Books: Letters of Horace Walpole, V4

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Letter 206 To Sir David Dalrymple.(406)
Berkeley Square, Jan. 1, 1781. (page 264)

Your favourable opinion of my father, Sir, is too flattering(r to
me not to thank you for the satisfaction it gave me. Wit, I
think he had not naturally, though I am sure he had none from
affectation, as simplicity was a predominant feature in his
amiable composition. but he possessed that, perhaps, most true
species of wit, which flows from experience and deep knowledge of
mankind, and consequently had more in his later than in his
earlier years; which is not common to a talent that generally
flashes from spirits, though they alone cannot bestow it. When
you was once before so good, Sir, as to suggest to me an attempt
at writing my father's life, I probably made you one answer that
I must repeat now, which is, that a son's encomiums would be
attributed to partiality; and with my deep devotion to his
memory, I should ever suspect it in myself. But I will set my
repugnance in a stronger light, by relating an anecdote not
incurious. In the new edition of the Biographia Britannica, Dr.
Kippis, the tinker of it, reflecting on my having called the
former, Vindicatio Britannica, or Defence of Every body,
threatened that when he should come to my father's life he would
convince me that the new edition did not deserve that censure. I
confess I thought this but an odd sort of historian equity, to
reverse scripture and punish the sins of children upon their
fathers! However, I said nothing. Soon after Dr. Kippis himself
called on me, and in very gracious terms desired I would favour
him with anecdotes of my father's life. This was descending a
little from his censorial throne, but I took no notice; and only
told him, that I was so persuaded of the fairness of my father's
character, that I chose to trust it to the most unprejudiced
hands; and that all I could consent to was, that when he shall
have written it, if he would communicate it to me, I would point
out to him any material facts, if I should find any, that were
not truly noted. This was all I could contribute. Since that
time I have seen in the second volume a very gross accusation of
Sir Robert, at second or third hand, and to which the smallest
attention must give a negative. Sir Robert is accused of having,
out of spite, influenced the House of Commons to expel the late
Lord Barrington for the notorious job of the Hamburg
lottery.(407) Spite was not the ingredient most domineering in
my father's character; but whatever has been said of the
corruption or servility of Houses of Commons, when was there one
so prostitute, that it would have expelled one of their own
members for a fraud not proved, to gratify the vengeance of the
minister? and a minister must have been implacable indeed, and a
House of Commons profligate indeed, to inflict such a stigma on
an innocent man, because he had been attached to a rival
predecessor of the minister. It is not less strange that the
Hamburgher's son should not have vindicated his parent's memory
at the opportunity of the secret committee on Sir Robert, but
should wait for a manuscript memorandum of Serjeant Skinner after
the death of this last. I hope Sir Robert will have no such
apologist!

I do not agree less with you, Sir, in your high opinion of King
William. I think, and a far better judge, Sir Robert, thought
that Prince one of the wisest men that ever lived. Your bon-mot
of his was quite new to me. There are two or three passages in
the Diary of the second Earl of Clarendon that always struck me
as instances of wisdom and humour at once, particularly his
Majesty's reply to the lords who advised him (I think at
Salisbury,) to send away King James; and his few words, after
long patience, to that foolish lord himself, who harangued him on
the observance of his declaration. Such traits, and several of
Queen Anne (not equally deep) in the same journal, paint those
princes as characteristically as Lord Clarendon's able father
would have drawn them. There are two letters in the "Nugae
Antiquae," that exhibit as faithful pictures of Queen Elizabeth
and James the First, by delineating them in their private life
and unguarded hours.

You are much in the right, Sir, in laughing at those wise
personages, who not only dug up the corpse of Edward the First,
but restored Christian burial to his crown and robes. Methinks,
had they deposited those regalia in the treasury of the church,
they would have committed no sacrilege. I confess I have not
quite so heinous an idea of sacrilege as Dr. Johnson. Of all
kinds of robbery, that appears to me the lightest species which
injures nobody. Dr. Johnson is so pious, that in his journey to
your country, he flatters himself that all his readers will join
him in enjoying the destruction of two Dutch crews, who were
swallowed up by the ocean after they had robbed a church.(408) I
doubt that uncharitable anathema is more in the spirit of the Old
Testament than of the New.

(406) Now first published.

(407) See ant`e, p. 201, letter 147.-E.

(408) The following are Johnson's words:--"The two churches of
Elgin were stripped, and the lead was shipped to be sold in
Holland: I hope every reader will rejoice that this cargo of
sacrilege was lost at sea."-E.

Letter 207 To The Hon. H. S. Conway.
January 3, 1781. (page 266)

After I had written my note to you last night, I called on * * *
* who gave me the dismal account of Jamaica,(409) that you will
see in the Gazette, and of the damage done to our shipping.
Admiral Rowley is safe; but they are in apprehensions for
Walsingham. He told me too what is not in the Gazette; that of
the expedition against the Spanish settlements, not a single man
survives! The papers to-day, I see, speak of great danger to
Gibraltar.

Your brother repeated to me his great desire that you should
publish your speech,(410) as he told you. I do not conceive why
he is so eager for it, for he professes total despair about
America. It looks to me as if there was a wish of throwing the
blame somewhere; but I profess I am too simple to dive into the
objects of shades of intrigues: nor do I care about them. We
shall be reduced to a miserable little island; and from a mighty
empire sink into as insignificant a country as Denmark or
Sardinia! When our trade and marine are gone, the latter of
which we keep up by unnatural efforts, to which our debt will put
a stop, we shall lose the East Indies as Portugal did; and then
France will dictate to us more imperiously than ever we did to
Ireland, which is in a manner already gone too! These are
mortifying reflections, to -which an English mind cannot easily
accommodate itself. But, alas! we have been pursuing the very
conduct that France would have prescribed, and more than with all
her presumption she could have dared to expect. Could she
flatter herself that we would take no advantage of the
dilatoriness and unwillingness of Spain to enter into the war?
that we would reject the disposition of Russia to support us? and
that our still more natural friend, Holland,(411) would be driven
into the league against us? All this has happened; and, like an
infant, we are delighted with having set our own frock in a
blaze! I sit and gaze with astonishment at our frenzy. Yet why?
Are not nations as liable to intoxication as individuals? Are
not predictions founded on calculation oftener rejected than the
prophecies of dreamers? Do we not act precisely like Charles
Fox, who thought he had discovered a new truth in figures, when
he preached that wise doctrine, that nobody could want money that
would pay enough for it? The consequence was, that in two years
he left himself without the possibility of borrowing a shilling.
I am not surprised at the spirits of' a boy of parts; I am not
surprised at the people; I do wonder at government, that games
away its consequence. For what are we now really at war with
America, France, Spain, and Holland!--Not with hopes of
reconquering America; not with the smallest prospect of
conquering a foot of land from France, Spain, or Holland. No; we
are at war on the defensive to protect what is left, or more
truly to stave off, for a year perhaps, a peace that must
proclaim our nakedness and impotence. I would not willingly
recur to that womanish vision of something may turn up in our
favour! That something must be a naval victory that will
annihilate at once all the squadrons of Europe--must wipe off
forty millions of new debt--reconcile the affections of America,
that for six years we have laboured to alienate; and that must
recall out of the grave the armies and sailors that are perished-
-and that must make thirteen provinces willing to receive the
law, without the necessity of keeping ten thousand men amongst
them. The gigantic imagination of Lord Chatham would not
entertain such a chimera. Lord * * * * perhaps would say he did,
rather than not undertake; or Mr. Burke could form a metaphoric
vision that would satisfy no imagination but his own: but I, who
am nullius addiclus itrare in verba, have no hopes either in our
resources or in our geniuses, and look on my country already as
undone! It is grievous--but I shall not have much time to lament
its fall!(412)

(409) On the 3d of October occurred one of the most dreadful
hurricanes ever experienced in the West Indies. In Jamaica,
Savannah la Mar, with three hundred inhabitants, was utterly
swept away by an irruption of the sea; and at Barbados, on the
10th, Bridgetown, the capital of the island, was almost levelled
to the ground, and several thousands of the inhabitants
perished.-E.

(410) "Introductory of a motion for leave to bring in a bill for
quieting the troubles that have for some time subsisted between
Great Britain and America, and enabling his Majesty to send out
commissioners with full power to treat with America for that
purpose." The motion was negatived by 123 against 81. For the
speech of General Conway, and a copy of his proposed bill, see
Parl. History, vol, Nxi. pp. 570, 588.-E.

(411) Mr. Henry Laurens, president of the American council,
having been taken by one of the King's frigates early in October
1780, on his passage to Holland, and it being discovered by the
papers in his possession that the American States had been long
carrying on a secret correspondence with Amsterdam, Sir Joseph
Yorke, the British minister at the Hague, demanded a satisfactory
explanation; but the same not being afforded, hostilities against
Holland were declared on the 28th of December 1780.-E.

(412) To this passage the editor of Walpole's Works subjoined, in
March 1798, the following note:--"It may be some comfort, in a
moment no less portentous and melancholy than the one here
described, to recollect the almost unhoped-for recovery of
national prosperity, which took place from the peace of 1782 to
the declaration of war against France in the year 1793. May our
exertions procure the speedy application of a similar remedy to
our present evils, and may that remedy be productive of equally
good effects!"-E.

Letter 208 To The Rev. Mr. Cole.
Berkeley Square, Feb. 7, 1781. (page 268)

Dear Sir,
I will not leave you a moment in suspense about the safety of
your very valuable volume, which you have so kindly sent me, and
which I have just received, with the enclosed letters, and your
other yesterday. I have not time to add a word more at present,
being full of business, having the night before last received an
account of Lady Orford's death at Pisa,(413) and a copy of her
will, which obliges me to write several letters, and to see my
relations. She has left every thing in her power to her friend
Cavalier Mozzi, at Florence; but her son comes into a large
estate, besides her great jointure. You may imagine, how I
lament that he had not patience to wait sixteen months, before he
sold his pictures!

I am very sorry you have been at all indisposed. I will take the
utmost care of your fifty-ninth volume (for which I give you this
receipt), and will restore it the instant I have had time to go
through it. Witness my hand.

(413) See vol. i. p. 243, letter 61.-E.

Letter 209 To The Rev. Mr. Cole.
February 9, 1781. (page 268)

I had not time, dear Sir, when I wrote last, to answer your
letter, nor do more than cast an eye on your manuscripts. To say
the truth, my patience is not tough enough to go through Wolsey's
negotiations. I see that your perseverance was forced to make
the utmost efforts to transcribe them. They are immeasurably
verbose, not to mention the blunders of the first copyist. As I
road only for amusement, I cannot, so late in my life, purchase
information on what I do not much care about, at the price of a
great deal of ennui. The old wills at the end of your volume
diverted me much more than the obsolete politics. I shall say
nothing about what you call your old leaven. Every body must
judge for himself in those matters: nor are you or I of an age to
change long-formed opinions, as neither of us is governed by
self-interest. Pray tell me how I may most safely return your
volume. I value all your manuscripts so much, that I should
never forgive myself, if a single one came to any accident by
your so obligingly lending them to me. They are great treasures,
and contain something or other that must suit most tastes: not to
mention your amazing industry, neatness, legibility, with notes,
arms, etc. I know no such repositories. You will receive with
your manuscript Mr. Kerrick's and Mr. Gough's letters. The
former is very kind. The inauguration of the Antiquated Society
is burlesque and so is the dearth of materials for another
volume; can they ever want such rubbish as compose their
preceding annals?

I think it probable that story should be stone: however, I never
piqued myself on recording every mason. I have preserved but too
many that did not deserve to be mentioned. I dare to say, that
when I am gone, many more such will be added to my volumes. I
had not heard of poor Mr. Pennant's misfortune. I am very sorry
for it, for I believe him to be a very honest good-natured man.
He certainly was too lively for his proportion of understanding,
and too impetuous to make the best use of what he had. However,
it is a credit to us antiquaries to have one of our class
disordered by vivacity. I hope your goutiness is dissipated, and
that this last fine week has set you on your feet again.

Letter 210 To The Earl Of Buchan.(414)
Berkeley Square, Feb. 10, 1781. (page 269)

I was honoured yesterday with your lordship's card, with the
notification of the additional honour of my being elected an
honourary member of the Society of the Antiquaries of
Scotland;(415) a grace, my lord, that I receive with the respect
and gratitude due to so valuable a distinction; and for which I
must beg leave, through your lordship's favour, to offer my most
sincere and humble thanks to that learned and respectable
Society. My very particular thanks are still due to your
lordship, who, in remembrance of ancient partiality, have been
pleased, at the hazard of your own judgment, to favour an old
humble servant, who can only receive honour from, but can reflect
none on, the Society into which your lordship and your associates
have condescended to adopt him. In my best days, my lord, I
never could pretend to more than having flitted over some flowers
of knowledge. Now worn out and near the end of my course, I can
Only be a broken monument to prove that the Society of the
Antiquaries of Scotland are zealous to preserve even the least
valuable remains of a former age, and to recompense all who have
contributed their mite towards illustrating our common island. I
am, etc.

(414) Now first printed.

(415) The Royal Society of Antiquaries of Scotland had been
formed at Edinburgh in the preceding December, when the Earl of
Buchan was elected president.-E.

Letter 211 To Sir David Dalrymple.(416)
Strawberry Hill, Feb. 10, 1781. (page 270)

I was very intimate, Sir, with the last Lord Finlater when he was
Lord Deskford. We became acquainted at Rome on our travels, and
though during his illness and long residence in Scotland, we had
no intercourse, I had the honour of seeing him sometimes during
his last visit to England; but I am an entire stranger to the
anecdote relative to my father and Sir William Windham. I have
asked my brother, who was much more conversant in the scenes of
that time, for I was abroad when Sir William died, and returned
to England but about six months before my father's retirement, so
that having been at school and at Cambridge, or in my infancy,
during Sir Robert's administration, the little I retain from him
was picked up in the last three years of his life, which is an
answer, Sir, to your inquiries why, among other reasons, I have
always declined writing his life; for I could in reality say but
little on my own knowledge; and yet should have the air of being
good authority, at least better than I should truly be. My
brother, Sir Edward, who is eleven years older than I am, never
heard of your anecdote. I may add, that latterly I lived in
great intimacy with the Marchioness of Blandford, Sir William's
widow, who died but a year and a half ago at Sheepe, here in my
neighbourhood; and with Lady Suffolk, who could not but be well
acquainted with the history of those times from her long
residence at court, and with whom, for the last five or six years
of her life here at Twickenham, I have had many and many long
conversations on those subjects, and yet I never heard a word of
the supposed event you mention. I myself never heard Sir W.
William speak but once in the House of Commons, but have always
been told that his style and behaviour were most liberal and like
a gentleman and my brother says, there never passed any
bitterness or acrimony between him and our father.(417)

I will answer you as fairly and candidly, Sir, about Archibald
Duke of Argyll, of whom I saw at least a great deal. I do
believe Sir Robert had a full opinion of his abilities as a most
useful man. In fact, it is plain he had; for he depended on the
Duke, when Lord Islay, for the management of your part of the
island, and, as I have heard at the time, disobliged the most
firm of the Scottish Whigs by that preference. Sir Robert
supported Lord Islay against the Queen herself, who hated him for
his attachment to Lady Suffolk, and he was the only man of any
consequence whom her Majesty did not make feel how injudicious it
was (however novel) to prefer the interest of the mistress to
that of the wife. On my father's defeat his warm friends loudly
complained of Lord Islay as having betrayed the Scottish
boroughs, at the election of Sir Robert's last Parliament, to his
brother, Duke John. It is true too, that Sir Robert always
replied, "I do not accuse him." I Must own, knowing my father's
manner, and that when he said but little, it was not a favourable
symptom, I did think, that if he would not accuse, at least he
did not acquit. Duke Archibald was undoubtedly a dark shrewd
man. I recollect an instance for which I should not choose to be
quoted just at this moment, though it reflects on nobody living.
I forget the precise period, and even some of the persons
concerned; but it was in the minority of the present Duke of
Gordon, and you, Sir, can probably adjust the dates. A regiment
had been raised of Gordons. Duke Archibald desired the command
of it to a favourite of his own. The Duchess-dowager insisted on
it for her second husband. Duke A. said, "Oh! to be sure her
grace must be obeyed;" but instantly got the regiment ordered to
the East Indies, which had not been the reckoning of a widow
remarried to a young fellow.(418)

At the time of the rebellion, I remember that Duke Archibald was
exceedingly censured in London for coming thither, and pleading
that he was not empowered to take up arms. But I believe that I
have more than satisfied your curiosity, Sir, and that you will
not think it very prudent to set an old man on talking of the
days of his Youth.

I have just received the favour of a letter from Lord Buchan, in
which his lordship is so good as to acquaint me with the honour
your new Society of Antiquaries have done me in nominating me an
honourary member. I am certainly much flattered by the
distinction, but am afraid his lordship's partiality and
patronage will in this only instance do him no credit. My
knowledge even of British antiquity has ever been desultory and
most superficial; I have never studied any branch of science
deeply and solidly, nor ever but for temporary \amusement, and
without any system, suite, or method. Of late years I have
quitted every connexion with societies, not only Parliament, but
those of our Antiquaries and of Arts and Sciences, and have not
attended the meetings of the Royal Society. I have withdrawn
myself in a great measure from the world, and live in a very
narrow circle idly and obscurely. Still, Sir, I could not
decline the honour your Society has been pleased to offer me,
lest it should be thought a want of respect and gratitude,
instead of a mark of humility and conscious unworthiness. I am
so sensible of this last, that I cannot presume to offer my
services in this part of' our island to so respectable an
assembly; but if you, Sir, who know too well my limited
abilities, can at any time point out any information that it is
in my power to give to the Society, (as in the case of Royal
Scottish portraits, on which Lord Buchan was pleased to Consult
Me,) I shall be very proud to obey your and their commands, and
shall always be with great regard their and your most obedient
humble servant.

P. S. I do not know whether I ever mentioned to you or Lord
Buchan, Sir, a curious and excellent head in oil of the Lady
Margaret Douglas at Mr. Carteret's, at Hawnes in Bedfordshire,
the seat of his grandfather Lord Granville; I know few better
portraits. It is at once a countenance of goodness and cunning,
a mixture I think pleasing. It seems to imply that the person's
virtue was not founded on folly or ignorance of the world; it
implies perhaps more, that the person would combat treachery and
knavery, and knew how. I could fancy the head in question was
such a character as Margaret Queen of Navarre, sister of Francis
the First. who was very free in her conversation and writings,
yet strictly virtuous; debonnaire, void of ambition; yet a
politician when her brother's situation required it. If your
Society should give into engraving historic portraits, this head
would deserve an early place. There is at Lord Scarborough's in
Yorkshire, a double portrait, perhaps by Holbein or Lucas de
Heere, of Lady Margaret's mother, Queen Margaret, and her second
husband.

(416) Now first collected.

(417) Pope in his second Dialogue for the Year 1738, has
transmitted Sir William's character to posterity--

"How can I, Pultney, Chesterfield, forget,
While Roman spirit charms, and Attic wit?
Or Wyndham, just to freedom and the throne,
The master of our passions and his own?"

Speaker Onslow says, "there was a spirit and power in his
speaking that always animated himself and his hearers, and with
the decoration of his manner, which was, indeed, very ornamental,
produced, not only the most attentive, respectful, but even a
reverend regard, to whatever he spoke."-E.

(418) See Memoires of George the Second, vol. i. p. 240. "In his
private life," says Walpole, "he had more merit, except in the
case of his wife, whom, having been deluded into marrying without
a fortune, he punished by rigorous and unrelaxed confinement in
Scotland. He had a great thirst for books; a head admirably
turned to mechanics; was a patron of ingenious men, a promoter of
discoveries, and one of the first encouragers of planting in
England; most of the curious exotics which have been familiarized
to this climate being introduced by him. He died suddenly in his
chair after dinner, at his house in Argyle-buildings, London,
April 15, 1761."-E.

Letter 212 To The Rev. Mr. Cole.
Berkeley Square, March 2, 1781. (page 272)

Dear Sir,
My Lady Orford ordered herself to be buried at Leghorn, the only
place in Tuscany where Protestants have burial; therefore I
suppose she did not affect to change. On the contrary, I believe
she had no preference for any sect, but rather laughed at all. I
know nothing new, neither in novelty nor antiquity. I have had
no gout this winter, and therefore I call it my leap-year. I am
sorry it is not yours too. It is an age since I saw Dr. lort. I
hope illness is not the cause. You will be diverted with hearing
that I am chosen an honourary member of the new Antiquarian
Society at Edinburgh. I accepted for two reasons: first, it is a
feather that does not demand my flying thither; and secondly, to
show contempt for our own old fools.(419) To me it will be a
perfect sinecure; for I have moulted all my pen feathers, and
shall have no ambition of nestling into their printed
transactions. Adieu, my good Sir. Your much obliged.