[A] He was said to have been confined to his bed during the

defence of Minorca, for which he was so extravagantly rewarded.

[B] The gallant but unsuccessful affair of Cassel in which the

Hereditary Prince of Brunswick was wounded.

The political libels on the King are thus sarcastically described:

“Recast the royal virtues, which before

The nation worshipped, and cry down the ore,

To teach the people this indulgent reign

With every charge of tyranny to stain,--

To swallow every contradiction down,--

In Antonine’s mild look see Nero’s frown,--

Wrest his intention and distort each fact,

And lend them treason till they long to act;

In terms of duty wrap each boisterous deed,--

Kneel while we stab, and libel while we plead.”

This compliment on the King is pretty:

“Who from the sceptre no exemption draws,

And is but the first subject of the laws.”

His gratitude to Lord Bute has flowered in a panegyric, which may

interest the reader from being one of the very few poetical tributes

obtained by that nobleman approaching mediocrity.

“Oh! if we seize with skill the coming hour,

And re-invest us with the robe of power--

Rule while we live--let _future_ days transmute

To every merit all we’ve charged on Bute.

Let late Posterity receive his name,

And swell its sails with every breath of fame:

Downward as far as Time shall roll his tide,

With every pendant flying let it glide;

And Truth emerging from the clouds we raise,

Gild all their orient colours with her blaze.

Let his loved arts, attendant on his way,

Their wanton trophies to the gale display;

While each dispassionate, each honest pen,

(Deterred by clamour, nor allured by gain,--

Bard or Historian--) shall from either shore,

Hail its approach, and its great course explore;

Faithful to Probity and Virtue’s cause,

Pursue its progress, and direct th’ applause.

Glad Gratulation shall with shouts approve,

And own him worthy of his Sovereign’s love.”

The success of this satire brought an accumulation of favours on the

author, as, in addition to a commissionership of lotteries, and other

small places, he received a pension for the lives of himself and his

wife of 500_l._ per annum. He was the only son of the celebrated

critic, and dabbled a little in criticism himself, though he was too

careless to become eminent in it. He wrote several party poems in

support of Lord Bute’s administration--all long since forgotten, as

is his unsuccessful play of “The Wishes,” which his nephew Cumberland

warmly praises for the brilliancy of its dialogue. “Philodamus,”

another of his dramas, equally failed, but was honoured with an

elaborate commentary by Gray; in return, perhaps, for the author’s

beautiful designs to the 4to edition of that poet’s works. These

designs, indeed, generally show considerable taste; and he was no doubt

an eminently accomplished person. Unhappily, he was also eminently

improvident, and notwithstanding a handsome patrimony which descended

to him from his father, and the substantial bounty of Lord Bute, he

fell into pecuniary difficulties, which harassed him to the end of

his life. The editor has seen in the Island of Jersey a lonely house

formerly belonging to Lord Granville, where he is described by Walpole

as residing for some years with a large family of daughters. He died

towards the close of the last century.--E.

[84] Mr. Anstey died in 1805, being upwards of eighty years of age. His

life had been easy and prosperous, and he cultivated literature only

as an amusement. The criticism passed by Walpole on his works has been

confirmed by posterity. Their inequality is not easily explained. He

was a good classical scholar, as he has shown by his translations in

Latin verse, which are very prettily turned.--E.

[85] It may appear strange to us that a work of so little merit as

Mrs. Macaulay’s History should be mentioned by Walpole almost in the

same sentence with Robertson’s “Charles the Fifth,” but other writers

of that day have bestowed on it equally elaborate and still more

complimentary criticism. Indeed, it met, on its original publication,

with a warmth of praise that presents a striking contrast to the

discouraging reception of the early volumes of Hume. Madame Roland

regarded it as hardly inferior to Tacitus. The adventitious events

which produced this perversion of judgment in a large portion of the

public have long ceased to operate, and the discredit which deservedly

attaches to Mrs. Macaulay’s History has extended rather unjustly to

her talents. She was a vain, self-opinionated, and prejudiced, but

also a clever woman. Her works show occasionally considerable power of

writing, especially in description; and carelessly as she consulted

original authorities, and unfairly as she used them, she may in that

respect bear no dishonourable comparison with Smollett, and others of

her contemporaries. She is at least entitled to the praise of having

been the first, in order, of our female historians. Mrs. Macaulay died

in 1791, aged fifty-eight. An imprudent marriage, late in life, with a

man much younger and in a much lower station than herself, alienated

from her most of her friends, and hastened the downfal of a literary

reputation, which had barely survived the wreck of the small section of

politicians with whom she was connected.--E.

[86] This is the case in her fourth volume; in the fifth, she takes the

contrary extreme.

[87] The letter was delivered at the Palace by Wilkes’s footman, and

as unceremoniously returned. It is not disrespectfully worded. It is

printed in Almon’s Life of Wilkes, vol. iii.--E.

[88] Going to ask the vote of a petty shopkeeper in Wapping, the man

desired Wilkes to wait a moment, went up stairs and brought him down a

bank-note of £20. Wilkes said he wanted his vote, not his money. The

man replied, he must accept both or neither.

[89] Sir Robert Ladbrooke had filled the office of Lord Mayor in 1747,

and so much to the satisfaction of the citizens that they elected

him at the first vacancy, and he kept his seat till his death, at an

advanced age, in 1773. (Note to Cavendish’s Parliamentary Debates, vol.

i. p. 70.)--E.

[90] Barlow Trecothick was an opulent merchant in the American trade,

and not, as Dr. Johnson supposed, an American. He supported Wilkes with

less warmth, but more judgment than Beckford, Mawbey, and Townshend,

and Sawbridge, and the other prominent City patriots. Probably he had

the penetration to see deeper into his character and views. Wilkes, in

consequence, appears not to have lived on any intimate footing with

him. He spoke well in Parliament. He was by far the ablest man of the

party that ruled the City in that day. He died at Addington in Surrey,

where he had a considerable estate, in 1775. His epitaph states, with

more truth than elegance of expression, “that he was much esteemed

by the merchants for his integrity and knowledge of commerce, truly

beloved by his fellow-citizens, who chose him as their representative

in Parliament, and sincerely lamented by his friends and relations, who

looked up to and admired his virtues.”--E.

[91] Sir Richard Glynn, an opulent banker in the City, and alderman.

He had been Lord Mayor in 1758, and was created a baronet in 1759. He

died in 1773: he was the founder of the great banking-house which still

hears his name. He married twice, and left issue by both marriages. His

eldest son by his second marriage was created a baronet in 1800.--E.

[92] Son of the late Speaker. Colonel George Onslow was the son of the

General, brother of the Speaker. (See infra.)

[93] Cotes became a bankrupt in Feb. 1767.--E.

[94] It was for the forty-fifth number of the _North Briton_ that

Wilkes had been prosecuted.

[95] Sir William Beauchamp Proctor, of Langley Park, Norfolk, had

represented the county from 1747 to 1768. He had been made a Knight of

the Bath on the King’s accession. He made a fruitless application for

Lord Chatham’s support in this contest; his Lordship’s answer being

that he did not meddle with elections. Sir William Beauchamp Proctor

died in 1778, aged fifty-one.--E.

[96] Elizabeth Gunning, sister of the celebrated Countess of Coventry,

had first married the Duke of Hamilton, and afterwards John Campbell,

Marquis of Lorn, eldest son of John Duke of Argyle, whom he succeeded

in the title, and thus became mother of the two heirs of the great

rival houses of Hamilton and Argyle. She was Lady of the Bedchamber

to Queen Charlotte, and had gone to fetch her from Mecklenburg, with

the Duchess of Ancaster, Mistress of the Robes. Her eldest son, Duke

Hamilton, died before he was of age. Lord Douglas Hamilton, his

brother, succeeded him. The Duchess Elizabeth, as guardian of her

sons, carried on the famous law-suit against Mr. Douglas for the

succession of his (supposed) uncle, the Duke of Douglas, of which more

will be said hereafter. By Duke Hamilton she had one daughter, Lady

Elizabeth, afterwards married to the Earl of Derby. By Lord Lorn she

had two sons, the eldest of which died an infant, and two daughters.

In her widowhood she had refused the hand of the Duke of Bridgwater.

She was entirely governed by the artful Lady Susan Stuart, daughter of

the Earl of Galloway, afterwards Countess Gower, on whose account she

much offended the Queen, as will be said hereafter; but recovering her

favour, was created an English Baroness, for the benefit of her eldest

son, Duke Hamilton. It is very remarkable that this great lady and

her sister, Lady Coventry, had been originally so poor, that they had

thoughts of being actresses; and when they were first presented to the

Earl of Harrington, the Lord-Lieutenant, at the Castle of Dublin, Mrs.

Woffington, the actress, lent clothes to them. They no sooner appeared

in England than their beauty drew crowds after them wherever they went.

Duke Hamilton married the second in such haste, that, having no ring

ready, they made use of one from the bed-curtain. The Duchess was more

delicate than her sister, with the most beautiful hands and arms in

the world; but Lady Coventry was still handsomer, had infinite life

and vivacity, the finest eyes in the world, nose, and mouth, excepting

that both had bad teeth. Lady Coventry danced like a nymph, and was too

kind a one. The Duchess always preserved her character. Lady Coventry

died young, of a consumption. Till within a few days of her death she

lay on a couch with a looking-glass in her hand. When she found her

beauty, which she idolized, was quite gone, she took to her bed, and

would be seen by nobody--not even by her nurse, suffering only the

light of a lamp in her room. She then took leave of her husband, who

had forgiven her errors, and died with the utmost resignation. It was

in October. I had dined with her in the foregoing June, with my niece,

the beautiful Lady Waldegrave, then just married, since Duchess of

Gloucester. They stood in the window in the full sun, and though Lady

Coventry was wasted and faded, and Lady Waldegrave in all her glow of

beauty, in spite of my partiality to my niece, I could not but own to

myself that Lady Coventry was still superior. It was a less triumph, as

Lord Pembroke was so fickle, that Lady Coventry gave great uneasiness

to his lovely wife, Lady Elizabeth Spencer, who, in the Madonna style,

was divinely beautiful. As the Gunnings made so much noise, it may

be excused in a note if I mention another anecdote. Soon after Lady

Coventry was married, I was at an assembly at Bedford House, and drew

together, her, the charming Lady Emily Lenox, then Marchioness of

Kildare, and since Duchess of Leinster, and Mrs. Penelope Pitt, since

Lady Rivers (the two last celebrated in my poem of “The Beauties;”)

I said I wanted to decide which was the handsomest. They said I

should declare. I replied, that was hard, but since they insisted, I

would--and “I give it,” added I, “to Lady Kildare, because she does

what you both try to do--blush.” These trifling anecdotes may at least

be as amusing us the more serious follies committed by and about Wilkes.

[97] Mr. Jenkinson had also a powerful family interest in Oxfordshire,

being the eldest son of Colonel Charles Jenkinson, whose father and

brother, each a Sir Robert Jenkinson, had in turn represented the

county for many years. His introduction to public life has been always

ascribed to the zealous and effectual support he gave to Lord Parker

and Sir Edward Turner in the famous contest for the county, in 1754,

when many successful poetical squibs came from his pen. Sir Edward

Turner or his friend Lord Harcourt, the chief of the Oxfordshire

Tories, certainly obtained for him the post of private secretary to

Lord Bute.--E.

[98] Lord Baltimore was properly acquitted, but the trial brought

before the public such disgusting instances of his profligacy as to

render the intervention of the Methodists to direct the indignation of

the people against him quite superfluous. He soon after went abroad,

and died at Naples in 1771, and having left no issue by his wife, a

daughter of the Duke of Kingston, his title became extinct.--(Selwyn

and his Contemporaries, vol. ii.)--He published in 1767 “A Tour in

the Year 1763–4, with Remarks on the East, and the Turks, &c.” It was

reprinted in 1768, and has since become very rare. A curious account of

it and of its author is given in the “Bibliothèque des Voyages,” vol.

ii. p. 79.--E.

[99] The report of these proceedings by Sir James Burrow would in some

measure justify this observation of Walpole, for there seems from it to

have been much coquetting between the Bench and the Attorney-General

(De Grey), and an apparent desire by each to shift the responsibility

upon the shoulders of the other. In delivering judgment upon the two

cross motions then before the Court, viz. that of the Attorney-General

for Wilkes’s committal, and that of Serjeant Glynn that Wilkes

should be admitted to bail, Lord Mansfield makes this remarkable

admission:--“I have no doubt we _might_ take notice of him upon his

voluntary appearance as the person outlawed and commit or bail him, but

we are not absolutely _bound_ to do it without _some_ reason to excuse

the going out of the regular course.” And in reference to the conduct

of the Attorney-General he thus expresses himself, “I don’t see why the

Attorney-General should demand of _the Court_ to commit the defendant

upon the outlawry, when he himself has suffered him to go at large

without any attempt to take him up, or even issuing process against

him.” (Rex _v._ Wilkes,--Burrow’s Reports, vol. iv. p. 2531–5.)--E.

[100] The reason assigned for these voluntary errors is, that the

punishment of outlawry is greater than the crime on which it is

inflicted--but is it more sensible to facilitate the defeat of an

outlawry than to lessen too rigorous a punishment? [This was the ground

mainly relied on by Mr. Justice Yates in his judgment, but was not

adverted to either by Lord Mansfield, Mr. Justice Acton, or Mr. Justice

Willes, in disposing of these preliminary motions. It is now admitted

that the object of the process in outlawry is not penal, but to enforce

the personal appearance of the party against whom it is issued.--E.]

[101] This is probably a mistake for Northampton, in the contest

for which and the ensuing petition Lord Spencer expended at least

70,000_l._--E.

[102] The Duke of Grafton says in his Memoirs, that at the first

Cabinet no one contemplated the difficulties which afterwards arose

out of Wilkes’s case. Many persons, among whom was Walpole himself,

considered that Parliament was the very place where Wilkes would do

least hurt. (Letter to Sir Horace Mann, 31st of March, vol. i. p.

384.)--E.

[103] Walpole’s statement of the decided view taken by the King of

Wilkes’s case from the very first is perfectly correct. In a letter

to Lord North of the 25th of April, the King says, “Though entirely

relying on your attachment to my person as well as in your hatred of

any lawless proceeding, yet I think it highly expedient to apprise

you that the expulsion of Mr. Wilkes appears to be very essential

and must be effected. The case of Mr. Ward, in the reign of my

great-grandfather, seems to point out the proper mode of proceeding. If

any man were capable of forgetting his criminal writings, his speech

in court last Wednesday, &c.”--(This extract was made by the editor

from the King’s letters to Lord North,--a very curious and interesting

collection, of which the friendship of Lord Brougham obtained him the

perusal from Lady Charlotte Lindsay.)--E.

[104] His daughter returning from France at the time of the Dauphin’s

wedding, when all post-horses were stopped for the service and

relays of the Dauphiness, who was expected from Vienna, Miss Wilkes

was regularly furnished with post-horses to Calais. [There is no

confirmation of this statement in Wilkes’s correspondence, nor is

it reconcilable with the fact that he was at that period in great

distress for even small sums. The suspicion, however, was very general.

Lacretelle says, “Wilkes, en agitant sa patrie, servit si bien les

desseins du Duc de Choiseul que quelques Anglais le regardèrent comme

son agent secret.”--Histoire de France, vol iv. p. 175.--E.]

[105] See infra, p. 211.--E.

[106] Lord Mansfield, sitting by the Duke of Bedford in the House of

Lords, said, if something vigorous was not done immediately, there

would be a revolution in ten days, and the Government overturned,--yet

when a motion was made against the riot, that dastardly magistrate sat

still and did not utter a syllable.

[107] The Duke of Grafton states in his MS. Memoirs, on the authority

of Mr. Bradshaw, who was present at the meeting, that with one

exception the company “were for expelling Wilkes on the double ground

of outlawry and conviction. Mr. Conway declared as much before he

came away. The single exception was Mr. Hussey, who expressed himself

strongly against a second expulsion for the same offence in being the

author of a political libel, for he said that Wilkes’s conviction

for the poem could not be thought of in the House of Commons without

coupling it with the means used to obtain evidence against him.”--E.

[108] The debate is reported by Cavendish, vol. i. p. 5–17. The

disunion that prevailed among the Opposition, some treating the riots

as most alarming, others as comparatively unimportant, gave the

Government great advantage in the discussion. It may be inferred from

the Duke of Grafton’s MS. Memoirs that the Government had been taken by

surprise. He says, “It was extraordinary that this combination of the

seamen was not foreseen by the merchants in a case wherein they were

so much interested; for if the slightest information had reached the

Admiralty, a few frigates and light vessels brought up the river would

have easily supported the civil power in preventing any outrage.”--E.

[109] Mr. Harley was the fourth son of Edward, third Earl of Oxford.

He had been bred a merchant, his father having succeeded to the title

late in life through a collateral limitation on the death of the second

Earl without male issue. His success in business, and his personal

worth, and perhaps still more, his birth, made him a considerable

person in the City. As a politician he seems to have given an unvarying

and indiscriminate support to almost every Administration. In 1776 he

had the good fortune to extricate himself from City politics by being

elected Member for Herefordshire, where he had a large estate, and he

continued to represent the county almost till the time of his death, at

an advanced age, in 1804.--E.

[110] See Cavendish, vol. i. pp. 21–26. After Lord Barrington, as

Secretary at War, had moved for leave to bring in the bill, Lord North

said that he did not know whether he should or should not oppose the

motion! On the second discussion, when the measure was virtually

dropped, Lord Barrington assured the House that the bill did not

proceed from any consultation of the Ministers, but from himself as

a Minister of the Crown, and on that ground he protested against the

Opposition claiming a triumph from its withdrawal,--a declaration that

enabled Mr. Burke to say fairly enough that there could be no triumph

over such weak and broken troops. If, however, the statement made by

Lord Barrington was correct, it strengthens the suspicion elsewhere

expressed in these notes that he acted on this as on other occasions at

the King’s instigation. See p. 273.--E.

[111] Charles Wolfran Cornwall was of an ancient family in

Herefordshire, being the son of Job Cornwall, a younger son of Charles

Cornwall of Benington, to which estate Mr. Cornwall eventually

succeeded. He was bred to the bar, but left it on his marriage.

This was his first Parliament. He soon gained the ear of the House,

and his name may be found in most debates of any importance even

in this session. He had an agreeable address, and a neat clear

persuasive style, which if it seldom rose to eloquence always ensured

him attention, which he had the tact not to abuse by speaking at

great length. He was exceedingly well informed, especially on all

points of constitutional law. Notwithstanding his connection with

Mr. Jenkinson, whose sister he had married, he joined in opposition

to the Government, having attached himself to Lord Shelburne, who

already aspired to be the patron of the rising talent of the day, and

adopting the views of that nobleman, he distinguished himself by his

speeches against the course pursued by the Ministers in their contest

with Mr. Wilkes, and in their policy towards America. His speeches,

as reported by Cavendish, are able, temperate, and manly. In 1774

he separated himself rather abruptly from his political friends by

accepting a Lordship of the Treasury. In 1780 he was proposed by Lord

North for the Speakership, to succeed Sir Fletcher Norton and elected

without opposition. His acknowledged abilities and experience, with

the advantages of a sonorous voice, a fine figure, and commanding

deportment, seemed to give him every qualification for his office. For

a time the public were not disappointed, but as his physical strength

yielded to the fatigues of the long and constant sittings of that

period, his reputation also declined, until it was wrecked in the

furious party conflicts that succeeded the Coalition. If the frequent

changes of Government rendered his position embarrassing, he aggravated

these difficulties by his irresolution, so that all parties attacked

him in turn. He certainly lost the consideration of the House, and

from the suspicions entertained by Pitt of his bias towards Fox during

the King’s illness, he would probably have been removed from the Chair

at the next dissolution: but he was spared this blow. The following

extract from Mr. Wilberforce’s diary is the only record that has come

under my notice of the conclusion of his public and private life:--

“January 1st.--Last night the Speaker put off the House by a note in

Warren’s handwriting, after he had sent word that he had passed a good

night--we suspect a trick.

“January 2nd.--Cornwall the Speaker died after a short illness this

morning. We had laughed at his indisposition the day before, thinking

him be-Warrened.”--(Life of Wilberforce, i. 199.)

By a singular coincidence his predecessor in the Chair, Lord Grantley,

died only the day before him. The Speaker left no children. He had sold

the Benington estate some years before to Alderman Harley. (See more

of him in Wraxall’s Posthumous Memoirs, vol. i. p. 53; vol. iii. p.

258.)--E.

[112] Captain the Hon. Constantine Phipps, R.N., M.P. for Lincoln,

eldest son of Lord Mulgrave, a nephew of Lord Bristol. His knowledge

of law could not have been very deep, considering that he was at this

time barely twenty-two years old; still it was remarkable for a sailor,

and he lost no opportunity of displaying it or indeed any of his other

attainments, for he put himself forward in every debate of public

interest with unwearied and systematic pertinacity. His speeches have

gained him a place in history from their being almost the only records

extant of some very important debates, and he deserves credit for the

pains which, with a forethought then rare, he took in revising them

for the press; but even with this advantage, they bear no traces of

eloquence. He is said to have been a dull debater. There was little

of animation or interest in his manner of expressing himself, and his

deportment was as destitute of grace as his figure, the heavy colossal

scale of which gained him the appellation of Ursa Major, to distinguish

him from his younger brother, who had also a seat in the House. His

voice also was particularly inharmonious. He had, indeed, two distinct

voices,--the one strong and hoarse, the other weak and querulous,

of both of which he occasionally availed himself. So extraordinary

a circumstance probably gave rise to a story of his falling into a

ditch on a dark night, and calling for aid in his shrill voice. A

countryman coming up was about to have assisted him, but Captain Phipps

addressing him in a hoarse tone, the man immediately exclaimed, “If

there are two of you in the ditch you may help each other out of it.”

His merit lay in his industry, information, and acuteness; these were

indisputable, and made him a formidable opponent, especially as he was

a man of great resolution. No superiority in talent or position could

intimidate him, and it was with equal indifference that when almost a

boy he used to provoke the patience of Lord North; and in maturer years

he courted the indignation of Fox, then in the zenith of his fame.

Notwithstanding his obligations to Lord Bristol, by whom his father

had recently been raised to the peerage, he generally went with the

popular party,--a line of conduct that would have gained him lasting

honour, had he not afterwards accepted office under Lord North, and

thenceforward supported the Government with the same zeal and vigour

which he had previously shown in opposing it. His “tried integrity and

worth” are sarcastically noticed in the Rolliad. After the fall of

Lord North, he, in common with other friends of that Minister, joined

Mr. Pitt. He proved an useful ally, especially in the debates on the

Westminster scrutiny, in which he took a very active part, and thus

brought upon himself the resentment and attacks of the Opposition

wits, as well as a prominent place in the Rolliad. He was consoled,

however, by the lucrative post of Joint-Paymaster, and a British

peerage. Lord Mulgrave died in 1792. He is the author of “A Narrative

of a Voyage of Observation and Discovery to the North Pole, in 1773,” a

work of considerable merit. The expedition failed, owing to the ships

getting entangled in the ice near Spitsbergen; but the philosophical

observations made on the voyage received no addition during more than

half a century afterwards.

Lord Mulgrave having died without issue, was succeeded in his Irish

title by his brother Henry, whose career was at least equally

successful, for he raised himself to the highest posts in the

Government, as well as an English Earldom. The Marquis of Normanby is

his eldest son.--E.

[113] He was the eldest son of Sir Henry Cavendish, Bart., of Doveridge

Hall, Derbyshire, and afterwards had some lucrative offices in Ireland.

His wife, the heiress of Mr. Bradshaw, was created Baroness in 1792. He

died in 1804. It is to him that the public are indebted for the very

interesting reports of the debates in Parliament, of which the first

volume was published in 1841 by the late Mr. Wright,--an astonishing

work for a man of his station, fortune, and pursuits, and incomparably

the best--indeed the only faithful record of the proceedings in

Parliament in the early part of this reign. It would have been far more

valuable if he had taken the pains to give the words of the speakers

in the passages of their speeches that were the most successful--his

abridgment of course conveying a very imperfect and inadequate idea

of any rhetorical excellence; hence, we rise from the perusal of his

reports of Burke with some disappointment. Still, the work cannot be

too carefully consulted by all who wish to gain an accurate insight

into the history of the period which it embraces. One proof of Mr.

(afterwards Sir Henry) Cavendish’s correctness is, that his reports of

his own speeches go far to justify Walpole’s account of him.--E.

[114] Eldest son of Simon Lord Irnham, who had two other sons--Temple,

who was a poet, and had parts, but proved a tedious orator; and the

third, who was a seaman, and had most parts of the three. He had also

two daughters, of whom Anne, the elder, then married to a Mr. Horton,

was very engaging, and rose afterwards to a very extraordinary rank.

[115] This was very like his pitiful countryman James the First, who

had disclaimed his own son-in-law, the King of Bohemia, when elected

for their Prince by an oppressed nation.

[116] It is true Lord Granville had provoked the Genoese in the

year 1743 by the treaty of Worms, in which he had proposed to force

Final from the Genoese, and give it to the King of Sardinia. France

had rescued Genoa from the Austrians. Still, there was no moral

or political reason for our taking part for the Genoese against

the Corsicans. The despotic principles of Lord Bute suggested that

preference.

[117] The debate on the Adjournment is reported in Cavendish, vol. i.

p. 28–31. It turned chiefly on the disturbances among sailors.--E.

[118] In a letter on these proceedings written shortly before the

judgment reversing the outlawry, Walpole says, “In short, my dear sir,

I am trying to explain what I really do not understand.” (To Sir Horace

Mann, vol. i. p. 392.) That he was not better informed at the date of

these Memoirs, is proved by the statement in the text. It was, however,

no disgrace to be ignorant of the absurd technicalities by which Lord

Mansfield’s very able judgment is defaced; nor should they attach any

stain to the memory of a judge who had to expound the law and not to

make it. Lord Mansfield’s love of the prerogative did not in this

instance lead him into the slightest injustice. Following the order

which the form of the proceedings naturally suggested, he commenced

with an elaborate and lucid examination of all the arguments which the

ingenuity of the defendant’s counsel, arguing from the reversal of

the outlawry, had most ably urged; and after carefully reviewing and

combating each _seriatim_, he disposes of them in these words: “These

are the errors which have been objected, and this the manner and form

in which they are assigned. For the reasons I have given, I cannot

allow them.” After a spirited vindication of his character, and a bold

declaration of the utter indifference in which he held all the menaces

by which he had been publicly and privately assailed, he proceeds to

advert to a technical error in the “Writ of Exigent,” which by a series

of precedents and cases ranging from the 7th of James the First to

the 18th of Charles the Second (a period of sixty years), he shows to

be fatal to the writ, and on _that_ ground decides that the outlawry

could not stand, adding at the conclusion of his judgment, “I beg to

be understood that I ground my opinion _singly upon the authority of

the cases adjudged_, which as they are on the _favourable_ side, in

a _criminal_ case _highly penal_, I think ought not to be departed

from.”--Burrow’s Reports, vol. iv. p. 2561.

The error upon which the reversal proceeded was, that after the words

“at the County Court” the writ altogether omitted to state “of the

County of Middlesex,” a ground obviously different from that which

Walpole here suggests. It is observable, also, that the discovery of

this error had _not_, as Walpole states, been made by Serjeant Glynn

“two months before in his pleading;” it is probable, however, that

Walpole may have confounded this with another error relied on by the

Serjeant, but overruled by the court,--namely, that the averment “Brook

Street _near_ Holborn in the County of Middlesex” was not a sufficient

averment that Brook Street was in Middlesex.

A clear account of these proceedings is given in the Life of Lord

Mansfield (No. XI. of the _Law Magazine_), in an able and yet not

servile defence by that eminent lawyer, who, with all his defects of

character, will always be regarded as one of the brightest ornaments

of British jurisprudence. It was written by Mr. Plunket, the author of

a history of the Roman law, who has since died, a Puisne Judge of St.

Lucia.--E.

[119] Mr. Townshend was the eldest son of the Hon. Thomas Townshend,

second son of Charles, Viscount Townshend, and M.P. for Whitchurch.

He prided himself on his family and fortune, and probably resented

the preference shown to a political adventurer, such as Rigby. An

additional motive for his resigning was his attachment to Lord Chatham,

with whom he soon entered into violent opposition to the Government.

He ranked high among the second-rate speakers in the House. The Whigs

proposed him for the Chair against Sir Fletcher Norton, 1770, of

course unsuccessfully. He was one of the Secretaries of State in Lord

Shelburne’s Administration, and distinguished himself by a most able

defence of the peace.--(Wraxall’s Historical Memoirs, vol. ii. p.

289.)--In 1783, the friendship of Mr. Pitt, with whom he had become

connected by the marriage of his daughter with the second Lord Chatham,

raised him to the peerage as Lord Sydney, and restored him the Seals

of Secretary, which he held till 1789. He died in 1800. He was an

accomplished classical scholar, and indefatigably industrious.--E.

[120] The Pope published a most satisfactory refutation of the claim

of the French Government, but the French troops retained their

conquest. A body of French troops under the Marquis de Rochecourt took

possession of Avignon on the 11th of June. No resistance was offered by

the papal authorities, the Legate only making a protest, accompanied

by a declaration that the invaders had subjected themselves to the

ecclesiastical penalties enumerated in the Bull _In Cænâ Domini_. The

plea set up by the French was the invalidity of the original alienation

of Avignon to the Pope by Jeanne of Naples in 1368. The Pope published

a reply, which was thought conclusive by all but the French, who

retained possession of the territory they had seized, until it suited

their interests to resign it.--E.

[121] The Duke of Grafton states in his MS. Memoirs that Lord

Rochford’s instructions only stopped short of a declaration of war. “At

one time Lord Rochford was confident that he should have succeeded, and

wrote over that the Duc de Choiseul’s language had so much softened,

that he had every hope that the French Ambassador would not risk the

attempt. In the audience of the next week, he found to his great

surprise the former tone taken up; and in a private letter to me, he

attributed the strange change in the Duc to the imprudent declaration

of a great law Lord (Lord Mansfield), then at Paris, at one of the

Minister’s tables, that the English Ministry were too weak, and the

nation too wise, to support them in entering into a war for the sake of

Corsica.” The remonstrances thus made by Lord Rochford having failed,

the Duke of Grafton dispatched Captain Dunant, a Genevese officer,

who had served with distinction in the Swiss troops of the King of

Sardinia, to Corsica, with the view of learning how far assistance

could be surreptitiously afforded to Paoli by the English Government,

and the result of the mission was, that the Corsicans obtained several

thousand stand of arms from the stock at the Tower. Lord Camden seems

to have been ready to have gone further. The Duke of Grafton saw no

necessity for an immediate decision, being under the impression that

the Corsicans might still hold out; and the events which followed, and

will be mentioned hereafter, took him completely by surprise. (Duke of

Grafton’s MS. Memoirs.)--E.

[122] Almon says the sentence was condemned by everybody as

unjustifiably severe. On the other hand, Mr. Grenville, in his

celebrated speech against Lord Barrington’s motion for Wilkes’s

expulsion, comments on it as very lenient, and contrasts it with Dr.

Shebbeare’s, who for his Sixth Letter to the People of England was

sentenced to be fined, to stand in the pillory, to be imprisoned

for three years, and to give security for good behaviour for seven

years. This, too, was whilst Mr. Pratt (afterwards Lord Camden) was

Attorney-General. (Cavendish, vol. i. p. 160.)--E.

[123] The Archbishop could with little propriety have set on foot such

a prosecution, having in the early part of his life exceeded Anet in

the latitude of his irreligion. Whether he incited it or not, I do

not know. It is justice to his character to say that he privately

allowed Anet 50_l._ a-year to support him in prison, where he died.

[This charge against the Archbishop also made by Walpole elsewhere,

has been repeatedly refuted. It appears to rest on the very slender

foundation of a foolish story told by some superannuated companion of

Secker’s at Leyden, where the latter, in the fulness of his passion for

metaphysics, probably indulged in paradoxes by way of argumentative

exercises, which it would be very unjust to regard as his real opinion.

Bishop Watson, when a student at Trinity, wrote a paper to refute

Clarke’s main argument to prove the existence of God, yet no one ever

thought of calling him an atheist.--E.]

[124] See supra, vol. i. p. 19. If Dr. Secker had not been the intimate

friend of the Duke of Newcastle and Lord Chancellor Hardwicke, his

character would no doubt have obtained the warm praise instead of

the constant abuse of Walpole. Bishop Hurd, who did not love him,

says that he was a wise man, an edifying preacher, and an exemplary

bishop.--(Life of Warburton, p. 69.)--He was very young when he left

the Dissenters to join the Church, and the Dissenters never questioned

the honesty of his change of opinions. Some of their most eminent

writers have recorded their respect for him. The purity of his life

brought on him the charge of hypocrisy from those alone who did not

care to practise the same virtues. After enjoying for ten years the

rich revenues of the primacy, he left an insignificant fortune, and his

distribution of his patronage was equally disinterested. He was the

last of the learned divines who have filled the highest dignities of

the Church. (Life by Porteus, also Memoirs of Mrs. Carter, p. 402.)--E.

[125] Bishop Newton, after describing him as “the not unworthy

successor of Secker,” says, “When he was a young man at the University

he had the misfortune of a paralytic stroke on his right side, from

which he has never recovered the full use of his right hand, and

is obliged to write with his left; but, this notwithstanding, he

has hitherto enjoyed uncommon good health, and never fails in his

attendance on the multifarious business of his station. He has greatly

improved Lambeth House, he keeps a hospitable and elegant table, has

not a grain of pride in his composition, is easy of access, receives

every one with affability and good nature, is courteous, obliging,

condescending, and as a proof of it he has not often been made the

subject of censure, even in this censorious age.”--(Memoirs, p.

121.)--This description might lead one to fear that the good Bishop’s

standard of Metropolitan merit was not very elevated. Archbishop

Cornwallis deserved still higher commendation. He seems to have had

a true sense of his religious duties. When a party in the East India

Company raised an outcry against the missionary Schwarts, then a

friendless and obscure foreigner, he came forward with his public

testimony on his behalf. The Archbishop died in 1783, aged 70.--E.

[126] The Count de Bernsdorffe was a Hanoverian. He had large estates

in Mecklenburg, but had sought fortune in Denmark, where at that

time foreigners were warmly welcomed, and raised to high posts. He

had been Foreign Minister to Frederick the Sixth. His reputation and

influence were considerable in the northern courts. Walpole describes

him elsewhere (Letters to Sir H. Mann, vol. i. p. 400) as a grim

old man, bowing and cringing at every word of the King with eastern

obsequiousness--indeed a Mentor and Telemachus have never yet been seen

in real life. Bernsdorffe died in 1772, aged sixty. His nephew, Count

Andrew de Bernsdorffe, also an eminent name in the later history of

Denmark, was Prime Minister in 1784, and died in 1797.--E.

[127] This piece of flattery was abruptly crushed. The poor King became

on his return a mere phantom of royalty, first in the hands of his

wife, next of the Queen Dowager. In 1784 his son was raised to the

Regency, and succeeded to the Crown on his death, in 1808.--E.

[128] The Duke of Grafton’s Memoirs confirm Walpole’s account of this

transaction, and he adds that “the Cabinet were unanimous in their

resolution for the removal of Sir Jeffery Amherst.” It was in the

manner of filling up the vacancy that they laid themselves open to the

suspicion of having accommodated a private job under the pretence of

reforming a public abuse, and people said, with some plausibility, “It

was not Virginia that wanted a governor, but a Court favourite that

wanted a salary.”--(See the clever letters in Woodfall’s Junius, vol.

iii. pp. 89–123.)--Lord Bottetort’s being a follower and friend of Lord

Bute, increased the cry against him.--E.

[129] The Hon. General John Fitzwilliam, had been Groom of the

Bedchamber to William, Duke of Cumberland, when Mr. Conway was in the

same post about his Royal Highness, and had long been intimate with

Rigby. [He died in 1789, and left his fortune to one of his servants.

He was uncle to Viscount Fitzwilliam (of Ireland), who founded the

noble museum that bears his name at Cambridge; and on the death of

whose brother the title became extinct.--E.]

[130] Afterwards the Right Hon. Sir William Lynch, K.B. He was the

eldest son of Dr. Lynch, Dean of Canterbury, by the youngest daughter

of Archbishop Wake. His family had long been settled at Groves, near

Canterbury, and he represented that city in two Parliaments. He usually

resided at Groves, where he had greatly embellished the house and park,

and collected some fine pictures. He died abroad in 1785, leaving a

widow, but no issue.--E.

[131] Lord Shelburne had been on very cold terms with the Duke of

Grafton since the commencement of Lord Chatham’s illness. This coldness

at length grew into absolute hostility; but it was at the instigation

of the King, not less than of the Bedford party, that Lord Shelburne

was removed; and such, indeed, was his alienation from his colleagues,

that even the Chancellor acquiesced in the necessity of his removal,

and, as the following letter shows, did not much regret it. “It does

behove his Lordship (Lord Shelburne) either to be cordially reconciled

or to resign, for it is neither just nor honourable to confound, much

less to betray, an Administration while he remains a member of it.

I should wish the first on many accounts, and yet I fear that can

hardly be expected, considering what has passed, especially the last

affront in setting aside his Lordship’s nomination to Turin.” (Letter

from Lord Camden to Duke of Grafton, MS.) I can find no confirmation

of the insinuation in Mr. Burke’s “Thoughts on Popular Discontents,”

that Lord Shelburne’s removal was a punishment for the warmth of his

representations to the French Court on the subject of Corsica. These

representations, indeed, appear to have been fully sanctioned by

the Duke of Grafton, and had they been disapproved by the Cabinet,

Lord Rochford who so warmly urged them on the Duc de Choiseul would

certainly not have been Lord Shelburne’s successor.--E.

[132] See Chatham Correspondence, vol. iii. p. 342.--E.

[133] Walpole had invariably entertained a mean opinion of Lord

Rochford. In a letter as early as 1746, just after the battle of

Culloden, he writes, “Is it news that Lord Rochford is an oaf? He

has got a set of plate buttons for the birthday, with the Duke’s (of

Cumberland) head on every one. Sure my good lady carries her art

too far to make him so great a dupe!”--(Collected Letters, vol. ii.

p. 165.) The plate buttons, however, were not thrown away, for Lord

Rochford was within three years appointed Minister at Turin, and in

1755 he obtained the lucrative office of Groom of the Stole. The new

reign obliged him to give way to Lord Bute, which he did with so good

a grace, as to preserve the favour of the Court. Not satisfied with a

large pension, he aspired to political eminence, and in 1763 accepted

the embassy at Madrid. He discharged its duties respectably--was

attentive to business--vigilant, and, when occasion called for it,

spirited--and his dispatches present a more faithful and interesting

account of the Court of Spain than is to be found in any cotemporary

work. The credit he thus acquired was the cause of his being appointed

Ambassador at Paris, where he conducted himself unexceptionably. It

cannot, however, be said that he left a name of any distinction in

diplomacy. The same mediocrity characterized his career as Secretary

of State. He made a poor figure in the House of Lords, and if he had

no enemies, he had as few friends. His colleagues shuffled him from

one department to the other, and at last parted with him with an

indifference that was fully shared by the public. Not, however, that

he was unrewarded. He received for seven years the high salary, and

enjoyed the patronage of the Secretary of State. He was Lord-Lieutenant

of Essex, and a Privy Councillor. In 1778 he became a Knight of the

Garter. His pecuniary circumstances, indeed, appear to have been

embarrassed; but he is not to be pitied, if, as was reported, this

arose from his speculations in the funds on the prospect of a Spanish

war (Chatham Correspondence, vol. iv. p. 80). It has been observed

that he is the only statesman whom Junius has noticed in terms of

unqualified praise; but it should be remembered that this was only

when writing under another signature,--no such praise is to be found

in “the Letters of Junius.” Being succeeded by Lord Weymouth in 1775,

he retired to St. Osyths, his seat in Essex--the ancient inheritance

of the Rivers’s, from whom he was maternally descended. He died in

1781 without issue, and the title became extinct on the decease of his

nephew.--(Coxe’s Kings of Spain, vol. iii.)--E.

[134] This correspondence between Lord Chatham and Lord Bristol

has been published among Lord Chatham’s Letters (vol. iii. p.

347). Walpole’s personal dislike of Lord Bristol, which is little

disguised in these Memoirs, could alone have made him regard that

nobleman’s conduct in this transaction as in the slightest degree

objectionable.--E.

[135] Instead of being deserted by these noblemen, it would be more

fair to say that Lord Chatham had deserted them. There is no excuse

for his conduct to Lord Bristol. His relation to Lord Camden was of a

different character, for the latter was under deep obligations to him;

but all intercourse between them had long been suspended, and their

friendship had, from Lord Chatham’s fault alone, withered into a mere

loose political connection. Still, the severance of that tie alarmed

Lord Camden; and his letters to the Duke of Grafton, on receiving the

first intelligence of Lord Chatham’s resignation, betray deep anxiety.

He writes from Bath on the 14th of October, after expressing a faint

hope that Lord Chatham’s resolution may not be final, “Your Grace and I

feel for each other. To me I fear the blow is fatal, yet I shall come

to no determination. If I can find out what is fit for me to do in this

most distressed situation, that I must do; but the difficulty lies in

forming a true judgment.... I do assure your Grace that my mind is at

present in too great an agitation to be soon settled, and therefore I

do not give myself leave to form an opinion concerning my own conduct.”

On the 16th, he writes in the same strain: “Nothing could give me so

much satisfaction as to join with your Grace in one line of conduct,

and yet I plainly see that our situations are different, and the same

honour, duty to the King, regard to the public, operating upon two

minds equally aiming at the same end, may draw us different ways, but

I dare say your Grace will believe me in all events and circumstances

what I really am, with all respect and unfeigned attachment,” &c. The

regard expressed in this note for the Duke of Grafton was perfectly

sincere, and when they met in London Lord Camden yielded to the Duke’s

solicitations. Various considerations united to bring him to this

decision. He was not insensible to the advantages of office. He had

made no provision for children whom he tenderly loved. One of these

children happened at the time to be alarmingly ill. The King pressed

him to remain. The country, whose welfare he identified with the

political principles he professed, might suffer from his resignation.

It was an error of judgment, for with the name of Lord Chatham the

Cabinet lost the distinction that attached to Lord Chatham’s policy;

and the small minority in which Lord Camden found himself, lingered on

for a while, suspected by the country, thwarted by their colleagues,

and discountenanced by the King, until the resignation to which they

were driven had become a matter of comparative indifference to the

different parties in the State.--E.

[136] The advantage of the Ministers lay in the disunion of their

opponents--a fact which the speeches of Mr. Grenville and Mr.

Burke, angry as each of them was with the Government, most palpably

disclosed;--America, as before, being the subject of their differences.

Mr. Grenville, however, disapproved of the dissolution of the American

Assemblies, observing that “no corporation was bound to obey the orders

of the Secretary of State further than they are enjoined by the laws

of the land.” The picture he drew of the state of England is in dark

colours. “Distress is among the common people; luxury among the rich;

servility, licentiousness, venality, of a nature the most dangerous to

the constitution; an enormous debt; a diminishing specie; an increasing

paper credit.” Mr. Burke greatly overrated the importance of Corsica.

“Corsica naked,” he observed, “I do not dread; but Corsica a province

of France, is dreadful to me.”--(Cavendish, vol. i. p. 46.) This

apprehension was very generally entertained,--time has proved it to

be utterly unfounded, the French having up to this moment derived as

little benefit from their conquest as has accrued to them from any of

their ultramarine possessions.--E.

[137] As Wilkes was elected into the succeeding Parliament, and was

allowed to sit, his expulsion at this time cannot be deemed a precedent

to justify the expulsion of any man because he had been expelled by

a former Parliament. No part of his expulsion can be turned into a

precedent, unless on the argument that he was then a prisoner under

sentence.

[138] The arguments for and against the expulsion of Wilkes are stated

with neatness and force by Mr. Burke in the Annual Register for

1769.--E.

[139] Sir Joseph Mawbey had soon forgotten the favours of the Whigs:--

“Exulting that he was the first

Who Ministerial chains had burst,

And in the cause of liberty

Could keep his honours and be free.”

RODONDO.

He professed to be independent of party, and one of the results of this

independence was, that the satirical poets of the day, Whig and Tory,

united in pitilessly assailing him. He died in 1817.--E.

[140] See the debate in Cavendish, vol. i. p. 46–49.--E.

[141] It has been supposed that the great object of the Duc de Choiseul

in encouraging Turkey to engage in war with Russia, was to procure

the possession of Egypt for France as a reward for her interference.

The Count de Vergennes had from the first predicted the issue of

this unequal conflict. He in vain laid before the Duc the military

incapacity of the Sultan Mustapha, the apathy of the Ministers, and

the inefficiency of the Turkish levies. “I can arm the Turks against

Russia,” he said, “whenever you desire, but I forewarn you that they

will be beaten.”--Lacretelle, Histoire de France, vol. iv. p. 212.--E.

[142] It is deemed an etiquette in France (which must make other

nations smile) that the most Christian King’s mistress must be a

married woman.

[143] He also said maliciously enough, “I would not put in threats of a

war in order to make the funds fall, nor would I fight a duel on every

the slightest affront; but I do not care to receive one affront after

another, lest I should be obliged to fight at last. In private life

a man who seems doubtful about fighting is more likely to fight than

any other.” The most interesting part of the debate is the discussion

between Mr. Stanley and Mr. Grenville on the expediency of producing

papers on a negotiation still pending. (Cavendish, p. 59, &c.)--E.

[144] The same attachment to liberty made him, in after years, the warm

friend and supporter of Mr. Fox. He was indolent and reserved, or he

might have played a great part in politics, for he possessed no common

talents. He died in 1811.--E.

[145] This will be explained more fully hereafter.

[146] John West, second Earl of Delawar, died in 1777, aged

forty-eight.--E.

[147] James, third Earl Waldegrave. He had married a sister of the

Duchess of Bedford.

[148] Henry Somerset, Duke of Beaufort. [He held the office only until

1780. In 1786 he was made a Knight of the Garter. He died in 1803.--E.]

[149] The debate is reported in Cavendish, vol. i. pp. 61–8. This was

one of the first steps towards that fatal entanglement in which the

characters of so many public men suffered by their being drawn into a

line of conduct contrary to their former professions, and their known

political principles.--E.

[150] Cavendish, vol. i. pp. 168–75. Lord Barrington evidently wanted

a vote of approbation to countenance his very injudicious letter; and

judging from the tenor of his public life, as well as from the course

pursued by the Ministers on this occasion, there is strong ground for

suspecting that Lord Barrington had written the letter to please the

King or even at his Majesty’s instigation.--See supra, p. 211.--E.

[151] Cavendish, vol. i. pp. 75–76.--E.

[152] Mr. Hopkins, of Oving House, near Aylesbury, M.P. for Great

Bedwin. He was appointed Clerk of the Green Cloth, through the Duke’s

interest. He left his estate to his nephew, General Northey, who

thereupon took the name of Hopkins, and has died very recently.--E.

[153] Cavendish, vol. i. p. 77, &c.--E.

[154] Cavendish, vol. i. p. 100.--E.

[155] It was the same day put off to the 12th. (Cavendish, vol. i. p.

78.)--E.

[156] Chauncey Townshend. They were not related to Lord Townshend’s

family. [Mr. James Townsend was at this time M.P. for West Looe. Lord

Shelburne brought him in for Calne on Mr. Dunning’s elevation to the

peerage, and he represented that borough till his death in 1787. He

spoke at times with considerable effect in the House of Commons. One

quality very requisite to the success of a popular leader he certainly

possessed,--and that was, resolution; he showed it on all occasions. I

have heard, on good authority, that a highway robbery having once been

committed in his neighbourhood, he disguised himself as a countryman,

and with his friend, the late Mr. Parker of Munden, in Hertfordshire,

set out in search of the offender, and succeeded in overpowering and

apprehending him. Mr. Parker used to dwell on the man’s ludicrous

astonishment in discovering that his captors were gentlemen.--E.]

[157] Daughter of Sir Orlando Bridgman. His second wife was Miss

Stevenson. She died a few weeks after the marriage.--E.

[158] Mr. John Sawbridge, of Olantigh, in Kent, grandson of Jacob

Sawbridge, M.P., the South Sea Director. He was a man of strong

understanding and upright principles. He is said to have had a coarse

figure, and still coarser manners (Wraxall’s Posthumous Memoirs, vol.

i. p. 105), but he did not want refinement of feeling. Highly as he

prized the popular favour, he at once sacrificed it at the coalition,

rather than abandon Mr. Fox. Wilkes, Townshend, and many of the leading

Patriots were on this occasion found among the King’s friends; and

Sawbridge, instead of being as usual at the head of the poll, saved his

seat by only seven votes. He represented the City till his death in

1793. John S. W. Sawbridge Earle Drax, Esq., M.P. is his grandson and

lineal representative.--E.

[159] Cavendish, vol. i. p. 100.--E.

[160] He was the eldest son of Lieutenant-General Richard Onslow, a

younger brother of the Speaker, by Miss Walton, the niece and heiress

of the gallant Admiral Sir George Walton. He succeeded his father as

Member for Guilford in 1760, and continued to represent it until 1784.

He died in 1792.--E.

[161] Sir Edward Deering, Bart., of Surrenden Deering in Kent, and one

of the representatives of New Romney. He was an opulent and influential

country gentleman. He died in 1798.--E.

[162] It was to excite the magistrates to do their duty against riots,

promising them protection. It was interpreted as preparatory to a

massacre.

[163] He was called with reason the petty tyrant of the North, and

the stories still related of his pride, caprice, and cruelty in

Westmoreland and Cumberland, are almost incredible. If he possessed

a virtue, it was as Peter Pindar said, in his well-known epistle to

him, “A farthing rushlight to a world of shade.” His eccentricities

were such as to cast doubts on the sanity of his intellect. He fought

several duels for causes ludicrously inadequate. This did not prevent

his making an impassioned appeal to the House of Commons in 1780,

on the duel of Lord Shelburne and Colonel Fullarton, against the

impropriety of duels arising out of language in the House of Commons,

as interrupting the freedom of debate. Mr. Pitt owed to him his first

introduction into public life--as his first seat was for Sir James’s

borough of Appleby,--a favour amply returned, by Sir James being raised

in 1784 to the Earldom of Lonsdale. He was more useful than creditable

as a political adherent. No man of his day spent such large sums in

election contests, or obtained greater success in them, notwithstanding

his extreme personal unpopularity. It is said that above seven thousand

guineas were found in his cassette at his death in 1802, destined for

the approaching general election,--a vast sum to collect in gold at a

time when even at the Queen’s commerce-table guineas were very rarely

staked, and when specie could scarcely be procured by men of the

largest fortune. (See more of him in Wraxall’s Posthumous Memoirs, vol.

i. p. 28.)--E.

[164] Wilkes proved himself wholly unworthy of Serjeant Glynn’s

generous support. The King once related to Lord Eldon that on his

saying to Wilkes at the levee that he was glad to see his friend

Serjeant Glynn looking so well, Wilkes replied, “Sire, he is not

my friend. He was a Wilkite, _I_ never was.” (Twiss’s Life of Lord

Eldon.)--E.

[165] Sir Francis Gosling was an eminent banker in Fleet Street, where

his descendants still carry on business under the same firm.--E.

[166] I have seen genuine letters from the King to Mr. George

Grenville, while the latter was Minister, which show how deeply his

Majesty interested himself in that prosecution. In one he says,

“Wilkes’s impudence is amazing, considering how near his ruin is.” (See

the King’s letter to Lord North, p. 200, supra.)

[167] He had murdered a man in his own castle, where he always lived,

and the affair had been winked at on supposition of his insanity,

and perhaps from the difficulty of bringing to justice or of getting

evidence against so great a lord in the centre of his dependants, and

in so remote a country.

[168] Colonel, afterwards Sir John Stewart, Bart., of Grandtully. The

marriage took place on the 10th of August, 1746. He died in 1764. It

appears from the pleadings that when he married Lady Jane Douglas

he was reduced in health, spirit, and circumstances, but was a man

naturally of an ardent temperament, and had led a bustling dissipated

life.--E.

[169] She was delivered of twins on the 10th of July, 1748, at Paris,

in the house of Madame le Brun, in the Fauxbourg St. Germains,

according to the evidence in the cause.--E.

[170] It should be observed, however, that in the judgments they

delivered in the House of Lords, both Lord Camden and Lord Mansfield

argue very strongly from Lady Jane’s conduct to her children that she

was their mother.--E.

[171] This was the general impression. Lord Mansfield, on the contrary,

was satisfied that the children in every way resembled Sir John Stewart

and Lady Jane,--“the one was the finished model of Sir John, the other

the exact picture in miniature of Lady Jane.” (See his Speech.)--E.

[172] The Douglas cause began in 1762. The judges in the Court of

Session were divided--being seven to seven. The casting vote of the

Lord President gave the decision to the Hamiltons. This judgment was

reversed in the Lords on Feb. the 27th, 1769.--E.

[173] Lady Susan Stuart, daughter of the Earl of Galloway, and third

wife of Earl Gower, was the intimate friend of the Duchess of Hamilton,

and governing her in all other points, was very zealous for her in this

cause, and had engaged the Bedford connection to support it.

[174] The speeches of Lord Mansfield and Lord Camden are to be found in

the Collectanea Juridica, vol. ii. p. 386, and Parliamentary History,

vol. xvi. p. 518. It is scarcely possible that the report of Lord

Mansfield’s can be correct. It is equally poor both in composition and

in argument; the main argument, indeed, being that a woman of Lady

Jane’s illustrious descent could not be guilty of a fraud. The report

contains none of the invectives against Andrew Stuart to which the text

refers,--an omission which has been attributed to Lord Mansfield’s

extreme caution or timidity,--and had no other effect than to encourage

Mr. Stuart to attack him afterwards with greater fierceness; whilst

against Lord Camden, whose speech was at least equally severe, he made

no assault whatever.--(Lord Brougham’s Historical Sketches, vol. iii.

p. 195.) Lord Camden’s speech has been reported with unusual care,

and is no doubt a fine specimen of judicial eloquence. Still, it does

not fairly grapple with the difficulties of the case, and some of the

strongest objections, too, in the way of the Douglas claim are left

entirely untouched.--E.

[175] Mr. Johnstone Pulteney was the second son of Sir James Johnstone,

Bart., of Westerhall, and brother of Governor Johnstone. He married

the rich heiress and niece of Lord Bath, whose frugal habits he seems

to have closely imitated. Wraxall says that his figure and dress

answered Pope’s description of Sir John Cutler, his whole wardrobe

being threadbare.--(Posthumous Memoirs, vol. iii. p. 280.) He died in

1805, at the age of eighty-four. His daughter was created Countess of

Bath.--E.

[176] These letters are intituled “Letters to Lord Mansfield on the

Douglas Cause, 1773,” 4to. They partly deserve the commendation

bestowed on them by Walpole, and may still be read with almost unabated

interest. Mr. Stuart had been a Writer of the Signet in Edinburgh. He

was the proprietor of a fair estate called Torrence, in Lanarkshire,

and for some years he represented the county in Parliament. In the

Letters cited above, he calls himself “one whose birth entitles him,

when provoked by injury, to feel no inferiority” to Lord Mansfield.

The Appendix to his work contains letters to him from Charles Yorke,

Dunning, Wedderburne, and Sir Adam Ferguson (who had all been of

counsel for the Hamiltons), testifying to his honour in the conduct

of the cause. It is difficult, nevertheless, to acquit him of very

reprehensible tampering with the evidence. He wrote several tracts on

Indian affairs, and likewise “A Genealogical History of the Stuarts,

from the Earliest Period to the Present Time,” a work more curious than

valuable. It led to some controversy long since forgotten. He died in

1801.--E.

[177] Without examining the records of France this fact cannot safely

be altogether denied; but after many inquiries both among Scotch and

English lawyers, the authenticity of it seems to rest with Walpole

alone. Had it happened before Mr. Stuart’s Letters was published in

1773, of course he would never have omitted so important a fact; but

neither in his Letters, nor in a French account of the Douglas cause

published in 1786, nor in any other publication that has fallen in the

editor’s way, is there the least notice of any such thing: besides

this, nobody remembers even to have heard of it; and it is not a story

likely to be forgotten, had it ever been mentioned.--E.

[178] He was the fifth son of the Earl of Shannon, [and M.P. for

Knaresborough. He went out to the West Indies some years afterwards as

Commodore, in the Thunderer, seventy-four, and perished with all his

crew in the celebrated hurricane of 1779. He had married one of the

daughters and co-heirs of Sir Charles Hanbury Williams.--E.]

[179] The trial is reported in the Gentleman’s Magazine for 1768, p.

587; 1769, p. 51–53, 108. Certainly the execution of these men would

have been an act of gross injustice.--E.

[180] Mr. Joseph Martin, M.P. for Gatton, an ancestor of the present

Member for Tewkesbury.--E.

[181] The Petition from “the major part of the Council of

Massachusets,” signed by Mr. Dunsford the President of the Council.

Lord North contended that by the constitution of the colony the Council

could not act separate from the Government except in their legislative

capacity, and in that case the Governor was President of the Council.

Owing to the recent dissolution, they could no longer act in their

legislative capacity. The President, therefore, had no authority to

sign in that character. (Cavendish’s Parliamentary Debates, vol. i. p.

185.)--E.

[182] The resolutions had previously been passed by the Lords, and

are given in Cavendish. They cite historically the acts both of the

people and legislature of Massachusets, and they were accompanied by

an address to the King, praying that he would direct the Governor of

the colony to transmit the names of the persons most conspicuous in

commencing illegal acts since the 2nd of December 1767 to one of the

Secretaries of State, and would, if the information proved sufficient,

issue a special commission for trying the offenders in Great Britain,

according to the statute of the 35th of Henry the Eighth. The debate

was conducted with ability and spirit on both sides of the House.

Governor Johnstone tersely observed that the resolutions were untrue

in point of fact, improper in point of language, and inexpedient in

point of time. Mr. Grenville analysed them with his usual acuteness,

and condemned the conduct of the Government as weak and inconsistent.

He predicted the failure of all half measures. “If you mean,” he said,

“to give up the proposition that you have a right to tax America, do it

like men; if you do not mean to give it up, take some proper measures

to show your intention; but do not stand hesitating between both,--if

you do, you will plunge both countries into confusion.” Mr. Burke

advocated the cause of the colonists with indignant eloquence. “Why,”

he asked, “are the provisions of the statute of Henry the Eighth to be

put in force against the Americans? Because you cannot trust a jury of

that country. Sir, that word must carry horror to every feeling mind.

If you have not a party among two millions of people, you must either

change your plan of government, or renounce your colonies for ever.”

Governor Pownall delivered a treatise full of information, which he

took care should be accurately reported, and it has accordingly had

more readers than it is likely to have found hearers. The resolutions

were defended by Hussy, with judgment, good taste, and ability. Nor was

Lord North deficient in making a plausible case for the Government. The

House was as thin as when it passed the Stamp Act. (Cavendish, vol. i.

pp. 191–225.)--E.

[183] The Speaker decided this to be an improper expression.--E.

[184] Alluding to the Paymaster’s place, which had been split into two,

but was again given to Rigby alone.

[185] This debate is reported in Cavendish, vol. i. pp. 120–8.--E.

[186] Cavendish, vol. i. p. 128–31.--E.

[187] This surely was more disgraceful to the Prince than to Sir

Laurence Dundas; but the Prince would no doubt have hanged, and with

more reason, Lord George Sackville, if he had dared, and this did not

obstruct that nobleman’s promotion.--E.

[188] Author of the Commentaries on the Law. He was a very

uninteresting speaker, and was afterwards made a judge. [His principles

being strongly Tory, drove him into a line of conduct on Wilkes’s

affair unlike the rest of his life, for in other respects he showed

himself an honest, able, and amiable man. He probably regretted his

subserviency to the directions of the Ministers, for he refused the

office of Solicitor on Dunning’s retirement, and was delighted to be

raised on the following year to one of the Judgeships of the Common

Pleas, which he held till his death, in 1780. An interesting life of

him is prefixed to his Reports.--E.]

[189] Mr. (afterwards Sir Ralph) Payne, (K.B.,) M.P. for Shaftesbury.

He seems to have soon discovered his failure, for in 1771 he

accepted the government of the Leeward Islands, where he possessed

a considerable estate, an ancestor of his having settled in Antigua

during the civil wars. His splendid hospitality and imposing

deportment, not less than his good nature, made him very popular with

the West Indians, and it was to their great regret that he returned to

England in 1775 to resume his political career. This, however, proved

far from successful. All he obtained was the Clerkship of the Green

Cloth, which he subsequently lost in consequence of his connecting

himself with Fox. His house, however, became the favourite resort of

the leaders of the Opposition, partly from his own agreeableness,

and more so from the attractions of his wife, a highly accomplished

Austrian lady, who was a very general favourite. It was on seeing her

in tears, which she placed with more adroitness than truth to the

account of her monkey, who had just died, that Sheridan wrote the

well-known ludicrous distich:--

“Alas! poor Ned,

My monkey’s dead;

I had rather by half

It had been Sir Ralph.”

In 1795 Sir Ralph made his peace with Pitt, and was raised to the Irish

peerage by the title of Lord Lavington. In 1801 he returned to his

former government, and in 1807 died at Antigua, without issue. Lady

Lavington survived him, and was left in circumstances so embarrassed,

that she applied to the legislature of Antigua for a small pension.

(See more of him in a work recently published under the title of

“Antigua and the Antiguans.”)--E.

[190] This debate is reported in Cavendish, vol. i. p. 131–8.--E.

[191] Secretary of the Treasury.

[192] Dr. Blackstone spoke with unusual spirit, and put the case on the

right grounds. Serjeant Glynn observed sensibly and fairly, “If the

letter is not entirely free from all possibility of reprehension, there

does not appear to be anything in it to subject the noble writer to

Parliamentary censure, but I think it calculated to induce magistrates

to exercise a power which ought not to be resorted to except in extreme

cases. It does not sufficiently define the occasions upon which it is

to be used. Most of the magistrates are uninstructed in the laws of the

country, and likely to be misled by the terms of it.” (Cavendish, vol.

i. p. 139–151.)--E.

[193] A noted partisan of Wilkes.

[194] The Ministers made a very poor figure in this debate, if any

trust is to be placed in Cavendish’s Reports. Dyson seems to have

acquitted himself the best. The temper of the majority may be inferred

from the applause said to have been received by Mr. (afterwards

Justice) Nares, on his declaring that he would “rather appear in that

House as an idolater of a Minister, than as a ridiculer of his Maker.”

On the Opposition side there was no speech like Mr. Grenville’s.

He revised the report of it taken by Cavendish; and printed a few

copies for private circulation, by which means it came into the hands

of Almon, who reprinted it (Parliamentary Debates, vol. xvi. pp.

546–575). Being one of the very few of his speeches that have been

preserved, it deserves the attentive study of those who desire to

know how he obtained the ascendancy which he so long enjoyed in the

House of Commons, combating as he did, at one time, almost alone,

the extraordinary and varied powers of Pitt and Charles Townshend.

It is plain that, to use an expression of Clarendon respecting Mr.

Pym, whom, by the way, in many respects he closely resembled, “his

parts were rather acquired by industry, than supplied by nature or

adorned by art.” This he well knew, and accordingly it was not his

aim to subdue the feelings or to captivate the imagination; he sought

to reach the understanding, and certainly the able structure of his

argument--the precision with which his points are laid down--his great

power of exposition,--and above all, the abundant stores of knowledge

which he always brought to the discussion, show how he excelled in the

line he had adopted. This speech remained unanswered, and was indeed

unanswerable. In some parts it approaches eloquence, but it can only

be fairly estimated as a whole,--no extracts would furnish a just idea

of its merit. The following passages, however, may be taken as a fair

specimen of his style:--

“Are these, then, the proper expedients to check and to restrain the

spirit of faction and of disorder, and to bring back the minds of

men to a sense of their duty? Can we seriously think that they will

have that effect? Surely it is time to look forward and to try other

measures. A wise Government knows how to enforce with temper, or to

conciliate with dignity; but a weak one is odious in the former, and

contemptible in the latter. How many arguments have we heard from the

Administration in the course of the session, for conciliatory measures

towards subjects in the American colonies upon questions where the

legislative authority of Great Britain was immediately concerned? And

is not the same temper, the same spirit of conciliation, at least

equally necessary towards the subjects within the kingdom? or is this

the only part of the King’s dominions where it is not advisable to show

it? Let not any gentleman think that by conciliation I mean a blind

and base compliance with popular opinions contrary to our honour and

justice--that would indeed be unworthy of us. I mean by conciliation

a cool and temperate conduct unmixed with passion or prejudice. No

man wishes more than I do to stop any excess on either side, or is

more ready to resist any tumultuous violence founded upon unreasonable

clamour. Such a clamour is no more than a sudden gust of wind that

passes by and is forgotten; but when the public discontent is founded

on truth and reason, when the sky lowers and hangs heavy all around us,

a storm may then arise which may tear up the constitution by the roots,

and shake the palace of the King himself.” (Cavendish’s Parliamentary

Debates, vol. i. p. 174.) Mr. Grenville took care throughout his

speech to prevent his opinion against Mr. Wilkes’s expulsion being

construed into approbation of that gentleman’s conduct, on which he

commented with a severity which the latter deeply resented. Lord Temple

interfered, but could not prevent Wilkes from publishing an insolent

pamphlet in reply to Mr. Grenville’s observations, the result of which

was, that Lord Temple never spoke to him afterwards.--E.

[195] Charles, second Earl Cornwallis. [He was the intimate friend

of the Duke of Grafton. A pleasing portrait is drawn of him by all

contemporary writers. If the failure of his American campaigns, where

he certainly proved no match for the self-taught commanders, whose

ignorance it was the fashion of the day to ridicule, raised a strong

presumption against his military talents, he met with great success

in India, both as a soldier and an administrator. His conduct in

Ireland during the Rebellion likewise does honour to his sagacity

and benevolence. He was one of the few statesmen who inculcated

the necessity of forbearance and concession in that misgoverned

country,--and the coldness with which the Ministers received his

remonstrances was the cause of his resignation. The mild dignity of his

demeanour faithfully represented the leading traits of his character.

He died in India in 1805, at a very advanced age, leaving an only

son, on whose decease, without male issue, the Marquisate became

extinct.--E.]

[196] Mr. Stephenson was the son of Sir William Stephenson of Kent. I

have been told that later in life he met with great losses in trade,

which obliged him to make a composition with his creditors, but having

subsequently retrieved his circumstances he paid everything in full.--E.

[197] Mr. Hollis published handsome editions of Toland’s Life of

Milton, and Algernon Sidney’s Discourses on Government,--works of

which the principles, political and religious, coincided with his own.

He was a very honest well-meaning man, the idol of a small circle of

friends, who profited largely by his bounty, and showed their gratitude

by extravagant praises of his moral and intellectual merit. He died

suddenly from apoplexy at his seat at Corscombe, in Dorsetshire, in

1764. An injudicious tribute was paid to his memory by the publication

of his Life in two massive volumes, 4to, by Archdeacon Blackburne, in

1780--one of the dullest books of the day--and which as completely

failed in its object as some of the biographies of the same cast, the

introduction of which into the Biographia Britannica, drew forth the

well-known lines of Cowper--

“O fond attempt to give a deathless lot

To names ignoble, born to be forgot!

In vain recorded in historic page,

They court the notice of a future age.

Those twinkling tiny lustres of the land,

Drop one by one from Fame’s neglecting hand;

Lethæan gulp receives them as they fall,

And dark oblivion soon absorbs them all.”--E.

[198] Henry Seymour, nephew of Edward eighth Duke of Somerset, and

half-brother by the mother to Lord Sandwich, but attached to Grenville.

[He was M.P. for Huntingdon.--E.]

[199] Cavendish’s Parliamentary Debates, vol i. p. 226.--E.

[200] This tract was understood to be written by Mr. Knox. It is but a

moderate performance, and has long ceased to be read, except by those

who wish to appreciate Mr. Burke’s admirable “Observations.” There are

some passages in it exactly in Mr. Grenville’s manner, and probably

of his composition: the sentiments of the whole were certainly his.

Another tract of a similar tendency had, not long before, issued from

the same mint, intituled “Considerations on Trade and Finance.”--E.

[201] This brilliant composition has so many beauties, and excites

throughout such deep interest, that it seems to be almost an abuse of

criticism to note its defects. The author, of course, wrote under a

strong bias, and for a temporary purpose; but his genius has cast a

halo over his opinions and his political associates, which has enlisted

posterity on his side.

The passage to which Walpole refers is in reply to some gloomy

statements of the decline of our trade.--“What if all he says of the

state of this balance were true? If these [custom-house entries] prove

us to be ruined, we were always ruined. Some ravens, indeed, have

always croaked out this kind of song. They have a malignant delight in

presaging mischief, when they are not employed in doing it. They are

miserable and disappointed at every instance of the public prosperity.

They overlook us, like the malevolent being of the poet,--

“‘Tritonida conspicit arcem

Ingeniis, opibusque, et festâ pace viventem,

Vixque tenet lachrymas quia nil lachrymabile cernit.’”--E.

[202] The debate is reported by Cavendish, vol. i. p. 227–237.--E.

[203] It would have been a wiser course in the Ministers not to

have resorted to this expedient, which at least was open to strong

suspicion. Mr. Burke thus comments upon it: “After a jury upon

legal evidence have given their verdict, a court of judicature has

determined, the judges have approved, and the party is under sentence,

the mercy of the Crown interposes; ‘No, no,’ say the Government, ‘we

must have a jury of surgeons--of that kind of judicature we must

avail ourselves,’ and the man receives the royal pardon. When they

witness these things the unfortunate people of England say, We are not

seditious without reason,” &c.--(Speech on Mr. Onslow’s motion for

declaring Colonel Lutterell duly elected for Middlesex, in Cavendish’s

Parliamentary Debates, vol. i. p. 382.)--See also Junius’s Letters,

vol. i. p. 50.--E.

[204] The bill was passed by the Lords without opposition, the Duke of

Grafton alone saying that he thought it a very bad bill.

[205] The debate is well reported in Cavendish, vol. i. pp. 241–51.--E.

[206] Lord Clive endeavoured to prove the agreement to be unjust

towards the Company--an opinion in which Mr. Grenville seems to have

concurred, but “four or five hundred thousand pounds was a bait too

tempting to be rejected,” and he therefore gave no objection to the

motion. Colonel Barré denounced with his usual vigour the constitution

of the Company. After referring to the sentiment he had expressed in

a former debate, that the management of a dominion containing sixteen

millions of inhabitants, and producing a revenue of from four to eight

millions a-year, could not be wisely and safely managed by twenty-four

gentlemen in Leadenhall Street, he proceeded to say, “The system of

direction, fluctuating as it does from year to year, must be ruinous.

Faction, too, that has stolen into almost every public assembly, has

found its way among them; at one time making a disadvantageous peace,

at another time making one on more advantageous terms; striking out

new wars; not content with the revenues which they already have, but

thirsting for more,--it is impossible but India must be a scene of

confusion. Instead of this, you might, by the wisdom of your laws and

the sagacity of your government, bring millions lying hid in the earth

into this country, and at the same time snatch the people of India from

the tyranny under which they have been accustomed to live. But instead

of this, there is nothing but war from the Carnatic to the Deccan.”

Mr. Burke appeared as the advocate of the Company, and defended the

annual election of Directors, as a system under which the Company

had prospered. “Men,” he observed, “continually watched by their

constituents are worked into vigour. If the Direction were established

for a number of years, the Directors might form themselves into

cabals.” (Cavendish’s Parliamentary Debates, vol. i. pp. 251–65.)--E.

[207] It is remarkable that Walpole should overlook the violent

altercation which occurred in this debate between General Conway and

Mr. Burke,--in which, as far as can be collected from Cavendish, the

latter had the advantage.--E.

[208] In these debates on the Civil List very able speeches appear to

have been made by Lord North, Mr. Grenville, Mr. Dowdeswell, and Mr.

Burke. An instructive account of them is given by Cavendish, though

it is evident that he has failed in his attempt to convey an adequate

representation of the brilliant eloquence of Burke. The rapidity of

Burke’s utterance, and the late period of the debate in which he spoke,

perhaps made this impracticable. He has done more justice to Lord

North, whose defence of his political conduct is so illustrative of his

general views, and of the course he pursued in Parliament, that I have

ventured, notwithstanding its length, to insert it here.

“Those repeated changes of Administration have been the principal cause

of the present grievance [the King’s debts]. I lament it as much as

any man can do. Under an Administration, whose principles I approved,

ten years ago I accepted a small office, and was contented with it;

those whom I served knew I never molested them on my own account. I had

formed principles from which I have never deviated,--principles not at

all calculated for an ambitious man. I thought the public had waged a

glorious war; and that the war would be concluded by a necessary peace.

It was never my idea to cry up the peace as the chef-d’œuvre of a great

minister. The peace was an advantageous one; because, in the situation

in which the country then stood, it was better to come to such a peace,

than to run the risk of another campaign. If the Ministers had no

other choice, they made a good choice; if the case was otherwise, they

made a bad one. Whether they had or had not, never came to my ears.

I never considered the country so reduced that we could not recover.

A steady manly resistance of the impatience of those who wanted to

ease themselves of the burdens left by the war, put the country at

length into a situation to meet other wars. Upon this system I have

ever been against popular measures. I do not dislike popularity; but

for the last seven years I have never given my vote for any one of the

popular measures. I supported the Cyder-tax with a view to the ease of

the people, and I afterwards opposed the repeal of the tax--a vote of

which I never repented. In 1765, I was for the American Stamp Act; the

propriety of passing which I took very much upon the authority of the

right honourable gentleman; and when, in the following year, a bill was

brought in for the repeal of that act, I directly opposed it; for I saw

the danger of the repeal. And when, again, in the year 1767, it was

thought necessary to relieve the people from the pressure of taxation,

by lessening the revenue to the extent of half a million, I was against

that measure also. There appeared on the public stage a strange

phenomenon--an individual grown, by the popularity of the times, to

be a man of consequence. I moved the expulsion of Mr. Wilkes. Every

subsequent proceeding against that man I have supported; and I will

again vote for his expulsion, if he again attempts to take his seat in

this House. In all my memory, therefore, I do not recollect a single

popular measure I ever voted for--no, not even the Nullum Tempus Bill.

I was against declaring the law in the case of general warrants. I

state this to prove that I am not an ambitious man. Men may be popular

without being ambitious; but there is rarely an ambitious man who does

not try to be popular.” (Cavendish, vol. i. p. 298.)--E.

[209] See some able comments on this question in Burke’s celebrated

tract on “Present Discontents,” (Works, vol. ii. p. 309.)--E.

[210] Cavendish, vol. i. pp. 307–336. Especially the speeches of Lord

North, Mr. Burke, and Mr. Grenville.--E.

[211] Dingley was a strange eccentric creature, always bent on some

wild scheme or other. He had obtained a patent for a newly-invented

sawing machine, which he carried on at Limehouse; and various other

projects of his are mentioned in the Annual Register. Junius states

that he died of a broken heart in consequence of having been so

contemptuously treated at this election. He was a man of some property,

and had been Lord Chatham’s landlord when the latter resided at

Hampstead. An amusing account of him is given in a note to Chatham’s

Correspondence, vol. iii. p. 350.--E.

[212] This debate is reported in Cavendish, vol. i. p. 345–355.--E.

[213] Yet it had been mentioned that very morning in the newspapers as

intended.

[214] Evelyn Pierpoint, the last Duke of Kingston, K.G. He was then

just married to the famous Miss Chudleigh--a marriage afterwards

disallowed by the House of Lords. [The Duke was the only son of Lord

Newark, only son of the second Duke of Kingston. His father died at the

early age of twenty-one, and he had the misfortune to be brought up by

his grandfather, a haughty, selfish, licentious man, who appears to

have been equally a tyrant in his family and out of it. Thus he became

bashful and dull, and displayed few if any of the talents which had

characterized his race, and were so evident in his aunts, Lady Mary

Wortley Montague and Lady Mar. He raised a regiment in 1745, which is

often mentioned in the history of that campaign as Kingston’s light

horse, and, what was not then common with Peers, he served with it. He

died at Bath in September 1773. His widow survived him till 1788, when

she died at Paris, aged sixty-eight.--E.]

[215] Lord Irnham, on a family quarrel, afterwards challenged his son

to fight.

[216] The date of the first letter published by Junius is the 21st of

January.--E.

[217] Mr. Grenville spoke twice in this debate. Early on Saturday he

was called up by an observation of Mr. Onslow that Alderman Beckford

was not at liberty to reason against a resolution of the House of

Commons. “Sir,” said he, in a tone exceedingly animated, “he who will

contend that a resolution of the House of Commons is the law of the

land, is a violent enemy of his country, be he who or what he will.

The law of the land, an Act of Parliament, is to be the guide of every

man in the kingdom. No power--not an order of the House of Commons can

set that aside, can change, diminish, or augment it. I do say, and I

will maintain that ground--let any gentleman call me to order--that the

law of the land, an Act of Parliament, cannot be altered, enforced, or

augmented by a vote of either House of Parliament. That I say is the

law of this country.” Immediately after this speech Mr. Grenville spat

blood.--(Cavendish, vol. i. p. 370.)

At a later period of the evening Mr. Grenville entered fully into the

questions of the House, and discussed with great ability the celebrated

cases of Ashby _v._ White, and Rex _v._ Lord Banbury, where in the

former instance the decision of the House of Commons, and in the latter

of the House of Lords, had not been recognised by the courts of law.--E.

[218] The debate in reported in Cavendish, vol. i. p. 360–86.--E.

[219] Lord North is stated by Cavendish to have withheld his consent

to the course recommended by Conway, on the ground that it would not

be justifiable to convey to the Americans the idea of a repeal of the

Act so long as there was a possibility of their being disappointed.

The best speeches on this debate were those of Edmund Burke and his

cousin William, both being clever and animated. (Cavendish, vol. i. p.

390–401.)--E.

[220] Serjeant Whitaker was also counsel against Wilkes in the action

against Lord Halifax tried in the Common Pleas in the following

November. His speech, on that occasion, is reported in the _London

Museum_ for 1769. It possessed sufficient interest at the time to cause

his style of speaking to be burlesqued in Foote’s Comedy of the “Lame

Lover.” His name does not often occur in the reports. He had been made

King’s Serjeant in 1759, and afterwards became Treasurer of his Inn. He

died of apoplexy in 1779.--E.

[221] Afterwards the Right Hon. Sir James Graham, one of the Barons

of the Exchequer. He died in 1836, at the great age of ninety-two.

He believed himself to belong to the Montrose family. It is more

certain that he was the son of a schoolmaster at Hackney. His personal

accomplishments and amiability made him a general favourite throughout

life, which perhaps prevented his attaining any considerable reputation

as a lawyer.--E.

[222] The ability displayed by Serjeant Adair on this occasion obtained

him the patronage of the Duke of Portland, who afterwards brought him

into Parliament. He spoke there occasionally, and distinguished himself

in the debates on the slave-trade. He was without any vivacity of

manner or expression, but had the reputation of being a sound lawyer,

and it may be perceived by the reports that his business in the Common

Pleas was considerable. He was a staunch Whig; it therefore became a

subject of the deepest mortification to him that Mr. Erskine should

have been brought from the King’s Bench to lead in the great case of

Mr. Fox against the High Bailiff of Westminster. Mr. Fox, who highly

esteemed him, perhaps was not less distressed, but the matter was too

important to be ruled by personal feelings. The Mr. Adair whose name

appears in the reports of the trial as the junior counsel, was not

the Serjeant, but a young barrister, who has since obtained a place

in history, by his eminence in diplomacy and his friendship with Mr.

Fox--the Right Hon. Sir Robert Adair, G.C.B. The Serjeant died suddenly

in 1798. His daughter married the late Judge Wilson. He succeeded Glynn

as Recorder, and held that office for ten years.--E.

[223] John Lee, or, as he was usually termed, “honest Jack Lee,” was a

sound lawyer, and for many years had the lead on the Northern Circuit,

where his practice was very considerable. He excelled, Lord Eldon

has recorded, in cross-examination. A brief blunt way of expressing

himself, much originality, and frequent sallies of a wit, which, though

not of an elevated character, was very amusing, gave him a short-lived

celebrity. He was appointed Solicitor-General by the Coalition. In

the great debate of the 17th Feb. 1783, on Lord Shelburne’s Peace, he

took a prominent and not very judicious part. He succeeded Wallace as

Attorney-General in the March following; and in April 1793, he died

at Staindrop, in the county of Durham--leaving, it was said, a great

estate.--E.

[224] Mr. Grenville cited from Blackstone’s Commentaries B. C. the

passage enumerating the nine cases of disqualification (of which cases

expulsion was not one), and ending--“but subject to the standing

restrictions and disqualifications, every subject is eligible of common

right.” In the editions, _subsequent to Wilkes’s_ case, the sentence

goes on, “though there are instances where persons, in particular

circumstances, have forfeited that common right and been declared

ineligible for that Parliament by a vote of the House of Commons, or

for ever by an Act of the Legislature.” (Commons’ Journal, 17th Feb.

1769.)--This difference in the two editions, led to the favourite toast

at political meetings of “The first edition of Doctor Blackstone’s

Commentaries.” Mr. Grenville’s speech is given by Cavendish, vol. i.,

where, however, it is not so severe or powerful as the accounts of it

in Walpole and Junius (Letter xviii.) would lead one to expect.--E.

[225] The Cardinal was drawn from the obscurity in which he had

lived since his disgrace in 1758, for the purpose of this mission.

He continued Ambassador at Rome until his death, in 1794, in his

eighty-fifth year. A memoir of him, by the Abbé Feletz, of the French

Academy, forms one of the best-written articles in the Biographie

Universelle. It would be more valuable if it were less of an éloge.

The Cardinal judged wisely in opposing the Austrian alliance: but

like other French statesmen, he took care to make his opposition

subservient to his interest. Indeed there is little either in his moral

or political conduct to deserve commendation until he was securely

settled at Rome. He owed his elevation entirely to Madame de Pompadour,

whose favour he had earned by betraying to her the King’s intrigue

with Madame de Choiseul--a secret with which that lady had imprudently

intrusted him.--(See more of him in the Memoires de Duclos, vol. ii. p.

172; Lacretelle’s Histoire de France, vol. iii. p. 161.)--E.

[226] The disapprobation with which Ganganelli was known to regard the

policy of the Jesuits procured him the support of France and Austria,

and consequently his election. It was not, however, until the year 1773

that he issued the brief for the extinction of the order. The troubles

in which this step involved him shortened his life. His advanced age,

for he was sixty-nine years old, the cares of Government, and his

sedentary studious habits, were held insufficient causes for his death,

without adding it to the catalogue of the crimes of the Jesuits; and

volumes were written to support and to repel the charge.--E.

[227] The Count du Châtelet, afterwards Duc, has been mentioned with

respect by the French historians of the day, and his name is associated

with more important transactions than this miserable affair. The King’s

esteem raised him to the command of the guards on the death of the Duc

de Biron. In common with other enlightened men attached to the Court,

he supported the reforms best calculated to ameliorate the condition

of the people. His popularity caused him to be fixed on as a successor

to Brienne in the Presidentship of the Council,--a dangerous honour,

which he wisely declined. He was, however, one of the early victims of

the Reign of Terror, and after a fruitless attempt to commit suicide,

perished by the guillotine on the 13th of December, 1793. His wife soon

followed him to the scaffold.--E.

[228] It was believed that he had acted under secret instructions from

the Empress; although, in conformity with the practice of the Russian

Court, he was left to bear the blame of failure. On his return to St.

Petersburg he was placed at the head of the marine department, and held

that post during several years, with a very poor reputation. He escaped

dismissal only because Catherine made it a principle to change as

seldom as possible either her Ministers or Ambassadors.--(Tooke’s Life

of Catherine the Second, vol. i. p. 304; vol ii. p. 46.)--E.

[229] Circulars were addressed by Lord Rochford to the British

Ministers at foreign Courts with an account of this transaction.--(See

letter to Sir A. Mitchell, in Ellis’s Original Letters, vol. iv. p.

521.)--E.

[230] A minute of Lord Chatham’s representations to the King is given

in the Duke of Grafton’s Memoirs, as if on his Majesty’s authority.

It confirms the statement in the text, with the addition, however, of

Lord Chatham having assured the King that in his state of health office

could no longer be even desirable to him.--E.

[231] Being asked soon afterwards, by Sir W. Meredith, if he was likely

to come in, he replied, “Good God! I!--with whom, and for whom?” There

would have been great sense in this answer, if he had not often shown

that he was indifferent _with whom_, and nobody could tell _for_ whom

he had ever come in: though his enemies would say, _only for himself_;

and Britain ought to say _for her_ in his successful Administration.

[232] Lord Temple, too, as if not without hopes, had shifted off to

September the meeting in Buckinghamshire for determining whether that

county should petition or not; and he might hope that the popular

clamour would drive the Court to have recourse to Lord Chatham and him.

[233] Edward Harvey. M.P. for Harwich, Governor of Portsmouth, and

Adjutant-General of the Forces. He bore a very high reputation in the

army, having served with great distinction on the Staff during the

seven years’ war. Prince Ferdinand frequently employed him on missions

to England, when there was any important military business to transact,

and he seems to have been equally in the confidence of the Prince and

the English Government. The King also entertained a warm regard for

him, and took much pleasure in his society; no one perhaps being more

constantly his Majesty’s attendant in his rides. On one occasion, when

they were riding together in a heavy shower of rain, the General having

no great-coat, the King lent him his own. The difficulty then arose

whether it was to be returned or not. At length the General decided on

returning it. The King remarked, “You have sent back my great-coat,

I see.” “Please your Majesty,” was the reply, “I could not presume

to offer a new one.” “Quite right, quite right,” rejoined the King;

“there may as well be two good men in the coat as one.” The General

usually resided at Blackheath. He died on April the 16th, 1778. He was

the brother of Mr. William Harvey of Chigwell, and uncle of the late

Admiral Sir Eliab Harvey, G.C.B.--E.

[234] If these Memoirs had been written at a later period, Walpole

would have mentioned Horne Tooke’s talents with more respect. He was,

however, at this time little known, except for his quarrel with Wilkes,

when, as Lord Brougham justly observes, “though he was clearly in the

right, he became the object of general and fierce popular indignation,

for daring to combat the worthless idol of the mob.”--(Sketches of

British Statesmen, vol. ii. p. 119.)--E.

[235] Son of the late Speaker. He became Lord Onslow by the death of

his cousin in 1776, was created Earl Onslow in 1801, and died in 1814.

He had lived on terms of great intimacy with Wilkes, whom, in a letter

printed by Almon, he praises with the warmth of a partisan.--(See Life

of Wilkes, vol. v. p. 240.)--E.

[236] The trial terminated in Mr. Onslow’s nonsuit, in consequence of

the word _pounds_ being inserted in the record instead of the word

_pound_. The case was re-heard at Guildhall, when Mr. Onslow was again

nonsuited. The trial was supposed to have cost him 1500_l._ The whole

transaction was most discreditable to Mr. Horne.--(Woodfall’s Junius,

vol. i. p. 196.)--E.

[237] The Duke gives some account, in his plain simple style, of these

brutal outrages in his Journal.--(Cavendish, vol. i. p. 621.)--He

appears to have had a narrow escape of being murdered at Honiton.

It is pleasing to find in his entry of the following day, a picture

presenting a striking contrast to this disgraceful tumult:--“I went in

the morning to Barwick Place, where my ancestors lived, in Dorsetshire.

It is a fine farm, but a dismal place. From thence I went by the

sea-side through Kingston Russell farm, to Mr. Hardy, my tenant’s

house, where I dined. This is an exceeding fine farm, and has the

finest ewe leasows I ever saw in my life. After a very good farmer-like

dinner, and a hearty welcome, I set out for Blandford.”--E.

[238] He had, moreover, at his seat at Kingsgate, in the Isle of

Thanet, erected a pillar to the honour of Alderman Harley, the most

unpopular of all the City’s magistrates.

[239] These accounts were not settled at Lord Holland’s death, and his

family profited of the interest of 400,000_l._ still remaining in his

hands. Lord North was very earnest to have the account made up, and yet

it was not finally closed in the middle of the year 1777, which shows

the intricacy and difficulty of terminating such accounts. [The delay

was no fault of Lord Holland’s; it arose from the imperfect system

of auditing the public accounts in that day. Lord Holland had been

out of office only three years and a-half. Mr. Winnington’s accounts

for 1744–6 were only settled in 1760, or fourteen years after their

close, and Lord Chatham’s remained open for the same period.--(Lord

Brougham’s Historical Sketches, vol. iii. p. 136.)--It should, however,

be stated, in fairness to Lord Chatham, that he derived no benefit from

the balance in his favour, having left all his receipts in the Bank of

England.--(See Lord Holland’s Memorial, and other papers arising out of

this accusation in the notes to Woodfall’s Junius, vol. i. p. 184.)--E.]

[240] Lord Chatham, Lord Temple, and Mr. Grenville. A petition from

Ailesbury being soon after agreed on, the members of the meeting

drank a health to the union of the three brothers. How little union

there really was amongst them appeared afterwards, for Mr. Grenville

had before his death made his peace with the Court without any

consideration of Lord Chatham, and so did Lord Temple in like manner in

1777. All the latter part of Lord Temple’s life was one continued scene

of quarrels and reconciliations with his family and friends, according

as his passions or restless ambition dictated.--(See the MS. Memoirs of

the Duke of Grafton, Appendix, on the subject of these petitions.)

[241] Letter to the Duke of Bedford, 19th September. Twenty-third

Letter.--E.

[242] Sir William Draper’s Letter to Junius, 7th October 1769. Junius’s

Twenty-sixth Letter.--E.

[243] The proceedings in the House of Commons on Dr. Musgrave’s charge

are given in Parliamentary History, vol. xvi. p. 763. Lord Mahon

notices the charge as being utterly unfounded.--(History, vol. iv. p.

410.) Dr. Musgrave had published an excellent edition of Euripides, but

in his latter years his reason was believed to be clouded. He died in

1780.--E.

[244] This does not agree with the authenticated accounts of the war

in Corsica. So far from it, Paoli at first succeeded in repelling the

attacks of the French, notwithstanding their superiority of numbers.

They were worsted in an engagement near Loreto, with great loss,

several companies having been drowned in the Golo in the attempt to

make their escape. On the 29th of October the corps sent to attack

Murato received a signal defeat, their commander being among the

slain.--(Sismondi’s Histoire de France, vol. xxix. p. 380.)--The

overwhelming force brought over by the Count de Vaux early in 1769 soon

dispersed the Corsican levies, and rendered all further resistance

on the part of Paoli perfectly vain. Paoli was much respected in

England by men of all parties. At the commencement of the Revolution

he was invited to France, and after an enthusiastic reception by the

National Assembly, placed in the command of Corsica, with the rank of

Lieutenant-General of the Island. The troubles that followed led him

to offer the Crown to England in 1793; but the English rule proved

unfortunate both to the Corsicans and to himself. He soon returned to

England, and died in the neighbourhood of London, in his eightieth

year. He left a considerable fortune, part of which eventually fell

under the administration of the Court of Chancery, and the Lord

Chancellor issued a commission to Corsica to ascertain his heirs.--See

more of him in Capefigue Diplomates Européens, pp. 123–133--E.

[245] According to the Duke’s own account in his Memoirs he was at

this time on uneasy terms with his colleagues, of whose general policy

he disapproved, and by whom he was generally outvoted in the Cabinet.

Nothing but the absence of an adequate excuse for resignation kept him

in office. It may be observed, also, that his marriage (to Miss Jane

Wrottesly), which took place on the 24th of June, had been followed by

his installation at Cambridge, where his presence was indispensable.--E.

[246] Mr. Thomas Pitt, nephew of Lord Chatham, was on some occasions a

man of probity and generosity. He gave five thousand pounds a-piece to

his two sisters, left destitute by their father; and himself marrying

Miss Wilkinson, whose elder sister had disobliged their father by

marrying against his consent, both Mr. Pitt and his wife would not

conclude their marriage without disclaiming all advantage to the

prejudice of the elder sister. [See vol. i. p. 339. His nominees were

Mr. Gerard Hamilton, and Mr. Crawford, Chamberlain for the County of

Fife.--E.]

[247] He was on that day aged forty-five, the date of his famous number

and device.

[248] The knowledge of this fact is said to have been the reason why

the jury did not give higher damages.--E.

[249] James Fitzgerald, Earl of Kildare, first Duke of Leinster. [An

amiable nobleman, always zealous to promote the welfare of his country.

He died in 1773.--E.]

[250] The King’s Letters to Lord North contain the following reference

to Lord Shannon and another politician of the same stamp. “Lord

Townshend’s idea of a pension to Lord Shannon is absurd--to let him do

all the mischief he can while his assistance could be of use, and then

reward him when his good wishes can avail nothing. Mr. Allen is only an

additional proof of that aversion to English Government and of _that

avowed profligacy_ that the gentlemen of that country seem to despise

masking with the name of conscience, and must sooner or later oblige

this country seriously to consider whether the uniting it to this Crown

would not be the only means of making both islands flourishing.” Lord

Shannon died in 1807.--E.

[251] In the money-bills, the Irish Parliament had endeavoured to lay a

tax on English beer, but it was rejected by a few voices; the Speaker,

fearing to lose his place of 4000_l._ a-year at the head of the

revenue, should they provoke England too far. They made an alteration,

however, in their own gauging, which some here thought equivalent

to a tax on our beer, and the Council were inclined to reject that

alteration, yet, desirous of getting the money-bills passed, and the

Attorney-General declaring that it was no violation of Poynings’s Act,

the alteration was suffered to remain, and the money-bills were sent

back uncorrected.

[252] Of King’s Remembrancer. It was a little before this time that

Calcraft, ignoble as his birth and rise were, aspired, by the Duke of

Grafton’s favour, to the title of Earl of Ormond. George Selwyn said,

“Calcraft might have pretensions to that title, as no doubt he must

have had many _Butlers_ in his family.”

[253] Junius’s account of the prosecution, Letter xxxiii, is

fair--making the usual deductions. See also Rex _v._ Vaughan (Burrow’s

Reports, vol. iv. p. 4494)--by which it seems that the motion for

the criminal information was made by Mr. Dunning.--“An Appeal to the

Public on Behalf of Samuel Vaughan Esq.,” 8vo., states some mitigating

circumstances.--E.

[254] Of Valeroyal [he died in 1779, aged fifty-three].--E.

[255] The evidence of Sir Philip Francis being the author of Junius has

been observed by an eminent lawyer who took no part in the controversy,

to be such as would be held conclusive by a jury on a question of

fact.--E.

[256] By Earl Waldegrave she had three daughters,--the Ladies Laura,

Maria, and Horatia.

[257] The King and Queen certainly intended it should be supposed

Lady Waldegrave was the Duke’s mistress. The world interpreted it in

a contrary sense in compliment to the Queen’s virtue, who on that

occasion wished her virtue had been thought more accommodating.

[258] Walpole is mistaken here. The King was at least as much opposed

to the Duke of Gloucester’s marriage as the Princess Dowager. As late

as in 1775 his sentiments remained unaltered, and in granting the

Duke permission to travel on the Continent, he positively declined to

make a provision for his Royal Highness’s family. In a letter to Lord

North, 15th January, 1775, the King says--“I cannot deny that on the

subject of this Duke my heart is wounded. I have ever loved him with

the fondness one bears to a child.” “His highly disgraceful step,” &c.

“--his wife, whom I never can think of placing in a situation to answer

her extreme pride and vanity. Should any accident befall the Duke, I

shall certainly provide for his children.”

Eventually the King acted with great generosity towards the Duchess and

her son and daughter by the Duke. Their conduct was so irreproachable

that the marriage could no longer have been a subject of regret to

him.--E.

Transcriber’s Notes

Punctuation and spelling were made consistent when a predominant

preference was found in this book; otherwise they were not changed.

Simple typographical errors were corrected; occasional unbalanced

quotation marks were corrected.

Ambiguous hyphens at the ends of lines were retained; occurrences of

inconsistent hyphenation have not been changed.

“Massachusets” was mostly spelled that way throughout this book.