The Letters of Horace Walpole, Earl of Orford Volume I Part 34

The great pleasure I receive from your letters is a little abated by my continually finding that they have been opened. It is a mortification as it must restrain the freedom of our correspondence, and at a time when more than ever I must want to talk to you. Your brother showed me a letter, which I approve extremely, yet do not think this a proper time for it; for there IS not only no present prospect of any further alterations, but, if there were, none that will give that person any interest. He really has lost himself so much, that it will be long before he can recover credit enough to do any body any service. His childish and troublesome behaviour, particularly lately (,but I Will not mention instances, because I would not have it known whom I mean), has set him in the lowest light imaginable. I have desired your brother to keep your letter, and when we see a necessary or convenient opportunity, which I hope will not arrive, it shall be delivered. However, if you are still of that opinion, say so, and your brother shall carry it. At present, my dear child, I am much more at repose about you, as I trust no more will happen to endanger your situation. I shall not only give you the first notice, but employ all the means in my power to prevent your removal.

The Secret Committee, it seems, are almost aground, and, it is thought, will soon finish. They are now reduced, as I hear, to inquire into the last month, not having met with any foundation for proceeding in the rest of the time. However, they have this week given a strong instance of' their arbitrariness and private resentments. They sent for Paxton,(558) the solicitor of the treasury, and examined him about five hundred pounds which he had given seven years ago at Lord Limerick's election. The man, as it directly tended to accuse himself, refused to answer. They complained to the House, and after a long debate he was committed to the sergeant-at-arms -, and to-day, I hear, for still refusing, will be sent to Newgate.(559) We adjourn to-day for ten days, but the committee has leave to continue sitting. . But, my dear child, you may be quite at ease, for they themselves seem to despair of being able to effect any thing.

The Duke (560) is of age to-day, and I hear by the guns, is just gone with the King, to take his seat in the Lords.

I have this morning received the jar of cedrati safe, for which I give you a million of thanks. I am impatient to hear of the arrival of your secretary and the things at Florence; it is time for you to have received them.

Here! Amorevoli has sent me another letter. Would you believe that our wise directors for next year will not keep the Visconti, and have sent for the Fumagalli? She will not be heard to the first row of the pit.

I am growing miserable, for it is growing fine weather-that is, every body is going out of town. I have but just begun to like London, and to be settled in an agreeable set of' people, and now they are going to wander all over the kingdom.

Because they have some chance of having a month of good weather they will bury themselves three more in bad.

The d.u.c.h.ess of Cleveland (561) died last night of what they call a miliary fever, which is much about: she had not been ill two days. So the poor creature, her duke, is again to be let; she paid dear for the hopes of being d.u.c.h.ess dowager. Lady Catherine Pelham,(562) has miscarried of twins; but they are so miserable with the loss of their former two boys, that they seem glad now of not having any more to tremble for.

There is a man who has by degrees bred himself up to walk upon stilts so high, that he now stalks about and peeps into one pair of stairs windows. If this practice should spread, dining-rooms will be as innocent as chapels. Good night! I never forget my best loves to the Chutes.

P. S. I this moment hear that Edgecombe (563) and Lord Fitzwilliam are created English peers: I am sure the first is, and I believe the second.

(558) Commemorated in a line of Pope-"'Tis all a libel, Paxton, Sir, will say."-D.

(559) On a division of 180 against 128, Paxton was this day committed to Newgate where he remained till the end of the session, July 15. He died in April 1744.-E.

(560) The Duke of c.u.mberland, third Son of George the Second.-E.

(561) Lady Henrietta Finch, sister of the Earl of Winchilsea, wife of William, Duke of Cleveland. [On whose death, in 1774, the t.i.tle became extinct.]

(562) Catherine, sister of John Manners, Duke of Rutland, and wife of Henry Pelham. They lost their two sons by an epidemic sore-throat, after which she would never go to Esher, or any house where she had seen them.

(563) Richard Edgecombe, a great friend of Sir R. Walpole, was Created a baron to prevent his being examined by the Secret Committee concerning the management of the Cornish boroughs. (He was created Lord Edgec.u.mbe on the 20th of April, and in December appointed chancellor of the duchy of Lancaster. He died in 1758.]

247 Letter 63 To Sir Horace Mann.

London, April 22, 1742.

You perceive, by the size of my paper, how little I have to say.

The whole town is out of town for Easter, and nothing left but dust, old women, and the Secret Committee. They go on warmly, and have turned their whole thoughts to the secret-service money, after which they are inquiring by all methods. Sir John Rawdon (564) (you remember that genius in Italy) voluntarily swore before them that, at the late election at Wallingforrd, he spent two thousand pounds, and that one Morley promised him fifteen hundred more, if he would lay it out. "Whence was Morley to have it?"-"I don't know; I believe from the first minister." This makes an evidence. It is thought that they will ask leave to examine members, which was the reason of Edgec.u.mbe's going into the peerage, as they supposed he had been the princ.i.p.al agent for the Cornish boroughs. Sir John Cotton said, upon the occasion, "Between Newgate (565 and the House of Lords the committee will not get information."

The troops for Flanders go on board Sat.u.r.day se'nnight, the first embarkation of five thousand men: the whole number is to be sixteen thousand. It is not yet known what success Earl Stair has had at the Hague. We are in great joy upon the news of the King of Prussia's running away from the Austrians: (566) though his cowardice is well established, it is yet believed that the flight in question was determined by his head, not his heart; in short, that it was treachery to his allies.

I forgot to tell you, that of the Secret Committee Sir John Rushout and Cholmley TurnOr never go to it, nor, which is more extraordinary, Sir John Barnard. He says he thought their views were more general, but finding them so particular against one man, he Will not engage with them.

I have been breakfasting this morning at Ranelagh-garden: (567) they have built an immense amphitheatre, with balconies full of little ale-houses; it is in rivalry to Vauxhall, and costs above twelve thousand pounds. The building is not finished, but, they get great sums by people going to see it and breakfasting in the house: there were yesterday no less than three hundred and eighty persons, at eighteen pence a-piece. You see how poor we are, when, with a tax of four shillings in the pound, we are laying out such sums for cakes and ale.

We have a new opera, with your favourite song, se cerca, se dice: (568) Monticelli sings it beyond what you can conceive. Your last was of April 8th. I like the medal of the Caesars and Nihils (569) extremely; but don't at all like the cracking of your house, (570) except that it drives away your Pettegola. (571) What I like much worse is your recovering your strength so slowly; but I trust to the warm weather.

Miss Granville, daughter of the late Lord Lansdown, (572) is named maid of honour, in the room of Miss Hamilton, who I told you is to be Lady Brook-they are both so small! what little eggs they will lay!

How does my Princess?(573) does not she deign to visit you too?

Is Sade (574) there still? Is Madame Suares quite gone into devotion yet? Tell me any thing-I love any thing that you write to me. Good night!

(564) He was afterwards made an Irish lord. (Lord Rawdon in 1750, and Earl of Moira in 1761. His first two wives were the daughters of the Earl of Egmont and Viscount Hillsborough. His third wife, by whom he was the father of the late Lord Hastings, was the daughter, and eventually the heiress, of Theophilus, ninth Earl of Huntingdon.-D.)

(565) Alluding to Paxton, who was sent thither for refusing to give evidence.

(566) this must allude to the King of Prussia's abandonment of his design to penetrate through Austria to Vienna, which he gave of) in consequence of the lukewarmness of his Saxon and the absence of his French allies. It is curious now, when the mist of contemporary prejudices has pa.s.sed away, to hear Frederick the Great accused of cowardice.-D.

(567) the once celebrated place of amus.e.m.e.nt was so called from its site being that of a villa of' Viscount Ranelagh, near Chelsea. The last entertainment given in it was the installation ball of the Knights of the Bath, in 1802. It has since been razed to the ground.-E.

(568) In the Olimpiade.

(569) A satirical medal: on one side was the head of Francis, Duke of Lorrain (afterwards emperor) with this motto, aut Caesar aut nihil: on the reverse, that of the Emperor Charles Vii. Elector of Bavaria, who had been driven out of his dominions, et Caesar et nihil.

(570) Sir H. Mann had mentioned, in one of his letters, the appearance of several cracks in the walls of his house at Florence. Mrs. Goldsworthy, the wife of the English consul, had taken refuge in it when driven from Leghorn by an earthquake.-D.

(571) Mrs. ('Goldsworthy.

(572) George Granville, Lord Lansdown, Pope's "Granville the polite," one of Queen Anne's twelve peers, and one of the minor poets of that time. He died in 1734, without male issue, and his honours extinguished.-D.

(573) Princess Craon.

(574) The Chevalier de Sade.

249 Letter 64 To Sir Horace Mann.

London, April 29, 1742.

By yours of April 17, N. S. and some of your last letters, I find my Lady Walpole is more mad than ever-why, there never was so wild a scheme as this, of setting up an interest through Lord Chesterfield! one who has no power; and, if he had, would think of, or serve her, one of the last persons upon earth.

What connexion has he with what interest could he have in obliging her? and, but from views, what has he ever done, or will he ever do? But is Richcourt (575) so shallow, and so ambitious, as to put any trust in there projects? My dear child, believe me, if I was to mention them here, they would sound so chimerical, so womanish, that I should be laughed at for repeating them. For yourself, be quite at rest, and laugh, as I do, at feeble, visionary malice, and a.s.sure yourself, whoever mentions such politics to you, that my Lady Walpole must have very frippery intelligence from hence, if she can raise no better views and on no better foundations. For the poem you mention, I never read it: upon inquiry, I find there was such a thing though now quite obsolete: undoubtedly not Pope's, and only proves what I said before, how low, how paltry, how uninformed her ladyship's correspondents must be.

We are now all military! all preparations for Flanders! no parties but reviews; no officers, but "hope" they are to go abroad-at least, it is the fashion to say so. I am studying lists of regiments and Dames of colonels-not that "I hope I am to go abroad," but to talk of those who do. Three thousand men embarked yesterday and the day before, and the thirteen thousand others sail as soon as the transports can return. Messieurs d'Allemagne (576) roll their red eyes, stroke up their great beards, and look fierce-you know one loves a review and a tattoo.

We had a debate yesterday in the House on a proposal for replacing four thousand men of some that are to be sent abroad, that, in short, we might have fifteen thousand men to guard the kingdom. This was strongly opposed by the Tories, but we carried it in the committee, 214 against 123, and to-day, in the House, 280 against 169. Sir John Barnard, Pultney, the new ministry, all the Prince's people, except the Cobham cousins,(577) the Lord Mayor, several of the Opposition, voted with us; so you must interpret Tories in the strongest sense of the word.

The Secret Committee has desired leave to-day to examine three members, Burrel, Bristow, and Hanbury Williams: (578) the two first are directors of the bank; and it is upon an agreement made with them, and at which Williams was present, about remitting some money to Jamaica, and in which they pretend Sir Robert made a bad bargain, to oblige them as members of Parliament. they all three stood up, and voluntarily offered to be examined; so no vote pa.s.sed upon it.

These are all the political news: there is little of any other sort; so little gallantry is stirring, that I do not hear of so much as one maid of honour who has declared herself with child by any officer, to engage him not to go abroad. I told you once or twice that Miss Hamilton is going to be married to Lord Brook: somebody wished Lord Archibald joy. He replied, "Providence has been very good to my family."

We had a great scuffle the other night at the Opera, which interrupted it. Lord Lincoln was abused in the most shocking manner by a drunken officer, upon which he kicked him, and was drawing his sword, but was prevented. were they were put under arrest, and the next morning, the man begged his pardon before the Duke of Marlborough, Lord Albemarle, and other officers, in the most submissive terms. I saw the quarrel from the other side of the house, and rushing to get to Lord Lincoln, could not for the crowd. I climbed into the front boxes, and stepping over the shoulders of three ladies, before I knew where I was, found I had lighted in Lord Rockingham's (579) lap. It was ridiculous! Good night!

(575) Count Richcourt was a Lorrainer, and chief minister of Florence; there was a great connexion between him and Lady Walpole.

(576)The royal family.

(577) Pitts, Grenvilles, Lytteltons, all related by marriage, or female descent, to Lord Cobham.-D.

(578) Sir Charles Hanbury Williams, a devoted follower of Sir Robert Walpole. His various satirical poems against the enemies and successors of that minister are well known, and must ever be admired for their ease, their spirit, and the wit and humour of their sarcasm. It was said at the time that Sir Charles's poetry had done more in three months to lower and discredit those it was written against, than the Craftsman and other abusive papers had been able to effect against Sir Robert in a long series of years.-D.