FREDERICK WILLIAM II.
Ld. Malmesbury was to have gone to make the compliments, but most likely Mr. Canning made him relinquish it for the sake of his young friend; and Ld. M. did it more readily since the memento of mortality he has lately had. His head is awry, and his whole appearance indicates a universal shock.
Ld. H. made, on ye 10th of January, his debut in the H. of Lords, on the subject of the Assessed Taxes.[181] He spoke well in his first speech, but admirably in his reply. His speech was precisely what a friend would wish: argumentative and simple, evidently not a studied declamation, and such as a first opening should be, more because it promised success than that it possessed it. I should have been sorry to have heard it was eloquent, as almost all the speakers who have begun pompously have stopped short, as for instance Ld. Hawkesbury, Belgrave, and Mr. Canning. The wit and quickness of his reply is an answer to those who probably would have ascribed to Mr. Fox his speech. In answer to Lord Grenville’s repeated boasts of the excellence of the Constitution, he said it reminded him of Prior’s lines:—
When Harlequin extolled his horse
Fit for the road, the chase, the course;
One fault he had, a fault indeed,
And what was that? His horse was dead.
He entered a protest, but by some unlucky misunderstanding the Duke of Bedford did not sign it, and Ld. H. was too indolent to get the signatures of the other peers who wanted to sign; and unfortunately Ld. Oxford was the only person who signed with him. The Assessed Taxes have passed, and there is besides a voluntary subscription open for those who have money enough left to squander upon such an absurd donation.[182] The Assessed Taxes add to us 1000l. and fifty pounds besides the old assessment—a sum added to the annual expenditure that compels us to exceed our income, and nothing but the desperate state of affairs can make me look upon such a certainty as a moderate calamity.
MR. GREY
Messrs. Grey, Tierney, and Erskine dined here last week. Grey was placid in temper and pleasing in his manner, a contrast to the general state of both, as he is usually irritable and supercilious. His heart is warm and excellent, and those few who do not detest him love him with great affection, but he is universally unpopular from the offensiveness of his behaviour. He says he is dissatisfied with his political conduct, and regrets having continued so long in Parliament after seceding. He began his political career under the auspices of Ld. Lansdown; the beauty and attraction of the Dss. of Devonshire drew him to the party of which she was a most active partisan. His abilities and connections secured him the flattery of the Whigs, and more seduced by his heart than convinced by his reason, he became an adherent of Mr. Fox’s. For many years he was discontented, for his ambition and vanity have been checked and mortified, the first from the desperate, unavailing opposition, and his vanity at being compared with Sheridan and obliged to act in concert with him. His eloquence is more pleasing and agreeable than forcible and deep; in private life he is very respectable. He has married the Duchess of Devonshire’s relation, Miss Ponsonby, a mild, insipid, pretty girl.[183] They are very happy, and if he is satisfied it is no person’s business to express astonishment at it.