ARLINGTON STREET, _June_ 15, 1770.
I have no public event to tell you, though I write again sooner than I
purposed. The journey of the Princess Dowager to Germany is indeed an
extraordinary circumstance, but besides its being a week old, as I do
not know the motives, I have nothing to say upon it. It is much
canvassed and sifted, and yet perhaps she was only in search of a little
repose from the torrents of abuse that have been poured upon her for
some years. Yesterday they publicly sung about the streets a ballad, the
burthen of which was, _the cow has left her calf_. With all this we are
grown very quiet, and Lord North's behaviour is so sensible and moderate
that he offends nobody.
Our family has lost a branch, but I cannot call it a misfortune. Lord
Cholmondeley died last Saturday. He was seventy, and had a constitution
to have carried him to a hundred, if he had not destroyed it by an
intemperance, especially in drinking, that would have killed anybody
else in half the time. As it was, he had outlived by fifteen years all
his set, who have reeled into the ferry-boat so long before him. His
grandson seems good and amiable, and though he comes into but a small
fortune for an earl, five-and-twenty hundred a-year, his uncle the
general may re-establish him upon a great footing--but it will not be in
his life, and the general does not sail after his brother on a sea of
claret.
You have heard details, to be sure, of the horrible catastrophe at the
fireworks at Paris.[1] Francèes, the French minister, told me the other
night that the number of the killed is so great that they now try to
stifle it; my letters say between five and six hundred! I think there
were not fewer than ten coach-horses trodden to death. The mob had
poured down from the _Etoile_ by thousands and ten thousands to see the
illuminations, and did not know the havoc they were occasioning. The
impulse drove great numbers into the Seine, and those met with the most
favourable deaths.
[Footnote 1: The Dauphin had been married to the Archduchess Marie
Antoinette on May 16th, and on May 30th the city of Paris closed a
succession of balls and banquets with which they had celebrated the
marriage of the heir of the monarchy by a display of fireworks in the
Place Louis XV., in which the ingenuity of the most fashionable
pyrotechnists had been exhausted to outshine all previous displays of
the sort. But towards the end of the exhibition one of the explosives
set fire to a portion of the platforms on which the different figures
were constructed, and in a moment the whole woodwork was in a flame.
Three sides of the Place were enclosed, and the fourth was so blocked up
with carriages, that the spectators, who saw themselves surrounded with
flames, had no way to escape open. The carriage-horses, too, became
terrified and unmanageable. In their panic-stricken flight the
spectators trampled one another down; hundreds fell, and were crushed to
death by their companions; hundreds were pushed into the river and
drowned. The number of killed could never be precisely ascertained; but
it was never estimated below six hundred, and was commonly believed to
have greatly exceeded that number, as many of the victims were of the
poorer class--many, too, the bread-winners of their families. The
Dauphin and Dauphiness devoted the whole of their month's income to the
relief of the sufferers; and Marie Antoinette herself visited many of
the families whose loss seemed to have been the most severe: this
personal interest in their affliction which she thus displayed making a
deep impression on the citizens.]
This is a slight summer letter, but you will not be sorry it is so
short, when the dearth of events is the cause. Last year I did not know
but we might have a battle of Edgehill[1] by this time. At present, my
Lord Chatham could as soon raise money as raise the people; and Wilkes
will not much longer have more power of doing either. If you were not
busy in burning Constantinople, you could not have a better opportunity
for taking a trip to England. Have you never a wish this way? Think what
satisfaction it would be to me?--but I never advise; nor let my own
inclinations judge for my friends. I had rather suffer their absence,
than have to reproach myself with having given them bad counsel. I
therefore say no more on what would make me so happy. Adieu!
[Footnote 1: Edgehill was the first battle in the Great Rebellion,
fought October 23, 1642.]
_FALL OF THE DUC DE CHOISEUL'S MINISTRY._