[5] Hist. MSS. Comm., MSS. of H.M. the King, Stuart Papers, i. p. xlviii.
[6] Sichel’s Bolingbroke, i. 340; Lockhart Papers, i. 460; Macpherson, ii. 529.
[7] Wentworth Papers, 408.
[8] Hist. MSS. Comm., Stuart Papers, i. 500; Berwick’s Mem. (Petitot), vol. lxvi. 262.
[9] Coxe’s Walpole, i. 200; Stuart Papers, ii. 511, and also 446, 460.
[10] Hist. MSS. Comm., Onslow MSS. 515.
[11] Bolingbroke to Swift, June 24th, 1727. He adds, “to hanker after a court is below either you or me.”
[12] Sichel’s Bolingbroke, ii. 267; Stanhope, ii. 163; Hist. MSS. Comm., Onslow MSS. 516, 8th Rep. Pt. III. App. p. 3. This remarkable incident is discredited by H. Walpole in Letters (ed. 1903), iii. 269; but he was not always well informed concerning his father’s career.
BOLIVAR, SIMON (1783-1830), the hero of South American independence, was born in the city of Caracas, Venezuela, on the 24th of July 1783. His father was Juan Vicente Bolivar y Ponte, and his mother Maria Concepcion Palacios y Sojo, both descended from noble families in Venezuela. Bolivar was sent to Europe to prosecute his studies, and resided at Madrid for several years. Having completed his education, he spent some time in travelling, chiefly in the south of Europe, and visited Paris, where he was an eye-witness of some of the last scenes of the Revolution. Returning to Madrid, he married, in 1801, the daughter of Don N. Toro, uncle of the marquis of Toro in Caracas, and embarked with her for Venezuela, intending, it is said, to devote himself to the improvement of his large estate. But the premature death of his young wife, who fell a victim to yellow fever, drove him again to Europe. Returning home in 1809 he passed through the United States, where, for the first time, he had an opportunity of observing the working of free institutions; and soon after his arrival in Venezuela he appears to have identified himself with the cause of independence which had already agitated the Spanish colonies for some years. Being one of the promoters of the insurrection at Caracas in April 1810, he received a colonel’s commission from the revolutionary junta, and was associated with Louis Lopez Mendez in a mission to the court of Great Britain. Venezuela declared its independence on the 5th of July 1811, and in the following year the war commenced in earnest by the advance of Monteverde with the Spanish troops. Bolivar was entrusted with the command of the important post of Puerto Cabello, but not being supported he had to evacuate the place; and owing to the inaction of Miranda the Spaniards recovered their hold over the country.