[31] He was the youngest son of the celebrated minister, Sir Robert
Walpole.--ED.
[32] In his letters there are uncommon instances of vivacity,
whenever pointed against authors. The following have not yet
met the public eye. What can be more maliciously pungent
than this on Spence? "As I know Mr. J. Spence, I do not
think I should have been so much delighted as Dr. Kippis with
reading his letters. He was a good-natured harmless little
soul, but more like a silver penny than a genius. It was a
neat fiddle-faddle bit of sterling, that had read good books,
and kept good company; but was too trifling for use, and only
fit to please a child."--On Dr. Nash's first volume of
'Worcestershire': "It is a folio of prodigious corpulence, and
yet dry enough; but it is finely dressed with many heads and
views." He characterises Pennant; "_He_ is not one of our
plodders (alluding to Gough); rather the other extreme;
his _corporal_ spirits (for I cannot call them _animal_) do
not allow him to digest anything. He gave a round jump
from ornithology to antiquity, and, as if they had any
relation, thought he understood everything that lay between
them. The report of his being disordered is not true; he has
been with me, and at least is as composed as ever I saw him."
His literary correspondence with his friend Cole abounds
with this easy satirical criticism--he delighted to
ridicule authors!--as well as to starve the miserable artists
he so grudgingly paid. In the very volumes he celebrated the
arts, he disgraced them by his penuriousness; so that he
loved to indulge his avarice at the expense of his vanity!
[33] This opinion on Walpole's talent for letter-writing was
published in 1812, many years before the public had the
present collection of his letters; my prediction has been
amply verified. He wrote a great number to Bentley, the son
of Dr. Bentley, who ornamented Gray's works with some
extraordinary designs. Walpole, who was always proud and
capricious, observes his friend Cole, broke with Bentley
because he would bring his wife with him to Strawberry-hill.
He then asked Bentley for all his letters back, but he
would not in return give Bentley's own.
This whole correspondence abounded with literature, criticism,
and wit of the most original and brilliant composition. This
is the opinion of no friend, but an admirer, and a good judge;
for it was Bentley's own.
[34] This is the renowned Strawberry-hill, a villa still standing on
the banks of the Thames, between Teddington and Twickenham,
but now despoiled of the large collection of pictures,
curiosities, and articles of _vertu_ so assiduously collected
by Walpole during a long life. The ground on which it stands
was originally partially occupied by a small cottage, built by
a nobleman's coachman for a lodging-house, and occupied by a
toy-woman of the name of Chevenix. Hence Walpole says of it,
in a letter to General Conway, "it is a little plaything house
that I got out of Mrs. Chevenix's shop, and is the prettiest
bauble you ever saw."--ED.
[35] Walpole's characters are not often to be relied on, witness his
injustice to Hogarth as a painter, and his insolent calumny of
Charles I. His literary opinions of James I. and of Sidney
might have been written without any acquaintance with the
works he has so maliciously criticised. In his account of
Sidney he had silently passed over the "Defence of Poetry;"
and in his second edition has written this avowal, that "he
had forgotten it; a proof that I at least did not think it
sufficient foundation for so high a character as he acquired."
How heartless was the polished cynicism which could dare to
hazard this false criticism! Nothing can be more imposing than
his volatile and caustic criticisms on the works of James I.,
yet he had probably never opened that folio he so poignantly
ridicules. He doubts whether two pieces, "The Prince's
Cabala," and "The Duty of a King in his Royal Office," were
genuine productions of James I. The truth is that both these
works are nothing more than extracts printed with those
separate titles and drawn from the king's "Basilicon Doron."
He had probably neither read the extracts nor the original.
[36] It was such a person as Cole of Milton, his correspondent of
forty years, who lived at a distance, and obsequious to his
wishes, always looking up to him, though never with a
parallel glance--with whom he did not quarrel, though if
Walpole could have read the private notes Cole made in his
MSS. at the time he was often writing the civilest letters of
admiration,--even Cole would have been cashiered from his
correspondence. Walpole could not endure equality in literary
men.--Bentley observed to Cole, that Walpole's pride and
hauteur were excessive; which betrayed themselves in the
treatment of Gray who had himself too much pride and
spirit _to forgive it_ when matters were made up between them,
and Walpole invited Gray to Strawberry-hill. When Gray came,
he, without any ceremony, told Walpole that though he
waited on him as civility required, yet by _no means would he
ever be there on the terms of their former friendship,
which he had totally cancelled_.--From COLE'S MSS.