Contents. Brougham's Early Tenacity.-Fitting up Conversations.- Old School' Ceremonies.-The Speculative Society.-A Brilliant Set.-Sydney's Opinion of his Friends.-Holland House.-Preacher at the Foundling.'-Sydney's 'Grammar of Life.'-The Picture Mania.-A Living Comes at Last.-The Wit's Ministry.-The Parsonage House at Foston-le-Clay.-Country Quiet. -The Universal Scratcher.-Country Life and Country Prejudice.-The Genial Magistrate.-Glimpse of Edinburgh Society.-Mrs. Grant of Laggan.- A Pension Difficulty.-Jeffrey and Cockburn.-Craigcrook.-Sydney Smith's Cheerfulness.-His Rheumatic Armour.-No Bishopric.-Becomes Canon of St. Paul's.-Anecdotes of Lord Dudley.-A Sharp Reproof.-Sydney's GEORGE BUBB DODINGTON, LORD MELCOMBE. A Dinner-giving lordly Poet.-A Misfortune for a Man of Society.-Branden- burgh House.-The Diversions of the Morning.-Johnson's Opinion of Foote. - Churchill and 'The Rosciad.'-Personal Ridicule in its Proper Light.-Wild Specimen of the Poet.-Walpole on Dodington's Diary.' The best Commentary on a Man's Life.-Leicester House.-Grace Boyle. -Elegant Modes of passing Time.-A sad Day.-What does Dodington come here for?-The Veteran Wit, Beau, and Politician.-' Defend us from A TREASURE FOR A LADY-SHERIDAN AND THE LAWYER 112 THEODORE HOOK'S ENGINEERING FROLIC SYDNEY SMITH'S WITTY ANSWER TO THE OLD PARISH 176 HORACE WALPOLE. The Commoners of England.-Horace's Regret for the Death of his Mother.'Little Horace' in Arlington Street.-Introduced to George I.-Charac teristic Anecdote of George I.-Walpole's Education.-Schoolboy Days.Boyish Friendships.-Companionship of Gray.- A Dreary Doom.-Walpole's Description of Youthful Delights.-Anecdote of Pope and Frederic of Wales. The Pomfrets.-Sir Thomas Robinson's Ball.-An Admirable Scene. Political Squibs. -Sir Robert's Retirement from Office.-The Splendid Mansion of Houghton.-Sir Robert's Love of Gardening.-What we owe to the 'Grandes Tours.'-George Vertue.-Men of One Idea.-The Noble Picture-gallery at Houghton.-The 'Market Pieces.'-Sir Robert's Death.-The Granville Faction.-A very good Quarrel.-Twickenham.Strawberry Hill. The Recluse of Strawberry.-Portraits of the Digby Family. Sacrilege.-Mrs. Damer's Models.-The Long Gallery at Strawberry.-The Chapel.-'A Dirty Little Thing.'-The Society around Strawberry Hill.-Anne Seymour Conway.-A Man who never Doubted.-Lady Sophia Fermor's Marriage.-Horace in Favour.-Anecdote of Sir William Stanhope.-A Paper House.-Walpole's Habits.-Why did he not Marry? -' Dowagers as Plenty as Flounders.'-Catherine Hyde, Duchess of Queensberry.-Anecdote of Lady Granville.-Kitty Clive.-Death of Horatio Walpole.-George, third Earl of Orford.—A Visit to Houghton.-Family Misfortunes. Poor Chatterton.-Walpole's Concern with Chatterton.-Walpole in Paris.-Anecdote of Madame Geoffrin.-'Who's that Mr. Walpole?The Miss Berrys.-Horace's two 'Straw Berries.'-Tapping a New Reign. -The Sign of the Gothic Castle.-Growing Old with Dignity.-Succession to an Earldom.-Walpole's Last Hours.-Let us not be Ungrateful. AD this elegant writer, remarks the compiler of 'Walpoliana,' composed memoirs of his own life, an example authorized by eminent names, ancient and modern, every other pen must have been dropped in despair, so true was it that 'he united the good sense of Fontenelle with the Attic salt and graces of Count Anthony Hamilton.' But Horace' was a man of great literary modesty, and always undervalued his own efforts. His life was one of little incident: it is his character, his mind, the society around him, the period in which he shone, that give the charm to his correspondence, and the interest to his biography. The Commoners of England. Besides, he had the weakness common to several other fine gentlemen who have combined letters and haut ton, of being ashamed of the literary character. The vulgarity of the court, its indifference to all that was not party writing, whether polemical or political, cast a shade over authors in his time. Never was there, beneath all his assumed Whig principles, a more profound aristocrat than Horace Walpole. He was, by birth, one of those well-descended English gentlemen who have often scorned the title of noble, and who have repudiated the notion of merging their own ancient names in modern titles. The commoners of England hold a proud pre-eminence. When some low-born man entreated James I. to make him a gentleman, the well-known answer was, 'Na, na, I canna! I could mak thee a lord, but none but God Almighty can mak a gentleman.' Sir Robert Walpole, afterwards minister to George II., and eventually Lord Orford, belonged to an ancient family in Norfolk; he was a third son, and was originally destined for the Church, but the death of his elder brethren having left him heir to the family estate, in 1698, he succeeded to a property which ought to have yielded him £2,000 a year, but which was crippled with various encumbrances. In order to relieve himself of these, Sir Robert married Catherine Shorter, the granddaughter of Sir John Shorter, who had been illegally and arbitrarily appointed Lord Mayor of London by James II. Horace was her youngest child, and was born in Arlington Street, on the 24th of September, 1717, O.S. Six years afterwards he was inoculated for the small-pox, a precaution which he records as worthy of remark, since the operation had then only recently been introduced by Lady Mary Wortley Montagu from Turkey. He is silent, however, naturally enough, as to one important point-his real parentage. The character of his mother was by no means such as to disprove an assertion which gained general belief: this was, that Horace was the offspring, not of Sir Robert Walpole, but of Carr, Lord Hervey, the eldest son of the Earl of Bristol, and the elder brother of Lord Hervey, whose Memoirs of the Court of George II.' are so generally known. Horace's Regret for the Death of his Mother. 3 Carr, Lord Hervey, was witty, eccentric, and sarcastic and from him Horace Walpole is said to have inherited his wit, his eccentricity, his love of literature, and his profound contempt for all mankind, excepting only a few members of a cherished and exclusive clique. In the Notes of his life which Horace Walpole left for the use of his executor, Robert Berry, Esq., and of his daughter, Miss Berry, he makes this brief mention of Lady Walpole 'My mother died in 1737.' He was then twenty years of age. But beneath this seemingly slight recurrence to his mother, a regret which never left him through life was buried. Like Cowper, he mourned, as the profoundest of all sorrows, the loss of that life-long friend. My mother, when I learn'd that thou wast dead, Although Horace in many points bore a strong resemblance to Sir Robert Walpole, he rarely if ever received from that jovial, heartless, able man, any proof of affection. An outcast from his father's heart, the whole force of the boy's love centred in his mother; yet in after-life no one reverenced Sir Robert Walpole so much as his supposed son. To be adverse to the minister was to be adverse to the unloved son who cherished his memory. What 'my father' thought, did, and said, was law; what his foes dared to express was heresy. Horace had the family mania strong upon him; the world was made for Walpoles, whose views were never to be controverted, nor whose faith impugned. Yet Horace must have witnessed, perhaps with out comprehending it, much disunion at home. Lady Walpole, beautiful and accomplished, could not succeed in riveting her husband to his conjugal duties. Gross licentiousness was the order of the day, and Sir Robert was among the most licentious; he left his lovely wife to the perilous attentions of all the young courtiers who fancied that by courting the Premier's wife they could secure Walpole's good offices. Sir Robert, ac cording to Pope, was one of those who • Never made a friend in private life, |