Books: The Letters of Horace Walpole, Volume 1

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I have been this morning at the Tower, and passed under the
new heads at Temple Bar,(1275) where people make a trade of
letting spying-glasses at a halfpenny a look. Old Lovat
arrived last night. I saw Murray, Lord Derwentwater, Lord
Traquair, Lord Cromartie and his son, and the Lord Provost,
-,it their respective windows. The other two wretched Lords
are in dismal towers, and they have stopped up one of old
Balmerino's windows because he talked to the populace; and now
he has only one, which looks directly upon all the
scaffolding. They brought in the death-warrant at his dinner.
His wife fainted. He said, "Lieutenant, with your damned
warrant you have spoiled my lady's stomach." He has written a
sensible letter to the Duke to beg his intercession, and the
Duke has given it to the King; but gave a much colder answer
to Duke Hamilton, who went to beg it for Lord Kilmarnock: he
told him the affair was in the King's hands, and that he had
nothing to do with it. Lord Kilmarnock, who has hitherto kept
up his spirits, grows extremely terrified. It will be
difficult to make you believe to what heights of affectation
or extravagance my Lady Townshend carries her passion for my
Lord Kilmarnock, whom she never saw but at the bar of his
trial, and was smitten with his falling shoulders. She has
been under his windows; sends messages to him; has got his dog
and his snuff-box; has taken lodgings out of town for
to-morrow and Monday night, and then goes to Greenwich;
forswears conversing with the bloody English, and has taken a
French master. She insisted on Lord Hervey's promising her he
would not sleep a whole night for my Lord Kilmarnock, "and in
return," says she, "never trust me more if I am not as yellow
as a jonquil for him."(1276) She said gravely t'other day,
"Since I saw my Lord Kilmarnock, I really think no more of Sir
Harry Nisbett than if there was no such man in the world." But
of all her flights, yesterday was the strongest. George
Selwyn dined with her, and not thinking her affliction so
serious as she pretends, talked rather jokingly of the
execution. She burst into a flood of tears and rage, told him
she now believed all his father and mother had said of him;
and with a thousand other reproaches flung upstairs. George
coolly took Mrs. Dorcas, her woman, and made her sit down to
finish the bottle: "And pray, sir," said Dorcas, "do you think
my lady will be prevailed upon to let me go see the execution?
I have a friend that has promised to take care of me, and I
can lie in the Tower the night before." My lady has quarrelled
with Sir Charles Windham for calling the two Lords
malefactors. The idea seems to be general; for 'tis said Lord
Cromartie is to be transported, which diverts me for the
dignity of the peerage. The ministry really gave it as a
reason against their casting lots for pardon, that it was
below their dignity. I did not know but that might proceed
from Balmerino'S not being an earl; and therefore, now their
hand is in, would have them make him one. You will see in the
papers the second great victory at Placentia. There are
papers pasted in several parts of the town, threatening your
cousin Sandwich's head if be makes a dishonourable peace. I
will bring you down Sir Charles Williams's new Ode on the
Manchester.(1277) Adieu!

(1275) In the sixth volume of "London and its Environs
described," published in 1761, a work which furnishes a
curious view of the state of the metropolis on the accession
of George the Third, it is not only gravely stated of Temple
Bar, that, "since the erection of this gate, it has been
particularly distinguished by having the heads of such as have
been executed for high treason placed upon it," but the
accompanying plate exhibits it as being at that time
surmounted by three such disgusting proofs of the- then
semi-barbarous state of our criminal code. The following
anecdote, in reference to this exhibition, was related by Dr.
Johnson in 1773:--"I remember once being with Goldsmith in
Westminster Abbey: while we surveyed the Poet's Corner, I said
to him,

'Forsitan et nostrum nomen miscebitur istis.'

When we got to Temple Bar, he stopped me, pointed to the heads
upon it, and slily whispered me,

'Forsitan et nostrum nomen miscebitur ISTIS."'
Life, vol. iii. p. 2@.-E

( 276) "This," says the Quarterly Review, "is an odd
illustration of the truth of the first line in the following
couplet, which begins an epigram ascribed to Johnson:--

'Pitied by gentle minds, Kilmarnock died:
The brave, Balmerino, are on thy side.'"--E.

(1277) Isabel, Duchess of Manchester, married to Edward
Hussey, Esq.-E.

501 Letter 217
To sir Horace Mann.
Windsor, Aug. 21, 1746.

You will perceive by my date that I am got into a new scene,
and that I am retired hither like an old summer dowager; Only
that I have no toad-eater to take the air with me in the back
part of my lozenge-coach, and to be scolded. I have taken a
small house here within the castle and propose spending the
greatest part of every week here till the parliament meets;
but my jaunts to town will prevent my news from being quite
provincial and marvellous. Then, I promise you, I will go to
no races nor assemblies, nor make comments upon couples that
come in chaises to the White Hart.

I came from town (for take notice, I put this place upon
myself for the country) the day after the execution of the
rebel Lords: I was not at it, but had two persons come to me
directly who were at the next house to the scaffold; and I saw
another who was upon it, so that you may depend upon my
accounts.

Just before they came out of the Tower, Lord Balmerino drank a
bumper to King James's health. As the clock struck ten they
came forth on foot, Lord Kilmarnock all in black, his hair
unpowdered in a bag: supported by Forster, the great
Presbyterian, and by Mr. Home a young clergyman, his friend.
Lord Balmerino followed], alone, in a blue coat turned up with
red, his rebellious regimentals, a flannel waistcoat, and his
shroud beneath; their hearses following They were conducted to
a house near the scaffold; the room forwards had benches for
spectators; in the second Lord Kilmarnock was put, and in the
third backwards Lord Balmerino; all three chambers hung with
black. Here they parted! Balmerino embraced the other, and
said, "My lord, I wish I could suffer for both!" he had scarce
left him, before he desired again to see him, and then asked
him, "My Lord Kilmarnock, do you know any thing of the
resolution taken in our army, the day before the battle of
Culloden, to put the English prisoners to death?" He replied,
"My lord, I was not present; but since I came hither, I have
had all the reason in the world to believe that there was such
order taken; and I hear the Duke has the pocket-book with the
order." Balmerino answered, "It was a lie raised to excuse
their barbarity to us."-Take notice, that the Duke's charging
this on Lord Kilmarnock (certainly on misinformation) decided
this unhappy man's fate! The most now pretended is, that it
would have come to Lord Kilmarnock's turn to have given the
word for the slaughter, as lieutenant-general, with the patent
for which he was immediately drawn into the rebellion, after
having been staggered by his wife, her mother, his own
poverty, and the defeat of Cope. He remained an hour and a
half in the house, and shed tears. At last he came to the
scaffold, certainly much terrified, but with a resolution that
prevented his behaving in the least meanly or unlike a
gentleman.(1278) He took no notice of the crowd, only to
desire that the baize might be lifted up from the rails, that
the mob might see the spectacle. He stood and prayed some
time with Forster, who wept over him, exhorted and encouraged
him. He delivered a long speech to the Sheriff, and with a
noble manliness stuck to the recantation he had made at his
trial; declaring he wished that all who embarked in the same
cause might meet the same fate. he then took off his bag,
coat and waistcoat with great composure, and after some
trouble put on a napkin-cap, and then several times tried the
block; the executioner, who was in white with a white apron,
out of tenderness concealing the axe behind himself. At last
the Earl knelt down, with a visible unwillingness to depart,
and after five minutes dropped his handkerchief, the signal,
and his head was cut off at once, only hanging by a bit of
skin, and was received in a scarlet cloth by four of the
undertaker's men kneeling, who wrapped it up and put it into
the coffin with the body; orders having been given not to
expose the heads, as used to be the custom.

The scaffold was immediately new-strewed with saw-dust, the
block new-covered, the executioner new-dressed, and a new axe
brought. Then came old Balmerino, treading with the air of a
general. As soon as he mounted the scaffold, he read the
inscription on his coffin, as he did again afterwards: he then
surveyed the spectators, who were in amazing numbers, even
upon masts of ships in the river; and pulling out his
spectacles, read a treasonable speech,(1279) which he
delivered to the Sheriff, and said, the young Pretender was so
sweet a Prince that flesh and blood could not resist following
him; and lying down to try the block, he said, "If I had a
thousand lives, I would lay them all down here in the same
cause." he said, "if he had not taken the sacrament the day
before, he would have knocked down Williamson, the lieutenant
of the Tower, for his ill usage of him. He took the axe and
felt it, and asked the headsman how many blows he had given
Lord Kilmarnock; and gave him three guineas. Two clergymen,
who attended him, coming up, he said, "No, gentlemen, I
believe you have already done me all the service you can."
Then he went to the corner of the scaffold, and called very
loud for the warder, to give him his periwig, which he took
off, and put on a nightcap of Scotch plaid, and then pulled
off his coat and waistcoat and lay down; but being told he was
on the wrong side, vaulted round, and immediately gave the
sign by tossing up his arm, as if he were giving the signal
for battle. He received three blows, but the first certainly
took away all sensation. He was not a quarter of an hour on
the scaffold; Lord Kilmarnock above half a one. Balmerino
certainly died with the intrepidity of a hero, but with the
insensibility of one too.(1280) As he walked from his prison
to execution, seeing every window and top of house filled with
spectators, he cried out, "Look, look, how they are all piled
up like rotten oranges!"

My Lady Townshend, who fell in love -with Lord Kilmarnock at
his trial, will go nowhere to dinner, for fear of meeting with
a rebel- pie; she says, every body is so bloody-minded, that
they eat rebels! The Prince of Wales, whose intercession
saved Lord Cromartie, says he did it in return for old Sir
William Gordon, Lady Cromartie's father, coming down out of
his deathbed to vote against my father in the Chippenham
election.(1281) If his Royal Highness had not countenanced
inveteracy like that of Sir Gordon he would have no occasion
to exert his gratitude now in favour of rebels. His brother
has plucked a very useful feather out of the cap of the
ministry, by forbidding any application for posts in the army
to be made to any body but himself: a resolution I dare say,
he will keep as strictly and minutely as he does the
discipline and dress of the army. Adieu!

P. S. I have just received yours of Aug. 9th. You had not
then heard of the second great battle of Placentia, which has
already occasioned new instructions, or, in effect, a recall,
being sent after Lord Sandwich.

(1278) "When," says Sir Walter Scott, in Tales of a
Grandfather, "he beheld the fatal scaffold, covered with black
cloth; the executioner with his axe and his assistants; the
saw-dust which was soon to be drenched with his blood; the
coffin prepared to receive the limbs which were yet warm with
life; above all, the immense display of human countenances
which surrounded the scaffold like a sea, all eyes being bent
on the sad object of the preparation, his natural feelings
broke forth in a whisper to the friend on whose arm he leaned,
'Home, this is terrible!' No sign of indecent timidity,
however, affected his behaviour."-E.

(1279) Ford, in his account, states that " so far was this
speech from being filled with passionate invective, that it
mentioned his Majesty as a Prince of the greatest magnanimity
and mercy, at the same time that, through erroneous 'political
principles, it denied him a right to the allegiance of his
people."-E.

(1280) He once more turned to his friends and took his last
farewell, and looking on the crowd, said, 'Perhaps some may
think my behaviour too bold; but remember, Sir,' said he to a
gentleman who stood near him, 'that I now declare it is the
effect of confidence in God, and a good conscience, and I
should dissemble if I should show any signs of fear.'"
Ford.-E.

(1281) See ant`e, P. 215. (in Letter 51, which begins p. 212.)

504 Letter 218
To Sir Horace Mann.
Windsor, Sept. 15, 1746.

You have sent me Marquis Rinuncini with as much secrecy as if
you had sent me a present. I was here; there came an
exceedingly fair written and civil letter from you, dated last
May: I comprehended by the formality of it, that it was
written for the person who brought it, not for the person it
was sent to. I have been to town on purpose to wait on him,
and though you know he was not of my set, yet being of
Florence and recommended by you, and recollecting how you used
to cuddle over a bit of politics with the old Marquis,(1282) I
set myself to be wondrous civil to Marquis Polco; pray, faites
valoir ma politesse!(1283) You have no occasion to let people
know exactly the situation of my villa; but talk of my
standing in campagnaz and coming directly in sedia di posta,
to far mio dovere al Signor Marchesino. I stayed literally an
entire week with him, carried him to see palaces and Richmond
gardens and park, and Chenevix's shop, and talked a great deal
to him alle conversationi. It is a wretched time for him;
there is not a soul in town; no plays; and Ranelagh shut up.
You may say I should have stayed longer with him. but I was
obliged to return for fear of losing my vintage. I shall be
in London again in a fortnight, and then I shall do more mille
gentilezzes. Seriously, I was glad to see him-after I had got
over being sorry to see him, (for with all the goodness of
one's Soquckin soqubut, as the Japanese call the heart, YOU
must own it is a little troublesome to be showing the tombs,)
I asked him a thousand questions, rubbed up my old tarnished
Italian, and inquired about fifty people that I had entirely
forgot till his arrival. He told me some passages, that I
don't forgive you for not mentioning; your Cicisbeatura, Sir,
with the Antinora;(1284) and Manelli's(1285) marriage and
jealousy: who consoles my illustrious mistress?(1286)
Rinuncini has announced the future arrival of the Abbate
Niccolini, the elder Pandolfini, and the younger Panciatici;
these two last, you know, were friends of mine; I shall be
extremely glad to see them.

Your two last were of Aug. 23d and 30th. In the latter you
talk of the execution of the rebel lords, but don't tell me
whether you received my long history of their trials. Your
Florentines guessed very rightly about my Lady O."s reasons
for not returning amongst you: she has picked up a Mr.
Shirley,(1287) no great genius--but with all her affectation
of parts, you know she never was delicate about the capacity
of her lovers. this swain has so little pretensions to any
kind of genius, that two years ago being to act in the Duke of
Bedford's company,(1288) he kept back the play three weeks,
because he could not get his part by heart, though it
consisted but of seventeen lines and a half. With him she has
retired to a villa near Newpark, and lets her house in town.

Your last letter only mentions the progress of the King of
Sardinia towards Genoa; but there is an account actually
arrived of his being master of it. It is very big new-,, and
I hope will make us look a little haughty again: we are giving
ourselves airs, and sending a secret expedition against
France: we don't indeed own that it is in favour of the
Chevalier William Courtenay,(1289) who, you know, claims the
crown of France, and whom King William threatened them to
proclaim, when they proclaimed the Pretender; but I believe
the Protestant Highlanders in the south of France are ready to
join him the moment he lands. There is one Sir Watkin
Williams, a great Baron in languedoc, and a Sir John Cotton, a
Marquis of Dauphin`e,(1290) who have engaged to raise a great
number of men, on the first debarkation that we make.

I think it begins to be believed that the Pretender's son is
got to France - pray, if he passes through Florence, make it
as agreeable to him as you can, ,ind introduce him to all my
acquaintance. I don't indeed know him myself, but he is a
particular friend of my cousin, Sir John Philipps,(1291) and
of my sister-in-law Lady O., who will both take it extremely
kindly--besides, do for your own sake you may make your peace
with her this way; and if ever Lord Bath comes into power, she
will secure your remaining at florence. Adieu!

(1282) Marquis Rinuncini, the elder, had been envoy in
England, and prime minister to John Gaston, the last Great
duke.

(1283) Grey, in a letter to Wharton of the 11th, says, "Mr.
Walpole has taken a house in Windsor, and I see him usually
once a week. He is at present gone to town, to perform the
disagreeable task of presenting and introducing about a young
Florentine, the Marquis Rinuncini, who comes recommended to
him." Works, vol. iii. @. 9.-E.

(1284) Sister of Madame Grifoni.

(1285) Signor Ottavio Manelli had been cicisbeo of Madame
Grifoni.

(1286) Madame Grifoni.

(1287) Sewallis Shirley, uncle of Earl Ferrers. (He married
Lady Orford, after her first husband's death.-D)

(1288) The Duke of Bedford and his friends acted several plays
at Woburn.

(1289) Sir William Courtenay, said to be the right heir of
Louis le Gros. There is a notion that at the coronation of a
new King of France, the Courtenays assert their pretensions,
and that the King of France says to them, "Apres Nous, Vous."
[See Gibbon's beautiful account of this family, in a
digression to his History of the Decline and Fall, Vol. xi.]

(1290) Two Jacobite Knights of Wales and Cambridgeshire.

(1291) Sir J. Philipps, of Picton Castle in Pembrokeshire; a
noted Jacobite. He was first cousin of Catherine Shorter,
first wife of Sir Robert Walpole.

506 Letter 219
To sir Horace Mann.
Windsor, Oct. 2,1746.

By your own loss YOU may measure My joy at the receipt of the
dear Chutes.(1292) I strolled to town one day last week, and
there I found them! Poor creatures! there they were!
wondering at every thing they saw, but with the difference
from Englishmen that go abroad, O keeping their amazement to
themselves. They will tell you of wild dukes in the
playhouse, of streets dirtier than forests, and of women more
uncouth than the streets. I found them extremely surprised at
not finding any ready-furnished palace built round two courts.
I do all I can to reconcile their country to them; though
seriously they have no affectation, and have nothing
particular in them, but that they have nothing particular: a
fault, of which the climate and their neighbours will soon
correct. You may imagine how we have talked you over, and how
I have inquired after the state of your Wetbrownpaperhood.
Mr. Chute adores you: do you know, that as well as I love you,
I never found all those charms in you that he does! I own this
to you out of pure honesty, that you may love him as much as
he deserves. I don't know how he will succeed here, but to me
he has more wit than any body I know: he is altered, and I
think, broken: Whitehed is grown leaner considerably, and is a
very pretty gentleman.(1293) He did not reply to me as the
Turcotti(1294) did bonnement to you when you told her she was
a little thinner: do you remember how she puffed and chuckled,
and said, "And indeed I think you are too." Mr. Whitehed was
not so sensible of the blessing of decrease, as to conclude
that it would be acceptable news even to shadows: he thinks me
plumped out. I would fain have enticed them down hither, and
promised we would live just as if we were at the King's Arms
in via di Santo Spirito:(1295) but they were obliged to go
chez eux, not pour se d`ecrasser, but pour se crasser. I
shall introduce them a tutte le mie conoscenze, and shall try
to make questo paese as agreeable to them as possible; except
in one point, for I have sworn never to tell Mr. Chute a word
of news, for then he will be writing it to you, and I shall
have nothing to say. This is a lucky resolution for you, my
dear child, for between two friends one generally hears
nothing; the one concludes that the other has told all.

I have had two or three letters from you since I wrote. The
young Pretender is generally believed to have got off the 18th
of last month: if he were not, with the zeal of the Chutes, I
believe they would be impatient to send a limb to Cardinal
Acquaviva and Monsignor Piccolomini. I quite gain a winter
with them, having had no expectation of them till spring'.
Adieu!

(1292) John Chute and Francis Whitehed had been several years
in Italy, chiefly at Florence.

(1293) Gray, in a letter to Mr. Chute, written at this time,
thus describes Mr. Whithead:

"He is a fine young personage in a coat all over spangles,
just come over from the tour in Europe to take possession and
be married. I desire my hearty congratulations to him, and
say I wish him more spangles, and more estates, and more
wives." Works, vol. iii. p. 20.-E.

(1294) A fine singer.

(1295) Mr. Mann hired a large palace of the Manetti family at
Florence in via di Santo Spirito: foreign ministers in Italy
affix large shields with the arms of their sovereign over
their door.

507 Letter 220
To the Hon. H. S. Conway.
Windsor still, Oct. 3, 1746.

My dear Harry,
You ask me if I have really grown a philosopher. Really I
believe not: for I shall refer you to my practice rather than
to my doctrine, and have really acquired what they only
pretended to seek, content. So far, indeed I was a
philosopher even when I lived in town, for then I was content
too; and all the difference I can conceive between those two
opposite doctors was, that Aristippus loved London, and
Diogenes Windsor; and if your master the Duke, whom I
sincerely prefer to Alexander, and who certainly can intercept
more sunshine, would but stand out of my way, which he is
extremely in, while he lives in the park here,(1296) I should
love my little tub of forty pounds a-year, more than my palace
dans la rue des ministers, with all my pictures and bronzes,
which you ridiculously imagine I have encumbered myself with
in my solitude. Solitude it is, as to the tub itself, for no
soul lives in it with me; though I could easily give you room
at the butt end of it, and with -vast pleasure; but George
Montagu, who perhaps is a philosopher too, though I am sure
not of Pythagoras's silent sect, lives but two barrels off;
and Asheton, a Christian philosopher of our acquaintance,
lives -,it the foot of that hill which you mention with a
melancholy satisfaction that always attends the reflection. A-
propos, here is an Ode on the very subject, which I desire you
will please to like excessively:(1297)
****************

You will immediately conclude, out of good breeding, that it
is mine, and that it is charming. I shall be much obliged to
you for the first thought, but desire you will retain only the
second; for it is Mr. Gray's, and not your humble servant's.

(1296) " The Duke of Cumberland is here at his lodge with
three women, and three aide-de-camps; and the country swarms
with people. He goes to races and they make a ring about him
as at a bear-baiting." Gray to Wharton, Sept. 11. Works, vol.
iii. p. 10.-E.

(1297) Here follows, in the original Mr. Gray's Ode on a,
distant prospect of Eton College. [This, which was the first
English production of Gray which appeared in print, was
published by Dodsley in the following year. Dr. Warton says,
that " little notice was taken of it, on its first
publication."-E.

508 Letter 221
To Sir Horace Mann.
Arlington Street, Oct. 14, 1746.

You will have been alarmed with the news of another
battle(1298) lost in Flanders, where we have no Kings of
Sardinia. We make light of it; do not allow it to be a
battle, but call it "the action near Liege." then, we have
whittled down our loss extremely, and will not allow a man
more than three hundred and fifty English slain out of the
four thousand. The whole of' it, as It appears to me, is,
that we gave up eight battalions to avoid fighting; as at
Newmarket people pay their forfeit when they foresee they
should lose the race; though, if the whole army had fought,
and we had lost the day, one might have hoped to have come off
for eight battalions. Then they tell you that the French had
four-and-twenty-pounders, and that they must beat us by the
superiority of their cannon; so that to me it is grown a
paradox, to war with a nation who have a mathematical
certainty of beating you; or else it is a still stranger
paradox, why you cannot have as large cannon as the French.
This loss was balanced by a pompous account of the triumphs of
our invasion of Bretagne; which, in plain terms, I think, is
reduced to burning two or three villages and reimbarking: at
least, two or three of the transports are returned with this
history, and know not what is become of Lestock and the rest
of the invasion. The young Pretender is landed in France,
with thirty Scotch, but in such a wretched condition that his
Highland Highness had no breeches.(1299)