I used to say that one could not go out of London for two days without finding at one's return that something very extraordinary had happened; but of late the climate had lost its propensity to odd accidents. Madness be praised, we are a little restored to the want of our senses! I have been twice this Christmas at Strawberry Hill for a few days, and at each return have been not a little surprised: the last time, at the very unexpected death of Lord Albemarle,(541) who was taken ill at Paris, going home from supper, and expired in a few hours; and last week at the far more extraordinary death of Montford.(542) He himself, with all his judgment in bets, I think would have betted any man in England against himself for self-murder: yet after having been supposed the sharpest genius of his time, he, by all that appears, shot himself on the distress of his circumstances; an apoplectic disposition I believe concurring, either to lower his spirits, or to alarm them. Ever since Miss * * * * lived with him, either from liking her himself, as some think, or to tempt her to marry his lilliputian figure, he has squandered vast sums at Horse- heath, and in living. He lost twelve hundred a-year by Lord Albemarle's death, and four by Lord Gage's, the same day. He asked immediately for the government of Virginia or the Foxhounds, and pressed for an answer with an eagerness that surprised the Duke of Newcastle, who never had a notion of pinning down the relief of his own or any other man's wants to a day. Yet that seems to have been the case of Montford, who determined to throw the die of life and death, Tuesday was Se'nnight, on the answer he was to receive from court; which did not prove favourable. He consulted indirectly, and at last pretty directly several people on the easiest method of finishing life; and seems to have thought that he had been too explicit; for he invited company to dinner for the day after his death, and ordered a supper at Whites, where he Supped, too, the night before. He played at whist till one in the morning; it was New Year's morning - Lord Robert Bertie drank to him a happy new year; he clapped his hands strangely to his eyes! In the morning he had a lawyer and three witnesses, and executed his will, which he made them read twice over, paragraph by paragraph: and then asking the lawyer if that will would stand good, though a man were to shoot himself? and being assured it would; he said, " Pray stay while I step into the next room;"=-went into the next room and shot himself. He clapped the pistol so close to his head, that they heard no report. The housekeeper heard him fall, and, thinking he had a fit, ran up with drops, and found his skull and brains shot about the room You will be charmed with the friendship and generosity of Sir Francis. Montford a little time since opened his circumstances to him. Sir Francis said, "Montford, if it will be of any service to you, you shall see what I have done for you;" pulled out his will, and read it, where he had left him a vast legacy. The beauty of this action is heightened by Sir Francis's life not being worth a year's purchase. I own I feel for the distress this man must have felt, before he decided on so desperate an action. I knew him but little; but he was good-natured and agreeable enough, and had the most compendious understanding I ever knew. He had affected a finesse in money matters beyond what he deserved, and aimed at reducing even natural affections to a kind of calculations, like Demoivre's. He was asked, soon after his daughter's marriage, if she was with child: he replied, "upon my word, I don't know; I have no bet upon it." This and poor * * * *'s self-murder have brought to light another, which happening in France, had been sunk; * * * *'s. I can tell you that the ancient and worshipful company- of lovers are under a great dilemma, upon a husband and a gamester killing themselves: I don't know whether they will not apply to Parliament for an exclusive charter for self-murder.
On the occasion of Montford's story, I heard another more extraordinary. If a man insures his life, this killing himself vacates the bargain; This (as in England almost every thing begets a contradiction) has produced an office for insuring in spite of self-murder; but not beyond three hundred pounds. I suppose voluntary deaths were not the bon-ton. of people in higher life. A man went and insured his life, securing this privilege of a free-dying Englishman. He carried the insurers to dine at a tavern, where they met several other persons. After dinner he said to the life—and-death brokers, "Gentlemen, it is fit that you should be acquainted with the company: these honest men are tradesmen, to whom I was in debt, without any means of paying, but by your assistance; and now I am your humble servant!" He pulled out a pistol and shot himself. Did you ever hear of such a mixture of honesty and knavery?
Lord Rochford is to succeed as groom of the stole. The Duke of Marlborough is privy-seal, in the room of Lord Gower, who is dead; and the Duke of Rutland is lord steward. Lord Albemarle's other offices and honours are still in petto. When the king first saw this Lord Albemarle, he said, "Your father had a great many good qualities, but he was a sieve!"- -It is 'the last receiver into which I should have thought his Majesty would have poured gold! You will be pleased with the monarch's politesse. Sir John Bland and Offley made interest to play at Twelfth-night, and succeeded—not at play, for they lost 1400 pounds and 1300 pounds. As it is not usual for people of no higher rank to play, the King thought they would be bashful about it, and took particular care to do the honours of his house to them, set only to them, and spoke to them at his levee next morning.
You love new nostrums and ]Inventions: there is discovered a method of inoculating the cattle for the distemper-it succeeds so well that they are not even marked. How we advance rapidly in discoveries, and in applying every thing to every thing! Here is another secret, that will better answer your purpose, and I hope mine too. They found out lately at the Duke of Argyle's, that any kind of ink may be made of privet: it becomes green ink by mixing salt of tartar. I don't know the process; but I am promised it by Campbell, who told me of it t'other day, when I carried him the true genealogy of the Bentleys, which he assured me shall be inserted in the next edition of the Biographia.
There sets out to-morrow morning, by the Southampton wagon, such a cargo of trees for you, that a detachment of Kentishmen would be furnished against an invasion if they were to unroll the bundle. I write to Mr. S * * * * to recommend great care of them. Observe how I answer your demands: are you as punctual? The forests in your landscapes do not thrive like those in' your letters. Here is a letter from G. Montagu; and then I think I may bid you good-night!
(541) In his "Memoires," Vol. i. p. 366, Walpole says, "He died suddenly at Paris, where his mistress had sold him to the French court." A writer in the Quarterly Review, Vol Ixii. p. 5, states that what he here asserts was generally believed in Paris; for that, in the "M`emoires Secrets," published in continuation of Bachaumont's Journal, it is said, on occasion of the Count d'Herouville's death in 1782, that " he had been talked of for the ministry under Louis XV. and would probably have obtained it, had it not been for 'son mariage trop in`egal. Il avait `epous`e la fameuse Lolotte maitresse du Comte d'Albemarle, l'ambassadeur d'Angleterre, laquelle servait d'espion au minist`ere de France aupr`es de son amant, et a touch`e en cons`equence jusqu'`a sa mort une pension de la cour de 12,000 livres.' But if the French court purchased, as he reports, and as is sufficiently probable, instructions of our ambassador, they could have learned from them nothing to facilitate their own schemes of aggression—nothing but what they knew before; for the policy of England, defective as it might be on other points, had this great and paramount advantage,-that it was open, honest, and straightforward."-E.
(542) Henry Bromley, created Lord Montford of Horse-heath, in 1741. He married Frances, daughter of Thomas Wyndham, Esq. and sister and heiress of Sir Francis Wyndham, of Trent, in the county of Somerset.-E.
236 Letter 122 To Sir Horace Mann. Arlington Street, Jan. 9, 1755.
I had an intention of deferring writing to you, my dear Sir, till I could wish you joy on the completion of your approaching dignity:(543) but as the Duke of Newcastle is not quite so expeditious as my friendship is earnest; and as your brother tells me that you have had some very unnecessary qualms, from your silence to me on this chapter, I can no longer avoid telling you how pleased I am with any accession of distinction to you and your family; I should like nothing better but an accession of appointments: but I shall say no more on this head, where wishes are so barren as mine. Your brother, who had not time to write by this post, desires me to tell you that the Duke will be obliged to you, if you will send him the new map of Rome and of the patrimony of St. Peter, which his Royal Highness says is just published.
You will have heard long before you receive this, of Lord Albemarle's(544) sudden death at Paris: every body is so sorry for him!—without being so: yet as sorry as he would have been for any body, or as he deserved. Can one really regret a man, who, with the most meritorious wife(545) and sons(546) in the world, and with near 15,000 pounds a year from the government, leaves not a shilling to his family, lawful or illegitimate, (and both very numerous,) but dies immensely in debt, though, when he married, he had 90,000 pounds, in the funds, and my Lady Albemarle brought him 25,000 pounds more, all which is dissipated to 14,000 pounds! The King very handsomely, and tired with having done so much for a man who had so little pretensions to it, immediately gave my Lady Albemarle 1200 pounds a year pension, and I trust will take care of this Lord, who is a great friend of mine, and what is much better for him, the first favourite of the Duke. If I were as grave an historian as my Lord Clarendon, I should now without any scruple tell you a dream; you would either believe it from my dignity of character, or conclude from my dignity of character that I did not believe it myself. As neither of these important evasions will serve my turn, I shall relate the following, only prefacing, that I do believe the dream happened, and happened right among the millions of dreams that do not hit. Lord Bury was at Windsor with the Duke when the express of his father's death arrived: he came to town time enough to find his mother and sisters at breakfast. "Lord! child," said my Lady Albemarle, "what brings you to town so early?" He said he had been sent for. Says she "You are not well!" "Yes," replied Lord Bury, "I am, but a little flustered with something I have heard." "Let me feel your pulse," said Lady Albemarle: "Oh!" continued she, "your father is dead!" "Lord Madam," said Lord Bury, "how could that come into your head? I should rather have imagined that you would have thought it was my poor brother William" (who is just gone to Lisbon for his health). "No," said my Lady Albemarle, "I know it is your father; I dreamed last night that he was dead, and came to take leave of me!" and immediately swooned.