Books: The Letters of Horace Walpole Volume 3

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Letter 253 To George Montagu, Esq.
Strawberry Hill, May 26, 1765. (page 405)

If one of the one hundred events, and one hundredth part of the
one hundred thousand reports that have passed, and been spread in
this last month, have reached your solitary hill, you must be
surprised at not a single word from me during that period. The
number of events is my excuse. Though mine is the pen of a
pretty ready writer, I could not keep pace with the revolution of
each day, each hour. I had not time to begin the narrative, much
less to finish it: no, I Must keep the whole to tell you at once,
or to read it to you, for I think I shall write the history,
which, let me tell you, Buckinger himself could not have crowded
into a nutshell.

For your part, you will be content though the house of Montagu
has not made an advantageous figure in this political warfare;
yet it is crowned with victory, and laurels you know compensate
for every scar. You went out of town frightened out of your
senses at the giant prerogative: alack! he is grown so tame,
that, as you said of our earthquake, you may stroke him.(842) The
Regency-bill, not quite calculated with that intent, has produced
four regents, King Bedford, king Grenville, King Halifax, and
king Twitcher.(843) Lord Holland is turned out, and Stuart
Mackenzie. Charles Townshend is paymaster, and Lord Bute
annihilated; and all done without the help of the Whigs. You
love to guess what one is going to say. Now you may what I am
not going to say. your newspapers perhaps have given you a long
roll of opposition names, who were coming into place, and so all
the world thought; but the Wind turned quite round, and left them
on the strand, and just where they were, except in opposition
which is declared to be at an end. Enigma as all this may sound,
the key would open it all to you in the twinkling of an
administration. In the mean time we have family reconciliations
without end. The King and the Duke of Cumberland have been shut
up together day and night; Lord Temple and George Grenville are
sworn brothers; well, but Mr. Pitt, where is he? In the clouds,
for aught I know; in one of which he may descend like the kings
of Bantam, and take quiet possession of the throne again.

As a thorough-bass to these squabbles, we have had an
insurrection and a siege. Bedford-house, though garrisoned by
horse and foot guards, was on the point of being taken. The
besieged are in their turn triumphant; and, if any body now was
to publish "Droit le Duc,"(844) I do not think the House of Lords
would censure his book. Indeed the regents may do what they
please, and turn out whom they will; I see nothing to resist
them. Lord Bute will not easily be tempted to rebel when the
last struggle has cost him so dear.

I am sorry for some of my friends, to whom I wished more fortune.
For myself, I am but just where I should have been had they
succeeded. It is satisfaction enough to me to be delivered from
politics; which you know I have long detested. When I was
tranquil enough to write Castles of Otranto in the midst of grave
nonsense and foolish councils of war, I am not likely to disturb
myself with the diversions of the court where I am not connected
with a soul. As it has proved to be the interest of the present
ministers, however contrary to their torturer views, to lower the
crown, they will scarce be in a hurry to aggrandize it again.
That will satisfy you; and I, you know, am satisfied if I have
any thing to laugh at--'tis a lucky age for a man who is so
easily contented!

The poor Chute has had another relapse, but is out of bed again.
I am thinking of my journey to France; but, as Mr. Conway has a
mind I should wait for him, I don't know whether it will take
place before the autumn. I will by no means release you from
your promise of making me a visit here before I go.

Poor Mr. Bentley, I doubt, is under the greatest difficulties of
any body. His poem, which he modestly delivered over to
immortality, must be cut and turned; for Lord Halifax and Lord
Bute cannot sit in the same canto together; then the horns and
hoofs that he had bestowed on Lord Temple must be pared away, and
beams of glory distributed over his whole person. 'Tis a
dangerous thing to write political panegyrics or satires; it
draws the unhappy bard into a thousand scrapes and
contradictions. The edifices and inscriptions at Stowe should be
a lesson not to erect monuments to the living. I will not place
an ossuarium in my garden for my cat, before her bones are ready
to be placed in it. I hold contradictions to be as essential to
the definition of a political man, as any visible or featherless
quality can be to man in general. Good night!

28th.

I shall send this by the coach; so whatever comes with it is only
to make bundle. Here are some lines that came into my head
yesterday in the postchaise, as I was reading in the Annual
Register an account of a fountain-tree in one of the Canary
Islands, which never dies, and supplies the inhabitants with
water. I don't warrant the longevity though the hypostatic union
of a fountain may eternize the tree.

"In climes adust, where rivers never flow,
Where constant suns repel approaching snow,
How Nature's various and inventive hand
Can pour unheard-of moisture o'er the land!
immortal plants she bids on rocks arise,
And from the dropping branches streams supplies,
The thirsty native sucks the falling shower,
Nor asks for juicy fruit or blooming flower;
But haply doubts when travellers maintain,
That Europe's forests melt not into rain."

(842) See ant`e, p. 365, letter 237.-E.

(843) Wilkes, in the North Briton, had applied to the Earl of
Sandwich the sobriquet of jemmy Twitcher.-E.

(844) ant`e, p. 294, letter 194.-E.

Letter 254 To George Montagu, Esq.
Strawberry Hill, June 10, 1765, Eleven at night. (page 407)

I am just come out of the garden in the most oriental of all
evenings, and from breathing odours beyond those of Araby. The
acacias, which the Arabians have the sense to worship, are
covered with blossoms, the honeysuckles dangle from every tree in
festoons, the seringas are thickets of sweets, and the new-cut
hay in the field tempers the balmy gales with simple freshness;
while a thousand sky-rockets launched into the air at Ranelagh or
Marybone illuminate the scene, and give it an air of Haroun
Alraschid's paradise. I was not quite so content by daylight;
some foreigners dined here, and, though they admired our verdure,
it mortified me by its brownness--we have not had a drop of rain
this month to cool the tip of our daisies. My company was Lady
Lyttelton, Lady Schaub, a Madame de Juliac from the Pyreneans,
very handsome, not a girl, and of Lady Schaub's mould; the Comte
de Caraman, nephew of Madame de Mirepoix, a Monsieur de
Clausonnette, and General Schouallow,(845) the favourite of the
late Czarina; absolute favourite for a dozen years, without
making an enemy. In truth, he is very amiable, humble, and
modest. Had he been ambitious, he might have mounted the throne:
as he was not, you may imagine they have plucked his plumes a
good deal. There is a little air of melancholy about him, and,
if I am not mistaken, Some secret wishes for the fall of the
present Empress; which, if it were civil to suppose, I could
heartily join with him in hoping for. As we have still liberty
enough left to dazzle a Russian, he seems charmed with England,
and perhaps liked even this place the more as belonging to the
son of one that, like himself, had been prime minister. If he
has no more ambition left than I have, he must taste the felicity
of being a private man. What has Lord Bute gained, but the
knowledge of how many ungrateful sycophants favour and power can
create?

If you have received the parcel that I consined to Richard Brown
for you, you will have found an explanation of my long silence.
Thank you for being alarmed for my health.

The day after to-morrow I go to Park-place for four or five days,
and soon after to Goodwood. My French journey is still in
suspense; Lord Hertford talks of coming over for a fortnight;
perhaps I may go back with him; but I have determined nothing
yet, till I see farther into the present chase, that somehow or
other I may take my leave of politics for ever; for can any thing
be so wearisome as politics on the account of others? Good
night! shall I not see you here? Yours ever.

(845) The Comte de Schouwaloff. See ant`e, p. 382, letter 245.
Walpole says, in a note to Madame du Deffand's letter to him of
the 19th of April, 1766, "Il fut IC favori, l'on croit le mari,
de la Czarine Elizabeth de Russie, et pendant douze ans de faveur
il ne se fit point un ennemi."-E.

Letter 255 To The Right Hon. Lady Hervey.
Strawberry Hill, June 11, 1765. (page 408)

I am almost as much ashamed, Madam, to plead the true cause of my
faults towards your ladyship, as to have been guilty of any
neglect. It is scandalous, at my age, to have been carried
backwards and forwards to balls and suppers and parties by very
young people, as I was all last week. My resolutions of growing
old and staid are admirable: I wake with a sober plan, and intend
to pass the day with my friends--then comes the Duke of Richmond,
and hurries me down to Whitehall to dinner-then the Duchess of
Grafton sends for me to loo in Upper Grosvenor-street--before I
can get thither, I am begged to step to Kensington, to give Mrs.
Anne Pitt my opinion about a bow-window--after the loo, I am to
march back to Whitehall to supper-and after that, am to walk with
Miss Pelham on the terrace till two in the morning, because it is
moonlight and her chair is not come. All this does not help my
morning laziness; and, by the time I have breakfasted, fed my
birds and my squirrels, and dressed, there is an auction ready.
In short, Madam, this was my life last week, and is I think every
week, with the addition of forty episodes. Yet, ridiculous as it
is, I send it your ladyship, because I had rather you should
laugh at me than be angry. I cannot offend you in intention, but
I fear my sins of omission are equal to many a good Christian's.
Pray forgive me. I really will begin to be between forty and
fifty by the time I am fourscore; and I truly believe I shall
bring my resolutions within compass; for I have not chalked out
any particular business that will take me above forty years more;
so that, if I do not get acquainted with the grandchildren of all
the present age, I shall lead a quiet sober life yet before I
die.

As Mr. Bateman's is the kingdom of flowers, I must not wish to
send you any; else, Madam, I should load wagons with acacias,
honeysuckles, and seringas. Madame de Juliac, who dined here
owned that the climate and odours equalled Languedoc. I fear the
want of rain made the turf put her in mind of it, too. Monsieur
de Caraman entered into the gothic spirit of the place, and
really seemed pleased, which was more than I expected; for,
between you and me, Madam, our friends the French have seldom
eyes for any thing they have not been used to see all their
lives. I beg my warmest compliments to your host and Lord
Ilchester. I wish your ladyship all pleasure and health, and am,
notwithstanding my idleness, your most faithful and devoted
humble servant.

Letter 256 To George Montagu, Esq.
Arlington Street, Saturday night. (page 409)

I must scrawl a line to you, though with the utmost difficulty,
for I am in my bed; but I see they have foolishly put it into the
Chronicle that I am dangerously ill; and as I know you take in
that paper, and are one of the very, very few, of whose
tenderness and friendship I have not the smallest doubt, I give
myself pain, rather than let you feel a moment's unnecessarily.
It is true, I have had a terrible attack of the gout in my
stomach, head, and both feet, but have truly never been in danger
any more than one must be in such a situation. My head and
stomach are perfectly well; my feet far from it. I have kept my
room since this day se'nnight, and my bed these three days, but
hope to get up to-morrow. You know my writing and my veracity,
and that I would not deceive you. As to my person, it will not
be so easy to reconnoitre it, for I question whether any of it
will remain; it was easy to annihilate so airy a substance.
Adieu!

Letter 257 To The Hon. H. S. Conway.
Wednesday noon, July 3, 1765. (page 410)

The footing part of my dance with my shocking partner the gout is
almost over. I had little pain there this last night, and got,
at twice, about three hours' sleep; but, whenever I waked, found
my head very bad, which Mr. Graham thinks gouty too. The fever
is still very high: but the same sage is of opinion, with my Lady
LOndonderry, that if it was a fever from death, I should die; but
as it is only a fever from the gout, I shall live. I think so
too, and hope that, like the Duke and Duchess of Marlborough.,
they are so inseparable, that when one goes t'other will.

Tell Lady Ailesbury, I fear it will be long before I shall be
able to compass all your terraces again. The weather is very
hot, and I have the (comfort of a window open all day. I have
got a bushel of roses too, and a new scarlet nightingale, which
does not sing Nancy Dawson from morning to night. Perhaps you
think all these poor pleasures; but you are ignorant what a
provocative the gout is, and what charms it can bestow on a
moment's amusement! Oh! it beats all the refinements of a Roman
sensualist. It has made even my watch a darling plaything; I
strike it as often as a child does. Then the disorder of my
sleep diverts me when I am awake. I dreamt that I went to see
Madame de Bentheim at Paris, and that she had the prettiest
palace in the world, built like a pavilion, of yellow laced with
blue; that I made love to her daughter, whom I called
Mademoiselle Bleue et Jaune, and thought it very clever.

My next reverie was very serious, and lasted half an hour after I
was awake; which you will perhaps think a little light-headed,
and so do I. I thought Mr. Pitt had had a conference with Madame
de Bentheim, and granted all her demands. I rung for Louis at
six in the morning, and wanted to get up and inform myself of
what had been kept so secret from me. You must know, that all
these visions of Madame de Bentheim flowed from George Selwyn
telling me last night, that she had carried most of her points,
and was returning. What stuff I tell you! But alas! I have
nothing better to do, sitting on my bed, and wishing to forget
how brightly the sun shines, when I cannot be at Strawberry.
Yours ever.

Letter 258 To The Countess Of Suffolk.(846)
London, July 3, 1765. (page 411)

Your ladyship's goodness to me on all occasions makes me flatter
myself that I am not doing an impertinence in telling you I am
alive; though, after what I have suffered, you may be sure there
cannot be much of me left. The gout has been a little in my
stomach, much more in my head, but luckily never out of my right
foot, and for twelve, thirteen, and seventeen hours together,
insisting upon having its way as absolutely as ever my Lady
Blandford(847) did. The extremity of pain seems to be over,
though I sometimes think my tyrant puts in his claim to t'other
foot; and surely he is, like most tyrants, mean as well as cruel,
or he could never have thought the leg of a lark such a prize.
The fever, the tyrant's first minister, has been as vexatious as
his master, and makes use of this hot day to plague me more; yet,
as I was sending a servant to Twickenham, I could not help
scrawling out a few lines to ask how your ladyship does, to tell
you how I am, and to lament the roses, strawberries, and banks of
the river. I know nothing, Madam, of ,any kings or ministers but
those I have mentioned; and this administration I fervently hope
will be changed soon, and for all others I shall be very
indifferent. had a (,real prince come to my bedside yesterday, I
should have begged that the honour might last a very few minutes.
I am, etc.

(846) Now first collected.

(847) lady Blandford was somewhat impatient in her temper. See
ant`e, p. 342, letter 220.-E.

letter 259 To The Countess Of Suffolk.(848)
Arlington Street, July 9, 1765. (page 411)

Madam,
though instead of getting better, as I flattered myself I should,
I have gone through two very painful and sleepless nights, yet as
I give audience here in my bed to new ministers and foreign
ministers, I think it full as much my duty to give an account of
myself to those who are so good as to wish me well. I am reduced
to nothing but bones and spirits; but the latter make me bear the
inconvenience of the former, though they (I mean my bones) lie in
a heap over one another like the bits of ivory at the game of
straws.

It is very melancholy, at the instant I was getting quit of
politics, to be visited with the only thing that is still more
plaguing. However, I believe the fit of politics going off makes
me support the new-comer better. Neither of them indeed will
leave me plumper;(849) but if they will both leave me at peace,
your ladyship knows it is all I have ever desired. The chiefs
of' the new ministry were to have kissed hands to-day; but Mr.
Charles Townshend, who, besides not knowing either of his own
minds, has his brother's minds to know too, could not determine
last night. Both brothers are gone to the King to-day. I was
much concerned to hear so bad an account of your ladyship's
health. Other people would wish you a severe fit, which is a
very cheap wish to them who do not feel it: I, who do, advise you
to be content with it in detail. Adieu! Madam. Pray keep a
little summer for me. I will give You a bushel of politics, when
I come to Marble Hill, for a teacup of strawberries and cream.

Mr. Chetwynd,(851) I suppose, is making the utmost advantage of
any absence, frisking and cutting capers before Miss Hotham, and
advising her not to throw herself away on a decrepit old man.-
-Well, fifty years hence he may begin to be an old man too; and
then I shall not pity him, though I own he is the best-humoured
lad in the world now. Yours, etc.

(848) Now first collected.

(849) Walpole was too fond of this boast of disinterestedness.
What was it but politics that made his fortune so plump? His
fortune from his father, we know from himself, was very
inconsiderable;-but from his childhood he held sinecure offices
which, during the greater part of his life, produced him between
six and seven thousand pounds per annum.-C.

(851) William Chetwynd, brother of the two first Viscounts, and
himself, in 1767, third Viscount Chetwynd. He was at this time
nearly eighty years of age.-E.

Letter 260 To George Montagu, Esq.
Arlington Street, July 11, 1765. (page 412)

You are so good, I must write you a few lines, and you will
excuse My not writing many, my posture is so uncomfortable, lying
on a couch by the side of my bed, and writing on the bed. I have
in this manner been what they call out of bed for two days, but I
mend very slowly, and get no strength in my feet at all; however,
I must have patience.

Thank you for your kind offer; but, my dear Sir, you can do me no
good but what you always do me, in coming to see me. I
should hope that would be before I go to France, whither I
certainly go the beginning of September, if not sooner. The
great and happy change-happy, I hope, for this country--is
actually begun. The Duke of Bedford, George Grenville, and the
two Secretaries are discarded. Lord Rockingham is first lord of
the treasury, Dowdeswell chancellor of the exchequer, the Duke of
Grafton and Mr. Conway secretaries of state. You need not wish
me joy, for I know you do. There is a good deal more to
come,(852) and what is better, regulation of general warrants,
and of undoing at least some of the mischiefs these - have been
committing; some, indeed, is past recovery! I long to talk it
all over with you; though it is hard that when I may write what I
will, I am not able. The poor Chute is relapsed again, and we
are no comfort to one another but by messages. An offer from
Ireland was sent to Lord Hertford last night from his brother's
office. Adieu!

(852) "There has been pretty clean sweeping already," wrote Lord
Chesterfield on the 15th; and I do not remember, in my time, to
have seen so much at once, as an entire new board of treasury,
and two new secretaries, etc. Here is a new political arch
built; but of materials of so different a nature, and without a
keystone, that it does not, in my opinion, indicate either
strength or duration. It will certainly require repairs and a
keystone next winter, and that keystone will and must necessarily
be Mr. Pitt."-E.

Letter 262 To George Montagu, Esq.
Strawberry Hill, August 23, 1765. (page 414)

As I know that when you love people, you love them, I feel for
the concern that the death of Lady Bab. Montagu(854) Will give
you. Though you have long lived out of the way of seeing her,
you are not a man to forget by absence, or all your friends would
have still more reason to complain of your retirement. Your
solitude prevents your filling up the places of those that are
gone. In the world, new acquaintances slide into our habits, but
you keep so strict a separation between your old friends and new
faces, that the loss of any of the former must be more Sensible
to you than to most people. I heartily condole with you, and yet
I must make you smile. The second Miss Jefferies was to go to a
ball yesterday at Hampton-court with Lady Sophia Thomas's
daughters. The news came, and your aunt Cosby said the girl must
not go to it. The poor child then cried in earnest. Lady Sophia
went to intercede for her, and found her grandmother at
backgammon, who would hear no entreaties. Lady Sophia
represented that Miss Jefferies was but a second cousin, and
could not have been acquainted. "Oh! Madam, if there is no
tenderness left in the world-cinq ace--Sir, you are to throw."

We have a strange story come from London. Lord Fortescue was
dead suddenly; there was a great mob about his house in
Grosvenor-square, and a buzz that my lady had thrown up the sash
and cried murder, and that he then shot himself. How true all
this I don't know: at least it is not so false as if it was in
the newspapers. However, these sultry summers do not suit English
heads: this last month puts even the month of November's nose out
of joint for self-murders. If it was not for the Queen the
peerage would be extinct: she has given us another Duke.(855)

My two months are up, and yet I recover my feet very slowly. I
have crawled once round my garden; but it sent me to my couch for
the rest of the day. This duration of weakness makes me very
impatient, as I wish much to be at Paris before the fine season
is quite gone. This will probably be the last time I shall
travel to finish my education, and I should be glad to look once
more at their gardens and villas: nay, churches and palaces are
but uncomfortable sights in cold weather, and I have much more
curiosity for their habitations than their company. They have
scarce a man or a woman of note that one wants to see; and, for
their authors, their style is grown so dull in imitation of us,
they are si philosophes, si g`eom`etres, si moraux, that I
certainly should not cross the sea in search of ennui, that I can
have in such perfection at home. However, the change of scene is
my chief inducement, and to get out of politics. There is no
going through another course of patriotism in your cousin
Sandwich and George Grenville. I think of setting out by the
middle of September; have I any chance of seeing you here before
that? Won't you come and commission me to offer up your
devotions to Notre Dame de Livry?(8 or chez nos filles de Sainte
Marie. If I don't make haste, the reformation in France will
demolish half that I want to see. I tremble for the Val de Grace
and St. Cyr. The devil take Luther for putting it into the heads
of his methodists to pull down the churches! I believe in twenty
years there Will not be a convent left in Europe but this at
Strawberry. I wished for you to-day; Mr. Chute and Cowslade
dined here; the day was divine: the sun gleamed down into the
chapel in all the glory of popery; the gallery was all radiance;
we drank our coffee on the bench under the great ash-tree; the
verdure was delicious; our tea in the Holbein room, by which a
thousand chaises and barges passed; and I showed them my new
cottage and garden over the way, which they had never seen, and
with which they were enchanted. It is so retired, so modest, and
yet so cheerful and trim, that I expect you to fall in love with
it. I intend to bring it a handful of treillage and agr`emens
from Paris; for being cross the road, and quite detached, it is
to have nothing gothic about it, nor pretend to call cousins with
the mansion-house.

I know no more of the big world at London, than if I had not a
relation in the ministry. To be free from pain and politics is
such a relief to me, that I enjoy my little comforts and
amusements here beyond expression. No mortal ever entered the
gate of ambition with such transport as I took leave of them all
at the threshold. Oh! if my Lord Temple knew what pleasures he
could create for himself at Stowe, he would not harass a
shattered carcass, and sigh to be insolent at St. James's! For my
part, I say with the bastard in King John, though with a little
more reverence, and only as touching his ambition,
Oh! old Sir Robert, father, on my knee
I give Heaven thanks I was not like to thee.