Letters Of Horace Walpole Volume I Part 15

I was much diverted the other morning with another volume on birds by Edwards, who has published four or five. The poor man, who is grown very old and devout, begs G.o.d to take from him the love of natural philosophy; and having observed some heterodox proceedings among bantam c.o.c.ks, he proposes that all schools of girls and boys should be promiscuous, lest, if separated, they should learn wayward pa.s.sions. But what struck me most were his dedications, the last was to G.o.d; this is to Lord Bute, as if he was determined to make his fortune in one world or the other.

Pray read Fontaine's fable of the lion grown old; don't it put you in mind of anything? No! not when his s.h.a.ggy majesty has borne the insults of the tiger and the horse, &c., and the a.s.s comes last, kicks out his only remaining fang, and asks for a blue bridle? _Apropos_, I will tell you the turn Charles Townshend gave to this fable. "My lord," said he, "has quite mistaken the thing; he soars too high at first: people often miscarry by not preceding by degrees; he went and at once asked for my _Lord_ Carlisle's garter--if he would have been contented to ask first for my _Lady_ Carlisle's garter, I don't know but he would have obtained it!" Adieu!

_CAPTURE OF CARRICKFERGUS._

TO SIR HORACE MANN.

ARLINGTON STREET, _Feb._ 28, 1760.

The next time you see Marshal Botta, and are to act King of Great Britain, France, and Ireland, you must abate about a hundredth thousandth part of the dignity of your crown. You are no more monarch of _all_ Ireland, than King O'Neil, or King Macdermoch is. Louis XV. is sovereign of France, Navarre, and Carrickfergus. You will be mistaken if you think the peace is made, and that we cede this Hibernian town, in order to recover Minorca, or to keep Quebec and Louisbourg. To be sure, it is natural you should think so: how should so victorious and heroic a nation cease to enjoy any of its possessions, but to save Christian blood? Oh! I know you will suppose there has been another insurrection, and that it is King John of Bedford, and not King George of Brunswick, that has lost this town. Why, I own you are a great politician, and see things in a moment--and no wonder, considering how long you have been employed in negotiations; but for once all your sagacity is mistaken.

Indeed, considering the total destruction of the maritime force of France, and that the great mechanics and mathematicians of this age have not invented a flying bridge to fling over the sea and land from the coast of France to the north of Ireland, it was not easy to conceive how the French should conquer Carrickfergus--and yet they have. But how I run on! not reflecting that by this time the old Pretender must have hobbled through Florence on his way to Ireland, to take possession of this sc.r.a.p of his recovered domains; but I may as well tell you at once, for to be sure you and the loyal body of English in Tuscany will slip over all this exordium to come to the account of so extraordinary a revolution. Well, here it is. Last week Monsieur Thurot--oh! now you are _au fait_!--Monsieur Thurot, as I was saying, landed last week in the isle of Islay, the capital province belonging to a great Scotch King, who is so good as generally to pa.s.s the winter with his friends here in London. Monsieur Thurot had three s.h.i.+ps, the crews of which burnt two s.h.i.+ps belonging to King George, and a house belonging to his friend the King of Argyll--pray don't mistake; by _his friend_, I mean King George's, not Thurot's friend. When they had finished this campaign, they sailed to Carrickfergus, a poorish town, situate in the heart of the Protestant cantons. They immediately made a moderate demand of about twenty articles of provisions, promising to pay for them; for you know it is the way of modern invasions to make them cost as much as possible to oneself, and as little to those one invades. If this was not complied with, they threatened to burn the town, and then march to Belfast, which is much richer. We were sensible of this civil proceeding, and not to be behindhand, agreed to it; but somehow or other this capitulation was broken; on which a detachment (the whole invasion consists of one thousand men) attack the place. We shut the gates, but after the battle of Quebec, it is impossible that so great a people should attend to such trifles as locks and bolts, accordingly there were none--and as if there were no gates neither, the two armies fired through them--if this is a blunder, remember I am describing an _Irish_ war. I forgot to give you the numbers of the Irish army. It consisted of four companies--indeed they consisted but of seventy-two men, under Lieut.-colonel Jennings, a wonderful brave man--too brave, in short, to be very judicious. Unluckily our ammunition was soon spent, for it is not above a year that there have been any apprehensions for Ireland, and as all that part of the country are most protestantly loyal, it was not thought necessary to arm people who would fight till they die for their religion. When the artillery was silenced, the garrison thought the best way of saving the town was by flinging it at the heads of the besiegers; according they poured volleys of brickbats at the French, whose commander, Monsieur Flobert, was mortally knocked down, and his troops began to give way. However, General Jennings thought it most prudent to retreat to the castle, and the French again advanced. Four or five raw recruits still bravely kept the gates, when the garrison, finding no more gunpowder in the castle than they had had in the town, and not near so good a brick-kiln, sent to desire to surrender. General Thurot accordingly made them prisoners of war, and plundered the town.

_THE BALLAD OF "HARDYKNUTE"--MR. HOME'S "SIEGE OF AQUILEIA"--"TRISTRAM SHANDY"--BISHOP WARBURTON'S PRAISE OF IT._

TO SIR DAVID DALRYMPLE.

STRAWBERRY HILL, _April_ 4, 1760.

Sir,--As I have very little at present to trouble you with myself, I should have deferred writing till a better opportunity, if it were not to satisfy the curiosity of a friend; a friend whom you, Sir, will be glad to have made curious, as you originally pointed him out as a likely person to be charmed with the old Irish poetry you sent me. It is Mr.

Gray, who is an enthusiast about those poems, and begs me to put the following queries to you; which I will do in his own words, and I may say truly, _Poeta loquitur_.

"I am so charmed with the two specimens of Erse poetry, that I cannot help giving you the trouble to inquire a little farther about them, and should wish to see a few lines of the original, that I may form some slight idea of the language, the measure, and the rhythm.

"Is there anything known of the author or authors, and of what antiquity are they supposed to be?

"Is there any more to be had of equal beauty, or at all approaching to it?

"I have been often told, that the poem called Hardykanute[1] (which I always admired and still admire) was the work of somebody that lived a few years ago. This I do not at all believe, though it has evidently been retouched in places by some modern hand; but, however, I am authorised by this report to ask, whether the two poems in question are certainly antique and genuine. I make this inquiry in quality of an antiquary, and am not otherwise concerned about it; for if I were sure that any one now living in Scotland had written them, to divert himself and laugh at the credulity of the world, I would undertake a journey into the Highlands only for the pleasure of seeing him."

[Footnote 1: "Hardyknute" was an especial favourite of Sir W. Scott. In his "Life of Mr. Lockhart" he mentions having found in one of his books a mention that "he was taught 'Hardyknute' by heart before he could read the ballad itself; it was the first poem he ever learnt, the last he should ever forget" (c. 2). And in the very last year of his life, while at Malta, in a discussion on ballads in general, "he greatly lamented his friend Mr. Frere's heresy in not esteeming highly enough that of 'Hardyknute.' He admitted that it was not a veritable old ballad, but 'just old enough,' and a n.o.ble imitation of the best style." In fact, it was the composition of a lady, Mrs. Hachet, of Wardlaw.]

You see, Sir, how easily you may make our greatest southern bard travel northward to visit a brother. The young translator has nothing to do but to own a forgery, and Mr. Gray is ready to pack up his lyre, saddle Pegasus, and set out directly. But seriously, he, Mr. Mason, my Lord Lyttelton, and one or two more, whose taste the world allows, are in love with your Erse elegies: I cannot say in general they are so much admired--but Mr. Gray alone is worth satisfying.

The "Siege of Aquileia," of which you ask, pleased less than Mr. Home's other plays.[1] In my own opinion, "Douglas" far exceeds both the other. Mr. Home seems to have a beautiful talent for painting genuine nature and the manners of his country. There was so little of nature in the manners of both Greeks and Romans, that I do not wonder at his success being less brilliant when he tried those subjects; and, to say the truth, one is a little weary of them. At present, nothing is talked of, nothing admired, but what I cannot help calling a very insipid and tedious performance: it is a kind of novel, called "The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy;"[2] the great humour of which consists in the whole narration always going backwards. I can conceive a man saying that it would be droll to write a book in that manner, but have no notion of his persevering in executing it. It makes one smile two or three times at the beginning, but in recompense makes one yawn for two hours. The characters are tolerably kept up, but the humour is for ever attempted and missed. The best thing in it is a Sermon, oddly coupled with a good deal of coa.r.s.eness, and both the composition of a clergyman.

The man's head, indeed, was a little turned before, now topsy-turvy with his success and fame. Dodsley has given him six hundred and fifty pounds for the second edition and two more volumes (which I suppose will reach backwards to his great-great-grandfather); Lord Fauconberg, a donative of one hundred and sixty pounds a-year; and Bishop Warburton[3] gave him a purse of gold and this compliment (which happened to be a contradiction), "that it was quite an original composition, and in the true Cervantic vein:" the only copy that ever was an original, except in painting, where they all pretend to be so. Warburton, however, not content with this, recommended the book to the bench of bishops, and told them Mr. Sterne, the author, was the English Rabelais. They had never heard of such a writer. Adieu!

[Footnote 1: "_Mr. Home's other plays._" Mr. Home was a Presbyterian minister. His first play was "The Tragedy of Douglas," which D'Israeli describes as a drama which, "by awakening the piety of domestic affections with the n.o.bler pa.s.sions, would elevate and purify the mind;"

and proceeds, with no little indignation, to relate how nearly it cost the author dear. The "Glasgow divines, with the monastic spirit of the darkest ages, published a paper, which I abridge for the contemplation of the reader, who may wonder to see such a composition written in the eighteenth century: 'On Wednesday, February 2, 1757, the Presbytery of Glasgow came to the following resolution: They, having seen a printed paper int.i.tuled an admonition and exhortation of the reverend Presbytery of Edinburgh, which, among other evils prevailing, observed the following _melancholy_ but _notorious_ facts, that one who is a minister of the Church of Scotland did _himself_ write and compose _a stage play_, int.i.tuled 'The Tragedy of Douglas,' and got it to be acted at the theatre of Edinburgh; and that he, with several other ministers of the Church, were present, and _some_ of them _oftener than once_, at the acting of the said play before a numerous audience. The presbytery being _deeply affected_ with this new and strange appearance, do publish these sentiments,'" &c., &c.--sentiments with which I will not disgust the reader.]

[Footnote 2: Walpole's criticism is worth preserving as a singular proof how far prejudice can obscure the judgement of a generally shrewd observer, and it is the more remarkable since he selects as its especial fault the failure of the author's attempts at humour; while all other critics, from Macaulay to Thackeray, agree in placing it among those works in which the humour is most conspicuous and most attractive. Even Johnson, when Boswell once, thinking perhaps that his "ill.u.s.trious friend" might be offended with its occasional coa.r.s.eness, p.r.o.nounced Sterne to be "a dull fellow," was at once met with, "Why no, Sir."]

[Footnote 3: Bishop Warburton was Bishop of Gloucester, a prelate whose vast learning was in some degree tarnished by unepiscopal violence of temper. He was a voluminous author; his most important work being an essay on "The Divine Legation of Moses." In one of his letters to Garrick he praises "Tristram Shandy" highly, priding himself on having recommended it to all the best company in town.]

_ERSE POETRY--"THE DIALOGUES OF THE DEAD"--"THE COMPLETE ANGLER."_

TO SIR DAVID DALRYMPLE.

_June_ 20, 1760.

I am obliged to you, Sir, for the volume of Erse poetry: all of it has merit; but I am sorry not to see in it the six descriptions of night with which you favoured me before, and which I like as much as any of the pieces. I can, however, by no means agree with the publisher, that they seem to be parts of an heroic poem; nothing to me can be more unlike. I should as soon take all the epitaphs in Westminster Abbey, and say it was an epic poem on the History of England. The greatest part are evidently elegies; and though I should not expect a bard to write by the rules of Aristotle, I would not, on the other hand, give to any work a t.i.tle that must convey so different an idea to every common reader. I could wish, too, that the authenticity had been more largely stated. A man who knows Dr. Blair's character will undoubtedly take his word; but the gross of mankind, considering how much it is the fas.h.i.+on to be sceptical in reading, will demand proofs, not a.s.sertions.

I am glad to find, Sir, that we agree so much on "The Dialogues of the Dead;"[1] indeed, there are very few that differ from us. It is well for the author, that none of his critics have undertaken to ruin his book by improving it, as you have done in the lively little specimen you sent me. Dr. Brown has writ a dull dialogue, called "Pericles and Aristides,"

which will have a different effect from what yours would have. One of the most objectionable pa.s.sages in Lord Lyttelton's book is, in my opinion, his apologising for the _moderate_ government of Augustus. A man who had exhausted tyranny in the most lawless and unjustifiable excesses is to be excused, because, out of weariness or policy, he grows less sanguinary at last!

[Footnote 1: "The Dialogues of the Dead" were by Lord Lyttelton. In an earlier letter Walpole p.r.o.nounces them "not very lively or striking."]

There is a little book coming out, that will amuse you. It is a new edition of Isaac Walton's "Complete Angler,"[1] full of anecdotes and historic notes. It is published by Mr. Hawkins,[2] a very worthy gentleman in my neighbourhood, but who, I could wish, did not think angling so very _innocent_ an amus.e.m.e.nt. We cannot live without destroying animals, but shall we torture them for our sport--sport in their destruction? I met a rough officer at his house t'other day, who said he knew such a person was turning Methodist; for, in the middle of conversation, he rose, and opened the window to let out a moth. I told him I did not know that the Methodists had any principle so good, and that I, who am certainly not on the point of becoming one, always did so too. One of the bravest and best men I ever knew, Sir Charles Wager, I have often heard declare he never killed a fly willingly. It is a comfortable reflection to me, that all the victories of last year have been gained since the suppression of the Bear Garden and prize-fighting; as it is plain, and nothing else would have made it so, that our valour did not singly and solely depend upon these two Universities. Adieu!

[Footnote 1: "The Complete Angler" is one of those rare books which retain its popularity 250 years after its publication--not for the value of its practical instructions to fishermen, for in this point of view it is valueless (Walton himself being only a worm or livebait fisherman, and the chapters on fly-fis.h.i.+ng being by Cotton), but for its healthy tone and love of country scenery and simple country amus.e.m.e.nts which are seldom more attractively displayed.]

[Footnote 2: Afterwards Sir John Hawkins, the executor and biographer of Dr. Johnson.]

_VISITS IN THE MIDLAND COUNTIES--WHICHNOVRE--SHEFFIELD--THE NEW ART OF PLATING--CHATSWORTH--HADDON HALL--HARDWICKE--APARTMENTS OF MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS--NEWSTEAD--ALTHORP._

TO GEORGE MONTAGU, ESQ.

ARLINGTON STREET, _Sept._ 1, 1760.

I was disappointed at your not being at home as I returned from my expedition.

My tour has been extremely agreeable. I set out with winning a good deal at Loo at Ragley; the Duke of Grafton was not so successful, and had some high words with Pam. I went from thence to Offley's at Whichnovre[1], the individual manor of the flitch of bacon, which has been growing rusty for these thirty years in his hall. I don't wonder; I have no notion that one could keep in good humour with one's wife for a year and a day, unless one was to live on the very spot, which is one of the sweetest scenes I ever saw. It is the brink of a high hill; the Trent wriggles through at the foot; Lichfield and twenty other churches and mansions decorate the view. Mr. Anson has bought an estate [Shugborough] close by, whence my Lord used to cast many a wishful eye, though without the least pretensions even to a bit of lard.

[Footnote 1: The manor of Whichnovre, near Lichfield, is held (like the better-known Dunmow, in Ess.e.x) on the singular custom of the Lord of the Manor "keeping ready, all times of the year but Lent, one bacon-flyke hanging in his hall, to be given to every man or woman who demanded it a year and a day after marriage, upon their swearing that they would not have changed for none other, fairer nor fouler, richer nor poorer, nor for no other descended of great lineage sleeping nor waking at no time."]

I saw Lichfield Cathedral, which has been rich, but my friend Lord Brooke and his soldiery treated poor St. Chad[1] with so little ceremony, that it is in a most naked condition. In a niche at the very summit they have crowded a statue of Charles the Second, with a special pair of shoe-strings, big enough for a weatherc.o.c.k. As I went to Lord Strafford's I pa.s.sed through Sheffield, which is one of the foulest towns in England in the most charming situation; there are two-and-twenty thousand inhabitants making knives and scissors: they remit eleven thousand pounds a week to London. One man there has discovered the art of plating copper with silver; I bought a pair of candlesticks for two guineas that are quite pretty. Lord Strafford has erected the little Gothic building, which I got Mr. Bentley to draw; I took the idea from Chichester Cross. It stands on a high bank in the menagerie, between a pond and a vale, totally bowered over with oaks. I went with the Straffords to Chatsworth and stayed there four days; there were Lady Mary c.o.ke, Lord Besborough and his daughters, Lord Th.o.m.ond, Mr. Boufoy, the Duke, the old d.u.c.h.ess, and two of his brothers. Would you believe that nothing was ever better humoured than the ancient Grace? She stayed every evening till it was dark in the skittle-ground, keeping the score; and one night, that the servants had a ball for Lady Dorothy's birthday, we fetched the fiddler into the drawing-room, and the dowager herself danced with us! I never was more disappointed than at Chatsworth,[2] which, ever since I was born, I have condemned. It is a glorious situation; the vale rich in corn and verdure, vast woods hang down the hills, which are green to the top, and the immense rocks only serve to dignify the prospect. The river runs before the door, and serpentises more than you can conceive in the vale. The Duke is widening it, and will make it the middle of his park; but I don't approve an idea they are going to execute, of a fine bridge with statues under a n.o.ble cliff. If they will have a bridge (which by the way will crowd the scene), it should be composed of rude fragments, such as the giant of the Peak would step upon, that he might not be wetshod. The expense of the works now carrying on will amount to forty thousand pounds. A heavy quadrangle of stables is part of the plan, is very c.u.mbrous, and standing higher than the house, is ready to overwhelm it. The princ.i.p.al front of the house is beautiful, and executed with the neatness of wrought plate; the inside is most sumptuous, but did not please me; the heathen G.o.ds, G.o.ddesses, Christian virtues, and allegoric gentlefolks, are crowded into every room, as if Mrs. Holman had been in heaven and invited everybody she saw. The great apartment is first; painted ceilings, inlaid floors, and unpainted wainscots make every room _sombre_. The tapestries are fine, but not fine enough, and there are few portraits. The chapel is charming. The great _jet d'eau_ I like, nor would I remove it; whatever is magnificent of the kind in the time it was done, I would retain, else all gardens and houses wear a tiresome resemblance. I except that absurdity of a cascade tumbling down marble steps, which reduces the steps to be of no use at all. I saw Haddon, an abandoned old castle of the Rutlands, in a romantic situation, but which never could have composed a tolerable dwelling. The Duke sent Lord John [Cavendish] with me to Hardwicke, where I was again disappointed; but I will not take relations from others; they either don't see for themselves, or can't see for me. How I had been promised that I should be charmed with Hardwicke,[3] and told that the Devons.h.i.+res ought to have established there! never was I less charmed in my life. The house is not Gothic, but of that betweenity, that intervened when Gothic declined and Paladian was creeping in--rather, this is totally naked of either. It has vast chambers--aye, vast, such as the n.o.bility of that time delighted in, and did not know how to furnish. The great apartment is exactly what it was when the Queen of Scots was kept there. Her council-chamber, the council-chamber of a poor woman, who had only two secretaries, a gentleman-usher, an apothecary, a confessor, and three maids, is so outrageously s.p.a.cious, that you would take it for King David's, who thought, contrary to all modern experience, that in the mult.i.tude of counsellors there is wisdom. At the upper end is the state, with a long table, covered with a sumptuous cloth, embroidered and embossed with gold,--at least what was gold; so are all the tables.

Round the top of the chamber runs a monstrous frieze, ten or twelve feet deep, representing stag-hunting in miserable plastered relief. The next is her dressing-room, hung with patch-work on black velvet; then her state bedchamber. The bed has been rich beyond description, and now hangs in costly golden tatters. The hangings, part of which they say her Majesty worked, are composed of figures as large as life, sewed and embroidered on black velvet, white satin, &c., and represent the virtues that were necessary for her, or that she was forced to have, as Patience and Temperance, &c. The fire-screens are particular; pieces of yellow velvet, fringed with gold, hang on a cross-bar of wood, which is fixed on the top of a single stick, that rises from the foot. The only furniture which has any appearance of taste are the table and cabinets, which are all of oak, richly carved. There is a private chamber within, where she lay, her arms and style over the door; the arras hangs over all the doors; the gallery is sixty yards long, covered with bad tapestry, and wretched pictures of Mary herself, Elizabeth in a gown of sea-monsters, Lord Darnley, James the Fifth and his Queen, curious, and a whole history of Kings of England, not worth sixpence a-piece. There is an original of old Bess of Hardwicke herself, who built the house.

Her estates were then reckoned at sixty thousand pounds a-year, and now let for two hundred thousand pounds. Lord John Cavendish told me, that the tradition in the family is, that it had been prophesied to her that she should never die as long as she was building; and that at last she died in a hard frost, when the labourers could not work. There is a fine bank of old oaks in the park over a lake; nothing else pleased me there.

However, I was so diverted with this old beldam and her magnificence, that I made this epitaph for her:--

Four times the nuptial bed she warm'd, And every time so well perform'd, That when death spoil'd each husband's billing, He left the widow every s.h.i.+lling.

Fond was the dame, but not dejected; Five stately mansions she erected With more than royal pomp, to vary The prison of her captive Mary.

When Hardwicke's towers shall bow their head, Nor ma.s.s be more in Worksop said; When Bolsover's fair fame shall tend Like Olcotes, to its mouldering end; When Chatsworth tastes no Ca'ndish bounties, Let fame forget this costly countess.

[Footnote 1: Scott alludes to Lord Brooke's violation of St. Chad's Cathedral in "Marmion," whose tomb

Was levelled when fanatic Brooke The fair cathedral stormed and took, But thanks to Heaven and good St. Chad A guerdon meet the spoiler had (c. vi. 36).

And the poet adds in a note that Lord Brooke himself, "who commanded the a.s.sailants, was shot with a musket-ball through the visor of his helmet; and the royalists remarked that he was killed by a shot fired from St.

Chad's Cathedral on St. Chad's Day, and received his wound in the very eye with which, he had said, he hoped to see the ruin of all the cathedrals in England."]

[Footnote 2: "_Disappointed with Chatsworth._" In a letter, however, to Lord Strafford three days afterwards he says: "Chatsworth surpa.s.sed his expectations; there is such richness and variety of prospect."]

[Footnote 3: Hardwicke was one of what Home calls "the gentleman's houses," to which the unfortunate Queen was removed between the times of her detention at Tutbury and Fotheringay. It is not mentioned by Burton.]

As I returned, I saw Newstead[1] and Althorpe: I like both. The former is the very abbey. The great east window of the church remains, and connects with the house; the hall entire, the refectory entire, the cloister untouched, with the ancient cistern of the convent, and their arms on it; a private chapel quite perfect. The park, which is still charming, has not been so much unprofaned; the present Lord has lost large sums, and paid part in old oaks, five thousand pounds of which have been cut near the house. In recompense he has built two baby forts, to pay his country in castles for the damage done to the navy, and planted a handful of Scotch firs, that look like ploughboys dressed in old family liveries for a public day. In the hall is a very good collection of pictures, all animals; the refectory, now the great drawing-room, is full of Byrons; the vaulted roof remaining, but the windows have new dresses making for them by a Venetian tailor. Althorpe has several very fine pictures by the best Italian hands, and a gallery of all one's acquaintance by Vand.y.k.e and Lely. I wonder you never saw it; it is but six miles from Northampton. Well, good night; I have writ you such a volume, that you see I am forced to page it. The Duke [of c.u.mberland] has had a stroke of the palsy, but is quite recovered, except in some letters, which he cannot p.r.o.nounce; and it is still visible in the contraction of one side of his mouth. My compliments to your family.