sir Horace Mann. Strawberry Hill, Oct. 14, 1751.
It is above six weeks since I wrote to you, and I was going on to be longer, as I stayed for something to tell you; but an express that arrived yesterday brought a great event, which, though you will hear long before my letter can arrive, serves for a topic to renew our correspondence. The Prince of Orange is dead: killed by the waters of Aix-la-Chapelle. This is all I yet know. I shall go to town to-morrow for a day or two, and if I pick up any particulars before the post goes away, you shall know them. The Princess Royal(278) was established Regent some time ago; but as her husband's authority seemed extremely tottering, it is not likely that she will be able to maintain hers. Her health is extremely bad, and her temper neither ingratiating nor bending. It is become the peculiarity of the House of Orange to have minorities.
Your last letter to me of Sept. 24th, and all I have seen since your first fright, make me easy about your Genoese journey. I take no honour from the completion of my prophecy; it was sufficient to know circumstances and the trifling falsehood of Richcourt, to confirm me in my belief that that embassy was never intended. We dispose of Corsica! Alas! I believe there is but one island that we shall ever have power to give away; and that is Great Britain—and I don't know but we may exert our power.
You are exceedingly kind about Mr. Conway-but when are not you so to me and my friends? I have just received a miserable letter from him on his disappointment; he had waited for a man-of-war to embark for Leghorn; it came in the night, left its name upon a card, and was gone before he was awake in the morning, and had any notice of it. He still talks of seeing you; as the Parliament is to meet so soon, I should think he will scarce have time, though I don't hear that he is sent for, or that they will have occasion to send for any body, unless they want to make an Opposition.
We were going to have festivals and masquerades for the birth of the Duke of Burgundy, but I suppose both they and the observance of the King's birthday will be laid aside or postponed, on the death of our son-in-law. Madame de Mirepoix would not stay to preside at her own banquets, but is slipped away to retake possession of the tabouret. When the King wished her husband joy, my Lady Pembroke(279) was standing near him; she was a favourite, but has disgraced herself by marrying a Captain Barnard. Mirepoix said, as he had no children he was indifferent to the honour of a duchy for himself, but was glad it would restore Madame to the honour she had lost by marrying him! "Oh!" replied the King, ,you are of so great a family, the rank was nothing; but I can't bear when women of quality marry one don't know whom!"
Did you ever receive the questions I asked you about Lady Mary Wortley's being confined by a lover that she keeps somewhere in the Brescian? I long to know the particulars. I have lately been at Woburn, where the Duchess of Bedford borrowed for me from a niece of Lady Mary about fifty letters of the latter. They are charming! have more spirit and vivacity than you can conceive, and as much of the spirit of debauchery in them as you will conceive in her writing. They were written to her sister, the unfortunate Lady Mar, whom she treated so hardly while out of her senses, which she has not entirely recovered, though delivered and tended with the greatest tenderness and affection by her daughter, Lady Margaret Erskine: they live in a house lent to them by the Duke of Bedford; the Duchess is Lady Mary's niece.(280) Ten of the letters, indeed, are dismal lamentations and frights of a scene of villany of Lady Mary, who, having persuaded one Ruremonde, a Frenchman and her lover, to entrust her with a large sum of money to buy stock for him, frightened him out of England, by persuading him that Mr. Wortley had discovered the intrigue, and would murder him; and then would have sunk the trust. That not succeeding, and he threatening to print her letters, she endeavoured to make Lord Mar or Lord Stair cut his throat. Pope hints at these anecdotes of her history in that line,
"Who starves a sister or denies a debt."(281)
In one of her letters she says, "We all partake of father Adam's folly and knavery, who first eat the apple like a sot, and then turned informer like a scoundrel." This is character, at least, if not very delicate; but in most of them, the wit and style are superior to any letters I ever read but Madame Sevign`e's. It is very remarkable, how much better women write than men. I have now before me a volume of letters written by the widow(282) of the beheaded Lord Russel, which are full of the most moving and expressive eloquence ; I want to persuade the Duke of Bedford to let them be printed.(283)
17th.—I have learned nothing but that the Prince of Orange died of an imposthume in his head. Lord Holderness is gone to Holland to-day—I believe rather to learn than to teach. I have received yours of Oct. 8, and don't credit a word of Birtle's(284) information. Adieu!
(276) Anne, eldest daughter of George the Second. Walpole, in his Memoires, vol. i. p. 173, describes her as being immoderately jealous and fond of her husband : "Yet," adds he, "this Mars, who was locked in the arms of that Venus, was a monster so deformed, that when the King had chosen him for his son-in-law, he could not help, in the honesty of his heart and the coarseness of his expression, telling the Princess how hideous a bridegroom she was to expect; and even gave her permission to refuse him: she replied, she would marry him if he was a baboon; "Well, then," said the King, "there is baboon enough for you!"-E.
(279) Mary, daughter of the Viscount Fitzwilliam, formerly maid of honour to the Queen, and widow of Henry Herbert, Earl of Pembroke. [In the preceding month, Lady Pembroke had married North Ludlow Barnard, a major of dragoons. She died in 1769.]
(280) Lady Mary Wortley Montagu, Lady Mar, and the first wife of John, Lord Gower, were daughters of Evelyn Pierpoint, Duke of Kingston.
(281) Upon this passage Lord Wharncliffe observes, that "nothing whatever has been found to throw light upon the ill treatment of Lady Mar by Lady Mary, and that accusation is supposed, by those who would probably have heard of it if true, to be without foundation." Nine of the ten letters spoken of by Walpole, are given in his lordship's edition of Lady Mary's Works; and, in the opinion of the Quarterly Reviewer, "they confirm, in a very extraordinary way, Horace Walpole's impression." See vol. viii. p. 191.-E.
(282) @Rachel, daughter of Thomas Wriothesley, Earl of Southampton, lord treasurer. One of these letters to Dr. Tillotson, to persuade him to accept the archbishopric, has been since printed, and a fragment of another of her letters, in Birch's Life of that prelate.
(283) They were published in 1773, and met with such deserved success as to call for a Seventh edition of them in 1809. In 1819, appeared a quarto volume, entitled "Some Account of the Life of Rachael Wriothesley, Lady Russell, with Letters from Lady Russell to her husband Lord Russell," by the editor of Madame du Deffand's Letters.-E.
(284) Consul at Genoa: he had heard the report of Mr. Mann's being designed for an embassy to Genoa.
118 Letter 50 To Sir Horace Mann. Arlington Street, Nov. 22, 1751.
As the Parliament is met, you will, of course, expect to hear something of it: the only thing to be told of it is, what I believe was never yet to be told of an English Parliament, that it is so unanimous, that we are not likely to have one division this session-Day, I think not a debate.(285) On the Address, Sir John Cotton alone said a few words against a few words of it. Yesterday, on a motion to resume the sentences against Murray, who is fled to France, only two persons objected—in short, we shall not be more a French Parliament when we are under French government. Indeed, the two nations seem to have crossed over and figured in; one hears of nothing from Paris but gunpowder plots in a Duke of Burgundy's cradle (whom the clergy, by a vice versa, have converted into a Pretender,) and menaces of assassinations. Have you seen the following verses, that have been stuck up on the Louvre, the Pontneuf, and other places?
"Deux Henris immol`es par nos braves Ayeux,
L'un `a la Libert`e et l'autre `a nos Dieux,
Nous animent, Louis, aux m`emes entreprises:
Ils revivent, en Toi ces anciens Tyrans:
Crains notre desespoir: La Noblesse a des Guises,
Paris des Ravaillacs, le Clerg`e des Clements."
Did you ever see more ecclesiastic fury? Don't you like their avowing the cause of Jacques Clement?'and that Henry IV. was sacrificed to a plurality of gods! a frank confession! though drawn from the author by the rhyme, as Cardinal Bembo, to write classic Latin, used to say, Deos immortales! But what most offends me is the threat of murder: it attaints the prerogative of chopping off the heads of Kings in a legal way. We here have been still more interested about a private history that has lately happened at Paris. It seems uncertain by your accounts whether Lady Mary Wortley is in voluntary or constrained durance - it is not at all equivocal that her son and a Mr. Taaffe have been in the latter at Fort LEvesque and the Chatelet.(286) All the letters from Paris have been very cautious of relating the circumstances. The outlines are, that these two gentlemen, who were pharaoh-bankers to Madame de Mirepoix, had travelled to France to exercise the same profession, where it is suppose(] they cheated a Jew, who would afterwards have cheated them of the money he owed; and that. to secure payment, they broke open his lodgings and bureau, and seized jewels and other effects; that he accused them; that they were taken out of their beds at two o'clock in the morning, kept in different prisons, without fire or candle, for six-and-thirty hours; have since been released on excessive bail; are still to be tried, may be sent to the galleys, or dismissed home, where they will be reduced to keep the best company; for I suppose nobody else will converse with them. Their separate anecdotes are curious: Wortley, you know, has been a perfect Gil Blas, and, for one of his last adventures; is thought to have added the famous Miss Ashe to the number of his wives. Taaffe is an Irishman, who changed his religion to fight a duel; as you know in Ireland a Catholic may not wear a sword. He is a gamester, usurer, adventurer, and of late has divided his attentions between the Duke of Newcastle and Madame Pompadour; travelling, with turtles and pine-apples, in postchaises, to the latter,-flying back to the former for Lewes races—and smuggling burgundy at the same time. I shall finish their history with a bon-mot. The Speaker was railing at gaming and White's, apropos to these two prisoners. Lord Coke, to whom the conversation was addressed, replied, "Sir, all I can say is, that they are both members of the House of Commons, and neither of them of White's." Monsieur de Mirepoix sent a card lately to White's, to invite all the chess-players of both 'clamps'. Do but think what a genius a man must have, or, my dear child, do you consider what information you would be capable of sending to your court, if, after passing two years in a country, you had learned but the two first letters of"a word, that you heard twenty times every day! I have a bit of paper left, so I will tell you another story. A certain King, that, whatever airs you may give yourself, you are not at all like, was last week at the play. The Intriguing Chambermaid in the farce(287) says to the old gentleman, "You are villanously old; you are sixty-six; you can't have the impudence to think of living above two years." The old gentleman in the stage-box turned about in a passion, and said, "This is d-d stuff!" Pray have you got Mr. Conway yet! Adieu!
(285) "Nov. 14 Parliament opened. Lord Downe and Sir William Beauchamp Proctor moved and seconded the Address. No opposition to it." Dodington, p. 114. Tindal says that this session was, perhaps, the most unanimous ever known."-E.
(286) See ant`e.-E.
(287) The Intriguing Chambermaid was performed at Drury-lane on the 6th of November; it was dedicated by Fielding to Mrs. Clive.-E.
119 Letter 51 To Sir Horace Mann. Dec. 12, 1751.
I have received yours and Mr. Conway's letters, and am transported that you have met at last, and that you answer so well to one another, as I intended. I expect that you tell me more and more all that you think of him. The inclosed is for him; as he has never received one of my letters since he left England, I have exhausted all my news upon him, and for this post you must only go halves with him, who I trust is still at Florence. In your last, you mentioned Lord Stormont, and commend him; pray tell me more about him. He is cried up above all the young men of the time-in truth we want recruits! Lord Bolingbroke is dead, or dying,(288) of a cancer, which was thought cured by a quack plaster; but it is not every body can be cured at seventy-five, like my monstrous uncle.
What is an uomo nero?-neither Mr. Chute nor I can recollect the term. Though you are in the season of the villegiatura, believe me, Mr. Conway will not find Florence duller than he would London: our diversions, politics, quarrels, are buried all in our Alphonso's grave!(289) The only thing talked of is a man who draws teeth with a sixpence, and puts them in again for a shilling. I believe it; not that it seems probable, but because I have long been persuaded that the most incredible discoveries will be made, and that, about the time, or a little after, I die, the secret will be found out of how to live for ever—and that secret, I believe, will not be discovered by a physician. Adieu!
P. S. I have tipped Mr. Conway's direction with French, in case it should be necessary to send it after him.
(288) lord Bolingbroke died on the 15th.-E.
(289) The late Prince of Wales: it alludes to a line in The Mourning Bride."
120 Letter 52
To George Montagu, Esq.
THE ST. JAMES'S EVENING POST.
Thursday, Jan. 9, 1752.
Monday being the Twelfth-day, his Majesty according to annual custom offered myrrh, frankincense, and a small bit of gold; and at night, in commemoration of the three kings or wise men, the King and Royal Family played a@ hazard for the benefit of a prince of the blood. There were above eleven thousand pounds upon the table; his most sacred Majesty won three guineas, and his Royal Highness the Duke three thousand four hundred pounds.
On Saturday was landed at the Custom-house a large box of truffles, being a present to the Earl of Lincoln from Theobald Taaffe, Esq. who is shortly expected home from his travels in foreign parts.
To-morrow the new-born son of the Earl of Egremont is to be baptized, when his Majesty, and the Earl of Granville (if he is able to stand), and the Duchess of Somerset, are to be sponsors.
We are assured that on Tuesday last, the surprising strong woman was exhibited at the Countess of Holderness's, before a polite assembly of persons of the first quality; and some time this week, the two dwarfs will play at brag at Madame Holman's. N.B. The strong man, who was to have performed at Mrs. Nugent's, is indisposed. There is lately arrived at the Lord Carpenter's, a curious male chimpanzee, which had had the honour of being shown before the ugliest princes in Europe, who all expressed their approbation; and we hear that he intends to offer himself a candidate to represent the city of Westminster at the next general election. Note: he wears breeches, and there is a gentlewoman to attend the ladies.'
Last night the Hon. and Rev. Mr. James Brudenel was admitted a doctor of opium in the ancient UNIVERSITY of White's, being received ad eundem by his grace the Rev. father in chess the Duke of Devonshire, president, and the rest of the senior fellows. At the same time the Lord Robert Bertie and Colonel Barrington were rejected, on account of some deficiency of formality in their testimonials.
Letters from Grosvenor Street mention a dreadful apparition, which has appeared for several nights at the house of the Countess Temple, which has occasioned several of her ladyship's domestics to leave her service, except the coachman, who has drove her sons and nephews for several years, and is not afraid of spectres. The coroner's inquest have brought in their verdict lunacy.
Last week the Lord Downe received at the treasury the sum of a hundred kisses from the Auditor of the Exchequer, being the reward for shooting at a highwayman.
On Tuesday the operation of shaving was happily performed on the upper lip of her grace the Duchess of Newcastle, by a celebrated artist from Paris, sent over on purpose by the Earl of Albemarle. The performance lasted but one minute and three seconds, to the great joy of that noble family; and in consideration of his great care and expedition, his grace has settled four hundred pounds a year upon him for life. We hear that he is to have the honour of shaving the heads of the Lady Caroline Petersham, the Duchess of Queensberry, and several other persons of quality.
By authority, on Sunday next will be opened the Romish chapel at Norfolk House; no persons will be admitted but such as are known well-wishers to the present happy establishment. Mass will begin exactly when the English liturgy is finished.
At the theatre royal in the House of Lords, the Royal Slave, with Lethe. At the theatre in St. Stephen's chapel, the Fool in Fashion.
The Jews are desired to meet on the 20th inst. at the sign of Fort L'Evesque in Pharaoh Street, to commemorate the noble struggle made by one of their brethren in support of his property.
Deserted—Miss Ashe.
Lost—an Opposition.
To be let—an ambassador's masquerade, the gentleman going abroad.
To be sold—the whole nation.
Lately published, The Analogy of political and private Quarrels, or the Art of healing family-differences by widening them; on these words, "Do evil that good may ensue." a sermon preached before the Right Hon. Henry Pell)am, and the rest of the society for propagating Christian charity, by William Levenson, chaplain to her R. H. the Princess Amelia; and now printed at the desire of several of the family.
For capital weaknesses, the Duke of Newcastle's true spirit of crocodiles.
Given gratis at the Turn-stile, the corner of
Lincoln's-inn-fields, Anodyne Stars and Garters.(290)
(290) The residence of the duke of newcastle.-E.
122 Letter 53 To Sir Horace Mann. Arlington Street, Feb. 2, 1752.
We are much surprised by two letters which my Lady Aylesbury has received from Mr. Conway, to find that he had not yet heard of his new regiment. She, who is extremely reasonable, seems content that he went to Rome before he got the news, as it would have been pity to have missed such an opportunity of seeing it, and she flatters herself that he would have set out immediately for England, if he had received the express -at Florence. Now you know him, and you will not wonder that she is impatient; you would wonder, if you knew her, if he were not so too.
After all I have lately told you of our dead tranquillity, You will be surprised to hear of an episode of Opposition: it is merely an interlude, for at least till next @ear we shall have no more: you will rather think it a farce, when I tell you, that that buffoon my old uncle acted a principal part in it. And what made it more ridiculous, the title of the drama was a subsidiary treaty with Saxony.(291) In short, being impatient with the thought that he should die without having it written on his tomb, "He-re lies Baron Punch," he spirited up—whom do you think?—only a Grenville! my Lord Cobham, to join with him in speaking against this treaty: both did: the latter retired after his speech; but my uncle concluded his (which was a direct answer to all he has been making all his life,) with declaring, that he should yet vote for the treaty! You never heard such a shout and laughter as it caused. This debate was followed by as new a one in, the House of Lords, where the Duke of Bedford took the treaty, and in the conclusion of his speech, the ministry, to pieces. His friend Lord Sandwich, by a most inconceivable jumble of cunning, spoke for the treaty, against the ministry; it is supposed, lest the 'Duke should be thought to have countenanced the Opposition: you never heard a more lamentable performance! there was no division.(292) The next day the Tories in our House moved for a resolution against subsidiary treaties in line of peace: Mr. Pelham, with great agitation, replied to the philippics of the preceding, day, and divided 180 to 52.
There has been an odd sort of codicil to these debates: Vernon,(293) a very inoffensive, good-humoured young fellow, who lives in the strongest intimacy with all the fashionable young men, was proposed for the Old Club at White's, into the mysteries of which, before a person is initiated, it is necessary that he should be well with the ruling powers: unluckily, Vernon has lately been at Woburn with the Duke of Bedford. The night of' the ballot, of twelve persons present, eight had promised him white balls, being his particular friends—however, there were six black balls!-this made great noise—his friends found it necessary to clear up their faith to him—ten of the twelve assured him upon their honour that they had given him white balls. I fear this will not give you too favourable an idea of the honour of the young men of the age!
Your father, who has been dying, and had tasted nothing but water for ten days, the other day called for roast beef, and is well; cured, I suppose, by this abstinence, which convinces me that intemperance has been his illness. Fasting and mortification will restore a good constitution, but not correct a bad one.
Adieu! I write you but short letters, and those, I fear, seldom; but they tell you all that is material; this is not an age to furnish volumes.
(291) Mr. Pitt was so much pleased with Mr. Horatio Walpole's speech on this occasion that he requested him to consign it to writing, and gave it as his opinion, that it contained much weighty matter, and from beginning to end breathed the spirit of a man who loved his country. See Chatham Correspondence, vol. i. p. 63.-E.
(292) For an account of this d(@bate, taken by Lord Chancellor Hardwicke, see Parl. Hist. vol. xiv. p. 1175.-E.
(293) Richard Vernon, Esq. He married Lady Evelyn Leveson, widow of the Earl of Upper Ossory, and sister of Gertrude, Duchess of Bedford.-D.
123 Letter 54 To Sir Horace Mann. Arlington Street, Feb. 27, 1752.
Gal. tells me that your eldest brother has written you an account of your affairs, the particulars of which I was most solicitous to learn, and am now most unhappy to find no better.(294) Indeed, Gal. would have most reason to complain, if his strong friendship for you did not prevent him from thinking that nothing is hard that is in your favour; he told me himself that the conditions imposed upon him were inferior to what he always proposed to do, if the misfortune should arrive of your recall. He certainly loves you earnestly; if I were not convinced of it, I should be far from loving him so well as I do.
I write this as a sort of letter of form on the occasion, for there is nothing worth telling you. The event that has made most noise since my last, is the extempore wedding of the youngest of the two Gunnings, who have made so vehement a noise. Lord Coventry,(295) a grave young lord, of the remains of the patriot breed, has long dangled after the eldest, virtuously with regard to her virtue, not very honourably with regard to his own credit. About six weeks ago Duke Hamilton,(296) the very reverse of the Earl, hot, debauched, extravagant, and equally damaged in his fortune and person, fell in love with the youngest at the masquerade, and determined to marry her in the spring. About a fortnight since, at an immense assembly at my Lord Chesterfield's, made to show the house, which is really magnificent, Duke Hamilton made violent love at one end of the room, while he was playing at pharaoh at the other end; that is, he saw neither the bank nor his own cards, which were of three hundred pounds each: he soon lost a thousand. I own I was so little a professor in love, that I thought all this parade looked ill for the poor girl; and could not conceive, if he was so much engaged with his mistress as to disregard such sums, why he played at all. However, two nights afterwards, being left alone with her while her mother and sister were at Bedford House, he found himself so impatient, that he sent for a parson. The doctor refused to perform the ceremony without license or ring: the Duke swore he would send for the Archbishop—at last they were married with a ring of the bed-curtain, at half an hour after twelve at night, at Mayfair chapel,(297) The Scotch are enraged; the women mad that so much beauty has had its effect; and what is most silly, my Lord Coventry declares that he now will marry the other.
Poor Lord Lempster has just killed an officer(298) in a duel, about a play-debt, and I fear was in the wrong. There is no end of his misfortunes and wrong-headedness!—Where is Mr. Conway!—Adieu!
(294) Mr. Mann's father was just dead.
(295) George-William, sixth Earl of Coventry. He died in 1809, at the age of eighty-seven.-E.
(296) James, fourth Duke of Hamilton. He died in 1758.-D.
(297) On the 14th of February.-E.
(298) Captain Gray of the Guards. The duel was fought, with swords, in Marylebone Fields. lord Lempster took his trial at the Old Bailey in April, and was found guilty of manslaughter.-E.
124 Letter 55 To Sir Horace Mann. Arlington Street, March 23, 1752.
Mr. Conway has been arrived this fortnight, or a week sooner than we expected him: but my Lady Ailesbury forgives it! He is full of your praises, so you have not sowed your goodness in unthankful ground. By a letter I have just received from you he finds you have missed some from him with Commissions; but he will tell you about them himself I find him much leaner, and great cracks in his beauty. Your picture is arrived, which he says is extremely like you. Mr. Chute cannot bear it; says it wants your countenance and goodness; that it looks bonny and Irish. I am between both, and should know it; to be sure, there is none of your wet-brown-paperness in it, but it has a look with which I have known you come out of your little room, when Richcourt has raised your ministerial French, and you have writ to England about it till you were half fuddled. Au reste, it is gloriously coloured—will Astley promise to continue to do as well? or has he, like all other English painters, only laboured this to get reputation, and then intends to daub away to get money?
The year has not kept the promise of tranquillity that it made you at Christmas; there has been another parliamentary bustle. The Duke of Argyll(299) has drawn the ministry into accommodating him with a notable job, under the notion of buying for the King from the mortgagees the forfeited estates in Scotland, which are to be colonized and civilized. It passed with some inconsiderable hitches through the Commons; but in the Lords last week the Duke of Bedford took it up warmly, and spoke like another Pitt.(300) He attacked the Duke of Argyll on favouring Jacobites, and produced some flagrant instances, which the Scotch Duke neither answered nor endeavoured to excuse, but made a strange, hurt, mysterious, contemptuous, incoherent speech, neither in defence of the bill nor in reply to the Duke of Bedford, but to my Lord Bath, who had fallen upon the ministry for assuming a dispensing power, in suffering Scotland to pay no taxes for the last five years. This speech, which formerly would have made the House of Commons take up arms, was strangely flat and unanimated, for want of his old chorus. Twelve lords divided against eighty that were for the bill. The Duke, who was present, would not vote; none of his people had attended the bill in the other House, and General Mordaunt (by his orders, as it is imagined) spoke against it. This concludes the session: the King goes to Hanover on Tuesday, he has been scattering ribands of all colours, blue ones on Prince Edward, the young Stadtholder, and the Earls of Lincoln, Winchilsea, and Cardigan;(301) a green one on Lord Dumfries;(302) a red on Lord Onslow.(303)
The world is still mad about the Gunnings; the Duchess of Hamilton was presented on Friday; the crowd was so great, that even the noble mob in the drawing-room clambered upon chairs and tables to look at her. There are mobs at their doors to see them get into their chairs; and people go early to get places at the theatres when it is known they will be there. Dr. Sacheverel never made more noise than these two beauties.
There are two wretched women that just now are as much talked of, a Miss Jefferies and a Miss Blandy; the one condemned for murdering her uncle, the other her father. Both their stories have horrid circumstances; the first, having been debauched by her uncle; the other had so tender a parent, that his whole concern while he was expiring, and knew her for his murderess, was to save her life. It is shocking to think what a shambles this country is grown! Seventeen were executed this morning, after having murdered the turnkey on Friday night, and almost forced open Newgate. One is forced to travel, even at noon, as if one was going to battle.
Mr. Chute is as much yours as ever, except in the article of pen and ink. Your brother transacts all he can for the Lucchi, as he has much more weight there(304) than Mr. Chute. Adieu!
(299) Archibald Campbell, Duke of argyll, formerly Earl of Isla.
(300) For Lord Hardwicke's notes of this speech, see Parl. Hist. vol. xiv. P. 1235.-E.
(301) George Brudenell, fourth Earl of cardigan, created Duke of Montagu in 1776; died in 1790.-D.
(302) William Crichton Dalrymple, fourth Earl of Dumfries in Scotland, in right of his mother. He also became, in 1760, fourth Earl of stair, and died in 1768.-D.
(303) George, third Lord Onslow; died in 1776.-D.
(304) With the late Mr. Whithed's brothers, who scrupled paying a small legacy and annuity to his mistress and child.
126 Letter 56 To The Hon. H. S. Conway.(305) Arlington Street, May 5, 1752.
I now entirely credit all that my Lord Leicester and his family have said against Lady Mary Coke and her family; and am convinced that it is impossible to marry any thing of the blood of Campbell, without having all her relations in arms to procure a separation immediately. Pray, what have I done? have I come home drunk to my wife within these four first days? or have I sat up gaming all night, and not come home at all to her, after her lady-mother had been persuaded that I was the soberest young nobleman in England, and had the greatest aversion to play'! Have I kept my bride awake all night with railing at her father, when all the world had allowed him to be one of the bravest officers in Europe? In short, in short, I have a mind to take COUNSEL, even of the wisest lawyer now living in matrimonial cases, my Lord Coke * * * If, like other Norfolk husbands, I must entertain the town with a formal parting, at least it shall be in my own way: my wife shall neither 'run to Italy after lovers and books,(306) nor keep a dormitory in her dressing-room at Whitehall for Westminster schoolboys, your Frederick Campbells, and such like. (307) nor 'yet shall she reside at her mother's house, but shall absolutely set out for Strawberry Hill in two or three days, as soon as her room can be well aired; for, to give her her due, I don't think her to blame, but flatter myself she is quite contented with the easy footing we live upon; separate beds, dining in her dressing-room when she is out of humour, and a little toad-eater that I had got for her, and whose pockets and bosom I have never examined, to see if' she brought any billets-doux from Tommy Lyttelton or any of her fellows. I shall follow her myself in less than a fortnight; and if her family don't give me any more trouble,-why, who knows but at your return you may find your daughter with qualms and in a sack? If you should happen to want to know any more particulars, she is quite well, has walked in the park every morning, or has the chariot, as she chooses; and, in short, one would think that I or she were much older than we really are, for I grow excessively fond of her.(308)
(305) Now first published.
(306) Alluding to the wife of his eldest brother, Lord Walpole, Margaret Rolle, who had separated Herself from her husband, and resided in Italy.—E.
(307) Lady Townshend.-E.
(308) All this letter refers to Ann Seymour Conway, then three years old, who had been left with her nurse at Mr. Walpole's, during an absence of her father and mother in Ireland.-E.
127 Letter 57 To George Montagu, Esq. Arlington Street, May 12, 1752.
You deserve no charity, for you never write but to ask it. When you are tired of yourself and the country, you think over all London, and consider who will be proper to send you an account of it. Take notice, I won't be your gazetteer; nor is my time come for being a dowager, a maker of news, a day-labourer in scandal. If you care for nobody but for what they can tell you, you must provide yourself elsewhere. The town is empty, nothing in it but flabby mackerel, and wooden gooseberry tarts, and a hazy east wind. My sister is gone to Paris; I go to Strawberry Hill in three days for the summer, if summer there will ever be any.
If you want news you must send to Ireland, where there is almost a civil war, between the Lord Lieutenant and Primate on one side (observe, I don't tell you what that side is), and the Speaker on the other, who carries questions by wholesale in the House of Commons against the Castle; and the teterrima belli causa is not the common one.
Reams of scandalous verses and ballads are come over, too bad to send you, if I had them, but I really have not. What is more provoking for the Duke of Dorset, an address is come over directly to the King (not as usual through the channel of the Lord Lieutenant), to assure him of their great loyalty, and apprehensions of being misrepresented. This is all I know, and you see, most imperfectly.
I was t'other night to see what is now grown the fashion, Mother Midnight's Oratory.(309) It appeared the lowest buffoonery in the world even to me, who am used to my uncle Horace. There is a bad oration to ridicule, what it is too like, Orator Henley; all the rest is perverted music: there is a man who plays so nimbly on the kettle-drum, that he has reduced that noisy instrument to an object of sight; for, if you don't see the tricks with his hands, it is no better than ordinary: another plays on a violin and trumpet together: another mimics a bagpipe with a German flute, and makes it full as disagreeable. There is an admired dulcimer, a favourite salt-box, and a really curious jew's-harp. Two or three men intend to persuade you that they play on a broomstick, which is drolly brought in, carefully shrouded in a case, so as to be mistaken for a bassoon or bass-viol; but they succeed in nothing but the action. The last fellow imitates * * * * * curtseying to a French horn. There are twenty medley overtures, and a man who speaks a prologue and an epilogue, in which he counterfeits all the actors and singers upon earth: in short, I have long been convinced, that what I used to imagine the most difficult thing in the world, mimicry, is the easiest; for one has seen for these two or three years, at Foote's and the other theatres, that when they lost one mimic, they called ,Odd man!" and another came and succeeded just as well.
Adieu! I have told you much more than I intended, and much more than I could conceive I had to say, except how does Miss Montagu?
P. S. Did you hear Captain Hotham's bon-mot on Sir Thomas
Robinson's making an assembly from the top of his house to the
bottom? He said, he wondered so many people would go to Sir
Thomas's, as he treated them all de haut en bas.
(309) "Among other diversions and amusements which increase upon us, the town," says the Gentleman's Magazine for January 1752, "has been lately entertained with a kind of farcical performance, called 'The Old Woman's Oratory,' conducted by Mrs. Mary Midnight and her family, intended as a banter on Henley's Oratory, and a puff for the Old Woman's Magazine."-E.
128 Letter 58 To Sir Horace Mann. Arlington Street, May 13, 1752.
By this time you know my way, how much my letters grow out of season, as it grows summer. I believe it is six weeks since I wrote to you last; but there is not only the usual deadness of summer to account for my silence; England itself is no longer England. News, madness, parties, whims, and twenty other causes, that used to produce perpetual events are at an end; Florence itself is not more inactive. Politics,
"Like arts and sciences are travelled west."
They are cot into Ireland, where there is as much bustle to carry a question in the House of Commons, as ever it was here in any year forty-one. Not that there is any opposition to the King's measures; out of three hundred members, there has never yet been a division of above twenty-eight against the government: they are much the most zealous subjects the king has. The Duke of Dorset has had the art to make them distinguish between loyalty and aversion to the Lord Lieutenant.
I last night received yours of May 5th; but I cannot deliver your expressions to Mr. Conway, for he and Lady Ailesbury are gone to his regiment in Ireland for four months, which is a little rigorous, not only after an exile in Minorca, but more especially unpleasant now as they have just bought one of the most charming 'places in England, Park-place, which belonged to Lady Archibald Hamilton, and then to the Prince. You have seen enough of Mr. Conway to judge how patiently he submits to his duty. Their little girl is left with me.
The Gunnings are gone to their several castles, and one hears no more of them, except that such crowds flock to see the Duchess Hamilton pass, that seven hundred people sat up all night in and about an inn in Yorkshire to see her get into her postchaise next morning.
I saw lately at Mr. Barret's a print of Valombrosa, which I should be glad to have, if you please; though I don't think it gives much idea of the beauty of the place: but you know what a passion there is for it in England, as Milton has mentioned it.
Miss Blandy died with a coolness of courage that is astonishing, and denying the fact,(310) which has made a kind of party in her favour as if a woman who would not stick at parricide, would scruple a lie!
We have made a law for immediate execution on conviction of murder: it will appear extraordinary to me if it has any effect;(311) for I can't help believing that the terrible part of death must be the preparation for it.
(310) Miss Blandy was executed at Oxford, on the 6th of April, "I am perfectly innocent," she exclaimed, "of any intention to destroy or even hurt my dear father; so help me God in these my last moments!"-E.
(311) Smollett, on the contrary, was of opinion that the expedient had been productive of very good effects.-E.
129 Letter 59 To George Montagu, Esq. Strawberry Hill, June 6, 1752.
I have just been in London for two or three days, to fetch an adventure, and am returned to my hill and castle. I can't say I lost my labour, as you shall hear. Last Sunday night, being as wet a night as you shall see in a summer's day, about half an hour after twelve, I was just come home from White's, and undressing to step into bed, I heard Harry, who you know lies forwards, roar out, "Stop thief!" and run down stairs. I ran after him. Don't be frightened; I have not lost one enamel, nor bronze, nor have been shot through the head again. A gentlewoman, who lives at Governor Pitt's,(312) next door but one to me, and where Mr. Bentley used to live, was going to bed too, and heard people breaking into Mr. Freeman's house, who, like some acquaintance of mine in Albemarle-street, goes out of town, locks up his doors, and leaves the community to watch his furniture. N. B. It was broken open but two years ago, and all the chairmen vow they shall steal his house away another time, before we shall trouble our heads about it. Well, madam called out "watch;" two men who were centinels, ran away, and Harry's voice after them. Down came I, and with a posse of chairmen and watchmen found the third fellow in the area of Mr. Freeman's house. Mayhap you have seen all this in the papers, little thinking who commanded the detachment. Harry fetched a blunderbuss to invite the thief up. One of the chairmen, who was drunk, cried, "Give me the blunderbuss, I'll shoot him!" But as the general's head was a little cooler, he prevented military execution, and took the prisoner without bloodshed, intending to make his triumphal entry into the metropolis of Twickenham with his captive tied to the wheels of his postchaise. I find my style rises so much with the recollection of my victory, that I don't know how to descend to tell you that the enemy was a carpenter, and had a leather apron on. The next step was to share my glory with my friends. I despatched a courier to White's for George Selwyn, who you know, loves nothing upon earth so well as a criminal, except the execution of him. It happened very luckily, that the drawer, who received my message, has very lately been robbed himself, and had the wound fresh in his memory. He stalked up into the club-room, stopped short, and with a hollow trembling voice said, "Mr. Selwyn! Mr. Walpole's compliments to you, and he has got a house-breaker for you!" A squadron immediately came to reinforce me, and having summoned Moreland with the keys of the fortress, we marched into the house to search for more of the gang. Colonel Seabright with his sword drawn went first, and then I, exactly the figure of Robinson Crusoe, with a candle and lanthorn in my hand, a carbine upon my shoulder, my hair wet and about my ears, and in a linen night-gown and slippers. We found the kitchen shutters forced but not finished; and in the area a tremendous bag of tools, a hammer large enough for the hand of a Joel, and six chisels! All which opima spolia, as there was no temple of Jupiter Capitolinus in the neighbourhood, I was reduced to offer on the altar of Sir Thomas Clarges.
am now, as I told you, returned to my plough with as much humility and pride as any of my great predecessors. We lead quite a rural life, have had a sheep-shearing, a hay-making, a syllabub under the cow, and a fishing of three gold fish out of Poyang,(313) for a present to Madam Clive. They breed with me excessively, and are grown to the size of small perch. Every thing grows, if tempests would let it; but I have had two of my largest trees broke to-day with the wind, and another last week. I am much obliged to you for the flower you offer me, but by the description it is an Austrian rose, and I have several now in bloom. Mr. Bentley is with me, finishing the drawings for Gray's Odes; there are some mandarin-cats fishing for gold fish, which will delight you; au reste, he is just where he was: he has heard something about a journey to Haughton, to the great Cu(314) of Hauculeo, but it don't seem fixed, unless he hears farther. Did he tell you the Prices and your aunt Cosby had dined here from Hampton Court? The mignonette beauty looks mighty well in his grandmother's jointure. The Memoires of last year are quite finished, but I shall add some pages of notes, that will not want anecdotes. Discontents, of the nature of those about Windsor-park, are spreading about Richmond. Lord Brooke, who has taken the late Duchess of Rutland's at Petersham, asked for a key; the answer was, (mind it, for it was tolerably mortifying to an Earl,) "that the Princess had already refused one to my Lord Chancellor."
By the way, you know that reverend head of the law is frequently shut up here with my Lady M * * * * h, who is as rich and as tipsy as Cacafogo in the comedy. What a jumble of avarice, lewdness, dignity,—and claret!
You will be pleased with a story of Lord Bury, that is come from Scotland: he is quartered at Inverness: the magistrates invited him to an entertainment with fire-works, which they intended to give on the morrow for the Duke's birthday. He thanked them, assured them he would represent their zeal to his Royal Highness; but he did not doubt but it would be more agreeable to him, if they postponed it to the day following, the anniversary of the battle of Culloden. They stared, said they could not promise on their own authority, but would go and consult their body. They returned, told him it was unprecedented, and could not be complied with. Lord Bury replied, he was sorry they had not given a negative at once, for he had mentioned it to his soldiers, who would not bear a disappointment, and was afraid it would provoke them to some outrage upon the town. This did;-they celebrated Culloden. Adieu!
(312) George Morton Pitt, Esq, Member for Pontefract.-E.
(313) Mr. Walpole called his gold-fish pond, Poyang.
(314) The Earl of Halifax.
131 Letter 60 To George Montagu, Esq. Twickenham, Thursday.
Dear George, Since you give me leave to speak the truth, I must own it is not quite agreeable to me to undertake the commission you give me; nor do I say this to assume any merit in having obeyed you, but to prepare you against my solicitation miscarrying, for I cannot flatter myself with having so much interest with Mr. Fox as you think. However, I have wrote to him as pressingly as I could, and wish most heartily it may have any effect. Your brother I imagine will call upon him again; and Mr.' Fox will naturally tell him whether he can do it or not at my request.
I should have been very glad of your company, if it had been convenient. You would have found me an absolute country gentleman: I am in the garden, planting as long as it is light, and shall not have finished, to be in London, before the middle of next week.
My compliments to your sisters and to the Colonel; and what so poor a man as Hamlet is, may do to express his love and friending to him, God willing, shall not lack. Adieu!
132 Letter 61 The Hon. H. S. Conway.(315) Strawberry Hill, June 23, 1752.
By a letter that I received from my Lady Ailesbury two days ago, I flatter myself I shall not have occasion to write to you any more; yet I shall certainly see you with less pleasure than ever, as our meeting is to be attended with a resignation of my little charge.(316) She is vastly well, and I think you will find her grown fat. I am husband enough to mind her beauty no longer, and perhaps you will say husband enough too, in pretending that my love is converted into friendship; but I shall tell you some stories at Park-place of her understanding that will please you, I trust, as much as they have done me.
My Lady Ailesbury says I must send her news, and the whole history of Mr. Seymour and Lady Di. Egerton, and their quarrel, and all that is said on both sides. I can easily tell her all that is said on one side, Mr. Seymour's, who says, the only answer he has ever been able to get from the Duchess or Mr. Lyttelton was, that Di. has her caprices. The reasons she gives, and gave him, were, the badness of his temper and imperiousness of his letters; that he scolded her for the overfondness of her epistles, and was even so unsentimental as to talk of desiring to make her happy, instead of being made so by her. He is gone abroad, in despair, and with an additional circumstance, which would be very uncomfortable to any thing but a true lover; his father refuses to resettle the estate on him, the entail of which was cut off by mutual consent, to make way for the settlements on the marriage.
The Speaker told me t'other day, that he had received a letter from Lord Hyde, which confirms what Mr. Churchill writes me, the distress and poverty of France and the greatness of their divisions. Yet the King's expenses are incredible; Madame de Pompadour is continually busied in finding out new journeys and diversions to keep him from falling into the hands of the clergy. The last party of pleasure she made for him, was a stag-hunting; the stag was a man in a skin and horns, worried by twelve men dressed like bloodhounds! I have read of Basilowitz, a Czar of Muscovy, who improved on such a hunt, and had a man in a bearskin worried by real dogs; a more kingly entertainment!
I shall make out a sad Journal of other news; yet I will be like any gazette, and scrape together all the births, deaths, and marriages in the parish. Lady Hartington and Lady Rachel Walpole are brought to bed of sons; Lord Burlington and Lord Gower have had new attacks of palsies: Lord Falkland is to marry the Southwark Lady Suffolk;(317) and Mr. Watson, Miss Grace Pelham. Lady Coventry has miscarried of one or two children, and is going on with one or two more, and is gone to France to-day. Lady Townshend and Lady Caroline Petersham have had their anniversary quarrel, and the Duchess of Devonshire has had her secular assembly, which she keeps once in fifty years: she was more delightfully vulgar at it than you can imagine; complained of the wet night, and how the men would dirty the rooms with their shoes; called out at supper to the Duke, "Good God! my lord, don't cut the ham, nobody will eat any!" and relating her private m`enage to Mr. Obnir, she said, "When there's only my lord and I, besides a pudding we have always a dish of Yeast!" I am ashamed to send you such nonsense, or to tell you how the good women at Hampton Court are scandalized at Princess Emily's coming to chapel last Sunday in riding-clothes with a dog under her arm; but I am bid to send news: what can we do -,it such a dead time of year? I must conclude, as my Lady Gower did very well t'other day in a letter into the country, "Since the two Misses(318) were hanged, and the two Misses(319) were married, there is nothing at all talked of." Adieu! My best compliments and my wife's to your two ladies.
(315) Now first published.
(316) Their daughter, Ann Seymour Conway.
(317) Sarah, Duchess-dowager of Suffolk, daughter of Thomas Unwen, Esq. of Southwark.-E.
(318) Miss Blandy and Miss Jefferies.
(319) The Gunnings.
133 Letter 62 To George Montagu, Esq. Strawberry Hill, July 20, 1752.
You have threatened me with a messenger from the secretary's office to seize my papers; who would ever have taken you for a prophet? If Goody Compton ,(320) your colleague, had taken upon her to foretell, there was enough of the witch and prophetess in her person and mysteriousness to have made a superstitious person believe she might be a cousin of Nostradamus, and heiress of some of her visions; but how came you by second sight? Which of the Cues matched in the Highlands? In short, not to keep you in suspense, for I believe you are so far inspired as to be ignorant how your prophecy was to be accomplished, as we were sitting at dinner t'other day, word was brought that one of the King's messengers was at the door. Every drop of ink in my pen ran cold; Algernon Sidney danced before my eyes, and methought I heard my Lord Chief-Justice Lee, in a voice as dreadful as Jefferies', mumble out, Scribere est agere. How comfortable it was to find that Mr. Amyand, who was at table, had ordered this appanage of his dignity to attend him here for orders! However, I have buried the Memoires under the oak in my garden, where they are to be found a thousand years hence, and taken perhaps for a Runic history in rhyme. I have part of another valuable MS. to dispose of, which I shall beg leave to commit to your care, and desire it may be concealed behind the wainscot in Mr. Bentley's Gothic house, whenever you build it. As the great person is living to whom it belonged, it would be highly dangerous to make it public; as soon as she is in disgrace, I don't know whether it Will not be a good way of making court to her successor, to communicate it to the world, as I propose doing, under the following title: "The Treasury of Art and Nature, or a Collection of inestimable Receipts, stolen out of the Cabinet of Madame de Pompadour, and now first published for the use of his fair Countrywomen, by a true born Englishman and philomystic." * * * * * * * * * * * * *
So the pretty Miss Bishop,(321) instead of being my niece, is to be Mrs. Bob Brudenel. What foolish birds are turtles when they have scarce a hole to roost in! Adieu!
(320) The Hun. George Compton. son of Lord Northampton, Mr. Montagu's colleague for Northampton.-E.
(321) Daughter of Sir Cecil Bishop.
134 Letter 63 To Sir Horace Mann. Arlington Street, July 27, 1752.
What will you say to me after a silence of two months? I should be ashamed, if I were answerable for the whole world, who will do nothing worth repeating. Newspapers have horse-races, and can invent casualties, but I can't have the confidence to stuff a letter with either. The only casualty that is of dignity enough to send you, is a great fire at Lincoln's Inn, which is likely to afford new work for the lawyers, in consequence of the number of deeds and writings it has consumed. The Duke of Kingston has lost many of his: he is unlucky with fires: Thoresby, his seat, was burnt a few years ago, and in it a whole room of valuable letters and manuscripts. There has been a Very considerable loss of that kind at this fire: Mr. Yorke, the Chancellor's son, had a great collection of Lord Somers's papers, many relating to the assassination plot; and by which, I am told, it appeared that the Duke of Marlborough was deep in the schemes of St. Germain's.
There are great civil wars in the neighbourhood of Strawberry Hill: Princess Emily, who succeeded my brother in the rangership of Richmond Park, has imitated her brother William's unpopularity, and disobliged the whole country, by refusal of tickets and liberties, that had always been allowed. They are at law with her, and have printed in the Evening Post a strong Memorial, which she had refused to receive-.(322) The High Sheriff of Surrey, to whom she had denied a ticket, but on better thought had sent one, refused it, and said he had taken his part. Lord Brooke(323) who had applied for one, was told he could not have one-and to add to the affront@, it was signified. that the Princess had refused one to my Lord Chancellor—your old nobility don't understand such comparisons! But the most remarkable event happened to her about three weeks ago. One Mr. Bird, a rich gentleman near the park, was applied to by the late Queen for a piece of ground that lay convenient for a walk she was making: he replied, it was not proper for him to pretend to make a Queen a present; but if she would do what she pleased with the ground, he would be content with the acknowledgment of a key and two bucks a-year. This was religiously observed till the era of her Royal Highness's reign; the bucks were denied, and he himself once shut out, on pretence it was fence-month (the breeding-time, when tickets used to be excluded, keys never.) The Princess soon after was going through his grounds to town; she found a padlock on his gate; she ordered it to be broke open: Mr. Shaw, her deputy, begged a respite, till he could go for the key. He found Mr. Bird at home—"Lord, Sir! here is a strange mistake; the Princess is at the gate, and it is padlocked!" "Mistake! no mistake at all - I made the road: the ground is my own property: her Royal Highness has thought fit to break the agreement which her Royal Mother made with me: nobody goes through my grounds but those I choose should. Translate this to your Florentinese; try if you can make them conceive how pleasant it is to treat blood royal thus!
There are dissensions of more consequence in the same neighbourhood. The tutorhood at Kew is split into factions: the Bishop of Norwich and Lord Harcourt openly at war with Stone and Scott, who are supported by Cresset, and countenanced by the Princess and Murray—so my Lord Bolinbroke dead, will govern, which he never could living! It is believed that the Bishop will be banished into the rich bishopric of Durham, which is just vacant-how pleasant to be punished, after teaching the boys a year, with as much as he could have got if he had taught them twenty! Will they ever expect a peaceable prelate, if untractableness is thus punished?
Your painter Astley is arrived: I have missed seeing him by being constantly at Strawberry Hill, but I intend to serve him to the utmost of my power, as you will easily believe, since he has your recommendation.
Our beauties are travelling Paris-ward: Lady Caroline Petersham and Lady Coventry are just gone thither. It will scarce be possible for the latter to make as much noise there as she and her sister have in England. It is literally true that a shoemaker it Worcester got two guineas and a half by showing a shoo that he was making for the Countess, at a penny a piece. I can't say her genius is equal to her beauty: she every day says some new sproposito. She has taken a turn of vast fondness for her lord: Lord Downe met them at Calais, and offered her a tent-bed, for fear of bugs in the inns. "Oh!" said she, "I had rather be bit to death, than lie one night from my dear Cov.!" I can conceive my Lady Caroline making a good deal of noise even at Paris; her beauty is set off by a genius for the extraordinary, and for strokes that will make a figure in any country. Mr. Churchill and my sister are just arrived from France; you know my passion for the writing of the younger Cr`ebillon:(324) you shall hear how I have been mortified by the discovery of the greatest meanness in him; and you will judge how much one must be humbled to have one's favourite author convicted of mere mercenariness! I had desired lady Mary to lay out thirty guineas for ne with Liotard, and wished, if I could, to have the portraits of Cr`ebillon and Marivaux(325) for my cabinet. Mr. Churchill wrote me word that Liotard's(326) price was sixteen guineas; that Marivaux was intimate with him, and would certainly sit, and that he believed he could get Cr`ebillon to sit too. The latter, who is retired into the provinces with an English wife,(327) was just then at Paris for a month: Mr. Churchill went to him, told him that a gentleman in England, who was making a collection of portraits of famous people, would be happy to have his, etc. Cr`ebillon was humble, "unworthy," obliged; and sat: the picture was just finished, when, behold! he sent Mr. Churchill word, that he expected to have a copy of the picture given him-neither more nor less than asking sixteen guineas for sitting! Mr. Churchill answered that he could not tell what he should do, were it his own case, but that this was a limited commission, and he could not possibly lay out double; and was now so near his return, that he could not have time to write to England and receive an answer. Cr`ebillon said, then he would keep the picture himself-it was excessively like. I am still sentimental enough to flatter myself, that a man who could beg sixteen gineas will not give them, and so I may still have the picture.
I am going to trouble you with a commission, my dear Sir, that will not subject me to any such humiliations. You may have heard that I am always piddling about ornaments and improvements for Strawberry Hill-I am now doing a great deal to the house—stay, I don't want Genoa damask!(328) What I shall trouble you to buy is for the garden: there is a small recess, for which I should be glad to have an antique Roman sepulchral altar, of the kind of the pedestal to my eagle; but as it will stand out of doors, I should not desire to have it a fine one: a moderate one, I imagine, might be picked up easily at Rome at a moderate price: if you could order any body to buy such an one, I should be much obliged to you.
We have had an article in our papers that the Empress-queen had desired the King of France to let her have Mesdames de Craon and de la Calmette, ladies of great piety and birth, to form an academy for the young Archduchesses-is there any truth in this? is the Princess to triumph thus at last over Richcourt? I should be glad. What a comical genealogy in education! the mistress and mother of twenty children to Duke Leopold, being the pious tutoress to his grand-daughters! How the old Duchess of Lorrain will shiver in her coffin at the thoughts of it? Who is la Calmette? Adieu! my dear child! You see my spirit of justice: when I have not writ to you for two months, I punish you with a reparation of six pages!—had not I better write one line every fortnight?
(322) The memorial will be found in the Gentleman's Magazine for this year. In December the park was opened by the King's order.-E.
(323) Francis Greville, Earl Brooke.
(324) Claude Prosper Jolyot de Cr`ebillon, son of the tragic poet of that name, and author of many licentious novels, which are now but little read. He was born in 1707, and died in 1777.-D. ["The taste for his writings," says the Edinburgh Reviewers, " passed away very rapidly and completely in France; and long before his death, the author of the Sopha, and Les Egaremens du Coeur et de l'Esprit, had the mortification to be utterly forgotten by the public." Vol. xxi. p. 284.]
(325) Pierre Carlet de Chamblain de Marivaux, the author of numerous plays and novels, some of which possess considerable merit. The peculiar affectation of his style occasioned the invention of the word marivaudage, to express the way of writing of him and his imitators. He was born in 1688, and died in 1763.-D.
(326) Walpole, in his Anecdotes of Painting, states Liotard to have been an admirable miniature and enamel painter. At Rome he was taken notice of by the Earl of Sandwich, and by Lord Besborough, then Lord Duncannon. See Museum Florentinum, vol. x.; where the name of the last mentioned nobleman is spelled Milord D'un Canon.-E.
(327) She was a Miss Strafford. The perusal of Cr`ebillon's works inspired her with such a passion for the author, that she ran away from her friends, went to Paris, married him, and nursed and attended him with exemplary tenderness and affection to his dying day. In reference to this marriage, Lord Byron, in his Observations on Bowles's Strictures upon Pope, makes the following remark:—"For my own part, I am of the opinion of Pausanias, that success in love depends upon fortune. Grimm has an observation of the same kind, on the different destinies of the younger Cr`ebillon and Rousseau. The former writes a licentious novel, and a young English girl of some fortune runs away, and crosses the sea to marry him; while Rousseau, the most tender and passionate of lovers, is obliged to espouse his chambermaid."-E.
(328) Lord Cholmondoley borrowed great sums of money of various people, under the pretence of a quantity of Genoa damask being arrived for him, and that his banker was out of town, and he must pay for it immediately. Four persons comparing notes, produced four letters from him in a coffeehouse, in the very same words.
137 Letter 64 To Richard Bentley, Esq.(329) Battel, Wednesday, August 5, 1752.
here we are, my dear Sir, in the middle of our pilgrimage; and lest we should never return from this holy land of abbeys and Gothic castles, I begin a letter to you. that I hope some charitable monk, when he has buried our bones, will deliver to you. We have had piteous distresses, but then we have seen glorious sights! You shall hear of each in their order.
Monday, Wind S. E.—at least that was our direction—While they were changing our horses at Bromley, we went to see the Bishop of Rochester's palace; not for the sake of any thing there was to be seen, but because there was a chimney, in which had stood a flower-pot, in which was put the counterfeit plot against Bishop Sprat. 'Tis a paltry parsonage, with nothing of antiquity but two panes of glass, purloined from Islip's chapel in Westminster Abbey, with that abbot's rebus, an eye and a slip of a tree. In the garden there is a clear little pond, teeming with gold fish. The Bishop is more prolific than I am.
>From Sevenoaks we went to Knowle. The park is sweet, with much old beech, and an immense sycamore before the great gate, that makes me more in love than ever with sycamores. The house is not near so extensive as I expected:(330) the outward court has a beautiful decent simplicity that charms one. The apartments are many, but not large. The furniture throughout, ancient magnificence; loads of portraits, not good nor curious; ebony cabinets, embossed silver in vases, dishes, etc. embroidered beds, stiff chairs, and sweet bags lying on velvet tables, richly worked in silk and gold. There are two galleries, one very small; an old hall, and a spacious great drawing-room. There is never a good staircase. The first little room you enter has sundry portraits of the times; but they seem to have been bespoke by the yard, and drawn all by the same painter; One should be happy if they were authentic; for among them there is Dudley, Duke of Northumberland, Gardiner of Winchester, the Earl of Surry, the poet, when a boy, and a Thomas, Duke of Norfolk, but I don't know which. The only fine picture is of Lord Goring and Endymion Porter by Vandyke. There is a good head of the Queen of Bohemia, a whole-length of Duc d'Espernon, and another good head of the Clifford, Countess of Dorset, who wrote that admirable haughty letter to Secretary Williamson, when he recommended a person to her for member for Appleby: "I have been bullied by an usurper, I have been neglected by a court, but I won't be dictated to by a subject: your man shan't stand. Ann Dorset, Pembroke and Montgomery." In the chapel is a piece of ancient tapestry: Saint Luke in his first profession is holding an urinal. Below stairs is a chamber of poets and players, which is proper enough in that house; for the first Earl wrote a play,(331) and the last Earl was a poet,(332) and I think married a player(333) Major Mohun and Betterton are curious among the latter, Cartwright and Flatman among the former. The arcade is newly enclosed, painted in fresco, and with modern glass of all the family matches. In the gallery is a whole-length of the unfortunate Earl of Surry, with his device, a broken column, and the motto Sat superest. My father had one of them, but larger, and with more emblems, which the Duke of Norfolk bought at my brother's sale. There is one good head of henry VIII., and divers of Cranfield, Earl of Middlesex, the citizen who came to be lord treasurer, and was very near coming to be hanged.(334) His Countess, a bouncing kind of lady-mayoress, looks pure awkward amongst so much good company. A visto cut through the wood has a delightful effect from the front: but there are some trumpery fragments of gardens that spoil the view from the state apartments.
We lay that night at Tunbridge town, and were surprised with the ruins of the old castle. The gateway is perfect, and the enclosure formed into a vineyard by a Mr. Hooker, to whom it belongs, and the walls spread with fruit, and the mount on which the keep stood, planted in the same way. The prospect is charming, and a breach in the wall opens below to a pretty Gothic bridge of three arches over the Medway. We honoured the man for his taste-not but that we wished the committee at Strawberry Hill were to sit upon it, and stick cypresses among the hollows.—But, alas! he sometimes makes eighteen sour hogsheads, and is going to disrobe 'the ivy-mantled tower,' because it harbours birds!
Now begins our chapter of woes. The inn was full of farmers and tobacco; and the next morning, when we were bound for Penshurst, the only man in the town who had two horses would not let us have them, because the roads, as he said, were so bad. We were forced to send to the wells for others, which did not arrive till half the day was spent-we all the while up to the head and ears in a market of sheep and oxen. A mile from the town we climbed up a hill to see Summer Hill,(335) the residence of Grammont's Princess of Babylon.(336) There is now scarce a road to it: the Paladins of those times were too valorous to fear breaking their necks; and I much apprehend that la Monsery and the fair Mademoiselle Hamilton,(337) must have mounted their palfreys and rode behind their gentlemen-ushers upon pillions to the Wells. The house is little better than a farm, but has been an excellent one, and is entire, though out of repair. I have drawn the front of it to show you, which you are to draw over again to show me. It stands high, commands a vast landscape beautifully wooded, and has quantities of large old trees to shelter itself, some of which might be well spared to open views.
>From Summer Hill we went to Lamberhurst to dine; near which, that is, at the distance of three miles, up and down impracticable hills, in a most retired vale, such as Pope describes in the last Dunciad,
"Where slumber abbots, purple as their vines,"
We found the ruins of Bayham Abbey, which the Barrets and Hardings bid us visit. There are small but pretty remains, and a neat little Gothic house built near them by their nephew Pratt. They have found a tomb of an abbot, with a crosier, at length on the stone.
Here our woes increase. The roads row bad beyond all badness, the night dark beyond all darkness, our guide frightened beyond all frightfulness. However, without being at all killed, we got UP, or down,—I forget which, it was so dark,—a famous precipice called Silver Hill, and about ten at night arrived at a wretched village called Rotherbridge. We had still six miles hither, but determined to stop, as it would be a pity to break our necks before we had seen all we intended. But alas! there was only one bed to be had: all the rest were inhabited by smugglers, whom the people of the house called mountebanks; and with one of whom the lady of the den told Mr. Chute he might lie. We did not at all take to this society, but, armed with links and ]anthems, set out again upon this impracticable journey. At two o'clock in the morning we got hither to a still worse inn, and that crammed with excise officers, one of whom had just shot a smuggler. However, as we were neutral powers, we have passed safely through both armies hitherto, and can give you a little farther history of our wandering through these mountains, where the young gentlemen are forced to drive their curricles with a pair of oxen. the only morsel of good road we have found, was what even the natives had assured us was totally impracticable: these were eight miles to Hurst Monceaux.(338) It is seated at the end of a large vale, five miles in a direct line to the sea, with wings of blue hills covered with wood, one of which falls down to the in a sweep of a hundred acres. The building, for the convenience of water to the moat, sees nothing at all; indeed it is entirely imagined on a plan of defence, with drawbridges actually in being, round towers, watch-towers mounted on them, and battlements pierced for the passage of arrows from long bows. It was built in the time of Henry VI., and is as perfect as the first day. It does not seem to have been ever quite finished, or at least that age was not arrived at the luxury of white-wash; for almost all the walls, except in the principal chambers, are in their native brickhood. It is a square building, each side about two hundred feet in length; a porch and cloister, very like Eton College; and the -whole is much in the same taste, the kitchen extremely so, with three vast funnels to the chimneys going up on the inside. There are two or three little courts for offices, but no magnificence of apartments. It is scarcely furnished with a few necessary beds and chairs: one side has been sashed, and a drawing-room and dining-room and two or three rooms wainscoted by the Earl of Sussex, who married a natural daughter of Charles II. Their arms with delightful carvings by Gibbons-, particularly two pheasants, hang Over the chimneys. Over the great drawing-room chimney is the first coat armour of the first Leonard, Lord Dacre, with all his alliances. Mr. Chute was transported, and called cousin with ten thousand quarterings.(339) The chapel is small, and mean: the Virgin and seven long lean saints, ill done, remain in the windows. There have been four more, but seem to have been removed for light; and we actually found St. Catherine, and another gentlewoman with a church in her hand, exiled into the buttery. There remain two odd cavities, with very small wooden screens on each side the altar, which seem to have been confessionals. The outside is a mixture of gray brick and stone, that has a very venerable appearance. The drawbridges are romantic to a degree; and there is a dungeon, that gives one a delightful idea of living in the days of soccage and under such goodly tenures. They showed us a dismal chamber which they called Drummer's-hall, and suppose that Mr. Addison's comedy is descended from it. In the windows of the gallery over the cloisters, which leads all round to the apartments, is the device of the Fienneses, a wolf holding a baton with a scroll, Le roy le veut—an unlucky motto, as I shall tell you presently, to the last peer of that line. The estate is two thousand a year, and so compact as to have but seventeen houses upon it. We walked up a brave old avenue to the church, with ships sailing on our left hand the whole way. Before the altar lies a lank brass knight, hight William Fienis, chevalier, who obiit c.c.c.c.v. that is in 1405. By the altar is a beautiful tomb, all in our trefoil taste, varied into a thousand little canopies and patterns, and two knights reposing on their backs. These were Thomas, Lord Dacre, and his only son Gregory, who died sans issue. An old grayheaded beadsman of the family talked to us of a blot in the scutcheon; and we had observed that the field of the arms was green instead of blue, and the lions ramping to the right, contrary to order. This and the man's imperfect narrative let us into the circumstances of the personage before us; for there is no inscription. He went in a Chevy-chase style to hunt in a Mr. Pelham's(340) park at Lawton: the keepers opposed, a fray ensued, a man was killed. The haurhty baron took the death upon himself, as most secure of pardon; but however, though there was no chancellor of the exchequer in the question, he was condemned to be hanged: Le roy le Vouloist.
Now you arc fully master of Hurst Monceaux, I shall carry you on to Battel—By the way, we bring you a thousand sketches, that you may show us what we have seen. Battel Abbey stands at the end of the town, exactly as Warwick Castle does of Warwick; but the house of Webster have taken due care that it should not resemble it in any thing else. A vast building, which they call the old refectory, but which I believe was the original church, is now barn, coach-house, etc. The situation is noble, above the level of abbeys: what does remain of gateways and towers is beautiful, particularly the flat side of a cloister, which is now the front of the mansion-house. Miss of the family has clothed a fragment of a portico with cockle-shells! The grounds, and what has been a park, lie in a vile condition. In the church is the tomb of Sir Anthony Browne, master of the horse for life to Harry VIII.: from whose descendants the estate was purchased. The head of John Hanimond, the last abbot, is still perfect in one of the windows. Mr. Chute says, "What charming things we should have done if Battel Abbey had been to be sold at Mrs. Chenevix's, as Strawberry was!" Good night!
Tunbridge, Friday.
We are returned hither, where we have established our head-quarters. On our way, we had an opportunity of surveying that formidable mountain, Silver Hill, which we had floundered down in the dark: it commands a whole horizon of the richest blue prospect you ever saw. I take it to be the ]Individual spot to which the Duke of Newcastle carries the smugglers, and, showing them Sussex and Kent, says, "All this will I give you, if you will fall down and worship me." Indeed one of them, who exceeded the tempter's warrant, hangs in chains on the very spot where they finished the life of that wretched customhouse officer whom they were two days in murdering.
This morning we have been to Penshurst-but, oh! how fallen!(341) The park seems to have never answered its character: at present it is forlorn; and instead of Sacharissa's(342) cipher carved on the beeches, I should sooner have expected to have found the milkwoman's score. Over the gate is an inscription, purporting the manor to have been a boon from Edward VI. to Sir William Sydney. The apartments are the grandest I have seen in any of these old palaces, but furnished in tawdry modern taste. There are loads of portraits; but most of them seem christened by chance, like children at a foundling hospital. There is a portrait of Languet,(343) the friend of Sir Philip Sydney; and divers of himself and all his great kindred; particularly his sister-in-law, with a vast lute, and Sacharissa, charmingly handsome, But there are really four very great curiosities, I believe as old portraits as any extant in England: they are, Fitzallen, Archbishop of Canterbury, Humphry Stafford, the first Duke of Buckingham; T. Wentworth, and John Foxle; all four with the dates of their commissions as constables of Queenborough Castle, from whence I suppose they were brought. The last is actually receiving his investiture from Edward the Third, and Wentworth is in the dress of Richard the Third's time. They are really not very ill done.(344) There are six more, only heads; and we have found since we came home that Penshurst belonged for a time to that Duke of Buckingham. There are some good tombs in the church, and a very Vandal one. called Sir Stephen of Penchester. When we had seen Penshurst, we borrowed saddles, and, bestriding the horses of our postchaise, set out for Hever,(345) to visit a tomb of Sir Thomas Bullen, Earl of Wiltshire, partly with a view to talk of it in Anna Bullen's walk at Strawberry Hill. But the measure of our woes was not full, we could not find our way.. and were forced to return; and again lost ourselves in coming from Penshurst, having been directed to what they call a better road than the execrable one we had gone.
Since dinner we have been to Lord Westmorland's which is so perfect in a Palladian taste, that I must own it has recovered me a little from Gothic. It is better situated than I had expected from the bad reputation it bears, and some prospect, though it is in a moat, and mightily besprinkled with small ponds. The design, you know, is taken from the Villa del Capra by Vicenza, but on a larger scale: yet, though it has cost an hundred thousand pounds, it is still only a fine villa: the finishing of in and outside has been exceedingly Expensive. A wood that runs up a hill behind the house is broke like an Albano landscape, with an octagon temple and a triumphal arch; But then there are some dismal clipt hedges, and a pyramid, which by a most unnatural copulation is at once a grotto and a greenhouse. Does it not put you in mind of the proposal for your drawing a garden-seat, Chinese on one side and Gothic on the other? The chimneys, which are collected to a centre, spoil the dome of the house, and the hall is a dark well. The gallery is eighty-two feet long, hung with green velvet and pictures, among which is a fine Rembrandt and a pretty La Hire. The ceilings are painted, and there is a fine bed of silk and gold tapestry. The attic is good, and the wings extremely pretty, with porticoes formed on the style of the house. The Earl has built a new church, with a steeple which seems designed for the latitude, of Cheapside, and is so tall that the poor church curtsies under it, like Mary Rich(346) in a vast high-crown hat: it has a round portico, like St. Clement's, with vast Doric pillars supporting a thin shelf. The inside is the most abominable piece of tawdriness that ever was seen, stuffed with pillars painted in imitation of verd antique, as all the sides are like Sienna marble: but the greatest absurdity is a Doric frieze, between the triglyphs of which is the Jehovah, the I. H. S. and the Dove. There is a little chapel with Nevil tombs, particularly of the first Fane, Earl of Westmorland, and of the founder of the old church, and the heart of a knight who was killed in the wars. On the Fane tomb is a pedigree of brass in relief, and a genealogy of virtues to answer it. There is an entire window of painted-glass arms, chiefly modern, in the chapel, and another over the high altar. The hospitality of the house was truly Gothic; for they made our postilion drunk, and he overturned us close to a water and the bank did but just save us from being in the middle of it. Pray, whenever you travel in Kentish roads, take care of keeping your driver sober.
Rochester, Sunday.
We have finished our progress sadly! Yesterday after twenty mishaps we got to Sissinghurst to dinner. There is a park in ruins, and a house in ten times greater ruins, built by Sir John Balier, chancellor of the exchequer to Queen Mary. You go through an arch of the stables to the house, the court of which is perfect and very beautiful. The Duke of Bedford has a house at Cheneys, in Buckinghamshire, which seems to have been very like it, but is more ruined. This has a good apartment, and a fine gallery, a hundred and twenty feet by eighteen, which takes up one side: the wainscot is pretty and entire: the ceiling vaulted, and painted in a light genteel grotesque. The whole is built for show: for the back of the house is nothing but lath and plaster. From thence we Went to Bocton-Malherbe, where are remains of a house of the Wottons, and their tombs in the church; but the roads were so exceedingly bad that it was dark before we got thither, and still darker before we got to Maidstone: from thence we passed this morning to Leeds Castle.(347) Never was such disappointment! There are small remains: the moat is the only handsome object, and is quite a lake, supplied by a cascade which tumbles through a bit of a romantic grove. The Fairfaxes have fitted up a pert, bad apartment in the fore-part of the castle, and have left the only tolerable rooms for offices. They had a gleam of Gothic in their eyes, but it soon passed off into some modern windows, and some that never were ancient. The only thing that at all recompensed the fatigues we have undergone was the picture of the Duchess of Buckingham,(348) la Ragotte, who is mentioned in Grammont—I say us, for I trust that Mr. Chute is as true a bigot to Grammont as I am. Adieu? I hope you will be as weary with reading our history as we have been in travelling it. Yours ever.
(329) Only son of Dr. Richard Bentley, the celebrated Divine and classical scholar. He was educated at Trinity College, under his father. Cumberland, who was his nephew, describes him as a man of various and considerable accomplishments; possessing a fine genius, great wit, and a brilliant imagination; "but there was," he adds, "a certain eccentricity and want of prudence in his character, that involved him in distresses, and reduced him to situations uncongenial with his feelings, and unpropitious to the cultivation and encouragement of his talents."-E.
(330) Evelyn ' in his Diary for July 25, 1673, says, "In my way I visited my Lord of Dorset's house at Knowle, near Sevenoaks, a greate old-fashion'd house."-E.
331) Thomas Sackville, Lord Buckhurst, while a student in the
Temple, wrote his tragedy of Gordobuc, which was played before
Queen Elizabeth, at Whitehall, in 1561. He was created Earl of
Dorset by James the First, in 1604.-E.
(332) Charles Sackville, sixth Earl of Dorset. On the day previous to the naval engagement with the Dutch, in 1665, he is said to have composed his celebrated song, "to all you Ladies now on Land."-E.
(333) On the contrary, he married the Lady Frances, daughter of the Earl of Middlesex, who survived him.-E.
(334) Lionel Cranfield, Earl of Middlesex, married two wives: the first was the daughter of a London citizen; the second, the daughter of James Brett, Esq. and half-sister of Mary Beaumont, created Countess of Buckingham. To this last alliance, Lord Middlesex owed his extraordinary advancement.-E.
(335) "May 29, 1652. We went to see the house of my Lord Clanrickard, at Summer Hill, near Tunbridge; now given to that villain Bradshaw, who condemned the King. 'Tis situated on an eminent hill, with a park, but has nothing else extraordinary." Evelyn, vol. ii. p. 58.-E.
(336) lady Margaret Macarthy, daughter and heiress of the Marquis of Clanricarde, wife of Charles, Lord Muskerry.-E.
(337) Elizabeth, eldest daughter of Sir George Hamilton, fourth son of the first Earl of Abercorn, and niece of to the first Duke of Ormond, celebrated in the "M`emoires de Grammont" (written by her brother, Count Anthony Hamilton,) for her beauty and accomplishments. She married Philip, Count de Grammont, by whom she had two daughters; the eldest married Henry Howard, created Earl of Stafford, and the youngest took the veil.-E.
(338) the ancient inheritance of Lord Dacre of the South.-E.
(339) Chaloner Chute, Esq, of the Vine, married Catherine, daughter of Richard, Lord Dacre.-E.
(340) At the date of this letter Mr. Pelham was prime minister.
(341) Evelyn, who visited Penshurst exactly a century before Walpole, gives the Following brief notice of the place:-"July 9, 1652. We went to see Penshurst, the Earl of Leicester's, famous once for its gardens and excellent fruit, and for the noble conversation which Was wont to meet there, celebrated by that illustrious person Sir Philip Sidney, who there composed divers of his pieces. It stands in a park, is finely watered, and was now full of company, on the marriage of my old fellow-collegiate, Mr. Robert Smith, who marries Lady Dorothy Sidney, widow of the Earl of Sunderland."-E.
(342) Lady Dorothy Sidney, daughter of Philip, Earl of Leicester; of whom Waller was the unsuccessful suitor, and to whom he addressed those elegant effusions of poetical gallantry, in which she is celebrated under the name of Sacharissa. Walpole here alludes to the lines written at Penshurst-
"Go, boy, and carve this passion on the bark
Of yonder tree, which stands the sacred mark
Of noble Sydney's birth; when such benign,
Such more than mortal-making stars did shine,
That there they cannot but for ever prove
The monument and pledge of humble love;
His humble love, whose hope shall ne'er rise higher,
Than for a pardon that he dares admire."-E.
(343) Hubert Tanguet, who quitted the service of the Elector of Saxony on account of his religion, and attached himself to the Prince of Orange. He died in 1581.-E.
(344) In Harris's History of Kent, he gives from Philpot a list of the constables of Queenborough Castle, p. 376; the last but one of whom, Sir Edward Hobby, is said to have collected all their portraits, of which number most probably were these ten.
(345) Hever Castle was built in the reign of Edward III., by William de Hevre, and subsequently became the property of the Boleyn family. In this castle Henry VIII. passed the time of his courtship to the unfortunate Anne Boleyn; whose father, Sir Thomas Boleyn, was Created Earl of wiltshire and Ormond, 1529 and 1538.-E.
(346)Daughter of Sir Robert Rich, and elder sister of Elizabeth Rich, Lady Lyttelton.
(347) A very ancient and magnificent structure, built throughout of stone, at different periods, formerly belonging to the family of Crovequer. In the fifteenth of Edward II. Sir Thomas de Colepeper, who was castellan of the castle, was hanged on the drawbridge for having refused admittance to Isabel, the Queen-consort, in her progress in performing a pilgrimage to the shrine of St. Thomas `a Becket at Canterbury. The manor and castle were forfeited to the crown by his attainder, but restored to his son, sir Thomas Colepeper. By his Diary of May 8, 1666, it appears to have been hired by Evelyn for a prison. "Here," he says, "I flowed the dry moat, made a new drawbridge, brought spring-water into the court of the castle to an old fountain, and took order for the repairs."-E.
(348) Mary, Duchess of Buckingham, only daughter of Thomas, Lord Fairfax.-E.
145 Letter 65 To George Montagu, Esq. Strawberry Hill, Aug. 28, 1752.
Will you never have done jigging at Northampton with that old harlotry Major Compton? Peggy Trevor told me, she had sent you a mandate to go thither. Shall I tell you how I found Peggy, that is, not Peggy, but her sister Muscovy? I went, found a bandage upon the knocker, an old woman and child in the hall, and a black boy at the door. Lord! thinks I, this can't be Mrs. Boscawen's. However, Pompey let me up; above were fires blazing, and a good old gentlewoman, whose occupation easily spoke itself to be midwifery. "Dear Madam, I fancy I should not have come up."—"Las-a-day! Sir, no, I believe not; but I'll stop and ask." Immediately out came old Falmouth,(348) looking like an ancient fairy, who had just been tittering a malediction over a new-born prince, and told me, forsooth, that Madame Muscovy was but just brought to bed, which Peggy Trevor soon came and confirmed. I told them I would write you my adventure. I have not thanked you for your travels, and the violent curiosity you have given me to see Welbeck. Mr. Chute and I have been a progress too; but it was in a land you know full well, the county of Kent. I will only tell you that we broke our necks twenty times to your health, and had a distant glimpse of Hawkhurst from that Sierra Morena, Silver Hill. I have since been with Mr. Conway at Park-place, where I saw the individual Mr. Cooper, a banker, and lord of the manor of Henley, who had those two extraordinary forfeitures from the executions of the Misses Blandy and Jefferies, two fields from the former, and a malthouse from the latter. I had scarce credited the story, and was pleased to hear it confirmed by the very person; though it was not quite so remarkable as it was reported, for both forfeitures were in the same manor.
Mr. Conway has brought Lady Ailesbury from Minorca, but originally from Africa, a Jeribo. To be sure you know what that is; if you don't, I will tell you, and then I believe you will scarce know any better. It is a composition of a squirrel, a hare, a rat, and a monkey, which altogether looks very like a bird. In short, it is about the size of the first, with much Such a head, except that the tip of the nose seems shaved off, and the remains are like a human hare-lip; the ears and its timidity are like a real hare. It has two short little feet before like a rat, but which it never uses for walking, I believe never but to hold its food. The tail is naked like a monkey's, with a tuft of hair at the end; striped black and white in rings. The two hind legs are as long as a Granville's, with feet more like a bird than any other animal, and upon these it hops so immensely fast and upright that at a distance you would take it for a large thrush. It lies in cotton, is brisk at night, eats wheat, and never drinks; it would, but drinking is fatal to them. Such is a Jeribo!
Have you heard the particulars of the Speaker's quarrel with a young officer, who went to him, on his landlord refusing to give his servant the second best bed in the inn? He is a young man of eighteen hundred a year, and passionately fond of the army. The Speaker produced the Mutiny-bill to him. "Oh Sir," said the lad, "but there is another act of parliament which perhaps you don't know of." The "person of dignity," as the newspapers call him, then was so ingenious as to harangue on the dangers of a standing army. The boy broke out, "Don't tell me of your privileges: what would have become of you and your privileges in the year forty-five, if it had not been for the army—and pray, why do you fancy I would betray my country? I have as much to lose as you have!" In short, this abominable young hector treated the Speaker's oracular decisions with a familiarity that quite shocks me to think of!
The Poemata-Grayo-Bentleiana, or Gray's Odes, better illustrated than ever odes were by a Bentley, are in great forwardness, and I trust will appear this Winter. I shall tell you One little anecdote about the authors and conclude. Gray is in love to distraction with a figure of Melancholy, which Mr Bentley has drawn for one of the Odes, and told him he must have something of his pencil: Mr. Bentley desired him to choose a subject. He chose Theodore and Honoria!—don't mention this, for we are shocked. It is loving melancholy till it is not strong enough, and he grows to dram with Horror. Good night! my compliments to Miss Montagu; did you receive my recipes?
(348) Charlotte, daughter and co-heiress of Colonel Godfrey, married in 1700 to Lord Falmouth.-E.
146 Letter 66 To Sir Horace Mann. Strawberry Hill, Oct. 28, N. S. 1752.
I must certainly make you a visit, for I have nothing to say to you. Perhaps you will think this an odd reason; but as I cannot let our intimacy drop, and no event happens here for fuel to the correspondence, if we must be silent, it shall be like a matrimonial silence, t`ete-`a-t`ete. Don't look upon this paragraph as a thing in the air, though I dare to say you will, upon my repeating that I have any thoughts of a trip to Florence: indeed I have never quite given up that intention and if I can possibly settle my affairs at all to my mind, I shall certainly execute my scheme towards the conclusion of this Parliament, that is, about next spring twelvemonth: I cannot bear elections: and still less, the hash of them over again in a first session. What vivacity such a reverberation may give to the blood of England, I don't know; at present it all stagnates. I am sometimes almost tempted to go and amuse myself at Paris with the bull Unigenius. Our beauties are returned, and have done no execution. The French would not conceive that Lady Caroline Petersham ever had been handsome, nor that my Lady Coventry has much pretence to be so now. Indeed all the travelled English allow that there is a Madame de Broune handsomer, and a finer figure. Poor Lady Coventry was under piteous disadvantages; for besides being very silly, ignorant of the world, breeding, speaking no French, and suffered to wear neither red nor powder, she had that perpetual drawback upon her beauty her lord, who is sillier in a wise way, as ignorant, ill bred, and speaking very little French himself-just enough to show how ill-bred he is. The Duke de Luxemburg told him he had called upon my Lady Coventry's coach; my lord replied, "Vous avez fort bien fait." He is jealous, prude, and scrupulous; at a dinner at Sir John Bland's, before sixteen persons, he coursed his wife round the table, on suspecting she had stolen on a little red, seized her, scrubbed it off by force with a napkin, and then told her, that since she had deceived him and broke her promise, he would carry her back directly to England. They were pressed to stay for the great fete at St. Cloud; he excused himself, "because it would make him miss a music-meeting at Worcester;" and she excused herself from the fireworks at Madame Pompadour's, "because it was her dancing-master's hour." I will tell you but one more anecdote, and I think You cannot be imperfect in your ideas of them. The Mar`echale de lowendahl was pleased with an English fan Lady Coventry had, who very civilly gave it her: my lord made her write for it again next morning, because he had given it her before marriage, and her parting with it would make an irreparable breach," and send an old one in the room of it! She complains to every body she meets, "How odd it is that my lord should use her so ill, when she knows he has so great a regard that he would die for her, and when he was so good as to marry her without a shilling!" Her sister's history is not unentertaining: Duke Hamilton is the abstract of Scotch pride: he and the Duchess at their own house walk in to dinner before their company, sit together at the upper end of their own table, eat off the same plate, and drink to nobody beneath the rank of Earl-would not one wonder how they could get any body either above or below that rank to dine with them at all? I don't know whether you will not think all these very trifling histories; but for myself, I love any thing that marks a character SO Strongly.
I told you how the younger Cr`ebillon had served me, and how angry I am; yet I must tell you a very good reply of his. His father one day in a passion with him, said, "Il y a deux choses que je voudrois n'avoir jamais fait, mon Catilina et vous!" He answered, "Consolez vous, mon p`ere, car on pr`etend que vous n'avez fait ni l'un ni l'autre." Don't think me infected with France, if I tell you more French stories; but I know no English ones, and we every day grow nearer to the state of a French province, and talk from the capital. The old Cr`ebillon, who admires us as much as we do them. has long had by him a tragedy called Oliver Cromwell, and had thoughts of dedicating it to the Parliament of England: he little thinks how distant a cousin the present Parliament is to the Parliament he wots of. The Duke of Richelieu's son,(349) who certainly must not pretend to declare off, like Cr`ebillon's, (he is a boy of ten years old,) was reproached for not minding his Latin: he replied, "Eh! mon p`ere n'a jamais s`cu le Latin, et il a eu les plus jolies femmes de France!" My sister was exceedingly shocked with their indecorums: the night She arrived at Paris, asking for the Lord knows what utensil, the footman of the house came and "showed it her himself, and every thing that is related to it. Then, the footmen who brought messages to her, came into her bedchamber in person; for they don't deliver them to your servants, in the English way. She amused me with twenty other new fashions, which I should be ashamed to set down, if a letter was at all upon a higher or wiser foot than a newspaper. Such is their having a knotting bag made of the same stuff with every gown; their footmen carrying their lady's own goblet whenever they dine; the King carrying his own bread in his pocket to dinner, the etiquette of the queen and the Mesdames not speaking to one another cross him at table, and twenty other such nothings; but I find myself Gossiping and will have done, with only two little anecdotes that please me. Madame Pompadour's husband has not been permitted to keep an opera-girl, because it would too frequently occasion the reflection of his not having his wife— is not that delightful decorum? and in that country! The other was a most sensible trait of the King. The Count Charolois(350) shot a President's dogs, who lives near him: the President immediately posted to Versailles to complain: the King promised him justice; and then sent to the Count to desire he would give him two good dogs. The Prince picked out his two best: the king sent them to the President, with this motto on their collars, 'J'appartiens au Roi!' "There," said the king, "I believe he won't shoot them now!"
Since I began my letter, I looked over my dates, and was hurt to find that three months are gone and over since I wrote last. I was going to begin a new apology, when your letter of Oct. 20th came in, curtsying and making apologies itself. I was charmed to find you to blame, and had a mind to grow haughty and scold you-but I won't. My dear child, we will not drop one another at last; for though we arc English, we are not both in England, and need not quarrel we don't know why. We will write whenever we have any thing to say; and when we have not,—Why, we will be going to write. I had heard nothing of the Riccardi deaths: I still like to hear news of any of my old friends. Your brother tells me that you defend my Lord Northumberland's idea for his gallery, so I will not abuse it so much as I intended, though I must say that I am so fired with copies of the pictures he has chosen, that I would scarce hang up the originals—and then, copies by any thing now living!—and at that price!—indeed price is no article, or rather price is a reason for my Lord Northumberland's liking any thing. They are building at Northumberland-house, at Sion, at Stansted, at Alnwick, and Warkworth Castles! they live by the etiquette of the old peerage, have Swiss porters, the Countess has her pipers—in short, they will very soon have no estate.
One hears here of writings that have appeared in print on the quarrel of the Pretender and his second son; I could like to see any such thing. Here is a bold epigram, which the Jacobites give about:
"In royal veins how blood resembling runs!
Like any George, James quarrels with his sons.
Faith! I believe, could he his crown resume,
He'd hanker for his herenhausen, Rome."
The second is a good line; but the thought in the last is too obscurely expressed; and yet I don't believe that it was designed for precaution.
I went yesterday with your brother to see Astley's(351) pictures: mind, I confess myself a little prejudiced, for he has drawn the whole Pigwigginhood. but he has got too much into the style of the four thousand English painters about town, and is so intolerable as to work for money, not for fame: in short, he is not such a Rubens as in your head—but I fear, as I said, that I am prejudiced. Did I ever tell you of a picture at Woolterton of the whole family which I call the progress of riches? there is Pigwiggin in a laced coat and waistcoat; the second son has only the waistcoat trimmed; the third is in a plain suit, and the little boy is naked. I saw a much more like picture of my uncle last night at Drury Lane in the farce; there is a tailor who is exactly my uncle in person, and my aunt in family. Good night! I wish you joy of being dis-Richcourted; you need be in no apprehensions of his Countess; she returns to England in the spring! Adieu!
P.S. You shall see that I am honest, for though the beginning of my letter is dated Oct. 28th, the conclusion ought to be from Nov. 11th.
(349) The infamous Duke de Pronsac.-D.
(350) Charles de Bourbon, Count de Charolois, next brother to the Duke de Bourbon, who succeeded the Regent Duke of Orleans as prime minister of France. the Count de Charolois was a man of infamous character, and committed more than one murder. when Louis the Fifteenth pardoned him for one of these atrocities, he said to him, "I tell you fairly, that I will also pardon any man who murders you."-D.
(351) John Astley, an English portrait painter of some merit, born at Wem, in Shropshire. He married a lady of large fortune, relinquished his profession, and died in 1787.-D.
150 Letter 67 To The Hon. H. S. Conway.(352) Strawberry Hill, November 8th, 1752.
Dear Harry, After divers mistakes and neglects of my own servants and Mr. Fox's, the Chinese pair have at last set sail for Park-place: I don't call them boar and sow, because of their being fit for his altar: I believe, when you see them, you will think it is Zicchi Micchi himself, the Chinese god of good eating and drinking, and his wife. They were to have been with you last week, but the chairmen who were to drive them to the water side got drunk, and said, that the creatures were so wild and unruly, that they ran away and would not be managed. Do but think of their running! It puts me in mind of Mrs. Nugent's talking of just jumping out of a coach! I might with as much propriety talk of' having all my clothes let out. My coachman is vastly struck with the goodly paunch of the boar, and says, it would fetch three pounds in his country; but he does not consider, that he is a boar with the true brown edge,(353) and has been fed with the old original wheatsheaf: I hope you will value him more highly: I dare say Mr. cutler or Margas,(354) would at least ask twenty guineas for him, and swear that Mrs. Dunch gave thirty for the fellow.
As you must of course write me a letter of thanks for my brawn, I beg you will take that opportunity Of telling me very particularly how my Lady Aylesbury does, and if she is quite recovered, as I much hope? How does my sweet little wife do @ Are your dragons all finished? Have the Coopers seen Miss Blandy's ghost, or have they made Mr. Cranston poison a dozen or two more private gentlewomen? Do you plant without rain as I do, in order to have your trees die, that you may have the pleasure of planting them over again with rain? Have you any Mrs. Clive(355) that pulls down barns that intercept your prospect; or have you any Lord Radnor(356) that plants trees to intercept his own prospect, that he may cut them down again to make an alteration? There! there are as many questions as if I were your schoolmaster or your godmother! Good night!
(352) Now first printed.
(353) He means such as are painted on old china with the brown edge, and representations of wheatsheafs.-E.
(354) Fashionable china-shops.-E.
(355) Then living at Little Strawberry Hill.-E.
(356) The last Lord Radnor of the family of Robarts, then living at Twickenham, very near Strawberry Hill.-E.
150 Letter 68 To George Montagu, Esq. White's, December 3, 1752.
I shall be much obliged to you for the passion-flower, notwithstanding it comes out of a garden of Eden, from which Eve, my sister-in-law, long ago gathered passion-fruit. I thank you too for the offer of your Roman correspondences, but you know I have done with virt`u, and deal only with the Goths and Vandals.
You ask a very improper person, why my Lord Harcourt(357) resigned. My lord Coventry says it is the present great arcanum of government, and you know I am quite out of the circle of secrets. The town says, that it was finding Stone is a Jacobite; and it says, too, that the Whigs are very uneasy. My Lord Egremont says the Whigs can't be in danger, for then my Lord Hartington would not be gone a-hunting. Every body is as inpatient as you can be, to know the real cause, but I don't find that either Lord or Bishop is disposed to let the world into the true secret. It is pretty certain that one Mr. Cresset has abused both of them without ceremony, and that the Solicitor-general told the Bishop in plain terms that my Lord Harcourt was a cipher, and was put in to be a cipher: an employment that, considering it is a sinecure, seems to hang unusually long upon their hands. They have so lately quarrelled with poor Lord Holderness for playing at blindman's-buff at Tunbridge, that it will be difficult to give him another place only because he is fit to play at blind-man's-buff; and yet it is much believed that he will be the governor, and your cousin his successor. I am as improper to tell you why the governor of Nova Scotia is to be at the head of the Independents. I have long thought him one of the greatest dependents, and I assure you I have seen nothing since his return, to make me change my opinion. He is too busy in the bedchamber to remember me.
Mr. Fox said nothing about your brother; if the offer was ill-designed from one quarter, I think you may make the refusal of it have its weight in another.
It would be odd to conclude a letter from White's without a bon-mot of George Selwyn's; he came in here t'other night, and saw James Jefferies playing at piquet with Sir Everard Falkener, "Oh!" says he, "now he is robbing the mail." Good night! when do you come back?
(357) On the death of the Prince of Wales in 1751, his eldest son, Prince George, was committed to the care of the Earl of Harcourt as governor.
151 Letter 69 To Sir Horace Mann. Strawberry Hill, Dec. 11, 1752, N. S.
I don't know whether I may not begin a new chapter of revolutions: if one may trust prognosticators, the foundations of a revolution in earnest are laying. However, as I am only a simple correspondent, and no almanack-maker, I shall be content with telling you facts, and not conjectures, at least if I do tell you conjectures they shall not be my own. Did not I give you a hint in the summer of some storms gathering in the tutorhood? They have broke out; indeed there wanted nothing to the explosion but the King's arrival, for the instant he came, it was pretty plain that he was prepared for the grievances he was to hear—not very impartially it seems, for he would not speak to Lord Harcourt. In about three days he did, and saw him afterwards alone in his closet. What the conversation was, I can't tell you: one should think not very explicit, for in a day or two afterwards it was thought proper to send the Archbishop and Chancellor to hear his lordship's complaints; but on receiving a message that they would wait on him by the King's orders, he prevented the visit by going directly to the Chancellor; and on hearing their commission, Lord Harcourt, after very civil speeches of regard to their persons, said, he must desire to be excused, for what he had to say was of a nature that made it improper to be said to any body but the King. You may easily imagine that this is interpreted to allude to a higher person than the mean people who have offended Lord Harcourt and the Bishop of Norwich. Great pains were taken to detach the former from the latter; "dear Harcourt, we love you, we wish to make you easy; but the Bishop must go." I don't tell you these were the Duke of Newcastle's words; but if I did, would they be unlike him? Lord Harcourt fired, and replied with spirit, "What! do you think to do me a favour by offering me to stay! know, it is I that will not act with such fellows as Stone and Cresset, and Scott: if they are kept, I will quit, and if the Bishop is dismissed, I will quit too." After a few days, he had his audience and resigned. It is said, that he frequently repeated, "Stone is a Jacobite," and that the other person who made up the t`ete-`a-t`ete cried, "Pray, my lord! pray, my lord!"—and would not hear upon that subject. The next day the Archbishop went to the King, and begged to know whether the Bishop of Norwich might have leave to bring his own resignation, or whether his Majesty would receive it from him, the Archbishop, The latter was chosen, and the Bishop' was refused an audience.
You will now naturally ask me what the quarrel was: and that is the most difficult point to tell you; for though the world expects to see some narrative, nothing has yet appeared, nor I believe will, though both sides have threatened. The Princess says, the Bishop taught the boys nothing; he says, he never was suffered to teach them any thing. The first occasion of uneasiness was the Bishop's finding the Prince of Wales reading the Revolutions of England, written by P`ere d'Orl`eans to vindicate James II. and approved by that Prince. Stone at first peremptorily denied that he had seen that book these thirty years, and offered to rest his whole justification upon the truth or falsehood of this story. However, it is now confessed that the Prince was reading that book, but it is qualified with Prince Edward's borrowing it of Lady Augusta. Scott, the under-preceptor, put in by Lord Bolingbroke, and of no very orthodox odour, was another complaint. Cresset, the link of the connexion, has dealt in no very civil epithets, for besides calling Lord Harcourt a groom, he qualified the Bishop with bastard and atheist,' particularly to one of the Princess's chaplains, who, begged to be excused from hearing such language against a prelate of the church, and not prevailing, has drawn up a narrative, sent it to the Bishop, and offered to swear to it. For Lord Harcourt, besides being treated with considerable contempt by the Princess, he is not uninformed of the light in which he was intended to stand, by an amazing piece of imprudence of the last, but not the most inconsiderable performer in this drama, the Solicitor-general, Murray—pray, what part has his brother, Lord Dunbar, acted in the late squabbles in the Pretender's family? Murray, early in the quarrel, went officiously to the Bishop, and told him Mr. Stone ought to have more consideration in the family: the Bishop was surprised, and got rid of the topic as well as he could. The visit and opinion were repeated: the Bishop said, he believed Mr. Stone had all the regard shown him that was due; that lord Harcourt, who was the chief person, was generally present. Murray interrupted him, "Pho! Lord Harcourt! he is a cipher, and must be a cipher, and was put in to be a cipher." Do you think after this declaration, that the employment will be very agreeable? Every body but Lord Harcourt understood it before; but at least the cipher -ism was not notified in form. Lord Lincoln, the intimate friend of that lord, was so friendly to turn his back upon him as he came out of the closet—and yet Lord Harcourt and the Bishop have not at all lessened their characters by any part of their behaviour in this transaction. What will astonish you, is the universal aversion that has broke out against Stone: and what heightens the disgusts, is, the intention there has been of making Dr. Johnson, the new Bishop of Gloucester, preceptor. He was master of Westminster School, of Stone's and Murray's year, and is certainly of their principles—to be sure, that is, Whig—but the Whigs don't seem to think so. As yet no successors are named; the Duke of Leeds,(359) Lord Cardigan, Lord Waldegrave, Lord Hertford, Lord Bathurst, and Lord Ashburnham,(360) are talked of for governor. The two first are said to have refused; the third dreads it; the next I hope will not have it; the Princess is inclined to the fifth, and the last I believe eagerly wishes for it. Within this day or two another is named, which leads me to tell you another interlude in our politics. This is poor Lord Holderness —to make room in the secretary's office for Lord Halifax. Holderness has been in disgrace from the first minute of the King's return: besides not being spoken to, he is made to wait at the closet-door with the bag in his hand, while the Duke of Newcastle is within; though the constant etiquette has been for both secretaries of state to go in together, or to go in immediately, if one came after the other. I knew of this disgrace; but not being quite so able a politician as Lord Lincoln, at least having an inclination to great men in misfortune, I went the other morning to visit the afflicted. I found him alone: he said, "You are very good to visit any body in my situation." This lamentable tone had like to have made me laugh; however I kept my countenance, and asked him what he meant? he said, "Have not you heard how the world abuses me only for playing at blindman's-buff in a private room at Tunbridge?" Oh! this was too much! I laughed out. I do assure you, this account of his misfortunes was not given particularly to me: nay, to some he goes so far as to say, "Let them go to the office, and look over my letters and see if I am behindhand!" To be sure, when he has done his book, it is very hard he may not play! My dear Sir, I don't know what apologies a P`ere d'Orl`eans must make for our present history! it is too ridiculous!
The preceptor is as much in suspense as the governor. The Whigs clamour so much against Johnson, that they are regarded,- -at least for a time. Keene,(361) Bishop of Chester, and brother of your brother minister, has been talked of. He is a man that will not prejudice his fortune by any ill-placed scruples. My father gave him a living of seven hundred pounds a year to marry one of his natural daughters; he took the living; and my father dying soon after, he dispensed with himself from taking the wife, but was so generous as to give her very near one year's income of the living. He then was the Duke of Newcastle's- tool at Cambridge, which university be has half turned Jacobite, by cramming down new ordinances to carry measures of that Duke; and being rewarded with the bishopric, he was at dinner at the Bishop of Lincoln's when he received the nomination. He immediately rose from the table, took his host into another room, and begged he would propose him to a certain great fortune, to whom he never spoke, but for whom he now thought himself a proper match.(362) Don't you think he would make a very proper preceptor? Among other candidates, they talk of Dr. hales, the old philosopher, a poor good primitive creature, whom I call the Santon Barsisa; do you remember the hermit in the Persian tales, who after living in the odour of sanctity for above ninety years, was tempted to be naughty with the King's daughter, who had been sent to his cell for a cure? Santon Hales but two years ago accepted the post of clerk of the closet to the Princess, after literally leading the life of a studious anchorite till past seventy. If he does accept the preceptorship, I don't doubt but by the time the present clamours are appeased, the wick of his old life will be snuffed out, and they will put Johnson in his socket. Good night! I shall carry this letter to town to-morrow, and perhaps keep it back a few days, till I am able to send you this history complete.
Arlington Street, Dec. 17th.
Well! at last we shall have a governor: after meeting with divers refusals, they have forced lord Waldegrave(364) to take it; and he kisses hands to-morrow. He has all the time declared that nothing but the King's earnest desire should make him accept it-and so they made the King earnestly desire it! Dr. Thomas, the Bishop of Peterborough, I believe, is to be the tutor—I know nothing of him: he had lain by for many years, after having read prayers to the present King when he lived at Leicester House, which his Majesty remembered, and two years ago popped him into a bishopric.
There is an odd sort of manifesto arrived from Prussia, which does not make us in better humour at St. James's. It stops the payment of the interest on the Silesian loan, till satisfaction is made some Prussian captures during the war. The omnipotence of the present ministry does not reach to Berlin! Adieu! All the world are gone to their several Christmases, as I should do, if I could have got my workmen out of Strawberry Hill; but they don't work at all by the scale of my impatience.
(358) The Bishop of Norwich, who was a prelate of profound learning, and conscientiously zealous for the mental improvement of his pupil, disgusted the young Prince by his dry and pedantic manners, and offended the Princess, his mother, by persevering in the discipline which he deemed necessary to remedy the gross neglect of her son's education." Coxe's Pelham, vol. ii. p. 236.-E.
(359) Thomas Osborne, fourth Duke of Leeds. He died in 1789.-D.
(360) John, second Earl of Ashburnham. He died at a great age, April 8th, 1812.-D.
(361) Dr. Edmund Keene, Bishop of Chester, was, for some reason which is not known, the constant subject of Gray's witty and splenetic effusions. One of the chief amusements discovered by the poet, pour passer le temps in a postchaise, was making extempore epigrams upon the Bishop, and then laughing at them immoderately. The following, which is the commencement of one of them, may serve as a specimen:
"Here lies Edmund Keene, the Bishop of Chester,
Who ate a fat goose and could not digest her."
(362) In the May of this year, Dr. Keene married the only daughter of Lancelot Andrews, Esq. of Edmonton, formerly an eminent linendraper in Cheapside, a lady of considerable fortune.-E.
(363) Dr. Stephen Hales, author of "Vegetable Statics," and "Vegetable Essays." This eminent natural philosopher and vegetable physiologist was offered a canonry of Windsor, but contented himself with the living of Teddington, which he held with that of Farringdon. He died in 1761, at the age of eighty-four.
(364) Walpole, in his Memoires, gives the following account of Lord Waldegrave's appointment: " The Earl accepted it at the earnest request of the King, and after repeated assurances of the submission and tractability of Stone. The Earl was averse to it. He was a man of pleasure, understood the court, was firm in the King's favour, easy in his circumstances, and at once undesirous of rising, and afraid to fall. He said to a friend, "If I dared, I would make this excuse to the King- -'Sir, I am too young to govern. and too old to be governed:' but he was forced to submit. A man of stricter honour and of more reasonable sense could not have been selected for the employment." Vol. i. p. 255.-E.
155 Letter 70 To Sir Horace Mann. Arlington Street, Feb. 14, 1753.
I have been going to write to you every post for these three weeks, and could not bring myself to begin a letter with "I have nothing to tell YOU." But it grows past a joke; we will not drop our correspondence because there is no war, no Politics, no parties, no madness, and no scandal. In the memory of England there never was so inanimate an age: it is more fashionable to go to church than to either House of Parliament. Even the era of the Gunnings is over: both sisters have lain in, and have scarce made one paragraph in the newspapers, though their names were grown so renowned, that in Ireland the beggarwomen bless you with,-,, "the luck of the Gunnings attend you!"
You will scarce guess how I employ my time; chiefly at present in the guardianship of embryos and cockleshells. Sir hans Sloane is dead, and has made me one of the trustees to his museum, which is to be offered for twenty thousand pounds to the king, the Parliament, the Royal Academies of Petersburnh, Berlin, Paris, and Madrid.(365) He valued it at fourscore thousand; and so would any body who loves hippopotamuses, sharks with one ear, and spiders as big as geese! It is a rent-charge, to keep the foetuses in spirits! You may believe that those who think money the most valuable of all curiosities, will not be purchasers. The King has excused himself, saying he did not believe that there were twenty thousand pounds in the treasury. We are a charming, wise set, all philosophers, botanists, antiquarians, and mathematicians; and adjourned our first meeting because Lord Macclesfield, our chairman, was engaged to a party for finding out the longitude. One of our number is a Moravian who signs himself Henry XXVIII, Count de Reus. The Moravians have settled a colony at Chelsea, in Sir Hans's neighbourhood, and I believe he intended to beg Count Henry XXVIIIth's skeleton for his museum.
I am almost ashamed to be thanking you but now for a most entertaining letter of two sheets, dated December 22, but I seriously had nothing to form an answer. It is but three mornings ago that your brother was at breakfast with me, and scolded me, "Why, you tell me nothing!"—"No," says I "if I had any thing to say, I should write to your brother." I give you my word, that the first new book that takes, the first murder, the first revolution, you shall have, with all the circumstances. In the mean time, do be assured that there never was so dull a place as London, or so insipid an inhabitant of it, as, yours, etc.
(365) Ames, in a letter written on the 22d of March to Mr. T. Martin, says, "I cannot forbear to give you some relation of Sir Hans Sloane's curiosities. The Parliament has been pleased to accept them on the condition of Sir Hans's codicil; that is, that they should be kept together in one place in or near London, and should be exhibited freely for a public use. The King, or they, by the will, were to have the first error. The 19th instant being appointed for a committee of the whole House, after several speeches, the Speaker himself moved the whole House into a general regard to have them joined with the King's and Cotton Libraries, together with those of one Major Edwards, who had left seven thousand pounds to build a library, besides his own books; and to purchase the Harleian manuscripts, build a house for their reception," etc. An act was shortly after passed, empowering the Crown to raise a sufficient sum by lottery to purchase the Sloane collection and Harleian manuscripts, together with Montagu House. Such was the commencement of the British Museum.-E.
157 Letter 71 To Mr. Gray. Arlington Street, Feb. 20, 1753.
I am very sorry that the haste I made to deliver you from your uneasiness the first moment after I received your letter, should have made me express myself in a manner to have the quite contrary effect from what I intended. You well know how rapidly and carelessly I always write my letters: the note you mention was written in a still greater hurry than ordinary, and merely to put you out of pain. I had not seen Dodsley, consequently could only tell you that I did not doubt but he would have no objection to satisfy you, as you was willing to prevent his being a loser by the plate.(366) Now, from this declaration, how is it possible for you to have for one momentput such a construction upon my words, as would have been a downright stupid brutality, unprovoked? It is impossible for me to recollect my very expression, but I am confident that I have repeated the whole substance.
How the bookseller would be less a loser by being at more expense, I can easily explain to you. He feared the price of half a guinea would seem too high to most purchasers. If by the expense of ten guineas more he could make the book appear so much more rich and showy as to induce people to think it cheap, the profits from selling many more copies would amply recompense him for his additional disbursement.
The thought of having the head engraved was entirely Dodsley's own, and against my opinion, as I concluded it would be against yours; which made me determine to acquaint you with it before its appearance.
When you reflect on what I have said now, you will see very clearly, that I had and could have no other possible meaning in what I wrote last. You might justly have accused me of neglect, if I had deferred giving you all the satisfaction in my powers, as soon as ever I knew your uneasiness.
The head I give up.(367) The title I think will be wrong, and not answer your purpose; for, as the drawings are evidently calculated for the poems, how will the improper disposition of the word designs before poems make the edition less yours? I am as little convinced that there is any affectation in leaving out the Mr. before your names: it is a barbarous addition: the other is simple and classic; a rank I cannot help thinking due to both the poet and painter. Without ranging myself among classics, I assure you, were I to print any thing with my name, it should be plain Horace Walpole: Mr. is one of the Gothicisms I abominate. The explanation(368) was certainly added for people who have not eyes:—such are-almost all who have seen Mr. Bentley's drawings, and think to compliment him by mistaking them for prints. Alas! the generality want as much to have the words "a man," "a cock," written under his drawings, as under the most execrable hieroglyphics of Egypt, or of signpost painters.
I will say no more now, but that you must not wonder if I am partial to you and yours, when you can write as you do and yet feel so little vanity. I have used freedom enough with your writings to convince you I speak truth: I praise and scold Mr. Bentley immoderately, as I think he draws well or ill: I never think it worth my while to do either, especially to blame, where there are not generally vast excellencies. Good night! Don't suspect me when I have no fault but impatience to make you easy.
(366) This was a print of Mr. Gray, after the portrait of him by Eckardt. It was intended to have been prefixed to Dodsley's quarto edition of the Odes with Mr. Bentley's designs but Mr. Gray's extreme repugnance to the proposal obliged his friends to drop it.
(367) In a letter to Walpole, written from Stoke, in January, on receiving a proof of the head, Gray had said, "Sure you are not out of your wits! This I know, if you suffer my head to be printed, you will put me out of mine. I conjure you immediately to put a stop to any such design. Who is at the expense of engraving it, I know not; but if it be Dodsley, I will make up the loss to him. The thing as it was, I know, will make me ridiculous enough: but to appear in proper person, at the head of my works, consisting Of half a dozen ballads in thirty pages, would be worse than the pillory. I do assure you, if I had received such a book, with such a frontispiece, without any warning, I do believe it would have given me the palsy." Works, vol. iii. p. 106.-E.
(368) Of Mr. Bentley's designs.
158 Letter 72 To Sir Horace Mann. Strawberry Hill, March 4, 1753.
have you got any wind of our new histories? Is there any account at Rome that Mr. Stone and the Solicitor-general are still thought to be more attached to Egypt than Hanover? For above this fortnight there have been strange mysteries and reports! the cabinet council sat night after night till two o'clock in the morning: we began to think that they were empannelled to sit upon a new rebellion, or invasion at least; or that the King of Prussia, had sent his mandate, that we must receive the young Pretender in part payment of the Silesian loan. At last it is come out that Lord Ravensworth,(369) on the information of one Fawcett, a lawyer, has accused Stone, Murray, and Dr. Johnson, the new Bishop of Gloucester, of having had an odd custom of toasting the Chevalier and my Lord Dunbar at one Vernon's, a merchant, about twenty years ago. The Pretender's counterpart ordered the council to examine into it: Lord Ravensworth stuck to his story: Fawcett was terrified with the solemnity of the divan, and told his very different Ways, and at last would not sign his deposition. On the other hand, Stone and Murray took their Bible on their innocence, and the latter made a fine speech into the bargain. Bishop Johnson scrambled out of the scrape at the very beginning; and the council have reported to the King that the accusation was false and malicious.(370) This is an exact abridgement of the story; the commentary would be too voluminous. The heats upon it are great: the violent Whigs are not at all convinced of the Whiggism of the culprits, by the defect of evidence: the opposite clan affect as much conviction as if they wished them Whigs.
Mr. Chute and I are come hither for a day or two to inspect the progress of a Gothic staircase, which is so pretty and so small, that I am inclined to wrap it up and send it you in my letter. As my castle is so diminutive, I give myself a Burlington air, and say, that as Chiswick is a model of Grecian architecture, Strawberry Hill is to be so of Gothic. I went the other morning with Mr. Conway to buy some of the new furniture-paper for you: if there was any money at Florence, I should expect this manufacture would make its fortune there.
Liotard, the painter, is arrived, and has brought me Marivaux's picture, which gives one a very different idea from what one conceives of the author of Marianne, though it is reckoned extremely like: the countenance is a mixture of buffoon and villain. I told you what mishap I had with Cr`ebillon's portrait: he has had the foolish dirtiness to keep it. Liotard is a G`en`evois; but from having lived at Constantinopole, he wears a Turkish habit, and a beard down to his girdle: this, and his extravagant prices, which he has raised even beyond what he asked at Paris, will probably get him as much money as he covets, for he is avaricious beyond imagination. His crayons and his water-colours are very fine; his enamel, hard: in general, he is too Dutch, and admires nothing but excess of finishing.
We have nothing new but two or three new plays, and those not worth sending to you. The answer to the Prussian memorial, drawn chiefly by Murray, is short, full, very fine, and has more spirit than I thought we had by us. The whole is rather too good, as I believe our best policy would have been, to be in the wrong, and make satisfaction for having been ill-used: the author with whom we have to deal, is not a sort of man to stop at being confuted. Adieu!
(369) Sir Henry Liddel, Baron of Ravensworth.
(370) "Upon the whole matter," says the Hon. Philip Yorke, in his MS. Parliamentary Journal, "the lords came unanimously to an opinion of reporting to the King, that there appeared to them no foundation for any part of the charge; that Mr. Fawcett, the only evidence, had grossly prevaricated in it: that it was malicious and scandalous, and ought not to affect the character of the Bishop, or either of the gentlemen who were aspersed by it."-E.
159 Letter 73 To Sir Horace Mann. Arlington Street, March 27, 1753.
Such an event as I mentioned to you in my last, has, you may well believe, had some consequences; but only enough to show what it would have had in less quiet times. Last week the Duke of Bedford moved in the House of Commons to have all the papers relating to Lord Ravensworth and Fawcett laid before them. As he had given notice of his intention, the ministry, in a great fright, had taken all kind of precaution to defeat the motion; and succeeded—if it can be called success to have quashed the demand, and thereby confirmed the suspicions. After several councils, it was determined, that all the cabinet councillors should severally declare the insufficience and prevarication of Fawcett's evidence: they did, and the motion Was rejected by 122 to 5.(371) If one was prejudiced by classic notions of the wisdom and integrity of a senate, that debate would have cured them. The flattery to Stone was beyond belief: I will give you but one instance. The Duke of Argyll said, "He had happened to be at the secretary's office during the rebellion, when two Scotchmen came to ask for a place, which one obtained, the other lost, but went away best pleased, from Mr. Stone's gracious manner of refusal!" It appeared in the most glaring manner, that the Bishop of Gloucester had dictated to Fawcett a letter of acquittal to himself; and not content with that, had endeavoured to persuade him to make additions to it some days after. It was as plain, that Fawcett had never prevaricated till these private interviews(372) With the prelate-yet there were 122 to 5!
I take for granted our politics adjourn here till next winter unless there should be any Prussian episode. It is difficult to believe that that King has gone so far, without intending to go farther: if he is satisfied with the answer to his memorial, though it is the fullest that ever was made, yet it will be the first time that ever a monarch was convinced! For a King of the Romans, it seems as likely that we should see a King of the Jews.
Your brother has got the paper for your room. He shall send you with it a fine book which I have had printed of' Gray's poems, with drawings by another friend of mine, which I am sure will charm you, though none of them are quite well engraved, and some sadly. Adieu! I am all brick and mortar: the castle at Strawberry Hill grows so near a termination, that you must not be angry if I wish to have you see it. Mr. Bentley is going to make a drawing of the best view, which I propose to have engraved, and then you shall at least have some idea of that sweet little spot—little enough, but very sweet!
(371) "The debate was long and heavy; the Duke of Bedford's performance moderate enough: he divided the House, but it was not told, for there went below the bar with him the Earl of Harcourt, Lord Townshend, the Bishop of Worcester, and Lord Talbot only. Upon the whole, it was the worst judged, the worst executed, and the worst supported point, that I ever saw of so much expectations" Dodington, p. 202.-E.
(372) This insignificant, and indeed ridiculous accusation, against Murray and Stone, is magnified by Walpole, both here and in his Memoire,,,, into an important transaction, in consequence of the hatred he bore to the persons accused,-D. ["The accusation was justly ridiculed by the wits of the day, as a counterpart to the mountain in labour; and the Pelhams had the satisfaction of seeing it terminate in the full exculpation of their friends, the Solicitor-general and Mr. Stone." Coxe's Pelham, vol. ii, p. 263.]
(373) On receiving a proof of the tail-piece, which Mr. Bentley had designed for the Elegy in a Country Churchyard, and which represents a village funeral, Gray wrote to Walpole: "I am surprised at the print, which far surpasses my idea of London graving: the drawing itself was so finished, that I suppose it did not require all the art I imagined to copy it tolerably. My aunts seeing me open your letter, took it to be a burying- ticket, and asked whether any body had left me a ring; and so they still conceive it to be, even with all their spectacles on. Heaven forbid they should suspect it to belong to any verses of mine! They would burn me for a poet." Works, vol. iii. p. 105.-E.
161 Letter 74 To Sir Horace Mann. Arlington Street, April 16, 1753.
Dear Sir, I know I never give you more pleasure than in recommending such an acquaintance as Mr. Stephens, a young gentleman now in Italy, of whom I have heard from the best hands the greatest and most amiable character. He is brother-in-law of Mr. West,(374) Mr. Pelham's secretary, and (to you I may add,) as I know it will be an additional motive to increase your attentions to his relation, a particular friend of mine. I beg you will do for my sake, what you always do from your own goodness of heart, make Florence as agreeable to him as possible: I have the strongest reasons to believe that you will want no incitement the moment you begin to know Mr. Stephens.
(374) James West, member for St. Albans, secretary to Mr. Pelham as chancellor of the exchequer, secretary to the treasury, treasurer to the Royal Society, and member of the Antiquarian Society, married the sister of this Mr. Stephens.
161 Letter 75 To Sir Horace Mann. Strawberry Hill, April 27, 1753.
I have brought two of your letters hither to answer: in town there are so many idle people besides oneself, that one has not a minute's time; here I have whole evenings, after the labours of the day are ceased. Labours they are, I assure you; I have carpenters to direct, plasterers to hurry, papermen to scold, and glaziers to help: this last is my greatest pleasure: I have amassed such quantities of painted glass, that every window in my castle will be illuminated with it: the adjusting and disposing it is vast amusement. I thank you a thousand times for thinking of procuring me some Gothic remains from Rome; but I believe there is no such thing there: I scarce remember any morsel in the true taste of it in Italy. indeed, my dear Sir, kind as you are about it, I perceive you have no idea what Gothic is; you have lived too long amidst true taste, to understand venerable barbarism. You say, "You suppose my garden is to be Gothic too." That can't be; Gothic is merely architecture; and as one has a satisfaction in imprinting the gloom of abbeys and cathedrals on one's house, so one's garden, on the contrary, is to be nothing but riot, and the gaiety of nature. I am greatly impatient for my altar, and so far from mistrusting its goodness, I only fear it will be too good to expose to the weather, as I intend it must be, in a recess in the garden. I was going to tell you that my house is so monastic, that I have a little hall decked with long saints in lean arched windows, and with taper columns, which we call the Paraclete, in memory of Eloisa's cloister.(375)
I am glad you have got rid of your duel, bloodguiltless: Captain Lee had ill luck in lighting upon a Lorrain officer; he might have boxed the ears of the whole Florentine nobility, (con rispetto si dice,) and not have occasioned you half the trouble you have had in accommodating this quarrel.
You need not distrust Mr. Conway and me for showing any attentions to Prince San Severino,(376) that may convince him of' our regard for you; I only hope he will not arrive till towards winter, for Mr. Conway is gone to his regiment in Ireland, and my chateau is so far from finished, that I am by no means in a condition to harbour a princely ambassador. By next spring I hope to have rusty armour, and arms with quarterings enough to persuade him that I am qualified to be Grand Master of Malta. If you could send me Viviani,(377 with his invisible architects out of the Arabian tales, I might get my house ready at a day's warning; especially as it will not be quite so lofty as the triumphal arch at Florence.
What you say you have heard of strange conspiracies, fomented by our nephew(378) is not entirely groundless. A Dr. Cameron(379) has been seized in Scotland, who certainly came over with commission to feel the ground. He is brought to London; but nobody troubles their head about him, or any thing else, but Newmarket, where the Duke is at present making a campaign, with half the nobility and half the money of England attending him: they really say, that not less than a hundred thousand pounds have been carried thither for the hazard of this single week. The palace has been furnished for him from the great wardrobe, though the chief person(380) concerned flatters himself that his son is at the expense of his own amusement there.
I must now tell you how I have been treated by an old friend of yours—don't be frightened, and conclude that this will make against your friend San Severino: he is only a private prince; the rogue in Question is a monarch. Your brother has sent you some weekly papers that are much in fashion, called "The World;" three or four of them are by a friend of yours; one particularly I wrote to promote a subscription for King Theodore, who is in prison for debt. His Majesty's character is so bad, that it only raised fifty pounds; and though that was so much above his desert, it was so much below his expectation, that he sent a solicitor to threaten the printer with a prosecution for having taken so much liberty with his name—take notice too, that he had accepted the money! Dodsley, you may believe, laughed at the lawyer; but that does not lessen the dirty knavery. It would indeed have made an excellent suit! a printer prosecuted suppose for having solicited and obtained charity for a man in prison, and that man not mentioned by his right name, but by a mock title, and the man himself not a native of the country!—but I have done with countenancing kings!
Lord Bath has contributed a paper to the World, but seems to have entirely lost all his wit and genius: it is a plain heavy description of Newmarket, with scarce an effort towards humour.(381) I had conceived the greatest expectations from a production of his, especially in the way of the Spectator; but I M now assured by Franklyn, the old printer of the Craftsman, (who by a comical revolution of things, is a tenant of mine at Twickenham,) that Lord Bath never wrote a Craftsman himself, only gave hints for them—yet great part of his reputation was built on those papers. Next week my Lord chesterfield appears in the World(382)—I expect much less from him than I did from Lord Bath, but it is very certain that his name will make it applauded. Adieu!
P.S. Since I came to town, I hear that my Lord Granville has cut another colt's tooth-in short, they say he is going to be married again; it is to Lady Juliana Collier,(383) a very pretty girl, daughter of Lord Portmore: there are not above two or three and forty years difference in their ages, and not above three bottles difference in @ their drinking in a day, so it is a very suitable match! She will not make so good a Queen as our friend Sophia, but will like better, I suppose, to make a widow. If this should not turn out true,(384) I can't help it.
(375) "Where awful arches make a noonday night, And the dim windows shade a solemn light."-Pope.-E.
(376) Ambassador from the King of Naples.
(377) Viviani, a Florentine nobleman, showing the triumphal arch there to Prince San Severino, assured him, and insisted upon it, that it was begun and finished in twenty-four hours!
(378) The King of Prussia.
(379) This is a strange story, and it is difficult to believe that the King of Prussia was concerned in it. In his Memoires, Walpole gives the following account of the taking of Dr. Cameron:—"About this time was taken in Scotland, Dr. Archibald Cameron, a man excepted by the act of indemnity. Intelligence had been received some time before of his intended journey to Britain, with a commission from Prussia to offer arms to the disaffected Highlanders, at the same time that ships were hiring in the north to transport men. The fairness of Dr. Cameron's character, compared with the severity he met from a government most laudably mild to its enemies, confirmed this report. That Prussia, who opened its inhospitable arms to every British rebel, should have tampered in such a business, was by no means improbable. That King hated his uncle: but could a Protestant potentate dip in designs for restoring a popish government? Of what religion is policy? To what sect is royal revenge bigoted? The Queen-dowager, though sister of our King, was avowedly a Jacobite, by principle so-and it was natural: what Prince, but the single one who profits by the principle, can ever think it allowable to overturn sacred hereditary right? It is the curse of sovereigns that their crimes should be unpunishable."-D.
(380) The King.
(381) No. 17, giving an account of the races and manners at Newmarket.-E.
(382) It forms the 18th number, and is entitled " A Country Gentleman's Tour to Paris with his family."-E.
(383) Lady Juliana Collier, youngest daughter of Charles, second Earl of Portmore, by Juliana hale, Duchess-dowager of Leeds. She married, in 1759, James Dawkins, Esq. of Standlinch, in Wiltshire.-D.
(384) It did not happen.
164 Letter 76 To The Hon. H. S. Conway. Strawberry Hill, May 5, 1753.
Though my letter bears a country date, I am only a passenger here, just come to overlook my workmen, and repose myself upon some shavings, after the fatigues of the season. You know balls and masquerades always abound as the weather be(,Ins to be too hot for them, and this has been quite a spring-tide of diversion. Not that I am so abandoned as to have partaken of all; I neither made the Newmarket campaign under the Duke, nor danced at any ball, nor looked well at any masquerade: I begin to submit to my years, and amuse myself-only just as much as I like. Indeed, when parties and politics are at an end, an Englishman may be allowed not to b always grave and out of humour. His Royal Highness has won as many hearts at Newmarket as he lost in Scotland; he played deep and handsomely; received every body at his table with the greatest good humour, and permitted the familiarities of the place with ease and sense.
There have been balls at the Duchess of Norfolk's, at Holland-house, and Lord Granville's, and a subscription masquerade: the dresses were not very fine, not much invention, nor any very absurd. I find I am telling you extreme trifles; but you desired me to write; and there literally happens nothing of greater moment. If I can fill out a sheet even in this way, I will; for at Sligo(385) perhaps I may appear a journalist of consequence.
There is a Madame de Mezi`eres arrived from Paris, who has said a thousand impertinent things to my Lady Albemarle, on my lord's not letting her come to Paris.(386) I should not repeat this to you, only to introduce George Selwyn's account of this woman who, he says, is mother to the Princess of Montauban, grandmother to Madame de Brionne, sister to General Oglethorpe, and was laundress to the Duchess of Portsmouth.
Sir Charles Williams, never very happy at panegyric, has made a distich on the Queen of Hungary, which I send you for the curiosity, not the merit of it:
"O regina orbis prima et pulcherrima, ridens
Es Venus, incedens Juno, Minerva loquens."
It is infinitely admired at Vienna, but Baron Munchausen has received a translation of it into German in six verses, which are still more applauded.
There is another volume published of Lord Bolinbroke's: it contains his famous Letter to Sir William Windham, with an admirable description of the Pretender and hi Court, and a very poor justification of his own treachery to that party; a flimsy unfinished State of the Nation, written at the end of his life, and the commonplace tautology of an old politician, who lives out of the world and writes from newspapers; and a superficial letter to Mr. Pope, as an introduction to his Essays, which are printed, but not yet published.
What shall I say to you more? You see how I am forced to tack paragraphs together, without any connexion or consequence! Shall I tell you one more idle story, and will you just recollect that you once concerned yourself enough about the heroine of it, to excuse my repeating such a piece of tittle-tattle? This heroine is Lady Harrington, the hero is— not entirely of royal blood; at least I have never heard that Lodomie, the toothdrawer, was in any manner descended from the house of Bourbon. Don't be alarmed: this plebeian operator is not in the catalogue of your successors. How the lady was the aggressor is not known; 'tis only conjectured that French politeness and French interestedness could never have gone such lengths without mighty provocation. The first instance of the toothdrawer's un-gentle behaviour was on hearing it said that Lady Harrington was to have her four girls drawn by Liotard; which was wondered at, as his price is so great—"Oh!" said Lodomie, "chacune paie pour la sienne." Soon after this insult, there was some dispute about payments and toothpowder, and divers messages passed. At last the lady wrote a card, to say she did not understand such impertinent answers being given to her chairman by an arracheur de dents. The angry little gentleman, with as much intrepidity as if he had drawn out all her teeth, tore the card in five slits, and returned it with this astonishing sentence, "I return you your impertinent card, and desire you will pay me what you owe me." All I know more is, that the toothdrawer still lives; and so do many lords and gentlemen, formerly thought the slaves of the offended fair one's will and passions, and among others, to his great shame, your sincere friend.
(385) Mr. Conway was then with his regiment quartered at Sligo in Ireland.
(386) Lord Albemarle was then ambassador at Paris.
165 Letter 77 To George Montagu, Esq. Strawberry Hill, May 22, 1753.
You may very possibly be set out for Greatworth, but what house Greatworth is, or whose, or how you came to have it, is all a profound secret to us: your transitions arc so Pindaric, that, without notes, we do not understand them, especially as neither Mr. Bentley nor I have seen any of the letters, which I suppose you have written to your family in the intervals of your journeyings from Sir Jonathan Cope's(387) to Roel, and from Roel to Greatworth. Mr. Bentley was just ready to send you down a packet of Gothic, and brick and mortar, and arched windows, and taper columns to be erected at Roel—no such matter, you have met with some brave chambers belonging to Sir Jonathan somebody in Northamptonshire, and are unloading your camels and caravan,.;, and pitching your tents among your own tribe. I cannot be quite sorry, for I shall certainly visit you at Greatworth, and it might have been some years before the curtain had drawn up at Roel. We emerge very fast out of shavings, and hammerings, and pastings; the painted glass is full-blown in every window, and the gorgeous saints, that were brought out for one day on the festival of Saint George Montagu, are fixed for ever in the tabernacles they are to inhabit.- The castle is not the only beauty: and to-day we had a glimpse of the sun as he passed by, though I am convinced the summer is over; for these two last years we have been forced to compound for five hot days in the pound.
News there is none to tell you. We had two days in the House of Commons, that had something of the air of Parliament; there has been a Marriage-bill, invented by my Lord Bath, and cooked up by the Chancellor, which was warmly opposed by the Duke of Bedford in the Lords, and with us by Fox and Nugent: the latter made an admirable speech last week against it, and Charles Townshend,(388) another very good one yesterday, when we sat till near ten o'clock, but were beat, we minority, by 165 to 84.
I know nothing else but elopements: I have lost my man Henry, who is run away for debt; and my Lord Bath his only son. who is run away from thirty thousand pounds a-year, which in all probability would have come to him in six months. There had been some great fracas about his marriage; the stories are various on the Why; some say his father told Miss Nichols that his son was a very worthless young man; others, that the Earl could not bring himself to make tolerable settlements; and a third party say, that the Countess has blown up a quarrel in order to have his son in her power, and at her mercy. Whatever the cause was, this ingenious young man, who You know has made my Lady Townshend his everlasting enemy, by repeating her histories of Miss Chudleigh to that Miss, of all counsellors in the world, picked out my Lady Townshend to consult on his domestic grievances: she, with all the good-nature and charity imaginable, immediately advised him to be disinherited. He took her advice, left two dutiful letters for his parents, to notify 'his disobedience, and went off last Friday night to France. The Earl is so angry, that he could almost bring himself to give Mr. Newport, and twenty other people, their estates again. Good night—here is the Goth, Mr. Bentley, wants to say a word to you.
"Dear Sir, Wrote you a supernumerary letter on Saturday, but as I find you have shifted your quarters since I heard from 'YOU, imagine it may not have reached you yet. If you want to know what made me so assiduous, it was to tell you Sir Danvers Osborn has kissed hands for New York, that's all. I am sincerely yours.
"P.S. I wish you Would write to him mentioning me, that's more."
(387) At Brewern, in Oxfordshire.-E.
(388) Second son of the Marquis of Townshend.
167 Letter 78 To The Hon. H. S. Conway. Strawberry Hill, May 24, 1753.
It is well you are married! How would my Lady Ailesbury have liked to be asked in a parish church for three Sundays running? I really believe she would have worn her weeds for ever, rather than have passed through so impudent a ceremony! What do you think? But you will want to know the interpretation of this preamble. Why, there is a new bill, which, under the notion of preventing clandestine marriages, has made such a general rummage and reform in the office of matrimony that every Strephon and Chloe, every dowager and her Hussey, will have as many impediments and formalities to undergo as a treaty of peace. Lord Bath invented this bill,(389) but had drawn it so ill, that the Chancellor was forced to draw a new one, and then grew so fond of his own creature, that he has crammed it down the throats of both Houses-though they gave many a gulp before they could swallow it. The Duke of Bedford attacked it first with great spirit and mastery, but had little support, though the Duke of Newcastle did not vote. The lawyers were all ordered to purse it through our House: but except the poor Attorney-general,(390) "Who is nurse indeed. to all intents and purposes, and did amply gossip over it, not one of them said a word. Nugent shone extremely in opposition to the bill, and, though every now and then on the precipice of absurdity, kept clear of it, with great humour and wit and argument, and was unanswered-yet we were beat. Last Monday it came into the committee: Charles Townshend acted a very good speech with great cleverness, and drew a picture of his own story and his father's tyranny, with at least as much parts as modesty. Mr. Fox mumbled the Chancellor and his lawyers, and pinned the plan of the bill upon a pamphlet he had found of Dr. Gally's,(391) where the doctor, recommending the French scheme of matrimony, says, "It was found that fathers were too apt to forgive." "The Gospel, I thought," said Mr. Fox, "enjoined forgiveness; but pious Dr. Gal] v thinks fathers are too apt to forgive." Mr. Pelham, extremely in his opinion against the bill, and in his inclination too, was forced to rivet it, and, without speaking one word for it, taught the House how to vote for it; and it was carried against the Chairman's leaving the chair by 165 to 84. This Is all the news I know, or at least was all when I came out of town; for I left the tinkering of the bill, and came hither last Tuesday to my workmen. I flatter myself I shall get into tolerable order to receive my Lady Ailesbury and you at your return from Sligo, from whence I have received 'your letter, and where I hope you have had my first. I say nothing of the exile of the Parliament of Paris for I know no more than you will see in the public papers; only, as we are going to choose a new Parliament, we could not do better than choose the exiles: we could scarce choose braver or honester men. I say as little of Mademoiselle Murphy,(392) for I conclude you hear nothing but her health drank in whiskey. Don't all the nailed Irish flatter themselves with preferment, and claim relation with her? Miss Chudleigh says, there is some sense in belonging to a king who turns off an old mistress when he has got a new one.
Arlington Street, May 29.
I am Come to town for a day or two, and find that the Marriage-bill has not only lasted till now-in the committee, but has produced, or at least disclosed, extreme heats. Mr. Fox and Mr. Pelham have had very high words on every clause, and the former has renewed his attacks on the Chancellor under the name of Dr. Gally. Yesterday on the nullity clause they sat till half an hour after three in the morning, having just then had a division On adjournment, which was rejected by the ministry by above 80 to 70. The Speaker, who had spoken well against the clause, was so misrepresented by the Attorney-general, that there was danger of a skimmington between the great wig and the coif, the former having given a flat lie to the latter. Mr. Fox I am told, outdid himself for spirit, and severity on the Chancellor and the lawyers. I say I am told; for I was content with having been beat twice, and did not attend. The heats between the two ministers were far from cooling by the length of the debate. Adieu! You did little expect in these times, and at this season, to have heard such a parliamentary history! The bill is not near finished;(393) Mr. Fox has declared he will dispute every inch of ground. I hope he won't be banished to Pontoise.(394) I shall write to you no more; so pray return. I hear most favourable accounts of my Lady Ailesbury.
(389) The following is Tindal's account of the origin of this bill: "The fatal consequences of clandestine marriages had been long complained of in England, as rendering the succession to all property insecure and doubtful. Every day produced hearings of the most shocking kind in the court of Chancery, and appeals in the House of Lords, concerning the validity of such marriages; and sometimes the innocent offspring were cut off from succession, though their parents had been married bona fide, because of the irregularity of such marriage. On the other hand, both women and men of the most infamous characters had opportunities of ruining the sons and daughters of the greatest families in England, by conveniences of marrying in the Fleet, and other unlicensed places; and marrying was now become as much a trade as any mechanical profession."-E.
(390 Sir Dudley Ryder.
(391) Dr. Henry Gally, one of the King's chaplains in ordinary. Besides the pamphlet here spoken of, which was entitled "Some Considerations upon Clandestine Marriages," he wrote a "Dissertation on Pronouncing the Greek Language," and several other works He died in 1769.-E.
(392) An Irishwoman who was, for a short time, mistress to Louis XV.
(393) "The opposition to the bill was such that few clauses remained unaltered; and Mr. Fox, holding it up in the House, as Antony exposed the murdered body of Caesar, made a kind of a parody of the speech in Shakespeare upon that occasion." Tindal.-E.
(394) The Parliament of Paris having espoused the clause of religious liberty, and apprehended several priests who, by the authority of the Archbishop of Paris and other prelates, had refused the sacraments to those who would not subscribe to the bull Unigunitus, were banished by Louis XV. to Pontoise.
169 Letter 79 To George Montagu, Esq. Strawberry Hill, June 11, 1753.
You will think me very fickle, and that I have but a slight regard to the castle I am building for my ancestors, when you hear that I have been these last eight days in London amid dust and stinks, instead of seringa, roses, battlements, and niches; but you perhaps recollect that I have another Gothic passion, which is for squabbles in the Wittenagemot.(395) I can't say that the contests have run so high in either House as they have sometimes done in former days, but this age has found out a new method of parliamentary altercations. The Commons abuse the Barons, and the Barons return it; in short, Mr. Fox attacked the Chancellor violently on the Marriage-bill; and when it was sent back to the Lords, the Chancellor made the most outrageous invectives on Fox that ever was heard. But what offends still more,—I don't mean offends Fox more,—was the Chancellor describing the chief persons who had opposed his bill in the Commons, and giving reason why he excused them. As the speaker was in the number of the excused, the two maces are ready to come to blows.(396) The town says Mr. Fox is to be dismissed, but I can scarce think it will go so far.
My Lord Cornwallis is made an earl; Lord Bristol's sisters have the rank of Earl's daughters; Damer is Lord Milton in Ireland, and the new Lord Barnard is, I hear, to be Earl of Darlington.
Poor Lady Caroline Brand is dead of a rheumatic fever, and her husband as miserable a man as ever he was a cheerful one: I grieve much for her, and pity him; they were infinitely happy, and lived in the most perfect friendship I ever saw.
You may be assured that I will pay you a visit some time this summer, though not yet, as I cannot leave my workmen, especially as we have a painter who paints the paper on the staircase under Mr. Bentley's direction. The armoury bespeaks the ancient chivalry of the lords of the castle; and I have filled Mr. Bentley's Gothic lanthorn with painted glass, which casts the most venerable gloom on the stairs that ever was seen since the days of Abelard. The lanthorn itself, in which I have stuck a coat of the Veres, is supposed to have come from Castle Henningham. Lord and Lady Vere were here t'other day, and called cousins with it, and would very readily have invited it to Hanworth; but her Portuguese blood has so blackened the true stream that I could not bring myself to offer so fair a gift to their chapel.
I shall only tell you a bon-mot of Keith's, the marriage-broker, and conclude. "G-d d-n the bishops!" said he, (I beg Miss Montagu's pardon,) "so they will hinder my marrying. Well, let 'em; but I'll be revenged! I'll buy two or three acres of ground, and, by G-d! I'll underbury them all!" Adieu!
(395) The name of the Saxon great council, the supposed origin of parliaments.
(396) Among the Hardwicke papers there is a letter from Dr. Birch to the Hon. Philip Yorke, giving an account of the debate in the House of Lords. The following is an extract:— "My Lord Chancellor expressed his surprise, that the bill should have been styled out of doors an absurd, a cruel, a scandalous, and a wicked one. With regard to his own share in this torrent of abuse, as he was obliged to those who had so honourably defended him, so,' said he, 'I despise the invective, and I despise the retractation; I despise the scurrility, and I reject the adulation.' Mr. Fox was not present, but had soon an account of what had passed; for the same evening, being at Vauxhall with some ladies, he broke from them, and collecting a little circle of young members of parliament and others, told them with great eagerness, that he wished the session had continued a fortnight longer, for then he would have made ample returns to the Lord Chancellor. The Speaker talks of my Lord Chancellor's speech in the style of Mr. Fox, as deserving of the notice of the Commons, if they had not been prorogued."-E.
170 Letter 80 To Sir Horace Mann. Strawberry Hill, June 12, 1753.
I could not rest any longer with the thought of your having no idea of a place of which you hear so much, and therefore desired Mr. Bentley to draw you as much idea of it as the post would be persuaded to carry from Twickenham to Florence. The enclosed enchanted little landscape, then, is Strawberry Hill; and I will try to explain so much of it to you as will help to let you know whereabouts we are when we are talking to you; for it is uncomfortable in so intimate a correspondence as ours not to be exactly master of every spot where one another is writing, or reading, or sauntering. This view of the castle(397) is what I have just finished, and is the only side that will be at all regular. Directly before it is an open grove, through which you see a field, which is bounded by a serpentine wood of all kind of trees, and flowering shrubs, and flowers! The lawn before the house is situated on the top of a small hill, from whence to the left you see the town and church of Twickenham encircling a turn of the river, that looks exactly like a seaport in miniature. The opposite shore is a most delicious meadow, bounded by Richmond Hill, which loses itself in the noble woods of the park to the end of the prospect on the right, where is another turn of the river, and the suburbs of Kingston as luckily placed as Twickenham is on the left; and a natural terrace on the brow of my hill, with meadows of my own down to the river, commands both extremities. Is not this a tolerable prospect? You must figure that all this is perpetually enlivened by a navigation of boats and barges, and by a road below my terrace, with coaches, post-chaises, wagons, and horsemen constantly in motion, and the fields speckled with cows, horses, and sheep. Now you shall walk into the house. The bow-window below leads into a little parlour hung with a stone-colour Gothic paper and Jackson's Venetian prints, which I could never endure while they pretended, infamous as they are, to be after Titian, etc., but when I gave them this air of barbarous basreliefs, they succeeded to a miracle: it is impossible at first sight not to conclude that they contain the history of Attila or Tottila, done about the very aera. From hence, under two gloomy arches, you come to the hall and staircase, which it is impossible to describe to you, as it is the most particular and chief beauty of the castle. Imagine the walls covered with (I call it paper, but it is really paper painted in perspective to represent) Gothic fretwork: the lightest Gothic balustrade to the staircase, adorned with antelopes (our supporters) bearing shields lean windows fattened with rich saints in painted glass, and a vestibule open with three arches on the landing-place, and niches full of trophies of old coats of mail, Indian shields made of rhinoceros's hides, broadswords, quivers, long bows, arrows, and spears—all supposed to be taken by Mr Terry Robsart(398) in the holy wars. But as none of' this regards the enclosed drawing, I will pass to that. The room on the ground-floor nearest to you is a bedchamber, hung with yellow paper and prints, framed in a new manner, invented by Lord Cardigan; that is, with black and white borders printed. Over this is Mr. Chute's bedchamber, hung with red in the same manner. The bow-window room one pair of stairs is not yet finished; but in the tower beyond it is the charming closet where I am now writing to you. It is hung with green paper and water-colour pictures; has two windows; the one in the drawing looks to the garden, the other to the beautiful prospect; and the top of each glutted with the richest painted glass of the arms of England, crimson roses, and twenty other pieces of green, purple, and historic bits. I must tell you, by the way, that the castle, when finished, will have two-and-thirty windows enriched with painted glass. In this closet, which is Mr. Chute's college of arms, are two presses with books of heraldry and antiquities, Madame Sevign`e's Letters, and any French books that relate to her and her acquaintance. Out of this closet is the room where we always live, hung with a blue and white paper in stripes adorned with festoons, and a thousand plump chairs, couches, and luxurious settees covered with linen of the same pattern, and with a bow-window commanding the prospect, and gloomed with limes that shade half each window, already darkened with painted glass in chiaroscuro, set in deep blue glass. Under this room is a cool little hall, where we generally dine, hung with paper to imitate Dutch tiles.
I have described so much, that you will begin to think that all the accounts I used to give you of the diminutiveness of our habitation were fabulous; but it is really incredible how small most of the rooms are. The Only two good chambers I shall have are not yet built; they will be an eating-room and a library, each twenty by thirty, and the latter fifteen feet high. For the rest of the house, I could send it you in this letter as easily as the drawing, only that I should have no where to live till the return of the post. The Chinese summer-house which you may distinguish in the distant landscape, belongs to my Lord Radnor. We pique ourselves upon nothing but simplicity, and have no carvings, gildings, paintings, inlayings, or tawdry businesses.
You will not be sorry, I believe,. by this time to have done with Strawberry Hill, and to hear a little news. The end of a very dreaming session has been extremely enlivened by an accidental bill which has opened great quarrels, and those not unlikely to be attended with interesting circumstances. A bill to prevent clandestine marriages, so drawn by the Judges as to clog all matrimony in general, was inadvertently espoused by the Chancellor; and having been strongly attacked in the House of Commons by Nugent, the Speaker, Mr. Fox, and others, the last went very great lengths of severity on the whole body of the law, and on its chieftain in particular-, which, however, at the last reading, he softened and explained off extremely. This did not ,appease; but on the return of the bill to the House of Lords, where our amendments were to be read, the Chancellor in the most personal terms harangued against Fox, and concluded with saying that "he despised his scurrility as much as his adulation and recantation." As Christian charity is not one of the oaths taken by privy-counsellors, and as it is not the most eminent virtue in either of the champions, this quarrel is not likely to be soon reconciled. There are natures(399) whose disposition it is to patch up political breaches, but whether they will succeed, or try to succeed in healing this, can I tell you?
The match for Lord Granville, which I announced to you, is not concluded: his flames are cooled in that quarter as well as in others.
I begin a new sheet to you, which does not match with the other, for I have no more of the same paper here. Dr. Cameron is executed, and died with the greatest firmness. His parting with his wife the night before was heroic and tender: he let her stay till the last moment, when being aware that the gates of the Tower would be locked, he told her so; she fell at his feet in agonies: he said, "Madam, this was not what you promised me," and embracing her, forced her to retire; then with the same coolness, looked at the window till her coach was out of sight, after which he turned about and wept. His only concern seemed to be at the ignominy of Tyburn: he was not disturbed at the dresser for his body, or at the fire to burn his bowels.(400) The crowd was so great, that a friend who attended him could not get away, but was forced to stay and behold the execution: but what will you say to the minister or priest who accompanied him? The wretch, after taking leave, went into a landau, where, not content with seeing the Doctor hanged, he let down the top of the landau for the better convenience of seeing him embowelled! I cannot tell you positively that what I hinted of this Cameron being commissioned from Prussia was true, but so it is believed. Adieu! my dear child; I think this is a very tolerable letter for summer!
(397) It was a view of the south side towards the northeast.
(398) An ancestor of Sir Robert Walpole, who was knight of the garter.
(399) An allusion to Mr. Pelham.
(400) "The populace," says Smollet, though not very subject to tender emotions, were moved to compassion, and even to tears, by his behaviour at the place of execution; and many sincere well-wishers to the present establishment thought that the sacrifice of this victim, at such a juncture, could not redound either to its honour or security."-E.
173 Letter 81 To George Montagu, Esq. Strawberry Hill, July 17, 1753.
Dear sir, You are so kind, that I am peevish with myself for not being able to fix a positive day for being with you; as near as I can guess, it will be some of the very first days of the next month: I am engaged to go with Lady Ailesbury and Mr. Conway to Stowe, the 28th of this month, if some little business which I have here does not prevent me; and from thence I propose to meet Mr. Chute at Greatworth. If this should at all interfere with your schemes, tell me so; especially, I must beg that you would not so far depend on me as to stay one minute from doing any thing else you like, because it is quite impossible for me to be sure that I can execute just at the time I propose such agreeable projects. Meeting Mrs. Trevor will be a principal part of my pleasure; but the summer shall certainly not pass without my seeing you.
You will, I am sure, be concerned to hear that your favourite, Miss Brown, the pretty Catholic, who lived with Madame d'Acunha, is dead at Paris, by the ignorance of the physician. Tom Harvey, who always obliges the town with a quarrel in a dead season, has published a delightful letter to Sir William Bunbury,(401) full of madness and wit. He had given the Doctor a precedent for a clergyman's fighting a duel, and I furnished him with another story of the same kind, that diverted him extremely. A Dr. Suckling, who married a niece of my father, quarrelled with a country squire, who said, "Doctor, your gown is your protection." "Is it so?" replied the parson; "but, by God! it shall not be yours;" pulled it off, and thrashed him—I was going to say damnably, at least, divinely. Do but think, my Lord Coke and Tom Harvey are both bound to the peace, and are always going to fight together: how comfortable for their sureties!
My Lord Pomfret is dead; George Selwyn says, that my Lord
Ashburnham(402) is not more glad to get into the parks than
Lord Falkland is to get out of them. You know he was forced to
live in a privileged place.
Jack Hill(403) is dead too, and has dropped about a hundred legacies; a thousand pound to the Dowager of Rockingham; as much, with all his plate and china, to her sister Bel. I don't find that my uncle has got so much as a case of knives and forks, he always paid great court, but Mary Magdalen, my aunt, undid all by scolding the man, and her spouse durst not take his part.
Lady Anne Paulett's daughter is eloped with a country clergyman. The Duchess of Argyle Harangues against the Marriage-bill not taking place immediately, and is persuaded that all the girls will go off before next lady-day.
Before I finish, I must describe to you the manner in which I overtook Monsieur le Duc de Mirepoix t'other day, who lives at Lord Dunkeron's house at Turnham-green. It was seven o'clock in the evening of one of the hottest and most dusty days of this summer. He was walking slowly in the beau milieu of Brentford town, without any company, but with a brown lap-dog with long ears, two pointers, two pages, three footmen, and a vis-a-vis following him. By the best accounts I can get, he must have been to survey the ground of the battle of Brentford, which I hear he has much studied, and harangues upon.
Adieu! I enclose a World' to you, which, by a story I shall tell you, I find is called mine. I met Mrs. Clive two nights ago, and told her I had been in the meadows, but would walk no more there, for there was all the world. "Well," says she, "and don't you like the World!(404) I hear it was very clever last Thursday." All I know is, that you will meet with some of your acquaintance there. Good night, with my compliments to Miss Montagu.
(401) The Rev. Sir William Bunbury, father of Sir Charles, and of Henry, the celebrated caricaturist.-E.
(402) Lord Ashburnham succeeded Lord Pomfret as ranger of St. James's and Hyde Parks.
(403) Member for Higham Ferrers.
(404) No. 28, entitled " Old women most proper objects for love." Lady Mary Wortley Montagu, in a letter to her daughter, says, "Send me no translations, no periodical papers; though I confess some of The World' entertained me very much, particularly Lord Chesterfield and Horry Walpole; but whenever I met Dodsley, I wished him out of the World with all my heart. The title was a very lucky one, being, as you see, productive of puns world without end; which is all the species of wit some people can either practise or understand."-E.
174 Letter 82 To Sir Horace Mann. Strawberry Hill, July 21, 1753.
Though I have long had a letter of yours unanswered, yet I verily think it would have remained so a little longer, if the pretty altar-tomb which you have sent me had not roused my Gratitude. It arrived here—I mean the tomb, not my gratitude—yesterday, and this morning churchyarded itself in the corner of my wood, where I hope it will remain till some future virtuoso shall dig it up, and publish 'it in " A Collection of Roman Antiquities in Britain. It is the very thing I wanted: how could you, my dear Sir, take such exact measure of my idea? By the way, you have never told me the price; don't neglect it, that I nay pay your brother.
I told you how ill disposed I was to write to you, and you must know without my telling you that the only reason of that could be my not knowing a tittle worth mentioning; nay, not a tittle, worth or not. All England is gone over all England electioneering: the spirit is as great now they are all on one side, as when parties ran the highest. You judge how little I trouble myself about all this; especially when the question is not who shall be in the ministry, only who shall be in the House.
I am almost inclined not to say a word to your last letter, because if I begin to answer it, it must be by scolding you for making SO serious an affair of leaving off snuff; one would think you was to quit a vice, not a trick. Consider, child, you are in Italy, not in England: here you would be very fashionable by having so many nerves, and you might have doctors and waters for every One Of them, from Dr. Mead to Dr. Thompson, and from Bath to the iron pear-tree water. I should sooner have expected to hear that good Dr. Cocchi(405) was in the Inquisition than in prescribing to a snuff-twitter-nerve-fever! You say people tell you that leaving off snuff all at once may be attended with bad consequences—I can't conceive what bad consequences, but to the snuff-shop, who, I conclude by your lamentations, must have sold you tolerable quantities; and I know what effects any diversion of money has upon the tobacco-trade in Tuscany. I forget how much it was that the duty sank at Florence in a fortnight after the erection of the first lottery, by the poor people abridging themselves of snuff to buy tickets; but I think I have said enough, considering I don't intend to scold.
Thank you for your civilities to Mr. Stephens; not at all for those to Mr. Perry,(406) who has availed himself of the partiality which he found you had for me, and passed Upon you for my friend. I never spoke one word to him in my life, but when he went out of his own dressing-room at Penshurst that Mr. Chute and I might see it, and then I said, "Sir, I hope we don't disturb you;" he grunted something, and walked away—la belle amiti`e!—yet, my dear child, I thank you, who receive bad money when it is called My coin. I Wish YOU had liked my Lady Rochford's beauty more: I intended it should return well preserved: I grow old enough to be piqued for the charms of my contemporaries.
Lord Pomfret(407) is dead, not a thousand pound in debt. The Countess has two thousand a-year rent-charge for jointure, five hundred as lady of the bedchamber to the late Queen, and fourteen thousand pounds in money, in her own power, just recovered by a lawsuit-what a fund for follies! The new Earl has about two thousand four hundred pounds a-year in present but deep debts and post-obits. He has not put on mourning, but robes; that is, in the middle of this very hot summer, he has produced himself in a suit of crimson velvet, that he may be sure of not being mistaken for being in weepers. There are rents worth ten thousand pounds left to little Lady Sophia Carteret,(408) and the whole personal estate between the two unmarried daughters;(409) so the seat(410) must be stripped. There are a few fine small pictures, and one(411) very curious One of Henry VII. and his Queen, with Cardinal Morton, and, I think, the Abbot of Westminster. Strawberry casts a Gothic eye upon this, but I fear it will pass our revenues. The statues,(412) which were part of the Arundel collection, are famous, but few good. The Cicero is fine and celebrated: the Marius I think still finer. The rest are Scipios, Cincinnatus's and the Lord knows who, which have lost more of their little value than of their false pretensions by living out of doors; and there is a green-house full of colossal fragments. Adieu! Have you received the description and portrait of my castle?
(405) he was a very free thinker, and suspected by the Inquisition.
(406) He married one of the coheiresses of the Sidneys, Earls of Leicester.
(407) Thomas Fermor, first Earl of Pomfret, so created in 1721. He had ben master of the horse to Queen Caroline, and ranger of St. James's Park-D.
(408) Daughter of John, Earl of Granville, by his second wife, eldest daughter of Thomas Fermor, Earl of Pomfret. (Afterwards married to William Petty, Earl of Shelburne and Marquis of Lansdowne.-D.)
(409) Lady Louisa and Lady Anne; the latter was afterwards married to Mr. Dawson.
(410) Easton Neston, in Northamptonshire.
(411) It is the marriage of Henry VII. and Elizabeth of York. The two other figures are probably St. Thomas and the Bishop of linola, the Pope's nuncio, who pronounced the nuptial benediction. This curious picture was purchased by Lady Pomfret for two hundred pounds. The Earl of Oxford offered her five hundred pounds for it: Mr. Walpole bought it at Lord Pomfret's sale for eighty-four guineas, and it is now at Strawberry Hill.
(412) Lady Pomfret bought the statues, after her lord's death, and presented them to the University of Oxford.
176 Letter 83 To John Chute, Esq. Stowe, Aug. 4, 1753
My dear Sir, You would deserve to be scolded, if you had not lost almost as much pleasure as you have disappointed me of.(413) Whether George Montagu will be so content With your commuting punishments, I don't know: I should think not; he "cried and roared all night"(414) when I delivered your excuse. He is extremely well-housed, after having roamed like a Tartar about the country with his whole personal estate at his heels. . There is an extensive view, which is called pretty: but Northamptonshire is no county to please me. What entertained me was, that he who in London -,vas grown an absolute recluse, is over head and ears in neighbours, and as popular as if he intended to stand for the county, instead of having given up the town. The very first morning after my arrival, as we were getting into the chaise to go to Wroxton, they notified a Sir Harry Danvers, a young squire, booted and spurred, and buckskin-breeche'd. "Will you drink any chocolate?" "No; a little wine and water, if you please."—I suspected nothing but that he had rode till he was dry. "Nicol`o, some wine and water." He desired the water might be warm—I began to stare; Montagu understood the dialect, and ordered a negus. I had great difficulty to keep my countenance, and still more when I saw the baronet finish a very large jug indeed. To be sure, he wondered as much at me e who did not finish a jug; and I could not help reflecting, that living always in the world makes one as unfit for living out of it, as always living out of it does for living in it. Knightley, the knight of the shire, has been entertaining all the parishes round with a turtle-feast, which, so far from succeeding, has almost made him suspected for a Jeu,, as the country parsons have not yet learned to wade into green fat.
The roads are very bad to Greatworth; and such numbers of gates, that if one loved punning one should call it the Gate-house. - The proprietor had a wonderful invention: the chimneys, which are of stone, have niches and benches in them, where the man used to sit and smoke. I had twenty disasters, according to custom; lost my way, and had my French boy almost killed by a fall with his horse: but I have been much pleased. When I was at Park-place I went to see Sir H. Englefield's,(415) which Mr. Churchill and Lady Mary prefer, but I think very undeservedly, to Mr. Southcote's. It is not above a quarter as extensive, and wants the river. There is a pretty view of Reading seen under a rude arch, and the water is well disposed. The buildings are very insignificant, and the house far from good. The town of Henley has been extremely disturbed with an engagement between the ghosts of Miss Blandy and her father, which continued so violent, that some bold persons, to prevent farther blood-shed, broke in, and found it was two jackasses which had got into the kitchen.
I felt strangely tempted to stay at Oxford and survey it at my leisure; but as I was alone, I had not courage. I passed by Sir James Dashwood'S,(416) a vast new house, situated so high that it seems to stand for the county as well as himself. I did look over Lord Jersey's(417) which was built for a hunting-box, and is still little better. But now I am going to tell you how delightful a day I passed at Wroxton. Lord Guildford has made George Montagu so absolutely viceroy over it, that we saw it more agreeable than you can conceive; roamed over the whole house, found every door open, saw not a creature, had an extreme good dinner, wine, fruit, coffee and tea in the library, were served by fairies, tumbled over the books, said one or two talismanic words, and the cascade played, and went home loaded with pine-apples and flowers.—You will take me for Monsieur de CoulangeS,(418) I describe eatables so feelingly; but the manner in which we were served made the whole delicious. The house was built by a Lord Downe in the reign of James the First; and though there is a fine hall and a vast dining-room below, and as large a drawing-room above, it is neither good nor agreeable; one end of the front was never finished, and might have a good apartment. The library is added by this Lord, and is a pleasant chamber. Except loads of portraits, there is no tolerable furniture. A whole-length of the first Earl of Downe is in the Bath-robes, and has a coif under the hat and feather. There is a charming picture of Prince Henry about twelve years old, drawing his sword to kill a stag, with a Lord Harrington; a good portrait of Sir Owen Hopton,(419) 1390; your pious grandmother, my Lady Dacre, which I think like you; some good Cornelius Johnsons; a Lord North, by Riley, good; and an extreme fine portrait by him of the Lord Keeper: I have never seen but few of the hand, but most of them have been equal to Lely and the best of Sir Godfrey. There is too a curious portrait of Sir Thomas Pope, the founder of Trinity College, Oxford, said to be by Holbein. The chapel is new, but in a pretty Gothic taste, with a very long window of painted glass, very tolerable. The frieze is pendent, just in the manner I propose for the eating-room at Strawberry Hill. Except one scene, which is indeed noble, I cannot much commend the without-doors. This scene consists of a beautiful lake entirely shut in with wood: the head falls into a fine cascade, and that into a serpentine river, over which is a little Gothic seat like a round temple, lifted up by a shaggy mount. On an eminence in the park is an obelisk erected to the honour and at the expense of "optimus" and 1, munificentissimus" the late Prince of Wales, "in loci amoenitatem et memoriam advent`us ejus." There are several paltry Chinese buildings and bridges, which have the merit or demerit of being the progenitors of a very numerous race all over the kingdom: at least they were of the very first. In the church is a beautiful tomb of an Earl and Countess of Downe, and the tower is in a good plain Gothic style, ind was once, they tell you, still more beautiful; but Mr. Miller, who designed it, unluckily once in his life happened to think rather of beauty than of the water-tables, and so it fell down the first winter.
On Wednesday morning we went to see a sweet little chapel at Steane, built in 1620 by Sir Thomas Crewe, Speaker in the time of the first James and Charles. Here are remains of the mansion-house, but quite in ruins: the chapel is kept up by my Lord Arran, the last of the race. There are seven or eight monuments. On one is this epitaph, which I thought pretty enough:
"Conjux, casta parens felix, matrona pudica;
Sara viro, mundo Martha, Maria Deo."
On another is the most affected inscription I ever saw, written by two brothers on their sister: they say, "This agreeable mortal translated her into immortality such a day:" but I could not help laughing at one quaint expression, to which time has given a droll sense: "She was a constant lover of the best."
I have been here these two days, extremely amused and charmed indeed. Wherever you stand you see an Albano landscape. Half as many buildings I believe would be too many, but such a profusion gives inexpressible richness. You may imagine I have some private reflections entertaining enough, not very communicable to the company: the Temple of Friendship, in which, among twenty memorandums of quarrels, is the bust of Mr. Pitt: Mr. James Grenville is now in the house, whom his uncle disinherited for his attachment to that very Pylades, Mr. Pitt. He broke with Mr. Pope, who is deified in the Elysian fields, before the inscription for his head was finished. That of Sir John Barnard, which was bespoke by the name of a bust of my Lord Mayor, was by a mistake of the sculptor done for Alderman Perry. The statue of the King, and that "honori, laudi, virtuti divae Carolinae," make one smile, when one sees the ceiling where Britannia rejects and hides the reign of King * * * * But I have no patience at building and planting a satire! Such is the temple of modern virtue in ruins! The Grecian temple is glorious: this I openly worship: in the heretical corner of my heart I adore the Gothic building, which by some unusual inspiration Gibbs had made pure and beautiful and venerable. The style has a propensity to the Venetian or mosque Gothic, and the great column near it makes the whole put one in mind of the Place of St. Mark. The windows are throughout consecrated with painted glass; most of it from the priory at Warwick, a present from that foolish Greathead, who quarrelled with me (because his father was a gardener) for asking him if Lord Brook had planted much—Apropos to painted glass. I forgot to tell you of a sweet house which Mr. Montagu carried me to see, belonging to a Mr. Holman, a Catholic, and called Warkworth. The situation is pretty, the front charming, composed of two round and two square towers. The court within is incomplete on one side; but above stairs is a vast gallery with four bow-windows and twelve other large ones, all filled with the arms of the old peers of England, with all their quarterings entire. You don't deserve, after deserting me, that I should tempt you to such a sight; but this alone is worth while to carry you to Greatworth.
Adieu, my dear Sir! I return to Strawberry to-morrow, and forgive you enough not to deprive myself of the satisfaction of seeing you there whenever you have nothing else to do.
(413) In not accompanying Mr. Walpole on a visit to Mr. George Montagu at Greatworth.
(414) A phrase of Mr. Montagu's.
(415) Whiteknights.
(416) At High Wycombe.
(417) Middleton.
(418) The cousin and friend of Madame de S`evign`e, and frequently mentioned in her letters.-E.
(419) Lieutenant of the Tower. His daughter was the wife of the first Earl of Downe.-E.
179 Letter 84 To George Montagu, Esq. Strawberry Hill, Aug. 16, 1753.
Don't you suspect, that I have not only forgot the pleasure I had at Greatworth and Wroxton,(420) but the commissions you gave me too? It looks a little ungrateful not to have vented a word of thanks; but I stayed to write till I could send you the things, and when I had them, I stayed to send them by Mr. Chute, who tells you by to-night's post when he will bring them. The butter-plate is not exactly what You ordered, but I flatter myself you will like it as well. There are a few seeds; more shall follow at the end of the autumn. Besides Tom Harvey's letter, I have sent you maps of Oxfordshire and Northamptonshire, having felt the want of them when I was with you. I found the road to Stowe above twelve miles, very bad, and it took me up two hours and a half: but the formidable idea I conceived of the breakfast and way of life there by no means answered. You was a prophet; it was very agreeable. I am ashamed to tell you that I laughed half an hour yesterday at the sudden death of your new friend Sir Harry Danvers,(421) "after a morning's airing," the news call it; I suspect it was after a negus. I found my garden brown and bare, but these rains have recovered the green. You may get your pond ready as soon as you please; the gold fish swarm: Mr. Bentley carried a dozen to town t'other day in a decanter. You would be entertained with our fishing; instead of nets, and rods and lines, and worms, we use nothing but a pail and a basin and a tea-strainer, which I persuade my neighbours is the Chinese method. Adieu! My best compliments to Miss Montagu.
P. S. Since writing my letter, I have received your twin dispatches. I am extremely sensible of the honour my Lord Guildford does me, and beg you to transmit my gratitude to him: if he is ever at Wroxton when I visit Greatworth, I shall certainly wait upon him, and think myself happy in seeing that charming place again. As soon as I go to town, I shall send for Moreland, and barbour your wardrobe with great pleasure. I find I must beg your pardon for laughing in the former part of my letter about your baronet's death; but his "wine and water a little warm" had left such a ridiculous effect upon me, that even his death could not efface it. Good night! Mr. Miller told me at Stowe, that the chimney-piece (I think from Steane) was he believed at Banbury, but he did not know exactly. If it lies in your way to inquire, on so vague a direction, will you? Mr. Chute may bring me a sketch of it.
(420) The seat of Lord Guilford.
(421) Of Culworth, in Oxfordshire. He died at the age of twenty-two.-E.
180 Letter 85 To Richard Bentley, Esq. Arlington Street, September, 1753.
My dear Sir, I am going to send you another volume of my travels; I don't know whether I shall not, at last, write a new Camden's Britannia; but lest you should be afraid of my itinerary, I will at least promise you that it shall not be quite so dry as most surveys, which contain nothing but lists of impropriations and glebes, and carucates, and transcripts out of Domesday, and tell one nothing that is entertaining, describe no houses nor parks, mention no curious pictures, but are fully satisfied if they inform you that they believe that some nameless old tomb belonged to a knight-templar, or one of the crusado, because he lies cross-legged. Another promise I will make you is, that my love of abbeys shall not make me hate the Reformation till that makes me grow a Jacobite, like the rest of my antiquarian predecessors; of whom, Dart in particular wrote Billingsgate against Cromwell and the regicides: and Sir Robert Atkins concludes his summary of the Stuarts with saying, "that it is no reason, because they have been so, that this family should always continue unfortunate."
I have made my visit at Hagley,(422) as I intended. On my way I dined at Park-place, and lay at Oxford. As I was quite alone, I did not care to see any thing; but as soon as it was dark I ventured out, and the moon rose as I was wandering among the colleges, and gave me a charming venerable Gothic scene, which was not lessened by the monkish appearance of the old fellows stealing to their pleasures. Birmingham is large, and swarms with people and trade, but did not answer my expectation from any beauty in it: yet, new as it is, I perceived how far I was got back from the London hegira; for every alehouse is here written mug-house, a name one has not heard of since the riots in the late King's time.
As I got into Worcestershire, I opened upon a landscape of country which I prefer even to Kent, which I had reckoned the most beautiful county in England: but this, with all the richness of Kent, is bounded with mountains. Sir George Lyttelton's house is immeasurably bad and old; one room at the top of the house, which was reckoned a conceit in those days, projects a vast way into the air. There are two or three curious pictures, and some of them extremely agreeable to me for their relation to Grammont: there is le s`erieux Lyttelton,(423) but too old for the date of that book; Mademoiselle Stuart,(424) Lord Brounker, and Lady Southesk;(425) besides, a portrait of Lord Clifford the treasurer(426) with his staff, but drawn in armour (though no soldier) out of flattery to Charles the Second, as he said the most glorious part of his life was attending the King at the battle of Worcester. He might have said, that it was as glorious as any part of his Majesty's life. You might draw, but I can't describe, the enchanting scenes of the park: it is a hill of three miles, but broke into all manner of beauty; such lawns, such wood, rills, cascades, and a thickness of verdure quite to the summit of the hill, and commanding such a vale of towns, and meadows, and woods extending quite to the Black Mountain in Wales, that I quite forgot my favourite Thames! Indeed, I prefer nothing to Hagley but Mount Edgecombe. There is extreme taste in the park - the seats are not the best, but there is not one absurdity. There is a ruined castle, built by Miller, that would get him his freedom even of Strawberry: it has the true rust of the barons' wars. Then there is a scene of a small lake, with cascades falling down such a Parnassus 1 with a circular temple on the distant eminence; and there is such a fairy dale, with more cascades gushing out of rocks! and there- is a hermitage, so exactly like those in Sadeler's prints, on the brow of a shady mountain, stealing peeps into the glorious world below; and there is such a pretty well under a wood, like the Samaritan woman's in a picture of Nicol`o Poussin! and there is such a wood without the park, enjoying such a prospect! and there is such a mountain on t'other side of the park commanding all prospects, that I wore out my eyes with gazing, my feet with climbing, and my tongue and my vocabulary with commending! The best notion I can give you of the satisfaction I showed, was, that Sir George proposed to carry me to dine with my Lord Foley; and when I showed reluctance, he said, "Why, I thought you did not mind any strangers, if you were to see any thing!" Think of my not minding strangers! I mind them so much, that I missed seeing Hartlebury Castle, and the Bishop of Worcester's chapel of painted glass there, because it was his public day when I passed by his park.-Miller has built a Gothic house in the village at Hagley for a relation of Sir George: but there he is not more than Miller; in his castle he is almost Bentley. There is a genteel tomb in the church to Sir George's first wife,(427) with a Cupid and a pretty urn in the Roman style.
You will be diverted with my distresses at Worcester. I set out boldly to walk down the high-street to the cathedral: I found it much more peopled than I intended, and, when I was quite embarked, discovered myself up to the ears in a contested election. A new candidate had arrived the night before, and turned all their heads. Nothing comforted me, but that the opposition is to Mr. Trevis; and I purchased my passage very willingly with crying "No Trevis! No Jews!" However, the inn where I lay was Jerusalem itself, the very head-quarters where Trevis the Pharisee was expected; and I had scarce got into my room, before the victorious mob of his enemy, who had routed his advanced guard, broke open the gates of our inn, and almost murdered the ostler-and then carried him off to prison for being murdered. The cathedral is pretty, and has several tombs, and clusters of light pillars of Derbyshire marble, lately cleaned. Gothicism and the restoration of that architecture, and not of the bastard breed, spreads extremely in this part of the world. Prince Arthur's tomb, from whence we took the paper for the hall and staircase, to my great surprise. is on a less scale than the paper, and is not of brass but stone, and that wretchedly whitewashed. The niches are very small, and the long slips in the middle are divided every now and then with the trefoil. There is a fine tomb for Bishop Hough, in the Westminster Abbey style; but the obelisk at the back is not loaded with a globe and a human figure, like Mr. Kent's design for Sir Isatc Newton; an absurdity which nothing but himself could surpass, when he placed three busts at the foot of an altar-and, not content with that, placed them at the very angles—where they have as little to do as they have with Shakspeare.
>From Worcester I went to see Malvern Abbey. It is situated half way up an immense mountain of that name: the mountain is very long, in shape like the prints of a whale's back: towards the larger end lies the town. Nothing remains but a beautiful gateway and a church, which is very large: every window has been glutted with painted glass, of which much remains, but it did not answer; blue and red there is in abundance, and good faces; but the portraits are so high, I could not distinguish them. Besides, the woman who showed me the church would pester me with Christ and King David, when I was hunting for John of Gaunt and King Edward. The greatest curiosity, at least what I had never seen before, was, the whole floor and far up the sides of the church has been, if I may call it so, wainscoted with red and yellow tiles, extremely polished, and diversified with coats of arms, and inscriptions, and mosaic. I have since found the same at Gloucester, and have even been so fortunate as to purchase from the sexton about a dozen, which think what an acquisition for Strawberry! They are made of the natural earth of the country, which is a rich red clay, that produces every thing. All the lanes are full of all kind of trees, and enriched with large old apple-trees, that hang over from one hedge to another. Worcester city is large and pretty. Gloucester city is still better situated, but worse built, and not near so large. About a mile from Worcester you break upon a sweet view of the Severn. A little farther on the banks is Mr. Lechmere's house; but he has given strict charge to a troop of willows never to let him see the river: to his right hand extends the fairest meadow covered with cattle that ever you saw - at the end of it is the town of Upton, with a church half ruined and a bridge of six arches, which I believe with little trouble he might see from his garden.
The vale increases in riches to Gloucester. I stayed two days at George Selwyn's house called Matson, which lies on Robin Hood's Hill: it is lofty enough for an Alp, yet is a mountain of turf to the very top, has wood scattered all over it, springs that long to be cascades in twenty places of it: and from the summit it beats even Sir George Lyttelton's views, by having the city of Gloucester at its foot, and the Severn widening to the horizon. His house is small, but neat. King Charles lay here at the siege; and the Duke of York, with typical fury, hacked and hewed the window-shutters of his chamber, as a memorandum of his being there. Here is a good picture, of Dudley Earl of Leicester in his latter age, which he gave to Sir Francis Walsingham, at whose house in Kent it remained till removed hither; and what makes it very curious, is, his age marked on it, fifty-four in 1572. I had never been able to discover before in what year he was born. And here is the very flower-pot and counterfeit association, for which Bishop Sprat was taken up, and the Duke of Marlborough sent to the tower. The reservoirs on the hill supply the city. The late Mr. Selwyn governed the borough by them-and I believe by some wine too. The Bishop's house is pretty, and restored to the Gothic by the late Bishop. Price has painted a large chapel-window for him, which is scarce inferior for colours, and is a much better picture than any of the old glass. The eating-room is handsome. As I am a Protestant Goth, I was glad to worship Bishop Hooper's room, from whence he was led to the stake: but I could almost have been a Hun, and set fire to the front of the house, which is a small pert portico, like the conveniences at the end of a London garden. The outside of the cathedral is beautifully light; the pillars in the nave outrageously plump and heavy. There is a tomb of one Abraham Blackleach, a great curiosity; for, though the figures of him and his wife are cumbent, they are very graceful, designed by Vandyck, and well executed. Kent designed the screen; but knew no more there than he did any where else how to enter into the true Gothic taste. Sir Christopher Wren, who built the tower of the great gateway at Christ Church, has catched the graces of it as happily as you could do: there is particularly a niche between two compartments of' a window, that is a masterpiece.
But here is a modernity, which beats all antiquities for curiosity: just by the high altar is a small pew hung with green damask, with curtains of the same; a small corner cupboard, painted, carved, and gilt, for books, in one corner, and two troughs of a bird-cage, with seeds and water. If any mayoress on earth was small enough to enclose herself in this tabernacle, or abstemious enough to feed on rape and canary, I should have sworn that it was the shrine of the queen of the aldermen. It belongs to a Mrs. Cotton, who, having lost a favourite daughter, is convinced her soul is transmigrated into a robin-redbreast; for which reason she passes her life in making an aviary of the cathedral of Gloucester. The chapter indulge this whim, as she contributes abundantly to glaze, whitewash, and ornament the church.
King Edward the Second's tomb is very light and in good repair. The old wooden figure of Robert, the Conqueror's unfortunate eldest son, is extremely genteel, and, though it may not be so ancient as his death, is in a taste very superior to any thing of much later ages. Our Lady's Chapel has a bold kind of portal, and several ceilings of chapels, and tribunes in a beautiful taste: but of all delight, is what they call the abbot's cloister. It is the very thing that you would build, when you had extracted all the quintessence of trefoils, arches, and lightness. In the church is a star-window of eight points, that is prettier than our rose-windows.
A little way from the town are the ruins of Lantony Priory: there remains a pretty old gateway, which G. Selwyn has begged, to erect on the top of his mountain, and it will have a charming effect.
At Burford I saw the house of Mr. Lenthal the descendant of the Speaker. The front is good and a chapel connected by two or three arches, which let the garden appear through, has a pretty effect; but the inside of the mansion is bad and ill-furnished. Except a famous picture of Sir Thomas More's family, the portraits are rubbish, though celebrated. I am told that the Speaker, who really had a fine collection, made his peace by presenting them to Cornbury, where they were well known, till the Duke of Marlborough bought that seat.
I can't go and describe so known a place as Oxford, which I saw pretty well on my return. The whole air of the town charms me; and what remains of the true Gothic un-Gibbs'd, and the profusion of painted glass, were entertainment enough to me. In the picture-gallery are quantities of portraits; but in general they are not only not so much as copies, but proxies-so totally unlike they arc to the persons they pretend to represent. All I will tell you more of Oxford is, that Fashion has so far prevailed over her collegiate sister, Custom, that they have altered the hour of dinner from twelve to one. Does not it put one in mind of reformations in religion? One don't abolish Mahommedism; one only brings it back to where the impostor himself left it. I think it is at the South-Sea-house, where they have been forced to alter the hour of payment, instead of from ten to twelve, to from twelve to two; so much do even moneyed citizens sail with the current of idleness!
Was not I talking of religious sects? Methodism is quite decayed in Oxford, its cradle. In its stead, there prevails a delightful fantastic system, called the sect of the Hutchinsonians,(429) of whom one seldom hears any thing in town. After much inquiry, all I can discover is, that their religion consists in driving Hebrew to its fountain-head, till they find some word or other in every text of the Old Testament, which may seem figurative of something in the New, or at least of something, that may happen God knows when, in consequence of the New. As their doctrine is novel, and requires much study, or at least much invention, one should think that they could not have settled half the canon of what they are to believe-and yet they go on zealously, trying to make and succeeding in making converts.(429) I could not help smiling at the thoughts of etymological salvation; and I am sure you will smile when I tell you, that according to their gravest doctors, "Soap Is an excellent type of Jesus Christ, and the York-buildings waterworks of the Trinity."—I don't know whether this is not as entertaining as the passion of the Moravians for the "little side-hole!" Adieu, my dear sir!
(422) The seat of Sir George, afterwards Lord Lyttelton.-E.
(423) Sir Charles Lyttelton, distinguished in the M`emoires de Grammont as "le s`erieux Lyttelton." He died in 1716, at the age of eighty-six.-E.
(424) The beautiful Frances Stuart, who married Esme, Duke of Richmond; which greatly displeased Charles the Second, who was in love with her.
(425) Anne, daughter of William, second Duke of Hamilton, and wife of Robert, third Earl of Southesk.-E.
(426) Sir Thomas Clifford, created Lord Clifford of Chudleigh. He was one of "The Cabal."-E.
(427) Lucy, daughter of Hugh Fortescue, Esq. of Filleigh; upon whose death, in 1746-7, Lord Lyttelton wrote his Celebrated monody.-E.
(428) John Hutchinson, the founder of this sect, was born in 1674, and died in 1737, leaving a number of works on the Hebrew language, which were collected in 1748, in twelve volumes octavo. He imagined all knowledge to be contained in the Hebrew Scriptures, and, rejecting the points, he gave a fanciful meaning to every one of the Hebrew letters. He possessed great mechanical skill, and invented a chronometer for the discovery of the longitude, which was much approved by Sir Isaac Newton.-E.
(429) Among his followers were the amiable Dr. Horne, Bishop of Norwich, who published an "Abstract" of his writings, and Parkhurst, the author of the Hebrew Lexicon.-E.
186 Letter 86 To Sir Horace Mann. Strawberry Hill, Oct. 6, 1753.
I fear the letter of July 21st, which you tell me you have received, was the last I wrote. I will make no more excuses for my silence; I think they take up half my letters. The time of year must be full excuse; and this autumn is so dead a time, that people even don't die.
You have puzzled me extremely by a paragraph in yours about one Wilton, a sculptor, who, you say, is mentioned with encomiums one of the Worlds:(430) I recollected no such thing. The first parcel your brother sends you shall convey the other numbers of that paper, and I will mark all the names I know of the authors: there are several, and of our first writers;(431) but in general you will not find that the paper answers the idea you have entertained of it.
I grieve for my Florentine friends, and for the doubling of their yoke: the Count has shown great art. I am totally ignorant, not to say indifferent, about the Modenese treaty;(432) indeed, I have none of that spirit which was formerly so much objected to some of my family, the love of negotiations during a settled peace. Treaties within treaties are very dull businesses: contracts of marriage between baby-princes and miss-princesses give me no curiosity. If I had not seen it in the papers, I should never have known that Master Tommy the Archduke was playing at marrying Miss Modena. I am as sick of the hide-and-seek at which all Europe has been playing about a King of the Romans! Forgive me, my dear child, you who are a minister, for holding your important affairs so cheap. I amuse myself with Gothic and painted glass, and am as grave about my own trifles as I could be at Ratisbon. I shall tell you one or two events within my own very small sphere, and you must call them a letter. I believe I mentioned having made a kind of armoury: my upper servant, who is full as dull as his predecessor, whom you knew, Tom Barney, has had his head so filled with arms, that the other day, when a man brought home an old chimney-back, which I had bought for having belonged to Harry VII, he came running in, and said, "Sir, Sir! here is a man has brought some more armour!"
Last week, when I was in town, I went to pay a bill to the glazier who fixed up the painted glass: I said, "Mr. Palmer, you charge me seven shillings a-day for your man's work: I know you give him but two shillings; and I am told that it is impossible for him to earn seven shillings a-day."—"Why no, Sir," replied be, "it is not that; but one must pay house-rent, and one must eat, and one must wear." I looked at him, and he had on a blue silk waistcoat with an extremely broad gold lace. I could not help smiling. I turned round, and saw his own portrait, and his wife's, and his son's. "And I see," said I, "one must sit for one's picture; I am very sorry that I am to contribute for all you must do!" Adieu! I gave you warning that I had nothing to say.
(430) Mr. Mann mistook; I think it was in a paper called "The Adventurer."
(431) Lord Chesterfield, Lord Bath, Mr. W. Whithed, Sir Charles Williams, Mr. Soame Jennings, Mr. Cambridge, Mr. Coventry, etc.
(432) It was between the Empress-Queen and the Duke of Modena, for settling the duchy of Milan on one of the little Archdukes, on his marrying the Duke's granddaughter, and in the mean time the Duke was made administrator of Milan.
187 Letter 87 To Sir Horace Mann. Arlington Street, Dec 6, 1753.
In a very long, and consequently a very agreeable letter, which I received from you yesterday, you set me an example which I despair of following, keeping up a correspondence with spirit when the world furnishes no events. I should not say no events, for France is big with matter, but to talk of the parliamentary wars of another country would be only transcribing gazettes: and as to Prince Heracilus,(433) the other phenomenon of the age, it is difficult to say much about a person of whom one knows nothing at all. The only scene, that promises to Interest one, lies in Ireland, from whence we are told that the Speaker's party has carried a question against the Lord Lieutenant's; but no particulars are yet arrived. Foundations have formerly been laid in Ireland of troubles that have spread hither: I have read somewhere this old saw,
"He that would England win,
Must with Ireland-first begin."
The only novelty I know, and which is quite private history, is, that there is a man(434) in the world, who has so much obligingness and attention in his friendships, that in the middle of public business, and teased to death with all kind of commissions, and overrun with cubs and cubaccioni's of every kind, he can for twelve years together remember any single picture, or bust, or morsel of virtu, that a friend of his ever liked; and what is forty times more extraordinary than this circumstantial kindness, he remembers it just at the time when others, who might be afflicted with as good a memory, would take pains to forget it, that is, when it is to be obtained:-exactly then this person goes and purchases the thing in question, whips it on board a ship, and sends it to his friend, in the manner in the world to make it most agreeable, except that he makes it impossible to thank him, because you must allow that one ought to be possessed of the same manner of obliging, before one is worthy of thanking such a person. I don't know whether you will think this person so extraordinary as I do; but I have one favour to beg; if you should ever hear his name, which, for certain reasons, I can't tell you, let me entreat you never to disclose it, for the world in general is so much the reverse of him, that they would do nothing but commend to him every thing they saw, in order to employ his memory and generosity. For this reason you will allow that the prettiest action that ever was committed, ought not to be published to all the world.
You, who love your friends, will not be sorry to hear a little circumstance that concerns, in a tolerable manner, at least two of them. The last of my mother's surviving brothers(435) is dead, and dead without a will, and dead rich. Mr. Conway and I shall share about six thousand pounds apiece in common with his brother and sister and my brother. I only tell you this for a momentary pleasure, for you are not a sort of person to remember any thing relative to your friends beyond the present instant!
After writing me two sheets of paper, not to mention the episode of Bianca Capello, I know not how to have the confidence to put an end to my letter already; and yet I must, and you will admit the excuse: I have but just time to send my brother an account of his succession: you who think largely enough to forgive any man's deferring such notice to you, would be the last man to defer giving it to any body else; and therefore, to spare you any more of the compliments and thanks, which surely I owe you, you shall let me go make my brother happy. Adieu!
(433) One of the pretenders to the throne of Persia, who gained many victories about this time.
(434) When Mr. Walpole was at Florence he saw a fine picture by Vasari of the Great duchess Bianca Capello, in the palace of the Marchese Vitelli, whose family falling to decay, and their effects being sold twelve years afterwards, Mr. Mann recollected-Mr. Walpole's having admired that picture, bought and sent it to him.
(435) Erasmus Shorter, brother of Catherine Lady Walpole, and of Charlotte Lady Conway, whose surviving children, Edward and Horace Walpole, Francis Earl of Hertford, Henry and Anne Conway, became his heirs.
188 Letter 88 To George Montagu, Esq. Arlington Street, Dec. 6, 1753.
I have at last found a moment to answer your letter; a possession of which, I think, I have not been master these ten days. You must know I have an uncle dead; a sort of event that could not possibly have been disagreeable to me, let his name have been what it would; and to make it still less unpleasant, here am I one of the heirs-at-law to a man worth thirty thousand pounds. One of the heirs, you must construe, one of five. In short, my uncle Erasmus is dead, and think at last we may depend on his having made no will. If a will should appear, we are but where we were; if it does not, it is not uncomfortable to have a little sum of money drop out of the clouds, to which one has as much right as any body, for which one has no obligation, and paid no flattery. This death and the circumstances have made extreme noise, but they are of an extent impossible to tell you within the compass of any letter, and I will not raise your curiosity when I cannot satisfy it but by a narration, which I must reserve till I see you.
The only event I know besides within this atmosphere, is the death of Lord Burlington, who, I have just heard, has left every thing in his power to his relict. I tell you nothing of Jew bills and Jew motions, for I dare to say you have long been as weary of the words as I am. The only point that keeps up any attention, is expectation of a mail from Ireland, from whence we have heard, by a side wind, that the court have lost a question by six; you may imagine one wants to know more of this.
The opera is indifferent; the first man has a finer voice than Monticelli, but knows not what to do with it. Ancient Visconti does so much with hers that it is intolerable. There is a new play of Glover's, in which Boadicea the heroine rants as much as Visconti screams; but happily you hear no more of her after the end of the third act, till in the last scene somebody brings a card with her compliments, and she is very sorry she cannot wait upon you, but she is dead. Then there is a scene between Lord Sussex and Lord Cathcart, two captives, which is most incredibly absurd; but yet the parts are so well acted, the dresses so fine, and two or three scenes pleasing enough, that it is worth seeing.(436)
There are new young lords, fresh and fresh: two of them are much in vogue; Lord Huntingdon and Lord Stormont.(437) I supped with them t'other night at Lady Caroline Petersham's; the latter is most cried up; but he is more reserved, seems sly and to have sense, but I should not think extreme: yet it is not fair to judge on a silent man at first. The other is very lively and very agreeable. This is the state of the town you inquire after, and which you do inquire after as one does after Mr. Somebody that one used to see at Mr. Such-a-one's formerly: do you never intend to know more of us? or do you intend to leave me to wither upon the hands of the town, like Charles Stanhope and Mrs. Dunch? My contemporaries seem to be all retiring to their proprerties. If I must too, positively I will go no farther than Strawberry Hill! You are very good to lament our gold fish - their whole history consists in their being stolen a deux reprises, the very week after I came to town.
Mr. Bentley is where he was, and well, and now and then makes me as happy as I can be, having lost him, with a charming drawing. We don't talk of his abode; for the Hecate his wife endeavours to discover it. Adieu! my best compliments to Miss Montagu.
(436) Glover's tragedy of "Boadicea" was acted nine or ten nights at Drury Lane with some success; but was generally considered better adapted to the closet than the stage. Archbishop Herring, in a letter to Mr. Duncombe, gives the following opinion of this play: "The first page of the play Shocked me, and the sudden and heated answer of the Queen to the Roman ambassador's gentle address is arrant madness. It is another objection, in my opinion, that Boadicea is really not the object of crime and punishment, so much as pity; and, notwithstanding the strong painting of her savageness, I cannot help wishing she had got the better. However, I admire the play in many passages, and think the two last acts admirable, In the fifth, particularly, I hardly ever found myself so strongly touched."-E.
(437) David, Viscount Stormont, He was afterwards ambassador at Vienna and Paris in 1779, one of the secretaries of state; and in 1783, president of the council. Upon the death of his uncle, Lord Chief Justice Mansfield, in 1793, he succeeded to the earldom. He died in 1796.-E.
190 Letter 89 To Richard Bentley, Esq. Arlington Street, Dec. 19, 1753.
I little thought when I parted with you, my dear Sir, that your absence(438) could indemnify me so well for itself; I still less expected that I should find you improving daily: but your letters grow more and more entertaining, your drawings more and more picturesque; you write with more wit, and paint with more melancholy, than ever any body did: your woody mountains hang down "somewhat so poetical," as Mr. Ashe(439) said, that your own poet Gray will scarce keep tune with you. All this refers to your cascade scene and your letter. For the library it cannot have the Strawberry imprimatur: the double arches and double pinnacles are most ungraceful; and the doors below the book-cases in Mr. Chute's design had a conventual look, which yours totally wants. For this time, we shall put your genius in commission, and, like some other regents, execute our own plan without minding our sovereign. For the chimney, I do not wonder you missed our instructions: we could not contrive to understand them ourselves; and therefore, determining nothing but to have the old picture stuck in a thicket of pinnacles, we left it to you to find out the how. I believe it will be a little difficult; but as I suppose facere quia impossibile est, is full as easy as credere, why—you must do it.
The present journal of the world and of me stands thus: King George II does not go abroad—Some folks fear nephews,(440) as much as others hate uncles. The Castle of Dublin has carried the Armagh election by one vote only—which is thought equivalent to losing it by twenty. Mr. Pelham has been very ill, I thought of St. Patrick's fire,(441) but it proved to be St. Antony's. Our House of Commons, mere poachers, are piddling wit the torture of Leheup,(442) who extracted so much money out of the lottery.
The robber of Po Yang(443) is discovered, and I hope will be put to death, without my pity interfering, as it has done for Mr. Shorter's servant,(444) or Lady Caroline Petersham's, as it did for Maclean. In short, it was a heron. I like this better than thieves, as I believe the gang will be more easily destroyed, though not mentioned in the King's speech or Fielding's treatises.
Lord Clarendon, Lord Thanet, and Lord Burlington are dead. The second sent for his tailor, and asked him if he could make him a suit of mourning in eight hours: if he could, he would go into mourning for his brother Burlington(445)—but that he did not expect to live twelve hours himself.
There are two more volumes come out of Sir Charles Grandison. I shall detain them till the last is published, and not think I postpone much of your pleasure. For my part, I stopped at the fourth; I was so tired of sets of people getting together, and saying, "Pray, Miss, with whom are you in love?" and of mighty good young men that convert your Mr. M * * * *'s in the twinkling of a sermon!—You have not been much more diverted, I fear, with Hogarth's book(446)—'tis very silly!—Palmyra(447) is come forth, and is a noble book; the prints finely engraved, and an admirable dissertation before it. My wonder is much abated: the Palmyrene empire which I had figured, shrunk to a small trading city with some magnificent public buildings out of proportion to the dignity of the place.
The operas succeed pretty well; and music has so much recovered its power of charming that there is started up a burletta at Covent Garden,(448) that has half the vogue of the old Beggar's Opera: indeed there is a soubrette, called the Niccolina, who, besides being pretty, has more vivacity and variety of humour than ever existed in any creature.
(438) Mr. Bentley was now in the island of Jersey; whither he had retired on account of the derangement of his affairs, and whither all the following letters are addressed to him.
(439) A nurseryman at Twickenham. He had served Pope. Mr. Walpole telling him he Would have his trees planted irregularly, he said, "Yes, Sir, I understand: you would have them hung down somewhat poetical."
(440) Frederick King of Prussia, nephew to George II. Mr. Walpole alludes to himself, who was upon bad terms with his uncle Horace Walpole, afterwards Lord Walpole of Wolterton.
(441) Alluding to the disturbances and opposition to government, which took place in Ireland during the viceroyalty of Lionel Duke of Dorset.
(442) In framing the act for the purchase of the Sloane Museum and the Harleian Manuscripts by lottery Mr. Pelham, who disapproved of this financial expedient, as tending to foster a spirit of gambling, had taken care to restrict the number of tickets to be sold to any single individual. Notwithstanding which, Mr. Leheup, one of the commissioners of the lottery, had sold to one person, under names which he knew to be fictitious, between two and three hundred tickets. The subject was brought before the House of Commons, where a series of resolutions was passed against Mr. Leheup, accompanied by an address to the King, praying that the offender might be prosecuted. The result was, that he was prosecuted by the Attorney-general, and fined one thousand pounds.-E.
(443) Mr. Walpole had given this Chinese name to a pond of gold fish at Strawberry Hill.
(444) A Swiss servant of Erasmus Shorter's, maternal uncle to Mr. Walpole, who was not without suspicion of having hastened his master's death.
(445) The Countesses of Thanet and Burlington were sisters.
(446) The Analysis of Beauty.
(447) "The Ruins of Palmyra, otherwise Tadmor in the Desert," by Robert Wood, Esq.; a splendid volume in folio, with a number of elegant engravings. In 1757, Mr. Wood published a similar description of the "Ruins of Balbec."-E.
(448) Harlequin Sorcerer.-E.
191 Letter 90 To Sir Horace Mann. Arlington Street, Jan. 28, 1754.
Her Serene Highness, the great Duchess Bianca Capello,(449) is arrived safe at a palace lately taken for her in Arlington Street. She has been much visited by the quality and gentry, and pleases universally by the graces of her person and comeliness of her deportment—my dear child, this is the least that the newspapers would say of the charming Bianca. I, who feel all the agreeableness of your manner, must say a great deal more, or should say a great deal more, but I can only commend the picture enough, not you. The head is painted equal to Titian; and though done, I suppose, after the 'clock had struck five-and-thirty, yet she retains a great share of beauty. I have bespoken a frame for her, with the grand-ducal coronet at top, her story on a label at bottom, which Gray is to compose in Latin, as short and expressive as Tacitus, (one is lucky when one can bespeak and have executed such an inscription!) the Medici arms on one side, and the Capello's on the other. I must tell you a critical discovery of mine apropos: in an old book of Venetian arms, there are two coats of Capello, who from their name bear a hat; on one of them is added a fleur-de-lis on a blue ball, which I am persuaded was given to the family by the Great Duke, in consideration of this alliance; the Medicis, you know, bore such a badge at the top of their own arms. This discovery I made by a talisman, which Mr. Chute calls the Sortes Walpolianae, by which I find every thing I want, `a pointe nomm`ee, whenever I dip for it. This discovery, indeed, is almost of that kind which I call Serendipity, a very expressive word, which, as I have nothing better to tell you, I shall endeavour to explain to you: you will understand it better by the derivation than by the definition. I once read a silly fairy tale, called "The Three Princes of Serendip;" as their Highnesses travelled, they were always making discoveries, by accidents and sagacity, of things which they were not in quest of: for instance, one of them discovered that a mule blind of the right eye had travelled the same road lately, because the grass was eaten only on the left side, where it was worse than on the right—now do you understand Serendipity? One of the most remarkable instances of this accidental Sagacity, (for you must observe that no discovery of a thing you are looking for comes under this description,) was of my Lord Shaftsbury, who, happening to dine at Lord Chancellor Clarendon's, found out the marriage of the Duke of York and Mrs. Hyde, by the respect with which her mother treated her at table. I will send you the inscription in my next letter; you see I endeavour to grace your present as it deserves.
Your brother would have me say something of my opinion about your idea of taking the name of Guise;(450) but he has written so fully that I can only assure you in addition, that I am stronger even than he is against it, and cannot allow of your reasoning on families, because, however families may be prejudiced about them, and however foreigners (I mean, great foreigners) here may have those prejudices too, vet they never operate here, where there is any one reason to counterbalance them. A minister who has the least disposition to promote a creature of his, and to set aside a Talbot or a Nevil, will at one breath puff away a genealogy that would reach from hence to Herenhausen. I know a great foreigner, who always says that my Lord Denbigh is the best gentleman in England, because he is descended from the old Counts of Hapsburg; and yet my Lord Denbigh, (and though he is descended from what one should think of much more consequence here, the old Counts of Denbigh,) has for many years wanted a place or a pension, as much as if he were only what I think the first Count of Hapsburg was, the Emperor's butler. Your instance of the Venetians refusing to receive Valenti can have no weight: Venice might bully a Duke of Mantua, but what would all her heralds signify against a British envoy? In short, what weight do you think family has here, when the very last minister whom we have despatched is Sir James Gray,—nay, and who has already been in a public character at Venice! His father was first a box-keeper, and then footman to James the Second; and this is the man exchanged against the Prince de San Severino! One of my father's maxims was quieta non movere; and he was a wise man in that his day. My dear child, if you will suffer me to conclude with a pun, content yourself with your Manhood and Tuscany: it would be thought injustice to remove you from thence for any body else: when once you shift about, you lose the benefit of prescription, and subject yourself to a thousand accidents. I speak very seriously; I know the carte du pais.
We have no news: the flames in Ireland are stifled, I don't say extinguished, by adjourning the Parliament, which is to be prorogued. A catalogue of dismissions was sent over thither, but the Lord Lieutenant durst not venture to put them in execution. We are sending a strong squadron to the East Indies, which may possibly bring back a war with France, especially as we are going to ask money of our Parliament for the equipment. We abound in diversions, which flourish exceedingly on the demise of politics. There are no less than five operas every week, three of which are burlettas; a very bad company, except the Niccolina, who beats all the actors and actresses I ever saw for vivacity and variety. We had a good set four years ago, which did not take at all; but these being at the playhouse, and at play prices, the people, instead of resenting it, as was expected, are transported with them, call them their own operas, and I will not swear that they do not take them for English operas. They huzzaed the King twice the other night, for bespeaking one on the night of the Haymarket opera.
I am glad you are aware of Miss Pitt: pray continue your awaredom: I assure you, before she set out for Italy, she was qualified to go any Italian length of passion. Her very first slip was with her eldest brother: and it is not her fault that she has not made still blacker trips. Never mention this, and forget it as soon as she is gone from Florence. Adieu!
(449) Bianca Capello was the daughter of a noble Venetian. She had been seduced and carried off from her father's house by a young Florentine of low origin, named Peter Bonaventuri. They came to Florence, where she became the mistress of the Grand Duke of Tuscany, Francis of Medicis. He was very anxious to have a child by her; upon which she pretended to be brought to bed of a son, who had in reality been bought of one of the lower orders. He was called Don Anthony of Medicis. In order to prevent the Grand Duke from discovering her fraud, Bianca caused several of the persons who had had a part in the deception to be assassinated. At length the wife of Francis, the Archduchess Joan of Austria, died in childbed; and Bianca intrigued so successfully, that she persuaded her lover to marry her. Her marriage with the Grand Duke took place on the 12th of October, 1579, and was so sumptuous that it cost one hundred thousand Florentine ducats. Her tyranny and rapacity soon made her universally hated. She is supposed, as well as her husband, to have died by poison, administered to them through the means of his brother, the Cardinal Ferdinand of Medicis, who succeeded him as Grand I)uke.-D.
(451) Mr. Mann's mother was an heiress of that house.
194 Letter 91 To Richard Bentley, Esq. Arlington Street, March 2, 1754.
After calling two or three times without finding him, I wrote yesterday to Lord Granville,' and received a most gracious answer, but desiring to see me. I went. He repeated all your history with him, and mentioned your vivacity at parting; however, consented to give you the apartment, with great good humour, and said he would write to his bailiff; and added, laughing, that he had an old cross housekeeper, who had regularly quarrelled with all his grantees. It is well that some of your desires, though unfortunately the most trifling, depend on me alone, as those at least are sure of being executed. By Tuesday's coach there will go to Southampton two orange trees, two Arabian jasmines, some tuberose roots, and plenty of cypress seeds, which last I send you in lieu of the olive trees, none of which are yet come over.
The weather grows fine, and I have resumed little flights to Strawberry. I carried George Montagu thither, who was in raptures, and screamed, and hooped and hollaed, and danced, and crossed himself a thousand times over. He returns to-morrow to Greatworth, and I fear will give himself up entirely to country squirehood. But what will you say to greater honour which Strawberry has received? Nolkejumskoi(453) has been to see it, and liked the windows and staircase. I can't conceive how he entered it. I should have figured him like Gulliver cutting down some of the largest oaks in Windsor Forest to make joint-stools, in order to straddle over the battlements and peep in at the windows of Lilliput. I can't deny myself this reflection (even though he liked Strawberry,) as he has not employed you as an architect.
Still there is little news. To-day it is said that Lord George Sackville is summoned in haste from Ireland, where the grand juries are going to petition for the resitting Of the Parliament. Hitherto they have done nothing but invent satirical healths, which I believe gratify a taste more peculiar to Ireland than politics, drinking. We have had one Considerable day in the House of Commons here. Lord Egmont, in a very long and fine speech, opposed a new Mutiny-bill for the troops going to the East Indies (which I believe occasioned the reports with you of an approaching war.) Mr. Conway got infinite reputation by a most charming speech in answer to him, in which he displayed a system of military learning, which was at once new, striking and entertaining.(454) I had carried Monsieur de Gisors thither, who began to take notes of all I explained to him: but I begged he would not; for, the question regarding French politics, I concluded the Speaker would never have done storming at the Gaulls collecting intelligence in the very senate-house. Lord Holderness made a magnificent ball for these foreigners last week: there were a hundred and forty people, and most stayed supper. Two of my Frenchmen learnt country-dances, and succeeded very well. T'other night they danced minuets for the entertainment of the King at the masquerade; and then he sent for Lady Coventry to dance: it was quite like Herodias-and I believe if he had offered her a boon, she would have chosen the head of St. John—I believe I told you of her passion for the young Lord Bolingbroke.
Dr. Mead is dead, and his collection going to be sold. I fear I have not virtue enough to resist his miniatures. I shall be ruined!(455)
I shall tell you a new instance of the Sortes Walpolianae: I lately bought an old volume of pamphlets; I found at the end a history of the Dukes of Lorrain, and with that an account of a series of their medals, of which, says the author, there are but two sets in England. It so happens that I bought a set above ten years ago at Lord Oxford's sale; and on examination I found the Duchess, wife of Duke Ren`e,(456) has a headdress, allowing for being modernized, as the medals are modern, which is evidently the same with that figure in my Marriage of Henry VI. which I had imagined was of her. It is said to be taken from her tomb at Angiers; and that I might not decide too quickly en connoisseur, I have sent to Angiers for a draught of the tomb.
Poor Mr. Chute was here yesterday, the first going out after a confinement of thirteen weeks; but he is pretty well. We have determined upon the plan for the library, which we find will fall in exactly with the proportions of the room, with no variations from the little door-case of St. Paul's, but widening the larger arches. I believe I shall beg your assistance again about the chimney-piece and ceiling; but I can decide nothing till I have been again at Strawberry. Adieu! my dear Sir.
(452) John Earl Granville, then secretary of state, had an estate in Jersey.
(453) The Duke of Cumberland.-E.
(454) Mr. Conway's speech will be found in the Parliamentary History, vol. xv. p. 282. The object of the bill was to extend the operation of the Mutiny act to the troops in the service of the East India Company. This question was strongly combated, on constitutional grounds, as conferring on a trading body powers which ought to be viewed with jealousy, when vested even in the head of the state. The second reading was carried by 245 against 50.-E.
(455) Dr. Mead's pictures were chosen with so much judgment, that at the sale of them in this month, they produced 3,417 pounds, 11 shillings, nearly seven hundred pounds more than he gave for them.-E.
(456) Duke of Anjou, father of the unfortunate Margaret of Anjou, Queen of Henry the Sixth of England.-E.
196 Letter 92 To Richard Bentley, Esq. Arlington Street, March 6, 1754.
My dear Sir, You will be surprised at my writing again so very soon; but unpleasant as it is to be the bearer of ill news,(457) I flattered myself that you would endure it better from me, than to be shocked with it from an indifferent hand, who would not have the same management for your tenderness and delicacy as I naturally shall, who always feel for you, and on this occasion with you! You are very unfortunate: you have not many real friends, and you lose—for I must tell it you, the chief of them! indeed, the only one who could have been of real use to you—for what can I do, but wish, and attempt, and miscarry?- -or from whom could I have hoped assistance for you, or warmth for myself and my friends, but from the friend I have this morning lost?—But it is too selfish to be talking of our losses, when Britain, Europe, the world, the King, Jack Roberts,(458) Lord Barnard, have lost their guardian angel. What are private misfortunes to the affliction of one's country? or how inglorious is an Englishman to bewail himself, when a true patriot should be acting for the good of mankind!- -Indeed, if it is possible to feel any comfort, it is from seeing how many true Englishmen, how many true Scotchmen are zealous to replace the loss, and snatch at the rudder of the state, amidst this storm and danger! Oh! my friend, how will your heart glow with melancholy admiration, when I tell you, that even the poor Duke of Newcastle himself conquers the torrent of his grief, and has promised Mrs. Betty Spence,(459) and Mr. Griham the apothecary, that, rather than abandon England to its evil genius, he will even submit to be lord treasurer himself? My Lord Chancellor, too, is said to be willing to devote himself in the same manner for the good of his country. Lord Hartington(460) is the most inconsolable of all; and when Mrs. Molly Bodens(461) and Mrs. Garrick were entreated by some of the cabinet council to ask him whom he wished to have minister, the only answer they could draw from him was, "a Whig! a Whig!" As for Lord B. I may truly say, he is humbled and licks the dust; for his tongue, which never used to hang below the waistband of his breeches, is now dropped down to his shoe-buckles; and had not Mr. Stone assured him that if the worst came to the worst, they could but make their fortunes under another family, I don't know whether he would not have despaired of the commonwealth. But though I sincerely pity so good a citizen, I cannot help feeling most for poor Lord Holderness, who sees a scheme of glory dashed which would have added new lustre to the British annals and have transmitted the name D'Arcy down to latest posterity. He had but just taken Mr. Mason the poet into his house to write his deserts; and he had just reason to expect that the secretary's office would have gained a superiority over that of France and Italy, which was unknown even to Walsingham.
I had written thus far, and perhaps should have elegized on for a page or two further, when Harry, who has no idea of the dignity of grief, blundered in, with satisfaction in his countenance, and thrust two packets from you into my hand.- -Alas! he little knew that I was incapable of tasting any satisfaction but in the indulgence of my concern.—I was once going to commit them to the devouring flames, lest any light or vain sentence should tempt me to smile but my turn for true philosophy checked my hand, and made me determine to prove that I could at once launch into the bosom of pleasure and be insensible to it.-I have conquered; I have read your letters, and yet I think of nothing but Mr. Pelham's death! Could Lady Catherine(462) do thus @ Could she receive a love-letter from Mr. Brown, and yet think only on her breathless Lord?
Thursday,
I wrote the above last night, and have stayed as late as I could this evening, that I might be able to tell you who the person is in whom all the world is to discover the proper qualities for replacing the national loss. But, alas! the experience of two @,whole days has showed that the misfortune is irreparable; and I don't know whether the elegies on his death will not be finished before there be any occasion for congratulations to his successor. The mystery is profound. How shocking it will be if things should go on just as they are! I mean by that, how mortifying if it is discovered, that when all the world thought Mr. Pelham did and could alone maintain the calm and carry on the government, even he was not necessary, and that it was the calm and the government that carried on themselves! However, this is not my opinion.—I believe all this will make a party.(453)
Good night! here are two more new plays: Constantine,(464) the better of them, expired the fourth night at Covent-garden. Virginia,(465) by Garrick's acting and popularity, flourishes still: he has written a remarkably good epilogue to it. Lord Bolingbroke is come forth in five pompous quartos, two and a half new and most unorthodox.(466) Warburton is resolved to answer, and the bishops not to answer him. I have not had a moment to look into it. Good night!
(457) This is an ironic letter on the death of Henry Pelham, first lord of the treasury and chancellor of the exchequer, with whom Mr. Walpole was on ill terms.
(458) John Roberts, Esq. secretary to Mr. Pelham.
(459) Companion to the Duchess of Newcastle. [This lady was related to the Rev. Joseph Spence, author of "Polymetis." She died in 1764, after being the friend and companion of the Duchess of Newcastle for more than forty-five years.]
(460) William, afterwards fourth Duke of Devonshire.
(461) Companion of Lady Burlington, Lord Hartington's mother-in-law.
(462) Lady Catherine Pelham, the widow of Mr. Pelham.-E.
(463) Mr. Walpole, when young, loved faction; and Mr. Bentley one day saying, " that he believed certain opinions would make a sect," Mr. W. said eagerly, "Will they make a party?"
(464) "Constantine," a tragedy was written by the Rev. Philip Francis, the translator of Horace and Demosthenes, and father of Sir Philip Francis, the reputed author of the Letters of Junius. He also wrote "Eugenia," a tragedy; but as a dramatic author he was not very successful.-E.
(465) "Virginia" was written by Henry Crisp, a clerk in the Custom-house. It was acted at Drury Lane with some success; owing chiefly to the excellence of the performers.-E.
(466) A splendid edition of Lord Bolingbroke's Works, in five volumes, quarto, having been published on the very day of Mr. Pelham's death, Garrick wrote an ode on the occasion, which contains the following stanza:-
"The same sad morn, to Church and State
(So for our sins 'twas fix'd by fate)
A double shock was given:
Black as the regions of the North,
St. John's fell genius issued forth,
And Pelham's fled to heaven!"
It was upon the appearance of this edition of Lord Bolingbroke's works, edited by David Mallet, that Dr. Johnson pronounced this memorable sentence upon both author and editor:—"Sir, he was a scoundrel and a coward; a scoundrel, for charging a blunderbuss against religion and morality; a coward, because he had no resolution to fire it off himself, but left half-a-crown to a beggarly Scotchman to draw the trigger after his death."-E.
198 Letter 93 To Sir Horace Mann. Arlington Street, March 7, 1754.
You will little have expected, my dear Sir, the great event that happened yesterday. Mr. Pelham(467) is dead! all that calm, that supineness, of which I have lately talked to you so much, is at an end! there is no heir to such luck as his. The whole people of England can never agree a second time upon the same person for the residence of infallibility; and though so many have found their interest in making Mr. Pelham the fermier-general for their Venality, yet almost all have found too, that it lowered their prices to have but one purchaser. He could not have died at a more critical time: all the elections were settled, all bargains made, and much money advanced: and by the way, though there never was so little a party, or so little to be made by a seat in Parliament, either with regard to profit or fame, there never was such established bribery, or so profuse. And as every thing was settled by his life, so every thing is thrown into confusion by his death: the difficulty Of naming, or of who should name the successor, is almost insurmountable—for you are not such a transmontane as to imagine that the, person who must sign the warrant will have the filling it up. The three apparent candidates are Fox, Pitt, and Murray; all three -with such encumbrances on their hopes as make them very desperate. The Chancellor hates Fox; the Duke of Newcastle does not (I don't say, love him, but to speak in the proper phrase, does not) pretend to love him: the Scotch abominate him, and they and the Jacobites make use of his connexion with the Duke to represent him as formidable: the Princess cannot approve him for the same reason: the law, as in duty bound to the Chancellor and to Murray, and to themselves, whom he always attacks, must dislike him. He has his parts and the Whigs, and the seeming right of succession. Pitt has no health, no party, and has, what in this case is allowed to operate, the King's negative. Murray is a Scotchman, and it has been suspected, of the worst dye: add a little of the Chancellor's jealousy—all three are obnoxious to the probability of the other two being disobliged by a preference. There is no doubt but the Chancellor and the Duke of Newcastle will endeavour to secure their own power, by giving an exclusion to Fox: each of them has even been talked of for Lord Treasurer; I say talked of, though Mr. Pelham died but yesterday; but you can't imagine how much a million of people can talk in a day on such a subject! It was even much imagined yesterday, that Sir George Lee would be the Hulla, to wed the post, till things are ripe for divorcing him again: he is an unexceptionable man, sensible, of good character, the ostensible favourite of the Princess, and obnoxious to no set of men: for though he changed ridiculously quick on the Prince's death, yet as every body changed with him, it offended nobody; and what is a better reason for promoting him now, it would offend nobody to turn him out again.
In this buzz is all the world at present: as the plot thickens or opens, you shall hear more. In the mean time you will not dislike to know a little of the circumstances of this death. Mr. Pelham was not sixty-one; his florid, healthy constitution promised long life, and his uninterrupted good fortune as long power; yet the one hastened his end, and the other was enjoyed in its full tranquillity but three poor years! i should not say, enjoyed, for such was his peevishness and suspicions, that the lightest trifles could poison all that stream of happiness! he was careless of his health, most intemperate in eating, and used no exercise. All this had naturally thrown him into a most scorbutic habit, for which last summer he went to Scarborough, but stayed there only a month, which would not have cleansed a scorbutic kitten. The sea-air increased his appetite, and his flatterers pampered it at their seats on the road. He returned more distempered, and fell into a succession of boils, fevers, and St. Anthony's fire—indeed, I think, into such a carbuncular state of blood as carried off my brother. He had recovered enough to come to the House of Commons; and last Friday walked in the Park till he put himself into an immense sweat; in that sweat he stood at a window to look at horses, ate immoderately at dinner, relapsed at six that evening, and died yesterday morning (Wednesday) a quarter before six. His will was to be opened to-day; he is certainly dead far from rich.(468) There arc great lamentations, some joy, some disappointments, and much expectation. As a person who loves to write history, better than to act in it, you will easily believe that I confine my sensations on the occasion chiefly to observation-at least, my care that posterity may know all about it prevents my indulging any immoderate (grief; consequently I am as well as can be expected, and ever yours, etc.
(467) Henry Pelham, chancellor of the exchequer, and first commissioner of the treasury; only brother of Thomas Duke of Newcastle.
(468) Walpole, almost the only author who has treated the memory of Mr. Pelham with disrespect, mentions to his honour, that he "lived without abusing his power, and died poor." See Memoires, vol. i. p. 332. By this expression, says Coxe, the reader will be reminded of a curious coincidence in the concluding lines of the eulogium inscribed on the base of Mr. Pitt's statue, by his friend and pupil, the Right Honourable George Canning, "Dispensing, for more than twenty years, the favours of the crown, he lived without ostentation, and he died poor."-E.
200 Letter 94 To Richard Bentley, Esq. Arlington Street, March 14, 1754.
In the confusion of things, I last week hazarded a free letter to you by the common post. The confusion is by no means ceased. However, as some circumstances may have rendered a desire of intelligence necessary, I send this by the coach, with the last volume of Sir Charles Grandison, for its chaperon.
After all the world has been named for chancellor of the exchequer, and my Lord Chief Justice Lee, who is no part of the world, really made so pro tempore; Lord Hartington went to notify to Mr. Fox, that the cabinet council having given it as their unanimous opinion to the King, that the Duke of Newcastle should be at the head of the treasury, and he (Mr. Fox) secretary of state with the management of the House of Commons; his grace, who had submitted to so oracular a sentence, hoped Mr. Fox would not refuse to concur in so salutary a measure; and assured him, that Though the Duke would reserve the sole disposition of the secret service-money, his grace would bestow his entire confidence on Mr. Fox, and acquaint him with the most minute details of that service. Mr. Fox bowed and obeyed- -and, as a preliminary step, received the Chancellor's(469) absolution. From thence he attended his—and our new master. But either grief for his brother's death, or joy for it, had so intoxicated the new maitre du palais, that he would not ratify any one of the conditions he had imposed: and though my Lord Hartington's virtue interposed, and remonstrated on the purport of the message he had carried, the Duke persisted in assuming the whole and undivided power himself, and left Mr. Fox no choice, but of obeying or disobeying, as he might choose. This produced the next day a letter from Mr. Fox, carried by Lord Hartington, in which he refused secretary of state, and pinned down the lie with which the new ministry is to commence. It was tried to be patched up at the Chancellor's on Friday night, though ineffectually: and yesterday morning Mr. Fox in an audience desired to remain secretary at war. The Duke immediately kissed hands-declared, in the most unusual manner, universal minister. Legge was to be chancellor of the exchequer: but I can't tell whether that disposition will hold, as Lord Duplin is proclaimed the acting favourite. The German Sir Thomas Robinson was thought on for the secretary's seals; but has just sense enough to be unwilling to accept them under so ridiculous an administration. This is the first act of the comedy.
On Friday this august remnant of the Pelhams went to court for the first time. At the foot of the stairs he cried and sunk down: the yeomen of the guard were forced to drag him up under the arms. When the closet-door opened, he flung himself at his length at the King's feet, sobbed, and cried "God bless your Majesty! God preserve your Majesty," and lay there howling and embracing the King's knees, with one foot so extended, that Lord Coventry, who was luckily in waiting, and begged the standers-by to retire with "For God's sake, gentlemen, don't look at a great man in distress," endeavouring to shut the door, caught his grace's foot, and made him roar out with pain.
You can have no notion of what points of ceremony have been agitated about the ears of the family. George Selwyn was told that my Lady Catharine had not shed one tear: "And pray," said he, "don't she intend it?" It is settled that Mrs. Watson is not to cry till she is brought-to-bed.
You love George Selwyn's bon-mots: this crisis has redoubled them: here is one of his best. My Lord Chancellor is to be Earl of Clarendon—"Yes," said Selwyn, from the very summit of the whites of his demure eyes; "and I suppose he will get the title of Rochester for his son-in-law, my Lord Anson." Do you think he will ever lose the title of Lord Rochester?
I expected that we should have been overrun with elegies and panegyrics: indeed, I comforted myself, that one word in all of them would atone for the rest—the late Mr. Pelham. But the world seems to allow that their universal attachment and submission was universal interestedness; there has not been published a single encomium. Orator Henley alone has held forth in his praise:-yesterday it was on charming Lady Catherine. Don't you think it should have been in these words, in his usual style? Oratory-chapel,—Right reason; madness; charming Lady Catherine; hell fire," etc.
Monday, March 18.
Almost as extraordinary news as our political, is, that it has snowed ten days successively, and most part of each day: it is living in Muscovy, amid ice and revolutions: I hope lodgings will begin to let a little dear in Siberia! Beckford and Delaval, two celebrated partisans, met lately at Shaftesbury, where they oppose one another: the latter said:
"Art thou the man whom men famed Beckford call?"
T'other replied,
"Art thou the much more famous Delaval?"
But to leave politics and change of ministries, and to come to something of real consequence, I must apply you to my library ceiling, of which I send you some rudiments. I propose to have it all painted by Clermont; the principal part in chiaro scuro, on the design which you drew for the Paraclete: but as that pattern would be surfeiting, so often repeated in an extension of twenty feet by thirty, I propose to break and enliven it by compartments in colours, according to the enclosed sketch, which you must adjust and dimension. Adieu!
(469) With whom he was at variance.
'202 Letter 95 To George Montagu, Esq. Arlington Street, March 19, 1754.
You will live in the country, and then you are amazed that people use you ill. Don't mistake me: I don't mean that you deserve to be ill-treated for living in the country; at least only by those who love and miss you; but if you inhabited the town a little, you would not quite so much expect uprightness, nor be so surprised at ingratitude, and . neglect. I am far from disposed to justify the great C`u; but when you had declined being his servant, do you wonder that he will not serve your friends! I will tell you what, if the news of to-day holds at all, which is what no one piece of news of this last fortnight has done, you may be worse used by your cousin as soon as you please; for he is one of the first upon the list for secretary of state, in the room of the Duke of Newcastle. Now again, are you such a rusticated animal as to suppose that the Duke is dismissed for inability, on the death of his brother. So far from it, it is already certainly known that it was he who supported Mr. Pelham, and the impediments and rubs thrown in the way of' absolute power long ago were the effects of the latter's timidity and irresolution. The Duke, freed from that clog, has declared himself sole minister, and the King has kissed his hand upon it. Mr. Fox, who was the only man in England that objected to this plan, is to be sent to a prison which is building on the coast of Sussex, after the model of Fort l'Ev`eque, under the direction of Mr. Taaffe.
Harry Legge is to be chancellor of the exchequer, but the declared favour rests on Lord Duplin. Sir George Lyttelton is to be treasurer of the navy. The parliament is to be dissolved on the fourth of next month: till when, I suppose, none of the changes will take place. These are the politics of the day; but as they are a little fluctuating, notwithstanding the steadiness of the new first minister, I will not answer that they will hold true to Greatworth: nothing lasts now but the bad weather.
I went two days ago, with Lady Ailesbury, and Mr. Conway, and Miss Anne, to hear the rehearsal of Mrs. Clive's new farce, which is very droll, with pretty music.
202 Letter 96 To Sir Horace Mann. Arlington Street, March 28, 1754.
I promised to write to you again soon, and therefore I do: that Is, I stick to the letter, not to the essence; for I not Only have very little to write, but your brother has, I believe, already told you all that has happened. Mr. Fox received almost at once a testimonial that he was the most proper for minister, and a proof that he was not to be so. He on the Tuesday consented to be secretary of state, with the management of the House of Commons, and the very next day refused to be the former, as he found he was not to have the latter. He remains secretary at war, in rupture with the Duke of Newcastle, (who, you know, has taken the treasury,) but declaring against opposition. That Duke is omnipotent; and, to show that power, makes use of nothing but machines. Sir Thomas Robinson is secretary of state; Mr. Legge, chancellor of the exchequer; Lord Duplin,(470) the agent of business.(471) Yesterday an odd event happened: Lord Gower resigned the privy seal: it had been for some time promised to the Duke of Rutland,(472) who having been reported dead, and who really having voided a quarry of stones, is come to town; and his brother, a Lord William Manners, better known in the groom-porter's annals than in those of Europe, and the whole Manners family having intimated to the Duke of Newcastle that unless Lord Gower was dismissed in a month, and the Duke of Rutland instated in his place, they would oppose the prosperous dawn of the new ministry, that poor Earl, who is inarticulate with the palsy, has been drawn into a resignation, and is the first sacrifice to the spirit of the new administration.(473) You will very likely not understand such politics as these, but they are the best we have.
Our old good-humoured friend Prince Craon is dead; don't you think that the Princess will not still despair of looking well in weeds! My Lord Orford's grandmother(474) is dead too; and after her husband's death, (whose life, I believe, she has long known to be not worth a farthing,) has left every thing to her grandson. This makes me very happy, for I had apprehended, from Lord Orford's indolence and inattention, and from his mother's cunning and attention, that she would have wriggled herself into the best clause in the will; but she is not mentioned in it, and the Houghton pictures may still be saved. Adieu! my dear Sir; I don't call this a letter, but a codicil to my last: one can't write volumes on trifling events.
(470 Eldest son of William Hay, Earl of Kinnoul.
(471) For an account of the political changes which took place upon the death of Mr. Pelham, see Lord Dover's Preface to these Letters, vol. i. p. 29.-E.
(472) John Manners, third Duke of Rutland, the father of the more celebrated Lord Granby. He died in 1779, at the age of eighty-three.-D.
(473) The Duke of Rutland did not succeed to the privy seal; but Charles Spencer, second Duke of Marlborough.-D.
(474) Margaret Tuckfield, second wife of Samuel Rolle, of
Haynton in Devonshire; by whom she was mother of Margaret
Countess of Orford, and afterwards married to John Harris, of
Hayne in Devonshire, master of the household to the King.
204 Letter 97 To Sir Horace Mann. Strawberry Hill, April 24, 1754.
Before I received your letter of March 29th, I had already told you the state of our politics, as they seemed fixed—at least for the present. The Duke of Newcastle is alone and all powerful, and, I suppose, smiles at those who thought that we must be governed by a succession of geniuses. I don't know whether there arc not more parts in governing without genius!- -be it as it will, all the world acquiesces: he has placed all the orators in whatever offices they demanded, and the New Parliament, which is almost chosen, will not probably degenerate from the complaisance of its predecessor. Which of the popes was it, who being chosen for his insufficience, said, "I could not have believed that it was so easy to govern!" You will forgive my smiling in my turn at your begging me to lay aside family considerations, and tell you if I do not think my uncle the fittest subject for a first minister. My dear child, you have forgot that three years are past since I so totally laid aside all family considerations, as not to speak or even bow to my uncle. Since the affair of Lord Orford and Miss Nichol], I have not had the least intercourse with the Pigwiggin branch; and should be very sorry if there were any person in the world but you, and my uncle himself, who thought him proper for minister.
I believe there is no manner of intention of sending Lord Albemarle to Ireland: the style toward that island is extremely lofty; and after some faint proposals of giving them some agreeable governor, violent measures have been resumed: the Speaker is removed from being chancellor of the exchequer, more of his friends are displaced, and the Primate, with the Chancellor and Lord Besborough, are again nominated lords Justices. These measures must oppress the Irish spirit, or, what is more likely, inflame it to despair. Lord Rochford certainly returns to Turin. General Wall, who was in the highest favour here, and who was really grown fond of England- -not at all to the prejudice of doing us what hurt he could in his public character, is recalled, to succeed Don Carvalho and Lancaster, as secretary of state for foreign affairs. If he regrets England too much, may not he think of taking Ireland in his way back?
I shall fill up the remainder of an empty letter with transcribing some sentences which have diverted me in a very foolish vulgar book of travels, lately published by one Drummond,(475) consul at Aleppo. Speaking of Florence, he says, that the very evening of his arrival, he was carried by Lord Eglinton and some other English, whom he names, to your house: "Mr. Mann" (these are his words) "is extremely Polite, and I do him barely justice in saying he is a fine gentleman, though indeed this is as much as can be said of any person whatever; yet there are various ways of distinguishing the qualities that compose this amiable character, and of these, he, in my opinion, possesses the most agreeable. He lives in a fine palace; all the apartments on the ground-floor, which is elegantly furnished, were lighted up; and the garden was a little epitome of Vauxhall. These conversationi resemble our card-assemblies;" (this is called writing travels, to observe that an assembly is like an assembly!) "and this was remarkably brilliant, for all the married ladies of fashion in Florence were present; yet were they as much inferior to the fair part of a British assembly, especially those of York and Edinburgh, as a crew of female Laplanders are to the fairest dames of Florence. Excuse this sally, which is more warm than just; for even this assembly was not without a few lovely creatures. Some played at cards, some passed the time in conversation; others walked from place to place; and many retired with their gallants into gloomy corners, where they entertained each other, but in what manner I will not pretend to say; though, if I may depend upon my information, which, by-the-by, was very good, their taste and mine would not at all agree. In a word, these countries teem with more singularities than I choose to mention." You will conclude I had very little to say when I had recourse to the observations of such a simpleton; but I thought they would divert you for a moment, as they did me. One don't dislike to know what even an Aleppo factor would write of one-and I can't absolutely dislike him, as he was not insensible to your agreeableness. I don't believe Orpheus would think even a bear ungenteel when it danced to his music. Adieu!
(475) Alexander Drummond, Esq. The work was entitled "Travels through different Cities of Germany, Italy, Greece, and several parts of Asia, as far as the banks of the Euphrates."-.
205 Letter 98 To John Chute, Esq. Arlington Street, April 30, 1754.
My God! Farinelli, what has this nation done to the King of Spain, that the moment we have any thing dear and precious he should tear it from us!-This is not the beginning of my letter to you, nor does it allude to Mr. Bentley; much less is it relative to the captivity of the ten tribes; nor does the King signify Benhadad or Tiglath-pileser; nor Spain, Assyria, as Dr. Pococke or Warburton, misled by dissimilitude of names, or by the Septuagint, may, for very good reasons, imagine—but it is literally the commencement of my lady Rich's(476) epistle to Farinelli on the recall of General Wall, as she relates it herself. It serves extremely well for my own lamentation, when I sit down by the waters of Strawberry, and think of ye, O Chute and Bentley!
I have seen "Creusa,"(477) and more than agree with you: it is the only new tragedy that I ever saw and really liked. The plot is most interesting, and, though so complicated quite clear and natural. The circumstance of so much distress being brought on by characters, every one good, yet acting consistently with their principles towards the misfortunes of the drama, is quite new and pleasing. Nothing offended me but that lisping Miss Haughton, whose every speech is inarticulately oracular.
I was last night at a little ball at Lady Anne Furnese's for the new Lords, Dartmouth and North, but nothing passed worth relating; indeed, the only event since you left London was the tragicomedy that was acted last Saturday at the Opera. One of the dramatic guards fell flat on his face and motionless in an apoplectic fit. The Princess(478) and her children were there. Miss Chudleigh, who apparemment had never seen a man fall on his face before, went into the most theatric fit of kicking and shrieking that ever was seen. Several other women, who were preparing their fits, were so distanced that she had the whole house to herself; and, indeed such a confusion for half an hour I never saw! The next day, at my Lady Townshend's, old Charles Stanhope asked what these fits were called? Charles Townshend replied, "The true convulsive fits, to be had only of the maker." Adieu! my dear Sir. To-day looks summerish, but we have no rain yet.
(476) One of the daughters and coheiresses of the Lord Mohun, killed in a duel with Duke Hamilton.
(477) William Whitehead's tragedy of "Creusa" was brought out at Drury Lane theatre with considerable applause. Mrs. Pritchard performed the character of Creusa with great effect; and as Garrick and Mossop also took parts in it, the performance was so perfect, that it was hardly possible for it not to succeed in the representation; yet it has seldom been revived.-E.
(478) The Princess of Wales, mother to George the Third.-E.
]206 Letter 99 To John Chute, Esq. Arlington Street, May 14, 1754.
My dear sir, I wrote to you the last day of last month: I only mention it to show you that I am- punctual to your desire. It is my only reason for writing to-day, for I have nothing new to tell you. The town is empty, dusty, and disagreeable; the country is cold and comfortless; consequently I daily run from one to t'other', as if both were so charming that I did not know which to prefer. I am at present employed in no very lively manner, in reading a treatise on commerce, which Count Perron has lent me, of his own writing: this obliges me to go through with it, though the subject and the style of the French would not engage me much. It does not want sense.
T'other night a description was given me of the most extraordinary declaration of love that ever was made. Have you seen young Poniatowski?(479) he is very handsome. You have seen the figure of the Duchess of Gordon,(480) who looks like a raw-boned Scotch metaphysician that has got a red face by drinking water. One day at the drawing-room, having never spoken to him, she sent one of the foreign ministers to invite Poniatowski to dinner with her for the next day. He bowed and went. The moment the door opened, her two little sons, attired like Cupids, with bows and arrows, shot at him; and one of them literally hit his hair, and was very near putting his eye out, and hindering his casting it to the couch
"Where she another sea-born Venus lay."
The only company besides this Highland goddess were two Scotchmen, who could not speak a word of any language but their own Erse; and to complete his astonishment at this allegorical entertainment, with the dessert there entered a little horse, and galloped round the table; a hieroglyphic I cannot solve. Poniatowski accounts for this profusion of kindness by his great-grandmother being a Gordon: but I believe it is to be accounted for by * * * * Adieu! my dear Sir.
(479) Stanislaus, the ill-fated King of Poland.
(480) Lady Catherine Gordon, daughter of the Earl of Aberdeen, widow of Cosmo Duke of Gordon, who died in 1752. She married, secondly, Colonel Saates Morris.-E.
207 Letter 100 To Richard Bentley, Esq. Arlington Street, May 18, 1754.
My dear Sir, Unless you will be exact in dating your letters, you will occasion me much confusion. Since the undated one which I mentioned in my last, I have received another as unregistered, with the fragment of the rock, telling me of one which had set sail on the 18th, I suppose of last month, and been driven back: this I conclude was the former undated. Yesterday, I received a longer, tipped with May 8th. You must submit to this lecture, and I hope will amend by it. I cannot promise that I shall correct myself much in the intention I had of writing to you seldomer and shorter at this time of year. If you could be persuaded how insignificant I think all I do, how little important it is even to myself, you would not wonder that I have not much empressement to give the detail of it to any body else. Little excursions to Strawberry, little parties to dine there, and many jaunts to hurry Bromwich, and the carver, and Clermont, are my material occupations. Think of sending these 'cross the sea!-The times produce nothing. there is neither party, nor controversy, nor gallantry, nor fashion, nor literature-the whole proceeds like farmers regulating themselves, their business, their views, their diversions, by the almanac. Mr. Pelham's death has scarce produced a change; the changes in Ireland, scarce a murmur. Even in France the squabbles of the parliament and clergy are under the same opiate influence.—I don't believe that Mademoiselle Murphy (who is delivered of a prince, and is lodged openly at Versailles) and Madame Pompadour will mix the least grain of ratsbane in one another's tea. I, who love to ride in the whirlwind, cannot record the yawns of such an age!
The little that I believe you would care to know relating to the Strawberry annals, is, that the great tower is finished on the outside, and the whole whitened, and has a charming effect, especially as the verdure of this year is beyond what I have ever seen it: the grove nearest the house comes on much; you know I had almost despaired of its ever making a figure. The bow-window room over the supper-parlour is finished; hung with a plain blue paper, with a chintz bed and chairs; my father and mother over the chimney in the Gibbons frame, about which you know we were in dispute what to do. I have fixed on black and gold, and it has a charming effect over your chimney with the two dropping points, which is executed exactly; and the old grate of Henry VIII. which you bought, is within it. In each panel around the room is a single picture; Gray's, Sir Charles Williams's, and yours, in their black and gold frames; mine is to match yours; and, on each side the doors, are the pictures of Mr. Churchill and Lady Mary, with their son, on one side, Mr. Conway and Lady Ailesbury on the other. You can't imagine how new and pretty this furniture is.-I believe I must get you to send me an attestation under your hand that you knew nothing of it, that Mr. Rigby may allow that at least this one room was by my own direction. - AS the library and great parlour grow finished, you shall have exact notice.
>From Mabland(481) I have little news to send you, but that the obelisk is danced from the middle of the rabbit-warren into his neighbour's garden, and he pays a ground-rent for looking at it there. His shrubs are hitherto unmolested, Et MaryboniaCoS(482) gaudet revirescere lucos!
The town is as busy again as ever on the affair of Canning, who has been tried for perjury. The jury would have brought her in guilty of perjury, but not wilful, till the judge informed them that that would rather be an Irish verdict: they then brought her in simply guilty, but recommended her. In short, nothing is discovered: the most general opinion is, that she was robbed, but by some other gipsy. For my own part, I am not at all brought to believe her story, nor shall, till I hear that living seven-and-twenty days without eating is among @ one of those secrets for doing impossibilities, which I suppose will be at last found out, and about the time that I am dead, even some art of living for ever.
You was in pain for me, and indeed I was in pain for myself, on the prospect of the sale of Dr. Mead's miniatures. You may be easy; it is more than I am quite; for it is come out that the late Prince of Wales had bought them every one.
I have not yet had time to have your granite examined, but will next week. If you have not noticed to your sisters any present of Ormer shells, I shall contradict myself, and accept them for my Lady Lyttelton,(483) who is making a grotto. As many as you can send conveniently, and any thing for the same use, will be very acceptable. You will laugh when I tell you, that I am employed to reconcile Sir George and Moore;(484) the latter has been very flippant, say impertinent, on the former's giving a little place to Bower, in preference to him. Think of my being the mediator!
The Parliament is to meet for a few days the end of this month, to give perfection to the Regency-bill. If the King dies before the end of this month, the old Parliament revives, which would make tolerable confusion, considering what sums have been laid out on seats in this. Adieu! This letter did not come kindly; I reckon it rather extorted from me, and therefore hope it will not amuse. However, I am in tolerable charity with you, and yours ever.
(481) A cant name which Mr. Walpole had given to Lord Radnor's whimsical house and grounds at Twickenham.
(482) Lord Radnor's garden was full of statues, etc. like that at Marylebone. (gray, in a letter to Wharton, of the 13th of August in this year says, "By all means see Lord Radnor's place again. He is a simple old Phobus, but nothing can spoil so glorious a situation, which surpasses every thing round it." Works, vol. iii. p. 119.-E).
(483) Elizabeth, daughter of Sir Robert Rich, Bart. was the second wife of George Lord Lyttelton. She was separated from her husband and survived him many years.-E.
(484) Author of The World, and some plays and poems. Moore had written in defence of lord Lyttelton against the Letters to the Whigs; which were not known to be Walpole's.
209 Letter 101 To George Montagu, Esq. Arlington Street, May 21, 1754.
I did not intend to write to you till after Thursday, when all your Boscawens, Rices, and Trevors(485) are to dine at Strawberry Hill; but an event has happened, of which I cannot delay giving you the instant pleasurable notice: now will you, according to your custom, be guessing, and, according to your custom, guessing wrong; but lest you should from my spirits make any undutiful or disloyal conjectures for me, know, that the great C`eu(486) of the Vine is dead, and that John the first was yesterday proclaimed undoubted Monarch. Nay, champion Dimmock himself shall cut the throat of any Tracy, Atkins, or Harrison, who shall dare to gainsay the legality of his title. In' short, there is no more will than was left by the late Erasmus Shorter of particular memory. I consulted Madame Rice, and she advised my directing to you at Mrs. Whettenhall's; to whom I beg as many compliments as if she wrote herself "La blanche Whitnell." As many to your sister Harriot and to your brother, who I hear is with you. I am sure, though both you and I had reason to be peevish with the poor tigress, that you grieve with me for her death. I do most sincerely, and for her Bessy: the man-tiger will be so sorry, that I am sure he will marry again to comfort himself. I am so tired with letters I have written on this event, that I can scarce hold the pen. How we shall wish for you on Thursday-and shan't you be proud to cock your tail at the Vine? Adieu!
(485) The daughters of Mr. Montagu's uncle, John Morley Trevor, of Glynd in Sussex; Anne, married to General Boscawen; Lucy, married to Edward Rice, Esq.; and Miss Grace Trevor, who was living at Bath in 1792.-E.
(486) Anthony Chute, Esq. of the Vine, Hants; who had been member for Newport, Hants.-E.
210 Letter 102 To Sir Horace Mann. Strawberry Hill, May 23, 1754.
Pray continue your M`emoires of the war of the Delmontis;(487) I have received two tomes, and am delighted with them. The French and Irish Parliaments proceed so heavily, that one cannot expect to live to the setting up the first standard; and it is so long since the world has furnished any brisk event, that I am charmed with this little military entremets. My Lady Orford will certainly wish herself at Florence again on the behalf of her old friend:(488) I always wish myself there; and, according to custom, she and I should not be of the same party: I cannot help wishing well to the rebellious. You ask, whether this Countess can deprive her son of her estate?-by no means, but by another child, which, at her age, and after the variety of experiments which she has made in all countries, I cannot think very likely to happen. I sometimes think her succession not very distant: she is very asthmatic. Her life is as retired as ever, and passed entirely with her husband, who seems a martyr to his former fame, and is a slave to her jealousy. She has given up nothing to him, and pays such attention to her affairs, that she will soon be vastly rich. But I won't be talking of her wealth, when the chief purpose of my writing to-night is, to announce the unexpected riches and good fortune of our dear Mr. Chute, I say our dear Mr. Chute, for though you have not reason to be content with him, yet I know your unchangeable heart-and I know he is so good, that if you will take this occasion to write him a line of joy, I am persuaded it will raccommode every thing; and though he will be far from proving a regular correspondent, we shall all have satisfaction in the re-establishment of the harmony.-In short, that tartar his brother is dead: and having made no will, the whole, and a very considerable whole, falls to our friend. This good event happened but three days ago, and I wait with the utmost impatience for his return from the Vine, where he was at the critical instant. As the whole was in the tyrant's power, and as every art had been used to turn the vinegar of his temper against his brother, I had for some time lived persuaded that he would execute the worst purposes-but let us forgive him!
I like to see in the Gazette that Goldsworthy(489) is going to be removed far from Florence: his sting has long been out-and yet I cannot help feeling glad that even the shadow of a competitor is removed from you.
We are going to have a week of Parliament-not to taste the new one, of which there is no doubt, but to give it essence: by the Regency-bill, if the King had died before it had sat, the old one must have revived.
There is nothing else in the shape of news but small-pox and miliary fevers, which have carried off people you did not know. If I had not been eager to notify Mr. Chute's prosperity to you, I think I must have deferred writing for a week or two longer: it is unpleasant to be inventing a letter to send so far, and must be disappointing when it comes from so far, and brings so little. Adieu!
(487) This alludes to the proceedings of a mad prior of the family of the Marchese Delmonti; who, with a party of ruffians, had seized upon a strong castle called Monta di Santa Maria, belonging to his brother the Marchese, and situated near Cortona. From whence he and his band ravaged the neighbouring country; and it was only with great difficulty that the troops of the Grand Duke of Tuscany succeeded in dislodging them-D.
(488) Marquis del Monti.
(489) Consul to Lisbon.
211 Letter 103 To Sir Horace Mann. Arlington Street, June 5, 1754.
Though I wrote to you but a few days ago, when I told you of Mr. Chute's good fortune, I must send you a few lines to-night upon a particular occasion. Mr. Brand,(490) a very intimate friend of mine, whom I believe you have formerly seen in Italy, is just set out for Germany on his way to Rome. I know by long and uninterrupted experience, that my barely saying he is my friend, will secure for him the kindest reception in the world from you: it would not express my conviction, if I said a word more on that head. His story is very melancholy: about six or seven years ago he married Lady Caroline Pierpoint,(491) half-sister of Lady Mary Wortley;(492) a match quite of esteem, she was rather older than he; but never were two people more completely, more reasonably happy. He is naturally all cheerfulness and laughter; she was very reserved, but quite sensible and faultless. She died about this time twelvemonth of a fever, and left him, with two little children, the most unhappy man alive. He travels again to dissipate his grief: you will love him much, if he stays any time with you. His connexions are entirely with the Duke of Bedford.
I have had another letter from you to-day, with a farther journal of the Delmonti war, which the rebels seem to be leaving to the Pope to finish for them. It diverted me extremely. had I received this letter before Mr. Brand set out, I would have sent you the whole narrative of the affair of Lord Orford and Miss -Nicholl; it is a little volume. The breach, though now by time silenced, was, I assure you, final.
We have had a spurt of Parliament for five days, but it was prorogued to-day. The next will be a terrible session from elections and petitions. The Oxfordshire(493) will be endless; the Appleby outrageous in expense. The former is a revival of downright Whiggism and Jacobitism,, two liveries that have been lately worn indiscriminately by all factions. The latter is a contest between two young Croesus's, Lord Thanet(494) and Sir James Lowther:(495) that a convert; this an hereditary Whig. A knowing lawyer said, to-day, that with purchasing tenures, votes, and carrying on the election and petition, five-and-fifty thousand pounds will not pay the whole expense— it makes one start! Good night! you must excuse the nothingness of a supernumerary letter.
(490) Thomas Brand, of the Hoo, in Hertfordshire.
(491) Daughter of Evelyn, Duke of Kingston, by his second wife.
(492) Lady Mary, in a letter to her daughter, of the 23d of July, 1753, says, "The death of Lady Carolina naturally raises the mortifying reflection, on how slender a thread hangs all worldly prosperity! I cannot say I am otherwise much touched with it. It is true she was my sister, as it were, and in some sense; but her behaviour to me never gave me any love, nor her general conduct any esteem."-E.
(493) This was the great Oxfordshire contest between the Jacobites and the Whigs. The candidates of the former party were Viscount Wenman and Sir Edward Turner, Bart. those of the latter, Viscount Parker, eldest son of the Earl of Macclesfield, and Sir James Dashwood, Bart. Great sums were spent on both sides: in the election the Jacobites carried it; but on petition to the House of Commons, the ministers, as usual, seated their own friends.-D.
(494) Sackville Tufton, eighth Earl of Thanet.-D.
(495) Sir James Lowther had succeeded his collateral relation, Henry, third Viscount Lonsdale, in his vast estates. He became afterwards remarkable for his eccentricities, and we fear, we must add, for his tyranny and cruelty. Mr. Pitt created him Earl of Lonsdale, in the year 1784. He died in 1802.-D. [In 1782, he offered to build, and Completely furnish and man, a ship of war of seventy guns for the service of the country at his own expense; but the proposal, though sanctioned by the King, was rendered unnecessary to be carried into execution by the peace.]
212 Letter 104 To George Montagu, Esq. Strawberry Hill, Saturday, June 8, 1754.
By my computation you are about returned to Greatworth: I was so afraid of my letters missing you on the road, that I deferred till now telling you how much pleasure I shall have in seeing you and the Colonel at Strawberry. I have long been mortified that for these three years you have seen it only in winter: it is now in the height of its greenth, blueth, gloomth, honey-suckle and seringahood. I have no engagement till Wednesday se'nnight, when I am obliged to be in town on law business. You will have this to-morrow night; if I receive a letter, which I beg you will direct to London, on Tuesday or Wednesday, I will meet you here whatever day you will be so good as to appoint. I thank the Colonel a thousand times. I cannot write a word more; for I am getting into the chaise to whisk to the Vine for two days, but shall be in town on Tuesday night. Adieu!
213 Letter 105 To George Montagu, Esq. Strawberry Hill, June 29, 1754.
I shall take care to send your letter the first time I write to Mr. Bentley. It is above a fortnight since I heard from him. I am much disappointed at not having seen you yet; I love you should execute your intentions while you intend them, because you are a little apt to alter your mind, and as I have set mine on your seeing Strawberry Hill this summer, while it is in its beauty, you will really mortify me by changing your purpose.
It is in vain that you ask for news: I was in town two days ago, but heard nothing; indeed there were not people enough to cause or make news. Lady Caroline Petersham had scraped together a few foreigners, after her christening; but I cannot say that the party was much livelier than if it had met at Madame Montandre's.(496) You must let me know a little beforehand when you have fixed your time for coming, because, as I am towards flying about on my summer expeditions, I should be unhappy not to be here just when you would like it. Adieu!
P. S. I supped at White's the other night with the great C`u, and he was by far more gracious, both on your topic and my own, than ever I knew him.
(496) Widow of Francis de la Rochefaucauld, Marquis de Montandre, who came to England with William the Third, and served in all the wars of that monarch, and of Queen Anne. He was made a marshal in July 1739, and died in the following August.-E.
213 Letter 106 To Sir Horace Mann. Strawberry Hill, July 5, 1754.
I believe you never receive a letter from me at this season of the year, without wishing for winter, that I might have something to tell you. Warm weather in England disperses all the world, except a few old folks, whose day of events is past, and who contribute nothing to the society of news. There is a court indeed as near as Kensington, but where the monarch is old, the courtiers are seldom young: they sun themselves in a window like flies in autumn, past even buzzing, and to be swept away in the first hurricane of a new reign. However, as little novelty as the season or the times produce, there is an adventuress in the world, who even in the dullest times will take care not to let conversation stagnate: this public-spirited dame is no other than a Countess-dowager, my sister-in-law, who has just notified to the town her intention of parting from her second husband-a step which, being in general not likely to occasion much surprise,-she had, however, taken care to render extraordinary, by a course of inseparable fondness and wonderful jealousy, for the three years since these her second nuptials. The testimonials which Mr. Shirley had received in print from that living academy of love-lore, my Lady Vane, added to this excessive tenderness of one, little less a novice, convinced every body that he was a perfect hero. You will pity poor Hercules! Omphale, by a most unsentimental precaution, has so secured to her own disposal her whole estate and jointure, that he cannot command so much as a distaff; and as she is not inclined to pay much for nothing, her offers on the article of separation are exceedingly moderate. As yet he has not accepted them, but is gone to Scarborough, and she into the west, to settle her affairs, and from thence embarks for France and Italy. I am sorry she will plague you again at Florence; but I shall like to hear of what materials she composes her second volume, and what reasons she will allege in her new manifestoes: her mother, who sold her, is dead; the all-powerful minister, who bought her, is dead! whom will she charge with dragging her. to the bed of this second tyrant, from whom she has been forced to fly—On her son's account, I am really sorry for this second `equip`ee: I can't even help pitying her! at her age nobody can take such steps, without being sensible of their ridicule, and what snakes must such passions be, as can hurry one over such reflections? Her original story was certainly very unhappy; and the forcing so very young a creature against her inclinations, unjustifiable: but I much question whether any choice of her own could have tied down her inclinations to -any temper—at least, I am sure she had pitched upon a Hercules then, who of all men living was the least proper to encounter such labours, my Lord Chesterfield!
I have sent your letter to Mr. Chute, who is at his own Vine; he had written to you of his own accord, and I trust your friendship will be re-established as strongly as ever, especially as there was no essential fault on either side, and as you will now be prepared not to mind his aversion to writing. Thank Dr. Cocchi for the book(497) he is so good as to intend for me; I value any thing from him, though I scarce understand any thing less than Greek and physic; the little I knew of the first I have almost forgot, and the other, thank God! I never had any occasion to know. I shall duly deliver the other copies.
The French are encroaching extremely upon us in all the distant parts of the world, especially in Virginia, from whence their attempts occasion great uneasiness here. For my own part, I think we are very lucky, when they will be so good as to begin with us at the farther end. The revocation of the Parliament of Paris, which is done or doing, is thought very bad for us: I don't know but it may: in any other time I should have thought not, as it is a concession or yielding from the throne, and would naturally spirit up the Parliament to struggle on for power; but no other age is a precedent for this. As no oppression would, I believe, have driven them into rebellion, no concession will tempt them to be more assuming. The King of France will govern his Parliament by temporizing; the Parliament of Ireland is governed by being treated like a French one. Adieu!
(497) An edition of some of the Greek physicians.
215 Letter 107 To The Hon. H. S. Conway. Strawberry Hill, Saturday, July 6, 1754.
Your letter certainly stopped to drink somewhere by the way, I suppose with the hearty hostess at the Windmill; for, though written on Wednesday, it arrived here but this morning: it could not have travelled more deliberately in the Speaker's body-coach. I am concerned, because, your fishmonger not being arrived, I fear you have stayed for my answer. The fish(498) are apprised that they are to ride over to Park-place, and are ready booted and spurred; and the moment their pad arrives, they shall set forth. I would accompany them on a pillion if I were not waiting for Lady Mary,(499) who has desired to bring a poor sick girl here for a few days to try the air. You know how courteous a knight I am to distressed virgins of five years old, and that my castle-gates are always open to them. You will, I am sure, accept this excuse for some days: and as soon as ever my hospitality is completed, I will be ready to obey your summons, though you should send a water-pot for me. I am in no fear of not finding you in perfect verdure; for the sun, I believe, is gone a great way off to some races or other, where his horses are to run for the King's plate: we have not heard of him in this neighbourhood. Adieu!
(497) Gold fish.
(499) Lady Mary Churchill.
215 Letter 108 To Sir Richard Bentley, Esq. Strawberry Hill, July 9, 1754.
I only write a letter for company to the enclosed one. Mr. Chute is returned from the Vine, and gives you a thousand thanks for your letter; and if ever he writes, I don't doubt but it will be to you. Gray and he come hither to-morrow, and I am promised Montagu and the Colonel(500) in about a fortnight—How naturally my pen adds, but when does Mr. Bentley come! I am sure Mr. Wicks wants to ask me the same question every day—"Speak to it, Horatio!" Sir Charles Williams brought his eldest daughter hither last week: she is one of your real admirers, and, without its being proposed to her, went on the bowling-green, and drew a perspective view of the castle from the angle, in a manner to deserve the thanks of the Committee.(501) She is to be married to my Lord Essex in a Week,(502) and I begged she would make you overseer of the works at Cashiobury. Sir Charles told me, that on the Duke of Bedford's wanting a Chinese house at Woburn, he said, "Why don't your grace speak to mr. Walpole? He has the prettiest plan in the world for one." —"Oh," replied the Duke, "but then it would be too dear!" I hope this was a very great economy, or I am sure ours would be very great extravagance: only think of a plan for little Strawberry giving the alarm to thirty thousand pounds a year! My dear sir, it is time to retrench! Pray send me 'a slice of granite(503) no bigger than a Naples biscuit.
The monument to my mother is at last erected; it puts me in mind of the manner of interring the Kings of France: when the reigning one dies, the last before him is buried. Will you believe that I have not yet seen the tomb? None of my acquaintance were in town, and I literally had not courage to venture alone among the Westminster-boys at the Abbey: they are as formidable to me as the ship-carpenters at Portsmouth. I think I have showed you the inscription, and therefore I don't send it yet].
I was reading t'other day the Life of Colonel Codrington,(504) who founded the library at All Souls - he left a large estate for the propagation of the Gospel, and ordered that three hundred negroes should constantly be constantly employed upon it. Did one ever hear a more truly Christian charity, than keeping a perpetuity of three hundred slaves to look after the Gospel's estate? How could one intend a religious legacy, and miss the disposition of that estate for delivering three hundred negroes from the most shocking slavery imaginable? Must devotion be twisted into the unfeeling interests of trade? I must revenge myself for the horror this fact has given me, and tell you a story of Gideon.(505) He breeds his children Christians: he had a mind to know what proficience his son had made in his new religion; "So," says he, "I began, and asked him, who made him; He said 'God.' I then asked him, who redeemed him? He replied very readily, 'Christ.' Well, then I was at the end of my interrogatories, and did not know what other question to put to him. I said, Who—who—I did not know what to say; at last I said, Who gave you that hat? 'The Holy Ghost,' said the boy." Did you ever hear a better catechism? The great cry against Nugent at Bristol was for having voted for the Jew-bill: one old woman said, "What, must we be represented by a Jew and an Irishman?" He replied with great quickness, "My good dame, if you will step aside with me into a corner, I will show you that I am not a Jew, and that I am an Irishman."
The Princess(506) has breakfasted at the long Sir Thomas Robinson's at Whitehall; my Lady Townshend will never forgive it. The second dowager of Somerset(507) is gone to know whether all her letters from the living to the dead have been received. Before I bid you good-night, I must tell you of an admirable curiosity: I was looking over one of our antiquarian volumes, and in the description of Leeds is an account of Mr. Thoresby's famous museum there-what do you think is one of the rarities?—a knife taken from one of the Mohocks! Whether tradition is infallible or not, as you say, I think so authentic a relic will make their history indisputable. Castles, Chinese houses, tombs, negroes, Jews, Irishmen, princesses, and Mohocks—what a farrago do I send you! I trust that a letter from England to Jersey has an imposing air, and that you don't presume to laugh at any thing that comes from your mother island. Adieu!
(500) Charles Montagu.
(501) Mr. Walpole, in these letters, calls the Strawberry committee, those of his friends who had assisted in the plans and Gothic ornaments of Strawberry Hill.
(502) The lady was married to the Earl of Essex on the 1st of August. She died in childbed, in July 1759.-E.
(503) Mr. Walpole had commissioned Mr. Bentley to send him a piece of the granite found in the island of Jersey, for a sideboard in his dining-room.
(504) Colonel Christopher Codrington. He was governor of the Leeward Islands, and died at Barbadoes in 1710. He bequeathed his books, and the sum of ten thousand pounds, for the purpose of erecting and furnishing the above-mentioned library. He wrote some Latin poems, published in the "Musae Anglicanae," and addressed a copy of English verse to Garth on his Dispensary.-E.
(505) Sampson Gideon, the noted rich Jew. [In 1759, his only son, being then in his eleventh year, was created an English baronet; and, in 1789, advanced to the dignity of Lord Eardley.]
(506) Of Wales.
(507) Frances, oldest daughter and coheir of the Hon. Henry Thynne. '
217 Letter 109 To The Hon. H. S. Conway.(508) Strawberry Hill, August 6, 1754.
>From Sunday next, which is the eleventh, till the four or five-and-twentieth, I am quite unengaged, and will wait upon you any of the inclusive days, when your house is at leisure, and you will summon me; therefore you have nothing to do but to let me know your own time: or, if this period does not suit you, I believe I shall be able to come to you any part of the first fortnight in September; for, though I ought to go to Hagley, it is incredible how I want resolution to tap such a journey.
I wish you joy of escaping such an accident as breaking the Duke's(509) leg; I hope he and you will be known to posterity together by more dignified wounds than the kick of a horse. As I can never employ my time better than in being your biographer, I beg you will take care that I may have no such plebeian mishaps upon my hands or, if the Duke is to fall out of battle, he has such delicious lions and tigers, which I saw the day before yesterday at Windsor, that he will be exceedingly to blame, if he does not give some of them an exclusive patent for tearing him to pieces.
There is a beautiful tiger at my neighbour Mr. Crammond's here, of which I am so fond, that my Lady Townshend says it is the only thing I ever wanted to kiss. As you know how strongly her ladyship sympathizes with the Duke, she contrived to break the tendon of her foot, the very day that his leg was in such danger. Adieu!
P. S. You may certainly do what you please with the Fable;(510) it is neither worth giving nor refusing.
(508) Now first printed.
(509) The Duke of Cumberland.
(510) The Entail.
218 Letter 110 To George Montagu, Esq. Strawberry Hill, Aug 29, 1754.
You may be sure that I shall always be glad to see you whenever you like to come hither, but I cannot help being sorry that you are determined not to like the place, nor to let the Colonel like it; a conclusion I may very justly make, when, I think, for these four years, you have contrived to visit it only when there is not a leaf upon the trees. Villas are generally designed for summer; you are the single person who think they look best in winter. You have still a more unlucky thought; which Is, to visit the Vine in October. When I saw it in the middle of summer, it was excessively damp; you will find it a little difficult to persuade me to accompany you thither On stilts, and I believe Mr. Chute Will not be quite happy that you prefer that season; but for this I cannot answer at present, for he is at Mr. Morris's in Cornwall. I shall expect you and the Colonel here at the time you appoint. I engage for no farther, unless it is a very fine season indeed. I beg my compliments to Miss Montagu, and am yours ever.
218 Letter 111 To Sir Horace Mann. Arlington Street, Oct. 6, 1754.
You have the kindest way in the world, my dear Sir, of reproving my long silence, by accusing yourself. I have looked at my dates, and though I was conscious Of not having written to you for a long time, I did not think it had been so long as three months. I ought to make some excuse, and the truth is all I can make; if you have heard by any way in the world that a single event worth mentioning has happened in England for these three months, I will own myself guilty of abominable neglect. If there has not, as you know my unalterable affection for you, you will excuse me, and accuse the times. Can one repeat often, that every thing stagnates? At present we begin to think that the world may be roused again, and that an East Indian war and a West Indian war may beget such a thing as an European war. In short, the French have taken such cavalier liberties with some of our forts, that are of great consequence to cover Virginia, Carolina, and Georgia, that we are actually despatching two regiments thither. As the climate and other American circumstances are against these poor men, I pity them, and think them too many, if the French mean nothing farther; too few, if they do. Indeed, I am one of those that feel less resentment when we are attacked so far off: I think it an obligation to be eaten the last.
You have entertained me much with the progress of the history of the Delmontis, and obliged me. I wish I could say I was not shocked at the other part of your letter, where you mention the re-establishment of the Inquisition at Florence. Had Richcourt power enough to be so infamous! was he superstitious, fearful, revengeful, or proud of being a tool of the court of Rome? What is the fate of the poor Florentines, who are reduced to regret the Medicis, who had usurped their government! You may be glad, my dear child, that I am not at Florence; I should distress your ministerial prudence, your necessary prudence, by taking pleasure to speak openly of Richcourt as he deserves: you know my warmth upon power and church power!
The Boccaneri seems to be one of those ladies who refine so much upon debauchery as to make even matrimony enter into their scheme of profligacy. I have known more than one instance, since the days of the Signora Messalina, where the lady has not been content to cuckold her husband but with another husband. All passions carried to extremity embrace within their circle even their opposites. I don't know whether Charles the Fifth did not resign the empire Out Of ambition of more fame. I must contradict myself in all passions; I don't believe Sir Robert Brown will ever be so covetous as to find a pleasure in squandering.
Mr. Chute is much yours: I am going with him in a day or two to his Vine, where I shall try to draw him into amusing himself a little with building and planting; hitherto he has done nothing with his estate-but good.
You will have observed what precaution I had taken, in the smallness of the sheet, not to have too much paper to fill; and yet you see how much I have still upon my hands! As, I assure you, were I to fill the remainder, all I should say would be terribly wiredrawn, do excuse me: you shall hear an ample detail of the first Admiral Vernon that springs out of our American war; and I promise you at least half a brick of the first sample that is sent over of any new Porto Bello. The French have tied up the hands of an excellent fanfaron, a Major Washington,(511) whom they took, and engaged not to serve for a year. In his letter, he said, "Believe me, as the cannon-balls flew over my head. they made a most delightful sound." When your relation, General Guise, was marching up to Carthagena, and the pelicans whistled round him, he said, "What would Chlo`e(512) give for some of these to make a pelican pie?" The conjecture made that scarce a rodomontade; but what pity it is, that a man who can deal in hyperboles at the mouth of a cannon, should be fond of them with a glass of wine in his hand! I have heard Guise affirm, that the colliers at Newcastle feed their children with fire-shovels! Good night.
(511) This was the celebrated Liberator of America, who had been serving in the English army against the French for some time with much distinction.
(512 ) The Duke of Newcastle's French cook.
220 Letter 112 To The Hon. H. S. Conway.(513) Strawberry Hill, Oct. 24, 1754.
You have obliged me most extremely by telling me the progress you have made in your most desirable affair.(514) I call it progress, for, notwithstanding the authority you have for supposing there may be a compromise, I cannot believe that the Duke of Newcastle would have affirmed the contrary so directly, if he had known of it. Mr. Brudenel very likely has been promised my Lord Lincoln's interest, and then supposed he should have the Duke's. However, that is not your affair; if any body has reason to apprehend a breach of promise, it is poor Mr. Brudenel. He can never come into competition with you; and without saying any thing to reflect on him, I don't know where you can ever have a competitor, and not have the world on your side. Though the tenure is precarious, I cannot help liking the situation for you. Any thing that sets you in new lights, must be for your advantage. You are naturally indolent and humble, and are content with being perfect in whatever you happen to be. It is not flattering you to Say, nor can you deny it, with all your modesty, that you have always made yourself' master of whatever you have attempted, and have never made yourself master of any thing without shining extremely in it. If the King lives, you will have his favour; if he lives it all, the Prince must have a greater establishment, and then you will have the King's partiality to countenance your being removed to some distinguished place about the Prince: if the King should fail, your situation in his family, and your age, naturally recommend you to an equal place in the new household. I am the more desirous of seeing you at court, because, when I consider the improbability of our being in a situation to make war, I am earnest to have you have other opportunities of being one of the first men in this country, besides being a general. Don't think all I say on this subject compliment. I can have no view in flattering you; and You have a still better reason for believing me sincere, which is, that you know well that I thought the same of you, and professed the same to you, before I was of an age to have either views or flattery; indeed, I believe you know me enough to be sure that I am as void of both now as when I was fourteen, and that I am so little apt to court any body, that if you heard me say the same to any body but yourself, you would easily think that I spoke what I thought.
George Montagu and his brother are here, and have kept me from meeting you in town: we go on Saturday to the Vine. I fear there is too much truth in what you have heard of your old mistress.(515) When husband, wife, lover, and friend tell every thing, can there but be a perpetual fracas? My dear Harry, how lucky you was in what you escaped, and in what you have got! People do sometimes avoid, not always, what is most improper for them; but they do not afterwards always meet with what they most deserve. But how lucky you are in every thing! and how ungrateful a man to Providence if you are not thankful for so many blessings as it has given you! I won't preach, though the dreadful history which I have just heard of poor Lord Drumlanrig(516) is enough to send one to La Trappe. My compliments to all yours, and Adieu!
(513) Now first printed.
(514) His being appointed groom of the bedchamber to the King, George the Second.-E.
(515) Caroline Fitzroy, Countess of Harrington.-E.
(516) Only son of Charles third Duke of Queensberry, who was shot by the accidental discharge of his pistol on his journey from Scotland to London, in company with his parents and newly- married wife, a daughter of the Earl of Hopetoun. Lady Mary Wortley thus alludes to this calamity in a letter to her daughter:—"The Duchess of Queensberry's misfortune would move compassion in the hardest heart; yet, all circumstances coolly considered, I think the young lady deserves most to be pitied, being left in the terrible situation of a young and, I suppose, rich widowhood; which is walking blindfold upon stilts amidst precipices, though perhaps as little sensible of her danger, as a child of a quarter old would be in the paws of a monkey leaping on the tiles of a house."-E.
221 Letter 113 To Richard Bentley, Esq. Strawberry Hill, Nov. 3, 1754.
I have finished all my parties, and am drawing towards a conclusion here: the Parliament meets in ten days: the House, I hear, will be extremely full—curiosity drawing as many to town as party used to do. The minister(517) in the house of Lords is a new sight in these days.
Mr. Chute and I have been at Mr. Barret's(518) at Belhouse; I never saw a place for which one did not wish, so totally void of faults. What he has done is in Gothic, and very true, though not up to the perfection of the committee. The hall is pretty; the great dining room hung with good family pictures; among which is his ancestor, the Lord Dacre who was hanged.(519) I remember when Mr. Barret was first initiated in the College of Arms by the present Dean of Exeter(520) at Cambridge, he was overjoyed at the first ancestor he put up, who was one of the murderers of Thomas Becket. The chimney-pieces, except one little miscarriage into total Ionic (he could not resist statuary and Siena marble), are all of a good King James the First Gothic. I saw the heronry so fatal to Po Yang, and told him that I was persuaded they were descended from Becket's assassin, and I hoped from my Lord Dacre too. He carried us to see the famous plantations and buildings of the last Lord Petre. They are the Brobdignag of the bad taste. The Unfinished house is execrable, massive, and split through and through: it stands on the brow of a hill, rather to seek for a prospect than to see one, and turns its back upon an outrageous avenue which is closed with a screen of tall trees, because he would not be at the expense of beautifying the black front Of his house. The clumps are gigantic, and very ill placed.
George Montagu and the Colonel have at last been here, and have screamed with approbation through the whole Cu-gamut. Indeed, the library is delightful. They went to the Vine, and approved as much. Do you think we wished for you? I carried down incense and mass-books, and we had most Catholic enjoyment Of the chapel. In the evenings, indeed, we did touch a card a little to please George—so much, that truly I have scarce an idea left that is not spotted with clubs, hearts, spades, and diamonds. There is a vote of the Strawberry committee for great embellishments to the chapel, of which it will not be long before you hear something. It will not be longer than the spring, I trust, before you see something of it. In the mean time, to rest your impatience, I have enclosed a scratch of mine which you are to draw out better, and try if you can give yourself a perfect idea of the place. All I can say is, that my sketch is at least more intelligible than Gray's was of Stoke, from which you made so like a picture.
Thank you much for the box of Guernsey lilies, which I have received. I have been packing up a few seeds, which have little merit but the merit they will have with you, that they come from the Vine and Strawberry. My chief employ in this part of the world, except surveying my library which has scarce any thing but the painting to finish, is planting at Mrs. Clive's, whither I remove all my superabundancies. I have lately planted the green lane, that leads from her garden to the common: "Well," said she, "when it is done, what shall we call it?"-" Why," said I, " what would you call it but Drury Lane?" I mentioned desiring some samples of your Swiss's(521 abilities: Mr. Chute and I even propose, if he should be tolerable, and would continue reasonable, to tempt him over hither, and make him work upon your designs-upon which, you know, it is not easy to make you work. If he improves upon your hands, do you think we shall purchase the fee-simple of him for so many years, as Mr. Smith did of Canaletti?(522) We will sell to the English. Can he paint perspectives, and cathedral-aisles, and holy glooms? I am sure you could make him paint delightful insides of the chapel at the Vine, and of the library here. I never come up the stairs without reflecting how different it is from its primitive state, when my Lady Townshend all the way she came up the stairs, cried out, "Lord God! Jesus! what a house! It is just such a house as a parson's, where the children lie at the feet of the bed!" I cant say that to-day it puts me much in mind of another speech of my lady's, "That it would be a very pleasant place, if Mrs. Clive's face did not rise upon it and make it so hot!" The sun and Mrs. Clive seem gone for the winter.
The West Indian war has thrown me into a new study: I read nothing but American voyages, and histories of plantations and settlements. Among all the Indian nations, I have contracted a particular intimacy with the Ontaouanoucs, a people with whom I beg you will be acquainted: they pique themselves upon speaking the purest dialect. How one should delight in the grammar and dictionary of their Crusca! My only fear is, that if any of them are taken prisoners, General Braddock is not a kind of man to have proper attentions to so polite a people; I am even apprehensive that he would damn them, and order them to be scalped, in the very worst plantation-accent. I don't know whether you know that none of the people of that immense continent have any labials: they tell you que c'est ridicule to shut the lips in order to speak. Indeed, I was as barbarous as any polite nation in the world, in supposing that there was nothing worth knowing among these charming savages. They are in particular great orators, with this little variation from British eloquence, that at the end of every important paragraph they make a present; whereas we expect to receive one. They begin all their answers with recapitulating what has been said to them; and their method for this is, the respondent gives a little stick to each of the bystanders, who is, for his share, to remember such a paragraph of the speech that is to be answered. You will wonder that I should have given the preference to the Ontaouanoucs, when there is a much more extraordinary nation to the north of Canada, who have but one leg, and p— from behind their ear; but I own I had rather converse for any time with people who speak like Mr. Pitt, than with a nation of jugglers, who are only fit to go about the country, under the direction of Taafe and Montagu.(523) Their existence I do not doubt; they are recorded by P`ere Charlevoix, in his much admired history of New France, in which there are such outrageous legends of miracles for the propagation of the Gospel, that his fables in natural history seem strict veracity.
Adieu! You write to me as seldom as if you were in an island where the Duke of Newcastle was sole minister, parties at an end, and where every thing had done happening. Yours ever.
P. S. I have just seen in the advertisements that there are
arrived two new volumes of Madame de S`evign`e's Letters.
Adieu, my American studies!—adieu, even my favourite
Ontaouanoucs!
(517) The Duke of Newcastle.
(518) Afterwards Lord Dacre.
(519) Thomas ninth Lord Dacre. Going, with other young persons, one night from Herst Monceaux to steal a deer out of his neighbour, Sir Nicholas Pelham's park (a frolic not unusual in those days), a fray ensued, and one of the park-keepers received a blow that caused his death; and although Lord Dacre was not present on the spot, but in a distant part of the park, he was nevertheless tried, convicted, and executed, in 1541. His honours became forfeited, but were restored to his son in 1562.-E.
(520) Dr. Charles Lyttelton, brother of Lord Lyttelton. He was first a barrister-at-law, but in 1712 entered into holy orders, and in 1762 was consecrated Bishop of Carlisle. He died in 1768, unmarried.-E.
(521) Mr. Muntz, a Swiss painter.
(522) Mr. Smith, the English consul at Venice, had engaged Canaletti for a certain number of years to paint exclusively for him, at a fixed price, and sold his pictures at an advanced price to English travellers.
(523) See ant`e 93, letter 35.-E.
224 Letter 114 To Richard Bentley, Esq. Arlington Street, November 11, 1754.
If you was dead, to be sure you would have got somebody to tell me so. If you was alive, to be sure in all this time you would have told me so yourself. It is a month to-day since I received a line from you. There was a Florentine ambassador here in Oliver's reign, who with great circumspection wrote to his court, "Some say the Protector is dead, others say he is not: for my part, I believe neither one nor t'other." I quote this sage personage, to show you that I have a good precedent, in case I had a mind to continue neutral upon the point of your existence. I can't resolve to believe you dead, lest I should be forced to write to Mr. S. again to bemoan you; and on the other hand, it is convenient to me to believe you living, because I have just received the enclosed from your sister, and the money from Ely. However, if you are actually dead, be so good as to order your executor to receive the money, and to answer your sister's letter. If you are not dead, I can tell you who is, and at the same time whose death is to remain as doubtful as yours till to-morrow morning Don't be alarmed! it is only the Queen-dowager of Prussia. As excessive as the concern for her is at court, the whole royal family, out of great consideration for the mercers, lacemen, etc. agreed not to shed a tear for her till tomorrow morning, when the birthday will be over; but they are all to rise by six o'clock to-morrow morning to cry quarts. This is the sum of all the news that I learnt to-day on coming from Strawberry Hill, except that Lady Betty Waldegrave was robbed t'other night In Hyde Park, under the very noses of the lamps and the patrol. If any body is robbed at the ball at court to-night, you shall hear in my next despatch. I told you in my last that I had just got two new volumes of Madame S`evign`e's Letters; but I have been cruelly disappointed; they are two hundred letters which had been omitted in the former editions, as having little or nothing worth reading. How provoking, that they would at last let one see that she could write so many letters that were not worth reading! I will tell you the truth: as they are certainly hers, I am glad to see them, but I cannot bear that any body else should. Is not that true sentiment? How would you like to see a letter of hers, describing a wild young Irish lord, a Lord P * * * *, who has lately made one of our ingenious wagers, to ride I don't know how many thousand miles in an hour, from Paris to Fontainebleau? But admire the politesse of that nation: instead of endeavouring to lame his horse, or to break his neck, that he might lose the wager, his antagonist and the spectators showed all the attention in the world to keep the road clear, and to remove even pebbles out of his way. They heaped coals of fire upon his head with all the good breeding of the Gospel. Adieu! If my letters are short, at least my notes are long.
225 Letter 115 To George Montagu, Esq. Arlington Street, Nov. 16, 1754.
You are over-good to me, my dear Sir, in giving yourself the trouble of telling me you was content with Strawberry Hill. I will not, however, tell you, that I am Content with your being there, till you have seen it in all its greenth and blueth. Alas! I am sorry I cannot insist upon as much with the Colonel.
Mr. Chute, I believe, was so pleased with the tenebra in his own chapel, that he has fairly buried himself in it. I have not even had so much as a burial card from him since.
The town is as full as I believe you thought the room was at your ball at Waldershare. I hear of nothing but the parts and merit of Lord North. Nothing has happened yet, but sure so many English people cannot be assembled long without committing something extraordinary.
I have seen and conversed with our old friend Cope; I find him grown very old; I fear he finds me so too; at least as old as I ever intend to be. I find him very grave too, which I believe he does not find me.
Solomon and Hesther, as my Lady Townshend calls Mr. Pitt and Lady Hester Grenville, espouse one another to-day.(524) I know nothing more but a new fashion which my Lady Hervey has brought from Paris. It is a tin funnel covered with green ribbon, and holds water, which the ladies wear to keep their bouquets fresh. I fear Lady Caroline and some others will catch frequent colds and sore throats with overturning this reservoir.
Apropos, there is a match certainly in agitation, which has very little of either Solomon or Hesther in it. You will be sorry when I tell you, that Lord Waldegrave certainly dis-Solomons himself with the Drax. Adieu! my dear Sir; I congratulate Miss Montagu on her good health, and am ever yours.
(524) On the ]6th of November, Mr. Pitt married Lady Hester Grenville, only daughter of Richard Grenville, of Wotton, Esq., and of Hester, Countess Temple.-E.
226 Letter 116 To Richard Bentley, Esq. Arlington Street, Nov. 20, 1754.
IF this does not turn out a scolding letter I am much mistaken. I shall give way to it with the less scruple, as I think it shall be the last of the kind; not that you will mend, but I cannot support a commerce of visions! and therefore, whenever you send me mighty cheap schemes for finding out longitudes and philosophers' stones, you will excuse me if I only smile, and don't order them to be examined by my council. For Heaven's sake, don't be a projector! Is not it provoking, that, with the best parts in the world, you should have so gentle a portion of common sense?(525) But I am clear, that you never will know the two things in the world that import you the most to know, yourself and me. Thus much by way of preface: now for the detail.
You tell me in your letter of November 3d, that the (quarry of granite might be rented at twenty pounds or twenty shillings, I don't know which, no matter, per annum. When I can't get a table out of it, is it very likely you or I should get a fortune out of it? What signifies the cheapness of the rent? The cutting and shippage would be articles of some little consequence! Who should be supervisor? You, who are so good a manager, so attentive, so diligent, so expeditious, and so accurate? Don't you think our quarry would turn to account? Another article, to which I might apply the same questions, is the project for importation of French wine: it is odd that a scheme so cheap and so practicable should hitherto have been totally overlooked. One would think the breed of smugglers was lost, like the true spaniels, or genuine golden pippins! My dear Sir, you know I never drink three glasses of my wine-can you think I care whether, they are sour or sweet, cheap or dear?—or do you think that I, who am always taking trouble to reduce my trouble into as compact a volume as I can, would tap such an article as importing my own wine? But now comes your last proposal about the Gothic paper. When you made me fix up mine, unpainted, engaging to paint it yourself, and yet could never be persuaded to paint a yard of it, till I was forced to give Bromwich's man God knows what to do it. would you make me believe that you will paint a room eighteen by fifteen? But, seriously, if it is possible for you to lay aside visions, don't be throwing continual discouragements in my way. I have told you seriously and emphatically that I am labouring your restoration: the scheme is neither facile nor immediate:-but, for God's sake! act like a reasonable man. You have a family to whom you owe serious attention. Don't let me think, that if you return, you will set out upon every wildgoose chase, sticking to nothing, and neglecting chiefly the talents and genius which you have in such excellence, to start projects which you have too much honesty and too little application ever to thrive by. This advice is, perhaps, worded harshly: but you know the heart from which it proceeds, and you know that, with all my prejudice to it, I can't even pardon your wit, when it is employed to dress up schemes that I think romantic. The glasses and Ray's Proverbs you shall have, and some more gold fish, when I have leisure to go to Strawberry; for you know I don't suffer any fisheries to be carried on there in my absence.
I am as newsless as in the dead of summer: the Parliament produces nothing but elections: there has already been one division- on the Oxfordshire of two hundred and sixty-seven Whigs to ninety-seven Tories: you may calculate the burial of that election easily from these numbers.(526) The Queen of Prussia is not dead, as I told you in my last. If you have shed many tears for her, you may set them off to the account of our son-in-law, the Prince of Hesse, who is turned Roman Catholic. One is in this age so unused to conversions above the rank of a housemaid turned Methodist, that it occasions as much surprise as if one had heard that he had been initiated in the Eleusinian mysteries. Are not you prodigiously alarmed for the Protestant interest in Germany?
We have operas, burlettas, cargoes of Italian dancers, and none good but the Mingotti, a very fine figure and actress. I don't know a single bon-mot that is new: George Selwyn has not waked yet for the winter. You will believe that, when I tell you, that t'other night having lost eight hundred pounds at hazard, he fell asleep upon the table with near half as much more before him, and slept for three hours, with every body stamping the box close at his ear. He will say prodigiously good things when he does wake. In the mean time, can you be content with one of Madame S`evign`e's best bons-mots, which I have found amongst her new letters? Do you remember her German friend the Princess of Tarente, who was always in mourning for some sovereign prince or princess? One day Madame de S`evign`e happening to meet her in colours, made her a low curtsey, and said, "Madame, je me r`ejouis de la sant`e de l'Europe." I think I may apply another of her speeches which pleased me, to what I have said t@ you in the former part of my letter. Mademoiselle du Plessis had said something she disapproved: Madame S`evign`e said to her, "Mais que cela est sot; car je veux vous parler doucement." Adieu!
(525) Cumberland, in his Memoirs, speaking of Mr. Bentley, says, "There was a certain eccentricity and want of worldly prudence in my uncle's character, that involved him in distresses, and reduced him to situations uncongenial with his feelings, and unpropitious to the cultivation and encouragement of his talents."-E.
(526) At the close of the Oxfordshire election the sheriff returned all the four candidates, who all of them petitioned. Two were chosen upon what was called the new interest, and were supported by the court; and two by the old interest. The expense and animosity which this dispute occasioned is incredible. Even murder was committed upon the place of elections The friends of the new interest were ultimately voted to be the sitting members by a majority of 233 against 103.-E.
228 Letter 117 To Sir Horace Mann. Strawberry Hill, Dec. 1, 1754
You do me justice, my dear Sir, when you impute the want of my letters to my want of news: as a proof, I take up my pen again on the first spring-tide of politics. However, as this is an age of abortions, and as I have often announced to you a pregnancy of events, which have soon after been stillborn, I beg you will not be disappointed if nothing comes of the present ferment. The offenders and the offended have too often shown their disposition to soothe, or to be soothed, by preferments, for one to build much on the duration or implacability of their aversions. In short, Mr. Pitt has broke with the Duke of Newcastle, on the want of power, and has alarmed the dozing House of Commons with some sentences, extremely in the style of his former Pittics. As Mr. Fox is not at all more in humour, the world expects every day to see these two commanders, first unite to overturn all their antagonists, and then worry One another. They have already mumbled poor Sir Thomas Robinson cruelly. The Chancellor of the exchequer(527) crouches under the storm, and seems very willing to pass eldest. The Attorney-General(528) seems cowed, and unwilling to support a war, of which the world gives him the honour.(529) Nugent alone, with an intrepidity worth his country, affects to stand up against the greatest orator, and against the best reasoner of the age. What will most surprise you is, that the Duke of Newcastle, who used to tremble at shadows, appears unterrified at Gorgons! If I should tell you in my next, that either of the Gorgons has kissed hands for secretary of state, only smile: snakes are as easily tamed as lapdogs.
I am glad you have got my Lord of Cork.(530) He is, I know, a very worthy man, and though not a bright man, nor a man of the world, much less a good author, yet it must be comfortable to you now and then to see something besides travelling children, booby governors, and abandoned women of quality. You say, you have made my Lord Cork give up my Lord Bolingbroke: it is comical to see how he is given up here, since the best of his writings, his metaphysical divinity, have been published. While he betrayed and abused every man who trusted him, or who had forgiven him, or to whom he was obliged, he was a hero, a patriot, and a philosopher; and the greatest genius of the age: the moment his Craftsmen against Moses and St. Paul, etc. were published, we have discovered that he was the worst man and the worst writer in the world. The grand jury have presented his works, and as long as there are any parsons, he will be ranked with Tindal and Toland—nay, I don't know whether my father won't become a rubric martyr, for having been persecuted by him. Mr. Fraigneau's story of the late King's design of removing my father and employing, Bolingbroke, is not new to me; but I can give you two reasons, and one very strong indeed, that convince me of its having no foundation, though it is much believed here. During the last year of the late King's life, he took extremely to New Park, and loved to shoot there, and dined with my father and a private party, and a good deal of punch. The Duchess of Kendal, who hated Sir Robert, and favoured Bolingbroke, and was jealous for herself, grew uneasy at these parties, and used to put one or two of the Germans upon the King to prevent his drinking, (very odd preventives!)- -however, they obeyed orders so well, that one day the King flew into a great passion, and reprimanded them in his own language with extreme warmth; and when he went to Hanover, ordered my father to have the new lodge in the park finished against his return; which did not look much like an intention of breaking with the ranger of the Park. But what I am now going to tell you is conclusive: the Duchess obtained an interview for Bolingbroke in the King's closet, which not succeeding, as lord Bolingbroke foresaw it might not at once, he left a memorial with the King, who, the very next time he saw Sir Robert, gave it to him.
You will expect that I should mention the progress of the West Indian war; but the Parliamentary campaign opening so warmly, has quite put the Ohio upon an obsolete foot. All I know is, that the Virginians have disbanded all their troops and say they will trust to England for their defence. The dissensions in Ireland increase. At least, here are various and ample fields for speeches, if we are to have new oppositions. You will believe that I have not great faith in the prospect, when I can come quietly hither for two or three days to place the books in my new library. Mr. Chute is with me, and returns you all your kind speeches with increase. Your two brothers, who dine at lord Radnor's, have just been here, and found me writing to you: your brother Gal. would not stay a moment, but said, , Tell him I prefer his pleasure to my own." I wish, my dear Sir, I could give you much more, that is, could tell you more; but unless our civil wars continue, I shall know nothing but of contested elections: a first session of a Parliament is the most laborious scene of dulness that I know. Adieu!
(527) Mr. Legge.
(528) Mr. Murray; he was preferred to be attorney-general this year, in the room of Sir Dudley Ryder, who was made lord chief justice, on the death of Sir William Lee.
(529) "At this time," says Lord Waldegrave, "Fox had joined Pitt in a kind of parliamentary opposition. They were both in office,—the one paymaster, the other secretary at war,-and therefore could not decently obstruct the public business; but still they might attack persons, though not things. Pitt undertook the difficult task of silencing Murray, the attorney-general, the ablest man, as well as the ablest debater, in the House of Commons; whilst Fox entertained himself with the less dangerous amusement of exposing Sir Thomas Robinson, or rather assisted him whilst he turned himself into ridicule; for Sir Thomas, though a good secretary of state -is far as the business of his office, was ignorant even of the language of the House of Commons controversy; and when he played the orator, it was so exceedingly ridiculous, that those who loved and esteemcd him could not always preserve a friendly composure of countenance." Memoirs, 1). 31.-E.
(530) John Earl of Orrery and Cork, author of a translation of Pliny's Epistles, a Life of Dr. Swift, etc.
230 Letter 118 To Richard Bentley, Esq. Arlington Street, Friday, Dec. 13, 1754.
"If we do not make this effort to recover our dignity, we shall only sit here to register the arbitrary edicts of one too powerful a subject." Non riconosci tu Faltero viso? Don't you at once know the style? Shake those words all altogether-, and see if they can be any thing but the disiecta membra of Pitt? In short, about a fortnight ago, bomb burst. Pitt, who is well, is married, is dissatisfied—not With his bride, but with the Duke of Newcastle; has twice thundered out his dissatisfaction in Parliament, and was seconded by Fox. The event was exactly what I dare say you have already foreseen. Pitt was to be turned out; overtures were made to Fox; Pitt is not turned out: Fox is quieted with the dignity of cabinet-counsellor, and the Duke of Newcastle remains affronted—and omnipotent. The commentary on this text is too long for a letter; it may be developed some time or other. This scene has produced a diverting interlude; Sir George Lyttelton, who could not reconcile his content with Mr. Pitt's discontents, has been very ill with the cousinhood. In the grief of his heart, he thought of resigning his place, but somehow or other stumbled upon a negotiation for introducing the Duke of Bedford into the ministry again, to balance the loss of Mr. Pitt. Whatever persuaded him, he thought this treaty so sure of success that he lost no time to be the agent of it himself; and whether commissioned or noncommissioned, as both he and the Duke of Newcastle say, he carried carte blanche, to the Duke of Bedford, who bounced like a rocket, frightened away poor Sir George, and sent for Mr. Pitt to notify the overture. Pitt and the Grenvilles are outrageous; the Duke of Newcastle disclaims his ambassador, and every body laughs. Sir George came hither yesterday, to expectorate with me, as he called it. Think how I pricked up my ears, as high as King Midas, to hear a Lyttelton vent his grievances against a Pitt and Grenvilles! Lord Temple has named Sir George the apostolic nuncio; and George Selwyn says, "that he will certainly be invited by Miss Ashe among the foreign ministers." These are greater storms than perhaps you expected yet; they have occasioned mighty bustle, and whisper, and speculation; but you see
Pulveris exigui jactu composta quiescunt.
You will be diverted with a collateral incident. * * * * met Dick Edgecumbe, and asked him with great importance, if he knew whether Mr. Pitt was out. Edgecumbe, who thinks nothing important that is not to be decided by dice, and who, consequently, had never once thought of Pitt's political state, replied, "Yes." "Ay! how do you know?" "Why, I called at his door just now, and his porter told me so." Another political event is, that Lord E. comes into place: he is to succeed Lord Fitzwalter, who is to have Lord Grantham's pension, -who is dead immensely rich: I think this is the last of the old Opposition, of any name, except Sir John Barnard. If you have curiosity about the Ohio, you must write to ]France: there I believe they know something about it; here it was totally forgot till last night, when an express arrived with an account of the loss of one of the transports off Falmouth, with eight officers and sixty men on board.
My Lady Townshend has been dying, and was wofully frightened, and took prayers; but she is recovered now, even of her repentance. You will not be undiverted to hear that the mob of Sudbury have literally sent a card to the mob of Bury, to offer their assistance at a contested election there: I hope to be able to tell you in my next, that Mrs. Holman(531) has sent cards to both mobs for her assembly.
The shrubs shall be sent, but you must stay till the holidays; I shall not have time to go to Strawberry sooner. I have received your second letter, dated November 22d, about the Gothic paper. I hope you will by this time have got mine, to dissuade you from that thought. If you insist upon it, I will send the paper: I have told you what I think, and will therefore say no more on that head; but I will transcribe a passage which I found t'other day in Petronius, and thought not unapplicable to you: "Omnium herbarum succos Democritus expressit; et ne lapidum virgultorumque vis lateret, aetatem inter experimenta consumpsit." I hope Democritus could not draw charmingly when he threw away his time in extracting tints from flints and twigs!
I can't conclude my letter without telling you what an escape I had at the sale of Dr. Mead's library, which goes extremely dear. In the catalogue I saw Winstanley's views of Audley-inn, which I concluded was, as it really was, a thin, dirty folio, worth about fifteen shillings. As I thought it might be scarce, it might run to two or three guineas. however, I bid Graham certainly buy it for me. He came the next morning in a great fright, said he did not know whether he had done very right or very wrong, that he had gone as far as nine-and-forty guineas—I started in such a fright! Another bookseller had luckily had as unlimited a commission, and bid fifty—when my Graham begged it might be adjourned, till they could consult their principals. I think I shall never give an unbounded commission again, even for views of Les Rochers!(532) Adieu! Am I ever to see any more of your hand-drawing? Adieu! Yours ever.
(531) The lady of whom the anecdote is told p. 65, ant`e, letter 22.-E.
(532) Madame de S`evign`e's seat in Bretagne.
231 Letter 119 To Richard Bentley, Esq. Strawberry Hill, Dec. 24, 1754. '
My dear Sir, I received your packet of December 6th last night, but intending to come hither for a few days, and unluckily sent away by the coach in the morning a parcel of things for you; you must therefore wait till another bundle sets out, for the new letters of Madame S`evign`e. Heaven forbid that I should have said they were bad! I only meant that they were full of family details, and mortal distempers, to which the most immortal of us are subject: and I was sorry that the profane should ever know that my divinity was ever troubled with a sore leg, or the want of money; though, indeed, the latter defeats Bussy@s ill natured accusation of avarice; and her tearing herself from her daughter, then at Paris, to go and save money in Bretagne to pay her debts, is a perfection of virtue which completes her amiable character. My lady Hervey has made me most happy, by bringing me from Paris an admirable copy of the very portrait that was Madame de Simiane's: I am going to build an altar for it, under the title of Notre Dame des Rochers!
Well! but you will want to know the contents of the parcel that is set out. It Contains another parcel, which contains I don't know what; but Mr. Cumberland sent it, and desired I would transmit it to you. There arc Ray's Proverbs, in two volumes interleaved; a few seeds, mislaid when I sent the last; a very indifferent new tragedy, called "Barbarossa,"(533) now running; the author(534) unknown, but believed to be Garrick himself. There is not one word of Barbarossa's real story, but almost the individual history of Merope; not one new thought, and, which is the next material want, but one line of perfect nonsense;
"And rain down transports in the shape of sorrow."
To complete it, the manners are so ill observed, that a Mahometan princess royal is at full liberty to visit her lover in Newgate, like the banker's daughter in George Barnwell. I have added four more "Worlds,"(535) the second of which will, I think, redeem my lord Chesterfield's character with you for wit, except in the two stories, which are very flat: I mean those of two misspelt letters. In the last "World,"(536) besides the hand, you will find a story of your acquaintance: BoncoEur means Norborne Berkeley, whose horse sinking up to his middle in Woburn park, he would not allow that it was any thing more than a little damp. The last story of a highwayman happened almost literally to Mrs. Cavendish.
For news, I think I have none to tell you. Mr. Pitt is gone to the Bath, and Mr. Fox to Newcastle House; and every body else into the country for the holidays. When Lord Bath was told of the first determination of turning out Pitt, and letting Fox remain, he said it put him in mind of a story of the gunpowder plot. The Lord Chamberlain was sent to examine the vaults under the Parliament-house, and, returning with his report, said he had found five-and-twenty barrels of gunpowder; that he had removed ten of them, and hoped the other fifteen would do no harm. Was ever any thing so well and so just?
The Russian ambassador is to give a masquerade for the birth of the little great prince;(537) the King lends him Somerset House: he wanted to borrow the palace over against me, and sent to ask it of the cardinal-nephew (538) who replied, "Not for half Russia."
The new madness is Oratorys. Macklin has set up one, under the title of The British Inquisition;(539) Foote another against him; and a third man has advertised another to-day. I have not heard enough in their favour to tempt me to them, nor do I in the world know enough to compose another paragraph. I am here quite alone; Mr. Chute is setting out for his Vine; but in a day or two I expect Mr. Williams,(540) George Selwyn, and Dick Edgecumbe. You will allow that when I do admit any body within my cloister, I choose them well. My present occupation is putting up my books; and thanks to arches and pinnacles, and pierced columns, I shall not appear scantily provided. Adieu!
(533) The tragedy of "Barbarossa" met with some success, principally from the advantages it appeared under, by the performance of Garrick and Mossop, in the parts of Achmet and Barbarossa. Garrick also supplied the prologue and epilogue,. It being mentioned to Dr. Johnson, that Garrick assisted the author in the composition of this tragedy, "No, Sir," said the Doctor, "Browne would no more suffer Garrick to write a line in his play than he would suffer him to mount his pulpit."-E.
(534) The author was the ingenious but unhappy Dr. John Browne, who was also author of the "Essays on Satire," occasioned by the death of Pope, and the celebrated "Estimate of the Manners and Principles of the Times." He had the misfortune to labour under a constitutional dejection of spirits; and in September 1766, in an interval of deprivation of reason, put a period to his existence, in his fifty-first year.-E.
(535) No. 92, Reflections on the Drinking Club; No. 98, On the Italian Opera; No. 100, On Dr. Johnson's Dictionary; and No. 101, Humorous Observations on the English Language; by Lord Chesterfield.-E.
(536) No. 103, On Politeness; and the Politeness of Highwaymen.-E.
