The Letters of Horace Walpole, Earl of Orford Volume II Part 13

I find I must send away my letter this week, and reserve the history of the Regency for another post. The bill was to have been brought into the House of lords to-day, but Sherlock, the Bishop of London, has raised difficulties against the limitation of the future Regent's authority, which he a.s.serts to be repugnant to the spirit of our Const.i.tution. Lord Talbot had already determined to oppose it; and the Pitts and Lyttelton's, who are grown very mutinous on the Newcastle's not choosing Pitt for his colleague, have talked loudly against it without doors. The preparatory steps to this great event I will tell you. The old Monarch grandchildizes exceedingly: the Princess, who is certainly a wise woman, and who, in a course of very difficult situations, has never made an enemy nor had a detractor, has got great sway there. The Pelhams, taking advantage of this new partiality, of the universal dread of the Duke, and of the necessity of his being administrator of Hanover, prevailed to have the Princess Regent, but with a council of nine of the chief great officers, to be continued in their posts till the majority, which is fixed for eighteen; nothing to be transacted without the a.s.sent of the greater number; and the Parliament that shall find itself existing at the King's death to subsist till the minority ceases: such restrictions must be almost as unwelcome to the Princess as the whole regulation is to the Duke. Judge of his resentment: he does not conceal it. The divisions in the ministry are neither closed nor come to a decision. Lord Holderness arrived yesterday, exceedingly mortified at not finding himself immediate secretary of state, for which purpose he was sent for; but Lord Halifax would not submit to have this cipher preferred to him. An expedient was proposed of flinging the American province into the Board of Trade, but somehow or other, that has miscarried, and all is at a stand. It is known that Lord Granville is designed for president-and for what more don't you think?-he has the inclination of the King--would they be able again to persuade people to resign unless he is removed?-and will not all those who did resign with that intention endeavour to expiate that insult?

Amid all this new clash of politics Murray has had an opportunity for one or two days of making himself talked of. A month ago his brother(247) obtained leave, on pretence of his health, to remove him into the custody of the sergeant-at-arms; but he refused to go thither, and abused his brother for meanness in making such submissive application. On this his confinement was straitened. Last week, my worthy cousin, Sir John Philips, moved the King's Bench for a rule to bring him thither, in order to his having his habeas corpus. He was produced there the next day; 'but the three Judges, onhearing he was committed by the House of Commons, acknowledged the authority, and remanded him back. There was a disposition to commit Sir John, but we have liked to be-pleased with this acknowledgment of our majesty.

St.i.tara(248) has declared to her son that she is marrying s.h.i.+rley, but ties him up strictly. I am ready to begin again with a panegyric of My nephew, but I will rather answer a melancholy letter I have Just received from you. His affairs are putting into the best situation we can, and we are agitating a vast match for him, which, if it can be brought to bear, will even save your brother, whose great tenderness to mine has left him exposed to greater risks than any of the creditors. For myself, I think I shall escape tolerably, as my demands are from my father, whose debts are likely to be satisfied. My uncle Horace is indefatigable in adjusting all this confusion. Do but figure him at seventy-four, looking, not merely well for his age, but plump, ruddy, and without a wrinkle or complaint; doing every body's business, full of politics as ever, from morning till night, and then roaming the town to conclude with a party at whist! I have no apprehensions for your demands on Doddington; but your brother, who sees him, will be best able to satisfy you on that head.

Madame de Mirepoix's brother-in-law was not Duke, but Chevalier de Boufflers. Here is my uncle come to drop me a bit of marriage-settlements on his road to his rubbers, so I must finish--you will not be sorry; at least I have given you some light to live upon. Adieu!

(234) George Bubb Dodington.

(235) The following is Dodington's own account of this plan:- -"March 21. When this unfortunate event happened, I had set on foot a project for a union between the independent Whigs and Tories, by a writing, renouncing all tincture of Jacobitism, and affirming short const.i.tutional Revolution principles.

These parties, so united, were to lay this paper, containing these principles, before the Prince, offering to appear as his party now, and upon those principles to undertake the administration when he was King, in the subordination and rank among themselves that he should please to appoint. Father of mercy! thy hand that wounds alone can save!" Diary, P. 88.-E.

(236) Lord Middles.e.x.

(237) Thomas Hayter, Bishop of Norwich.

(238) Dr. Lancelot Blackburne. (See vol. i. The Quarterly Reviewer of Walpole's Memoires, alluding to a similar statement made in that work says,--"As to the accusations of b.a.s.t.a.r.dy and profligacy brought against the Bishop and Archbishop, they were, probably, either the creatures of Walpole's own anxiety to draw striking characters, or the echoes of some of those slanderous murmurs which always accompany persons who rise from inferior stations to eminence. He tells us without any hesitation, that Bishop Hayter was a natural son of archbishop Blackburne's. Now we have before us extracts from the registers of the parish of Chagford, in Devons.h.i.+re, which prove that the Bishop Thomas Hayter was 'the son of George Hayter, rector of this parish, and of Grace his wife,' and that Thomas was one of a family of not fewer, we believe, than ten children Vol. xxvii. p. 186.-E.)

(239) George Augustus Yelverton, second Earl of Suss.e.x, died 1758.-D.

(240) Henry Pleydell Dawnay, third Viscount Downe in Ireland.

He distinguished himself greatly in the command of a regiment at the battle of Minden; and died Dec. 9th, 1760, of the wounds he had received at the battle of Campen, Oct. 16th of that year.-D.

(241) The third son of Robert, first Duke of Ancaster and Kesteven. He died in 1782.-D.

(242) "May 3.-Sense of the House taken, if the young Prince of Wales's new servants should be reelected: it was agreed not.

The act was read; but those who seemed to favour a re-election forgot to call for the warrants that appointed them servants to the Prince: by whom are they signed? if by the King, the case would not have admitted a word of dispute." Dodington, p.

104.-E.

(243) Mademoiselle d'Olbreuse. It is this m'esalliance which prevents our Royal Family from being what is called chapitrate in Germany. Mademoiselle d'Olbreuse was the mother of George the First's unhappy wife.-D.

(244) Lady Pomfret.

(245) See ant'e.-E.

(246) Henry Petty, Earl of Shelburne in Ireland, the last of the male descendants of Sir William Petty. Upon his death his t.i.tles extinguished; but his estates devolved on his nephew, the Lord John Fitz Maurice, in whose favour the t.i.tle of Shelburne was revived.-D.

(247) Lord Elibank.

(248) Lady Orford. She did marry Mr. s.h.i.+rley.

103 Letter 40 To Sir Horace Mann.

Arlington Street, May 30, 1751.

In your last of May 14th, you seem uneasy at not having heard from me in two posts. I have writ you so exactly all the details that I know you would wish to hear, that I think my letters must have miscarried. I will mention all the dates of this year; Feb. 8th, March 14th and 21st, April 1st, and May 1st; tell me if you have received all these. I don't pretend to say any thing to alleviate your concern for the late misfortunes, but will only recommend to you to harden yourself against every accident, as I endeavour to do. The mortifications and disappointments I have experienced have taught me the philosophy that dwells not merely in speculation.

I choose to think about the world, as I have always found, when I most wanted its comfort, it thought about me, that is, not at all. It is a disagreeable dream which must end for every body else as well as for oneself. Some try to supply the emptiness and vanity of present life by something still more empty, fame.

I choose to comfort myself, by considering that even while I am lamenting any present uneasiness it is actually pa.s.sing away. I cannot feel the comfort of folly, because I am not a fool, and I scarce know any other being that it is worth one's while to wish to be. All this looks as if it proceeded from a train of melancholy ideas--it does so: but misfortunes have that good in them that they teach one indifference.

if I Could be mortified anew, I should be with a new disappointment, The immense and uncommon friends.h.i.+p of Mr.

Chute had found a method of saving both my family and yours.

In short, in the height of his affliction for Whithed, whom he still laments immoderately, he undertook to get Miss Nicholl, the vast fortune, a fortune of above 150,000 pounds, whom Whithed was to have had, for Lord Orford. He actually persuaded her to run away from her guardians, who used her inhumanly, and are her next heirs. How clearly he is justified, you will see, when I tell you that the man, who has eleven hundred a-year for her maintenance, with which he stopped the demands Of his own creditors, instead of employing it for her maintenance and education, is since gone into the Fleet. After such fair success, Lord Orford has refused to marry her; why, n.o.body can guess. Thus had I placed him in a greater situation than even his grandfather hoped to bequeath to him, had retrieved all the oversights of my family, had saved Houghton and all our glory!-Now, all must go!-and what shocks me infinitely more, Mr. Chute, by excess of treachery, (a story too long for a letter,) is embroiled with his own brother the story, with many others, I believe I shall tell you in person; for I do not doubt but the disagreeable scenes which I have still to go through, will at last drive me to where I have long proposed to seek some peace. But enough of these melancholy ideas!

The Regency-bill has pa.s.sed with more ease than could have been expected from so extraordinary a measure; and from the warmth with which it was taken up one day in the House of Commons. In the Lords there were but 12 to 106, and the former, the most inconsiderable men in that House. Lord Bath and Lord Grenville spoke vehemently for it: the former in as wild a speech, with much parts, as ever he made in his patriot days; and with as little modesty he lamented the scrambles that he had seen for power! In our House, Mr. Pelham had four signal mortifications: the Speaker, in a most pathetic and fine speech, Sir John Barnard, and Lord Cobham,(249) speaking against, and Mr. Fox, though voting for it, tearing it to pieces. Almost all the late Prince's people spoke or voted for it; most, pretending deference to the Princess, though her power is so much abridged by it. However, the consolation that resides in great majorities balanced the disagreeableness of particular oppositions. We sit, and shall sit, till towards the end of June, though with little business of importance. If there happens any ministerial struggle, which seems a little asleep at present, it will scarce happen till after the prorogation.

Adieu! my dear child; I have nothing else worth telling you at present--at least, the same things don't strike me that used to do; or what perhaps is more true, when things of consequence takes one up, one can't attend to mere trifling. When I say this, you will ask me, where is my philosophy! Even where the best is: I think as coolly as I can, I don't exaggerate what is disagreeable, and I endeavour to lessen it, by undervaluing what I am inclined to think would be a happier state.

(249) Richard Grenville, eldest son of Richard Grenville, of Wotton, Esq. and of Esther Temple, Countess Temple and Viscountess Cobham, in her own right. Lord Cobham became well known in the political world as Earl Temple; which t.i.tle he succeeded to on the decease of his mother in 1752.-D.

105 Letter 41 To George Montagu, Esq.

Arlington Street, May 30, 1751.

Mrs. Boscawen says I ought to write to you. I don't think so.

you desired I would, if I had any things new to tell you; I have not. Lady Caroline and Miss Ashe had quarrelled, about reputations before you went out of town. I suppose you would not give a straw to know all the circ.u.mstances of a Mr. Paul killing a Mr. Dalton, though the town, who talks of any thing, talks of nothing else. Mrs. French and her Jeffery are parted again. Lady Orford and s.h.i.+rley married: they say she was much frightened; it could not be for fear of what other brides dread of happening, but for fear it should not happen.

My evening yesterday was employed, how wisely do You think? in trying to procure for the d.u.c.h.ess of Portland a scarlet spider from Admiral Boscawen. I had just seen her collection, which is indeed magnificent, chiefly composed of the spoils of her father's, and the Arundel collections. The gems of all sorts are glorious. I was diverted with two relics of St. Charles the Martyr; one, the pearl you see in his pictures, taken out of his ear after his foolish head was off; the other, the cup out of which he took his last sacrament. They should be given to that nursery of nonsense and bigotry, Oxford.

I condole with you on your journey, am glad Miss Montagu is in better health, and am yours sincerely.

105 Letter 42 To The Rev. Joseph Spence.(250) Arlington Street, June 3, 1751.

Dear sir, I have translated the lines, and send them to you; but the expressive conciseness and beauty of the original, and my disuse of turning 106 verses, made it so difficult, that I beg they may be of no other use than that of showing you how readily I complied with your request.

"Illam, quicquid agit, quoquo vestilia vert.i.t, Componit furtim subsequiturque decor."

"If she but moves or looks, her step, her face, By stealth adopt unmeditated grace."

There are twenty little literal variations that may be made, and are of no consequence, as 'move' or 'look'; 'air' instead of 'step', and 'adopts' instead of 'adopt': I don't know even whether I would not read 'steal and adopt', instead of 'by stealth adopt'. But none of these changes will make the copy half so pretty as the original. But what signifies that? I am not obliged to be a poet because Tibullus was one; nor is it just now that I have discovered I am not. Adieu!

(250) Now first collated. See Singer's edition of Spence's Anecdotes, p. 349.-E.

106 Letter 43 To George Montagu, Esq.

Arlington Street, June 13, 1751.

You have told me that it is charity to write you news into Kent; but what if my news should shock you! Won't it rather be an act of cruelty to tell you, your relation, Sandwich,(251) is immediately to be removed; and that the Duke of Bedford and all the Gowers will resign to attend him? Not quite all the Gowers, for the Earl himself keeps the privy-seal and plays on at brag, with Lady Catherine Pelham, to the great satisfaction of the Staffords.h.i.+re Jacobites, who desire, at least expect, no better diversion than a division in that house. Lord Trentham does resign. Lord Hartington is to be master of the horse, and called up to the House of Peers. Lord Granville is to be president; if he should resent any former resignations and insist on victims, will Lord Hartington a.s.sure the menaced that they shall not be sacrificed?

I hear your friend Lord North is wedded: somebody said it is very hot weather to marry so fat a bride; George Selwyn replied, "Oh! she was kept in ice for three days before."

The first volume of Spenser is published with prints, designed by Kent; but the most execrable performance you ever beheld.

The graving not worse than the drawing; awkward knights, scrambling Unas, hills tumbling down themselves, no variety Of prospect and three or four perpetual spruce firs.