[337] Henry Lyttelton, formerly Governor of Carolina, and youngest brother of George Lord Lyttelton.
[338] Francis Russell, only son by Gertrude Leveson, the Duke’s second wife.
[339] They were called, in the satires of the time, the Bloomsbury Gang, Bedford House standing in Bloomsbury Square: of these the chief were Earl Gower, Lord Sandwich, and Rigby. Sandwich gloried in his artifices; Rigby was not ashamed of his, but veiled them for better use; Lord Gower had neither feeling, shame, nor remorse. All three were men of parts, and agreeable. Lord Weymouth became an accession, and inferior to none of them in their worse faults; he brought pride into the account, and a less proportion of parts.
[340] Lady Tavistock died in 1768 at Lisbon, where she had been sent for the recovery of her health. Hers was really a case of broken heart. From the hour that her husband’s death was made known to her, she drooped until she sank into what she truly designated “the welcome grave.”—E.
[341] Walpole’s hatred of the Duke and Duchess of Bedford must have been intense, or his sagacity could have scarcely overlooked, that in censuring Junius he condemns himself. Perhaps he is the more blameable of the two. Junius may have believed the Duke to have been a bad man. Walpole has elsewhere described him as having a good heart. He knew the facts urged by Junius in support of the charge of the Duke being an unnatural parent to be untrue; and yet he not only leaves them uncontradicted, but frames his narration so as to facilitate their belief. The Duke’s memory has been repeatedly vindicated from this cruel aspersion, and never with more generous and indignant eloquence than lately by Lord Brougham.—(Political Sketches, vol. iii.) It has always been understood in the quarters likely to be the best informed, that he felt his son’s loss deeply to the last hour of his life. Instead, however, of yielding to his grief, he endeavoured to employ his thoughts on public business, and the natural fervour of his disposition insensibly engaged him in the scenes before him perhaps more deeply than he was aware of. The meeting he attended at the India House must, as appears from the Company’s books, have been that of the 8th of April, which determined the course to be taken by the Company on the Government propositions: a great question, in which he took the liveliest interest. The force of mind he thus displayed is noticed with commendation in a letter written at the time by David Hume, who, from his connection with Conway, is assuredly an impartial witness.—(Hume to M. de Barbantine, Cav. Debates, vol. i. p. 601.) The absurd charge brought by Junius against the Duchess, of making money by Lord Tavistock’s wardrobe, originated in its having been sold for the benefit of his valet and Lady Tavistock’s maid, according to the general practice of that day.—E.
[342] He was brother of the Member for Berkshire, and of Miss Vansittart, favourite of the Princess of Wales, and was lost not long after in a voyage to India, along with Mr. Scrafton, author of an excellent tract on Indian affairs.
[343] He not only risked, but lost it in 1783.
[344] Three Lords of the Bedchamber, the Earls of Coventry, Eglinton, and Buckinghamshire, were also in the minority. (See Chatham Correspondence, vol. iii.) The Duke of Bedford notices the Debate in his Journal as if he had not felt much interest in the matter. (Cavendish’s Debates, vol. i. p. 601.)—E.
Transcriber’s Notes
Punctuation and spelling were made consistent when a predominant preference was found in this book; otherwise they were not changed.