Chapter 187

Arlington Street, Wednesday, Feb. 15, 1764. (page 283)

My dear lord, You ought to be Witness to the fatigue I am suffering, before you can estimate the merit I have in being writing to you at this moment. Cast up eleven hours in the House of Commons on Monday, and above seventeen hours yesterday--ay, seventeen at length,- -and then you may guess if I am tired! nay, you must add seventeen hours that I may possibly be there on Friday, and then calculate if I am weary.(473) In short, yesterday was the longest day ever known in the House of Commons--why, on the Westminster election at the end of my father's reign,(474) I was at home by six. On Alexander Murray's(475) affair, I believe, by five--on the militia, twenty people, I think, sat till six, but then they were only among themselves, no heat, no noise, no roaring. It was half an hour after seven this morning before I was at home. Think of that, and then brag of your French parliaments!(476)

What is ten times greater, Leonidas and the Spartan minority did not make such a stand at Thermopylae, as we did. Do you know, we had like to have been the majority? Xerxes(477) is frightened out of his senses; Sysigambis(478) has sent an express to Luton to forbid Phrates(479) coming to town to-morrow: Norton's(480) impudence has forsaken him; Bishop Warburton is at this moment reinstating Mr. Pitt's name in the dedication to his sermons, which he had expunged for Sandwich's;(481) and Sandwich himself is--at Paris, perhaps, by this time, for the first thing I expect to hear to-morrow is, that he is gone off.

Now are you mortally angry with me for trifling with you, and not telling you at once the particulars of this almost-revolution. You may be angry, but I shall take my own time, and shall give myself what airs I please both to you, my Lord Ambassador, and to you, my Lord Secretary of State, who will, I suppose, open this letter--if you have courage enough left. In the first place, I assume all the impertinence of a prophet, aye, of that great curiosity, a prophet, who really prophesied before the event, and whose predictions have been accomplished. Have I, or have I not, announced to you the unexpected blows that would be given to the administration?--come, I will lay aside my dignity, and satisfy your impatience. There's moderation.

We sat all Monday hearing evidence against Mr. Wood,(482) that dirty wretch Webb,(483) and the messengers, for their illegal proceedings against Mr. Wilkes. At midnight, Mr. Grenville offered us to adjourn or proceed. Mr. Pitt humbly begged not to eat or sleep till so great a point should be decided. On a division, in which though many said aye to adjourning, nobody would go out for fear of losing their seats, it was carried by 379 to 31, for proceeding--and then--half the House went away. The ministers representing the indecency of this, and Fitzherbert saying that many were within call, Stanley observed, that after voting against adjournment, a third part had adjourned themselves, when, instead of being within call, they ought to have been within hearing: this was unanswerable, and we adjourned.

Yesterday we fell to again. It was one in the morning before the evidence was closed. CarringTon, the messenger, was alone examined for seven hours. This old man, the cleverest of all ministerial terriers, was pleased with recounting his achievements, yet guarded and betraying nothing. However, the arcana imperia have been wofully laid open.

I have heard Garrick, and other players, give themselves airs of fatigue after a long part--think of the Speaker, nay, think of the clerks taking most correct minutes for sixteen hours, and reading them over to every witness; and then let me hear of fatigue! Do you know, not only my Lord Temple,(484)--who you may swear never budged as spectator, but old Will Chetwynd,(485) now past eighty, and who had walked to the House, did not stir a single moment out of his place, from three in the afternoon till the division at seven in the morning. Nay, we had patriotesses, too, who stayed out the whole: Lady Rockingham and Lady Sondes the first day; both again the second day, with Miss Mary Pelham, Mrs. Fitzroy,(486) and the Duchess of Richmond, as patriot as any of us. Lady Mary Coke, Mrs. George Pitt,(487) and Lady Pembroke(488) came after the Opera, but I think did not stay above seven or eight hours at most.

At one, Sir W. Meredith(489) moved a resolution of the illegality of the warrant, and opened it well. He was seconded by old Darlington's brother,(490) a convert to us. Mr. Wood, who had shone the preceding day by great modesty, decency, and ingenuity, forfeited these merits a good deal by starting up (according to a ministerial plan,) and very arrogantly, and repeatedly in the night, demanding justice and a previous acquittal, and telling the House he scorned to accept being merely excused; to which Mr. Pitt replied, that if he disdained to be excused, he would deserve to be censured. Mr. Charles Yorke (who, with his family, have come roundly to us for support against the Duke of Bedford on the Marriage-bill(491)) proposed to adjourn. Grenville and the Ministry would have agreed to adjourn the debate on the great question itself, but declared they would push this acquittal. This they announced haughtily enough--for as yet, they did not doubt of their strength. Lord Frederick Campbell(492) was the most impetuous of all, so little he foresaw how much wiser it would be to follow your brother. Pitt made a short speech, excellently argumentative, and not bombast, nor tedious. nor deviating from the question. He was supported by your brother, and Charles Townshend, and Lord George;(493) the two last of whom are strangely firm, now they are got under the cannon of your brother Charles, who, as he must be extraordinary, is now so in romantic nicety of honour. His father,(494) who is dying, or dead, at Bath, and from whom he hopes two thousand a year, has sent for him. He has refused to go--lest his steadiness should be questioned. At a quarter after four we divided. Our cry was so loud, that both we and the ministers thought we had carried it. It is not to be painted, the dismay of the latter--in good truth not without reason, for we were 197, they but 207. Your experience can tell you, that a majority of but ten is a defeat. Amidst a great defection from them, was even a white staff, Lord Charles Spencer(495)--now you know still more of what I told you was preparing for them!

Crestfallen, the ministers then proposed simply to discharge the complaint; but the plumes which they had dropped, Pitt soon placed in his own beaver. He broke out on liberty, and, indeed, on whatever he pleased, uninterrupted. Rigby sat feeling the vice-treasurership slipping from under him. Nugent was now less pensive--Lord Strange,(496) though not interested, did not like it. Every body was too much taken up with his own concerns or too much daunted, to give the least disturbance to the Pindaric. Grenville, however, dropped a few words, which did but heighten the flame. Pitt, with less modesty than ever he showed, pronounced a panegyric, on his own administration, and from thence broke out on the dismission of officers. This increased the roar from us. Grenville replied, and very finely, very pathetically, very animated. he painted Wilkes and faction, and, with very little truth, denied the charge of menaces to officers. At that moment, General A'Court(497) walked up the House --think what an impression such an incident must make, when passions, hopes, and fears, were all afloat--think, too, how your brother and I, had we been ungenerous, could have added to these sensations! There was a man not so delicate. Colonel Barr`e rose--and this attended with a striking circumstance; Sir Edward Deering, one of our noisy fools, called out, "Mr. Barr`e,"(498) The latter seized the thought with admirable quickness, and said to the Speaker, who, in pointing to him, had called him Colonel, "I beg your pardon, Sir, you have pointed to me by a title I have no right to," and then made a very artful and pathetic speech on his own services and dismission; with nothing bad but an awkward attempt towards an excuse to Mr. Pitt for his former behaviour. Lord North, who will not lose his bellow, though he may lose his place, endeavoured to roar up the courage of his comrades, but it would not do--the House grew tired, and we again divided at seven for adjournment; some of our people were gone, and we remained but 184, they 208; however, you will allow our affairs are mended, when we say, but 184. We then came away, and left the ministers to satisfy Wood, Webb, and themselves, as well as they could. It was eight in the morning before I was in bed; and considering that this is no very short letter, Mr. Pitt bore the fatigue with his usual spirit(499)--and even old Onslow, the late Speaker, was sitting up, anxious for the event.

On Friday we are to have the great question, which would prevent my writing; and to-morrow I dine with Guerchy, at the Duke of Grafton's, besides twenty other engagements. To-day I have shut myself up; for with writing this, and taking notes yesterday all day, and all night, I have not an eye left to see out of--nay, for once in my life, I shall go to bed at ten o'clock.

I am glad to be able to contradict two or three passages in my last letter. The Prince and Princess of Brunswick are safely landed, though they were in extreme danger. The Duc de Pecquigny had not only been put in arrest late on the Sunday night, which I did not know, but has retrieved his honour. Monsieur de Guerchy sent him away, and at Dover Virette found him, and whispered him to steal from D'Allonville(500) and fight. The Duc first begged his pardon, owned himself in the wrong, and then fought him, and was wounded, though slightly, in four places in the arm; and both are returned to London with their honours as white as snow.

Sir Jacob Downing(501) is dead, and has left every shilling to his wife; id est, not sixpence to my Lord Holland;(502) a mishap which, being followed by a minority of 197, will not make a pleasant week to him.

now would you believe how I feel and how I wish? I wish we may continue the minority. The desires of some of my associates, perhaps, may not be satisfied, but mine are. Here is an opposition formidable enough to keep abler ministers than Messieurs the present gentlemen in awe. They may pick pockets, but they will pick no more locks. While we continue a minority, we preserve our characters, and we have some too good to part with. I hate to have a camp to plunder; at least, I am so Which I am so whig, I hate spoils but the opima spolia. I think it, too, much more creditable to control ministers, than to be ministers--and much more creditable than to become mere ministers ourselves. I have several other excellent reasons against our success, though I could combat them with as many drawn from the insufficience of the present folk, and the propriety of Mr. Pitt being minister; but I am too tired, and very likely so are you, my dear lord, by this time, and therefore good night!

Friday noon.

I had sealed my letter, and break it open again on receiving yours of the 13th, by the messenger. Though I am very sorry you had not then got mine from Monin, which would have prepared you for much of what has happened, I do not fear its miscarriage, as I think I can account for the delay. I had, for more security, put it into the parcel with two more volumes of my Anecdotes of Painting; which, I suppose, remained in M. Monin's baggage; and he might not have taken it when he delivered the single letters. If he has not yet sent you the parcel, you may ask for it, as the same delicacy is not necessary as for a letter.

I thank Lord Beauchamp much for the paper, but should thank him much more for a letter from himself. I am going this minute to the House, where I have already been to prayers,(503) to take a place. It was very near full then, so critical a day it is! I expect we shall be beaten-but we shall not be so many times more. Lord Granby(504) I hear, is to move the previous question--they are reduced to their heavy cannon.

Sunday evening, 19th.

Happening to hear of a gentleman who sets out for Paris in two or three days, I stopped my letter, both out of prudence (pray admire me!) and from thinking that it was as well to send you at once the complete history of our Great Week. By the time you have read the preceding pages, you may, perhaps, expect to find a change in the ministry in what I am going to say. You must have a little patience; our parliamentary war, like the last war in Germany, produces very considerable battles, that are not decisive. Marshal Pitt has given another great blow to the subsidiary army, but they remained masters of the field, and both sides sing te Deum. I am not talking figuratively, when I assure you that bells, bonfires, and an illumination from the Monument, were prepared in the city, in case we had the majority. Lord Temple was so indiscreet and indecent as to have fagots ready for two bonfires, but was persuaded to lay aside the design, even before it was abortive.

It is impossible to give you the detail of so long a debate as Friday's. You will regret it the less when I tell you it was a very dull one. I never knew a day of expectation answer. The impromptus and the unexpected are ever the most shining. We love to hear ourselves talk, and yet we must be formed of adamant to be able to talk day and night on the same question for a week together. If you had seen how ill we looked, you would not have wondered we did not speak well. A company of colliers emerging from damps and darkness could not have appeared more ghastly and dirty than we did on Wednesday morning; and we had not recovered much bloom on Friday. We spent two or three hours on corrections of, and additions to, the question of pronouncing the warrant illegal, till the ministry had contracted it to fit scarce any thing but the individual case of Wilkes, Pitt not opposing the amendments because Charles Yorke gave into them; for it is wonderful(505) what deference is paid by both sides to that house. The debate then began by Norton's moving to adjourn the consideration of the question for four months, and holding out a promise of a bill, which neither they mean nor, for my part, should I like: I would not give prerogative so much as a definition. You are a peer, and, therefore, perhaps, will hear it with patience--but think how our ears must have tingled, when he told us, that should we pass the resolution, and he were a judge, he would mind it no more than the resolution of a drunken porter! Had old Onslow been in the chair, I believe he would have knocked him down with the mace. He did hear of it during the debate, though not severely enough; but the town rings with it. Charles Yorke replied, and was much admired. Me he did not please; I require a little more than palliatives and sophistries. He excused the part he has taken by pleading that he had never seen the warrant, till after Wilkes was taken up--yet he then pronounced the No. 45 a libel, and advised the commitment of Wilkes to the Tower. If you advised me to knock a man down, would you excuse yourself by saying you had never seen the stick with which I gave the blow Other speeches we had without end, but none good, except from Lord George Sackville, a short one from Elliot, and one from Charles Townshend, so fine that it amazed, even from him. Your brother had spoken with excellent sense against the corrections, and began well again in the debate, but with so much rapidity that he confounded himself first, and then was seized with such a hoarseness that he could not proceed. Pitt and George Grenville ran a match of silence, striving which should reply to the other. At last, Pitt, who had three times in the debate retired with pain,(506) rose about three in the morning, but so languid, so exhausted, that, in his life, he never made less figure. Grenville answered him; and at five in the morning we divided. The Noes were so loud, as it admits a deeper sound than Aye, that the Speaker, who has got a bit of nose(507) since the opposition got numbers, gave it for us. They went forth; and when I heard our side counted to the amount of 218, I did conclude we were victorious; but they returned 232. It is true we were beaten by fourteen, but we were increased by twenty-one; and no ministry could stand on so slight an advantage, if we could continue above two hundred.(508)

We may, and probably shall, fall off: this was our strongest question--but our troops will stand fast: their hopes and views depend upon it, and their spirits are raised. But for the other side it will not be the same. The lookers-on will be stayers away, and their very subsidies will undo them. They bought two single votes that day with two peerages;(509) Sir R. Bampfylde(510) and Sir Charles Tynte(511)--and so are going to light up the flame of two more county elections--and that in the west, where surely nothing was wanting but a tinder-box!

You would have almost laughed to see the spectres produced by both sides; one would have thought that they had sent a search-warrant for members of parliament into every hospital. Votes were brought down in flannels and blankets, till the floor of the House looked like the pool of Bethesda. 'Tis wonderful that half of us are not dead--I should not say us; Herculean I have not suffered the least, except that from being a Hercules of ten grains, I don't believe I now weigh above eight. I felt from nothing so much as the noise, which made me as drunk as an owl- -you may imagine the clamours of two parties so nearly matched, and so impatient to come to a decision.

The Duchess of Richmond has got a fever with the attendance of Tuesday--but on Friday we were forced to be unpolite. The Amazons came down in such squadrons, that we were forced to be denied. However, eight or nine of the patriotesses dined in one of the Speaker's rooms, and stayed there till twelve--nay, worse, while their dear country was at stake, I am afraid they were playing at loo!

The Townshends, you perceive by this account, are returned; their father not dead.(512) Lord Howe(513) and the Colonel voted with us; so did Lord Newnham,(514) and is likely to be turned out of doors for it. A warrant to take up Lord Charles Spenser was sent to Blenheim from Bedford-house,(515) and signed by his brother, and returned for him; so he went thither--not a very kind office in the Duke of Marlborough to Lord Charles's character. Lord Granby refused to make the motion, but spoke for it. Lord Hardwicke is relapsed; but we do not now fear any consequences from his death. The Yorkes, who abandoned a triumphant administration, are not so tender as to return and comfort them in their depression.

The chief business now, I suppose, will lie in souterreins and intrigues. Lord Bute's panic will, probably, direct him to make application to us. Sandwich will be manufacturing lies, and Rigby, negotiations. Some change or other, whether partial or extensive, must arrive. The best that can happen for the ministers, is to be able to ward off the blow till the recess, and they have time to treat at leisure; but in just the present state it is impossible things should remain. The opposition is too strong, and their leaders too able to make no impression.

Adieu! pray tell Mr. Hume that I am ashamed to be thus writing the history of England, when he is with you!

P. S. The new baronies are contradicted, but may recover truth at the end of the session.(516)

(473) the important debate on the question of General Warrants, which is the subject of the following able and interesting letter, has never been reported. There are, indeed, in the parliamentary history, a letter from Sir George Yonge, and two statements by Sir William Meredith and Charles Townshend, on the subject, but they relate chiefly to their own motives and reasonings, and give neither the names nor the arguments of the debater,-, and fall very short indeed of the vigour and vivacity of Mr. Walpole's animated sketch.-C.

(474) On the 22d December, 1741. This was one of the debates that terminated Sir Robert Walpole's administration: the numbers on the division were 220 against 216.-C.

(475) The proceedings of the 6th of February, 1751, against the Honourable A. Murray, for impeding the Westminster election; but Walpole, in his Memoires, states that the House adjourned at two in the morning.-C.

(476) The disputes between Louis XV. and his parliaments, which prepared the revolution, were at this period assuming a serious appearance.-C.

(477) The King.

(478) The Princess Dowager.

(479) Lord Bute. Luton was his seat in Bedfordshire.

(480) Mr. Walpole was too sanguine: Sir Fletcher had not even lost his boldness; for in the further progress of the adjourned debate, we shall find that he told the House that he would regard their resolution of no more value (in point of law, must be understood) than the vociferations of so many drunken porters.-C.

(481) Lord Sandwich was an agreeable companion and an able minister; but One whose moral character did not point him out as exactly the fittest patron for a volume of sermons; and he was at this moment so unpopular, that Mr. Walpole affects to think he may have been intimidated to fly.-C.

(482) Robert Wood, Esq. under-secretary of state; against whom, for his official share in the affair of the general warrants, Mr. Wilkes's complaint was made.-C.

(483) Philip Carteret Webb, Esq. solicitor to the treasury, complained on the same ground. Mr. Walpole probably applies these injurious terms to Mr. Webb, on account of a supposed error in his evidence on the trial in the Common Pleas, for which he was afterwards indicted for perjury, but he was fully acquitted. The point was of little importance --whether he had or had not a key in his hand.-C.

(484) Lord Temple was, as every one knows, a very keen politician, and took in all this matter a most prominent part; indeed, he was the prime mover of the whole affair, and bore the expense of all Wilkes's law proceedings out of his own pocket.-C.

(485) William Chetwynd, brother of Lord Chetwynd: at this time master of the mint. He was in early life a friend of Lord Bolingbroke, and called, from the darkness of his complexion, Oroonoko Chetwynd: he sat out these debates with impunity, for he survived to succeed his brother as Lord Chetwynd, in 1767, and did not die for some years after.-C.

(486) Probably Anne, daughter of Admiral Sir Peter Warren; married, in 1758, to Colonel Charles Fitzroy, afterwards first Lord Southampton.-C.

(487) Penelope, daughter of Sir H. Atkins, married, in 1746, to George Pitt, first Lord Rivers.-C.

(488) Elizabeth. daughter of Charles Spenser, first Duke of Marlborough of the Spenser branch, married, in 1756, to Henry, tenth Earl of Pembroke; she was celebrated for her beauty, which had even, it was said, captivated George III. When General Conway was dismissed for the vote of this very night, Lord Pembroke succeeded to his regiment.-C.

(489) Sir William Meredith's motion was, "That a general warrant for apprehending and securing the authors, printers, and publishers of a seditious libel, together with their papers, is not warranted by law." This proposition the administration did not venture to deny, but they attached to it an exculpatory amendment to the Following effect:--"although such warrant has been issued according to the usage of office, and has been frequently produced to, and never condemned by, courts of justice."-C.

(490) Gilbert, youngest brother of henry, first Earl of Darlington, who was so well known in Sir Robert Walpole's and Mr. Pelham's time as " Harry Vane." Mr. Gilbert Vane was deputy treasurer of Chelsea Hospital, but on this occasion abandoned the ministerial side of the House, with which he had hitherto voted: he died in 1772.-C.

(491) The Marriage act was not an original measure of Lord Hardwicke; but as he, on the failure of one or two previous attempts at a bill on that subject, was requested by the House of Lords to prepare one, he, and of course his sons, must have continued interested in its maintenance; but Mr. Walpole's suspicion of a bargain and sale of sentiments between there and the opposition is quite absurd. Even from Mr. Walpole's own statement, it would seem, that, on the subject of general warrants, mr. Charles Yorke acted with sincerity and moderation,-anxious to have a great legal question properly decided, and unwilling to prostitute its success to the purposes of party.-C.

(492) Fourth son of John, third Duke of Argyle; afterwards keeper of the privy seal in Scotland, secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, and finally, lord register of Scotland. As He was the brother-in-law of General Conway, Mr. Walpole seems to have expected him to have followed Conway's politics.-C.

(493) Lord George Sackville.

(494) Charles, third Lord Townshend, a peer, whose reputation is lost between that of his father and his sons.-C.

(495) Second son of the Duke of Marlborough; his white staff was that of comptroller of the household. He was, it seems, in Mr. Walpole's sense of the word, wiser than Lord Frederick Campbell; but we shall see presently, that this wisdom grew ashamed of itself in a day or two, and in 1765, when the party which he had this night assisted came into power, he was turned out.-C.

(496) James, eldest son of the Earl of Derby, born in 1717; he died in 1771, before his father. I know not why Walpole says he was not interested; he was a very respectable man, but he was also chancellor of the duchy, and might naturally have felt as much interested as the other placemen-C.

(497) Lately dismissed. See ant`e, p. 276, letter 188.-E.

(498) Colonel Barr`e had been dismissed from the office of adjutant-general. See ant`e, p. 258, letter 184.-E.

(499) The Duke of Newcastle in a letter to Mr. Pitt of the 15th, says, "Mr. West and honest George Onslow came to my bedside this morning, to give me an account of the glorious day we had yesterday, and of the great obligations which every true lover of the liberties of his country and our present constitution owe to you, for the superior ability, firmness, and resolution which you showed during the longest attention that ever was known. God forbid that your health should suffer by your zeal for your country." Chatham Correspondence, vol. ii. p. 287.-E.

(500) Probably the gentleman in whose charge M. de Guerchy had sent away the giddy Duke.-C.

(501) Sir Jacob Gerrard Downing, Bart., member for Dunwich: he died the 6th of February, and left his estate, as Mr. Walpole says, to his wife; but only for her life, and afterwards to build and endow Downing College at Cambridge.(502) The grounds of any expectation which Lord Holland may have entertained from Sir Jacob Downing have not reached us; but it is right to say, that Mr. Walpole had quarrelled with Lord Holland, and was glad on any occasion, just or otherwise, to sneer at him.-C.

(503) It may be necessary to remark, that any member who attends at the daily prayers of the House has a right, for that evening, to the place he occupies at prayers. On nights of great interest, when the House is expected to be crowded, there is consequently a considerable attendance at prayers.-C.

(504) Eldest son of the third Duke of Rutland, well known for his gallant conduct at Minden, and still remembered for his popularity with the army and the public. He was at this time commander-in-chief and master-general of the ordnance. He died before his father, in 1770.-C.

(505) Wonderful to Mr. Walpole only, who had a private pique against the Yorkes; no one else could wonder that deference should be paid to long services, high stations, great abilities, and unimpeached integrity.-C.

(506) Mr. Pitt's frequent fits of the gout are well known: he was even suspected of sometimes acting a fit of the gout in the House of Commons. (A reference to the Chatham Correspondence will, it is believed, remove the illiberal suspicion, that Mr. Pitt, on this, or any other occasion, was in the practice of "acting a fit of the gout." On the morning after the debate, the Duke of Newcastle thus wrote to Mr. Pitt "I shall not be easy till I hear you have not increased your pain and disorder, by your attendance and the great service you did yesterday to the public. I could not omit thanking you and congratulating you upon your great and glorious minority, before I went to Claremont. Such a minority, with such a leader, composed of gentlemen of the Greatest and most independent fortunes in the kingdom, against a majority of fourteen only, influenced by power and force, and fetched from all corners of the kingdom, must have its weight, and produce the most happy consequences to the public." Chatham Correspondence, vol. ii. p. 288.-E.]

(507) Sir John Cust's nose was rather short, as his picture by Reynolds, as well as by Walpole, testify.-C.

(508) In reference to this defeat of the ministry, Gray, in a letter to Dr. Wharton, says, "Their crests are much fallen and countenances lengthened by the transactions of last week; for the ministry, on Thursday last (after sitting till near eight in the morning), carried a small point by a majority of only forty, and on another previous division by one of ten only; and on Friday last, at five in the morning, there were 220 to 232; and by this the court only obtained to adjourn the debate for four months, and not to get a declaration in favour of their measures. If they hold their ground many weeks after this, I shall wonder; but the new reign has already produced many wonders." Works, vol. iv. p. 30.-E.

(509) Not correct. See afterwards.-E.

(510) sir Richard Warwick Bampfylde, fourth baronet; member for Devonshire.-E.

(511) Sir Charles Kemeys Tynte, fifth baronet; member for Somersetshire.-E.

(512) He died on the 13th of the ensuing month.-E.

(513) Richard, fourth Viscount, and first Earl Howe, the hero of the 1st of June; and his brother, Colonel, afterwards General Sir William, who succeeded him as fifth Viscount Howe.-C.

(514) George Simon, Viscount Newnham, afterwards second Earl of Harcourt, remarkable for a somewhat exaggerated imitation of French fashions. His father, the first Earl, was at this time chamberlain to the Queen.-C.

(515) See ant`e, p. 286. The meaning of this passage is, that the Duke of Bedford (who was president of the council) wrote a letter, which he sent to Blenheim for the Duke of Marlborough to sign, desiring his brother, Lord Charles, to abstain from again voting against the government. The Duke of Marlborough (who was privy seal) signed, as Walpole intimates, the letter; and Lord Charles, instead of attending the House, and voting, as he had done on the former night, against ministers, went down to Blenheim.-C.

(516) They never took place, and probably never were in contemplation.-E.