Memoirs of the Reign of King George the Third, Volume 1 (of 4)

by Horace Walpole

FOOTNOTES

[1] Preface to the “Memoires of the Last Twelve Years of the Reign of George the Second,” p. xxvi.

[2] Postscript to the “Memoires of George the Second,” p. 40.

[3] Preface to the “Memoires of the Last Twelve Years of the Reign of George the Second,” p. xxxii.

[4] Mr. Wright’s notes on Lord Chatham’s Correspondence and his edition of Cavendish’s Debates are also most useful aids to the student of English History. He died not many months ago, in circumstances which proved his labours to have been very inadequately rewarded by the public.

[5] Mr. Clavering—he was a near relative of a North country baronet of the same name.—E.

[6] Sir Henry Wilmot, Bart., M.D., Physician-general to the Forces, an eminent medical practitioner, and the son-in-law of Dr. Mead; he died in 1786, at a very advanced age.—E.

[7] He was Serjeant-surgeon to the King, and had attended George II. at the battle of Dettingen.—E.

[8] John Stuart, third Earl of Bute.—This nomination was severely criticised in publications of the day. It is treated by Mr. Adolphus as a simple nomination to the Privy Council, and is defended as such, on the ground that the Groom of the Stole had been always constituted a Privy Counsellor. This is a misconception. The empty honour of the Council could be grudged by no one to a great officer of the royal household. The real grievance was his admission into the Cabinet.—E.

[9] The Duke very soon discovered his power to be gone. Lord Bute’s predilection for the Tories was undisguised, and it soon became evident that the Court had determined to break up the Whig party, the effect of which would be to reduce the Duke to insignificance. See an interesting letter from Mr. Rigby to the Duke of Bedford (19 Dec. 1760), giving an account of an interview of the former with the Duke of Newcastle.—Russell Correspondence, vol. ii. p. 467.

[10] William Cavendish, fourth Duke of Devonshire, and Lord Chamberlain.

[11] William Henry Nassau Zulestein, fourth Earl of Rochford. He was descended from General Zulestein, a natural uncle of William the Third; and his grandfather, the first Earl, had been one of the favourite generals of that Monarch. Lord Rochford had been minister at Turin from 1749 to 1755, when he was appointed Groom of the Stole, to the great disappointment of Earl Poulett, the first Lord of the Bedchamber, who in consequence resigned his employment. Walpole’s Memoirs, vol. i. p. 381.—E.

[12] The Duke of Bedford was no favourite of Walpole, owing to a private quarrel. There is no reason for suspecting that it could have been intended to remove his Grace from the Government of Ireland, a post which he had occupied with great reluctance (Walp. Mem. vol. ii. p. 105), and was glad to vacate shortly afterwards.—E.

[13] Granville Leveson, Earl Gower, brother of the Duchess of Bedford.

[14] James Brudenel, brother of the Earl of Cardigan, to which title he afterwards succeeded. He died without issue in 1811, aged 86.—E.

[15] Eldest daughter of John, Earl of Bute; afterwards married to Sir James Lowther.

[16] Afterwards third wife of Granville Leveson, Earl Gower.

[17] He had been dismissed for joining Mr. Pitt, and the Prince had at the time promised to restore him, upon coming to the throne.—Doddington’s Diary, Appendix.—E.

[18] Richard Temple, Lord Cobham, who had been much engaged with Frederick Prince of Wales, being asked by Henrietta, Lady Suffolk, what was the real character of the Princess, replied, “She was the only woman he could never find out: all he had discovered was, that she hated those most to whom she paid most court.”

[19] This criticism of Lord Bute is not borne out by facts. The fine collection of pictures made by his lordship at Luton, prove the munificence and discernment with which he patronized painting. Luton itself, the building, or rather the enlargement of which he is known to have personally superintended, with many faults had likewise many beauties, and was surpassed in taste by few of the mansions of that date, and certainly not by Strawberry Hill. He had, in fact, a genuine love both of painting and architecture, and his efforts to infuse the same into the mind of his royal pupil did not entirely fail, for George the Third’s example was unquestionably a great improvement in this respect on his immediate predecessors. Of the other charges here brought against Lord Bute, the Editor has spoken elsewhere.—E.

[20] Archbishop Secker has been in more than one instance misrepresented by Walpole. It is most improbable that he should have entertained the views here ascribed to him. As the head of the Church, it necessarily became his duty to attend frequently at Court on the commencement of a new reign, as has since happened to his successors without their incurring any such imputation.—E.

[21] When Prince of Wales, Scott, his sub-preceptor, reproached him with inattention to his studies. The Prince pleaded idleness. “Idle! Sir,” said Scott; “your brother Edward is idle; but do you call being asleep, being idle?”

[22] George Keppel, third Earl of Albemarle, a favourite of the Duke of Cumberland, and afterwards conqueror of the Havannah.

[23] George, eldest son of Charles Lord Viscount Townshend (afterwards Marquis of Townshend). His name often appears in these Memoirs.

[24] A Letter to the Honourable Brigadier General, Commander-in-Chief of his Majesty’s Forces in Canada.—London, 1760.—It is written with a point and spirit, and we may add, with a degree of malignity, closely akin to Junius, to whose pen, indeed, it has recently been ascribed. (See Preface by Mr. Simons to the new edition of this Pamphlet.) A reply, under the title of “Refutation of a Letter,” &c., composed, evidently, under the eye of Townshend or his family, appeared shortly afterwards, and is equally intemperate, but very inferior in ability. The controversy is so far prejudicial to Townshend, as convicting him of an ungenerous indifference to the memory of the great man who had led him to victory—his only excuse for the slight manner in which he notices Wolfe in the despatch being, not “want of esteem, but because of the impropriety of writing a panegyric to a Minister, when nothing but the situation and exigence of affairs is mentioned.” Townshend virtually admitted the justice of the charge, by subsequently publishing a studied panegyric on Wolfe in the form of a private letter, though it is more in the style of his brother’s parliamentary speeches, and was probably the composition of the latter. With respect to his opposition to Wolfe’s plan of attack, he stands entirely acquitted. The Protest made by him, in common with other officers, had been against a plan of attack which, in consequence of that Protest, was abandoned, and the dissentients on that occasion were those who proposed the very attack which proved so successful. The two generals were certainly not suited to each other. Townshend, though brave, clever, and not devoid of good feeling, was impatient of authority, and possessed in a singular degree the faculty of detecting and exaggerating the faults of his superiors. He had thus drawn upon himself the resentment of the Duke of Cumberland, to whom he was under great obligations, and had fallen into difficulties, out of which it required the all-powerful patronage of Pitt to extricate him. A partial friend (Mr. Glover) describes him as “often led into hasty and striking judgments of men either in approbation or censure.” Wolfe was not of a temperament to brook sarcasm, or even opposition, from a subordinate officer; and yet he had peculiarities which Townshend could scarcely overlook. One was a confidence in himself, which, as he took no pains to disguise it, led superficial observers to question the reality of his merit. Just before he quitted England for the last time, he called to take leave of Lord Temple, whom he found sitting with a colleague. The conversation turned on the prospects of the expedition; and some stress being laid on the resistance that might be expected from the numbers and gallantry of the French, Wolfe rose from his chair, and drawing his sword, exclaimed with a loud voice, and in a menacing attitude, that there was nothing to fear; for if he could only come within reach of the enemy, his success was not a matter of doubt, but of certainty. When he left the room the two Ministers looked at each other with astonishment, and agreed, that to entrust so hazardous an expedition to such a braggart, was indeed a fearful experiment. The feeling that at all times appeared uppermost in his mind, was an insatiable appetite for glory, and desire after posthumous fame. He idolized genius either in arts or arms. Even on the day of the attack, while sailing down the St. Lawrence, he read aloud Gray’s Elegy, and observed several times to the officers with him, that he did not know whether he would not rather be the author of that poem than the conqueror of Quebec. In truth his was a noble nature. His feelings were as genuine as they were ardent. He gave the most minute attention to the welfare and comfort of his troops; and instead of maintaining the reserve and stateliness so common with other commanders of that day, his manner was frank and open, and he had a personal knowledge of perhaps every officer in his army. We recollect a respectable veteran, who, after having served under him at Louisburgh and Cape Breton, commanded one of the first detachments that scaled the heights of Abraham. In that exploit Captain —— was shot through the lungs. On recovering his senses he saw Wolfe standing by his side. Amidst the anxieties of such a critical hour, the General stopped to press the hand of the wounded man—praised his services, encouraged him not to abandon the hope of life—assured him of leave of absence and early promotion; nay more, he desired an aide-de-camp to give a message to that effect to General Monckton, should he himself fall in the action; and, to the credit of General Monckton, the promise was kept. No wonder that these qualities coupled with brilliant success won the hearts of the soldiery: a sort of romance still clings to his name. He is the only British General belonging to the reign of George the Second who can be said to have earned a lasting reputation. Long as this note is, it would be incomplete without some notice of General Townshend. That officer was the son of Charles third Viscount Townshend, and the witty Ethelreda Harrison, and therefore the grandson of Charles second Viscount Townshend, the celebrated colleague of Sir Robert Walpole. He was not loved by either of his parents. His father, a man of dissolute habits, and an unnatural parent, made for him so mean a provision, that on leaving the University he joined the army abroad as a volunteer, and he served in that capacity at the battle of Dettingen. He was afterwards reduced to seek employment in the Dutch service, but, fortunately, was disappointed, as about this time he attracted the notice of the Duke of Cumberland, through whose interest he rose rapidly to the rank of Colonel. He attended the Duke during the remainder of the war, and distinguished himself at Fontenoy and Culloden. Subsequently, his marriage with Lady de Ferrars, the heiress of the Northamptons, placed him at once in opulent circumstances, and he was elected a representative for Norfolk without opposition, except from his father. The figure he made in the House, where he acquired considerable influence, especially over members in the agricultural interest, has caused him to be often noticed (generally with censure) in these Memoirs; but though Walpole paints him in no pleasing colours, on the other hand, another contemporary writer says that he was manly in person, demeanour, and sentiment, and exemplary as a husband and father, and, from his wit, agreeable to his friends and formidable to those he disliked. It cannot be denied, however, that he was too prone to mischief, and more worldly than seemed consistent with his love of pleasure and ease. His life was singularly prosperous, and prolonged to extreme old age. He became Viscount Townshend by the death of his father in 1764. In 1767 he was appointed Lord Lieutenant of Ireland; in 1787 he was created a Marquis, and in 1807, he died, aged 84, being then a Field Marshal, Governor of Jersey, and Colonel of a regiment of Dragoons. Memoirs of George the Second, vol. i. p. 33; vol. ii. p. 337. Memoirs of a distinguished Political and Literary Character, p. 71—E.

[25] Charles Lenox, third Duke of Richmond.

[26] William Keppel, third son of William Anne, second Earl of Albemarle, by Lady Anne Lenox, daughter of the first Duke of Richmond. He commanded a regiment at the conquest of the Havannah, and died a General officer, unmarried, in 1786.—E.

[27] There is a slight inaccuracy in this statement. The Duke’s resentment was not so generous. The object of his interview with the King was to promote his own interest, not that of Colonel Keppel.—See the Duke of Richmond’s letter of 21st June, 1783, in the Appendix to Dodington’s Diary.—E.

[28] William Petty, Lord Fitzmaurice, eldest son of the Earl of Shelburne, whom he succeeded in that title May 17, 1761; and by which title he will be frequently mentioned in the following Memoirs.

[29] Lord George Lenox was only brother of Charles third Duke of Richmond. He had behaved with distinguished gallantry in the German wars. The late Duke of Richmond was his son.—E.

[30] Charles Fitzroy, second son of Lord Augustus Fitzroy, second son of Charles second Duke of Grafton, and only brother of Augustus Henry third Duke of Grafton. He distinguished himself at the battle of Minden, where he served on the staff of Prince Ferdinand of Brunswick. He was created Lord Southampton in 1780, and died on the 21st of March 1797, aged 60.—E.

[31] Augustus Henry, Duke of Grafton, afterwards First Lord of the Treasury.

[32] Henry Fox had married Lady Caroline Lenox, eldest daughter of Charles, late Duke of Richmond, without the consent of her father and mother, who were some years unreconciled to her.

[33] It was given under pretence of paying the late Prince her husband’s debts. Whether she did discharge any of them I neither know nor deny; some, I have heard, remained unpaid, not only at her death, but in the year 1788.

[34] George Henry Lee, Earl of Litchfield, High Steward, and afterwards Chancellor of the University of Oxford, had been a zealous partisan of the House of Stuart, of which he was an illegitimate branch, his grandfather, Edward the first Earl, having married a daughter of Charles the Second by the Duchess of Cleveland. Lord Litchfield was too much a man of pleasure to shine in politics, or he might at this crisis have taken a leading part in public affairs, for his abilities were considerable. The following ironical character of him is almost the only instance in which Wilkes has described an opponent with candour and truth:—“The Captain (Giddy) was a sprightly fellow in his youth, and is remembered about twenty years ago to have made a very good speech or two at some of your public meetings in London. From this time, however, the figure he hath made in the world hath not been much to his credit. The chief of his company, till within these two years, have been parsons and country squires. They used to lead him about to races, cock-matches, and country clubs, where he was apt sometimes to drink a little too freely. A course of life of this sort brought on a swimming in his head, so that he hath frequently been supposed not to be sensible where he was, or what he was about: hence he hath been known in the late times of party violence, in the same sort of company, and within a few days of each other, to drink ‘Exclusion to the House of Hanover, and confusion to the Stuarts.’” North Briton, No. 29.—Lord Litchfield died in 1772. The title did not go beyond the third generation, though the first Earl had thirteen sons, of whom six lived to manhood.—E.

[35] Edward Harley, Earl of Oxford and Earl Mortimer, was grandson of the Lord Treasurer’s brother, on whom the title had been specially limited, on failure of issue male in the direct line. He died in 1790, aged 64.—E.

[36] Thomas Brudenel Bruce, Baron Bruce, youngest brother of George, Earl of Cardigan, and of the Duke of Montague. He was the fourth son of George third Earl of Cardigan, by Elizabeth, only daughter of Thomas second Earl of Aylesbury and Baron Bruce. That barony afterwards devolved upon him by a special limitation in the patent obtained by his uncle Charles, the third and last Earl of Aylesbury, who also bequeathed to him the bulk of the family property. He was created Earl of Aylesbury in 1776, on the death of his uncle, and died in 1814. The present Marquis of Aylesbury is his son.—E.

[37] James Douglas, Earl of March and Ruglen, afterwards Duke of Queensberry. He died in 1810, aged 86. He possessed uncommon shrewdness and penetration, but is now only remembered by the excessive profligacy which stained even the last years of his life.—E.

[38] Alexander Montgomery, Earl of Eglinton, an intelligent, public-spirited nobleman. Scotland is greatly indebted to him for the agricultural improvements he introduced upon his estates in Ayrshire, and still more for the benefit of his example on other large landed proprietors. He was mortally wounded in an accidental scuffle with an officer of Excise, whom he found poaching in his park, and died on the 25th October, 1769. The murderer was convicted, and only escaped execution by hanging himself in prison. Wood’s Peerage of Scotland, vol. i.—E.

[39] George Broderick, Viscount Middleton. He had married the eldest daughter of the Honourable Thomas Townshend, and great-niece of the Duke of Newcastle, and died in 1765, aged 35. He was the grandson of Lord Chancellor Broderick.—E.

[40] Andrew Stone, of whom see more in the preceding reign, and infra.

[41] Smith de Burgh, Earl of Clanrickard.

[42] Richard Rigby, of Mistley, near Manningtree, in Essex, Secretary to the Duke of Bedford.

[43] This tract may still be read with interest. It is a masterly production. The style is clear and persuasive, the tone calm, and the reasoning close and logical. The examples from English history with which the author supports his positions are skilfully chosen and agreeably introduced, and his strictures on the King of Prussia have a smartness and pungency that show no small command over the weapons of controversy. Mr. Mauduit was agent for Massachusetts. He wrote several tracts on the differences between England and her American Colonies, as well as on subjects connected with the Dissenting interests, of which he was a zealous and munificent promoter. He died unmarried, in June 1787, aged 72. See Nichols’s Literary Anecdotes, vol. viii. p. 466; and Chalmers’s Biographical Dictionary, Art. Mauduit.—E.

[44] Basil Fielding, Earl of Denbigh, Lord of the Bedchamber.

[45] Son of Mr. Grenville, of Wooton, and afterwards First Lord of the Treasury. He had for some time been looked upon as a very promising statesman. Mr. Glover, in writing of him a few years before, says, “George Grenville will, I believe, make the most useful and able Parliament man of the three, though not of equal eloquence with Pitt.”—Mem. of a Distinguished Pol. and Lit. Character, p. 20.

His memory is embalmed in the brilliant panegyric of Mr. Burke (speech on American Taxation); and a more sober, though not less friendly estimate of his merits, has been since given by Mr. Knox. (Cited in an interesting note to the Chatham Correspondence, vol. iii. p. 486.) These prove how highly he was esteemed by his friends; and it will be perceived in the course of this work that Walpole was not always blind to his great knowledge of the Constitution, his capacity for business, and his powers as a speaker in Parliament. The unfavourable opinion, however, expressed of Mr. Grenville in the text was by no means confined to Walpole, his unpopularity being remarkable. Justice, indeed, was never shown to his abilities by the public—even Dr. Johnson wrote of him, “Let him not be depreciated in his grave. He had powers not universally possessed; could he have enforced payment of the Manilla ransom, he could have counted it.” (Cited in Boswell, vol. ii. p. 113.)—E.

[46] Archibald Campbell, Duke of Argyle, died suddenly, March 15, 1761.

[47] The King.

[48] Sir Henry Erskine, though a moderate poet, was not meanly accomplished. He cultivated literature, and was a very lively companion. He spoke frequently in the House of Commons, and always fluently and with spirit, but in a style better suited to the hustings than to a deliberative assembly. His career was singular. He was the second son of Sir John Erskine, Bart., of Alva, and succeeded to his title on the death of his brother, Major Sir Charles Erskine, at Holst, just before the battle of Lafeldt. He accompanied the expedition to L’Orient, as Deputy Quarter-Master General of the Forces, under his uncle, General St. Clair. Devoting himself afterwards to politics, he shared the proscription which fell on the adherents of Leicester House, and was dismissed the service. The new reign amply restored his fortunes. With his commission he soon received the command of the Royal Scots; and in four years he had already attained the rank of Lieutenant-General, when he died, in 1765, in middle life. His marriage with Miss Wedderburn, little as it promised at the time of worldly advantage, brought wealth and rank into his family; the earldom and property of her brother, Lord Chancellor Rosslyn, having devolved subsequently on their eldest son, owing to the death of that nobleman and his brother, General Wedderburn, without issue.—E.

[49] John Home, author of the tragedies of Douglas, Agis, and Siege of Aquileia; of which none save Douglas (says Sir Walter Scott) were exhibited with remarkable applause, and one or two with marked disapprobation. Mr. Home, though not a first-rate dramatist, was a pleasing writer, well-informed, and very agreeable in society. George the Third became much attached to him, and provided for him on coming to the throne. He died in 1808, aged 84. His memoirs have been elegantly written by Mackenzie, and form the subject of one of Walter Scott’s beautiful criticisms in the Quarterly Review for June 1827.—E.

[50] Thomas Worseley, Surveyor General of the Board of Works.

[51] George Cooke, prothonotary of the Common Pleas, and member for Middlesex. Walpole calls him elsewhere a “pompous Jacobite.” He conducted the celebrated Westminster Petition against Lord Trentham in 1751; afterwards attaching himself to Mr. Pitt, he was appointed joint Paymaster-General in 1766, and died in 1768.—E.

[52] Thomas Coventry, member for Bridport. A barrister, and director of the South Sea Company. He was son of Thomas Coventry, who was brother of William fifth Earl of Coventry.—E.

[53] Alderman William Beckford, of Jamaica, member for the City of London.

[54] Henry Bilson Legge, a younger son of the first Earl of Dartmouth, was at this time Chancellor of the Exchequer. It should be remembered that Mr. Legge had abandoned Lord Winchelsea, and attached himself to Mr. Pelham in the Cabinet schism of 1744. He shared, with many respectable statesmen of that day, the charge of having served several masters, the partial changes so frequently made in the Government having rendered coalitions almost inevitable, especially at a time when, owing to the decline of Jacobitism, the lines of demarcation between the different political parties had become very indistinct. None, however, with whom he acted, could deny his eminent qualifications as a man of business, or as a debater in the House of Commons on all questions of trade and finance. His political integrity is less commendable. Dodington says, that his thoughts were “tout pour la trippe”—all for quarter-day (Diary, 407); and has, in common with Walpole, reproached him with perfidy, in disclosing to the Duke of Newcastle the negotiations of Leicester House with the Court in 1757. The more detailed account of the transaction, since published in the posthumous memoirs of Mr. Glover, makes it far more probable that the secret was insidiously drawn from him by the Duke, whose skill in imposing on men of superior ability to his own, is one of the most remarkable traits of his character; and that Mr. Legge was very open to such arts, may reasonably be inferred, from the well-known fact of his having incurred the serious displeasure of George the Second by an indiscreet slip in conversation, when minister at Berlin. He had the laxity of principle that belonged to the school of Walpole, but there is no ground for believing him to have been actually dishonest; and Mr. Pelham, who knew him well, said, “that he thought him as good as his neighbours: more able, and as willing, to serve them that served him as anybody he had been acquainted with for some time.” Whatever may have been his delinquencies in this respect, they would certainly have been overlooked by the Court, had he added to them by adopting the course which was urged on him by Lord Bute in the Hampshire election. This is proved by their published correspondence, in which he had a great advantage over Lord Bute. When that minister had the assurance to ask him to support Sir Simeon Steuart, who had come forward on the opposite interest, he honestly answered, “If the Whigs and Dissenters, who are very numerous in this country, will make it a point of opposing him, it will be impossible for me to declare for him, and abandon those who have supported me, to take part with those against whom they have supported me.” Lord Bute’s rejoinder is admirable! he protests against any desire on the Prince’s part to require the sacrifice of Mr. Legge’s honour, but besought him out of real friendship, to consider seriously whether he could not still, as far as was in his power, co-operate with the Prince’s wishes for the return of two candidates, and required a categorical answer. This was at once given in the negative by Mr. Legge, who added, that he would submit to any consequences rather than incur such a disgrace. Hence his dismissal. See more of Mr. Legge infra.—E.

[55] Daniel Finch, Earl of Winchelsea and Nottingham, Knight of the Garter. Lord Winchelsea is one of the few statesmen of the reign of George the Second whose character is worthy of a purer age. He was the son of Lord Winchelsea, the great Tory leader, whose disgrace he shared when that nobleman was dismissed for espousing the cause of the Jacobite peers involved in the rebellion of 1715. He subsequently became reconciled to Sir Robert Walpole, and in 1742 was appointed First Lord of the Admiralty. Lord Waldegrave says of his conduct at that period, “That it was so unexceptionable that faction itself was obliged to be silent.”—Walpole Memoirs, p. 139. Horace Walpole is equally warm in his praise. This is the testimony of political friends, but it stands uncontradicted. Indeed Lord Winchelsea appears to have enjoyed the respect of all parties. His public career, to use the words of Lord Mahon, “without being illustrious, was long, useful, and honourable.” He died in 1769, aged 81.—E.

[56] William Wildman Shute Barrington, Viscount Barrington, Treasurer of the Navy.

[57] Robert Darcy, Earl of Holderness. This is an exaggeration of Lord Holderness’s incapacity; for it appears by the Mitchell papers, that he had attended closely to the business of his office, and performed it respectably. His talents, however, were not above mediocrity. His foreign connexions had recommended him to George the Second, whom he attended as Lord of the Bedchamber at the battle of Dettingen, and he was afterwards minister at Turin and at the Hague. The Duke of Newcastle succeeded in making him Secretary of State, against the opinion of Mr. Pelham, when scarcely thirty years of age. His qualifications for that high office are thus summed up by the Duke, in a letter, urging the appointment:—“He is indeed, or was thought, trifling in his manner and carriage; but believe me, he has a solid understanding, and will come out as prudent a young man as any in the kingdom. He is good-natured, so that you may tell him his faults, and he will mend them. He is very taciturn, dexterous enough, and most punctual in the execution of his orders. He is got into the routine of business, and knows well the present state of it.” (Letter from Duke of Newcastle to Mr. Pelham, in Coxe’s Life of Pelham, vol. ii. p. 387.) A portrait not less characteristic of the Duke than of Lord Holderness. His lordship married a lady of the Fagel family, and his mother was daughter of the last Duke of Schomberg. He died 1778, without issue male, and his earldom became extinct. See more of him in Walpole’s Memoirs, vol. i. p. 172; and Lord Waldegrave’s Memoirs, p. 121.—E.

[58] James Grenville, second brother of Earl Temple. He had already been Deputy Paymaster General, and one of the Lords of Trade, and, lastly, of the Treasury.—E.

[59] John Manners, Duke of Rutland, Knight of the Garter, died in 1779, at the age of 83, having survived his gallant and amiable son, the Marquis of Granby.—E.

[60] Samuel Lord Sandys, formerly the indefatigable opponent of Sir Robert Walpole; but his importance had greatly diminished since that minister’s downfall. He died in 1770.—E.

[61] Thomas Osborne, Duke of Leeds, Knight of the Garter. He married Mary, daughter and co-heir of Francis Earl of Godolphin, and died in 1783, aged 76.—E.

[62] Charles Townshend, second son of Charles Viscount Townshend.

[63] Gilbert Elliot, afterwards Sir Gilbert.

[64] George Bussy Villiers, Viscount Villiers, only son of the Earl of Jersey, whom he afterwards succeeded. He held the post of Lord Chamberlain from 1765 to 1769, and subsequently filled other high offices in the royal household. He died in August, 1805, aged 70.—E.

[65] T. Pelham, of Stanmore, afterwards Lord Pelham.

[66] George Rice married Cecil, only child of William Lord Talbot, and a great heiress. He was Lord Lieutenant of the county of Carmarthen, and a Privy Councillor. He died in 1779. The present Lord Dynevor is his son.—E.

[67] John Spencer, only son of John Spencer, brother of Charles Duke of Marlborough. He was a person of very resolute, independent spirit, and warmly attached to the Whig interest, as he too well proved at the celebrated Northampton election, which seriously impaired even his immense fortune, while it made Lord Northampton an exile for the remainder of his life, and obliged Lord Halifax to sell Horton and his principal estates. With the exception of a very brief interval, Lord Spencer remained all his life in Opposition. He died greatly respected in 1783, aged 49. The present Earl Spencer is his grandson.—E.

[68] Sir Thomas Robinson, created Lord Grantham, had been minister at Vienna, and Secretary of State. He was the fourth son of Sir William Robinson, Baronet. His fortunate connexion with Horace Lord Walpole, to whom he had been Secretary in 1723, quickly raised him to eminence. He was an excellent man of business, and highly esteemed as a diplomatist. His despatches are written with great spirit and clearness. In the House of Commons he failed, as might have been expected from his previous pursuits, and his talents have in consequence been much underrated. He died in 1770. The Earl de Grey and the Earl of Ripon are his grandsons.—E.

[69] Sir Nathaniel Curzon, (fifth Baronet, and M. P. for Derbyshire,) created Lord Scarsdale. He afterwards was appointed Chairman of the Committee of the House of Lords, and died at an advanced age, in 1804.—E.

[70] Sir William Irby, created Lord Boston. He had been Page to George I. and George II., and Equerry to the Prince on the arrival of the latter in England. He married a niece of Mr. Selwyn, and died in 1773, aged 66.—E.

[71] George Bubb Dodington, created Lord Melcomb.

[72] William Pulteney, Earl of Bath.

[73] Son of the Lord Chancellor. He had in his youth been one of Sir Robert Walpole’s most violent opponents. The Count de Fuentes, in a letter to Mr. Wall, of 27th March, says that this appointment was ascribed to the Princess of Wales: of whom he adds, “they speak with too much liberty.”—Chatham Corresp. vol. ii. p. 106. The adherence of Lord Talbot to the Leicester House party certainly entitled him to consideration, but he was now much overpaid; and this was felt even by his patron Lord Bute, who wanted firmness to resist pretensions which were urged with impetuosity, amounting almost to passion.—(Dodington’s Diary, cited in note to the letter supra.) Lord Talbot had talents, was resolute and ready; and his speeches had an air of independence and a plausibility that made him rather a favourite with the public, notwithstanding his vices, until his duel with Wilkes brought ridicule upon his name, not to be effaced.—E.

[74] Son of Selina Countess of Huntingdon. He remained Groom of the Stole till 1770. Akenside, who was one of the least adulatory of poets, addressed to him, in 1747, a didactic ode on his setting out on his travels. He was an amiable and accomplished nobleman, though it requires some partiality to believe of his early youth that his “breast the gifts of every Muse had known.” Delicate health prevented his taking an active part in public business, and in 1766 he declined the embassy to Spain, which was pressed on him by Lord Chatham. He died in 1790, aged 62, without having been married, and the title was for some years supposed to be extinct. In 1819 the father of the present Earl established a claim to it, and took his seat in the House of Lords accordingly.—E.

[75] See page [39], and infra.

[76] Henry Seymour Conway, only brother of Francis Earl of Hertford.

[77] John Waldegrave, only brother of James Earl Waldegrave, whom he succeeded in the title, married Lady Elizabeth Leveson Gower, sister of Gertrude Duchess of Bedford. His presence of mind and intrepidity at the battle of Minden established his character as a soldier.—Mem. vol. ii. p. 367. He was appropriately rewarded with the regiment of dragoons, vacated by Lord George Sackville’s dismissal. Subsequently he obtained one of the regiments of foot-guards, and was made Master of the Horse to the Queen. His love of state, not less than the handsome manner in which he lived, well adapted him to any great office at Court. He died in 1784. His eldest son, a most respectable nobleman, and also an officer, only survived him five years.—E.

[78] John Mostyn, brother of Sir Roger Mostyn, Bart., and Groom of the Bedchamber to the King. He had commanded the British cavalry with distinction in Germany, and was mainly instrumental in gaining the Battle of Warburgh, the credit of which Lord Granby ascribed entirely to him. He might have risen high in the army, had he not shrunk from the responsibility of great commands. He refused the command of the expedition to the Havannah, on the ground that he did not pretend to be more than a cavalry officer. His good nature and conviviality, as well as his quiet military deportment, made him popular at Court; and George the Second liked him so much, that he generally formed one of the King’s evening party. It was believed he might have been a favourite if he pleased. His last employment was as Governor of Minorca.—Memoirs of Sir James Campbell, vol. i. p. 173.

[79] John Manners, Marquis of Granby, son of John Duke of Rutland.

[80] Letter (of 21st March) to George Montagu, and the note.—Walpole’s Collected Correspondence, vol. iv. p. 128.

[81] Sir John Philipps, Bart., of Picton Castle, in Pembrokeshire, an opulent and influential Jacobite. He was the second son of Sir Erasmus Philipps, and had succeeded to the title and estates on the death of his elder brother. He died in 1764, leaving an only son, Sir Richard, who was afterwards created an Irish Peer by the title of Lord Milford, and died without issue in 1823.—E.

[82] Henry, brother of Thomas Lord Archer.

[83] Mr. Onslow died in February 1768, aged 76. A very pleasing account of him is given in the Preface to the second volume of Hatsell’s Precedents, p. 6.

[84] William Pulteney, Earl of Bath.

[85] Henry Arthur Herbert, Earl of Powis.

[86] Dr. Hayter, afterwards Bishop of London. Vide p. 73, infra.

[87] Dr. Thomas, afterwards Bishop of Winchester. Vide Appendix.

[88] Charles Wyndham, Earl of Egremont, afterwards Secretary of State. Vide infra.

[89] Sir Joseph Yorke, Ambassador in Holland, third son of Philip Earl of Hardwicke. He had been a captain of the Guards, and aide-de-camp of the Duke of Cumberland at the battle of Fontenoy. In 1751 he was appointed Minister at the Hague, where he remained many years, and became almost naturalized, having married a Dutch lady. His estimable conduct, and also his splendid hospitality, gave him great consideration in Holland. In 1788 he was created Lord Dover. He died in 1792 without issue, and the title became extinct.—E.

[90] Admiral Edward Boscawen, brother of Lord Viscount Falmouth, a distinguished naval commander. He died this year, at the early age of 50. The late Earl of Falmouth was his grandson.—E.

[91] Hans Stanley, one of the Lords of the Admiralty, and afterwards Cofferer.

[92] M. Bussy was one of the chief Commis of the Foreign Department at Paris. He had great experience in business, and was eminently adroit and persuasive; qualities to which he owed his nomination to this difficult post. Formerly he had been private secretary to the Duc de Richelieu, through whose interest he was employed on a mission to George the Second in Hanover in 1754. Flassan, Hist. de la Diplomatic Française, vol. vi. p. 388. See more respecting him in Mr. Stanley’s Correspondence in the Appendix to the Life of Lord Chatham.—E.

[93] Memoirs of George the Second, vol. i. p. 242. It is ably drawn, and not unkindly, considering the belief long entertained by the Whigs of the Duke having betrayed Sir Robert Walpole. The more favourable portrait given by Archdeacon Coxe, from materials supplied by his family, is, like too many family portraits, feeble, flattering, and indistinct. His Grace unquestionably possessed a powerful, active, and cultivated mind. He had studied, and thoroughly understood the weaknesses of men, and was unscrupulous in the practice of all the arts of intrigue. Success usually crowned his efforts, and notwithstanding the various changes of Government, he maintained much of his power to the last. Disappointment attended only his private life, which was chilled by aversion to his wife and the want of children. Il fut riche, il fut titré, mais il ne fut point heureux—the just and natural result of a line of conduct which, as Lord Mahon correctly observes, was seldom on any occasion swayed either by virtue or generosity.—Coxe’s Life of Sir R. Walpole, vol. iv. p. 236; Mahon’s Hist. vol. iii. p. 237.—E.

[94] This prediction has not been realized. The Bangorian controversy has long lost its interest, and great as was their success in their day, and great their reward—no less than the Bishoprick of Winchester—the three massive folios of Hoadley’s Works now slumber on the shelves of theological libraries. His two sons, one of whom was chaplain, and the other physician to the King, were men of talent, and are still recollected as the joint authors of that popular comedy, “The Suspicious Husband.” They were the last of their family.—E.

[95] John Hay, Marquis of Tweedale, had been secretary of State for Scotland. Lord Tweedale had been one of the extraordinary Lords of Session in Scotland, and also had held the post of Secretary of State for that country. He was the last person that filled either of these offices. His connexion with Lord Granville, whose daughter he had married, brought him into public life in opposition to Walpole, and he shared the spoils of that minister. Like Lord Granville, he possessed considerable knowledge of law. He is said also to have been a good debater in Parliament. He died, without male issue, in December 1762.—E.

[96] Dr. Robert Hay Drummond, brother of the Earl Kinnoul.

[97] Richard Edgcumbe, second Lord Edgcumbe, an intimate friend of the author, who has given him a place in the Noble Authors. He was a humourist, and had a turn for poetry and drawing, of which some amusing specimens are noticed in the publications of his day. Walpole says, he never had a fault but to himself, never an enemy but himself.—E.

[98] Lady Caroline Lenox, eldest daughter of Charles second Duke of Richmond, married to Henry Fox, Paymaster of the Forces.

[99] Eldest daughter of Stephen Fox, Earl of Ilchester, by the sole daughter and heiress of Mr. Strangways Horner, whose name he assumed.

[100] Holland House, beyond Kensington, the seat of the Earls of Warwick and Holland; now of Henry Fox, Lord Holland.

[101] John Fane, Earl of Westmoreland, Chancellor of Oxford, Lieutenant-general in the army, and formerly captain of one of the troops of Horse Guards. In early life, when a younger brother, and a Whig, he had served under the Duke of Marlborough; and afterwards commanded “the body of troops which George the First had been obliged to send to Oxford, to teach the University the only kind of passive obedience of which they did not approve.” He subsequently joined the Jacobites in their opposition to Sir Robert Walpole, and became a high Tory; as indeed may be inferred from Lord Arran appointing him High Steward of the University in 1754, and from his succeeding that nobleman as Chancellor in 1758. He was comely in his person, and highly respected for his virtues in private life. Glover describes him as “a veteran patriot, slow, but solid; always meaning well, and therefore judging right.” He died without issue in 1762, at a very advanced age. Walpole’s Memoirs, vol. ii. p. 340. Memoirs of a distinguished Political and Literary Character, p. 121.—E.

[102] Sir Philip Yorke, Earl of Hardwicke, formerly Lord Chancellor.

[103] John Carteret, Earl of Granville, some time Prime Minister to George the Second.

[104] Simon Lord Harcourt, formerly Governor to the King. See an account of his resignation of that post, in the preceding reign, (Memoirs of George the Second, vol. i. p. 254.)

[105] Mary Panton, second wife of Peregrine Bertie, Duke of Ancaster.

[106] Elizabeth Gunning, Duchess Dowager of Hamilton, married, secondly, to John Campbell, Marquis of Lorn, eldest son of John Duke of Argyle.

[107] Mr. Hammond had been in love with her, and then forsaken her. The poems which he wrote on her have been published.

[108] Mr. Andrew Stone was appointed Treasurer to the Queen on her arrival. He was the well-known confident of the Duke of Newcastle and Mr. Pelham, over both of whom he exercised great influence. He had been private, and afterwards under secretary to the former. Latterly he had been sub-governor to the King when Prince of Wales. He was a fine scholar, and had distinguished himself at Oxford, where he was the rival and friend of Murray (Lord Mansfield). Bishop Newton, who knew him well, says that his tastes and feelings were better suited to the Church than to politics. Lord Waldegrave likewise commends his integrity. Walpole can find no fault in him, except that he had a tendency to Jacobitism, a charge which his conduct and connections proved to be unfounded. He appears to have been entirely devoid of ambition, honest, and most disinterested. He died in 1773, aged 72. The best account of Mr. Stone is in a note to Coxe’s Life of Pelham, vol. i. p. 430.—E.

[109] She did some years afterwards with the King, but quite in private.

[110] Dr. Robert Hay Drummond, brother of the Earl of Kinnoul, and Bishop of Salisbury, a man of parts and of the world. He was the second son of George eighth Earl of Kinnoul, formerly Ambassador at Constantinople. He had attended George the Second in the campaign of 1743, and preached the thanksgiving sermon at Hanover, for the battle of Dettingen. On his return he was made a prebendary of Westminster, and in 1748 Bishop of St. Asaph. He was a dignified and accomplished prelate. He died in 1776, in his 66th year. In 1803 one of his younger children, the late Mr. George Drummond, published a volume, intituled “Sermons on Public Occasions, and a Letter on Theological Study, by Robert, late Archbishop of York,” &c. The Archbishop’s eldest son became tenth Earl of Kinnoul.—E.

[111] Dr. Hayter was supposed to be the natural son of Dr. Blackburne, Archbishop of York. This supposition is indignantly attacked in an article on the first part of these Memoirs, in the Quarterly Review. In justice to Walpole, it is only fair to state, that this was a report generally believed at the time. In the quarrel in the Princess’s household which led to the Bishop’s disgrace, Mr. Cresset, the Princess’s confident, was charged with calling him a bastard.—Edinburgh Review, No. 73, p. 5, note. The suspicious report was rather strengthened than otherwise by Archbishop Blackburne’s leaving him a large fortune. What is of more importance to Bishop Hayter’s memory is, that he bore a high character for generosity and learning. He only survived his translation a single year, having died in 1762, aged 59. Nichols’s Literary Anecdotes, vol. ii. p. 505.—E.

[112] There were at this time two bishops of the same name; Dr. John Thomas, Bishop of Winchester, and Dr. John Thomas, Bishop of Lincoln: the latter had been promoted by Lord Granville.

[113] George William Hervey, Earl of Bristol, Ambassador in Spain, son of the famous John Lord Hervey.

[114] Charles third King of Spain, and before of Naples; commonly called Don Carlos.

[115] The Duke positively denied having made any such communication to Bussy. See infra.—E.

[116] The following note is transcribed from the manuscript memoirs of Sir George Colebrooke, Bart., M.P., Chairman of the East India Company; an eminent merchant, who sat many years in Parliament, and possessed the confidence of some of the leading statesmen of his day.

“During the time I attended Newcastle House and the Treasury Chambers on the Contract business, I had frequent opportunities of knowing how despotically Mr. Pitt governed his ministerial colleagues, and how much he was dreaded by the Duke. Some years afterwards I recollect his Grace making this the subject of lively conversation at table, at Claremont; but it was no subject of merriment at the time the transaction passed. More than once I was summoned to the Treasury to give an account of the state of the provisions, and of the money, for the army, Mr. West giving, for reason, that Mr. Pitt threatened the Duke, that if at any time a want of either should be found, he would impeach him in the ensuing session. At the Treasury I frequently met Mr. Wallis, Commissioner of the Navy, who mentioned the following memorable instance. A train of artillery was wanted at Portsmouth for an expedition. Mr. Pitt told Wallis that it must be down by a certain day he named. Wallis made some excuse for the delay, either that the transports were not ready or the winds were contrary; upon which Mr. Pitt insisted that they should go by land, a method of conveyance which was afterwards pursued.

“General Harvey, who had been sent by Prince Ferdinand to prepare matters in England for the campaign, and to carry over the English draughts, waited on Mr. Pitt to take his leave. Mr. Pitt asked him whether he had obtained everything he wanted, and the General answered, not; and he therefore came to take leave, that no blame might fall on him from the Prince. Mr. Pitt desired the General to enumerate what he wanted, and immediately rang his bell for Mr. Wood, who in the names of the different Boards signified to their officers his Majesty’s commands for the dispatch of what was required for Germany, and in four days General Harvey had in readiness what he had been as many months soliciting.

“West, the Secretary, always looked frightened; and well he might, for Mr. Pitt would have been as good as his word, which was to impeach the Commissioners of the Treasury, if they neglected anything needful for the war. At times he depended so little on them, that, notwithstanding a contract to supply the army, he caused provisions to be sent by victualling transports.

“Proceeding in the way I have mentioned, of writing in the names of the different public officers, there were numberless hiatus in their books of correspondence, and instances of orders carried into execution without their sanction. The name of Lord Barrington was principally used as Secretary at War, who did not know more than a stranger of troops being ordered on service, till the embarkation had actually taken place.

“The Duke of Newcastle, speaking himself of the cavalier manner with which Mr. Pitt treated the Cabinet, mentioned the instance of some foreign expedition which Mr. Pitt had proposed, but which, in the opinion of the ministers, and of Lord Anson, First Lord of the Admiralty, deprived Great Britain of too great a part of its internal defence. Lord Mansfield had not yet given his opinion; but Mr. Pitt, apprehensive that it would be against him, summed up the opinions of Council, a majority of which he declared to be for the expedition; adding, “The Chief Justice of England has no opinion to give in this matter thereby stopping his mouth. The Duke told Lord Coventry, that Mr. Murray, when Attorney-General, and in the House of Commons, had acknowledged to him that he was intimidated by Pitt. The more the latter found Murray to be intimidated, the more he naturally pressed him.

“I never saw the Duke in higher spirits than after Mr. Pitt, thwarted by the Cabinet in his proposal of declaring war against Spain, had given notice of resignation. The Duke had done more wisely, if he had followed Lord Hardwicke’s advice, and had resigned on the death of his late master. The Duke could not endure to part with his power, much less to devolve it on one who meant to keep it. When he last resigned the Treasury to the Duke of Devonshire, it was with a view to have it back again at a convenient season.”—E.

[117] The following extraordinary notice was published in the Gazette of the 9th October: “The Right Honourable William Pitt having resigned the Seals into the King’s hands, His Majesty was this day pleased to appoint the Earl of Egremont to be one of His Majesty’s principal Secretaries of State; and, in consideration of the great and important services of the said Mr. Pitt, His Majesty has been graciously pleased to direct that a warrant be prepared for granting to the Lady Hesther Pitt, his wife, a Barony of Great Britain, by the name, style, and title of Baroness of Chatham, to herself, and of Baron of Chatham to her heirs male, and also to confer upon the said William Pitt, Esq., an annuity of three thousand pounds sterling, during his own life and that of Lady Hesther Pitt, and their son John Pitt, Esq.”—E.

[118] It certainly is not the practice now (1844) to insert pensions in the Gazette. Whether it ever was so it would be difficult to ascertain, as there is no index prior to the year 1787. The impression of two very old officers, who have frequent occasions to consult the Gazette, is, that no such general practice ever prevailed.—E.

[119] It was by such expressions as this that Mr. Pitt created the disappointment in the public mind, that followed the announcement of his pension. To use the words of Lord Brougham: “He did not sustain the exalted pitch of magnanimous independence, and utter disregard of sublunary interests, which we should expect him to have reached and kept as a matter of course, from a mere cursory glance at the mould in which his lofty character was cast.” Statesmen of the Time of George III., 1st series, p. 45. A pension of £4000 a year to Lord Holderness passed without a murmur, while one of £3000 a year to Mr. Pitt raised a general burst of indignation, only because the country regarded the latter as lowering their idol to the level of the jobbing statesmen of the day. The cry against Mr. Pitt was, indeed, almost universal. See letter to Mr. Conway, vol. iv. of Walpole’s Collected Correspondence, p. 184; and particularly the note containing the opposite opinions of Mr. Gray and Mr. Burke. Mr. Pitt’s noble refusal of the vast emoluments of the Pay-office, which so enriched those who preceded and succeeded him as Paymaster, entitles his conduct in all pecuniary matters to a liberal construction from posterity. What is really to be regretted, is the humiliating tone of his correspondence with Lord Bute, in accepting the pension (Chatham Correspondence, vol. ii. p. 152,) and his language at his interview with the King on that occasion.—Annual Register for 1761. But we will not dwell on the defects of a man who certainly was far above his age, not only in talent, but in real independence.—E.

[120] Thomas Prowse, member for Somersetshire, which he had represented in five successive Parliaments, having been every time unanimously elected. He was an opulent, well-informed, and influential country gentleman. He died, after a long illness, in 1767, aged 59, and was buried in Axbridge Church; where the long panegyric on his tomb states—“That though frequently solicited, he never could be prevailed upon to accept any employment in the state.” Collinson’s History of Somerset, vol. iii. p. 563.—E.

[121] Edward Bacon, of Earlham Hall, Norfolk, barrister-at-law, and M. P. for Norwich. He was son of Walter Bacon, of Earlham Hall, and M. P. for Norwich. Mr. Edward Bacon had been member for Lynn in 1742. He represented Norwich from 1752 to 1784, when he retired from Parliament. He died in March 1786, and was buried in the chancel of Earlham Church. His portrait is still preserved at Earlham Hall.—E.

[122] A more favourable character of Sir John Cust is given in the preface of Moore’s General Index to the Journals of the House of Commons, vol. iv.; a very useful work, to the compilation of which he contributed. He added to great industry, a considerable knowledge of Parliamentary history and constitutional law; and his amiable disposition and obliging temper were no insignificant recommendations to the Speakership. He was a Lincolnshire country gentleman, of ancient family, and had inherited a great estate from his mother, the heiress of the Tyrconnels.—E.

[123] Sir Hugh Smithson Percy, Earl of Northumberland.

[124] John Berkeley, fifth and last Lord Berkeley of Stratton. He died without issue in 1773, having left his principal estates to Lord Berkeley.—E.

[125] It is certain that Monsieur de Bussy told different persons what the Duke of Bedford had said to him, particularly to Lady Hervey, from whom I heard it.

[126] George Spencer, Duke of Marlborough, K.G. He was son-in-law of the Duke of Bedford. He died in January 1817, aged 78.—E.

[127] Thomas Lord Parker, eldest son of the Earl of Macclesfield, whom he succeeded in that title in March 1764. Like his father, he cultivated the mathematics successfully, and was much respected. He had been defeated in the great contest for the county of Oxford in 1757, but was seated on petition. He died in 1795, aged 72.—E.

[128] The famous John Wilkes, member for Aylesbury, and author of “The North Briton.”

[129] George Dempster, an East India Director, and for nearly thirty years member for the Perth district of Boroughs. He was the friend of Dr. Johnson, and the patron of Robert Burns; and is described by Mr. Croker as a man of talents and very agreeable manners. He took an active part in all the debates of the House on East India questions; and was one of the few who, after defending Warren Hastings, gave a zealous support to Fox’s India Bill. He died about the year 1790, at a very advanced age. Croker’s Boswell, vol. i. p. 418. Annual Necrology, vol. iii. p. 141.—E.

[130] Peregrine Cust. He is mentioned in Churchill’s Satires.

[131] Eliab Harvey, brother of William Harvey of Chigwell, in Essex, died in 1769.

[132] During the administration of Sir Robert Walpole the Opposition propagated a report, which was universally believed, that the Spaniards, though at peace with us, had taken one of our ships, and cut off the captain’s ears.

[133] This was the famous sentence so often quoted, and so often ridiculed, in the pamphlets of that time.

[134] The Spanish Ambassador. See infra.

[135] Percy Windham Obrien, Earl of Thomond, second son of Sir William Windham, and brother of the Earl of Egremont. Their sister was married to Mr. George Grenville.

[136] Henry Arthur Herbert, Earl of Powis, having become male heir of this illustrious family by the death of the last peer, Henry Lord Herbert, of Cherbury, in 1738, he was created Lord Herbert in 1743, and Earl of Powis in 1748. His Lordship married Barbara, sole daughter and heiress of Lord Edward Herbert, brother of the last Marquis of Powis, and died in 1772, leaving a son, on whose death in 1801 the earldom became extinct.—E.

[137] Next brother of the Duke of Devonshire.

[138] Second son of Charles Lord Viscount Townshend.

[139] Thomas Charles Bunbury, called, after his father’s death, Sir Charles Bunbury. [He represented the county of Suffolk for forty-five years, and died in March 1821, in his 81st year. He forsook politics for horse-racing, which he found a more congenial pursuit, and was long considered as the father of the turf. See more of him in Selwyn’s Correspondence, vol. ii. p. 180.—E.]

[140] At the conferences held there previously to the Treaty of Utrecht.

[141] In twenty-eight years, viz. to 1788, the King has not once been at Hanover, nor seems to design it.

[142] Additional particulars respecting Colonel Barré are given in Chatham Correspondence, vol. ii. p. 41, 168–171. See especially the notes, containing extracts from the Mitchell MSS.—E.

[143] Richard Glover, a merchant, who, by superior intelligence, great fluency of speech in public, and some reputation as a poet, had gained considerable influence in the City, and was thought of sufficient importance to be admitted into the councils of Leicester House. This distinction, and the success of his poems, which had all a political tendency, made him fancy himself on an equality with Pitt, Lyttelton, and the other men of talent who surrounded the Prince of Wales. The illusion was painfully dispelled. The sudden death of the Prince broke up the party; Mr. Glover’s services were no longer required; and happening to be at the time under commercial embarrassments, he sank into obscurity. In a few years, however, by diligent application, and a successful speculation in the copper trade, he retrieved his fortunes, but he never forgave the neglect of his former associates; and the memoirs he left behind him show the angry feelings he entertained, particularly against Mr. Pitt. To this circumstance he probably owed his seat for Weymouth, the borough being one of those which Mr. Dodington placed at the disposal of Lord Bute. Mr. Glover died in 1785, aged 73. His autobiography from 1742 to 1757 was published in 1813, under the title of Memoirs of a Distinguished Literary and Political Character. They are not without spirit, but show few signs of a powerful mind, and are in every respect inferior to what might have been expected from him.—E.

[144] James Oswald, of Brunnikier, joint Vice-Treasurer of Ireland.

[145] Dr. George Hay, of the Commons, one of the Commissioners of the Admiralty.

[146] George Cooke, Prothonotary, member for Middlesex.

[147] Second son of John Duke of Argyle, for many years Lord Register of Scotland in Mr. Pitt’s administration.—E.

[148] Robert Nugent, Esq., of Gosfield, in Essex, afterwards Earl Nugent. See infra.

[149] This became a stronger truth every day.

[150] Mr. Gascoyne was the only son of Sir Crispe Gascoyne, Lord Mayor of London, from whom he inherited a considerable estate. He had a strong understanding, and was esteemed highly as a man of business. His rough deportment had gained him at the University (we are told by Wilkes) the appellation of the Butcher; and he took no pains to get rid of it. He was also called “the King of Barking,” his country residence and principal patrimony being in that village, where he was much respected, and where he lies buried. He died in 1791. The late Marchioness of Salisbury was his granddaughter, and inherited his estates.—E.

[151] Soon after, seeing another member give Barré a biscuit, Townshend said, “Oh! you should feed him with raw flesh.”

[152] George Augustus Selwyn, of Matson, Gloucestershire, famous for his wit. His correspondence has been recently published in 4 vols. 8vo.—E.

[153] Philip Francis, translator of Horace and Demosthenes, and the father of Sir Philip Francis, K.B.; a scholar and a man of talent, and a most active political partisan. He was for some time the tutor of Gibbon.—E.

[154] “Of this very alarming connection Mr. Pitt had the most early and authentic intelligence, together with the most positive assurances from persons of undoubted veracity, who are at this moment in no common sphere of life.” History of the Minority, p. 30. Mr. Adolphus states the treaty itself to have been communicated to Mr. Pitt by the Earl Marechal Keith, in gratitude for the reversal of his attainder, but “that the fact, if it existed, was not disclosed to the Cabinet,” Adolphus, vol. i. p. 44. This story receives some confirmation from a cotemporary memoir of the Earl Marechal recently published by the Spalding Society of Aberdeen, and supposed to have been written by Sir Robert Strange, who had once been a zealous Jacobite. Neither the Chatham Correspondence nor the Mitchell manuscripts contain anything on the subject; and the papers of the Earl Marechal, at Cumbernald, have never been thoroughly examined. The Editor is disposed to believe the intelligence received by Mr. Pitt did not go so far as the existence of the treaty, but consisted of facts sufficient, in his estimation, to leave no doubt of the object of the negotiation between France and Spain, and of the general intentions of the Spanish government. These facts he had imparted to Lord Bute, who had not drawn the same conclusions from them. Hist. of Minority, p. 33.—E.

[155] Charles Pratt was a younger son of Lord Chief Justice Pratt, and became afterwards Lord Chancellor and Baron Camden, as will appear in these memoirs. Pratt had been made Attorney-General by Pitt in 1757, and their connection was too close for the Government to feel easy at his continuing any longer in office.—E.

[156] He nevertheless made a favourable impression on the Duke of Newcastle, at their first interview; and at a later period we find him very handsomely mentioned by Lord Rochford. Some of his private letters in the Chatham Correspondence, as well as his public dispatches in the Parliamentary Papers, are those of an ambassador who understood his duty, and performed it. He laboured hard, in conjunction with his friend the Marquis of Grimaldi, to restore the old connection of his country with France; and one result of their success was, the appointment of Grimaldi to succeed Wall as First Minister of Spain. Fuentes, then, for some time, replaced Grimaldi at Paris; and subsequently returning to Spain, he employed all his influence, which was considerable, in supporting Grimaldi’s administration, until the latter imprudently allowed his son, the Prince of Pignatelli, to accompany the expedition to Algiers, under the Count O’Reily, in 1777, where the Prince perished; and Fuentes, who had refused his consent to his going, was so deeply offended, that he immediately joined the opposition to Grimaldi, and contributed essentially to his retirement from office. Coxe’s History of the Kings of Spain of the House of Bourbon, vol. v.—E.

[157] George William Hervey, Earl of Bristol, son of the famous John Lord Hervey, and grandson of John Earl of Bristol, whom he succeeded in the title. His dispatches prove him to have acted with great prudence as long as the disposition of the Spanish Court was doubtful and with great spirit afterwards. His connection with Mr. Pitt was in no degree of a servile character. It appears to have strengthened as that great minister was losing his ascendancy in the Cabinet, and it stood the test of his downfall. Lord Bristol died unmarried, in March 1775, aged 54.—E.

[158] Amelie Sophie de Walmoden, Countess of Yarmouth, mistress of George the Second.

[159] Philip Yorke, Earl of Hardwicke, Lord Chancellor in the preceding reign.

[160] William Murray, Lord Mansfield, Lord Chief Justice of the King’s Bench.

[161] John Carteret, Earl Granville, President of the Council, and formerly Prime Minister to George the Second.

[162] George Lord Anson, first Lord of the Admiralty.

[163] James Lord Tyrawley, formerly Ambassador at Lisbon, Governor of Port Mahon and Gibraltar, and Colonel of a regiment of Guards.

[164] George Keppel, third Earl of Albemarle, one of the Lords of the Bedchamber to William Duke of Cumberland.

[165] Frederick Lord North, eldest son of Francis Earl of Guilford.

[166] Thomas Walpole, second son of Horatio Lord Walpole, only brother of Sir Robert Walpole, Earl of Orford. Thomas married the eldest daughter of Sir Joshua Vanneck, with whom he dwelt in the City.

[167] Augustus Keppel, second son, and William Keppel, Groom of the Bedchamber to William Duke of Cumberland, third son of William Anne second Earl of Albemarle.

[168] Humphrey Parsons, formerly Lord Mayor of London, a great brewer. Odunn was an Irishman.

[169] Bishop Newton gives an anecdote of this prelate, not much to his credit. When it was proposed to allow monuments to be erected in St. Paul’s Cathedral, he violently opposed the plan, on the ground that, as there had been no monuments in all the time before he was bishop, there should be none in his time. Bishop Newton’s Life, p. 145.—E.

[170] Charles Lyttelton, brother of Lord Lyttelton, and President of the Antiquarian Society, died in 1768, aged 54. Warburton sneers at “his antiquarianism,” to which he was more exclusively devoted than strictly became his high position in the Church. On the other hand, he was what Bishop Warburton certainly was not, a very amiable, kind-hearted man. In early life he had been a barrister.—George Selwyn and his Contemporaries, vol. i. p. 71.—E.

[171] A greater military critic, General Jomini, was of a different opinion. He pronounces Broglio to be the only French commander of that day whose operations were uniformly skilful. He had fought in more battles than perhaps any of his contemporaries. An authentic account of his life would still be of value, but his fame was eclipsed by the exploits of younger heroes, and he had even ceased to be an object of interest when he died in exile at Munster, in 1804, at the advanced age of 86.—E.

[172] The Count de Broglio’s talents were undeniable. It was his misfortune, not less than his fault, that they were seldom well directed. His brilliant defence of Cassel during the Seven years’ war showed that he had no mean capacity for war; but his ambition was, to shine as a statesman, and, unhappily for him, the enmity of Choiseul excluded him from civil employments. Partly, perhaps, out of revenge, and partly from his love of political intrigue, he condescended to take charge of the secret correspondence which Louis the Fifteenth carried on for many years, independently of his ministers, at the principal foreign Courts, a system which made it almost impossible for an honourable man to serve the King with benefit. M. de Broglio eventually fell into disgrace, and died in obscurity in 1781, aged 62.—E.

[173] Granville Leveson Gower, Earl Gower, a converted Jacobite.

[174] George Walpole, Earl of Orford, grandson of Sir Robert Walpole.

[175] Francis Egerton, Duke of Bridgwater, author of the famous Navigation.

[176] William Henry, afterwards Duke of Gloucester.

[177] Edward Legrand, Esq., Governor to Prince William and Prince Henry.

[178] George Montagu Dunk, third and last Earl of Halifax, of that house. He was a nobleman of great elegance of person and manners, and of a cultivated mind, and was quite equal to his post, which did not then, as now, require decided ability as well as rank and good intentions to satisfy the expectations of the country. “He never,” says Cumberland, “could be mistaken for less than he was.” He maintained the magnificence of the Vice-Regal Court, whilst he attended closely to public business.—E.

[179] The Court of the Lords-Lieutenant.

[180] Wills Hill, Earl of Hilsborough. He had gone over to Ireland professedly on his private affairs; a large estate having recently been bequeathed to him by Sir William Cowper. Letter from Lord Barrington to Sir A. Mitchell.—Ellis’s Original Letters, vol. vii. p. 443.—E.

[181] Dr. George Stone, Archbishop of Armagh. See the preceding reign.

[182] William Gerard Hamilton, son of a Scotch lawyer, made two good speeches, and only two, in the English House of Commons. One being forgotten (the last being of inferior merit to the other), he was long known by the name of Single-speech. He came into Parliament in 1754; and after sitting silent for somewhat more than a year, at length delivered that single speech upon which his reputation has exclusively rested down to the present day. This speech, which we are told was set and full of antitheses, was in favour of the Ministry, and was speedily rewarded by a place at the Board of Trade.—Edinburgh Review, vol. xv. p. 164. He had a promptitude of thought, and a rapid flow of well-conceived matter, with many other requisites that only seemed waiting for opportunities to establish his reputation as an orator. These were set off by a striking countenance, a graceful carriage, great self-possession, and personal courage.—Cumberland’s Memoirs, i. 225. With all these advantages he did not rise to eminence, nor did he deserve it, for his views were narrow, and he was selfish and cold-hearted. He resumed his silence upon attaining the lucrative and sinecure office of Chancellor of the Exchequer in Ireland, and died in 1796, rich and unmarried. His “Parliamentary Logic” is an insignificant work.—E.

[183] Robert Monckton, brother of Lord Galway, a very gallant officer, who signed the reddition of Quebec, and performed other memorable services in that war.

[184] Sir George Bridges Rodney, afterwards Lord Rodney, the great naval commander. He died in 1792.—E.

[185] Colonel John Burgoyne, natural son of W. Benson, Lord Bingley. He proved a very unfortunate commander in the subsequent American war. He was also an author, and wrote that excellent comedy, “The Heiress.”

[186] Infidelity was then no uncommon charge against an unsuccessful commander. The Prince had in 1752 been worsted at Breslau, where he had only twenty-four thousand men to oppose to an army of ninety thousand, under Daun and Prince Charles of Lorraine. In return, he defeated Daun in 1762 at Reichenbad, a victory that decided the fate of Schweidnitz, and thus contributed to the final success of Prince Henry of Prussia at Friedberg.—E.

[187] Considering that Lord Tyrawley was in his 72nd year, and had not been employed on active service for a very long period, the Government surely acted discreetly in not appointing him to this command. He died in 1773, in his 83rd year. His life had been singularly licentious, even for the Courts of Russia and Portugal, where, however, he acquired extraordinary influence, for he had a thorough knowledge of the world, a great deal of humour, and an undaunted spirit. See more of him in Walpole’s Memoirs, vol. ii. p. 291; and Lord Chatham’s Correspondence.—E.

[188] This remarkable man was Sovereign of Lippe Buckebourgh, a petty state, lying on the confines of Hanover and Westphalia. His mother was daughter of George the First, by the Duchess of Kendal. He received the early part of his education in England, and held a commission in the Guards: at nineteen, he served at the battle of Dettingen; and two years after he showed signal intrepidity as a volunteer under Prince Lobkowitz, in Italy. At the outset of the Seven years’ war he joined the Confederates with his small contingent, and bore a prominent part in the various military operations that ensued. His bravery, in common with his opinions, had a tinge of eccentricity, but the boldness and originality of his mind were not ill directed. He became an enterprising and successful partisan, and an able commander of artillery; in which latter capacity he distinguished himself both at Minden and at Kampen. Being intrusted with a separate corps for the reduction of Munster, he not only captured the place, but defeated General Armentières, who had been sent with a French army to its relief. It was in Portugal, however, that he established his reputation. “He found the army there,” says his biographer, “in a state of thorough disorganization, without either food or pay; even the guards at the Royal Palace implored alms from strangers, with bended knees and outstretched caps. The officers, impelled by want, followed various humble crafts. There were instances of the husband working as a journeyman tailor, whilst his wife earned her subsistence as a washerwoman; and captains might be seen bringing baskets of linen from the wash. Many were servants in the households of generals and governors; indeed servants were sometimes presented with commissions in order that their pay might serve in lieu of wages.” All these abuses the Count, unsupported, if not opposed by the Court and the ministers, succeeded in rectifying. With the assistance of the English, he checked the progress of the Spanish troops, and defeated them in several encounters. He built the citadel of Elvas. He organized a plan for the defence of the kingdom; and at the end of the war he quitted Portugal, followed by the gratitude and attachment of the King and the people. Indeed, the House of Braganza were not under greater obligations to his illustrious predecessor, Marshal Schomberg. His reforms show considerable acuteness and knowledge of character, and were completely successful. One of the most questionable was, that while he punished officers in Germany for accepting a challenge, he punished the Portuguese for refusing, with the view of restoring a martial spirit among the troops. The remainder of his life he passed at Buckebourgh, the chief town of La Lippe, beloved by his subjects, and always employed in promoting their prosperity, though he has been charged with sometimes mistaking himself for a great monarch, while he was only a petty prince. He married in 1765 the Countess of La Lippe Bustafeld, a young lady of great beauty and accomplishments, and had one daughter, whose early death was quickly followed by that of the mother; and the Count, inconsolable under this double affliction, fell into a lingering disorder, of which he died in 1777, at the age of 53. He enjoyed the warm friendship of the King of Prussia, the Prince Ferdinand of Brunswick, and other great commanders. They entertained a high opinion of his military capacity. He inspired a sort of enthusiasm in all around him. Even the Spanish officers, who used to ridicule his reforms, and when they first descried him in the field, with his large hat and little sword, contemptuously asked whether the Portuguese were commanded by Don Quixote, eventually partook of the general feeling of admiration that attached to his generosity—his extreme disinterestedness—his abilities and valour. Biographische Denkmale, von K. Barnhagen von Ense.—E.

[189] Doctor Johnson, in the newspapers of the day, published an account of this inquiry. His weakness consisted in so far giving confidence to this flimsy imposture, as to think a solemn inquiry necessary. Croker’s Boswell, vol. i. p. 415, note.—E.

[190] Though so notorious at the time, we have been able to find only one pamphlet on the subject in the British Museum, and the papers seem to have been very reluctant to give the names of the parties. July 10, 1762, William Parsons, Elizabeth his wife, Mary Fraser, the Ghost’s interpreter, a clergyman, and a respectable tradesman, were tried at Guildhall, and convicted of a conspiracy to defame a Mr. Kent. In the Annual Register it is said, “The Court chusing that Mr. Kent, who had been so much injured on the occasion, should receive some reparation by punishment of the offenders, deferred giving judgment for seven or eight months, in hopes that the parties might make it up in the meantime. Accordingly, the clergyman and tradesman agreed to pay Mr. Kent a round sum—some say between 500l. and 600l.—to purchase their pardon, and were, therefore, dismissed with a severe reprimand. The father was ordered to be set in the pillory three times in one month—once at the end of Cock Lane; Elizabeth his wife to be imprisoned one year; and Mary Fraser six months in Bridewell, with hard labour. The father appearing to be out of his mind at the time he was first to stand in the pillory, the execution of that part of his sentence was deferred to another day, when, as well as the other day of his standing there, the populace took so much compassion on him, that instead of using him ill, they made a handsome subscription for him.”—v. Annual Register, vol. cxlii. and Gentleman’s Magazine, 1762, pp. 43 and 339. The liberty to speak to the prosecutor, described above as sanctioned by Lord Mansfield, would not now be so openly permitted, even by a bench of Middlesex Magistrates. Churchill’s poem mentions “the Ghost,” only as a peg to hang a satire upon. It has much vigour, but a key is wanted, and probably nobody can supply one to the allusions, or even the regularly drawn characters of the greater part: Johnson, Warburton, Mansfield, and one or two more are apparent. “The Ghost” has also furnished the very clever scene of the trial of Fanny the Phantom, in Foote’s farce of “The Orators.”—E.

[191] Dr. Thomas Secker.

[192] Prospero Lambertini, one of the most learned, enlightened, and virtuous prelates that ever filled the Papal chair. Protestants have vied with Catholics in doing honour to his memory. He died in 1758, at a very advanced age.—E.

[193] Lady Selina Shirley, Countess Dowager of Huntingdon. Her “Life and Times,” published a few years ago in 2 vols. 8vo., contains a graphical and interesting account of the sect which she originated and supported. Notwithstanding Walpole’s sneers, she appears to have been a woman of genuine piety; and her zeal, though sometimes misdirected, did, on the whole, essential service to the cause of religion.—E.

[194] Frederick the Third, King of Prussia.

[195] Count Schouvalow afterwards passed some time in England, and was a frequent guest at Strawberry Hill.—E.

[196] Francis Seymour Conway, Earl of Hertford, appointed Lord Lieutenant of Ireland in 1765, while he was Ambassador in France.

[197] Nevertheless, the French were at the time suspected of promoting, if not of originating, the insurrection. Lord Drogheda, who was employed with his regiment against the insurgents, told Sir Richard Musgrave that French money was found in the pockets of some of those killed, by the soldiers. Musgrave’s History of the Rebellion in Ireland, p. 35.—E.

[198] Gilbert Elliot and James Oswald, Scots, and Commissioners of the Treasury.—See infra.

[199] It appears by a letter from the Duke to Lord Hardwicke, of the 7th May, that the Duke’s earnestness to prosecute the German war, in opposition to the wishes of Lord Bute, caused a final breach between them. Adolphus, vol. i. p. 68.—E.

[200] Thomas Duke of Newcastle, and Henry Pelham, his only brother.

[201] Henry Clinton, Earl of Lincoln, nephew of the Pelhams, and afterwards Duke of Newcastle.

[202] Thomas Pelham of Stanmore, afterwards Lord Pelham.

[203] This subtle, insinuating Italian had paid his Court to Lord Bute in the preceding reign, and obtained a great ascendancy over him. Though a man of quality, he had been a monk, and the world and the cloister had united to make him an accomplished statesman. He eventually rose to be first minister of Sardinia. His main fault was that he used too much finesse and precaution, and attached too great importance to trifles. Some amusing anecdotes of him are told in Memoirs of a Traveller now in Retirement, vol. ii. p. 63.—E.

[204] The Bailli de Solar had been the Sardinian Ambassador at Rome, at the same time that the Duc de Choiseul was the French Ambassador there, and a warm friendship had existed between them from that period.—E.

[205] The communication made by Lord Bute to the Court of Vienna, appears to have originated in the belief that the Austrians were, on national grounds, more inclined to peace than any of the other powers. Considering the close connection existing between the Courts of Vienna and Paris, and the certainty that such a step would be viewed in the worst light by the King of Prussia, it must be regarded as a blunder. The correspondence that passed on the occasion is printed in the Appendix to Adolphus, vol. i. p. 578. There is an able Essay on the subject in the Appendix to the 1st vol. of Belsham.—E.

[206] Sir Edward Noel, Bart., Baron Wentworth of Nettleshead, created Viscount Wentworth of Welsborough, county of Leicester.

[207] Sir William Courtenay, Bart., chief of the great house of Courtenay. He had, like his father, represented the county of Devon for many years. He survived his creation only ten days. The title became extinct on the decease of his grandson, the late Earl of Devon.—E.

[208] John Percival, Earl of Egmont.—An amusing account of the importunities and intrigues by which he wrung his title from Lord Bute, is given by his friend Dodington, in the Diary of the latter.—E.

[209] Joseph Damer, Lord Milton, created Baron Milton of Milton Abbey, county Dorset: married Caroline, third daughter of Lionel Duke of Dorset. Sat in several Parliaments, from 1741 to 1754. He claimed a descent from the ancient Barons d’Amorie; but his wife’s genealogy, and his own wealth, of which the origin had certainly nothing distinguished in it, were the more probable causes of his elevation.—Banks, vol. iii. p. 516. He died in 1798. The title became extinct upon the death of his son George second Lord, unmarried, in 1808.—E.

[210] Created Baron Beaulieu, of Beaulieu, county Southampton, 11th May, 1762, to hold to him and the heirs male of his body by Isabella Duchess Dowager of Manchester, eldest daughter of John late Duke of Montagu, deceased, his then wife. In 1743, on the death of his father-in-law, the Duke of Montagu, he had taken the name and arms of that noble family, by Act of Parliament. Installed a K.B. 1753. In 1784 advanced to the dignity of Earl Beaulieu, and died 1803, when his honours became extinct. He was a comely, athletic, and spirited Irishman, and his marriage with the Duchess disappointed many aspirants to that honour. One of them, Sir Charles Hanbury Williams, revenged himself by a well-known lampoon.—E.

[211] Francis Vernon, (some time M. P. for Ipswich,) created Baron Orwell, of Newry, county Down, in the kingdom of Ireland, 7th April, 1762. He was second son of James Vernon, of Great Thurlow, county Suffolk, Esq., by Arethusa, daughter of Charles Lord Clifford, only son of Richard first Earl of Burlington, which James was younger brother of the well-known Admiral Vernon.—E.

[212] George Fox Lane, created Lord Bingley—he had married the only daughter and heiress of the last Lord of the same name. He died in 1773, S.P.—E.

[213] George Venables Vernon, Lord Vernon of Kinderton. He was the son of Henry Vernon, Esq., M. P., and therefore grand-nephew of Peter Venables, last Baron of Kinderton. He died in 1780.—E.

[214] John Olmius, many years director of the Bank. In 1737, M. P. for the Weymouth boroughs. Created 8th May, 1762, Baron Waltham of Philipstown, and died in September following.—E.

[215] Charles Lewis Frederick, Prince of Mecklenburg, brother of the Duke of Mecklenburg and of Queen Charlotte. Born 1741.—E.

[216] Buckingham House, in St. James’s Park, built by John Sheffield, Duke of Buckingham, was purchased of his natural son, Sir Charles Sheffield, and named the Queen’s Palace. The mob called it in derision, Holyrood House.

[217] James Stuart Mackenzie, only brother of the Earl of Bute. He had been Minister at Turin from 1758 to 1762, when he was appointed to Venice; but, before he could leave Turin, the death of the Duke of Argyle caused Lord Bute to bring him home abruptly to take the direction of the Government in Scotland; an exercise of the Favourite’s power, which proved him to be virtually at the head of the Administration. From the same feelings of exclusiveness, Lord Bute subsequently selected Mr. Mackenzie, in preference to any of his colleagues in the Cabinet, to assist him in the early part of the negotiations for peace. Whatever points were settled by his Lordship with the King, were then communicated, through Mr. Mackenzie, to the Count de Virri, by whom they were transmitted, through the Bailli de Solar, to the Duke of Choiseul, and it was only after an article had been actually agreed upon that it came officially under the cognizance of the Foreign Department; so that these two foreigners appear to have possessed more of Lord Bute’s confidence, as well as more influence over the negotiation, than the Secretary of State, Lord Egremont; a circumstance which rather explains the jealousy shown by the Cabinet, when the preliminaries had been settled, of any independent authority being given to the Duke of Bedford. These duties Mr. Mackenzie discharged irreproachably, and, far from sharing his brother’s unpopularity, was much esteemed by all parties. He is described by his secretary, M. Dutens, as having been most amiable, remarkably cheerful and pleasant in society, with very simple tastes, and no ambition; “well versed in the sciences, particularly in mathematics, algebra, and astronomy.” He took little part in public affairs after Lord Bute’s resignation, and died in 1800, at the age of 81 years, only a few months after the death of his wife, the daughter of John Duke of Argyle. Memoirs of a Traveller now in Retirement, vol. i. p. 159; vol. iv. p. 229.—E.

[218] Meaning Lord Bute, who was introducing the Tories in the place of the Whigs.

[219] Nicholson Calvert, of Hunsdon House, Hertfordshire, member for Tewkesbury, and sheriff for Hertfordshire in 1749. He was the second son of Felix Calvert of Furneaux Pelham Hall, but succeeded to the family property by the death of his elder brother. It is a pity that his madness was not catching, for he was one of the most honest and independent members in the House, an eminent agriculturist, and an active county magistrate. In politics he was “a Whig, and something more.” He died without issue in 1793.—E.

[220] This speech “is said to have silenced all future attacks by the poet either on Mr. Pitt or his administration, and was well received on all sides.”—Hansard’s Par. Hist. xv., p. 1227, note.—E.

[221] Of Newcastle.

[222] George Prince of Wales, afterwards King George the Second.

[223] Frederick Prince of Wales, against whom the Duke of Newcastle carried the chancellorship of Cambridge.

[224] Lord Bute had the ill-natured arrogance to compliment him on his retirement: the Duke replied with a spirit that marked his lasting ambition, “Yes, yes, my Lord, I am an old man; but yesterday was my birth-day, and I recollected that Cardinal Fleury began to be prime minister of France just at my age.”

[225] Frederick, brother of Earl Cornwallis, and afterwards Archbishop of Canterbury. Young, of Norwich, was out of town, but adhered faithfully to Newcastle.

[226] Sir Francis Dashwood’s want of knowledge of finance opened a fine field for the wits of the day, and was of course greatly exaggerated. One of them describes him as “a man to whom a sum of five figures was an impenetrable secret.” His vocation, certainly, was not to the Exchequer; and he was unfortunate in having Mr. Legge for his predecessor. There were other high offices of the Government which he would have filled with credit, for he had respectable talents, was “spirited, frank, and manly,” and had gained the consideration of the House. (Smollet.) He was the only son of Sir Francis Dashwood, Baronet, M.P. for Winchelsea, by Lady Mary Fane, sister of the Earl of Westmoreland, often mentioned in these Memoirs. In his youth he had travelled much, especially in Italy, and passed some time at Rome, where he was long recollected from the following anecdote, which made a great noise at the time. “It was on Good Friday, when each person who attends the service in the Sistine Chapel, as he enters, takes a small scourge from an attendant at the door. The chapel is dimly lighted, and there are three candles which are extinguished by the priest, one by one: at the putting out of the first, the penitents take off one part of their dress; at the next still more; and, in the darkness which follows the extinguishing of the third candle, lay on their own shoulders, with groans and lamentations. Sir Francis Dashwood, thinking this mere stage effect, entered with others, dressed in a large watchman’s coat; demurely took his scourge from the priest, and advanced to the end of the chapel; where, on the darkness ensuing, he drew from beneath his coat an English horsewhip and flogged right and left quite down the chapel and made his escape, the congregation exclaiming ‘Il diavolo! il diavolo!’ and thinking the Evil one was upon them with a vengeance! The consequence of this frolic might have been serious to him, had he not immediately fled the Papal dominions.”—(Private Information.) His political life was by no means discreditable; and, in the unfortunate affair of Admiral Byng, he exhibited kindness of feeling not less than tact and decision, which Walpole has elsewhere handsomely noticed.—Memoirs, ii. p. 145. He had a taste for the arts, and brought sculptors and painters from Italy to decorate his country-seat at West Wycombe, in Buckinghamshire, where he laid out an extensive park with skill and effect, and built a church and mausoleum. His private life was reported to be very licentious. He married the widow of Sir Richard Ellys, Baronet, by whom he had no children, and died in 1781. The peerage, to which his claim is mentioned in a following page, descended to the Stapylton family.—E.

[227] They called themselves the Dilettanti. In the year 1770, they published a pompous volume on some rubbish remaining of two or three temples in Ionia.

[228] William Henry, third son of Frederick Prince of Wales; afterwards Duke of Gloucester.

[229] Lord Bute held his levées at the Cockpit, Whitehall, as did afterwards the Duke of Grafton and Lord North. Till then, each minister saw company at his own house; but Lord Bute, who lived in a small house in Audley Street, Grosvenor Square, had not room enough.

[230] Mr., afterwards Sir Gilbert, Elliot, father of the late Earl of Minto. His connection with Lord Bute does credit to that nobleman’s discernment, for he was a most useful coadjutor; and Professor Stewart says of him, that he “seems to have united with his other well-known talents and accomplishments, a taste for abstract disquisitions which rarely occurs in men of the world, accompanied with that soundness and temperance of judgment which in such researches are so indispensably necessary to guard the mind against the illusions engendered by its own subtility.”—Philosophy of the Human Mind, vol. ii. p. 530.—E.

[231] Dr. Smollet, originally a ship-surgeon, was an abusive Jacobite writer, author of a compilation of the History of England, in which he had spoken most scurrilously of the Duke of Cumberland for suppressing the Rebellion, and had been punished by the King’s Bench for slandering Admiral Knowles. [His “genius,” however, to use the words of Walter Scott, “has raised an imperishable monument to his memory,” in the poems and novels which Walpole does not deign to notice in this allusion to his works. Nor is the criticism just in other respects. Smollet’s tracts are not more virulent than most publications of a similar character of that day. His censure of the Duke of Cumberland has been confirmed by subsequent historians, and his punishment for the libel on Admiral Knowles reflects discredit on the Admiral rather than on himself.—See Walter Scott’s Lives of the Novelists, vol. i. p. 143.—E.]

[232] Murphy, once an actor, was turned hackney writer, and had engaged in a paper called the Contest, in behalf of Lord Holland. He stole many plays from the French, and published other things long since forgotten. [“The Way to keep Him,” and “All in the Wrong,” are alone a sufficient refutation of the above harsh criticism on Murphy. He was a person of considerable accomplishments, and wanted only a better temper and more independence of character to have risen to eminence. He died at an advanced age in 1805.—E.]

Smollet and Murphy, with Dr. Shebbeare, who was in Newgate for abusing King George the First, King George the Second, King William, and the Revolution, and Dr. Johnson, another known Jacobite, who even in a Dictionary had vented his Jacobite principles, were selected by Lord Bute to defend his cause, and pensioned by him as a patron of learned men. Johnson’s acceptance of a pension was the more ridiculous, as in his Dictionary he had lashed the infamy of pensioners. [Neither Smollet nor Murphy were pensioned by Lord Bute. The bounty of the Crown was never more inexcusably exercised than in favour of Dr. Shebbeare—a pamphleteer who was a disgrace to his party, and had not long before been concerned in some fraudulent practices at Oxford, when employed by the University to arrange the Clarendon papers. He died in 1788, at a very advanced age. Dr. Johnson’s pension was not subjected to any conditions.—Boswell, vol. i. p. 292.—E.]

[233] His father was a distiller.

[234] Mr. Southey, opposed as he was to the political creed of Churchill, thought more favourably of him. He praises the generosity and straightforwardness of his character, and says of his poems that “manly sense is their characteristic, deriving strength from indignation, and that they contain passages of sound morality and permanent truth.” Cowper had a higher opinion of him than of any other contemporary writer, and even goes so far as to style him “the great Churchill.”—Southey’s Cowper, p. 87.—E.

[235] Groom of the Bedchamber to William Duke of Cumberland, and Commander in America. He was afterwards Knight of the Bath, and called Sir Joseph Amherst. He was subsequently made a Peer and Commander-in-Chief, [and lastly Field-Marshal. He had been the favourite aide-de-camp of Lord Ligonier during the German wars, and bore through life the reputation of a very able and zealous officer. He distinguished himself particularly in America. He died in 1797, in his eighty-first year.—E.]

[236] Alluding to the defeat of the French near Giessau, by Prince Ferdinand, on the 26th September, when he drove them from all their posts, and obliged them to fly with precipitation behind the Nahn.—Annual Register, 1762, p. 49.—E.

[237] This narrative of the dethronement of Peter the Third has been confirmed in many essential points by later writers.—Tooke’s Catherine the Second.—Castera.—Levesque, Hist. de Russie, vol. v. 298. The precise extent of the guilt of the Empress is still a subject of dispute. The dethronement of her husband might be an act of self-defence, for he seems to have contemplated raising his mistress to the throne. His murder certainly had her ready forgiveness, if not her acquiescence, and there is nothing in her character to controvert its having been committed at her instigation. The attempt to exculpate her in the recently published Memoirs of the Princess Dashkau is very far from satisfactory, though it in some degree elevates the character of the authoress above the level of her contemporaries at the Court of St. Petersburgh, a court in those days without a parallel for the prevalence of the crimes and vices of a semi-barbarous age.—E.

[238] George third Earl, Augustus, and William, sons of William Anne second Earl of Albemarle. Frederick, the fourth son, was on this occasion promoted to the Bishoprick of Exeter. Of Augustus (afterwards Lord Keppel) see more in the preceding reign, under the History of Admiral Byng.—Memoirs, vol. ii. p. 174. [A very interesting account of his life was lately published by his kinsman, the Honourable and Reverend Thomas Augustus Keppel.—E.]

[239] Madame Geoffrin was proprietor of a great manufacture of glass; yet by her wit, parts, riches, and cabals, and by patronizing authors, and the modern philosophers and painters, statuaries and architects, and by keeping an open house for foreigners of all nations, she was much considered, and had great respect paid to her by persons of the first rank in France. [Marmontel draws a spirited portrait of her in his Memoirs.—E.]

[240] This is a very one-sided view of the character of the Duc de Nivernois. He had no pretensions to the character of a soldier, having been obliged to quit the army from ill-health at an early age. As a diplomatist, he certainly failed at Berlin—as all other diplomatists did, who brought proposals that did not suit the views of the King of Prussia. In England he gave great satisfaction to all parties. His popularity is noticed by Lord Chesterfield. He was a generous, though not perhaps a very discriminating, patron of letters, and a respectable writer for one who made literature only an amusement. His private life was exemplary; and he showed no common strength of mind in the firmness with which he bore the loss of his rank and property, and, above all, his heavy domestic misfortunes. His second wife, to whom he was tenderly attached, died a few days after marriage. Of his two sons-in-law, the Count de Gisors, his destined heir, an élève of Marmontel, fell at the battle of Crevelt: the remaining one, the Duc de Brissac, was torn to pieces by the mob at Paris, at the beginning of the Revolution. The Duke of Nivernois died in 1798, at a very advanced age.—E.

[241] Besides his crime of being the favourite of the Duke of Cumberland, Fox had deeply offended the Princess by advising Mr. Pelham, the very day after the death of her husband, to take her son, the present King, from her, that she might not get an ascendant over him. I one day mentioned this fact to Lord Mansfield: he said, “It was very true, and he believed the measure was not followed, only because Mr. Fox had advised it”—so jealous was Mr. Pelham of Fox!

[242] James Earl Waldegrave, Governor to George the Third when Prince.

[243] William Cavendish, fourth Duke of Devonshire, Lord Chamberlain.

[244] Many causes might be assigned for the Duke’s dissatisfaction. It is not improbable that a generous Prince might resent the indignity offered to his country. He might, too, resent the unrelenting hatred of the Princess, and his total exclusion from power. He might feel for Germany, his other country, which he saw neglected: or he might have hoped that the aversion of the Princess to the House of Brunswick would not cease without disgusting Prince Ferdinand; and that then, if the war had continued, the command would have once more devolved on himself.

[245] Samuel Martin, a West Indian, had been in the service of the late Prince of Wales. See more of him hereafter, and in Churchill’s “Duellist.” [He had been brought into the Treasury by Mr. Legge when the latter was made Chancellor of the Exchequer. Sir George Colebrooke’s MS. Memoirs represent him as a plain-spoken, honest man, and more to be depended upon than his joint secretary Mr. West.—E.]

[246] Richard Aldworth Neville, of Billingbere, Berkshire, [son of Mr. Aldworth of Stanlake, by Catherine sister of Mr. Henry Neville Grey of Billingbere, whose estate he subsequently inherited. He filled for some years the office of Under Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, which occasioned his being employed at Paris; and he represented Wallingford, Reading, and Tavistock in different Parliaments. The Barony of Braybrooke descended on his only son (the late Lord) by a special limitation in the patent obtained by his relative, Sir John Griffin, Lord Howard de Walden, whose large estates he also inherited.—History of Audley End, p. 54.—E.]

[247] This statement rests on Walpole’s unsupported testimony. The facts that I have been able to collect on the subject, in the quarters likely to be the best informed, are these:—On the 7th of September Lord Egremont wrote to the Duke of Bedford, informing him of the King’s commands that he should not sign the preliminaries without first sending them over for his Majesty’s approbation. On the 18th the Duke wrote to M. de Choiseul that he was ready to sign, and that he only waits his answer to send his messenger to London. On the 28th or 29th Lord Egremont wrote by the French courier of M. de Nivernois that the Havannah was taken. On the 30th he repeats the news, and promises fresh instructions. The Duke never pretended to sign against the King’s orders, though he complained of their tenor. Thus Walpole’s story becomes very improbable.—E.

[248] William Ponsonby, Earl of Besborough, one of the Postmasters-General, had married Lady Caroline Cavendish, eldest sister of the Duke of Devonshire.

[249] Mr. Fox did not go to Devonshire House to “protest his utter ignorance of any such design.” He wrote to the Duke at Chatsworth on the 2nd of November, to express his sorrow at what had happened; and in a subsequent letter of the 9th assured his Grace that “he neither knew nor had the least suspicion” of the intention to strike his Grace’s name out of the Privy Council.—Note by the late Mr. Allen, on the manuscript copy of these Memoirs.

[250] Turned out for his opposition to the Excise Scheme in 1733.

[251] Robert Harley, Earl of Oxford, Prime Minister to Queen Anne.

[252] William Keith, Earl Marichal, engaged in the rebellion of 1715. When he came out of the King’s closet, and was asked what the King had said, he replied in the words of the old ballad,

“The King looked over his left shoulder,
And a grim look looked he,
And cried ‘Earl Marshal, but for my oath,
Or hanged thou should’st be.’”

Lord Marichal was afterwards in the service of the King of Prussia, and Governor of Neufchatel. He was pardoned by King George the Third. He is one of the few persons whom Frederick appears to have really loved. He was a philosopher after the fashion of that monarch, but a more practical and amiable one; for he bore the loss of rank and wealth, and the various discomforts of a long and almost hopeless exile, with unostentatious cheerfulness, conducting himself all the while so prudently, that amidst his many political opponents he had not a single personal enemy. The general esteem that followed him through life afterwards attached to his memory; and his name is rarely to be found mentioned in the works of his contemporaries without some expressions showing an earnest desire to represent him in the fairest colours. D’Alembert wrote an éloge in his honour. His brother, Marshal Keith, was a man of far superior ability, and his exile was a serious loss to the British army. Lord Marichal died at Potsdam in 1778, in his eighty-sixth year.—Wood’s Peerage of Scotland.—E.

[253] The disgrace of the Duke of Devonshire.

[254] John Montagu, Earl of Sandwich. See more of him in the preceding reign, and in the subsequent part of this work.

[255] George Montagu, fourth Duke of Manchester.

[256] George Spencer, third Duke of Marlborough.

[257] Hugh Smithson Percy, Earl of Northumberland, afterwards Duke of Northumberland, and Lord Lieutenant of Ireland.

[258] John second Earl of Ashburnham, Lord of the Bedchamber, and Ranger of the Parks, died on the 8th of April, 1802, in his eighty-eighth year, and was succeeded by George the third Earl, K.G., the agreeable biographer of John Ashburnham.—E.

[259] Thomas Hay, Earl of Kinnoul, better known as Lord Dupplin. He had, in the preceding reign, held with credit, at different times, the offices of a Lord of the Treasury, of Paymaster, Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, &c., and was a frequent and useful speaker in the House of Commons, “where,” says Walpole, “he aimed at nothing but understanding business and explaining it.” The Duke of Newcastle chiefly relied upon him in the distribution of the secret service-money and the Government patronage among the members. His embassy to Lisbon is remembered by the satirical verse of Pope,

“Kinnoul’s lewd cargo and Tyrawley’s crew.”

He took very little part in public affairs afterwards; residing usually on his estates in Scotland, and devoting himself to rural improvements and matters of local interest. He died in 1787, aged 77, without issue, and was succeeded by his nephew.—E.

[260] Henry Clinton, Earl of Lincoln, Knight of the Garter, and one of the Lords of the Bedchamber, was son of Henry Earl of Lincoln and Lucy Pelham, sister of the Duke of Newcastle and Henry Pelham, First Lord of the Treasury; and having married his first-cousin, Catherine, eldest daughter and co-heiress of Mr. Pelham, the Duke’s estate, and a new creation of the Duchy of Newcastle in reversion, were settled on him. (He died in 1794, and was the grandfather of the present Duke.)—E.

[261] “This honest old General,” as he is called by Lord Chesterfield, owed his high rank entirely to his own merit, being a French Huguenot, of not distinguished parentage, and without connections in this country. He was a very brave, zealous, and intelligent officer. He had served with Marlborough in the German wars, and his conduct afterwards at Dettingen attracted the particular notice of George the Second, who invested him with the insignia of the Bath on the field, in front of the whole army. As an additional mark of the King’s favour, he was also raised to a high command in Flanders, from which time all the skill shown in the Duke of Cumberland’s military operations,—which at Fontenoy was not inconsiderable, for the battle was only lost by the misconduct of General Ingoldsby,—the army ascribed exclusively to him, his Royal Highness being believed to act in a great measure under his guidance: and, indeed, he was usually called the Duke’s military tutor. In the Duke’s absence during the Scotch rebellion of 1745, he succeeded to the command of the British troops in Flanders, and was present with ten battalions in the unfortunate battle of Raucoux, where he almost retrieved the errors of Prince Charles of Lorraine, and is admitted to have saved the army from total destruction. The brilliant charges of cavalry by which he protected the retreat of the allies have obtained the praise even of the French historians. (Coxe’s Pelham, vol. i. p. 322; Lacratelle, vol. ii. p. 350.) The Duke returned in the following year, as if only to lose the battle of Lafeldt; on which occasion Sir John Ligonier reaped the same melancholy glory that had attended him at Raucoux. At seventy years of age, he led a charge of cavalry that broke the enemy’s line, and had he not been taken prisoner, might have turned the fortune of the day. Louis the Fifteenth received him with distinction; and, though a rebellious subject, made him the bearer of the overtures of the peace, which, on the following year, was concluded at Aix-la-Chapelle. The remainder of his life was passed in less active service, and in the enjoyment of the rank and honours he had so well earned. In 1757 he was made Commander-in-chief; in 1759, Field-Marshal; in 1766, after passing through the subordinate steps in the peerage, he was created Earl Ligonier. He retained to the last the gaiety and amiability which had made him the favourite both of the army and the Court. His tastes were simple; one of his chief amusements being the embellishment of his country-seat in Surrey, of which his gardens were the admiration of the neighbourhood. He died in 1770, aged 92; and was succeeded in his title by his nephew, an estimable and popular nobleman, who had been Aide-de-camp to Prince Ferdinand at the battle of Minden, and on whose death, without issue, the title became extinct.—E.

[262] Welbore Ellis. See his character in the preceding reign.—Memoirs, vol. i. p. 484.

[263] Charles second Duke of Richmond, and Sarah Cadogan his Duchess. Fox had stolen their eldest daughter, Lady Caroline Lenox.

[264] For the borough of Lynn, in Norfolk.

[265] On the contested election for the borough of St. Michael, in Cornwall, Lord Orford, my nephew, had quarrelled with me for taking part with Fox. I offered to resign my seat, but would not give up the liberty of voting as I pleased.

[266] As Usher of the Exchequer, I advanced a very large sum of money every year to furnish the Treasury with paper, stationery wares, &c., and to pay the workmen; so that, if the payments are kept back, I am a considerable sufferer.

[267] The Rangership of St. James’s and Hyde Parks. This post was not worth two thousand two hundred pounds a year by itself, but with the Bedchamber; as Lord Ashburnham had held it. Lord Orford was already Lord of the Bedchamber; so, though I did not know it at that time, the offer was grossly fallacious. Fox, however, might be ignorant too of this circumstance.

[268] George Walpole, third Earl of Orford, grandson of Sir Robert Walpole. Not only his grandfather and father had left great debts, but his own dissipation had involved him in many more.

[269] He scarce ever had any thoughts about politics, but lived almost always in the country and at Newmarket, wasting his time and fortune by carelessness, rather than in pleasures and expenses. With a most engaging figure and address, he profited of no one advantage to which he was born; and, without any view of advantage to himself, disgusted every friend he had by insensibility, and every friend he might have had by insincerity.

[270] Charles Boone, brought into Parliament by Lord Orford for Castlerising. Fox had already sounded Lord Orford through Mr. Boone, but without receiving any answer.

[271] This alludes to my having projected a match for Lord Orford with Miss Nicholl, an heiress worth one hundred and fifty thousand pounds, whom Lord Orford would not marry; and in the course of which negotiation I had a great quarrel with my uncle, old Horace Walpole, who endeavoured, though trusted with her by me, to marry her to one of his own younger sons. This quarrel had made very great noise, and many persons were engaged in it. The young lady afterwards married the Marquis of Caernarvon.

[272] Mr. Fox had supported Mr. Sullivan at a borough in the West against Mr. T. Walpole; I forget whether it was Callington or Ashburton. Lord Orford was heir to estates in both by his mother.

[273] Mr. Boone had acquainted me with this, and Mr. Fox thought I did not know it, but I chose to let him see I did.

[274] Thomas Thynne, Viscount Weymouth, afterwards one of the Secretaries of State.

[275] Sir John Probyn, K.B., Lord Carysfort of Ireland. His son and successor was ambassador at St. Petersburgh at the beginning of the present century.—E.

[276] George Fermor, second Earl of Pomfret, brother-in-law to Earl Granville. He was clever, and a ready speaker; but so hot, headstrong, and injudicious, that his support was of very questionable benefit to his political friends. Vide an amusing anecdote of him in George Selwyn’s Correspondence, vol. i. p. 352.—E.

[277] Mr. Harris did not enter Parliament until he had passed his fiftieth year, or he would probably have better supported in the House the reputation he had acquired in society and literature. He was an accomplished and truly amiable man. He did not rise beyond subordinate offices in the Government, having been made Lord of the Admiralty in 1762, Lord of the Treasury in 1763. The change of administration in 1765 displaced him, but he was appointed Controller to the Queen in 1774. He died in 1780, in his seventy-second year. An elegant account of his life is prefixed to the edition of his works by his son, the first Earl of Malmesbury.—E.

[278] Son of the Marquis of Lothian. He had been aide-de-camp of the Duke at Fontenoy, where he was severely wounded, and commanded the cavalry at Culloden. He died in 1775, aged sixty-five.—E.

[279] John Fitzwilliam, brother of the Viscount of that name.

[280] If there was any hardship in this step, it consisted in these gentlemen not having received previous notice from Mr. Fox that he should regard opposition to the vote in the light of such direct hostility to the Government as would be incompatible with the tenure of office under it. Previously, there appears to have been no settled rule as to the claims of the Government on the support of members in office. Mr. Pitt, when Paymaster, not only voted but frequently spoke against the Government. It would now be considered very extraordinary in any member of the administration, however subordinate, to vote against a Government measure without a previous intimation to the premier of his readiness to resign.—E.

[281] Fourth daughter of John Leveson, first Earl Gower, wife of General John Waldegrave, who succeeded his brother in the Earldom of Waldegrave.

[282] Giles Earle.

[283] Eldest son of Thomas, one of the Tellers of the Exchequer, second son of Charles Viscount Townshend, Secretary of State to George I. and II.

[284] Younger son of the Earl of Granard.

[285] A sufficient reason against his original appointment, but a bad one for his dismissal. Mr. Schutz was very rich, having succeeded by bequest to a large estate in Essex, from Sir J. Tyrrel.—E.

[286] This certainly was a very harsh proceeding. No Lord Lieutenant has since been dismissed without far more decided provocation.—E.

[287] This character of Lord Granville is not one of the author’s happiest efforts. He has, however, hit off some of the more salient traits of that nobleman’s character with great cleverness in his “Correspondence.” Lord Mahon and Mr. Macaulay have subsequently gone over the same ground with brilliant success, but the following sketch by Lord Chesterfield, to which they are both indebted, is so full of life and spirit, that the editor cannot refrain from inserting it.

“He had great parts and a most uncommon share of learning for a man of quality. He was one of the best speakers in the House of Lords, both in the declamatory and the argumentative way. He had a wonderful quickness and precision in seizing the stress of a question, which no art, no sophistry, could disguise in him. In business he was bold, enterprising, and overbearing. He had been bred up in high monarchical, that is, tyrannical principles of government, which his ardent and imperious temper made him think were the only rational and practical ones. He would have been a great first Minister in France, little inferior, perhaps, to Richelieu; in this government, which is yet free, he was neither ill-natured nor vindictive, and had a great contempt for money—his ideas were all above it. In social life he was an agreeable, good-humoured, and instructive companion, a great but interesting talker.

“He degraded himself by the vice of drinking, which, together with a great stock of Greek and Latin, he had brought from Oxford, and practised ever afterwards. By his own industry he had made himself master of all the modern languages, and had acquired great knowledge of the law. His political knowledge of the interests of princes and of commerce was extensive, and his notions were just and great. His character may be summed up in nice precision, great decision, and overbearing presumption.”—Chesterfield’s Miscell. Works, vol. iv. p. 49.—E.

[288] This persecution is inexcusable, and very unlike Mr. Fox, who was a very good-humoured man.—E.

[289] Son of Heneage Legge, one of the Barons of the Exchequer.

[290] I shall give two instances of my assertions. Sir William Milner held a place of about 2000l. a year in the Custom-house, the greater portion of which had been allotted to his wife’s aunt, Mrs. Poyntz,[a] as a jointure on the death of her husband, who had been governor to the Duke of Cumberland. This was now taken away, and bestowed by Lord Bute on Mr. Poole, to make him amends for the ravage made on his family[b] in this new persecution; Lord Bute intending at the same time to reserve 600l. a year out of it for Mrs. Poyntz. Lord Spencer, who had married her daughter, wrote to the King representing the case, and begging his protection for Mrs. Poyntz. The petition concluded with telling the King that this application was made to him, because probably his Majesty would hear of the grievance no other way. On this the whole was stopped; but that Fox might bear all the odium, and Lord Bute have all the merit, the latter sent a message by Lord Ancram to the Duke of Cumberland,[c] to say, that if his Royal Highness would take it as a favour, the King would continue the pension to Mrs. Poyntz; and it was accepted.

The other was the case of Mrs. Cavendish, widow of an Admiral of that name. She had for many years enjoyed a housekeeper’s place in one of the offices, in lieu of a pension as an Admiral’s widow. Fox, hunting after employments for his dependents and objects of vengeance for himself, lighting on the name of a Cavendish, took away her place. The lady, of a respectable family, and sister of Mrs. Cartwright, Maid of Honour to the late Queen, sent the latter to Lady Suffolk,[d] from whom I heard this account, immediately to entreat by her means an audience of Lady Elizabeth Mackenzie.[e] Mrs. Cavendish herself, living in devotion and unknown to, proved to be a relation of Lady Bute; to whom Lady E. Mackenzie had instantly applied. Lady Bute, no less surprised, sent for her lord up stairs. He said the story could not be true: it was one Mrs. Greening that was displaced, to make room for Mrs. Goldsworthy, a companion of the late Duchess of Richmond.[f] It proved that Fox had thus imposed on Lord Bute, to whom the name of Mrs. Cavendish had never been mentioned, and who gave her immediate redress.

[a] Anna Maria Mordaunt, Maid of Honour to Queen Caroline, and widow of Stephen Poyntz. She had been a great beauty; the poem of “The Fair Circassian” was written by a gentleman who was in love with her.

[b] Sir Francis Poole, related to the Duke of Newcastle, had been turned out, with others of the same connection.

[c] Eldest son of the Marquis of Lothian, and groom of the bedchamber to the duke.

[d] Henrietta Hobart, Countess of Suffolk, Mistress of the Robes to Queen Caroline.

[e] Wife of James Stuart Mackenzie, brother of the Earl of Bute.

[f] Sarah Cadogan, Duchess of Richmond, mother of Lady Caroline Fox.

[291] The same charge is brought against Sir Fletcher Norton by Junius (Letter 39), who applies to him the lines of Ben Jonson, describing the lawyer who

Gives forked counsel; takes provoking gold
On either hand, and puts it up;
So wise, so grave, of so perplexed a tongue,
And loud withal, that would not wag, nor scarce
Lie still, without a fee.

Though Norton had the character at the bar of being the reverse of a liberal practitioner, it is very improbable that Walpole’s assertion, “that he took money from both parties” in a suit, should be literally correct. He had too many rivals as well as enemies in the profession, to admit of such conduct remaining unpunished; but it is not uncommon for a counsel to feel himself bound in honour to refuse a brief which he could not accept without using knowledge acquired while employed by parties who had a different interest, until he has given those parties the option of employing him again; and Norton’s eagerness for gain made him take a very narrow view of such questions.—E.

[292] Only son of the Earl of Derby, and Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster.

[293] William Aislabie, auditor of the imprest, son of Mr. Aislabie, who was concerned in the South-Sea scheme in the reign of George I.

[294] The Report of the Committee is given in the Parliamentary Debates, vol. xv. 1286. It is a very interesting document, but the only fruit of it was a Resolution, “That it is the opinion of the House that the present state of the mad-houses in this kingdom requires the interposition of the Legislature.”—E.

[295] This does not include those who died of their wounds.

[296] George Onslow, only son of the late Speaker.

[297] Sir Henry Liddel, Lord Ravensworth, father of the Duchess of Grafton, a connection to which he probably owed the favourable notice of him in the author’s Memoirs of George II., vol. i. p. 265.—E.

[298] One of the Duke of Devonshire’s brothers, and Lord of the Bedchamber to the Duke. A very gallant officer, who had frequently distinguished himself during the war.—E.

[299] Maria, second daughter of Sir Edward Walpole.

[300] Sir Francis Dashwood.

[301] Hugh Hume, Earl of Marchmont; called in his father’s time Lord Polwarth, and a great friend of Pope. He generally succeeded best in reply, for he could then best employ the fire and acrimony which formerly made him shine in opposition.—E.

[302] George Lord Lyttelton, Chancellor of the Exchequer in the late reign; another friend of Pope, and Author of Dialogues of the Dead, Life of King Henry II., &c. [Vide Walpole’s Memoirs of Geo. II., vol. i. p. 175, for his character, and many particulars of his public life, written in no friendly spirit.—E.]

[303] William Legge, Earl of Dartmouth, nephew of Henry Legge; and much attached to the Methodist sect; but of an excellent character. [Richardson is reported to have said of him, when asked if he knew an original answerable to his portrait of Sir Charles Grandison, that he might apply it to him if he were not a Methodist. (Southey’s Life of Cowper, vol. i. p. 234.) He was afterwards Secretary of State.—E.]

[304] Charles Paulet, Duke of Bolton, K.B. He died without issue in 1765.—E.

[305] The best defence of his resignation is given by Mr. Adolphus, vol. i. p. 115, from private information. It by no means exculpates him from the charges in the text, and is also at variance with the statement of a writer who lived on terms of the closest intimacy with the Bute family. M. Dutens says, “That he resigned, because he was disgusted with the bustle of business, indignant at the behaviour of those who endeavoured to obtain his favour, at the baseness of some, and the duplicity of others.”—Memoirs of a Traveller now in Retirement, vol. iv. p. 181. This corresponds with all that has transpired of Lord Bute’s character.—E.

[306] Thomas Orby Hunter.

[307] Henry Lord Digby, nephew of Mr. Fox.

[308] Richard Viscount Howe.

[309] Thomas Pitt, of Boconnock, nephew of Mr. William Pitt, with whom he was at variance. [To this gentleman, when a student at the University, Mr. Pitt addressed the beautiful letters subsequently published by Lord Grenville.—E.]

[310] General George Townshend, afterwards Viscount.

[311] Simon Lord Harcourt, who had been Governor to the King.

[312] Charles Douglas, Duke of Queensberry; he had been Lord of the Bedchamber to the late Prince of Wales.

[313] James Duke of Athol.

[314] A friend of Mr. William Pitt.

[315] He had been Groom of the Bedchamber to the late Prince.

[316] James Douglas, Earl of March and Ruglin [afterwards Duke of Queensberry].

[317] Charles Shaw, Lord Cathcart, had been one of the hostages to France, and Lords of the Bedchamber to William Duke of Cumberland; he was afterwards Ambassador in Russia. [Died July 21, 1776.—E.]

[318] Gertrude Leveson Duchess of Bedford.

[319] George Spencer, Duke of Marlborough.

[320] John Manners, Duke of Rutland, father of Lord Granby.

[321] Granville Leveson Gower, Earl Gower, brother of the Duchess of Bedford.

[322] John Calcraft began with being clerk in the War Office at 40l. a year. [He was a very shrewd, intelligent man, and gained great popularity with the army by his liberal conduct and hospitality to the officers.—E.]

[323] This charge is entirely unfounded. Had there been any truth in it, the connection between Mr. Fox and Mr. Calcraft would not have been so easily dissolved.—E.

[324] It is in reference to Mr. Rigby’s conduct that Lord Holland probably alludes to the following passage of a letter to Mr. Selwyn of October 5, 1763: “I drop all politics that may not go by the post, till I see you, when I will tell you all I know of them, with the trait I mentioned. Had it been from a political friend only, I should be ashamed to be hurt by it. No politics will or can mortify me; I thought this man’s friendship had not been only political. I loved him; and whether to feel or not to feel, to despise or grieve, on such an occasion, be most worthy of a man, I won’t dispute; but the fact is that I have been, and still am, whenever I think of it, very unhappy.” Selwyn Correspondence, vol. i. p. 267.—E.

[325] Lady Isabella Fitzroy, second daughter of Charles Duke of Grafton.

[326] Then held by Mr. Aislabie for life.

[327] Secretary to the Treasury. [He derived no benefit from this appointment, having died some years before Walpole.—E.]

[328] Collector of the Customs. Sir Robert Walpole held it for his own life, and for the lives of his two eldest sons, with power of bequeathing it for their lives to any child he pleased.

[329] Charles Jenkinson, private secretary to Lord Bute [afterwards Earl of Liverpool.—E.]

[330] It was again offered to me afterwards, and I again refused it.

[331] This was not the only favour that the count owed to the English Government, for they prevented his recall soon after the king’s accession; and it was entirely at their instance that he obtained permission to give up his embassy to his son. He had also received a portrait set in diamonds, and a suite of Gobelin hangings from the King of France. Upon his resignation he retired to his estates in Savoy, where he intrigued until he succeeded in replacing the Count de St. Germaine as first Minister of Savoy.—Mem. of a Traveller, vol. ii. p. 70.—E.

[332] The negotiation was conducted by Count Virri (Duke?) Envoy in England, and by the Bailli de Solar, the Sardinian Minister at Paris, the intimate friend of the Duchess de Choiseul; and that convenience was probably a reason why Lord Bute yielded to the treaty being settled at Paris, though the King of France had offered to treat here vis-à-vis du Roi de la Grande Brétagne. [Vide notes in p. 157 and 160, supra, for more details respecting the part taken by these Sardinian Ministers in the negotiation.—E.]

[333] These Memoirs were published in 1821, with a very able introduction by the late Lord Holland. A critic, who cannot be suspected of partiality (Quarterly Review, vol. xxv. p. 413), pronounces them “a model of this species of writing.” It is to be regretted that they embrace only four years, and those not the most interesting, of the reign of George II. Lord Waldegrave possessed sound sense and respectable abilities. He was highly esteemed by his contemporaries, and few men have passed through life, and, above all, public life, with a character so entirely unblemished.—A masterly critique of Lord Waldegrave’s Memoirs is given in the seventy-third number of the Edinburgh Review, from the pen of the late Mr. John Allen.—E.

[334] George Grenville, next brother of Richard Earl Temple. He married Elizabeth, daughter of Sir William Windham, and sister of Charles Earl of Egremont, and of Percy Windham Obrien, Earl of Thomond.

[335] Treasurer of the Navy.

[336] Sir Charles Windham, Earl of Egremont, eldest son of the celebrated orator, Sir William Windham, Chancellor of the Exchequer in the four last years of Queen Anne, and of Lady Catherine Seymour, daughter of Charles Duke of Somerset, the proudest man of his age.

[337] Had Lord Egremont been a liar of the “monstrous magnitude” stated in the text, he certainly would never have had the opportunity of refusing the offer of being Secretary of State from a man of such strict honour and integrity as Lord Waldegrave; an offer, be it observed, which Walpole notices in his Memoirs of George the Second without censure. It was to his refusal of that offer, and to his subsequent connection with Mr. Grenville, that Lord Egremont owed this severe imputation. He was proud, obstinate, and hot-tempered; but that he was not without talent is proved by his answer to the Spanish memorial, a State paper of acknowledged merit. Bishop Newton, who knew him well, says, “that if he had entered earlier into business, he might have made as considerable a figure as his father had. He had seldom occasion to speak in Parliament, but, when he did, it was with great clearness, force, and energy; and he was thought to resemble his father in manner as well as in good matter, having a little catch and impediment in his voice, as his father had.”—Newton’s Mem. p. 89.—E.

[338] Many interesting anecdotes of Lord Halifax are given in the Memoirs of Mr. Cumberland, who had been his private secretary for many years. He describes him thus: “I am persuaded he was formed to be a good man, he might also have been a great one: his mind was large, his spirit active, his ambition honourable; he had a carriage noble and imposing; his first approach attracted notice; his consequent address ensured respect. If his talents were not quite so solid as some, nor altogether so deep as others, yet they were brilliant, popular, and made to glitter in the eyes of men: splendour was his passion; his good-fortune threw opportunities in his way to have supported it; his ill-fortune blasted all those energies which should have been reserved for the crisis of his public fame. The first offices of the State, the highest honours which his Sovereign could bestow, were showered upon him when the spring of his mind was broken; and his genius, like a vessel overloaded with treasure, but far gone in decay, was only precipitated to ruin by the very freight that, in its better days, would have crowned it with prosperity and riches.” Vol. i. p. 242. This is a generous portrait, considering that Cumberland had certainly been unkindly treated by Lord Halifax; and, had he always felt thus, he would not have furnished Sheridan with the model of Sir Fretful Plagiary.—E.

[339] The figures 45 became the hieroglyphics of Wilkes’s party.

[340] Queen Anne’s speech on the treaty of Utrecht told a similar lie; so exactly was the parallel maintained throughout. [It was consequently made one of the subjects of Lord Orford’s impeachment. Vide fifteenth Article, Journals, vol. xviii. p. 214.—E.]

[341] The following passages are those to which the text refers: “This week has given the public the most abandoned instance of official effrontery ever attempted to be imposed on mankind. The minister’s speech last Tuesday is not to be paralleled in the annals of this country. I am in doubt whether the imposition is greater on the Sovereign or on the nation. Every friend of his country must lament that a Prince of so many great and amiable qualities, whom England truly reveres, can be brought to give the sanction of his name to the most odious measures, and to the most unjustifiable public doctrines, from a Throne ever renowned for truth, honour, and unsullied virtue. I am sure all foreigners, especially the King of Prussia, will hold the minister in contempt and abhorrence. He has made our Sovereign declare, ‘My expectations have been fully answered by the happy effects which the several allies of my crown have derived from the salutary measure of the definitive treaty. The powers at war with my good brother the King of Prussia have been induced to agree to such terms of accommodation as that great Prince has approved, and the success which has attended my negotiation has necessarily and immediately diffused the blessings of peace throughout Europe.’ The infamous fallacy of this whole sentence is apparent to all mankind; for it is known that the King of Prussia did not barely approve, but absolutely dictated as conqueror, every article of the terms of peace. No advantage of any kind has accrued to that magnanimous Prince from our negotiation; but he was basely deserted by the Scottish Prime Minister of England. He was known by every Court in Europe to be scarcely on better terms here than at Vienna, and he was betrayed by us in the treaty of peace. What a strain of insolence, therefore, is it in a minister to lay claim to what he is conscious his efforts tended to prevent, and meanly to arrogate to himself a share in the fame and glory of one of the greatest Princes the world has ever seen!”—E.

[342] Robert Wood, author of the accounts of Balbec and Palmyra, and Under-Secretary of State. He had been so made by Lord Chatham, but had deserted him. [Mr. Wood was still, and for some time after, on most friendly terms with Lord Chatham. Vide his letters of the 3rd and 6th of September, 1763, in the second volume of the Chatham Correspondence, p. 246.—E.]

[343] Philip Carteret Webbe, M.P. for Hazlemere, and Solicitor to the Treasury. The part he took in the proceedings against Wilkes savoured too much of the practice at the Old Bailey, and made him very unpopular. His character was otherwise unexceptionable. He published various tracts on law and antiquities, and was a great collector of books and medals. He died in 1770, aged 70.—E.

[344] When Charles King of Naples, on the death of his brother King Ferdinand, succeeded to the crown of Spain, he set aside his eldest son as an idiot, made the second Prince of Asturias, and the third King of Naples.

[345] He was appointed King’s Counsel in May, 1757, and Baron of the Exchequer in Hilary Term, 1762. He resigned in May, 1764. We cannot find anything more about him. His praise of the peace seems to have been on his first circuit; probably, while his surprise and gratitude were fresh. There are no Exchequer reports of that time. Except on the circuit, a Baron of the Exchequer was then, and long after, almost a sinecurist.—E.

[346] Ralph Allen, of Prior Park, near Bath, Master of the Cross-posts.

[347] Mr. Pitt had openly pronounced the peace inadequate, and it seemed to be personally levelled at him, that the address affected to call it adequate. [Bishop Warburton insists on Allen’s ignorance of Mr. Pitt having applied the term “inadequate” to the peace, and disclaims any concern in it himself; though he admits having drawn up, promoted, and advised a similar address from the clergy of Gloucester, whose interference, on this occasion, “had the fate,” Mr. Pitt observed, “not to be imitated by any other episcopal see in the kingdom.” Allen, who was now an old man, felt Mr. Pitt’s resentment acutely, and immediately withdrew from this corporation. He died on the 29th June of the following year, having bequeathed to Mr. Pitt a legacy of 1000l. Mr. Pitt’s letter of condolence to his widow shows, that whatever coolness the address might have produced in their intercourse was short-lived. The correspondence between Mr. Pitt and Allen is in the Annual Register for 1763, p. 208; and in the Chatham Correspondence, vol. ii. p. 256.—E.]

[348] Captain Forbes, of Ogilby’s regiment, in the French service. He was of good family in Scotland, and of some merit in his profession, as may be inferred from his subsequently attaining the rank of General in Portugal, where, in common with other Scotch exiles, he was employed and trusted.—E.

[349] Vide Memoirs of the year 1751, [vol. i. p. 15–181. He was at that time residing at Paris, under the name of Count Murray. In 1771, he was recalled by letter under the King’s privy seal, and he died shortly afterwards.—E.]

[350] Thomas Osborne, fourth Duke of Leeds.

[351] Thomas Villiers, Baron Hyde, brother of William Earl of Jersey. [He had been Minister at Berlin in the reign of George the Second, and received various honours from Frederick the Great, whose preference of him to such men as Mr. Legge and Mr. Fox, and even to Sir Andrew Mitchell, probably arose from the same reasons that induced Napoleon to bestow the warmest praise on such of his enemy’s generals as he most wished to have as opponents. Lord Hyde was an amiable nobleman, of very comely person, and graceful deportment; he married one of the coheiresses of Lord Clarendon, was elevated to that earldom in 1776, and died in 1786.—E.]

[352] Mr. Grenville was deeply offended at this interference of the Duke of Bedford; and his friends, in consequence, took no pains to defend the Duke when the current of popular feeling afterwards turned so strongly against his Grace.—E.

[353] Mr. Pitt’s villa at Hayes, near Bromley, in Kent.

[354] Walpole is mistaken in this supposition; for the King himself proposed Lord Temple for the Treasury. (Lord Hardwicke’s letter to the Duke of Newcastle.) An impartial narrative of this transaction is given by Mr. Adolphus (vol. i. p. 127), with a reference to the contemporary authorities, of which the most important are Lord Hardwicke’s letter, and the letters in the Chatham Correspondence (vol. ii. p. 242). The “dexterity” and finesse ascribed in the text to Mr. Pitt hardly belong to his character, and certainly were not exhibited on this occasion. His private correspondence proves, as he told the King, that he felt throughout the impossibility of his making a ministry, unless it rested “on the great families who had supported the Revolution Government, and other great persons, of whose ability and integrity the country had had experience, and who had weight and credit in the nation.” This would necessarily have involved greater changes than the King then contemplated, though not greater than his Majesty subsequently found inevitable.—E.

[355] Henry Arthur Herbert, Earl of Powis.

[356] He had been succeeded as Treasurer of the Household by Lord Powis.

[357] His Majesty did not give him up in less than two years on the next change.

[358] Charles Watson Wentworth, Marquis of Rockingham.

[359] Welbore Ellis, Esq.

[360] George Keppel, third Earl of Albemarle.

[361] Walpole is in error here. Wood informed Mr. Pitt of the report, that he had proscribed Lord Gower, Rigby, and others of the Bedford party; and Mr. Pitt’s reply, though it has not been preserved, may be inferred, from Wood’s acknowledgment of it, to have amounted to a positive denial of the charge. (Chatham Correspondence, vol. ii. p. 250.)—E.

[362] Dr. Charles Lyttelton, brother of George Lord Lyttelton. They were sons of Christian, sister of Richard Lord Cobham, consequently first cousins of Lord Temple.

[363] James Grenville, the third brother.

[364] Richard Temple, Lord Cobham, had four sisters, Maria, Hester, Christian, and Penelope. Maria, widow of Sir John Langham, offended him by marrying Mr. West, a clergyman, on which he set her aside, and settled his estate, and obtained his peerage to be settled, on Hester, the second sister, and her issue, who, by Mr. Grenville, her husband, were Richard, George, James, Henry, Thomas, and Hester, the wife of Mr. Pitt. [Mr. West was the father of Gilbert West, one of the Clerks of the Council, and better known as the translator of Pindar, and author of the popular treatise “On the Resurrection.” He was a most amiable man, and the intimate friend of Pitt.—E.]

[365] Henrietta Hobart, sister of the first Earl of Buckinghamshire, widow of the Earl of Suffolk, and afterwards of George Berkeley, brother of the Earl of Berkeley, Mistress of the Robes to Queen Caroline, and mistress of King George the Second. The author lived in great friendship with her the last years of her life; her house at Marble Hill, Twickenham, and his at Strawberry Hill, near the same village, were within a mile of each other, and he passed three or four evenings every week with her, when they were in the country. She died July 26, 1767, aged 79, and was remarkable for her strict and minute veracity and memory, which she retained to the last, as well as her eyesight, teeth, and the elegance of her person.

[366] Leicester House, in Leicester Fields, the residence of the Sydneys, Earls of Leicester, was hired and inhabited by King George and Queen Caroline, when Prince and Princess of Wales, on their quarrel with George the First; as it was afterwards, on a similar occasion, by Frederick, Prince of Wales, whose widow, Augusta, also dwelled there till after the accession of her son to the Crown. George the Third, after his father’s death, lived at Saville House, the next door to her.

[367] The names of four Scotchmen appear in the same Gazette to appointments, or as Governors in the American Colonies, Johnstone being one of them. He was the third son of Sir James Johnstone, of Westerhall; he was of a hot and most pugnacious temperament, as he showed some years later by his duel with Lord George Germaine. He died in 1787.—E.

[368] Don Richard Wall, of Irish extraction, was Ambassador here from Spain in the reign of George the Second. He was a most artful, agreeable man, of much wit, and a great favourite at this Court. At his return to Madrid, he had been made Secretary of State in 1754, [upon the downfall of Enseñada. Sir Benjamin Keene, by his advice and influence, materially contributed to this event, which proved highly favourable to the British interests at Madrid. The intrigues in the Spanish Court, and the financial difficulties of the country, made Wall’s post a very irksome one. He discharged its duties at least as ably as either his predecessor or his successor. The King was unwilling to part with him, and made his retirement honourable by many marks of distinction. He passed the remaining years of his life chiefly at Soto de Roma, a royal castle, in the lovely valley of Grenada, where he maintained a splendid hospitality. Mr. Swinburne visited him there, and has given a very agreeable account of him. He died 1778.—E.]

[369] Grimaldi was a Genoese. He had been educated for the church, and always retained the soft and insinuating manners of an Italian ecclesiastic. It was to his address, rather than to his talents, that he was indebted for high situations he filled. In negotiating the celebrated treaty of Paris, he appears to have been overmatched by Choiseul, and the loss of the Havannah, and the other misfortunes of the war, were the immediate fruits of his eagerness for a French alliance. His administration in Spain was neither popular nor successful. It ended with the failure of the expedition to Algiers. His chief merit lay in the encouragement he gave to literature, his patronage of the arts, his love of justice, and the mildness and generosity of his disposition. On his resignation, in 1777, he was created a Duke, and a Grandee of Spain. Having been allowed to nominate his successor, he was at his own request appointed Ambassador at Rome. Coxe’s Spain, vol. v. c. 63; and Memoirs of a Traveller now in Retirement, vol. iv. p. 109.—E.

[370] He had particularly distinguished himself in the command of his regiment at Fontenoy, where his valour and good fortune are noticed by Voltaire:—

“Guerchy n’est pas blessé, la vertu peut te plaire.”—E.

[371] See an account of him in the notes, infra.—E.

[372] This Vergy was a French spy. In 1771, I heard Mr. Phelps, secretary to Lord Sandwich, relate that Vergy had offered him to act, too, as a spy on Guerchy, of which Mr. Phelps gave the ambassador warning. Vergy remained here several years, and wrote pamphlets and novels for a livelihood.

[373] When they talked to D’Eon of a breach of the peace, he understood English so imperfectly, that he thought Lord Halifax threatened to break the peace between the two nations, of which he, D’Eon, had been the messenger, and that inflamed his madness.

[374] Augustus the Third, a weak and unfortunate monarch, whose reign forms one of the most melancholy epochs in the annals of Saxony. His incapacity was more remarkable from his being opposed to Frederick the Great and Catherine the Second. He died in 1763, and with him ended the independence of Poland—his successor Stanislaus being merely the nominee of Russia.—E.

[375] Count Bruhl.—[This worthless courtier, who exercised for many years an arbitrary sway over Saxony and Poland, and inflicted irreparable injuries on both countries, died in October, 1764.—E.]

[376] Rezzonico, Pope by the name of Clement the Thirteenth, [filled the Papal Chair from 1758 to 1769, when he died, in his 76th year. His life was decent, and his intentions appear to have been honest, but his policy was unenlightened and vacillating, and is strikingly contrasted by that of his illustrious successor.—E.]

[377] Sir Hugh Smithson, who assumed the name of Percy on marrying Lady Elizabeth Seymour, daughter of Algernon Duke of Somerset, and heiress of the house of Percy by her grandmother. They were created Earl and Countess of Northumberland.

[378] Thomas Potter—see more of him in the preceding reign. [Memoirs of George II. vol. i. p. 61. He was the second son of Archbishop Potter, whose fortune he inherited, owing to his elder brother having disobliged his father by an imprudent marriage. In 1748 he had been appointed secretary to the Prince of Wales, then the patron of all the talent in the House opposed to the Government, and from that time he took an active part in the political contests of the day. He was a clever and impressive speaker, and, with application and steadiness of conduct, might have become one of the leaders of his party. Unfortunately, he had contracted, in early life, habits of dissipation, under which his constitution sunk, just as his ambitious hopes bade fair to be realized. He died Vice-Treasurer of Ireland, in June, 1759. Some interesting letters from him to Mr. Pitt are given in the Chatham Correspondence, vol. i.—E.]

[379] James Douglas, Earl of March and Ruglen, Lord of the Bedchamber to the King, [afterwards the too well-known Duke of Queensberry—an appropriate patron of such a divine.—E.]

[380] Lord Despencer said, he never heard the devil preach before. Yet Lord Sandwich had a precedent in a great Reformer of the Church: “Calvin eut par trahison les feuilles d’un ouvrage que Servet faisait imprimer secrètement. Il les envoya à Lyon avec les lettres qu’il avait reçues de lui: action qui servirait pour le deshonorer à jamais dans la Société. Calvin fit accuser Servet par un emissaire. Quel rôle pour un Apôtre!”—Voltaire, Essai sur l’Hist. Générale, chap. 113.

[381] A broken wine-merchant, brother of Admiral Cotes, an intimate of Wilkes.

[382] Only son of the Duke of Chandos. [He afterwards succeeded to the Dukedom, and died in 1789, when his titles became extinct. His only daughter married the late Duke of Buckingham.—E.]

[383] Mr. Pitt’s speech had the very dubious merit of pleasing his opponents rather than his friends. Lord Barrington, in a letter to Sir Andrew Mitchell, says, that if fifty thousand pounds had been given for it, the sum would have been well expended. It secures us a quiet session. Chatham Correspondence, vol. ii. p. 262, and Walpole’s Letters, vol. iv. p. 313.—In fact Mr. Pitt’s interviews with the King had necessarily blunted the edge of his opposition, and he found it as difficult to give an intelligible defence of his proceedings, as all succeeding ministers, in the same predicament, have experienced since.—E.

[384] The Lords on the same account put off the hearing of Wilkes’s defence on the Essay on Woman, to the 22nd; and then for a week longer.

[385] Frederick, second son of George the Third.

[386] Edward Duke of York, next brother to the King.

[387] Frederick Lord North, eldest son of the Earl of Guilford.

[388] Mr. Morton, or Moreton, M.P. for Abingdon, a barrister of eminence, who was appointed Chief Justice of Chester in 1763. His name will hereafter occur in the debates on the Regency. He must not be confounded with Sir William Moreton, of Moreton, in Cheshire, Recorder of London, who died in 1763.—E.

[389] Mr. Forester had been originally recommended by Alderman Beckford to the Duke of Bedford (when the Alderman and his Grace acted together) for a seat in Parliament, “as a person in whom steadiness, honour, and elocution were not exceeded by any man in the country.” (Bedford Correspondence.)—E.

[390] Mr. Wilbraham, M.P. for Newton, and Deputy Steward of the University of Oxford. He was an eminent lawyer, whose politics, like those of Mr. Fazakerly, prevented his attaining the honours of his profession.—(Walpole’s Correspondence, vol. iv. p. 319.)—E.

[391] Benjamin Bathurst of Lydney, in Gloucestershire, brother of the first Lord Bathurst, and father of the late Bishop of Norwich.—E.

[392] Sir John Griffin, an officer of some distinction. He had been severely wounded at the battle of Campen, when fighting near the hereditary Prince of Brunswick. In 1786 he succeeded to the ancient Barony of Howard de Walden; in 1796 he became a Field Marshal; and he died in 1797, having devised Audley-End and his other estates to his kinsman, Mr. Aldworth Neville, who at the same time succeeded to the Barony of Braybrooke, which had been limited over to him on the death of Lord Howard de Walden.—E.

[393] See infra.

[394] General Philip Honeywood, of Marks Hall, Essex, an officer of distinction. He died without issue in 1785.—E.

[395] Sir John Rushout had taken an active part in the debates against Walpole’s Excise Bill in 1732. He was made a Lord of the Treasury in 1742, and in the following year Treasurer of the Navy. He was strongly attached to Pulteney, and had the sagacity to predict the consequences of that statesman’s refusal to take office on the resignation of Walpole. He lived to the great age of 91, and died on the 2nd of March, 1775. His son was created Lord Northwich.—E.

[396] In Ireland.

[397] Henly Earl of Northington.

[398] Under Lord Chatham’s administration in the war.

[399] Thomas Harley, a merchant, and brother of the Earl of Oxford.

[400] The tax on cyder.

[401] The Duke of Bedford.

[402] Walpole’s Correspondence, vol. iv. p. 329.

[403] Vide Wilkes v. Wood. State Trials, vol. xix. 1154.—E.

[404] Vide Mr. Croker’s note in Walpole’s Correspondence, vol. iv. p. 322.

[405] He was the second son of William de Grey, Esq., M.P., and younger brother of Thomas de Grey of Merton Hall, M.P. for Norfolk, whose estates he inherited, on the death of the latter without issue, in 1765.—E.

[406] This was one of the most obstinate contests of the day, and cost Mr. Luther many thousand pounds. He had been the pupil, and was the intimate friend, of Dr. Watson, the Bishop of Landaff, to whom he bequeathed a considerable portion of his fortune. The Bishop describes him correctly as a man of most upright conduct and honourable principles. He died in 1786. Watson’s Anecdotes, vol. i. p. 235.—E.

[407] Philip Yorke, Lord Royston, afterwards second Earl of Hardwicke.—See infra.

[408] General A’Court, M.P. for Heytesbury, was Colonel of the 11th Dragoons. He did not long remain an object of compassion, for he recovered his rank and regiment, and afterwards inherited a large estate and the borough of Heytesbury, from his uncle, Mr. Ash. He died in 1781. The present Lord Heytesbury is his grandson and lineal representative.—E.

[409] General Henry Seymour Conway, only brother of Francis Earl of Hertford.

[410] Thomas Pitt of Boconnock, only son of Thomas Pitt, elder brother of the famous William Pitt, by the eldest sister of George Lord Lyttelton. [He inherited from his father the borough of Old Sarum, for which he brought himself into Parliament in 1761. In 1763 he was made a Lord of the Admiralty. In 1784 created Lord Camelford. He went abroad for his health in 1787, and died at Florence in 1793. The letters addressed to him when a student at Cambridge, by Lord Chatham, have attached an interest to his name beyond what belongs to his political career; and it is singular that he should, at the very outset of his public life, have abruptly separated from one whose opinions up to that time he seems to have entirely shared. Their connection was not afterwards resumed, though, as Lord Chatham’s relative, he returned thanks (rather coldly) to the House for the marks of distinction conferred on that great man’s memory. He is described by his son-in-law, Lord Grenville, “as combining a steadiness of principle and a correctness of judgment with an integrity of heart, which produced the affectionate attachment from those who knew him that has followed him beyond the grave.” Many of his letters during his residence abroad are printed in Nichols’s Illustrations of Literary History, vol. vi. p. 75; they show more amiability of disposition than power of mind, and were scarcely worth being preserved. On the death of his only son the title became extinct.—E.]

[411] Charles Lenox, third Duke of Richmond, had married Lady Mary Bruce, daughter of the last Earl of Ailesbury by his third wife, Caroline Campbell, afterwards married to General Conway.

[412] Elizabeth, only daughter of Sir William Windham, a lady highly respected for her virtues as a wife and mother; and whose death, not long after, her husband never recovered.—E.

[413] Augusta, eldest daughter of Frederick Prince of Wales.

[414] Anne, eldest daughter of King George the Second.

[415] Mary, fourth daughter of George the Second, married to the Prince of Hesse; and Louisa, his fifth, married to the King of Denmark.

[416] The Prince visited Mr. Pitt on the 22nd of January, and passed two hours with him. On the 14th, the Prince had addressed him a very complimentary letter. Chatham Correspondence, vol. ii. p. 272, and note.—E.

[417] The Prince succeeded to the Dukedom on the death of his father in 1780, and for some years after resided at Brunswick, where the Princess, who was throughout life deservedly esteemed, made his Court very agreeable. In 1787 he commanded the Prussian forces which took possession of Amsterdam, and put down the republican party in Holland. His campaigns against the French republicans were less successful, and his well-known manifesto rendered his failure more glaring. He was mortally wounded at Auerstadt, and expired at Altona on the 10th of November, 1806, leaving behind him the reputation of a bold and enterprising, rather than of an able general. His Duchess took refuge in England, where she died at an advanced age. They were not happy in their family: of their two daughters, the eldest married the late King of Wirtemberg, and came to a miserable end in Russia; the younger was the unfortunate Queen Caroline. Their eldest son was of a weak understanding, and the younger, “Brunswick’s fated Chieftain,” a Prince of moderate abilities but signal courage, fell in middle life at Waterloo.—E.

[418] A general officer.

[419] Sir William Meredith was elected for Wigan in 1755, and for Liverpool in 1762. In 1765 he was appointed a Lord of the Admiralty, an office which he resigned on the dismissal of the Rockingham Administration. In 1774 he was sworn of the Privy Council, and made Comptroller of the Household. He died in 1790.—Cavendish’s Debates, (note,) vol. i. p. 52.—E.

[420] This character of Sir George Saville is not less honourable to his memory than Mr. Burke’s well-known and brilliant panegyric at the Bristol election in 1780. Few public men received more respect from their cotemporaries—few, perhaps, have so well earned it. He devoted his time, his talents, and his purse almost exclusively to the public service. Neither the fashionable nor literary circles of London, nor the pursuits of the country, had any charm for him; he seldom resided at Rufford, the splendid seat of his ancestors: business was his passion, and whether in town or country, constituted his sole occupation; fortunately, he had abilities to perform it creditably, and his generosity, which was scarcely bounded by his great estate, had always usefulness for its object. The same discernment appears in his selection of the Parliamentary questions with which his name is identified, such as the Limitation of the Claims of the Crown on Landed Estates; the Relief of Roman Catholics as well as of Protestant Dissenters, and the Condemnation of General Warrants, and, lastly, the Improved Representation of the People: all these he advocated with an earnestness and singleness of purpose, and consistency of action, which extorted the admiration even of his opponents. Though not an impressive speaker, he was always sensible and very fluent, and he spared no pains to understand his subject. His speeches, indeed, partook of one of the characteristics of his mind, which was a simplicity approaching to austerity, and an exemption from party, or even popular prejudices. His life in all respects strictly corresponded with his principles, and was unstained by vice or even by weakness of any kind; his death was regarded as a public loss. He died in 1784, unmarried, aged 57, and with him ended the last line of the illustrious family of Saville. He was a collateral descendant of the Marquis of Halifax, to whose estates his father had succeeded.—E.

[421] This house, in which James Earl Waldegrave died, has again become remarkable by a club created there in 1769 by several ladies of first rank; the first public female club ever known, and which gave great offence, though the ladies were almost all of distinguished virtue. Nor, though the age was notorious for divorces, though most of the female members were of the greatest beauty, and though most of the young men of fashion were of the club, did any scandal happen from that society. Even gaming, which at that time raged to so enormous a degree, went to no great lengths there. So that vice and satire, which prevailed so exceedingly, did not always meet where they deserved to meet. The King and Queen marked their disapprobation of the club, while Lord Despenser, Lord Talbot, and Lord Pembroke were in place, while Lady Berkeley was of the bedchamber to the Princess Dowager, though her husband, Lord Clare, had disavowed her last child, and while Miss Chudleigh had remained Maid of Honour to her, though she had owned her marriage with Captain Hervey to her Royal Highness, till she openly married the Duke of Kingston, though Hervey was alive; and was received by all the Royal Family as Duchess, after having been publicly kept by the Duke as his mistress. No wonder the sanctity of the Court passed for hypocrisy.

[422] For an account of this debate, see Chatham Correspondence, vol. ii. p. 281.—E.

[423] A graphical description of this Debate is given by the author in a letter to Lord Hertford, vol. iv. p. 359, of his Correspondence.—E.

[424] For an account of Mr. Grenville’s speech, see James Grenville’s letter to Mr. Pitt. Chatham Correspondence, vol. ii. p. 285.—E.

[425] Sir Anthony Abdy, Baronet, of Chobham Place, Surrey, had been brought into Parliament by the Duke of Devonshire, for Knaresborough. He was a King’s Counsel, in great practice, and likewise a country gentleman of considerable estate, having inherited the property of his kinsman Gainsford, the son of Sir Anthony Thomas. He died in 1775.—E.

[426] This speech of General Conway’s appears to have made a great impression on the House. See the letter cited supra.—E.

[427] The Right Honourable James Oswald, of Dunnikier, already mentioned as the adviser and warm partisan of Lord Bute. This was one of the last questions of great public interest in which he took part, his health being now on the decline; indeed he retired from Parliament at the dissolution. He had been member for Kirkaldy, his native district, for more than twenty years, and possessed considerable weight in the House, as a clear, well-informed, sensible, and effective speaker. His services were rewarded with a large sinecure for his son, and a bishoprick for his brother. It is due to his memory to notice his kindness to men of letters; David Hume’s History and Political Essays were submitted to his revision before they went to press, and Lord Kaimes and Adam Smith lay under similar obligations to him. His criticisms, however, were probably the least valuable fruits of his friendship. His Correspondence was published some years ago, under the title of “Memorials of the Right Honourable James Oswald.” Most of his papers having been burnt, the book contains nothing remarkable.—E.

[428] Afterwards Lord Chancellor of Ireland, and a peer of that kingdom by the title of Lord Lifford. He filled that office with great credit. His judgments in the Court of Chancery were reported by Mr. Freeman, and the work is still one of some authority. He died in 1769.—E.

[429] Charles Lord Viscount Townshend, minister at the Hague, and afterwards Secretary of State to the Kings George the First and Second. By his eldest son, Charles, he was grandfather of General George Townshend, afterwards Viscount, and of the famous Charles Townshend. His second son, Thomas, was father of another Thomas, often mentioned in these Memoirs. William, third son, was father of another Charles Townshend, called the black or Spanish Charles, from having been Secretary to the Embassy at Madrid.

[430] Robert Wood died in September, 1771; he was writing Dissertations on Homer, since published.

[431] See what is said of them in the Advertisement prefixed to the first volume of the Anecdotes of Painting.

[432] Mr. Bouverie and Mr. Dawkins.

[433] Pitt had issued two general warrants during the war.

[434] Alluding to the enormous debt contracted by the war.

[435] Being dependent on Lord Shelburne, Barré had, under him, connected himself with Mr. Pitt, whom he had so savagely attacked not long before, and had been dismissed from the army.

[436] Richard Hussey, Esq., M. P. for East Looe, Attorney-General to the Queen, Counsel to the Admiralty, and Auditor to the Duchy of Cornwall and Greenwich Hospital. He died in 1780. Cavendish’s Debates, vol. i. p. 197, note.—E.

[437] Alluding to Mr. Pitt.

[438] Wilkes subsequently published a very friendly letter, dated 26th March, 1763, addressed to him by Mr. Legge, inviting him to meet Dr. Hay at dinner. Indeed the intimacy of Wilkes was a reproach shared at that time with Dr. Hay by several of the most eminent persons in the kingdom. And it was not till after the publication of the forty-fifth number of the North Briton, on the 23rd of April, 1763, that their eyes were open to the enormity of his offences.—E.

[439] Arthur Onslow, Speaker in the reign of George the Second.

[440] Lord Howe was then only an Irish Peer. He had succeeded to his title on the death of his elder brother at Ticonderago in 1758. His great services raised him to the English Peerage in 1782, as Viscount Howe, and as Earl Howe in 1788. He died in 1799.—E.

[441] This debate is described in the author’s letters to Lord Hertford.—Correspondence, vol. iv. p. 373.—E.

[442] This statement is probably much exaggerated. There is no doubt that Pratt applied to the Court, according to the usual practice, to appoint a day for Hensey’s execution. Lord Mansfield desired him to name the day, and on Hensey’s solicitor asking that it might not be an early day, Pratt said he was ready to give as long a day as might be proper. At last the Court agreed that it might be a month.—Burr. Reports, vol. i. p. 651, R. v. Hensey. The sentimentality imputed to Pratt certainly formed no part of his character; and as the story is without question inaccurate, we may fairly doubt whether Norton was guilty of so curious a piece of brutality. Hensey was respited on the very morning that he was going to execution. On the 5th of Sept. 1759, he appeared in Court and pleaded a full pardon.—E.

[443] Hugh Smithson Percy, Earl of Northumberland. His eldest son married a daughter of Lord Bute. Both the Earl and Brecknock afterwards, finding their expectations not answered, turned against the Court. Brecknock was hanged twenty years after in Ireland, for being accessory to an atrocious murder perpetrated by Mr. Fitzgerald, who suffered with him.

[444] The compliment was not insincere, for the King probably entertained more enlarged views of constitutional liberty than Lord Marchmont. His Lordship clung to his Jacobite principles to the last, though he changed their object.—E.

[445] Lord Holland has justly observed, “that wherever that great magistrate (Lord Hardwicke) is concerned, Lord Orford’s resentments blind his judgment and disfigure his narrative.”—Mem. vol. i. p. 139, note. He certainly has in this instance drawn a caricature, of which there is no merit in the execution to compensate for the faults of the design. Lord Chesterfield, though also a political opponent, has done Lord Hardwicke more justice.—See Miscell. Works, vol. iv. p. 51. Admitting many of his eminent qualities, he elegantly says of his avarice, that though it was his ruling passion, he never was in the least suspected of any kind of corruption; a rare and meritorious instance of virtue and self-denial, under the influence of such a craving, insatiable, and increasing passion.—See also Lord Mahon’s Hist. vol. iii. p. 201. The Editor has only further to observe, that none but a lawyer who has practised in the Court where Lord Hardwicke so long presided, can correctly appreciate his discharge of the duties of that high office. His judgments maintain their authority to the present hour, and furnish the earliest and clearest exposition of the principles of the Equity Jurisdiction of this country. And whoever may have had the opportunity of examining his Lordship’s note-books, will see the patient attention and indefatigable research that distinguished every part of his judicial career.—E.

[446] John Perceval, second Earl of Egmont.

[447] In America.

[448] All the sums mentioned in this speech must be carefully re-examined, for I am not sure they are exact; [nor has the Editor been able to verify them.—E.]

[449] A plan, of which the consequences were so little foreseen, that Walpole does not even notice it in a letter to Lord Hertford, written two days afterwards. Corresp. vol. iv. p. 386.—E.

[450] Afterwards Sir George Amyand. [He was one of the leading Directors of the East India Company, and an eminent merchant in the City. He died in 1766.—E.]

[451] It appears to have been Lord Clive himself who made this observation: “not thinking it strictly honourable to take advantage of this sudden spirit of generosity, and to carry merely by his popularity a case which was depending at law, he rose and requested that they would desist from their liberal intentions: adding, that from being sensible of the impropriety of going abroad while so valuable a part of his property remained in dispute, he would make some proposals to the Court of Directors, which would, he trusted, end in an amicable adjustment of this affair.” Malcolm’s Life of Lord Clive, vol. ii. p. 230.—E.

[452] One of the Aldermen, and member for Plympton. He had married one of the coheiresses of Jacob Tonson, the printer.—E.

[453] The book displays cleverness rather than “great parts.” D’Eon was an unprincipled coxcomb, bold, ready, and plausible; with a smattering of literature, and more than common powers of writing. At the outset of the dispute he was not much in the wrong, for the difficulties raised to the payment of his disbursements as Minister were ungenerous, if not unjust; and M. Guerchy’s lamentations over the guinea per month lavishly expended in English Gazettes would have put the forbearance of most men to a severe test. In his passion D’Eon forgot the laws of decency as well as of honour, and the publication of his book injured him certainly not less than his enemies. It had an immense circulation, and the attempts to suppress it at Paris, of course, served to make it more sought after. Lord Holland, who happened to be there at that time, used to lend his copy by the hour. A reply to D’Eon was published, under the title of “Examen des Lettres, &c. du Chevalier d’Eon, dans une Lettre à M. N—” and is smart enough. The Critical Review (1764) treats it as a satisfactory refutation of D’Eon’s charges; but the public continued to laugh at the French Ambassador and his Government, and they fell in general estimation fully to the extent stated in the text.—E.

[454] Walpole’s hatred of Lord Chancellor Hardwicke may be traced in this portrait of his son. Lord Hardwicke was one of the best informed noblemen of his day. The Athenian Letters which he wrote, in conjunction with his brother, whilst at the University, ranks next to the Travels of Anacharsis among works of its kind. “The Correspondence of Sir Dudley Carleton” is more curious than interesting; and the editor seems to have correctly appreciated it, by restricting his first edition to twenty copies, and his second to fifty. Perhaps there was some ostentation in terming the next impression a third edition. He is entitled to more credit for his State Papers, published in two volumes, quarto,—a work of value, and which still fully maintains its consideration. Lord Hardwicke’s health was very delicate, and he neither liked nor shone in general society, but he did not want decision of character, and had a strong sense of honour. He was firm in his political connections, and exemplary in private life. A biographical account of him is given in Cole’s MSS. in the British Museum, Donation, 5886.—E.

[455] Thomas Pitt, of Boconnock, nephew of Mr. William Pitt, but attached to Mr. G. Grenville, and by him made a Lord of the Admiralty.

[456] Frederick Montagu, only son of Charles Montagu, of Paplewich in Northamptonshire, Auditor to the late Prince of Wales.

[457] The chief of the Whigs in Opposition.

[458] Son of Sir Orlando Bridgman, after whose death he became Sir Henry; [and having succeeded to the estates of his cousin Thomas, the last Earl of Bradford, who had died without issue, was in 1794 created Baron Bradford. He died at an advanced age in 1800. He was grandfather of the present Earl.—E.]

[459] Younger brother of Henry Vernon, of Hilton in Staffordshire; and married to Lady Evelyn Leveson, Countess Dowager of Ossory. [Mr. Vernon’s later life was more creditable. He became a great traveller, and visited the East; and he served with distinction as a volunteer in the Spanish expedition to Algiers. He was one of the handsomest men of his day.—E.]

[460] Charles Sloane Cadogan, only son of Charles Lord Cadogan, [afterwards created Earl Cadogan. His second wife was Miss Churchill, a niece of Horace Walpole. He died in 1807, aged 78.—E.]

[461] Dr. Akenside, by some thought a Poet, was of the same principles with, and an intimate friend of, Dyson, who obtained his being named Physician to the Queen. To that mistress and to that friend he made a sacrifice of the word Liberty, in the last edition of his poem on the Pleasures of the Imagination. It was uncourtly, a personification to be invoked by one who felt the pulse of royalty. [The alteration to which Walpole refers is as follows. In the old editions there is the passage—

Wilt thou, kind Harmony, descend,
And join the festive train, for with thee comes,
Majestic Truth; and where Truth deigns to come,
Her sister Liberty will not be far.

In the later editions it stands thus—

... for with thee comes
Wise Order; and where Order deigns to come,
Her sister Liberty will not be far.

Nichols’s Liter. Anec. vol. viii. p. 525.

Akenside’s political tergiversation is an unpleasant commentary on a work so full of elevated thoughts as his poem. Personal attachment to Dyson probably influenced him. He died in 1770, in his forty-ninth year.—E.]

[462] Mr. Dyson had changed his politics on the King’s accession, when he became at once a determined Tory, having previously professed the opposite creed. He afterwards formed one of the party that went under the name of the King’s friends, a political section which can hardly be said to have existed in preceding reigns, and which the personal character of George the Third rendered very influential on public measures. A more valuable recruit could not easily have been found. He was certainly a most able parliamentary lawyer, and the exactness and precision that characterised his mind, caused his opinion to be always depended upon. These qualities, added to his discretion, gave him a moral influence over the House which could not be the result of his political conduct. His manners were obliging, and his private life irreproachable. It is highly to his credit that, when Clerk of the House, he departed from the example of his predecessors, by making no profit of his patronage. Nichols’s Literary Anecdotes, vol. viii. p. 523; Hatsell’s Parliamentary Precedents.—E.

[463] Catherine and Charlotte Shorter were daughters of John Shorter, of Bybrook in Kent. Catherine was first wife of Sir Robert Walpole, and mother of the author of these Memoirs. Charlotte was third wife of Francis Seymour, Lord Conway, and by him mother of Francis Earl of Hertford, and of General Henry Seymour Conway.

[464] I have seen a letter from the King to George Grenville, in which his Majesty pressed him to turn out Conway.

[465] John Fane, Earl of Westmoreland.

[466] Sir Richard Temple, Lord Viscount Cobham.

[467] This does not mean the vote of a single day, but all the votes on general warrants considered as one question.

[468] General John Campbell, Groom of the Bedchamber to George the Second, and cousin and successor of John and Archibald Dukes of Argyle when an old man.

[469] Caroline, daughter of the latter Duke John, third wife and widow of Charles Bruce, last Earl of Ailesbury, by whom she had an only child, Mary Duchess of Richmond. The Countess of Ailesbury married secondly General Henry Seymour Conway, only brother of Francis first Earl of Hertford of that branch.

[470] John Campbell, Marquis of Lorn, married to the famous beauty Elizabeth Gunning, widow of James Duke of Hamilton.

[471] Lord Frederick Campbell had been bred to the law, and succeeded well there, but quitted the profession on his father’s attaining the dukedom. [As he was brother in-law to General Conway, Mr. Walpole seems to have expected him to have followed Conway’s politics.—Mr. Croker’s note to the fourth volume of Walpole’s Letters, p. 369. Wraxall says of him, “Devoid of shining talents, he nevertheless wanted not either ability or eloquence in a certain degree, both which were under the control of reason and temper. His figure and deportment were remarkably graceful.” He married the Dowager Countess Ferrers, sister of Sir William Meredith, and died at an advanced age in 1816.—E.]

[472] Lord Hertford could not reasonably be expected to court a share in the consequences of an act of which he disapproved: and he was of a temperament that too easily disposed him to shrink from any personal sacrifice. His political principles were very indefinite. His merit was of a different character. Lord Chesterfield was sincere when he said of him, in a letter not intended for publication, “I verily believe he will please as Viceroy, for he is one of the honestest and most religious men in the kingdom, and moreover very much of a gentleman in his behaviour to everybody.”—His administration of Ireland was respectable, and in general approved of, and it passed away in almost uniform tranquillity.—Hardy’s Life of Lord Charlemont, vol. i. p. 224. He filled many high offices, and was very prosperous throughout life. He was created Marquis in 1793, and died in the following year, leaving a large family.—E.

[473] Lord Hertford had married Lady Isabella Fitzroy, youngest daughter of Charles Duke of Grafton, who was succeeded in the title by his grandson Augustus Henry, of whom much will be said in some of the following pages.

[474] The Duke subsequently gave the best proof of the sincerity of this offer by bequeathing General Conway a legacy of 5000l.—E.

[475] Conway conducted himself less well than Wolfe at Rochfort, but far better than the other generals. “Though eminently distinguished for his gallant and indefatigable behaviour,” says Walpole, “he never had the happiness of achieving any action of remarkable éclât, or of performing alone any act of singular utility to his country. However, he had been engaged in six regular battles, besides smaller affairs.”—(Counter Address to the Public on the Dismissal of a late General.) He commanded a division with credit in the Seven years’ war. An ill-natured cotemporary critic charges him with being a “martinet,” and with unnecessarily fatiguing his men, but admits that “he would have made a very good general if he had not been spoilt by his education under the Duke of Cumberland.” Life of Lord Chatham, Ap. vol. iii. p. 262.—E.

[476] The Queen’s brother.

[477] Lord Pembroke was again made a Lord of the Bedchamber in 1769, without applying; and exactly at a time when he was said to have carried off another woman, a young Venetian bride (he was then at Venice), the very night of her wedding. [Lord Pembroke had served in the Seven years’ war, and was popular with the officers under him, though not much of a soldier. He was dissolute and extravagant, and notwithstanding his large income, left when he died heavy debts, which his only son, the late Earl, a very respectable nobleman, honourably paid.—E.]

[478] Dr. Thomas Newton, Bishop of Bristol.

[479] Twickenham.

[480] Thomas Worseley, Surveyor of the Board of Works.

[481] Sir Hugh Smithson, of a very recent family, had married Lady Elizabeth Seymour, only daughter of Algernon Duke of Somerset, whose mother was heiress of the Percies, Earls of Northumberland; on which foundation Hugh and Elizabeth were created Earl and Countess of Northumberland.

[482] Dr. Johnson said, in allusion to it, “that his Grace was only fit to succeed himself.” Boswell, vol. ii. p. 210.—E.

[483] He had been likewise Secretary to the Earl of Halifax.

[484] Charles sixth Earl and first Marquis of Drogheda, K.P.—The Primate had four years before importunately pressed Mr. Pitt to give this nobleman the rank of colonel; and although the application was supported by the Duke of Devonshire and Lord Besborough, Mr. Pitt was firm in resisting it. “Among the very many lieutenant-colonels,” he said, “above Lord Drogheda on the list, there were not a few who could not be postponed without great hardship, and loud complaints in the army. He had publicly pledged himself to that most meritorious class of officers, that he would never contribute, from any considerations of family or parliamentary interest, to their depression.” The Primate’s letter and Mr. Pitt’s reply are given in the Chatham Correspondence, vol. ii. p. 59. The transaction reflects great honour on Mr. Pitt, and furnishes an additional proof of the high sense of public duty entertained by that illustrious statesman, in this, as in many other respects so superior, to most of his cotemporaries, not excepting the Primate of Ireland. Lord Drogheda obtained his rank in 1762, and eventually reached almost the head of the army list, having in his old age been appointed Field-Marshal. He died at Dublin in December 1821, in his ninety-second year. He saw little, if any, foreign service, but he had been constantly employed in his own country, where he was much esteemed. He preserved to the last a remarkable elegance and amiability of deportment.—E.

[485] It must be recollected, that Walpole, from some private cause, bore Lord and Lady Northumberland no good will, and frequently sneers at them in his Correspondence. A childish feeling of envy at Lord Northumberland’s brilliant success in life, was probably at the bottom of this, and prevented Walpole’s making due allowance for the temptations attendant on great and unexpected prosperity. His Lordship had the tastes that became the high rank to which he was elevated. He patronized the arts, and was generous to men of letters. His vanity was unaccompanied by arrogance, and his feelings, though not warm, were kind and amiable. Neither his talents nor acquirements were above mediocrity. He died in 1786.—E.

[486] The Duchess’s defects are, no doubt, greatly exaggerated by Walpole. M. Dutens says of her Grace, that “she possessed great elevation of mind, natural and easy wit, a good and compassionate heart, and, above all, a strong attachment to her friends, whom she took every opportunity to distinguish and to serve.”—Memoirs of a Traveller, &c., vol. ii. p. 100. She met her death, which was sudden, with great firmness and resignation.—E.

[487] The marriage was unfortunate, and dissolved in 1779. Lord Warkworth became Duke of Northumberland in 1786. He served as Lord Percy in the American war. Unlike his father, he was totally devoid of ostentation, and most simple and retiring in his habits. He died in 1817.—E.

[488] The house of Andrew Stone, in Privy Garden.

[489] George Keppel, third Earl of Albemarle. His youngest sister, Lady Elizabeth, was married to Francis Russell, Marquis of Tavistock, only son of John Duke of Bedford.