Books: The Letters of Horace Walpole, Volume 1

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(771) Philip, second Earl Stanhope, born in 1714. He
succeeded his father when he was only seven years old, and
died in 1786. His character is thus sketched by his great-
grandson, Viscount Mahon, in his History of England, vol. iii.
p. 242.-"He had great talents, but fitter for speculation than
for practical objects of action. He made himself one of the
best-Lalande used to say the best-mathematicians in England of
his day, and was likewise deeply skilled in other branches of
science and philosophy. The Greek language was as familiar to
him as the English; he was said to know every line of Homer by
heart. In public life, on the contrary, he was shy, ungainly,
and embarrassed. From his first onset in Parliament, he took
part with vehemence against the administration of Sir Robert
Walpole." Bishop Secker says, that Lord Stanhope "spoke a
precomposed speech, which he held in his hand, with great
tremblings and agitations, and hesitated frequently in the
midst of great vehemence."-E.

(772) Lord Hervey.

(773) Lord Gower.

(774) Edward Bligh, second Earl of Darnley, in Ireland, and
Lord of the Bedchamber to Frederic Prince of Wales.-D.

309 Letter 97
To Sir Horace Mann.
Feb. 13, 1743.

Ceretesi tells me that Madame Galli is dead: I have had two
letters from you this week; but the last mentions only the
death of old Strozzi. I am quite sorry for Madame Galli,
because I proposed seeing her again, on my return to Florence,
which I have firmly in my intention: I hope it will be a
little before Ceretesi's, for he seems to be planted here. I
don't conceive who -waters him! Here are two noble Venetians
that have carried him about lately to Oxford and Blenheim: I
am literally waiting for him now, to introduce him to Lady
Brown's sunday night; it is the great mart for all travelling
and travelled calves-pho! here he is.

Monday morning.-Here is your brother: he tells me you never
hear from me; how can that be? I receive yours, and you
generally mention having got one of mine, though long after
the time you should. I never miss above one post, and that
but very seldom. I am longer receiving yours, though you have
never missed; but then-I frequently receive two at once. I am
delighted with Goldsworthy's mystery about King Theodore! If
you will promise me not to tell him, I will tell you@a secret,
which is, that if that person is not King Theodore, I assure
you it is not Sir Robert Walpole.

I have nothing to tell you but that Lord Effingham Howard(775)
is dead, and Lord Litchfield(776) at the point of death; he
was struck with a palsy last Thursday. Adieu!

(775) Francis, first Earl of Effingham, and seventh Lord
Howard of Effingham. He died February 12, 1743.-D.

(776) George Henry Lee, second Earl of Lichfield. He died
February 15, 1743.-D.

309 Letter 98
To Sir Horace Mann.
Arlington Street, Feb. 24, 1743.

I write to you in the greatest hurry in the world, but write I
will. Besides, I must wish you joy; you are warriors; nay,
conquerors;(777) two things quite novel in this war, for
hitherto it has been armies without fighting, and deaths
without killing. We talk of this battle as of a comet; "Have
you heard of the battle?" it Is so strange a thing, that
numbers imagine you may go (ind see it at Charing Cross.
Indeed, our officers, who are going to Flanders, don't quite
like it; they are afraid it should grow the fashion to fight,
and that a pair of colours should be no longer a sinecure. I
am quite unhappy about poor Mr. Chute: besides, it is cruel to
find that abstinence is not a drug. If mortification ever
ceases to be a medicine, or virtue to be a passport to
carnivals in the other world, who will be a self-tormentor any
longer-not, my child, that I am one; but, tell me, is he quite
recovered?

I thank you for King Theodore's declaration,(778) and wish Him
success with all my soul. I hate the Genoese; they make a
commonwealth the most devilish of all tyrannies!

We have every now and then motions for disbanding Hessians and
Hanoverians, alias mercenaries; but they come to nothing.
To-day the party have declared that they have done for this
session; so you will hear little more but of fine equipages
for Flanders: our troops are actually marched, and the
officers begin to follow them-1 hopes they know whither! You
know in the last war in Spain, Lord Peterborough rode
galloping about to inquire for his army.

But to come to more real contests; Handel has set up an
oratorio against the opera @ind succeeds. He has hired all
the goddesses from farces and the singers of Roast Beef(779)
from between the acts at both theatres, with a man with one
note in his voice, and a girl without ever an one; and so they
sing, and make brave hallelujahs; and the good company encore
the recitative, if it happens to have any cadence like what
they call a tune. I was much diverted the other night at the
opera; two gentlewoman sat before my sister, and not knowing
her, discoursed at their ease. Says one, "Lord! how fine Mr.
W. is!" "Yes," replied the other, with a tone of saying
sentences, "some men love to be particularly so, your
petit-maitres-but they are not always the brightest of their
sex.'@-Do thank me for this period! I am sure you will enjoy
it as much as we did.

I shall be very glad of my things, and approve entirely of
your precautions; Sir R. will be quite happy, for there is no
telling YOU how impatient he is for his Dominichin. Adieu!

(777) This alludes to an engagement, which took place on the
8th of February, near Bologna, between the Spaniards under M.
de Gages, and the Austrians under General Traun, in which the
latter were successful.-D.

(778) With regard to Corsica, of which he had declared himself
King. By this declaration, which was dated January 30,
Theodore recalled, under pain of confiscation of their
estates, all the Corsicans in foreign service, except that of
the Queen of Hungary, and the Grand Duke of Tuscany.-E.

(779) It was customary at this time for the galleries to call
for a ballad called "The Roast Beef of Old England," between
the acts, or before or after the play.

310 Letter 99
To Sir Horace Mann.
March 3d, 1743.

So, she is dead at last, the old Electress!(780)-well, I have
nothing more to say about her and the Medici; they had
outlived all their acquaintance: indeed, her death makes the
battle very considerable -makes us call a victory what before
we did not look upon as very decided laurels.

Lord Hervey has entertained the town with another piece of
wisdom: on Sunday it was declared that he had married his
eldest daughter the night before to a Mr. Phipps,(781)
grandson of the Duchess of Buckingham. They sent for the boy
but the day before from Oxford, and bedded them at a day's
notice. But after all this mystery, it does not turn out that
there is any thing great in this match, but the greatness of
the secret. Poor
Hervey,(782) the brother, is in fear and trembling, for he
apprehends being ravished to bed to some fortune or other with
as little ceremony. The Oratorios thrive abundantly-for my
part, they give me an idea of heaven, where every body is to
sing whether they have voices or not.

The Board (the Jacobite Club) have chosen his Majesty's Lord
Privy Seal(783) for their President, in the room of Lord
Litchfield. Don't you like the harmony of parties? We expect
the parliament will rise this month: I shall be sorry, for if
I am not hurried out of town, at least every body else
will-and who can look forward from April to November? Adieu!
though I write in defiance of having nothing to say, yet you
see I can't go a great way in this obstinacy; but you will
bear a short letter rather than none.

(780) Anna Maria of Medicis, daughter of Cosmo III. widow of
John William, Elector Palatine. After her husband's death she
returned to Florence, where she died, Feb @ 7 1743, aged
seventy-five, being the last of that family.

(781) Constantine Phipps, in 1767, created Lord Mulgrave in
Ireland. He married, on the 26th of February, Lepel, eldest
daughter of Lord Hervey, and died in 1775. Her ladyship was
found dead in her bed, 9th March, 1780, at her son's house in
the Admiralty.-E.

(782) George William Hervey, afterwards second Earl of
Bristol. He died unmarried, in 1775.-E.

(783) Lord Gower.

311 Letter 100
To Sir Horace Mann.
Arlington Street, March 14, 1743.

I don't at all know how to advise you about mourning; I always
think that the custom of a country, and what other foreign
ministers do, should be your rule. But I had a private
scruple rose with me: that was, whether you should show so
much respect to the late woman (784) as other ministers do,
since she left that legacy to Quella a Roma.(785) I mentioned
this to my lord, but he thinks that the tender manner of her
wording it, takes off that exception; however, he thinks it
better that you should write for advice to your commanding
officer. That will be very late, and you will probably have
determined before. You see what a casuist I am in ceremony; I
leave the question more perplexed than I found it.

Pray, Sir, congratulate me upon the new acquisition of glory
to my family! We have long been eminent statesmen; now that we
are out of employment we have betaken ourselves to war-and we
have made great proficiency in a short season. We don't run,
like my Lord Stair, into Berg and Juliers, to seek battles
where we are sure of not finding them-we make shorter marches;
a step across the Court of Requests brings us to engagement.
But not to detain you any longer with flourishes, which will
probably be inserted in my uncle Horace's patent when he is
made a field-marshal; you must know that he has fought a duel,
and has scratched a scratch three inches long on the side of
his enemy-lo Paon! The circumstances of this memorable
engagement were, in short, that on some witness being to be
examined the other day in the House upon remittances to the
army, my uncle said, He hoped they would indemnify him, if he
told any thing that affected himself." Soon after he was
standing behind the Speaker's chair, and Will. Chetwynd,(786)
an intimate of Bolingbroke, came up to him, What, Mr. Walpole,
are you for rubbing up old sores?" He replied, "I think I said
very little, considering that you and your friends would last
year have hanged up me and my brother at the lobby-door
without a trial." Chetwynd answered, I would still have you
both have your deserts." The other said, If you and I had,
probably I should be here and you would be somewhere else."
This drew more words, and Chetwynd took him by the arm and led
him out. In the lobby, Horace said, "We shall be-observed, we
had better put it off till to-morrow." "No, no, now! now!"
When they came to the bottom of the stairs, Horace said, "I am
out of breath, let us draw here." They drew; Chetwynd hit him
on the breast, but was not near enough to pierce his coat.
Horace made a pass which the other put by with his hand, but
It glanced along his side-a clerk, who had observed them go
out together so arm-in-arm-ly, could not believe it amicable,
but followed them, and came up just time enough to beat down
their swords, as Horace had driven him against a post, and
would probably have run him through at the next thrust.
Chetwynd went away to a surgeon's, and kept his bed the next
day; he has not reappeared yet, but is in no danger. My uncle
returned to the House, and was so little moved as to speak
immediately upon the Cambrick bill, which made Swinny say,
"That it was a sign he was not ruffled."(787) Don't you
delight in this duel? I expect to see it daubed up by some
circuit-painter on the ceiling of the saloon at Woolterton.

I have no news to tell you, but that we hear King Theodore has
sent over proposals of his person and crown to Lady Lucy
Stanhope,(788) with whom he fell in love the last time he was
in England.

Princess Buckingham(789) is dead or dying: she has sent for
Mr. Anstis, and settled the ceremonial of her burial. On
Saturday she was so ill that she feared dying before all the
pomp was come home: she said, "Why won't they send the canopy
for me to see? let them send it, though all the tassels are
not finished." But yesterday was the greatest stroke of all!
She made her ladies vow to her, that if she should lie
senseless, they would not sit down in the room before she was
dead. She has a great mind to be buried by her father at
Paris. Mrs. Selwyn says, "She need not be carried out of
England, and yet be buried by her father." You know that Lady
Dorchester always told her, that old Graham(790) was her
father.

I am much obliged to you for the trouble you have taken about
the statue; do draw upon me for it immediately, and for all my
other debts to you: I am sure they must be numerous; pray
don't fail.

A thousand loves to the Chutes: a thousand compliments to the
Princess; and a thousand-what? to the Grifona. Alas! what can
one do? I have forgot all my Italian. Adieu!

(784) The Electress Palatine Dowager.

(785) She left a legacy to the Pretender, describing him only
by these words, To Him at Rome.

(786) William Chetwynd, brother of the Lord Viscount Chetwynd.
On the coalition he was made Master of the Mint.

(787) Coxe, in his Memoirs of Lord Walpole, gives the
following account of this duel: "A motion being made in the
House of Commons, which Mr. Walpole supported, he said to Mr.
Chetwynd, 'I hope we shall carry this question.' Mr. Chetwynd
replied, 'I hope to see you hanged first!' 'You see me hanged
first!' rejoined Mr. Walpole and instantly seized him by the
nose. They went out and fought. The account being conveyed
to Lord Orford, he sent his son to make inquiries; who, on
coming into the House of Commons, found his uncle speaking
with the same composure as if nothing had happened to ruffle
his tamper or endanger his life. Mr. Chetwynd was wounded."
vol. ii. p. 68.-E.

(788) Sister of Philip, second Earl Stanhope.

(789) Catherine, Duchess of Buckingham, natural daughter of
King James II. by the Countess of Dorchester. She was so
proud of her birth, that she would never go to Versailles,
because they would not give her the rank of Princess of the
Blood. At Rome, whither she went two or three times to see
her brother, and to carry on negotiations with him for his
interest, she had a box at the Opera distinguished like those
of crowned heads. She not only regulated the ceremony of her
own burial, and dressed up the waxen figure of herself for
Westminster Abbey, but had shown the same insensible pride on
the death of her only son, dressing his figure, and sending
messages to her friends, that if they had a mind to see him
lie in state, she would carry them in conveniently by a
back-door. She sent to the old Duchess of Marlborough to
borrow the triumphal car that had carried the Duke's body.
Old Sarah, as mad and proud as herself, sent her word, "that
it had carried my Lord Marlborough, and should never be
profaned by any other corpse." The Buckingham retorted that,
"she had spoken to the undertaker, and he had engaged to make
a finer for twenty pounds." [See ant`e, p. 204.]

(790) Colonel Graham. When the Duchess was young, and as
insolent as afterwards, her mother used to say, "You need not
be so proud, for you are not the King's but old Graham's
daughter." It is certain, that his legitimate daughter, the
Countess of Berkshire and Suffolk, was extremely like the
Duchess, and that he often said with a sneer, "Well, well,
kings are great men, they make free with whom they please! All
I can say is, that I am sure the same man begot those two
women." The Duchess often went to weep over her father's body
at Paris: one of the monks seeing her tenderness, thought it a
proper opportunity to make her observe how ragged the pall is
that lies over the body, (which is kept unburied, to be some
time or other interred in England,)-but she would not buy a
new!

314 Letter 101
To Sir Horace Mann.
Arlington Street, March 25, 1743.

Well! my dear Sir, the Genii, or whoever are to look after the
seasons, seem to me to change turns, and to wait instead of
one another, like lords of the bedchamber. We have had loads
of sunshine all the winter; and within these ten days nothing
but snows, north-east winds, and blue plagues. The last ships
have brought over all your epidemic distempers: not a family
in London has escaped under five or six ill: many people have
been forced to hire new labourers. Guernier, the apothecary,
took two new apothecaries, and yet could not drug all his
patients. It is a cold and fever. I had one of the worst,
and was blooded on Saturday and Sunday, but it is quite gone:
my father was blooded last night: his is but slight. The
physicians say that there has been nothing like it since the
year Thirty-three, and then not so bad: in short, our army
abroad would shudder to see what streams of blood have been
let out! Nobody has died of it, but old Mr. Eyres, of Chelsea,
through obstinacy of not bleeding; and his ancient Grace of
York:(791) Wilcox of Rochester(792) succeeds him, who is fit
for nothing in the world, but to die of this cold too.

They now talk of the King's not going abroad: I like to talk
on that side; because though it may not be true, one may at
least be able to give some sort of reason why he should not.
We go into mourning for your Electress on Sunday; I suppose
they will tack the Elector of Mentz to her, for he is just
dead. I delight in Richcourt's calculation- I don't doubt but
it is the method he often uses in accounting with the Great
Duke.

I have had two letters from you of the 5th and 12th, with a
note of things coming by sea; but my dear child, you are
either run Roman Catholicly devout, or take me to be so; for
nothing but a religious fit of zeal could make you think of
sending me so many presents. Why, there are Madonnas enough
in one case to furnish a more than common cathedral-I
absolutely will drive to Demetrius, the silversmith's, and
bespeak myself a pompous shrine! But indeed, seriously, how
can I, who have a conscience, and am no saint, take all these
things? You must either let me pay for them, or I will demand
my unfortunate coffee-pot again, which has put you upon
ruining yourself By the way, do let me have it again, for I
cannot trust it any longer in your hands at this rate; and
since I have found out its virtue, I will present it to
somebody, whom I shall have no scruple of letting send me
bales and cargoes, and ship-loads of Madonnas, perfumes,
prints, frankincense, etc. You have not even drawn upon me
for my statue, my hermaphrodite, my gallery, and twenty other
things, for which I am lawfully your debtor.

I must tell you one thing, that I will not say a word to my
lord of this Argosie, as Shakspeare calls his costly ships,
till it is arrived, for he will tremble for his Dominichin,
and think it will not come safe in all this company-by the
way, will a captain of a man-of-war care to take all? We were
talking over Italy last night- my lord protests, that if he
thought he had strength, he would see Florence, Bologna, and
Rome, by way of Marseilles, to Leghorn. You may imagine how I
gave in to such a jaunt. I don't set my heart upon it,
because I think he cannot do it; but if he does, I promise
you, you shall be his Cicerone. I delight in the gallantry of
the Princess's brother.(793) I will tell you what, if the
Italians don't take care, they will grow as brave and as
wrongheaded as their neighbours. Oh! how shall I do about
writing to her? Well, if I can, I will be bold, and write to
her to-night.

I have no idea what the two minerals are that you mention, but
I will inquire, and if there are such, you shall have them;
and gold and silver, if they grow in this land; for I am sure
I am deep enough in your debt. Adieu! .

P. S. It won't do! I have tried to write, but you would bless
yourself to see what stuff I have been forging for half an
hour, and have not waded through three lines of paper. i have
totally forgot my Italian, and if she will but have prudence
enough to support the loss of a correspondence, which was long
since worn threadbare, we will come to as decent a silence as
may be.

(791) Doctor lancelot Blackburne. Walpole, in his Memoires,
vol. i. p. 74, calls him "the jolly old archbishop, who had
the manners of a man of quality, though he had been a
buccaneer, and was a clergyman." Noble, in his continuation
of Granger, treats these aspersions as the effect of malice.
"How is it possible!" he asks, ,that a buccaneer should be so
great a scholar as Blackburne certainly was? he who had so
perfect a knowledge of the classics, as to be able to read
them with the same ease as he could Shakspeare, must have
taken great pains to have acquired the learned languages, and
have had both leisure and good masters." He is allowed to have
been a remarkably pleasant man; and it was said of him, that
"he gained more hearts than souls."-E.

(792) He was not succeeded by Dr. Wilcox, but by Dr. Herring,
who was elevated, in 1747, to the archbishopric of Canterbury,
and died in 1757.-E.

(793) a Signor Capponi, brother of Madame Grifoni.

315 Letter 102
To Sir Horace Mann.
Monday, April 4, 1743.

I had my pen in my hand all last Thursday morning to write to
you, but my pen had nothing to say. I would make it do
something to-day though what will come of it, I don't
conceive.

They say, the King does not go abroad: we know nothing about
our army. I suppose it is gone to blockade Egra, and to not
take Prague, as it has been the fashion for every body to send
their army to do these three years. The officers in
parliament are not gone yet. We have nothing to do, but I
believe the ministry have something for us to do, for we are
continually adjourned, but not prorogued. They talk of
marrying Princess Caroline and Louisa to the future Kings of
Sweden and Denmark; but if the latter(794) is King of both, I
don't apprehend that he is to marry both the Princesses in his
double capacity.

Herring, Of Bangor, the youngest bishop, is named to the see
of York. it looks as if the bench thought the church going out
of fashion; for two or three(795) of them have refused this
mitre.

Next Thursday we are to be entertained with a pompous parade
for the burial of old Princess Buckingham. They have invited
ten peeresses to walk: all somehow or other dashed with
blood-royal, and rather than not have King James's daughter
attended by princesses, they have fished out two or three
countesses descended from his competitor Monmouth.

There, I am at the end of my tell! If I write on, it must be
to ask questions. I Would ask why Mr. Chute has left me off
but when he sees what a frippery correspondent I am, he will
scarce be in haste to renew with me again. I really don't
know why I am so dry; mine used to be the pen of a ready
writer, but whist seems to have stretched its leaden wand over
me too, who have nothing to do with it. I am trying to set up
the noble game of bilboquet against it, and composing a
grammar in opposition to Mr. Hoyle's. You will some day or
other see an advertisement in the papers, to tell you where it
may be bought, and that ladies may be waited upon by the
author at their houses, to receive any further directions. I
am 'really ashamed to send this scantling of paper by the
post, over so many seas and mountains: it seems as impertinent
as the commission which Prior gave to the winds,

"Lybs must fly south, and Eurus east,
For jewels for her neck and breast."

Indeed, one would take you for my Chloe, when one looks on
this modicum of gilt paper, which resembles a billet-doux more
than a letter to a minister. You must take it as the widow's
mite, and since the death of my spouse, poor Mr. News, I
cannot afford such large doles as formerly. Adieu! my dear
child, I am yours ever, from a quire of the largest foolscap
to a vessel of the smallest gilt.

(794) There was a party at this time in Sweden, who tried to
choose the Prince Royal of Denmark for successor to King
Frederick of sweden.

(795) Dr. Wilcox, Bishop of Rochester, and Dr. Sherlock,
Bishop of Salisbury: the latter afterwards accepted the See of
London.

317 Letter 103
To Sir Horace Mann.
Arlington Street, April 14, 1743.

This has been a noble week; I have received three letters at
once from you. I am ashamed when I reflect on the poverty of
my own! but what can one do? I don't sell you my news, and
therefore should not be excusable to invent. I wish we don't
grow to have more news! Our politics, which have not always
been the most in earnest, now begin to take a very serious
turn. Our army is wading over the Rhine, up to their middles
in snow. I hope they will be thawed before their return: but
they have gone through excessive hardships. The King sends
six thousand more of his Hanoverians at his own expense: this
will be popular-and the six thousand Hessians march too. All
this will compose an army considerable enough to be a great
loss if they miscarry. The King certainly goes abroad in less
than a fortnight. He takes the Duke with him to Hanover who
from thence goes directly to the army. The Court will not be
great: the King takes only Lord Carteret, the Duke of
Richmond, master of the horse, and Lord Holderness and Lord
Harcourt,(796) for the bedchamber. The Duchesses of Richmond
and Marlborough,(797) and plump Carteret,(798) go to the
Hague.