for notwithstanding the solemnity of the painted windows, it had a gaudiness that was a little profane.

I can know no news here but by rebound; and yet, though they are to rebound again to you, they will be as fresh as any you can have at Greatworth. A kind of administration is botched up for the present, and even gave itself an air of that fierceness with which the winter sat out. Lord Hardwicke was told, that his sons must vote with the court, or be turned out; he replied, as he meant to have them in place, he chose they should be removed now. It looks ill for the court when he is sturdy. They wished, too, to have Pitt, if they could have had him without consequences; but they don't find any recruits repair to their standard. They brag that they should have had lord Waldegrave; a most notorious falsehood, as he had refused every offer they could invent the day before he was taken ill. The duke of Cumberland orders his servants to say, that so far from joining them, he believes if lord Waldegrave could have been foretold of his death, he would have preferred it to an union with Bute and Fox. The former's was a decisive panic; so sudden, that it is said lord Egremont was sent to break his resolution of retiring to the king. The other, whose journey to France does not indicate much less apprehension, affects to walk in the streets at the most public hours to mark his not trembling. In the mean time the two chiefs have paid their bravoes magnificently no less than fifty-two thousand pounds a-year are granted in reversion! Young Martin, who is older than I am, is named my successor; but I intend he shall wait some years if they had a mind to serve me, they could not have selected a fitter tool to set my character in a fair light by the comparison. Lord Bute's son has the reversion of an auditor of the imprest; this is all he has done ostensibly for his family, but the great things bestowed on the most insignificant objects, make me suspect some private compacts. Yet I may wrong him, but I do not mean it. Lord Granby has refused Ireland, and the Northumberlands are to transport their magnificence thither. I lament

5

* Samuel Martin, esq. M.P. for Camelford, one of the joint secretaries of the Treasury, named to succeed Walpole as usher of the receipts of Exchequer, comptroller of the great roll, and keeper of the foreign receipts. [Ed.]

5 The earl of Northumberland was gazetted, on the 20th April, lord lieutenant of Ireland, and on the 14th May, the marquis of Granby was appointed master of the Ordinance. [Ed.]

that you made so little of that voyage, but this is the season of unrewarded merit! One should blush to be preferred within the same year. Do but think that Calcraft is to be an Irish lord! Fox's millions, or Calcraft's tythes of millions, cannot purchase a grain of your virtue or character. Adieu!

Yours most truly.

To GEORGE MONTAGU, Esq.

Arlington-street, April 22, 1763.

I HAVE two letters from you, and shall take care to execute the commission in the second. The first diverted me much.

66

I brought my poor niece from Strawberry on Monday. As executrix, her presence was quite necessary, and she has never refused to do any thing reasonable that has been desired of her. But the house and the business have shocked her terribly; she still eats nothing, sleeps worse than she did, and looks dreadfully: I begin to think she will miscarry. She said to me t'other day, They tell me that if my lord had lived, he might have. done great service to his country at this juncture, by the respect all parties had for him. This is very fine; but as he did not live to do those services, it will never be mentioned in history!" I thought this solicitude for his honour charming. But he will be known by history; he has left a small volume of memoirs,1 that are a chef-d'œuvre. He twice shewed them to me, but I kept his secret faithfully; now it is for his glory to divulge it.

I am glad you are going to Dr. Lewis. After an Irish voyage I do not wonder you want careening. I have often preached to you-nay, and lived to you, too; but my sermons were flung away and my example.

This ridiculous administration is patched up for the present; the detail is delightful, but that I shall reserve for Strawberrytide. Lord Bath has complained to Fanshaw of lord Pulteney's

2

1 The "Memoirs from 1754 to 1758, by James earl of Waldegrave," which were published in 1821, with an introduction, said to be from the pen of lord Holland. [Ed.]

2 Son of the earl of Bath. [Or.] Lord viscount Pulteney was a lord of the bed chamber, member for Westminster, and colonel of the royal volun

extravagance, and added, "if he had lived he would have spent my whole estate." This almost comes up to sir Robert Brown, who, when his eldest daughter was given over, but still alive, on that uncertainty sent for an undertaker, and bargained for her funeral in hopes of having it cheaper, as it was possible she might recover. Lord Bath has purchased the Hatton vault in Westminster-abbey, squeezed his wife, son, and daughter into it, reserved room for himself, and has set the rest to sale. Come; all this is not far short of sir Robert Brown.

To my great satisfaction, the new lord Holland has not taken the least friendly, or even formal notice of me, on lord Waldegrave's death. It dispenses me from the least farther connexion with him, and saves explanations, which always entertain the world more than satisfy.

Dr. Cumberland is an Irish bishop; I hope before the summer is over that some beam from your cousin's portion of the triumvirate may light on poor Bentley. If he wishes it till next winter, he will be forced to try still new sunshine. I have taken Mrs. Pritchard's house for lady Waldegrave; I offered her to live with me at Strawberry, but with her usual good sense she declined, as she thought the children would be troublesome.

Charles Townshend's episode in this revolution passes belief; though he does not tell it himself. If I had a son born, and an old fairy were to appear and offer to endow him with her choicest gift, I should cry out, "Powerful Goody, give him any thing but parts!" Adieu!

Yours ever.

TO THE HON. H. S. CONWAY.

Strawberry-hill, May 1, 1763.

I FEEL happy at hearing your happiness; but, my dear Harry, your vision is much indebted to your long absence, which

Makes bleak rocks and barren mountains smile.

I mean no offence to Park-place, but the bitterness of the wea

teers at Madrid. His lordship went over with his regiment in the defence of Portugal. He died the 16th February 1763. [Ed.]

now.

ther makes me wonder how you can find the country tolerable This is a May-day for the latitude of Siberia! The milkmaids should be wrapped in the motherly comforts of a swan-skin petticoat. In short, such hard words have passed between me and the north-wind to-day, that, according to the language of the times, I was very near abusing it for coming from Scotland, and to imputing it to lord Bute. I don't know whether I should not have written a North Briton against it, if the printers were not all sent to Newgate, and Mr. Wilkes' to the Tower-ay, to the Tower, tout de bon. The new ministry are trying to make up for their ridiculous insignificance by a coup d'eclat. As I came hither yesterday, I do not know whether the particulars I have heard are genuine-but in the Tower he certainly is, taken up by lord Halifax's warrant for treason; vide the North Briton of Saturday was se'nnight. It is said he refused to obey the warrant, of which he asked and got a copy from the two messengers, telling them he did not mean to make his escape, but sending to demand his habeas corpus, which was refused. He then went to lord Halifax, and thence to the Tower; declaring they should get nothing out of him but what they knew. All his papers have been seized. Lord chief justice Pratt, I am told, finds great fault with the warrant.

wording of the

I don't know how to execute your commission for books of architecture, nor care to put you to expense, which I know will not answer. I have been consulting my neighbour, young Mr. Thomas Pitt, my present architect: we have all books of that sort here, but cannot think of one which will help you to a cottage or a green-house. For the former you should send me your idea, your dimensions; for the latter, don't you rebuild your old one, though in another place? A pretty green-house I never saw; nor without immoderate expense can it well be an agreeable object. Mr. Pitt thinks a mere portico without a pediment, and windows removeable in summer, would be the best plan you could have. If so, don't you remember something of that kind,

1 Wilkes was arrested in the night of the 29th, but his threats induced the officers to defer the execution of their warrant until the next morning, the 30th April 1763; when he was carried before the Secretaries of State for examination, and by them committed to the Tower. [Ed.]

2 Afterwards created lord Camelford. [Or.]

which you liked, at sir Charles Cotterel's at Rousham? But a fine green-house must be on a more exalted plan. In short, you must be more particular, before I can be at all so.

I called at Hammersmith yesterday about lady Ailesbury's tubs; one of them is nearly finished, but they will not both be completed these ten days. Shall they be sent to you by water? Good-night to her ladyship and you, and the infanta, whose progress in waxen statuary I hope advances so fast, that by next winter she may rival Rackstrow's old man. Do you know that, though apprised of what I was going to see, it deceived me, and made such an impression on my mind, that thinking on it as I came home in my chariot, and seeing a woman steadfastly at work in a window in Pall-mall, it made me start to see her Adieu ! Yours ever.

move.

Arlington-street, Monday night.

The mighty commitment set out with a blunder; the warrant directed the printer, and all concerned (unnamed) to be taken up. Consequently Wilkes had his habeas corpus of course, and was committed again; moved for another in the Commonpleas, and is to appear there to-morrow morning. Lord Temple being, by another strain of power, refused admittance to him, said, "I thought this was the Tower, but find it is the Bastille." They found among Wilkes's papers an unpublished North Briton, designed for last Saturday. It contained advice to the king not to go to St. Paul's on the thanksgiving, but to have a snug one in his own chapel; and to let George Sackville carry the sword. There was a dialogue in it, too, between Fox and Calcraft the former says to the latter, "I did not think you would have served me so, Jemmy Twitcher."

TO THE HON. H. S. CONWAY.

Arlington-street, May 6, very late, 1763.

THE Complexion of the times is a little altered since the beginning of this last winter. Prerogative, that gave itself such airs in November, and would speak to nothing but a Tory, has

Anne Seymour Conway. [Or.]