(638) William Gerard Hamilton. It was this speech which, not being followed, as was naturally expected, by repeated exhibitions of similar eloquence, acquired for him the name of single-speech Hamilton.
(639) The Duke of Cumberland.
291 Letter 160 To Richard Bentley, Esq. Arlington Street, November 16, 1755.
Never was poor invulnerable Immortality so soon brought to shame! Alack! I have had the gout! would fain have persuaded myself that it was a sprain: and, then, that it was only the gout come to look for Mr. Chute at Strawberry Hill: but none of my evasions will do! I was, certainly, lame for two days; and though I repelled it—first, by getting wet-shod, and then by spirits of camphor; and though I have since tamed it more rationally by leaving off the little wine I drank, I still know where to look for it whenever I have an occasion for a political illness. Come, my constitution is not very much broken, when, in four days after such a mortifying attack, I could sit in the House of Commons, full as possible, from two at noon till past five in the morning, as we did but last Thursday. The new opposition attacked the address. Who are the new opposition? Why, the old opposition— Pitt and the Grenvilles; indeed, with Legge instead of Sir George Lyttelton. Judge how entertaining it was to me to hear Lyttelton answer Grenville, and Pitt Lyttelton! The debate, long and uninterrupted as it was, was a great deal of it extremely fine: the numbers did not answer to the merit: the new friends, the Duke of Newcastle and Mr. Fox, had 311 to 105. The bon-mot in fashion is, that the staff was very good, but they wanted private Men. Pitt surpassed himself, and then I need not tell you that he surpassed Cicero and Demosthenes. What a figure would they, with their formal, laboured, cabinet orations, make vis-`a-vis his manly vivacity and dashing eloquence at one o'clock in the morning, after sitting in that heat for eleven hours! He spoke above an hour and a half, with scarce a bad sentence: the most admired part was a comparison he drew of the two parts of the new administration, to the conflux of the Rhone and the Saone; "the latter a gentle, feeble, languid stream, languid but not deep; the other a boisterous and overbearing torrent; but they joined at last; and long may they continue united, to the comfort of each other, and to the glory, honour, and happiness of this nation!" I hope you are not mean-spirited enough to dread an invasion, when the senatorial contests are reviving in the temple of Concord.-But will it make a party? Yes, truly: I never saw so promising a prospect. Would not it be cruel, at such a period, to be laid up?
I have only had a note from you to promise me a letter; but it is not arrived:—but the partridges are, and well; and I thank you.
England seems returning:(640) for those who are not in Parliament, there are nightly riots at Drury-lane, where there is an anti-Gallican party against some French dancers. The young men of quality have protected them till last night, when, being Opera night, the galleries were victorious.(641)
Montagu writes me many kind things for you; he is in Cheshire, but comes to town this winter. Adieu! I have so much to say, that I have time to say but very little.
P. S. George Selwyn hearing much talk of a sea-war or a continent, said, , I am for a sea-war and a continent admiral."
(640) Walpole means the disposition towards mobs and rioting at public places, which was then common among young men, and had been a sort of fashion in his early youth.-E.
(641) A spectacle brought out by Garrick, in the beginning of this month, at Drury-lane gave great offence to the public, in consequence of the number of foreigners employed in it; and, on the sixth representation, a violent riot took place, by which a damage to the theatre was incurred of several thousand pounds.-E.