Books: The Letters of Horace Walpole, Volume 2

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Our politics wear a serener face than they have done of late:
you will have heard that our nephew of Prussia-I was going to
say, has asked blessing--begging our dignity's pardon, I fear
he has given blessing! In short, he guarantees the empire with
us from all foreign troops. It is pleasant to think, that at
least we shall be to fight for ourselves. Fight we must,
France says: but when she said so last, she knew nothing of
our cordiality with the court of Berlin. Monsieur Rouill`e
very lately wrote to Mr. Fox, by way of Monsieur Bonac in
Holland, to say his master ordered the accompanying M`emoire
to be transmitted to his Britannic Majesty in person; it is
addressed to nobody, but after professing great disposition to
peace, and complaining in harsh terms of our brigandages and
pirateries, it says, that if we will restore their ships,
goods, etc. they shall then be ready to treat. We have
returned a squab answer, retorting the infraction of treaties,
professing a desire of peace too, but declare we cannot
determine upon restitution comme pr`eliminaire. If we do not,
the M`emoire says, they shall look upon it comme declaration
de guerre la plus authentique. Yet, in my own opinion, they
will not declare it; especially since the King of Prussia has
been Russianed out of their alliance. They will probably
attempt some stroke; I think not succeed in it, and then lie
by for an opportunity when they shall be stronger. They can
only go to Holland, attempt these islands, or some great coup
in America.(657) Holland they may swallow when they will;
yet, why should they, when we don't attempt to hinder them?
and it would be madness if -we did. For coming hither, our
fleet is superior say, but equal: our army and preparations
greater than ever--if an invasion were still easy, should we
be yet to conquer, when we have been so long much more
exposed? In America we arc much stronger than they, and have
still more chances of preventing their performing any action
of consequence.

The opposition is nibbling, but is not popular, nor have Yet
got hold of any clue of consequence. There is not the
vivacity that broke forth before the holidays.

I condole with you for Madame Antinori,(658) and Madame
Grifoni; but I know, my dear child, how much too seriously
your mind will be occupied about your dear brother, to think
that romantic grief will any longer disquiet you. Pray
Heaven! I may send you better and better news. Adieu!

P. S. I forgot to thank you for your history of the war with
Lucca in your last but one.

(657) "A formal declaration of war from France," writes Lord
Chesterfield to Mr. Dayrolles on the 23d, "seems to be the
natural consequence of Rouill`e's memorial. I am not so fond
of war as I find many people are. Mark the end on 't. Our
treaty lately concluded with Russia is a fortunate event, and
secures the peace of the empire; and is it possible that
France can invade the Low Countries, which are the dominions
of the Empress Queen, only because Admiral Boscawen has taken
two of their ships in America? I see but two places where
France can annoy us; in America, by slipping over in single
ships a considerable number of troops, and next by keeping us
in a state of fear and expense at home, with the threats and
appearances of an intended invasion."-E.

(658) A Florentine lady, whom Sir Horace admired, and who was
just dead: she was sister of Madame Grifoni.

306 Letter 172
To Sir Horace Mann.
Arlington Street, Feb. 5, 1756.

I think I can give you a little better account of your
brother, who is so dear to both of us; I put myself on a foot
with you, for nothing can love him better than I do. I have
been a week at Strawberry Hill. in order to watch and see him
every day. The Duke's physician, Dr. Pringle, who now attends
him, has certainly relieved him much: his cough is in a manner
gone, his fever much abated, his breath better. His strength
is not yet increased; and his stitches, which they impute to
wind, are not relieved. But both his physicians swear that
his lungs are not touched. His worst symptom is what they
cannot, but I must and will remove: in short, his wife is
killing him, I can scarce say slowly. Her temper is beyond
imagination, her avarice monstrous, her madness about what she
calls cleanliness, to a degree of distraction; if I had not
first, and then made your brother Ned interpose in form, she
would once or twice a week have the very closet washed in
which your brother sleeps after dinner. It is certainly very
impertinent to interfere in so delicate a case, but your
brother's life makes me blind to every consideration: in
short, we have made Dr. Pringle declare that the moment the
weather is a little warmer, and he can be moved, change of air
is absolutely necessary, and I am to take him to Strawberry
Hill, where you may imagine he will neither be teased nor
neglected: the physicians are strong for his going abroad, but
I find that it will be a very difficult point to carry even
with himself. His affairs are so extensive, that as yet he
will not hear of leaving them. Then the exclusion of
correspondence by the war with France would be another great
objection with him to going thither; and to send him to Naples
by sea, if we could persuade him would hardly be advisable in
the heat of such hostilities. I think by this account you
will judge perfectly of your brother's situation: you may
depend upon it, it is not desperate, and yet it is what makes
me very unhappy. Dr. Pringle says, that in his life he never
knew a person for whom so many people were concerned. I go to
him again to-morrow.

The war is reckoned inevitable, nay begun, though France does
not proceed to a formal declaration, but contents herself with
Monsieur Rouill`e's conditional declaration. All intercourse
is stopped. We, who two months ago were in terrors about a
war on the continent, are now more frightened about having it
at home. Hessians and Dutch are said to be, and, I believe,
are sent for. I have known the time when we were much less
prepared and much less alarmed. Lord Ravensworth moved
yesterday to send par pr`eference for Hanoverians, but nobody
seconded him. The opposition cavil, but are not strong enough
to be said to oppose. This is exactly our situation.

I must beg, my dear sir, that you will do a little for my
sake, what I know and hear you have already done from natural
goodness. Mr. Dick, the consul at Leghorn, is particularly
attached to my old and great friend Lady Harry Beauclerc, whom
you have often heard me mention; she was Miss Lovelace: it
will please me vastly if you will throw in a few civilities
more at my request.

Adieu! Pray for your brother: I need not say talk him over and
over with Dr. Cocchl, and hope the best of the war.

307 Letter 173
To The Hon. H. S. Conway.
Arlington Street, Feb. 12, 1756.

I will not write to my Lady Ailesbury to-night, nor pretend to
answer the prettiest letter in the world, when I am out of
spirits. I am very unhappy about poor Mr. Mann, who I fear is
in a deep consumption: the doctors do not give him over, and
the symptoms are certainly a little mended this week; but you
know how fallacious that distemper is, and how unwise it would
be to trust to it! As he is at Richmond, I pass a great deal
of my time out of town to be near him, and so may have missed
some news; but I will tell you all I know.

The House of Commons is dwindled into a very dialogue between
Pitt and Fox-one even begins to want Admiral Vernon again for
variety. Sometimes it is a little piquant; in which though
Pitt has attacked, Fox has generally had the better. These
three or four last days we have been solely upon the
Pennsylvanian regiment, bickering, and but once dividing, 165
to 57. We are got but past the first reading yet. We want
the French to put a little vivacity into us. The Duke of
Newcastle has expected them every hour: he was terribly
alarmed t'other night; on his table he found a mysterious card
with only these words, "Charles is very well, and is expected
in England every day." It was plainly some secret friend that
advertised him of the pretender's approaching arrival. He
called up all the servants, ransacked the whole house to know
who had been in his dressing-room:-at last it came out to be
an answer from the Duchess of Queensberry to the Duchess of
Newcastle about Lord Charles Douglas. Don't it put you in
mind of my Lord Treasurer Portland in Clarendon, "Remember
Caesar"!

The French have promised letters of noblesse to whoever fits
out even a little privateer. I could not help a melancholy
smile when my Lady Ailesbury talked of coming over soon. I
fear major-general you will scarce be permitted to return to
your plough at Park-place, when we grudge every man that is
left at the plough. Between the French and the earthquakes,
you have no notion how good we are grown; nobody makes a suit
of clothes now but of sackcloth turned up with ashes. The
fast was kept so devoutly, that Dick Edgecumbe, finding a very
lean hazard at White's, said with a sigh, "Lord, how the times
are degenerated! Formerly a fast would have brought every
body hither; now it keeps every body away!" A few nights
before, two men walking up the Strand, one said to t'other,
"Look how red the sky is! Well, thank God! there is to be no
masquerade!"

My Lord Ashburnham(659) does not keep a fast; he is going to
marry one of the plump Crawleys:--they call him the noble lord
upon the woolsack.

The Duchess of Norfolk has opened her new house: all the earth
was there last Tuesday. You would have thought there had been
a comet, every body was gaping in the air and treading on one
another's toes. In short, you never saw such a scene of
magnificence and taste. The tapestry, the embroidered bed,
the illumination, the glasses, the lightness and novelty of
the ornaments, and the ceilings, are delightful. She gives
three Tuesdays, would you be at one! Somebody asked my Lord
Rockingham afterwards at White's, what was there'! He said, ,
"Oh! there was all the company afraid of the Duchess, and the
Duke afraid of all the company."--It was not a bad picture.

My Lady Ailesbury flatters me extremely about my "World," but
it has brought me into a peck of troubles. In short, the
good-natured town have been pleased to lend me a meaning, and
call my Lord Bute Sir Eustace. I need not say how ill the
story tallies to what they apply it; but I do vow to you, that
so far from once entering into my imagination, my only
apprehension was that I should be suspected of flattery for
the compliment to the Princess in a former part. It is the
more cruel, because you know it is just the thing in the world
on which one must not defend one's self. If I might, I can
prove that the paper was writ last Easter, long before this
history was ever mentioned, and flung by, because I did not
like it: I mentioned it one night to my Lady Hervey, which was
the occasion of its being printed.

I beg you will tell my Lady Ailesbury, that I am sorry she
could not discover any wit in Mrs. Hussey's making a
sept-leva. I know I never was so vain of any wit in my life
as winning a thousand leva and two five hundred levas.

You would laugh if you saw in the midst of what trumpery I am
writing. Two porters have just brought home my purchases from
Mrs. Kennon the midwife's sale: Brobdignag combs, old broken
pots, pans, and pipkins, a lantern of scraped oyster-shells,
scimitars, Turkish pipes, Chinese baskets, etc. etc. My
servants think my head is turned: I hope not: it is all to be
called the personal estate and moveables of my
great-great-grandmother, and to be reposited at Strawberry. I
believe you think my letter as strange a miscellany as my
purchases.

P. S. I forgot, that I was outbid for Oliver Cromwell's
nightcap.

(659) John, second Earl of Ashburnham. On the 28th of June he
married Elizabeth, daughter and coheiress of Ambrose Crawley,
Esq.-E.

309 Letter 174
To Sir Horace Mann.
Arlington Street, Feb. 23, 1756.

I can tell you with as much truth as pleasure that your brother
assuredly mends, and that his physician, Dr. Pringle, who is
the Duke's has told his Royal Highness, who expresses great
concern, that he now will live. He goes out to take the air
every day, that is not very bad: Mr. Chute and I went to see
him yesterday, and saw a real and satisfactory alteration. I
don't say this to flatter you; on the contrary, I must bid you,
my dear child, not to be too sanguine, for Dr. Cocchi will
tell you that there is nothing more fallacious than a
consumptive case; don't mistake me, it is not a consumption,
though it is a consumptive disposition. His spirits are
evidently better.

You will have heard, before you receive this, that the King of
France and Madame Pompadour are gone into devotion. Some say,
that D'Argenson, finding how much her inclination for peace
with us fell in with the Monarch's humanity, (and winch indeed
is the only rational account one can give of their inactivity,)
employed the Cardinal de la Rochefoucault and the Confessor to
threaten the most Christian King with an earthquake if he did
not communicate at Easter; and that his Majesty accordingly
made over his mistress to his wife, by appointing the former
dame du palais: others, who refine more, pretend that Madame
Pompadour, perceiving how much the King's disposition veered to
devotion, artfully took the turn of humouring it, desired to be
only his soul's concubine, and actually sent to ask pardon of
her husband, and to offer to return to him, from which he
begged to be excused-the point in dispute is whether she has or
has not left off rouge. In our present hostile state we cannot
arrive at any certainty on this important question; though our
fate seems to depend on it!

We have had nothing in Parliament but most tedious and long
debates on a West Indian regiment, to be partly composed of
Swiss and Germans settled in Pennsylvania, with some Dutch
officers. The opposition neither increase in numbers or
eloquence; the want of the former seems to have damped the fire
of the latter. the reigning fashion is expectation of an
invasion; I can't say I am fashionable; nor do I expect the
earthquake, though they say it is landed at Dover.

The most curious history that I have to tell you, is a
malicious, pretty successful, and yet most clumsy Plot executed
by the papists, in which number you will not be surprised at my
including some Protestant divines, against the famous
Bower,(660) author of the History of the Popes. Rumours were
spread of his being discovered in correspondence with the
Jesuits; some even said the correspondence was treasonable, and
that he was actually in the hands of a messenger. I went to
Sir George Lyttelton, his great friend, to learn the truth; he
told me the story: that Sir Harry Bedingfield, whom I know for
a most bigoted Papist in Norfolk, pretended to have six letters
from Bower (signed A. B.) in his hands, addressed to one Father
Sheldon, a Jesuit, under another name, in which A. B. affected
great contrition and desires of reconciliation to that church,
lamenting his living in fornication with a woman, by whom he
had a child, and from whom he had got fifteen hundred pounds,
which he had put into Sheldon's hands, and which he affirmed he
must have again if he broke off the commerce, for that the
woman insisted on having either him or her money; and offering
all manner of submission to holy church, and to be sent
wherever she should please; for non mea voluntas sed tua fiat:-
-the last letter grieved at not being able to get his money,
and to be forced to continue in sin, and concluded with telling
the Jesuit that something would happen soon which would put an
end to their correspondence-this is supposed to allude to his
history. The similitude of hands is very great-but you know
how little that can weigh! I know that Mr. Conway and my Lady
Ailesbury write so alike, that I never receive a letter from
either of them that I am not forced to look at the name to see
from which it comes; the only difference is that she writes
legibly, and he does not. These letters were shown about
privately, and with injunctions of secrecy: it seems Hooke, the
Roman historian, a convert to Popery, and who governs my Lord
Bath and that family, is deep in this plot. At last it got to
the ears of Dr. Birch, a zealous but simple Than, and of Millar
the bookseller, angry at Bower for not being his printer--they
trumpeted the story all over the town. Lord Pultney was One
who told it me, and added, "a Popish gentleman and an English
clergyman are upon the scent;" he told me Sir H. Bedingfield's
name, but Would not the clergyman's. I replied, then your
lordship must give me leave to say, as I don't know his name,
that I suppose our doctor is as angry as Sir Harry at Bower for
having written against the church of Rome. Sir G. Lyttelton
went to Sir Harry, and demanded to see the letters, and asked
for copies, which were promised. He soon observed twenty
falsehoods and inconsistencies, particulary the mention of a
patent for a place, which Sir George obtained for him, but
never thought of asking till a year and a half after the date
of this letter; to say nothing of the inconsistence of his
taking a place as a Protestant, at the same time he was
offering to go whithersoever the Jesuits would send him; and
the still more glaring improbability of his risking himself
again under their power! Sir George desired the woman might be
produced--Sir Harry shuffled, and at last said he believed it
was a lie of Bower. When he was beaten out of every point, he
said, he Would put it on this single fact, "Ask Mr. Bower if he
was not reconciled to the church of Rome in the year '44." The
whole foundation proves to be this: Bower, who is a very child
in worldly matters, was weak enough, for good interest, to put
fifteen hundred pounds into the hands of one Brown, a Jesuit
here in London, and from that correspondence they have forged
his hand; and finding the minds of men alarmed and foolish
about the invasion and the earthquake, they thought the train
would take like wildfire. I told Bower, that though this
trusting a Jesuit did great honour to his simplicity, it
Certainly did none to his judgment. Sir George begged I would
advise them what to do-they were afraid to enter into a
controversy, which Hooke might manage. I told him at once that
their best way would be to advertise a great reward for
discovery of the forgery, and to communicate their intention to
Sir Harry bedington. Sir George was pleased with the
thought-and indeed it succeeded beyond expectation. Sir Harry
sent word that he approved the investigation of truth, be the
persons concerned of what profession they would; that he was
obliged to go out of town next day for his health, but hoped at
his return Sir George would give him leave to cultivate an
acquaintance which this little affair had renewed. Sir George
answered with great propriety and spirit, that he should be
very proud of his acquaintance, but must beg leave to differ
with him in calling a little affair what tended to murder a
man's character, but he was glad to see that it was the best
way that Rome had of answering Mr. Bower's book. You see, Sir
Harry is forced to let the forgery rest on himself, rather than
put a chancellor of the exchequer upon the scent after priests!
He has even hesitated Upon giving Bower copies of the letters.

Since I began my letter, we hear that France is determined to
try a numerous invasion in several places in England and
Ireland, coute qui coute, and knowing how difficult it is. We
are well-prepared and strong; they have given us time. If it
were easy to invade us, we should not have waited for an attack
till the year 1756. I hope to give you a good account both of
England and your brother. Adieu!

(660) Bower was a man of very bad character, and it is now
generally believed that he intended to cheat the Jesuits out of
a sum of money.-D.

(661) Dr. Douglas, afterwards Bishop of Salisbury, an intimate
friend of Lord Bath. He had detected sundry errors in Bower's
Lives of the Popes.-D.

312 Letter 175
To The Hon. H. S. Conway.
Arlington Street, March 4, 1756.

Dear Harry,
I have received so kind and so long a letter from you, and so
kind too because so long, that I feel I shall remain much in
your debt, at least for length. I won't allow that I am in
your debt for warmth of friendship. I have nothing worth
telling you: we are hitherto conquered only in threat: for my
part. I have so little expectation of an invasion, that I have
not buried a single enamel, nor bought a pane of painted glass
the less; of the two panics in fashion, the French and the
earthquake, I have not even made my option yet. The opposition
get ground as little as either: Mr. Pitt talks by Shrewsbury
clock, and is grown almost as little heard as that is at
Westminster. We have had full eight days on the Pennsylvania
regiment. The young Hamilton has spoken and shone again; but
nothing is luminous compared with Charles Townshend:--he drops
down dead in a fit, has a resurrection, thunders in the
Capitol, confounds the treasury-bench, laughs at his own party,
is laid up the next day, and overwhelms the Duchess and the
good women that go to nurse him! His brother's
Militia-bill(662) does not come on till next week: in the mean
time, he adorns the shutters, walls and napkins of every tavern
in Pall Mall with caricatures of the Duke(663) and Sir George
Lyttelton, the Duke of Newcastle and Mr. Fox. Your friend
Legge has distinguished himself exceedingly on the supplies and
taxes, and retains all the dignity of chancellor of the
exchequer. I think I never heard so complete a scene of
ignorance as yesterday on the new duties! Except Legge, you
would not have thought there was a man in the House had learned
troy-weight; Murray quibbled--at Hume Campbell the House
groaned! Pitt and Fox were lamentable; poor Sir George never
knew prices from duties, nor drawbacks from premiums! The
three taxes proposed were on plate, on bricks and tiles, on
cards and dice. The earthquake has made us so good, that the
ministry might have burned the latter in Smithfield if they had
pleased. The bricks they were forced to give up, and consented
graciously, to accept 70,000 pounds on alehouses, instead of
30,000 pounds on bricks. They had nearly been forced to extend
the duty on plate beyond 10 pounds carrying the restriction by
a majority of only two.

An embargo is laid on the shipping, to get sailors. The young
court lords were going to raise troops of light horse, but my
Lord Gower (I suppose by direction of the Duke) proposed to the
King that they should rather employ their personal interest to
recruit the army; which scheme takes place, and, as George
Townshend said in the House, they are all turning recruiting
sergeants. But notwithstanding we so much expect a storm from
France, I am told that in France they think much more of their
own internal storms than of us. Madame Pompadour wears
devotion, whether forced or artful is not certain: the disputes
between the King and the parliament run very high, and the Duke
of Orleans and the Prince of Conti have set themselves -,it the
head of the latter. Old Nugent came fuddled to the Opera last
week, and jostled an ancient Lord Irwin, and then called him
fool for being in his way: they were going to fight; but my
Lord Talbot, professing that he did not care if they were both
hanged, advised them to go back and not expose themselves. You
will stare perhaps at my calling Nugent old: it is not merely
to distinguish him from his son; but he is such a champion and
such a lover, that it is impossible not to laugh at him as if
he was a Methuselah! He is en affaire regime with the young
Lady Essex. At a supper there a few nights ago of
two-and-twenty people, they were talking of his going to
Cashiobury to direct some alterations: Mrs. Nugent in the
softest infantine voice called out, "My Lady Essex, don't let
him do any thing out of doors; but you will find him delightful
within!"

I think I have nothing else to tell you but a bon-mot or two;
with that sort of news I think I take care to supply you duly.
I send you constantly the best that London affords. Dick
Edgecumbe has said that his last child was born on
All-gamesters'-day; Twelfth-night. This chapter shall conclude
with an epigram; the thought was George Selwyn's, who, you
know, serves all the epigram-makers in town with wit. It is on
Miss Chudleigh crying in the drawing-room on the death of her
mother:-

"What filial piety! what mournful grace,
For a lost parent, sits on Chudleigh's face
Fair virgin, weep no more, your anguish smother!
You in this town can never want a mother."

I have told poor Mr. Mann how kind you are to him: indeed I
have been exceedingly frightened and troubled for him, and
thought him in immediate danger. He is certainly much mended,
though I still fear a consumption for him; he has not been able
to move from Richmond this whole winter: I never fail to visit
him twice or thrice a week. I heartily pity the fatigue and
dullness of your life; nor can I flatter you with pretending to
believe it will end soon: I hope you will not be forced to gain
as much reputation in the camp as you have in the cabinet!--You
see I must finish.