Walpole’s love of English Scenery.--Richmond Hill.--Burke on
the French Revolution.--The Berrys at Florence.--Death of
George Selwyn.--London Solitude.--Repairs at Cliveden.--Burke
and Fox.--The Countess of Albany.--Journal of a Day.--Mrs.
Hobart’s Party.--Ancient Trade with India.--Lady Hamilton.--A
Boat Race.--Return of the Berrys.--Horace succeeds to the
Peerage.--Epitaphium Vivi Auctoris.--His Wives.--Mary
Berry.--Closing Years.--Love of Moving Objects.--Visit
from Queen Charlotte.--Death of Conway.--Final Illness of
Horace.--His Last Letter.
It cannot, we fear, be said with truth that Walpole had much eye for
the greater beauties of nature. When he recalls the travels of his
youth, it is on the Gallery at Florence and the Fair of Reggio that
his memory dwells, rather than on his ride to the Grande Chartreuse
or his visit to Naples. But of the modest charms of English scenery
he had a real and thorough enjoyment. The enthusiasm expressed in his
Essay on “Modern Gardening” has a more genuine ring about it than is
often found in his writings. In reading it, one does not doubt that
his praises of “the rich blue prospects of Kent, the Thames-watered
views in Berkshire, and the magnificent scale of nature in Yorkshire,”
were something more than compliments to friends who happened to have
seats in those districts. Yet there was one spot which he admired more
than even these captivating scenes. At the bottom of his heart, he
was persuaded that no stream in the world could compare with his own
reaches of the Thames, nor any mountain or hill with Richmond Hill.
And what he believed in his heart, he was not always slow to proclaim
with mouth and pen. Thus in describing the effects of a tempest, he
writes: “The greatest ruin is at my nephew Dysart’s at Ham, where
five-and-thirty of the old elms are blown down. I think it is no
loss, as I hope now one shall see the river from the house. He never
would cut a twig to see the most beautiful scene upon earth.” Again,
after visiting Oatlands, then recently purchased by the Duke of York,
Horace says: “I am returned to my own Thames with delight, and envy
none of the princes of the earth.” He sneers bitterly at Mr. Gilpin,
who “despised the richness, verdure, amenity of Richmond Hill, when
he had seen rocks and lakes in the north; for size and distance of
place add wonderfully to loveliness.” And when he is trying to coax
his Straw-Berries home from Florence, he tells them there is not an
acre on the banks of the Thames that should vail the bonnet to Boboli.
With the exception of an occasional visit paid during the absence of
these ladies to Conway at Henley, the six last summers and autumns
of Walpole’s life seem to have been spent almost uninterruptedly at
Twickenham. Some little time after Mrs. Clive’s death, Cliveden, or
Little Strawberry Hill, was let for a short time to Sir Robert Goodere;
but it seems that, before his young friends left England, Horace had
determined, on their return, to give Miss Berry and her sister this
house for their lives, that he might have them constantly near him.
The design succeeded. Mary and Agnes became attached to the place; it
continued to be their country residence for many years; and when, after
surviving their aged admirer for more than half a century, they died,
both unmarried, within a few months of each other, they were buried
in one grave in Petersham churchyard, opposite Twickenham, “amidst
scenes,” as their epitaph records, “which in life they had frequented
and loved.”
After despatching the farewell letter given at the end of our last
chapter, Walpole lingered at Strawberry Hill, consoling himself
with the society of Richmond, and with Burke’s “Reflections on the
Revolution in France.” The shock of that earthquake had already made
him half a Tory, and he welcomed the great orator’s declamation with
delight. “His pamphlet,” he tells Miss Berry, “came out this day
se’nnight, and is far superior to what was expected, even by his
warmest admirers. I have read it twice, and though of three hundred
and fifty pages, I wish I could repeat every page by heart. It is
sublime, profound, and gay. The wit and satire are equally brilliant;
and the whole is wise, though in some points he goes too far; yet in
general there is far less want of judgment than could be expected from
_him_. If it could be translated, which, from the wit and metaphors and
allusions, is almost impossible, I should think it would be a classic
book in all countries, except in _present_ France. To their tribunes it
speak daggers; though, unlike them, it uses none. Seven thousand copies
have been taken off by the booksellers already, and a new edition is
preparing. I hope you will see it soon.” In a subsequent letter to
both his favourites, dated Strawberry Hill, Nov. 27, 1790, he says: “I
am still here: the weather, though very rainy, is quite warm; and I
have much more agreeable society at Richmond, with small companies and
better hours, than in town, and shall have till after Christmas, unless
great cold drives me thither.” Two days later, having heard of the
arrival of the Berrys at Florence, he writes to Agnes:
“Though I write to both at once, and reckon your letters to
come equally from both, yet I delight in seeing your hand with
a pen as well as with a pencil, and you express yourself as
well with the one as with the other. Your part in that which I
have been so happy as to receive this moment, has singularly
obliged me, by your having saved me the terror of knowing you
had a torrent to cross after heavy rain. No cat is so afraid
of water for herself, as I am grown to be for you. That panic,
which will last for many months, adds to my fervent desire
of your returning early in the autumn, that you may have
neither fresh water nor the ‘silky’ ocean to cross in winter.
Precious as our insular situation is, I am ready to wish with
the Frenchman, that you could somehow or other get to it by
land,--‘Oui, c’est une isle toujours, je le sçais bien; mais,
par exemple, en allant d’alentour, n’y auroit-il pas moyen d’y
arriver par terre?’…
“Richmond, my metropolis, flourishes exceedingly. The Duke
of Clarence arrived at his palace there last night, between
eleven and twelve, as I came from Lady Douglas. His eldest
brother and Mrs. Fitzherbert dine there to-day with the Duke
of Queensberry, as his Grace, who called here this morning,
told me, on the very spot where lived Charles the First,
and where are the portraits of his principal courtiers from
Cornbury. Queensberry has taken to that palace at last, and has
frequently company and music there in an evening. I intend to
go.”
He was detained in the country longer than he had intended by an attack
of gout; on his return to town he announces his recovery to Lady Ossory.
“Berkeley Square, Jan. 28, 1791.
“You and Lord Ossory have been so very good to me, Madam, that
I must pay you the first tribute of my poor reviving fingers--I
believe they never will be their own men again; but as they
have lived so long in your Ladyship’s service, they shall show
their attachment to the last, like Widdrington on his stumps.
I have had another and grievous memento, the death of poor
Selwyn! His end was lovely, most composed and rational. From
eight years old I had known him intimately without a cloud
between us; few knew him so well, and consequently few knew
so well the goodness of his heart and nature. But I will say
no more--_Mon Chancelier vous dira le reste._[121]--No, my
chancellor shall put an end to the session, only concluding, as
Lord Bacon would have done for King James, with an apologue,
‘His Majesty’s recovery has turned the corner, and exceeding
the old fable, has proved that the stomach can do better
without the limbs than they could without him.’”
About the same date he describes his life in London to the Berrys:
“I wish that complaining of people for abandoning me were an
infallible recipe for bringing them _back_! but I doubt it
will not do in acute cases. To-day, a few hours after writing
the latter part of this, appeared Mr. Batt.[122] He asked many
pardons, and I easily forgave him; for the _mortification_
was not begun. He asked much after you both. I had a crowd
of visits besides; but they all come past two o’clock, and
sweep one another away before any can take root. My evenings
are solitary enough, for I ask nobody to come; nor, indeed,
does anybody’s evening begin till I am going to bed. I have
outlived daylight as well as my contemporaries. What have I
not survived? The Jesuits and the monarchy of France! and
both without a struggle! Semiramis seems to intend to add
Constantinople to the mass of revolutions; but is not her
permanence almost as wonderful as the contrary explosions! I
wish--I wish we may not be actually flippancying ourselves
into an embroil with that Ursa-major of the North Pole. What
a vixen little island are we, if we fight with the Aurora
Borealis and Tippoo Saib at the end of Asia at the same time!
You, damsels, will be like the end of the conundrum,
“‘You’ve seen the man who saw these wondrous sights.’
“I cannot finish this with my own hand, for the gout has
returned a little into my right arm and wrist, and I am not
quite so well as I was yesterday; but I had said my say, and
have little to add. The Duchess of Gordon, t’other night,
coming out of an assembly, said to Dundas, ‘Mr. Dundas, you are
used to speak in public; will you call my servant?’… Adieu! I
will begin to write again myself as soon as I can.”
In the middle of March he wrote from Strawberry Hill to Miss Berry:
“As I have mended considerably for the last four days, and as we have
had a fortnight of soft warm weather, and a south-west wind to-day, I
have ventured hither for a change of air, and to give orders about some
repairs at Cliveden; which, by the way, Mr. Henry Bunbury, two days
ago, proposed to take off my hands for his life. I really do not think
I accepted his offer.” All the spring he vibrates between London and
Twickenham. He writes again from the latter place to Miss Berry towards
the end of April:
“To-day, when the town is staring at the sudden resignation of
the Duke of Leeds,[123] asking the reason, and gaping to know
who will succeed him, I am come hither with an indifference
that might pass for philosophy; as the true cause is not known,
which it seldom is. Don’t tell Europe; but I really am come
to look at the repairs of Cliveden, and how they go on; not
without an eye to the lilacs and the apple-blossoms: for even
_self_ can find a corner to wriggle into, though friendship may
fit out the vessel. Mr. Berry may, perhaps, wish I had more
political curiosity; but as I must return to town on Monday for
Lord Cholmondeley’s wedding, I may hear before the departure of
the post, if the seals are given.”
Among the letters written to Miss Berry from town during this season,
one gives an account of the famous quarrel between Burke and Fox in the
House of Commons:
“Mr. Fox had most imprudently thrown out a panegyric on the
French Revolution. His most considerable friends were much
hurt, and protested to him against such sentiments. Burke went
much farther, and vowed to attack these opinions. Great pains
were taken to prevent such altercation, and the Prince of Wales
is said to have written a dissuasive letter to Burke; but he
was immovable; and on Friday, on the Quebec Bill, he broke out,
and sounded a trumpet against the plot, which he denounced
as carrying on here. Prodigious clamours and interruption
arose from Mr. Fox’s friends; but he, though still applauding
the French, burst into tears and lamentations on the loss of
Burke’s friendship, and endeavoured to make atonement; but
in vain, though Burke wept too. In short, it was the most
affecting scene possible; and undoubtedly an _unique_ one, for
both the commanders were earnest and _sincere_.[124] Yesterday,
a second act was expected; but mutual friends prevailed, that
the contest should not be renewed: nay, on the same Bill, Mr.
Fox made a profession of his faith, and declared he would
venture his life in support of the _present_ constitution by
Kings, Lords, and Commons. In short, I never knew a wiser
dissertation, if the newspapers deliver it justly; and I think
all the writers in England cannot give more profound sense to
Mr. Fox than he possesses. I know no more particulars, having
seen nobody this morning yet.”
Another refers to the trial of Hastings, and sundry matters of public
interest:
“After several weeks spent in search of precedents for
trials[125] ceasing or not on a dissolution of Parliament,
the Peers on Monday sat till three in the morning on the
report; when the Chancellor and Lord Hawkesbury fought for the
cessation, but were beaten by a large majority; which showed
that Mr. Pitt has more weight (at present) in that House too,
than--the diamonds of Bengal. Lord Hawkesbury protested. The
trial recommences on Monday next, and has already cost the
public fourteen thousand pounds; the accused, I suppose, much
more.
“The Countess of Albany[126] is not only in England, in
London, but at this very moment, I believe, in the palace of
St. James’s--not restored by as rapid a revolution as the
French, but, as was observed last night at supper at Lady
Mount-Edgcumbe’s, by that topsy-turvy-hood that characterises
the present age. Within these two months the Pope has been
burnt at Paris; Madame du Barry, mistress of Louis Quinze,
has dined with the Lord Mayor of London, and the Pretender’s
widow is presented to the Queen of Great Britain! She is to be
introduced by her great-grandfather’s niece, the young Countess
of Aylesbury. That curiosity should bring her hither, I do
not quite wonder--still less, that she abhorred her husband;
but methinks it is not very well-bred to his family, nor very
sensible; but a new way of _passing eldest_.[127]
“Thursday night.
“Well! I have had an exact account of the interview of the
two Queens, from one who stood close to them. The Dowager was
announced as Princess of Stolberg. She was well-dressed, and
not at all embarrassed. The King talked to her a good deal;
but about her passage, the sea, and general topics: the Queen
in the same way, but less. Then she stood between the Dukes of
Gloucester and Clarence, and had a good deal of conversation
with the former; who, perhaps, may have met her in Italy. Not
a word between her and the Princesses; nor did I hear of the
Prince; but he was there, and probably spoke to her. The Queen
looked at her earnestly. To add to the singularity of the day,
it is the Queen’s birth-day. Another odd accident: at the Opera
at the Pantheon, Madame d’Albany was carried into the King’s
box, and sat there. It is not of a piece with her going to
Court, that she seals with the royal arms.…
“Boswell has at last published his long-promised ‘Life of Dr.
Johnson,’ in two volumes in quarto. I will give you an account
of it when I have gone through it. I have already perceived,
that in writing the history of Hudibras, Ralpho has not forgot
himself--nor will others, I believe, forget _him_!”
The next is also to Miss Berry:
“Berkeley Square, May 26, 1791.
“I am rich in letters from you: I received that by Lord Elgin’s
courier first, as you expected, and its elder the next day. You
tell me mine entertain you; _tant mieux_. It is my wish, but
my wonder; for I live so little in the world, that I do not
know the present generation by sight: for, though I pass by
them in the streets, the hats with valences, the folds above
the chin of the ladies, and the dirty shirts and shaggy hair
of the young men, who have levelled nobility almost as much as
the mobility of France have, have confounded all individuality.
Besides, if I did go to public places and assemblies, which
my going to roost earlier prevents, the bats and owls do not
begin to fly abroad till far in the night, when they begin to
see and be seen. However, one of the empresses of fashion,
the Duchess of Gordon, uses fifteen or sixteen hours of her
four-and-twenty. I heard her journal of last Monday. She first
went to Handel’s music in the Abbey; she then clambered over
the benches, and went to Hastings’s trial in the Hall; after
dinner, to the play; then to Lady Lucan’s assembly; after that
to Ranelagh, and returned to Mrs. Hobart’s faro-table; gave a
ball herself in the evening of that morning, into which she
must have got a good way; and set out for Scotland the next
day. Hercules could not have achieved a quarter of her labours
in the same space of time.”
Before the middle of June he is settled at Twickenham. He condoles with
the Berrys:
“Strawberry Hill, June 14, 1791.
“I pity you! what a dozen or fifteen uninteresting letters
are you going to receive! for here I am, unlikely to have
anything to tell you worth sending. You had better come back
incontinently--but pray do not prophesy any more; you have
been the death of our summer, and we are in close mourning for
it in coals and ashes. It froze hard last night: I went out
for a moment to look at my haymakers, and was starved. The
contents of an English June are, hay and ice, orange-flowers
and rheumatisms! I am now cowering over the fire. Mrs. Hobart
had announced a rural breakfast at Sans-Souci last Saturday;
nothing being so pastoral as a fat grandmother in a row of
houses on Ham Common. It rained early in the morning: she
despatched post-boys, for want of Cupids and zephyrs, to stop
the nymphs and shepherds who tend their flocks in Pall Mall and
St. James’s Street; but half of them missed the couriers and
arrived. Mrs. Montagu was more splendid yesterday morning, and
breakfasted seven hundred persons on opening her great room,
and the room with the hangings of feathers.[128] The King and
Queen had been with her last week. I should like to have heard
the orations she had prepared on the occasion. I was neither
City-mouse nor Country-mouse. I did dine at Fulham on Saturday
with the Bishop of London [Porteus]. Mrs. Boscawen, Mrs.
Garrick, and Hannah More were there; and Dr. Beattie, whom I
had never seen. He is quiet, simple, and cheerful, and pleased
me. There ends my tale, this instant Tuesday! How shall I fill
a couple of pages more by Friday morning! Oh! ye ladies on the
Common, and ye uncommon ladies in London, have pity on a poor
gazetteer, and supply me with eclogues or royal panegyrics!
Moreover--or rather more under--I have had no letter from you
these ten days, though the east wind has been as constant as
Lord Derby.[129] I say not this in reproach, as you are so
kindly punctual; but as it stints me from having a single
paragraph to answer. I do not admire specific responses to
every article; but they are great resources on a dearth.
“Madame de Boufflers is ill of a fever, and the Duchesse de
Biron goes next week to Switzerland;--_mais qu’est que cela
vous fait?_”
“June 23, 1791.
“Woe is me! I have not an atom of news to send you, but that
the second edition of Mother Hubbard’s Tale [Mrs. Hobart’s
party] was again spoiled on Saturday last by the rain; yet
she had an ample assemblage of company from London and the
neighbourhood. The late Queen of France, Madame du Barry, was
there; and the late Queen of England, Madame d’Albany, was not.
The former, they say, is as much altered as her kingdom, and
does not retain a trace of her former powers. I saw her on a
throne in the chapel of Versailles; and though then pleasing in
face and person, I thought her _un peu passée_.
“What shall I tell you more? that Lord Hawkesbury is added to
the Cabinet-Council--_que vous importe_? and that Dr. Robertson
has published a ‘Disquisition into the Trade of the Ancients
with India;’ a sensible work--but that will be no news to you
till you return. It was a peddling trade in those days. They
now and then picked up an elephant’s tooth, or a nutmeg, or one
pearl, that served Venus for a pair of pendants, when Antony
had toasted Cleopatra in a bumper of its fellow; which shows
that a couple was imported: but, alack! the Romans were so
ignorant, that waiters from the Tres Tabernæ, in St. Apollo’s
Street, did not carry home sacks of diamonds enough to pave the
Capitol--I hate exaggerations, and therefore I do not say, to
pave the Appian Way. One author, I think, does say, that the
wife of Fabius Pictor, whom he sold to a Proconsul, did present
Livia[130] with an ivory bed, inlaid with Indian gold; but,
as Dr. Robertson does not mention it, to be sure he does not
believe the fact well authenticated.”
[Illustration: _Sir Joshua Reynolds. Pinx._ _A. Dawson. Ph. Sc._ _J.
Raphael Smith. Sc._
_Mrs. Montagu._]
In one of our last extracts, Walpole refers to some of the French
exiles, who were now assembled in large numbers at Richmond. Shortly
afterwards came the news of the escape and recapture of the French
King and Queen. Horace writes, “I have been very much with the wretched
fugitives at Richmond. To them it is perfect despair; besides trembling
for their friends at Paris!” Nevertheless, their distresses did not
prevent them from taking part in the gaieties of Richmond:
“Berkeley Square, Tuesday, Aug. 23, 1791.
“On Saturday evening I was at the Duke of Queensberry’s
(at Richmond, _s’entend_) with a small company: and there
were Sir William Hamilton and Mrs. Harte;[131] who, on the
3rd of next month, previous to their departure, is to be
made Madame l’Envoyée à Naples, the Neapolitan Queen having
promised to receive her in that quality. Here she cannot be
presented, where only such over-virtuous wives as the Duchess
of Kingston and Mrs. Hastings--who could go with a husband in
each hand--are admitted. Why the Margravine of Anspach, with
the same pretensions, was not, I do not understand; perhaps
she did not attempt it. But I forget to retract, and make
_amende honorable_ to Mrs. Harte. I had only heard of her
attitudes; and those, in dumb show, I have not yet seen. Oh!
but she sings admirably; has a very fine, strong voice; is an
excellent buffa, and an astonishing tragedian. She sung Nina in
the highest perfection; and there her attitudes were a whole
theatre of grace and various expressions.
“The next evening I was again at Queensberry House, where
the Comtesse Emilie de Boufflers played on her harp, and
the Princesse di Castelcigala, the Neapolitan minister’s
wife, danced one of her country dances, with castanets, very
prettily, with her husband. Madame du Barry was there too, and
I had a good deal of frank conversation with her about Monsieur
de Choiseul; having been at Paris at the end of his reign and
at the beginning of hers, and of which I knew so much by my
intimacy with the Duchesse de Choiseul.
“On Monday was the boat-race. I was in the great room at
the Castle, with the Duke of Clarence, Lady Di, Lord Robert
Spencer, and the House of Bouverie, to see the boats start
from the bridge to Thistleworth, and back to a tent erected on
Lord Dysart’s meadow, just before Lady Di’s windows; whither
we went to see them arrive, and where we had breakfast. For
the second heat, I sat in my coach on the bridge; and did not
stay for the third. The day had been coined on purpose, with
my favourite south-east wind. The scene, both up the river and
down, was what only Richmond upon earth can exhibit. The crowds
on those green velvet meadows and on the shores, the yachts,
barges, pleasure and small boats, and the windows and gardens
lined with spectators, were so delightful, that when I came
home from that vivid show, I thought Strawberry looked as dull
and solitary as a hermitage. At night there was a ball at the
Castle, and illuminations, with the Duke’s cypher, etc., in
coloured lamps, as were the houses of his Royal Highness’s
tradesmen. I went again in the evening to the French ladies on
the Green, where there was a bonfire; but, you may believe, not
to the ball.”
At the end of September, Walpole writes to Hannah More:
“I thank you most cordially for your inquiry after _my_ wives.
I am in the utmost perplexity of mind about them; torn between
hopes and fears. I believe them set out from Florence on their
return since yesterday se’ennight, and consequently feel
all the joy and impatience of expecting them in five or six
weeks: but then, besides fears of roads, bad inns, accidents,
heats and colds, and the sea to cross in November at last,
all my satisfaction is dashed by the uncertainty whether
they come through Germany or France. I have advised, begged,
implored, that it may not be through those Iroquois, Lestryons,
Anthropophagi, the Franks; and then, hearing passports were
abolished, and the roads more secure, I half consented, as they
wished it, and the road is much shorter; and then I repented,
and have contradicted myself again. And now I know not which
route they will take; nor shall enjoy any comfort from the
thoughts of their return, till they are returned safe.
“I am happy at and honour Miss Burney’s resolution in casting
away golden, or rather gilt chains: others, out of vanity,
would have worn them till they had eaten into the bone. On
that charming young woman’s chapter[132] I agree with you
perfectly.”
Shortly after the date of the last letter, the Berrys were back in
England. Their stay in Italy, which had been determined partly by
motives of economy, was shortened in consequence of Walpole’s eagerness
for their return. In his anxiety, he entreated them to draw on his
bankers in case of any financial difficulty; and in November, 1791,
he had the satisfaction of installing them at Little Strawberry Hill.
This was not accomplished without some vexation both to him and them.
An ill-natured rumour, which found its way into the newspapers,
attributing the attachment shown by the Berry family for Walpole to
interested motives, aroused the indignation of Miss Berry, and for
the moment threatened to produce an estrangement. The cloud, however,
blew over: the intimacy was resumed, and in a subsequent letter to the
sisters, the old man expresses his gratitude at finding that they could
bear to pass half their time with an antediluvian without discovering
any ennui or disgust.
Almost immediately after he had recovered the Berrys, Walpole became
Earl of Orford by the death of his nephew. He refers to this event, and
his feelings respecting it, in the following letter to Lady Ossory:
“Berkeley Square, Dec. 10, 1791.
“Your Ladyship has so long accustomed me to your goodness
and partiality, that I am not surprised at your being kind
on an occasion that is generally productive of satisfaction.
That is not quite the case with me. Years ago, a title would
have given me no pleasure, and at any time the management of
a landed estate, which I am too ignorant to manage, would
have been a burthen. That I am now to possess, should it
prove a considerable acquisition to my fortune, which I much
doubt, I would not purchase at the rate of the three weeks
of misery which I have suffered, and which made me very ill,
though I am now quite recovered. It is a story much too full
of circumstances, and too disagreeable to me to be couched
in a letter; some time or other I may perhaps be at leisure
and composed enough to relate in general.--At present I have
been so overwhelmed with business that I am now writing these
few lines as fast as I can, to save the post, as none goes
to-morrow, and I should be vexed not to thank your Ladyship and
Lord Ossory by the first that departs. As, however, I owe it to
you and to my poor nephew, I will just say that I am perfectly
content. He has given me the whole Norfolk estate, heavily
charged, I believe, but that is indifferent. I had reason
to think that he had disgraced, by totally omitting me--but
unhappy as his intellects often were, and beset as he was by
miscreants, he has restored me to my birth-right, and I shall
call myself obliged to him, and be grateful to his memory, as
I am to your Ladyship, and shall be, as I have so long been,
your devoted servant, by whatever name I may be forced to call
myself.”
This letter has no signature. The writer for some time rarely used
his new title when he could avoid it. Some of his letters after his
succession to the peerage are signed “the late H. W.,” and some, “the
uncle of the late Earl of Orford.” In 1792, he wrote the following
“Epitaphium vivi Auctoris:”
“An estate and an earldom at seventy-four!
Had I sought them or wished them ’twould add one fear more,
That of making a countess when almost fourscore.
But Fortune, who scatters her gifts out of season,
Though unkind to my limbs, has still left me my reason,
And whether she lowers or lifts me I’ll try,
In the plain simple style I have lived in, to die:
For ambition too humble, for meanness too high.”
He could not escape the suspicion of having meditated the folly
referred to in these lines. His much talked of devotion to his “sweet
damsels” rendered this impossible. There is a tradition, handed down
by the Lord Lansdowne of the last generation, that he would have gone
through the ceremony of marriage with either sister, to make sure of
their society, and confer rank and fortune on the family; as he had
the power of charging the Orford estate with a jointure of £2,000 a
year. There is just so much evidence in support of this story that he
does appear to have avowed in society his readiness to do this for
Mary Berry, who was clearly the object of his preference. But he does
not seem to have ever made any such proposal to her, nor even to have
spoken to her on the subject. In a letter to a friend written at the
time, Miss Berry says: “Although I have no doubt that Lord Orford said
to Lady D. every word that she repeated--for last winter, at the time
the C’s.[133] talked about the matter, he went about saying all this
and more to everybody that would hear him--but I always thought it
rather to frighten and punish them than seriously wishing it himself.
And why should he? when, without the ridicule or the trouble of a
marriage, he enjoys almost as much of my society, and every comfort
from it, that he could in the nearest connexion?” Walpole was almost
certainly of the same opinion as Miss Berry. He would have shrunk from
the lasting stigma of a marriage, though he was content to bear passing
jests which, perhaps, the attention of his young friends rendered even
agreeable. In May, 1792, he writes to Lady Ossory:
“I am indeed much obliged for the transcript of the letter
on my ‘Wives.’ Miss Agnes has a _finesse_ in her eyes and
countenance that does not propose itself to you, but is very
engaging on observation, and has often made herself preferred
to her sister, who has the most exactly fine features, and
only wants colour to make her face as perfect as her graceful
person; indeed neither has good health nor the air of it. Miss
Mary’s eyes are grave, but she is not so herself; and, having
much more application than her sister, she converses readily,
and with great intelligence, on all subjects. Agnes is more
reserved, but her compact sense very striking, and always to
the purpose. In short, they are extraordinary beings, and I am
proud of my partiality for them; and since the ridicule can
only fall on me, and not on them, I care not a straw for its
being said that I am in love with one of them--people shall
choose which: it is as much with both as either, and I am
infinitely too old to regard the _qu’en dit on_.”
Nothing could be more sentimental than Walpole’s language to and about
these ladies, but his admiration and regard for them were rational
enough. There was no dotage in the praises he lavished on their
attractions and accomplishments. However much of their first social
success may have been due to him, they proved able to perpetuate
and extend it by their personal qualities alone, without the aid
of large fortune or family connexion. And the tenor of his latest
letters seems to show that this old man of the world derived benefit
as well as amusement from their conversation. Their refinement and
unpresuming moral worth were perhaps the highest influences to which
his worn brain and heart were susceptible. One cannot help remarking
that the respect with which he treats Mary Berry is a much stronger
feeling than that which he displays for Hannah More. Though a good
deal younger, Miss Berry had travelled more, and seen more of society,
than the excellent schoolmistress from the West of England; and
with this more varied experience came wider sympathies and larger
toleration. Madam Hannah’s fervent desires for the improvement of
her friends, though always manifest, were not always accompanied by
skill to make her little homilies acceptable. Her letters to Walpole
betray some consciousness of a deficiency in this respect, and her
embarrassment was not lost upon “the pleasant Horace,” as she called
her correspondent. He complained of the too great civility and cold
complimentality of her style. The lady of Cowslip Green, who dedicated
small poems to him, adorned her letters with literary allusions, and
dropped occasional hints for his benefit, was always, in his eyes,
a blue-stocking; and this the ladies of Cliveden never were. He was
incessantly divided between his wish to treat the elder lady with
deference, and a mischievous inclination to startle her notions of
propriety. When he is tempted to transgress, he checks himself in some
characteristic phrase: “I could titter _à plusieurs reprises_; but I
am too old to be improper, and you are too modest to be _impropered_
to.” But the temptation presently returns. In short, Walpole subscribed
to Miss More’s charities, echoed her denunciations of the slave-trade,
applauded her Cheap Repository Tracts, and was ever Saint Hannah’s most
sincere friend and humble servant; but he could not help indemnifying
himself now and then by a smile at her effusive piety and bustling
benevolence. On the other hand, the entire and unqualified respect
which Lord Orford entertained for Miss Berry’s abilities and character
was shown, not merely by the particular expressions of affection and
esteem so profusely scattered through his letters to her, and by
the whole tone of the correspondence between them, but still more
decisively by the circumstance that he entrusted to her the care of
preparing a posthumous edition of his works, and bequeathed to her
charge all necessary papers for that purpose. This he did in fact, for
though in his will he appointed her father[134] as his editor, it was
well understood that that was merely a device to avoid the publication
of her name, and the task was actually performed by her alone.
During the rest of Walpole’s life, three-fourths of each year were
spent by him in constant association with the Berrys either at
Twickenham or in London. The months which they employed in visits
to other friends or to watering-places, he passed for the most part
at Strawberry Hill, sending forth constant letters to Yorkshire,
Cheltenham, Broadstairs, or where-ever else his wives might be staying.
He laughs at his own assiduity. “I put myself in mind of a scene in
one of Lord Lansdowne’s plays, where two ladies being on the stage,
and one going off, the other says, ‘Heaven, she is gone! Well, I must
go and write to her.’ This was just my case yesterday.” The postman at
Cheltenham complained of being broken down by the continual arrival
of letters from Twickenham. At other times, Walpole’s pen was now
comparatively idle. When in town, he beguiled the hours as best he
could with the customers who still resorted to his coffee-house to
discuss the news of the day. But he generally preferred his villa till
quite the end of autumn. “What could I do with myself in London?” he
asks Miss Berry. “All my playthings are here, and I have no playfellows
left there! Reading composes little of my pastime either in town or
country. A catalogue of books and prints, or a dull history of a
county, amuse me sufficiently; for now I cannot open a French book, as
it would keep alive ideas that I want to banish from my thoughts.” At
Strawberry, accordingly, he remained, trifling with his endless store
of medals and engravings, and watching from his windows the traffic up
and down the Thames. He has expressed his fondness for moving objects
in a passage dated in December, 1793:
“I am glad Lord and Lady Warwick are pleased with their new
villa [at Isleworth]: it is a great favourite with me. In my
brother’s time [Sir Edward W.’s] I used to sit with delight
in the bow-window in the great room, for besides the lovely
scene of Richmond, with the river, park, and barges, there
is an incessant ferry for foot passengers between Richmond
and Isleworth, just under the Terrace; and on Sundays Lord
Shrewsbury pays for all the Catholics that come to his chapel
from the former to the latter, and Mrs. Keppel has counted
an hundred in one day, at a penny each. I have a passion for
seeing passengers, provided they do pass; and though I have
the river, the road, and two foot-paths before my Blue Room
at Strawberry, I used to think my own house dull whenever I
came from my brother’s. Such a partiality have I for moving
objects, that in advertisements of country-houses I have
thought it a recommendation when there was a N.B. of _three
stage-coaches pass by the door every day_. On the contrary, I
have an aversion to a park, and especially for a walled park,
in which the capital event is the coming of the cows to water.
A park-wall with ivy on it and fern near it, and a back parlour
in London in summer, with a dead creeper and a couple of sooty
sparrows, are my strongest ideas of melancholy solitude. _A
pleasing melancholy_ is a very august personage, but not at all
good company.”
This love of life and society clung to him till the end.
Notwithstanding his crippled condition, he entertained the Duchess of
York at Strawberry Hill in the autumn of 1793, and received a visit
from Queen Charlotte there as late as the summer of 1795. He was
probably honest in disclaiming all vanity at being the poorest Earl in
England. When pressed by Lady Ossory to take his seat in the House of
Peers, he replied: “I know that having determined never to take that
unwelcome seat, I should only make myself ridiculous by fancying it
could _signify_ a straw whether I take it or not. If I have anything of
character, it must dangle on my being consistent. I quitted and abjured
Parliament near twenty years ago: I never repented, and I will not
contradict myself now.” If, however, there was any occasion on which
his earldom gave him pleasure, it was undoubtedly when the Seneschal
of Strawberry Castle was to do homage to Royal guests. Referring to
Macaulay’s taunt that Walpole had the soul of a gentleman usher, Miss
Berry remarks that the critic only repeated what Lord Orford often said
of himself, that from his knowledge of old ceremonials and etiquettes
he was sure that in a former state of existence he must have been a
gentleman usher about the time of Elizabeth. Walpole sends Conway a
brief account of the Queen’s visit:
“Strawberry Hill, July 2, 1795.
“As you are, or have been, in town, your daughter [Mrs. Damer]
will have told you in what a bustle I am, preparing, not to
visit, but to receive an invasion of royalties to-morrow;
and cannot even escape them, like Admiral Cornwallis, though
seeming to make a semblance; for I am to wear a sword, and have
appointed two aides-de-camp, my nephews, George and Horace
Churchill. If I _fall_, as ten to one but I do, to be sure
it will be a superb tumble, at the feet of a Queen and eight
daughters of Kings: for, besides the six Princesses, I am to
have the Duchess of York and the Princess of Orange! Woe is me,
at seventy-eight, and with scarce a hand and foot to my back!
Adieu!
“Yours, etc.,
“A POOR OLD REMNANT.”
“July 7, 1795.
“I am not dead of fatigue with my Royal visitors, as I
expected to be, though I was on my poor lame feet three whole
hours. Your daughter, who kindly assisted me in doing the
honours, will tell you the particulars, and how prosperously I
succeeded. The Queen was uncommonly condescending and gracious,
and deigned to drink my health when I presented her with the
last glass, and to thank me for all my attentions. Indeed,
my memory _de la vieille cour_ was but once in default. As I
had been assured that her Majesty would be attended by her
Chamberlain, yet was not, I had no glove ready when I received
her at the step of her coach; yet she honoured me with her
hand to lead her upstairs; nor did I recollect my omission
when I led her down again. Still, though gloveless, I did not
squeeze the royal hand, as Vice-Chamberlain Smith did to Queen
Mary.”[135]
Conway died suddenly two days after the date of the last letter. He
had received the truncheon of a Field-Marshall less than two years
before. Like his old friend Horace, he attained the last distinction
of his life when he was too old to enjoy it. Horace lingered on twenty
months longer in constantly increasing debility. In the latter part of
December, 1796, he was seen to be sinking, and his friends prevailed
on him to remove from Strawberry Hill to Berkeley Square, to be nearer
assistance in case of any sudden seizure. The account of his last
days is thus given by Miss Berry: “When not immediately suffering
from pain, his mind was tranquil and cheerful. He was still capable
of being amused, and of taking some part in conversation; but during
the last weeks of his life, when fever was superadded to his other
ills, his mind became subject to the cruel hallucination of supposing
himself neglected and abandoned by the only persons to whom his memory
clung, and whom he always desired to see. In vain they recalled to
his recollection how recently they had left him, and how short had
been their absence; it satisfied him for the moment, but the same idea
recurred as soon as he had lost sight of them. At last nature, sinking
under the exhaustion of weakness, obliterated all ideas but those of
mere existence, which ended without a struggle on the 2nd of March,
1797.”
Horace Walpole’s last letter was addressed, as was fitting, to Lady
Ossory, then almost the sole survivor of his early friends:
“Jan. 15, 1797.
“MY DEAR MADAM,--
“You distress me infinitely by showing my idle notes, which I
cannot conceive can amuse anybody. My old-fashioned breeding
impels me every now and then to reply to the letters you honour
me with writing, but in truth very unwillingly, for I seldom
can have anything particular to say; I scarce go out of my own
house, and then only to two or three private places, where I
see nobody that really knows anything, and what I learn comes
from newspapers, that collect intelligence from coffee-houses;
consequently what I neither believe nor report. At home I see
only a few charitable elders, except about four-score nephews
and nieces of various ages, who are each brought to me about
once a year, to stare at me as the Methusaleh of the family,
and they can only speak of their own contemporaries, which
interest me no more than if they talked of their dolls, or bats
and balls. Must not the result of all this, Madam, make me a
very entertaining correspondent? And can such letters be worth
showing? or can I have any spirit when so old, and reduced to
dictate?
“Oh! my good Madam, dispense with me from such a task, and
think how it must add to it to apprehend such letters being
shown. Pray send me no more such laurels, which I desire no
more than their leaves when decked with a scrap of tinsel,
and stuck on twelfth-cakes that lie on the shop-boards of
pastrycooks at Christmas. I shall be quite content with a sprig
of rosemary thrown after me, when the parson of the parish
commits my dust to dust. Till then, pray, Madam, accept the
resignation of your
“Ancient Servant,
“ORFORD.”
Besides numerous portraits of Horace Walpole, we have two pen-and-ink
sketches of him, one by Miss Hawkins, the other by Pinkerton. The
lady describes[136] him as she knew him before 1772: “His figure was
not merely tall, but more properly long and slender to excess; his
complexion, and particularly his hands, of a most unhealthy paleness.
His eyes were remarkably bright and penetrating, very dark and lively;
his voice was not strong, but his tones were extremely pleasant.… I do
not remember his common gait; he always entered a room in that style of
affected delicacy which fashion had then made almost natural: _chapeau
bas_ between his hands, as if he wished to compress it, or under his
arm; knees bent, and feet on tiptoe, as if afraid of a wet floor. His
dress in visiting was most usually, in summer, when I most saw him,
a lavender suit, the waistcoat embroidered with a little silver, or
of white silk worked in the tambour; partridge silk stockings, and
gold buckles; ruffles and frill, generally lace. I remember, when a
child, thinking him very much under-dressed, if at any time, except
in mourning, he wore hemmed cambric. In summer no powder, but his wig
combed straight, and showing his very smooth, pale forehead, and
queued behind; in winter, powder.”
Miss Hawkins, who was recording in her old age the impressions of
her girlhood, is clearly mistaken as to the height of Walpole’s
figure. Pinkerton paints him as he was at a later period, and adds
several details of his domestic habits. We give the main part of
the antiquary’s description,[137] and generally in his own words:
The person of Horace Walpole was short and slender, but compact and
neatly formed. When viewed from behind, he had somewhat of a boyish
appearance, owing partly to the simplicity of his dress. His laugh was
forced and uncouth, and his smile not the most pleasing. His walk was
enfeebled by the gout, which not only affected his feet, but attacked
his hands to such a degree that his fingers were always swelled and
deformed, and discharged large chalk-stones once or twice a year.
When at Strawberry Hill, he generally rose about nine o’clock, and
appeared in the breakfast-room, his favourite Blue Room overlooking
the Thames. His approach was proclaimed, and attended, by a favourite
little dog, the legacy of the Marquise du Deffand; and which ease and
attention had rendered so fat that it could hardly move. The dog had
a liberal share of his breakfast; and as soon as the meal was over,
Walpole would mix a large basinful of bread and milk, and throw it
out of the window for the squirrels, who presently came down from the
high trees to enjoy their allowance. Dinner was served in the small
parlour, or large dining-room, as it happened; in winter, generally
the former. His valet supported him downstairs; and he ate most
moderately of chicken, pheasant, or any light food. Pastry he disliked,
as difficult of digestion, though he would taste a morsel of venison
pie. Never but once that he drank two glasses of white wine,[138]
did Pinkerton see him taste any liquor, except ice-water. A pail of
ice was placed under the table, in which stood a decanter of water,
from which he supplied himself with his favourite beverage. If his
guests liked even a moderate quantity of wine, they must have called
for it during dinner, for almost instantly after he rang the bell to
order coffee upstairs. Thither he would pass about five o’clock; and
generally resuming his place on the sofa, would sit till two o’clock in
the morning, in miscellaneous chit-chat, full of singular anecdotes,
strokes of wit, and acute observations, occasionally sending for books
or curiosities, or passing to the library, as any reference happened
to arise in conversation. After his coffee he tasted nothing; but the
snuff-box of _tabac d’étrennes_, from Fribourg’s, was not forgotten,
and was replenished from a canister lodged in an ancient marble urn
of great thickness, which stood in the window-seat, and served to
secure its moisture and rich flavour. Such was a private rainy day of
Horace Walpole. The forenoon quickly passed in roaming through the
numerous apartments of the house, in which, after twenty visits,
still something new would occur; and he was indeed constantly adding
fresh acquisitions. Sometimes a walk in the grounds would intervene,
on which occasions he would go out in his slippers through a thick
dew; and he never wore a hat.[139] He said that, on his first visit
to Paris, he was ashamed of his effeminacy, when he saw every little
meagre Frenchman, whom even he could have thrown down with a breath,
walking without a hat, which he could not do without a certainty of
that disease which the Germans say is endemical in England, and is
termed by the nation _le catch-cold_. The first trial cost him a slight
fever, but he got over it, and never caught cold afterwards: draughts
of air, damp rooms, windows open at his back, all situations were alike
to him in this respect. He would even show some little offence at any
solicitude expressed by his guests on such an occasion; and would say,
with a half smile of seeming crossness, “My back is the same with my
face, and my neck is like my nose.”
THE END.
BILLING AND SONS, PRINTERS, GUILDFORD AND LONDON.
FOOTNOTES
[1] “The Letters of Horace Walpole, Earl of Orford, edited by Peter
Cunningham.”
[2] A second edition was published in 1866.
[3] _E.g._, in Jesse’s “Memoirs of George III.”
[4] Or in 1732, if the dates of some letters published in _Notes and
Queries_, 4th Series, vol. iii., p. 2, can be trusted. But as the
second of these letters, the date of which is given as Sep. 18, 1732,
refers to the death of Walpole’s mother, and as we know, from his own
statement, that Lady Walpole died Aug. 20, 1737, there seems to be an
error.
[5] The story that Horace was of Hervey blood was first published in
some Introductory Anecdotes prefixed to the later editions of the
works of Lady Mary Wortley Montagu. These anecdotes were contributed
by Lady Louisa Stuart, daughter of Lord Bute, the Prime Minister,
and grand-daughter of Lady Mary. Her statement about Walpole, though
generally accepted, has perhaps received more credit than it deserves,
but _se non è vero, è ben trovato_. The similarity, both in matter and
composition, between the memoirs of Lord Hervey and those of Horace
Walpole is certainly remarkable.
[6] Born in July, 1719. He was second son of the first Lord Conway
by his third wife, Charlotte Shorter, sister of Lady Walpole. He was
Secretary in Ireland during the vice-royalty of William, fourth Duke
of Devonshire; then Groom of the Bedchamber to George II. and to
George III.; became Secretary of State in 1765; Lieutenant-General of
the Ordnance in 1770; Commander-in-Chief in 1782; and was created a
Field-Marshal in 1793. He married the Dowager Countess of Aylesbury, by
whom he had an only child, Mrs. Damer, the sculptor, to whom Walpole
left Strawberry Hill.
[7] One of his papers in _The World_ contains an account of an escape
which he had, in 1749, of being shot by highwaymen in Hyde Park. His
face was grazed by a ball from the pistol of one of his assailants,
which went off accidentally before aim had been taken. An allusion to
this adventure will be found in one of our extracts.
[8] Letter to John Pinkerton, Dec. 26, 1791.
[9] “I have been called a Republican; I never was quite that.”--Walpole
to Lady Ossory, July 7, 1782.
[10] Letter to Mann, July 10, 1782.
[11] Letter to Lady Ossory, July 7, 1782.
[12] Miss Berry.
[13] Letter to Sir Horace Mann.
[14] Letter to Sir Horace Mann, July 1, 1762.
[15] Son of Brigadier-General Edward Montagu, and nephew to the second
Earl of Halifax. He was member of Parliament for Northampton, usher of
the Black Rod in Ireland during the lieutenancy of the Earl of Halifax,
ranger of Salsey Forest, and private secretary to Lord North when
Chancellor of the Exchequer.
[16] Had Chatterton appealed simply to Walpole’s charity, he would not
have been rejected. This was the opinion of those who knew Horace best.
But, apart from the imposture sought to be palmed on him, Walpole did
not profess to be a patron of literature or the arts. An artist has
pencils, he would say, and an author has pens, and the public must
reward them as it sees fit.
[17] Thus described by Walpole in his account of the pictures at
Houghton: “The Virgin and Child, a most beautiful, bright, and capital
picture, by Dominichino: bought out of the Zambeccari Palace at Bologna
by Horace Walpole, junior.”
[18] The Princess of Campoflorido.
[19] Lord Orford’s successor as Chancellor of the Exchequer.
[20] When he [Kilmarnock] beheld the fatal scaffold covered with black
cloth; the executioner, with his axe and his assistants; the saw-dust,
which was soon to be drenched with his blood; the coffin, prepared to
receive the limbs which were yet warm with life; above all, the immense
display of human countenances which surrounded the scaffold like a sea,
all eyes being bent on the sad object of the preparation,--his natural
feelings broke forth in a whisper to the friend on whose arm he leaned,
“Home, this is terrible!” No sign of indecent timidity, however,
affected his behaviour.--_Sir Walter Scott’s Tales of my Grandfather._
[21] Afterwards Archbishop of Canterbury. Walpole had a strong and
unreasonable prejudice against him.
[22] Thomas Sherlock, Master of the Temple; first, Bishop of Salisbury,
and afterwards of London.--WALPOLE.
[23] She was daughter of the Duke of Grafton.
[24] His gait was so singular, that he was called Peter Shamble.
[25] Mrs. Lloyd of Spring Gardens, to whom the Earl of Haddington was
married this year.
[26] An Irish adventurer, whose fine person had induced the Dowager
Duchess of Manchester to marry him. He was afterwards created Earl of
Beaulieu. O’Brien, it seems, was even taller than Hussey.
[27] Walpole had given this Chinese name to a pond of gold-fish at
Strawberry Hill.
[28] It was written by Mrs. Halket of Wardlaw. Mr. Lockhart states,
that on the blank leaf of his copy of Allan Ramsay’s “Evergreen,” Sir
Walter Scott has written, “Hardyknute was the first poem that I ever
learnt, the last that I shall forget.”
[29] The “Siege of Aquileia,” a tragedy, by John Home, produced at
Drury Lane, 21st February, 1760.
[30] The living of Coxwold, in Yorkshire.
[31] “My flatterers here are all mutes. The oaks, the beeches, the
chestnuts, seem to contend which best shall please the Lord of the
Manor. They cannot deceive, they will not lie.”--_Sir Robert Walpole to
General Churchill_, Houghton, June 24th, 1743.
[32] “Queen Charlotte had always been if not ugly, at least ordinary,
but in her later years her want of personal charms became of course
less observable, and it used to be said that she was grown better
looking. I one day said something to this effect to Colonel Disbrowe,
her Chamberlain. ‘Yes,’ replied he, ‘I do think that the _bloom_ of her
ugliness is going off.’”--CROKER.
[33] “The recluse life led here at Richmond, which is carried to such
an excess of privacy and economy, that the Queen’s friseur waits on
them at dinner, and that four pounds only of beef are allowed for their
soup, disgusts all sorts of people.”--_Walpole to Lord Hertford, Sep.
9, 1764._
[34] Walpole was thinking of an anecdote he had told in a previous
letter. “The old Maréchale de Villars gave a vast dinner [at Paris] to
the Duchess of Bedford. In the middle of the dessert, Madame de Villars
called out, ‘Oh dear! they have forgot! yet I bespoke them, and I am
sure they are ready; you English love hot rolls--bring the rolls.’
There arrived a huge dish of hot rolls, and a sauce-boat of melted
butter.”
[35] “The Duc de Nivernois [the French ambassador] called here the
other day in his way from Hampton Court; but, as the most sensible
French never have eyes to see anything, unless they see it every day
and see it in fashion, I cannot say he flattered me much, or was much
struck with Strawberry. When I carried him into the Cabinet, which I
have told you is formed upon the idea of a Catholic chapel, he pulled
off his hat, but perceiving his error, he said, ‘_Ce n’est pas une
chapelle pourtant_,’ and seemed a little displeased.”--_Walpole to
Mann, April 30, 1763._
[36]
“Esher’s peaceful grove
Where Kent and Nature vie for Pelham’s love.”--_Pope._
“Esher’s groves,
Where, in the sweetest solitude, embraced
By the soft windings of the silent Mole,
From courts and senates Pelham finds repose.”--_Thomson._
[37] Mrs. Anne Pitt, sister of Lord Chatham.
[38] Miss Chudleigh.
[39] Afterwards Dukes of Gloucester and Cumberland.
[40] The old Bedlam stood in Moorfields.
[41] The substance of this petition, and the grave answer which the
King was advised to give to such a ludicrous appeal, are preserved in
the _Gentleman’s Magazine_ for 1765, p. 95; where also we learn that
Mr. Walpole’s idea of the Carpenters’ petition was put in practice, and
his Majesty was humbly entreated to wear a wooden leg himself, and to
enjoin all his servants to do the same. It may, therefore, be presumed
that this _jeu d’esprit_ was from the pen of Mr. Walpole.
[42] “Their women are the first in the world in everything but beauty;
sensible, agreeable, and infinitely informed. The _philosophes_, except
Buffon, are solemn, arrogant, dictatorial coxcombs--I need not say
superlatively disagreeable.”--_Walpole to Mann._
[43] He alludes to his Roman Eagle at Strawberry Hill.
[44] The installation of the Duke of Grafton as Chancellor of the
University of Cambridge. Gray wrote the Ode for the occasion.
[45] The proceedings of the House of Commons against Wilkes had just
produced a Ministerial crisis.
[46] Maria Walpole, Countess Dowager of Waldegrave, who had now
secretly married William Henry, Duke of Gloucester.
[47] Sons of Francis, Earl of Hertford, Mr. Walpole’s cousin-german.
[48] Mr. Walpole’s nephews.
[49] The Pantheon.
[50] In the comedy of “The Provoked Husband.”
[51] Benjamin West, afterwards, at Sir Joshua’s death, President of the
Royal Academy of Arts.
[52] Lady Anne Howard, daughter of Henry, fourth Earl, and sister of
Frederick, fifth Earl of Carlisle.
[53] The Temple of Friendship, like the ruins in the Campo Vaccino, is
reduced to a single column at Stowe.--_Walpole to Crauford, 6th March,
1766._
[54] ‘He dropped me, partly from politics and partly from caprice, for
we never had any quarrel; but he was grown an excessive humourist,
and had shed almost all his friends as well as me. He had parts, and
infinite vivacity and originality till of late years; and it grieved
me much that he had changed towards me after a friendship of between
thirty and forty years.’ This is Walpole’s account written to Cole
the day after Montagu’s death. But Montagu’s last letter to Walpole,
dated October 6, 1770, is cordial and even affectionate in tone; while
in Walpole’s preceding letter there are some signs of pique, and the
letter from Horace which ends the correspondence is both short and cold.
[55] He means Gloucester House.
[56] ‘I went to the House of Commons the other day to hear Charles
Fox, contrary to a resolution I had made of never setting my foot
there again. It is strange how disuse makes one awkward. I felt a
palpitation, as if I were going to speak there myself. The object
answered: Fox’s abilities are amazing at so very early a period,
especially under the circumstances of such a dissolute life. He was
just arrived from Newmarket, had sat up drinking all night, and had not
been in bed. How such talents make one laugh at Tully’s rules for an
orator, and his indefatigable application! His laboured orations are
puerile in comparison with this boy’s manly reason.’--_Walpole to Mann,
April 9, 1772._
[57] Walpole’s playful name for Little Strawberry Hill, a cottage near
his villa, and belonging to him, which he gave to Mrs. Clive, the
actress, for her life.
[58] Mrs. Clive’s brother, who lived with her.
[59] A new singer who attained great celebrity.
[60] A comedy by Hugh Kelly.
[61] Lady Louisa Fitzpatrick, Lord Ossory’s sister, afterwards married
to the Earl of Shelburne.
[62] The period of the year when Lady Ossory left Ampthill for Farming
Woods.
[63] His quitting Parliament.
[64] Lord Clive, in fact, cut his throat, as Walpole, correcting
himself, mentions in a postscript to this letter.
[65] In 1760, Walpole wrote: “General Clive is arrived, all over
estates and diamonds. If a beggar asks charity, he says, ‘Friend, I
have no small brilliants about me.’”
[66] They poisoned Pope Ganganelli.--WALPOLE.
[67] “Who knows but that hereafter some traveller like myself will
sit down upon the banks of the Seine, the Thames, or the Zuyder Zee?…
Who knows but that he will sit down solitary amid silent ruins?”
etc.--Volney’s _Ruins_.
“When London shall be an habitation of bitterns, when St. Paul’s and
Westminster Abbey shall stand, shapeless and nameless ruins, in the
midst of an unpeopled marsh; … some Transatlantic commentator will be
weighing … the respective merits of the Bells and the Fudges, and their
historians.”--Shelley, _Dedication to Peter Bell the Third_.
The rest are still more remote.
[68] Walpole, as well as Macaulay, repeats himself: “Nations at the
acme of their splendour, or at the eve of their destruction, are
worth observing. When they grovel in obscurity afterwards, they
furnish neither events nor reflections; strangers visit the vestiges
of the Acropolis, or may come to dig for capitals among the ruins
of St. Paul’s; but nobody studies the manners of the pedlars and
banditti that dwell in mud huts within the precincts of a demolished
temple.”--_Letter to Mason, dated May 12, 1778, first published in
1851._
[69] Thomas, second Lord Lyttelton; he had been at Florence.
[70] Thomas Lennard Barret; his wife was sister of Lord Camden.
[71] The lady’s dog, which, on her death, passed into the care of
Walpole.
[72] This picture, by Sir Joshua Reynolds, was painted for Mr. Rigby.
The attitude of Miss Vernon is, as Walpole here says, affected. That of
Lord William Russell illustrates the genius of Sir Joshua. The story is
told, that the boy was unwilling to stand still for his portrait, and
running about the room, crouched in a corner to avoid it. Sir Joshua,
at once seizing the possibility of painting him so, said, “Well, stay
there, my little fellow,” and drew him in a natural position of fear at
the dragon.--R. VERNON SMITH (afterwards LORD LYVEDEN).
[73] ‘I forgot to tell you that the town of Birmingham has petitioned
the Parliament to enforce the American Acts, that is, make war; for
they have a manufacture of swords and muskets.’--WALPOLE TO MANN, Jan.
27th, 1775.
‘Is it credible that five or six of the great _trading_ towns have
presented addresses against the Americans?--SAME TO SAME, Oct. 10,
1775. The writer tries to persuade himself that these addresses were
procured by ‘those boobies, the country gentlemen.’
[74] The Lady Louisa Fitzpatrick before referred to.--_See p. 131._
[75] Horace’s nephew, the mad earl.
[76] The Prince was now in his eighteenth year, having been born on the
12th of August, 1762.
[77] The Duke was in disgrace with the King on account of his marriage.
[78] Referring to a rumour that he had been appointed ambassador to
Spain.
[79] An Act passed in 1778 relaxing the penal laws against Roman
Catholics.
[80] Count Haslang, Minister from the Elector of Bavaria: he had been
here from the year 1740.
[81] Mademoiselle Fagniani, Selwyn’s adopted daughter.
[82] Walpole’s printer.
[83] Author of an “Essay on Prints,” the third edition of which he
dedicated to Horace Walpole.
[84] Afterwards Sir Nathaniel William Wraxall, Bart., known by his
“Memoirs of His Own Life.”
[85] This was the second Exhibition at Somerset House. The first was in
May, 1780.
[86] On the 7th of June, Mr. Fox moved for leave to bring in a bill to
amend the Act of the 26th of George II., for preventing clandestine
marriages. The bill passed the Commons, but was rejected by the Lords.
[87] “Mr. Fox never had much intimate intercourse with Horace Walpole;
did not, I think, like him at all; had no opinion of his judgment or
conduct; probably had imbibed some prejudice against him, for his
ill-usage of his father; and certainly entertained an unfavourable,
and even unjust, opinion of his abilities as a writer.” So says
Lord Vassall-Holland in one of the passages from his pen printed in
Russell’s Memorials of Fox. See vol. i., p. 276. It may be mentioned
here, that Lord Holland’s Collections for the Life of Fox, which are
contained in the work just referred to, include numerous extracts from
manuscript papers of Horace Walpole. “These papers, the property of
Lord Waldegrave, were lent to me,” says Lord Holland, “and have been
long in my possession.” That the manuscripts to which Lord Holland
thus had access comprised the portion of Walpole’s correspondence with
Mann, which was first published in 1843, appears by several passages
which his lordship quotes from these letters. Is it possible that this
circumstance may furnish a solution of the ethnological question, to
which we have adverted on p. 141, as to the descent of Macaulay’s New
Zealander from Walpole’s Peruvian? From 1831 Macaulay had been an
_habitué_ of Holland House. Trevelyan’s “Life of Lord Macaulay,” vol.
i. p. 176, et seq.
[88] An ordinance of the Great-Duke against high head-dresses.
[89] A neighbour at Twickenham.
[90] There can be no doubt that Horace about this time, as on former
occasions, had dreamed of seeing Conway in the position of Prime
Minister. The General had taken a prominent part in the last attacks
upon Lord North, and when the latter gave place to Lord Rockingham’s
second Administration, the services of the former were requited by the
office of Commander-in-Chief, with a seat in the Cabinet. But Walpole’s
illusion about his friend was finally dispelled when, in the search for
a leader which went on during and after Lord Rockingham’s last illness,
it appeared that Conway’s name occurred to no one but himself.--_See
Walpole to Mason, May 7, 1882, and to Mann, July 1, 1782._
[91] He did get but five of his sons into that Parliament.--WALPOLE.
[92] Lord Hood was an admiral.
[93] Almost all the hackney-chairmen in London were Irish.
[94] “The fact of the Duchess having purchased the vote of a stubborn
butcher by a kiss, is, we believe, undoubted. It was probably during
the occurrence of these scenes that the well-known compliment was
paid to her by an Irish mechanic: ‘I could light my pipe at her
eyes.’”--_Jesse’s_ “Selwyn,” vol. iv., p, 118.
[95] “Fox said that Sayers’s caricatures had done him more mischief
than the debates in Parliament, or the works of the press. The prints
of Carlo Khan, Fox running away with the India House, Fox and Burke
quitting Paradise when turned out of office, and many others of these
publications, had certainly a vast effect on the public mind.”--_Lord
Chancellor Eldon_, “Life of Twiss,” vol. i., p. 162. This very apt
quotation is made by Mr. P. Cunningham in his valuable edition of
Walpole’s Letters.
[96] Alluding to some coke-ovens for which Conway obtained a patent.
[97] Mr. Pitt says, in a letter to Mr. Wilberforce, on the 8th of
April, “Westminster goes on well, in spite of the Duchess of Devonshire
and the other women of the people; but when the poll will close is
uncertain.” At the close of it, on the 17th of May, the numbers were,
for Hood, 6,694; Fox, 6,223; Wray, 5,998. Walpole, whose delicate
health at this time confined him almost entirely to his house, went in
a sedan-chair to give his vote for Mr. Fox.
[98] The Lady Caroline Petersham of the frolic at Vauxhall, related in
a former chapter. Conway in his youth had been enamoured of her.
[99] At this time commencing her career as an actress.
[100] Cole died 16th December, 1782.
[101] See page 226.
[102] Lord Strafford died 10th March, 1791.
[103] Very shortly after this visit, Miss Burney was appointed one of
the Keepers of the Queen’s Robes in the room of Madame Haggerdorn, who
retired.
[104] Born in 1745, at Stapleton, near Bristol, where her father had
the care of the Charity School. Early in life, she joined her sisters
in establishing a school for young ladies, which had great success.
In 1773 she published a pastoral drama, called “The Search after
Happiness,” and in 1774 a tragedy founded on the story of Regulus.
These works led to her introduction into London society. Her tragedy
“Percy” was produced at Covent Garden on the 10th of December, 1777,
and ran nineteen nights. About this time also she wrote “The Fatal
Falsehood,” and “Sacred Dramas.” In 1786, when she was forty years of
age, she withdrew from London, and settled at Cowslip Green, near her
native place, in which district she spent the remainder of her life,
devoting herself to works of charity, and the composition of religious
books.
[105] That is, voted that the charge relating to the spoliation of the
Begums of Oude contained matter for impeachment.
[106] Miss Elizabeth Farren, afterwards Countess of Derby.
[107] A celebrated tavern adjoining Drury Lane Theatre.
[108] Recently the seat of Lord St. Leonards.
[109] A comedy called “False Appearances,” translated from “L’Homme du
Jour” of Boissy. It was first acted at the private theatre at Richmond
House, and afterwards at Drury Lane.
[110] Meaning the establishment of the Mail-coach. Miss More, in her
last letter, had said,--“Mail-coaches, which come to others, come not
to me: letters and newspapers, now that they travel in coaches, like
gentlemen and ladies, come not within ten miles of my hermitage; and
while other fortunate provincials are studying the world and its ways,
and are feasting upon elopements, divorces, and suicides, tricked
out in all the elegancies of Mr. Topham’s phraseology, I am obliged
to be contented with village vices, petty iniquities, and vulgar
sins.”--_Memoirs_, vol. ii., p. 77.
[111] Major Topham was the proprietor of the fashionable morning
paper entitled _The World_. “In this paper,” says Mr. Gifford, in his
preface to the “Baviad,” “were given the earliest specimens of those
unqualified and audacious attacks on all private character, which
the town first smiled at for their quaintness, then tolerated for
their absurdity; and--now that other papers equally wicked and more
intelligible have ventured to imitate it--will have to lament to the
last hour of British liberty.”
[112] Walpole was mistaken here. It was their granduncle, not their
grandfather, from whom Mr. Berry had expected to inherit.
[113] The date is thus put, alluding to his age, which, in 1789, was
seventy-one.--MARY BERRY.
[114] “Bishop Bonner’s Ghost.”
[115] Her “Observations and Reflections made in the course of a Journey
through France, Italy, and Germany,” honoured with a couplet in the
“Baviad”--
“See Thrale’s grey widow with a satchel roam,
And bring in pomp laborious nothings home.”
[116] One half the prediction was fulfilled, since the Duke of Clarence
outlived the Duke of York, and came to the throne in 1830, on the death
of his eldest brother, at this time, 1789, the Prince of Wales.
[117] This alludes to Miss Berry’s father having been disinherited by
an uncle, to whom he was heir-at-law, and a large property left to his
younger brother.--MARY BERRY.
[118] A drawing by Miss Agnes Berry.
[119] His secretary.
[120] An unmarried sister of the first Earl Howe, who then lived at
Richmond.
[121] Here begins Kirgate’s handwriting in the MS.
[122] A friend of the Berrys. He was then one of the Commissioners for
Auditing the Public Accounts.
[123] Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs. He was succeeded in the
office by Lord Grenville.
[124] The following anecdote, connected with this memorable evening,
is related by Mr. Curwen, at that time member for Carlisle, in his
“Travels in Ireland:”--“The most powerful feelings were manifested on
the adjournment of the House. While I was waiting for my carriage, Mr.
Burke came to me and requested, as the night was wet, I would set him
down. As soon as the carriage-door was shut, he complimented me on my
being no friend to the revolutionary doctrines of the French; on which
he spoke with great warmth for a few minutes, when he paused to afford
me an opportunity of approving the view he had taken of those measures
in the House. At the moment I could not help feeling disinclined to
disguise my sentiments: Mr. Burke, catching hold of the check-string,
furiously exclaimed, ‘You are one of these people! set me down!’ With
some difficulty I restrained him;--we had then reached Charing Cross: a
silence ensued, which was preserved till we reached his house in Gerard
Street, when he hurried out of the carriage without speaking.”
[125] He means impeachments.
[126] Louisa Maximiliana de Stolberg Gœdern, wife of the Pretender.
After the death of Charles Edward in 1788, she travelled in Italy and
France, and lived with her favourite, the celebrated Alfieri, to whom
she is stated to have been privately married. She continued to reside
at Paris, until the progress of the revolution compelled her to take
refuge in England.
[127] A loo phrase.
[128] “There [at the opening of Hastings’s trial] were the
members of that brilliant society which quoted, criticised, and
exchanged repartees, under the rich peacock-hangings of Mrs.
Montagu.”--_Macaulay’s Essay on “Warren Hastings.”_
[129] To Miss Farren.
[130] This alludes to the stories told at the time of an ivory bed,
inlaid with gold, having been presented to Queen Charlotte by Mrs.
Hastings, the wife of the Governor-General of India.
[131] Shortly afterwards Lady Hamilton--Nelson’s Lady Hamilton.
[132] Miss Burney had recently resigned her situation about the Queen’s
person. Madame d’Arblay (Miss Burney) has entered in her Diary the
following portion of a letter addressed to her by Walpole:
“As this will come to you by my servant, give me leave to add a word on
your most unfounded idea that I can forget you, because it is almost
impossible for me ever to meet you. Believe me, I heartily regret that
privation, but would not repine, were your situation, either in point
of fortune or position, equal in any degree to your merit. But were
your talents given to be buried in obscurity? You have retired from
the world to a closet at Court--where, indeed, you will still discover
mankind, though not disclose it; for if you could penetrate its
characters, in the earliest glimpse of its superficies, will it escape
your piercing eye when it shrinks from your inspection, knowing that
you have the mirror of truth in your pocket? I will not embarrass you
by saying more, nor would have you take notice of, or reply to what I
have said: judge only, that feeling hearts reflect, not forget. Wishes
that are empty look like vanity; my vanity is to be thought capable
of esteeming you as much as you deserve, and to be reckoned, though a
very distant, a most _sincere_ friend,--and give me leave to say, dear
Madam, your most obedient humble servant, HOR. WALPOLE.
“Strawberry Hill, October, ’90.”
[133] The Cholmondeleys.
[134] The weak and indolent character of Mr. Berry made him always and
everywhere a cipher.
[135] Queen Mary asked some of her attendant ladies what a squeeze of
the hand was supposed to intimate. They said “Love.” “Then,” said the
Queen, “my vice-chamberlain must be violently in love with me, for he
always squeezes my hand.”
[136] ‘Anecdotes,’ etc., by Lætitia Matilda Hawkins, 1822.
[137] ‘Walpoliana,’ Preface.
[138] As early as 1754 he wrote to Bentley: “You know I never drink
three glasses of any wine.”
[139] “A hat, you know, I never wear, my breast I never button, nor
wear great coats, etc.”--Letter to Cole, Feb. 14, 1782.
End of Project Gutenberg's Horace Walpole and his World, by Horace Walpole