Books: The Letters of Horace Walpole, Volume 2

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I read the necessary part of your letter to Sir George
Lyttelton, who thinks himself much obliged, and leaves the
vases entirely to your taste, and will be fully content with
the five jesses you name.

We have nothing new; the Parliament rises the 25th: all our
attention is pointed to Minorca, of which you must be much
better and sooner informed than we can. Great dissatisfactions
arise about the defenceless state in which it was left; it is
said, some account arrived from Commodore Edgcumbe(683) the
night before last, but it is kept very secret, which at least
specifies the denomination of it. I hope to find Mr. Conway in
town to-morrow night, whither he is just returned from Ireland;
he has pacified that country to the standard of his own
tranquillity.

I have read the poem you mention, the Pucelle, and am by no
means popular, for I by no means like it-it is as tiresome as
if it was really a heroic poem. The four first cantos are by
much the best, and throughout there are many vivacities; but so
absurd, perplexed a story is intolerable; the humour often
missed, and even the parts that give most offence, I think very
harmless.

P. S. We are to declare war this week; I suppose, in order to
make peace, as we cannot make peace till we have made war.

(682) George, eldest son of George third Earl of Cholmondeley,
by Mary, daughter of Sir Robert Walpole: he died before his
father and was father of George the fourth earl.

(683) George, second son of Richard Lord Edgecumbe, succeeded
his brother in the title, and was by George III. created
Viscount Mount Edgccumbe.

323 Letter 183
To George Montagu, Esq.
Arlington Street, May 19, 1756.

Nothing will be more agreeable to me than to see you at
Strawberry Hill; the weather does not seem to be of my mind,
and will not invite you. I believe the French have taken the
sun. Among other captures, I hear the King has taken another
English mistress. a Mrs. Pope, who took her degrees in
gallantry some years ago. She went to Versailles with the
famous Mrs. quon: the King took notice of them; he was told
that they were not so rigid as all other English women are-
-mind, I don't give you any part of this history for authentic;
you know we can have no news from France but what we run. I
have rambled so that I forgot what I intended to say; if ever
we can have spring, it must be soon; I propose to expect you
any day you please after Sunday se'nnight, the 30th: let me
know your resolution, and pray tell me in what magazine is the
Strawberry ballad? I should have proposed an earlier day to
you, but next week the Prince of Nassau is to breakfast at
Strawberry Hill, and I know your aversion to clashing with
grandeur.

As I have already told you one mob story of a king, I will tell
you another: they say, that the night the Hanover troops were
voted, he sent Schutz(684) for his German cook, and said, "Get
me a very good supper; get me all de varieties; I don't mind
expense."

I tremble lest his Hanoverians should be encamped at Hounslow;
Strawberry would become an inn; all the Misses would breakfast
there, to go and see the camp!

My Lord Denbigh,(685) is going to marry a fortune, I forget her
name; my Lord Gower asked him how long the honeymoon would
last? He replied, "Don't tell me of the honeymoon; it is
harvest moon with me." Adieu!

(684) Augustus Schutz, a German, master of the robes to the
King, and his favourite attendant.-E.

(685) Basil sixth Earl of Denbigh. In the following year he
married Mary, daughter and coheiress of Sir John Bruce
Cotton.-E.

323 Letter 184
To Sir Horace Mann.
Arlington Street, May 27, 1756.

Your brother is determined to go to Bristol in ten days: our
summer, which nobody but the almanack has the confidence to say
is not winter, is so cold that he does not advance at all. If
his temper was at all in the power of accidents, it would be
affected enough just now to affect his health! What a figure we
would make in a catalogue of philosophers or martyrs! His
wife's aunt, Mrs. Forth, who has always promised him the half
of her fortune, which is at least thirty thousand pounds, is
dead, and has left him only two thousand pounds. He sent for
your brother Ned this morning to talk to him upon some other
business, and it was with such unaffected cheerfulness, that
your eldest brother concluded he was reserving the notification
of a legacy of at least ten thousand pounds for the bonne
bouche; but he can bear his wife, and then what are
disappointments? Pray, my dear child, be humble, and don't
imagine that yours is the only best temper in the world. I
pretend so little to a good one, that it is no merit in me to
be out of all patience.

My uncle's ambition and dirt are crowned at last: he is a
peer.(686) Lord Chief Justice Ryder, who was to have kissed
hands with him on Monday, was too ill, and died on
Tuesday;(687) but I believe his son will save the peerage.

We know nothing yet of Minorca, and seem to think so little of
our war, that to pass away his time, Mars is turned Impresario:
in short, the Duke has taken the Opera-house for the ensuing
season. There has been a contest between the manager Vanneschi
and the singers Mingotti and Ricciarelli;(688) the Duke
patronizes the Mingotti and lists under her standard. She is a
fine singer, an admirable actress; I cannot say her temper is
entirely so sweet as your brother's.

May 30th, Arlington Street,

See what a country gentleman I am! One cannot stir ten miles
from London without coming to believe what one hears, and
without supposing that whatever should be done, will be done.
The Opera-house is still in dispute between Signor Guglielmo
and Signor Vanneschi--and Mr. Ryder(689) will not get the
peerage; for coronets are not forfeited by worthlessness, but
by misfortune. My lord Chief Justice misses one by only dying,
my uncle gets one by living!

I this moment receive your letter of the 15th. We had picked
up by scrambling accounts pretty much what you tell me of
Minorca; but hitherto we only live on comparing dates.

I can add nothing to what I have said in the article of your
brother. I am going to send the papers to Lord
Macclesfield.(690) Adieu!

P. S. It is uncertain who will be Chief Justice; Murray could
have no competitor, but the Duke of Newcastle cannot part with
him from the House of Commons.(691)

(686) Through the zeal of his friend Lord Hardwicke, and the
influence of the Cavendish party, the repugnance of the King
was overcome, and Horatio Walpole, on the 1st of June, was
elevated to the peerage, by the title of Lord Walpole of
Wolterton.-E.

(687) On the 24th of May, the King signed a warrant for raising
Sir Dudley Ryder to the peerage, but he died before the patent
was completed.-E.

(688) "Vanneschi's difference with Mingotti occasioned as many
private quarrels and public feuds as the disputed abilities of
Handel and Bononcini, or the talents of Faustina and Cuzzoni,
had done thirty years before. On a toujours tort in these
disputes; and addressing the town is but making bad worse: for
not a word which either party says is believed. These
squabbles ended in Vanneschi's being a bankrupt, a prisoner in
the Fleet, and afterwards a fugitive; and in Mingotti's
acquiring for a while the sovereignty in the Opera kingdom, by
which gratification of ambition they were soon brought to the
brink of ruin, as others had been before them." Burney.-E.

(689) In 1776, Mr. Ryder was created Baron Harrowby.-E.

(690) George Parker, second Earl of Macclesfield, President of
the Royal Society. He died in 1764.-D.

(691) Mr. Potter, in a letter to Mr. Pitt of the 4th of June,
says, "Upon the death of the Chief Justice, all the
Attorney-General's private friends thought the office, on every
account, so fit for him, that it would be infatuation to
decline it, and that the Attorney-General himself was of the
same opinion, but the Duke of Newcastle was frightened at the
thoughts of what was to become of the House of Commons."
Chatham Correspondence, v 1. i. p. 159.-E.

325 Letter 185
To The Earl Of Strafford.(692)
Strawberry Hill, June 6, 1756.

My dear lord,
I am not sorry to be paving my way to Wentworth Castle by a
letter, where I suppose you are at this time, and for which I
waited: it is not that I stayed so long before I executed my
embassy aupr`es de Milord Tylney. He had but one pair of gold
pheasants at present, but promises my Lady Strafford the first
fruits of their loves. He gave me hopes of some pied peacocks
sooner, for which I asked directly, as one must wait for the
lying-in of the pheasants. If I go on negotiating so
successfully, I may hope to arrive at a peerage a little sooner
than my uncle has.

As your Lordship, I know, is so good as to interest yourself in
the calamities of your friends, I will, as shortly as I can,
describe and grieve your heart with a catastrophe that has
happened to two of them. My Lady Ailesbury, Mr. Conway, and
Miss Rich passed two days last week at Strawberry Hill. We
were returning from Mrs. Clive's through the long field, and
had got over the high stile that comes into the road; that is,
three of us. It had rained, and the stile was wet. I could
not let Miss Rich straddle across so damp a palfrey, but took
her in my arms to lift her over. At that instant I saw a coach
and six come thundering down the hill from my house; and
hurrying to set down my charge, and stepping backwards, I
missed the first step, came down headlong with the nymph in my
arms; but turning quite round as we rushed to the ground, the
first thing that touched the earth was Miss Rich's head. You
must guess in how improper a situation we fell; and you must
not tell my Lady Strafford before any body that every
petticoat, etc. in the world were canted high enough indeed!
The coach came on, and never stopped. The apprehension that it
would run over my Chloe made me lie where I was, holding out my
arm to keep off the horses, which narrowly missed trampling us
to death. The ladies, who were Lady Holderness, Miss Pelham,
and your sister Lady Mary Coke, stared with astonishment at the
theatre which they thought I had chosen to celebrate our loves;
the footmen laughed; and you may imagine the astonishment of
Mr. Conway and Lady Ailesbury, who did not see the fall, but
turned and saw our attitude. It was these spectators that
amazed Miss Pelham, who described the adventure to Mrs. Pitt,
and said, "What was most amazing, there were Mr. Conway and
Lady Ailesbury looking on!" I shall be vexed to have told you
this long story, if Lady Mary has writ it already; only tell
in@ honestly if she has described it as decently as I have.

If you have not got the new Letters and Memoirs of Madame
Maintenon, I beg I may recommend them for your summer reading.
As far as I have got, which is but into the fifth volume of the
Letters, I think you will find them very curious, and some very
entertaining. The fourth volume has persuaded me of the
sincerity of' her devotion; and two or three letters at the
beginning of my present tome have made me even a little jealous
for my adored Madame de S`evign`e. I am quite glad to find
that they do not continue equally agreeable. The extreme
misery to which France was reduced at the end of Queen Anne's
war, is more striking than one could conceive. I hope it is a
debt that they are not going to pay, though the news that
arrived on Wednesday have but a black aspect. The
consternation on the behaviour of Byng,(693) and on the amazing
Council of war at Gibraltar,(694) is extreme; many think both
next to impossibilities. In the mean time we fear the loss of
Minorca. I could not help smiling t'other day at two passages
in Madame Maintenon's Letters relating to the Duc de Richelieu,
when he first came into the world: "Jamais homme n'a mieux
r`eussi `a la cour, la premi`ere fois qu'il y a paru: c'est
r`eellement une tr`es-jolie cr`eature!" Again:--"C'est la plus
aimable poup`ee qu'on puisse voir." How mortifying that this ,
jolie poup`ee should be the avenger Of the Valoises!

Adieu! my lord. I don't believe that a daughter of the Duke of
Argyle(695) will think that the present I have announced in the
first part of my letter balances the inglorious article in the
end. I wish you would both renew the breed of heroes, which
seems scarcer than that of gold pheasants!

(692) William Wentworth, second Earl of Strafford, of the
second creation. He married Lady Anne Campbell, second
daughter of John, second Duke of Argyle, and died in 1791.-E.

(693) Hon. John Byng, fourth son of Admiral Byng; a
distinguished officer, who, for his eminent services, was
created Viscount Torrington in 1721.-E.

(694) A council of war was held at Gibraltar, to decide upon a
request made by Admiral Byng for a reinforcement of troops from
that garrison for the defence of Minorca; where M. de la
Galissoni`ere, with thirteen sail of the line and several
transports, had, towards the end of April, landed a large body
of land forces under the command of the Duc de Richelieu.-E.

(695) Lady Strafford was the youngest daughter of John Duke of
Argyle.

327 Letter 186
To John Chute, Esq.(696)
Arlington Street, June 8, 1756.

My dear sir,
Pray have a thousand masses said in your divine chapel `a
l'intention of your poor country. I believe the occasion will
disturb the founder of it, and make him shudder in his shroud
for the ignominy of his countrymen. By all one learns, Byng,
Fowke, and all the officers at Gibraltar, were infatuated!
They figured Port Mahon lost, and Gibraltar a-going! a-going!
Lord Effingham, Cornwallis, Lord Robert Bertie, all, all signed
the council of war, and are in as bad odour as possible. The
King says It will be his death, and that he neither eats nor
sleeps--all our trust is in Hanoverians.

The Prince has desired to be excused living at Kensington, but
accepts of 40,000 pounds a year; 5,000 pounds is given to
Prince Edward, and an establishment is settling; but that too
will meet with difficulties. I will be more circumstantial
when we Meet.(697)

My uncle has chose no motto nor supporters yet: one would think
there were fees to pay for them! Mr. Fox said to him, "Why
don't you take your family motto?" He replied, "Because my
nephew would say I think I speak as well as my brother." I
believe he means me. I like his awe. The Duke of Richmond,
taking me for his son, reproached himself to Lady Caroline Fox
for not wishing me joy. She is so sorry she undeceived him!
Charles Townshend has turned his artillery upon his own court:
he says, "Silly fellow for silly fellow, I don't see why it is
not as well to be governed by my uncle with a blue riband, as
by my cousin with a green one."

I have passed to-day one of the most agreeable days of my life;
your righteous spirit will be offended with me-but I must tell
you: my Lord and Lady Bath carried my Lady Hervey and me to
dine with my Lady Allin at Blackheath. What added to the
oddness of the company in which I found myself was her sister
Mrs. Cleveland, whose bitterness against my father and uncle
for turning out her husband you have heard--but she is very
agreeable. I had a little private satisfaction in very
naturally telling my Lord Bath how happy I have made his old
printer, Franklyn. The Earl was in extreme good-humour,
repeated epigrams, ballads, anecdotes, stories, which, as
Madame S`evign`e says, put one in mind " "de sa d`efunte
veine." The Countess was not in extreme good-humour, but in
the best-humoured ill-humour in the world; contested every
thing with great drollery, and combated Mrs. Cleveland on
Madame Maintenon's character, with as much satire and knowledge
of the world as ever I heard in my life. I told my Lord Bath
General Wall's foolish vain motto, "Aut Caesar aut nihil." He
replied, "He is an impudent fellow; he should have taken 'Murus
aheneus.'" Doddington has translated well the motto on the
caps of the Hanoverians, "Vestigia nulla retrorsum." "They
never mean to go back again."

Saunders, the new admiral, told the King yesterday in a very
odd phrase, that they should scren his heart out, if Byng is
not now in the harbour of Mahon. The world condemns extremely
the rashness of superseding admirals on no information but from
our enemies. The ministry tremble for Thursday se'nnight
(inter alia), when the King is to desire the Parliament to
adjourn again. I believe altogether it will make a party.
Adieu!

(696) Now first printed.

(697) "June 6. I heard that a message in writing had been sent
to the Prince, from the King offering him an allowance of
40,000 pounds a year, and an apartment in the palaces of
Kensington and St. James's. The answer was full of high
gratitude for the allowance, but declining the apartment, on
account of the mortification it would be to his mother; though
it is well known that he does not live with her, either in town
or country." Doddington, p. 345.-E.

328 Letter 187
To Sir Horace Mann.
Arlington Street, June 14, 1756.

Our affairs have taken a strange turn, my dear Sir, since I
wrote to you last at the end of May; we have been all
confusion, consternation, and resentment! At this moment we
are all perplexity! When we were expecting every instant that
Byng would send home Marshal Richelieu's head to be placed upon
Temple-bar, we were exceedingly astonished to hear that the
governor and garrison of Gibraltar had taken a panic for
themselves, had called a council of war, and in direct
disobedience to a positive command, had refused Byng a
battalion from thence. This council was attended, and their
resolution signed, by all the chief officers there, among whom
are some particular favourites, and some men of the first
quality. Instead of being shocked at this disappointment, Byng
accompanied it with some wonderful placid letters, in which he
notified his intention of retiring under the cannon of
Gibraltar, in case he found it dangerous to attempt the relief
of Minorca! These letters had scarce struck their damp before
D'Abreu, the Spanish minister, received an account from France,
that Galissoni`ere had sent word that the English fleet had
been peeping about him, with exceeding caution, for two or
three days; that on the 20th of May they had scuffled for about
three hours, that night had separated them, and that to his
great astonishment, the English fleet, of which he had not
taken one vessel. had disappeared in the morning. If the world
was scandalized at this history, it was nothing to the
exasperation of the court, who, on no other foundation than an
enemy's report, immediately ordered Admiral Hawke and Saunders
[created an admiral on Purpose] to bridle and saddle the first
ship at hand, and post away to Gibraltar, and to hang and drown
Byng and West, and then to send them home to be tried for their
lives: and not to be too partial to the land, and to be as
severe upon good grounds as they were upon scarce any, they
despatched Lord Tyrawley and Lord Panmure upon the like errand
over the Generals Fowke and Stuart. This expedition had so far
a good effect, that the mob itself could i)ot accuse the
ministry of want of rashness; and luckily for the latter, in
three days more the same canal confirmed the disappearance of
the English fleet for four days after the engagement--but
behold! we had scarce had time to jumble together our sorrow
for our situation, and our satisfaction for the despatch we had
used to repair it, when yesterday threw us into a new puzzle.
Our spies, the French, have sent us intelligence that
Galissoni`ere is disgraced, recalled, and La Motte sent to
replace him, and that Byng has reinforced the garrison of St.
Philip's(698) with--150 men! You, who are nearer the spot, may
be able, perhaps, to unriddle or unravel all this confusion;
but you have no notion how it has put all your politics
aground!

This is not our only quandary! A message of 40,000 pounds
a-year, with an intention of an establishment for a court, and
an invitation of coming to live at Kensington, has been sent to
Leicester-fields. The money was very kindly received--the
proposal of leaving our lady-mother refused in most submissive
terms. It is not easy to enforce obedience; yet it is not
pleasant to part with our money for nothing--and yet it is
thought that will be the consequence of this ill-judged step of
authority. My dear child, I pity you who are to represent and
to palliate all the follies of your country!

My uncle has got his peerage: but just when the patent was
ready my Lord Privy Seal Gower went out of town, on which the
old baby wrote him quite an abusive letter, which my Lord Gower
answered with a great deal of wit and severity. Lord
Ilchester(699) and Lord Falconberg(700) are created earls.

General Isemberg of the Hessians has already diverted us: he
never saw the tide till he came to Southampton; he was alarmed,
and seeing the vessel leaning on the shore, he sent for his
master of the horse, and swore at him for overturning the ship
in landing the horses. Another of them has challenged a
Hampshire justice, for committing one of his soldiers; but
hitherto both Hessians and Hanoverians are rather popular.

Your brother, whom, if any thing, I think better, is set out
this morning for Bristol. You cannot pray more for its
restoring his health than I do. I have just received yours of
May 28th, to which I make no answer, as all the events I have
mentioned are posterior to your accounts. Adieu! my dear Sir.

(698) In the month of June 1756, the Marshal de Richelieu, at
the head of sixteen thousand men, landed in Minorca, and almost
immediately obtained possession of the whole island, as well as
of the fortress of St. Philip and Port Mahon, the population
joining him; and the garrison, commanded by General Blakeney,
being very weak, and not having received the expected succours
from Admiral Byng.-D.

(699) Stephen first Earl of Ilchester, eldest surviving son of
Sir Stephen Fox. His titles were given him, with remainder, in
failure of issue male of himself, to his younger brother, Henry
Fox.,-D.

(700) Thomas Belasyse, fourth Viscount and first Earl of
Fauconberg. He died in 1774.-D.

330 Letter 188
To George Montagu, Esq.
June 18.

The two drawings of the Vine and Strawberry, which you desired,
are done. and packed up in a box; tell me how I must send them.
The confusion about the ministry is not yet settled; at least
it was not at noon to-day; but, for fear that confusion should
ever finish, all the three factions are likely to come into
place together. Poor Mr. Chute has had another bad fit; he
took the air yesterday for the first time. I came to town but
last night, and returned to my chateau this evening knowing
nothing but that we are on the crisis of battles and
ministries. Adieu!

P. S. I just hear that your cousin Halifax has resigned, on
Pitt's not letting him be secretary of state for the West
Indies.

330 Letter 189
To Sir Horace Mann.
Strawberry Hill, July 11, 1756.

I receive with great satisfaction all your thanks for my
anxiety about your brother: I love you both so much, that
nothing can flatter me more, than to find I please the one by
having behaved as I ought to the other--oh, yes! I could be
much more rejoiced, if this brother ceased to want my
attentions. Bristol began to be of service to him. but he has
caught cold there, and been out of order again: he assures me
it is over. I will give you a kind of happiness: since he was
there, he tells me, that if he does not find all the benefit he
expects, he thinks of going abroad. I press this most eagerly,
and shall drive it on, for I own if he stays another winter in
England, I shall fear his disorder will fix irremovably. I
will give you a commission, which, for his sake, I am sure, you
will be attentive to execute in the perfectest manner. Mr. Fox
wants four vases of the Volterra alabaster, of four feet high
each. I choose to make over any merit in it to you, and though
I hate putting you to expense, at which you always catch so
greedily, when it is to oblige, yet you shall present these.
Choose the most beautiful patterns, look to the execution, and
send them with rapidity, with such a letter as your turn for
doing civil things immediately dictates.

There is no describing the rage against Byng; for one day we
believed him a real Mediterranean Byng.(701) He has not
escaped a sentence of abuse, by having involved so many
officers in his disgrace and his councils of war: one talks
coolly of their being broke, and that is all. If we may
believe report, the siege is cooled' into a blockade, and we
may still save Minorca, and, what I think still more of dear
old Blakeney.(702) What else we shall save or lose I know not.
The French, we hear, are embarked at Dunkirk--rashly, if to
come hither; if to Jersey or Guernsey, uncertain of success if
to Ireland, ora pro vobis! The Guards are going to encamp. I
am sorry to say, that with so much serious war about our ears,
we can't help playing with crackers. Well, if the French do
come, we shall at least have something for all the money we
have laid out on Hanoverians and Hessians! The latter, on
their arrival. asked bonnement where the French camp was. They
could not conceive being sent for if it was no nearer than
Calais.