Books: The Letters of Horace Walpole Volume 3

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The affront to you, the malice that aimed that affront, the
importance that it gives one, upon the long-run to act steadily
and uniformly with one's friends, the enemies you make in the
opposition, composed of so many great families, and of your own
principal allies,(635) and the little merit you gain with the
ministry by the contrary conduct,--all these were, to me,
unanswerable reasons, and remain so, for what I advised; yet, as
I told you before, I think the season is passed, and that you
must wait for an opportunity of disengaging yourself with credit.
I am persuaded that occasion will be given you, from one or other
of the causes I mentioned in my last; and if the fairest is, I
entreat you by the good wishes which I am sure you know from my
soul I bear you, to seize it. Excuse me: I know I go too far,
but my heart is set on your making a great figure, and your
letters are so kind, that they encourage me to speak with a
friendship which I am sensible is not discreet:--but you know you
and your brother have ever been the objects of my warmest
affection and however partial you may think me to him, I must
labour to have the world think as highly of you, and to unite you
firmly for your lives. If this was not my motive, you must be
sure I should not be earnest. It is not one vote in the House of
Lords that imports us. Party is grown so Serious,(636) and will,
I doubt, become every day more so, that one must make one's
option; and it will go to my soul to see you embarked against all
your friends, against the Whig principles you have ever
professed, and with men, amongst whom you have not one
well-wisher, and with whom you will not even be able to remain
upon tolerable terms, unless you take a vigorous part against all
you love and esteem.

In warm times lukewarmness is a crime with those on whose side
you are ranged. Your good sense and experience will judge
whether what I say is not strictly the case. It is not your
brother or I that have occasioned these circumstances. Lord Bute
has thrown this country into a confusion which will not easily be
dissipated without serious hours. Changes may, and, as I said in
the beginning of my letter, will probably happen but the seeds
that have been sown will not be rooted up by one or two
revolutions in the cabinet. It had taken an hundred and fifty
years(637) to quiet the animosities of Whig and Tory; that
contest is again set on foot, and though a struggle for places
may be now, as has often been, the secret purpose of principals,
the court and the nation are engaging on much deeper springs of
action. I wish I could elucidate this truth, as I have the rest,
but that is not fit for paper, nor to be comprised within the
compass of a letter;--I have said enough to furnish you with
ample reflections. I submit all to your own judgment:--I have
even acted rightly by YOU, in laying before you what it was not
easy for you, my dear lord, to see or know at a distance. I
trust all to your indulgence, and your acquaintance with my
character, which surely is not artful or mysterious, and which,
to you, has ever been, as it ever shall be, most cordial and
well-intentioned. I come to my gazette.

There is nothing new, but the resignation of Lord Carnarvon,(638)
who has thrown up the bedchamber, and they say, the lieutenancy
of Hampshire on Stanley being made governor of the Isle of Wight.

I have been much distressed this morning. The royal family
reside chiefly at Richmond, whither scarce necessary servants
attend them, and no mortal else but Lord Bute. The King and
Queen have taken to going about to see places; they have been at
Oatlands and Wanstead. A quarter before ten to-day, I heard the
bell at the gate ring,--that is, I was not up, for my hours are
not reformed, either at night or in the morning,--I inquired who
it was? the Prince of Mecklenburgh and De Witz had called to
know if they could see the house; my two Swiss, Favre and Louis,
told them I was in bed, but if they would call again in an hour,
they might see it. I shuddered at this report,--and would it
were the worst part! The Queen herself was behind, in a coach: I
am shocked to death, and know not what to do! It is ten times
worse just now than ever at any other time: it will certainly be
said, that I refused to let the Queen see my house. See what it
is to have republican servants! When I made a tempest about it,
Favre said, with the utmost sang froid, "Why could not he tell me
he was the Prince of Mecklenburgh?" I shall go this evening and
consult my oracle, Lady Suffolk. If she approves it, I will
write to De Witz, and pretend I know nothing of any body but the
Prince, and beg a thousand pardons, and assure him how proud I
should be to have his master visit my castle at Thundertentronk.

August 4th.

I have dined to-day at Claremont, where I little thought I should
dine,(639) but whither our affairs have pretty naturally
conducted me. It turned out a very melancholy day. Before I got
into the house, I heard that letters were just arrived there,
with accounts of the Duke of Devonshire having had two more fits.
When I came to see Lord John's(640) and Lord Frederick's letters,
I found these two fits had been but one, and that very slight,
much less than the former, and certainly nervous by all the
symptoms, as Sir Edward Wilmot, who has been at Chatsworth,
pronounces it. The Duke perceived it coming, and directed what
to have done, and it was over in four minutes. The next event
was much more real. I had been half round the garden with the
Duke in his one-horse chair; we were passing to the other side of
the house, when George Onslow met us, arrived on purpose to
advertise the Duke of the sudden death of the Duchess of
Leeds,(641) who expired yesterday at dinner in a moment: he
called it apoplectic; but as the Bishop of Oxford,(642) who is at
Claremont, concluded, it was the gout flown up into the head.
The Duke received the news as men do at seventy-one: but the
terrible part was to break it to the Duchess, who is ill. George
Onslow would have taken me away to dinner with him, but the Duke
thought that would alarm the Duchess too abruptly, and she is not
to know it yet: with her very low spirits it is likely to make a
deep impression. It is a heavy stroke too for her father, poor
old Lord Godolphin, who is eighty-six. For the Duke, his
spirits, under so many mortifications and calamities, are
surprising: the only effect they and his years seem to have made
on him is to have abated his ridicules.(643) Our first meeting
to be sure was awkward, yet I never saw a man conduct any thing
with more sense than he did. There were no notices of what is
passed; nothing fulsome, no ceremony, civility enough, confidence
enough, and the greatest ease. You would only have thought that
I had been long abroad, and was treated like an old friend's son
with whom he might make free. In truth, I never saw more
rational behaviour: I expected a great deal of flattery, but we
had nothing but business while we were alone, and common
conversation while the Bishop and the Chaplain were present. The
Duke mentioned to me his having heard Lord Holland's inclination
to your embassy. He spoke very obligingly of you, and said that,
next to his own children, he believed there was nobody the late
Lord Hardwicke loved so much as you. I cannot say that the Duke
spoke very affectionately of Sir Joseph Yorke. who has never
written a single line to him since he was out. I told him that
did not surprise me, for Sir Joseph has treated your brother in
the same manner, though the latter has written two letters to him
since his dismission.

Arlington Street, Tuesday night, 10 o'clock.

I am here alone in the most desolate of all towns. I came to-day
to visit my sovereign Duchess(644) in her lying-in, and have been
there till this moment, not a sole else but Lady Jane Scott.(645)
Lady Waldegrave came from Tunbridge yesterday en passant, and
reported a new woful history of a fracas there--don't my Lady
Hertford's ears tingle? but she will not be surprised. A
footman--a very homely footman--to a Mrs. Craster, had been most
extremely impertinent to Lord Clanbrazil, Frederick Vane, and a
son of Lady Anne Pope; they threatened to have him turned away--
he replied, if he was, he knew where he should be protected.
Tunbridge is a quiet private place, where one does not imagine
that every thing one does in one's private family will be known:-
-yet so it happened that the morning after the fellow's
dismission, it was reported that he was hired by another lady,
the Lord knows who. At night, that lady was playing at loo in
the rooms. Lord Clanbrazil told her of the report, and hoped she
would contradict it: she grew as angry as a fine lady could grow,
told him it was no business of his, and--and I am afraid, still
more. Vane whispered her--One should have thought that name
would have some weight--oh! worse and worse! the poor English
language was ransacked for terms that came up to her resentment:-
-the party broke up, and, I suppose, nobody went home to write an
account of what happened to their acquaintance.

O'Brien and Lady Susan are to be transported to the Ohio, and
have a grant of forty thousand acres. The Duchess of Grafton
says sixty thousand were bestowed; but a friend of yours, and a
relation of Lady Susan, nibbled away twenty thousand for a Mr.
Upton.

By a letter from your brother to-day, I find our northern journey
is laid aside; the Duke of Devonshire is coming to town; the
physicians want him to go to Spa. This derangement makes me turn
my eyes eagerly towards Paris; though I shall be ashamed to come
thither after the wise reasons I have given you against it in the
beginning of this letter; nous verrons--the temptation is strong,
but patriots must resist temptations; it is not the etiquette to
yield to them till a change happens.

I enclose a letter, which your brother has sent me to convey to
you, and two pamphlets.(646) The former is said to be written by
Shebbeare, under George Grenville's direction: the latter, which
makes rather more noise, is certainly composed by somebody who
does not hate your brother--I even fancy you will guess the same
person for the author that every body else does. I shall be able
to send you soon another pamphlet, written by Charles Townshend,
on the subject of the warrants:-you see, at least, we do not
ransack Newgate and the pillory(647) for writers. We leave those
to the administration.

I wish you would be so kind as to tell me, what is become of my
sister and Mr. Churchill. I received a letter from Lady Mary
to-day, telling me she was that instant setting out from Paris,
but does not say whither.

The first storm that is likely to burst in politics, seems to be
threatened from the Bedford quarter. The Duke and Duchess have
been in town but for two days the whole summer, and are now going
to Trentham, whither Lord Gower, qui se donnoit pour favori, is
retired for three months. This is very unlike the declaration in
spring, that the Duke must reside at Streatham,(648) because the
King could not spare him for a day.

The memorial(649) left by Guerchy at his departure, and the late
arr`ets in France on our American histories, make much noise, and
seem to say that I have not been a false prophet! If our
ministers can stand so many difficulties from abroad, and so much
odium at home, they are abler men than I take them for. Adieu,
the whole H`otel de Lassay!(650) I verily think I shall see it
soon.

(633) He had the lucrative office of usher of the exchequer, and
a couple of other less considerable sinecures.-C.

(634) Robert, last Earl of Holderness, grandson of the great Duke
Schomberg; he had been secretary of state at the accession.-C.

(635) Lady Hertford was daughter of the late, and cousin of the
existing Duke of Grafton, who was one of the leaders of the
opposition.-C.

(636) The state of the public mind at this time is thus described
by Gray:--"Grumble, indeed, every one does; but, since Wilkes's
affair, they fall off their metal, and seem to shrink under the
brazen hand of Norton and his colleagues. I hear there will be
no Parliament till after Christmas. If the French should be so
unwise as to suffer the Spanish court to go on in their present
measures (for they refuse to pay the ransom of Manilla, and have
driven away our logwood cutters already,) down go their friends
in the ministry, and all the schemes of right divine and
prerogative; and this is perhaps the best chance we have. Are
you not struck with the great similarity there is between the
first years of Charles the First and the present times? Who
would have thought it possible five years ago?" Works, vol. iv.
p. 34.-E.

(637) It is not easy to say what hundred and fifty years he
alludes to; the contests of Whig and Tory were never so violent
as in the last years of Queen Anne, just fifty years before this
time.-C.

(638) The Marquis of Carnarvon, eldest son of the second Duke of
Chandos.-E.

(639) See ant`e, p. 258, letter 184.

(640) Lord John and Lord Frederick Cavendish, his grace's
brothers.-E.

(641) Lady Mary, daughter of the second Lord Godolphin,
granddaughter of the great Duke of Marlborough, and sister of the
Duchess of Newcastle.-E.

(642) Dr. John Hume.-E.

(643) The reader will not fail to observe the sudden effect of
Mr. Walpole's conversion to the Duke of Newcastle's politics, how
it abates all ridicules and sweetens all acerbities. As no
writer has contributed so much as Mr. Walpole to depreciate the
character of the Duke of Newcastle, this kind of palinode is not
unimportant. See ant`e, p. 258, letter 184.-C.

(644) The Duchess of Grafton lay-in, on the 17th July 1764, of
her youngest son, Lord Charles.-E.

(645) Eldest daughter of Francis, second Duke of Buccleugh, born
1723, died in 1777, unmarried.-E.

(646) They were called "An Address to the Public on the late
dismission of a General Officer," and "A Counter Address." The
latter was written by Mr. Walpole himself.-C.

(647) Dr. Shebbeare had been convicted of a libel, and, I
believe, punished in the pillory-C. [By the indulgence of the
under-sheriff of Midllesex, the Doctor was allowed to stand on,
and not in, the pillory; for which indulgence he was prosecuted.)

(648) A villa of the Duke's at Streatham, derived from Mr.
Howland, his maternal grandfather, from whom Howland-street is
named.-C.

(649) The points in dispute between France and England at this
period arose out of the non-performance of certain articles of
the treaty-the payment of the Canada bills, and the expense of
the prisoners of war, and certain claims for compensation for
effects taken at Bellisle.-C.

(650) The house which Lord Hertford hired in Paris.-E.

Letter 219 To George Montagu, Esq.
Arlington Street, Aug. 16, 1764. (page 337)

I am not gone north, so pray write to me. I am not going south,
so pray come to me. The Duke of Devonshire's journey to Spa has
prevented the first, and twenty reasons the second; whenever
therefore you are disposed to make a visit to Strawberry, it will
rejoice to receive you in its old ruffs and fardingales, and
without rouge, blonde, and run silks.

You have not said a word to me, ingrate as you are, about Lord
Herbert; does not he deserve one line? Tell me when I shall see
you, that I may make no appointments to interfere with it. Mr.
Conway, Lady Ailesbury, and Lady Lyttelton, have been at
Strawberry with me for four or five days, so I am come to town to
have my house washed, for you know I am a very Hollander in point
of cleanliness.

This town is a deplorable solitude; one meets nothing but Mrs.
Holman, like the pelican in the wilderness. Adieu!

Letter 220 To The Earl Of Hertford.
Strawberry Hill, Aug. 27, 1764. (page 338)

I hope you received safe a parcel and a very long letter that I
sent you, above a fortnight ago, by Mr. Strange the engraver.
Scarce any thing has happened since worth repeating, but what you
know already, the death of poor Legge, and the seizure of Turk
Island:(651) the latter event very consonant to all ideas. It
makes much noise here especially in the city, where the ministry
grow every day more and more unpopular. Indeed, I think there is
not much probability of their standing their ground, even till
Christmas. Several defections are already known, and others are
ripe which they do not apprehend.

Doctor Hunter, I conclude, has sent you Charles Townshend's
pamphlet: it is well written, but does not sell much, as a notion
prevails that it has been much altered and softened.

The Duke of Devonshire is gone to Spa; he was stopped for a week
by a rash, which those who wished it so, called a miliary fever,
but was so far from it that if he does not find immediate benefit
from Spa, he is to go to Aix-la-Chapelle, in hopes that the warm
baths will supple his skin, and promote another eruption.

I have been this evening to Sion, which is becoming another Mount
Palatine. Adam has displayed great taste, and the Earl matches
it with magnificence. The gallery is converting into a museum in
the style of a columbarium, according to an idea that I proposed
to my Lord Northumberland. Mr. Boulby(652) and Lady Mary are
there, and the Primate,(653) who looks old and broken enough to
aspire to the papacy. Lord Holland, I hear, advises what Lord
Bute much wishes, the removal of George Grenville, to make room
for Lord Northumberland at the head of the treasury. The Duchess
of Grafton is gone to her father. I wish you may hear no more of
this journey! If you should, this time, the Complaints will come
from her side.

You have got the Sposo(654) Coventry with you, have not you? And
you are going to have the Duke of York. You will not want such a
nobody as me. When I have a good opportunity, I will tell you
some very sensible advice that has been given me on that head,
which I am sure you will approve.

It is well for me I am not a Russian. I should certainly be
knouted. The murder of the young Czar Ivan has sluiced again all
my abhorrence of the czarina. What a devil in a diadem! I
wonder they can spare such a principal performer from hell!

September 9th.

I had left this letter unfinished, from want of common materials,
if I should send it by the post; and from want of private
conveyance, if I said more than was fit for the post. being Just
returned from Park-place, where I have been for three days, I not
only find your extremely kind letter of August 21st, but a card
from Madame de Chabot, who tells me she sets out for Paris in a
day or two. and offers to carry a letter to you, which gives me
the opportunity I wished for.

I must begin with what you conclude-your most friendly
offer,(655) if I should be distressed by the treasury. I can
never thank you enough for this, nor the tender manner in which
you clothe it: though, believe me, my dear lord, I could never
blush to be obliged to you. In truth, though I do not doubt
their disposition to hurt me, I have had prudence enough to make
it much longer than their reign Can last, before it could be in
their power to make me feel want. With all my extravagance, I am
much beforehand, and having perfected and paid for what I wished
to do here, my common expenses are trifling, and nobody can live
more frugally than I, when I have a mind to it. What I said of
fearing temptations at Paris, was barely serious: I thought it
imprudent, just now, to throw away my money; but that
consideration, singly, would not keep me here. I am eager to be
with you, and my chief reason for delaying is, that I wish to
make a longer stay than I could just now. The advice I hinted
at, in the former part of this letter, was Lady Suffolk's, and I
am sure you will think it very sensible. She told me, should I
now go to Paris, all the world would say I went to try to
persuade you to resign; that even the report would be impertinent
to you, to whom she knew and saw I wished so well; and that when
I should return, it would be said I had failed in MY errand.
Added to this, which was surely very prudent and friendly advice,
I will own to you fairly, that I think I shall soon have it in my
power to come to you on the foot I wish,--I mean, having done
with politics, which I have told you all along, and with great
truth, are as much my abhorrence as yours. I think this
administration cannot last till Christmas, and I believe they
themselves think so. I am cautious when I say this, because I
promise you faithfully, the last thing I will do shall be to give
you any false lights knowingly. I am clear, I repeat it, against
your resigning now; and there is no meaning in all I have taken
the liberty to say to you, and which you receive with so much
goodness and sense, but to put you on your guard in such ticklish
times, and to pave imperceptibly to the world the way to your
reunion with your friends. In your brother, I am persuaded, you
will never find any alteration; and whenever you find an
opportunity proper, his credit with particular persons will
remove any coldness that may have happened. I admire the force
and reasoning with which you have stated your own situation; and
I think there are but two points in which we differ at all. I do
not see how your brother could avoid the part he chose. It was
the administration that made it--no inclination of his. The
other is a trifle; it regards Elliot, nor is it my opinion alone
that he is at Paris on business: every body believes it, and
considering his abilities, and the present difficulties of Lord
Bute, Elliot's absence would be very extraordinary, if merely
occasioned by idleness or amusement, or even to place his
children, when it lasts so long.

The affair of Turk Island, and the late promotion of Colonel
Fletcher(656) over thirty-seven older officers, are the chief
causes, added to the Canada bills, Logwood, and the Manilla
affairs, Which have ripened our heats to such a height. Lord
Mansfield's violence against the press has contributed much--but
the great distress of all to the ministers, is the behaviour of
the Duke of Bedford, who has twice or thrice peremptorily refused
to attend council. He has been at Trentham, and crossed the
country back to Woburn, without coming to town.(657) Lord Gower
has been in town but one day. Many causes are assigned for all
this; the refusal of making Lord Waldegrave of the bedchamber;
Lord Tavistocl('s inclination to the minority; and above all, a
reversion, which it is believed Lord Bute has been so weak as to
obtain, of Ampthill, a royal grant, in which the Duke has but
sixteen years to come. You know enough of that court, to know
that, in the article of Bedfordshire, no influence has any weight
with his grace. At present, indeed, I believe little is tried.
The Duchess and Lady Bute are as hostile as possible. Rigby's
journey convinces me of what I have long suspected, that his
reign is at an end. I have even heard, though I am far from
trusting to the quarter from which I had my intelligence, that
the Duke has been making overtures to Mr. Pitt,(658) which have
not been received unfavourably; I shall know more of this soon,
as I am to go to Stowe in three or four days. Mr. Pitt is
exceedingly well-disposed to your brother, talks highly of him,
and of the injustice done to him, and they are to meet on the
first convenient opportunity. Thus much for politics, which,
however, I cannot quit, without again telling you how sensible I
am of all your goodness and friendly offers.

The Court, independent of politics, makes a strange figure. 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. The drawing-rooms are
abandoned: Lady Buckingham(659) was the only woman there on
Sunday se'nnight. The Duke of York was commanded home. They
stopped his remittances,(660) and then were alarmed on finding he
still was somehow or other supplied with money. The two next
Princes(661) are at the Pavilions at Hampton Court, in very
private circumstances indeed; no household is to be established
for Prince William, who accedes nearer to the malcontents every
day. In short, one hears of nothing but dissatisfaction, which
in the city rises almost to treason.

Mrs. Cornwallis(662) has found that her husband has been
dismissed from the bedchamber this twelvemonth with no notice:
his appointments were even paid; but on this discovery they are
stopped.

You ask about what I had mentioned in the beginning of my letter,
the dissensions in the house of Grafton. The world says they are
actually parted: I do not believe that; but I will tell you
exactly all I know. His grace, it seems, for many months has
kept one Nancy Parsons,(663) one of the commonest creatures in
London, one much liked, but out of date. He is certainly grown
immoderately attached to her, so much, that it has put an end to
all his decorum. She was publicly with him at Ascot races, and
is now in the forest;(664) I do not know if actually in the
house. At first, I concluded this was merely stratagem to pique
the Duchess; but it certainly goes further. Before the Duchess
laid in, she had a little house on Richmond-Hill, whither the
Duke sometimes, though seldom, came to dine. During her month of
confinement, he was scarcely in town at all, nor did he even come
up to see the Duke of Devonshire. The Duchess is certainly gone
to her father. She affected to talk of the Duke familiarly, and
said she would call in the forest as she went to Lord
Ravensworth's. I suspect she is gone thither to recriminate and
complain. She did not talk of returning till October. It was
said the Duke was going to France, but I hear no more of it.
Thus the affair stands, as far as I or your brother, or the
Cavendishes, know; nor have we heard one word from either Duke or
Duchess of any rupture. I hope she will not be so weak as to
part, and that her father and mother will prevent it. It is not
unlucky that she has seen none of the Bedfords lately, who would
be glad to blow the coals. Lady Waldegrave was with her one day,
but I believe not alone.