Letters Of Horace Walpole Volume I Part 9

If you ever think of returning to England, as I hope it will be long first, you must prepare yourself with Methodism. I really believe that by that time it will be necessary: this sect increases as fast as almost ever any religious nonsense did. Lady f.a.n.n.y s.h.i.+rley has chosen this way of bestowing the dregs of her beauty; and Mr. Lyttelton is very near making the same sacrifice of the dregs of all those various characters that he has worn. The Methodists love your big sinners, as proper subjects to work upon--and indeed they have a plentiful harvest--I think what you call flagrancy was never more in fas.h.i.+on. Drinking is at the highest wine-mark; and gaming joined with it so violent, that at the last Newmarket meeting, in the rapidity of both, a bank-bill was thrown down, and n.o.body immediately claiming it, they agreed to give it to a man that was standing by....

_EARTHQUAKE IN LONDON--GENERAL PANIC--MARRIAGE OF CASIMIR, KING OF POLAND._

TO SIR HORACE MANN.

ARLINGTON STREET, _March_ 11, 1750.

Portents and prodigies are grown so frequent, That they have lost their name.

My text is not literally true; but as far as earthquakes go towards lowering the price of wonderful commodities, to be sure we are overstocked. We have had a second, much more violent than the first; and you must not be surprised if by next post you hear of a burning mountain sprung up in Smithfield. In the night between Wednesday and Thursday last (exactly a month since the first shock), the earth had a s.h.i.+vering fit between one and two; but so slight that, if no more had followed, I don't believe it would have been noticed. I had been awake, and had scarce dozed again--on a sudden I felt my bolster lift up my head; I thought somebody was getting from under my bed, but soon found it was a strong earthquake, that lasted near half a minute, with a violent vibration and great roaring. I rang my bell; my servant came in, frightened out of his senses: in an instant we heard all the windows in the neighbourhood flung up. I got up and found people running into the streets, but saw no mischief done: there has been some; two old houses flung down, several chimneys, and much chinaware. The bells rung in several houses. Admiral Knowles, who has lived long in Jamaica, and felt seven there, says this was more violent than any of them: Francesco prefers it to the dreadful one at Leghorn. The wise say,[1] that if we have not rain soon, we shall certainly have more. Several people are going out of town, for it has nowhere reached above ten miles from London: they say, they are not frightened, but that it is such fine weather, "Lord! one can't help going into the country!" The only visible effect it has had, was on the Ridotto, at which, being the following night, there were but four hundred people. A parson, who came into White's the morning of earthquake the first, and heard bets laid on whether it was an earthquake or the blowing up of powder mills, went away exceedingly scandalized, and said, "I protest, they are such an impious set of people, that I believe if the last trumpet was to sound, they would bet puppet-show against Judgment." If we get any nearer still to the torrid zone, I shall pique myself on sending you a present of cedrati and orange-flower water: I am already planning a _terreno_ for Strawberry Hill.

[Footnote 1: In an earlier letter Walpole mentions that Sir I. Newton had foretold a great alteration in the English climate in 1750.]

The Middles.e.x election is carried against the Court: the Prince, in a green frock (and I won't swear, but in a Scotch plaid waistcoat), sat under the Park-wall in his chair, and hallooed the voters on to Brentford. The Jacobites are so transported, that they are opening subscriptions for all boroughs that shall be vacant--this is wise! They will spend their money to carry a few more seats in a Parliament where they will never have the majority, and so have none to carry the general elections. The omen, however, is bad for Westminster; the High Bailiff went to vote for the Opposition.

I now jump to another topic; I find all this letter will be detached sc.r.a.ps; I can't at all contrive to hide the seams: but I don't care. I began my letter merely to tell you of the earthquake, and I don't pique myself upon doing any more than telling you what you would be glad to have told you. I told you too how pleased I was with the triumphs of another old beauty, our friend the Princess. Do you know, I have found a history that has great resemblance to hers; that is, that will be very like hers, if hers is but like it. I will tell it you in as few words as I can. Madame la Marechale l'Hopital was the daughter of a seamstress; a young gentleman fell in love with her, and was going to be married to her, but the match was broken off. An old fermier-general, who had retired into the province where this happened, hearing the story, had a curiosity to see the victim; he liked her, married her, died, and left her enough not to care for her inconstant. She came to Paris, where the Marechal de l'Hopital married her for her riches. After the Marechal's death, Casimir, the abdicated King of Poland, who was retired into France, fell in love with the Marechale, and privately married her. If the event ever happens, I shall certainly travel to Nancy, to hear her talk of _ma belle fille la Reine de France_. What pains my Lady Pomfret would take to prove that an abdicated King's wife did not take place of an English countess; and how the Princess herself would grow still fonder of the Pretender for the similitude of his fortune with that of _le Roi mon mari_! Her daughter, Mirepoix, was frightened the other night, with Mrs. Nugent's calling out, _un voleur! un voleur_! The amba.s.sadress had heard so much of robbing, that she did not doubt but _dans ce pais cy_, they robbed in the middle of an a.s.sembly. It turned out to be a _thief in the candle_! Good night!

GENERAL PANIC--SHERLOCK'S PASTORAL LETTER--PREDICTIONS OF MORE EARTHQUAKES--A GENERAL FLIGHT FROM LONDON--EPIGRAMS BY CHUTE AND WALPOLE HIMSELF--FRENCH TRANSLATION OF MILTON.

TO SIR HORACE MANN.

ARLINGTON STREET, _April_ 2, 1750.

You will not wonder so much at our earthquakes as at the effects they have had. All the women in town have taken them up upon the foot of _Judgments_; and the clergy, who have had no windfalls of a long season, have driven horse and foot into this opinion. There has been a shower of sermons and exhortations: Seeker, the Jesuitical Bishop of Oxford, began the mode. He heard the women were all going out of town to avoid the next shock; and so, for fear of losing his Easter offerings, he set himself to advise them to await G.o.d's good pleasure in fear and trembling. But what is more astonis.h.i.+ng, Sherlock, who has much better sense, and much less of the Popish confessor, has been running a race with him for the old ladies, and has written a pastoral letter, of which ten thousand were sold in two days; and fifty thousand have been subscribed for, since the two first editions.

I told you the women talked of going out of town: several families are literally gone, and many more going to-day and to-morrow; for what adds to the absurdity, is, that the second shock having happened exactly a month after the former, it prevails that there will be a third on Thursday next, another month, which is to swallow up London. I am almost ready to burn my letter now I have begun it, lest you should think I am laughing at you: but it is so true, that Arthur of White's told me last night, that he should put off the last ridotto, which was to be on Thursday, because he hears n.o.body would come to it. I have advised several, who are going to keep their next earthquake in the country, to take the bark for it, as it is so periodic.[1] d.i.c.k Leveson and Mr.

Rigby, who had supped and stayed late at Bedford House the other night, knocked at several doors, and in a watchman's voice cried, "Past four o'clock, and a dreadful earthquake!"...

[Footnote 1: "I remember," says Addison, in the 240th _Tatler_, "when our whole island was shaken with an earthquake some years ago, that there was an impudent mountebank who sold pills, which, as he told the country people, were 'very good against an earthquake.'"]

This frantic terror prevails so much, that within these three days seven hundred and thirty coaches have been counted pa.s.sing Hyde Park corner, with whole parties removing into the country. Here is a good advertis.e.m.e.nt which I cut out of the papers to-day:--

"On Monday next will be published (price 6_d._) A true and exact List of all the n.o.bility and Gentry who have left, or shall leave, this place through fear of another Earthquake."

Several women have made earthquake gowns; that is, warm gowns to sit out of doors all to-night. These are of the more courageous. One woman, still more heroic, is come to town on purpose: she says, all her friends are in London, and she will not survive them. But what will you think of Lady Catherine Pelham, Lady Frances Arundel, and Lord and Lady Galway, who go this evening to an inn ten miles out of town, where they are to play at brag till five in the morning, and then come back--I suppose, to look for the bones of their husbands and families under the rubbish. The prophet of all this (next to the Bishop of London) is a trooper of Lord Delawar's, who was yesterday sent to Bedlam. His _colonel_ sent to the man's wife, and asked her if her husband had ever been disordered before. She cried, "Oh dear! my lord, he is not mad now; if your _lords.h.i.+p_ would but get any _sensible_ man to examine him, you would find he is quite in his right mind."...

I shall now go and show you Mr. Chute in a different light from heraldry, and in one in which I believe you never saw him. He will s.h.i.+ne as usual; but, as a little more severely than his good-nature is accustomed to, I must tell you that he was provoked by the most impertinent usage. It is an epigram on Lady Caroline Petersham, whose present fame, by the way, is coupled with young Harry Vane.

WHO IS THIS?

Her face has beauty, we must all confess, But beauty on the brink of ugliness: Her mouth's a rabbit feeding on a rose; With eyes--ten times too good for such a nose!

Her blooming cheeks--what paint could ever draw 'em?

That paint, for which no mortal ever saw 'em.

Air without shape--of royal race divine-- 'Tis Emily--oh! fie!--'tis Caroline.

Do but think of my beginning a third sheet! but as the Parliament is rising, and I shall probably not write you a tolerably long letter again these eight months, I will lay in a stock of merit with you to last me so long. Mr. Chute has set me too upon making epigrams; but as I have not his art mine is almost a copy of verses: the story he told me, and is literally true, of an old Lady Bingley:

Celia now had completed some thirty campaigns, And for new generations was hammering chains; When whetting those terrible weapons, her eyes, To Jenny, her handmaid, in anger she cries, "Careless creature! did mortal e'er see such a gla.s.s!

Who that saw me in this, could e'er guess what I was!

Much you mind what I say! pray how oft have I bid you Provide me a new one? how oft have I chid you?"

"Lord, Madam!" cried Jane, "you're so hard to be pleased!

I am sure every gla.s.sman in town I have teased: I have hunted each shop from Pall Mall to Cheapside: Both Miss Carpenter's man, and Miss Banks's I've tried."

"Don't tell me of those girls!--all I know, to my cost, Is, the looking-gla.s.s art must be certainly lost!

One used to have mirrors so smooth and so bright, They did one's eyes justice, they heightened one's white, And fresh roses diffused o'er one's bloom--but, alas!

In the gla.s.ses made now, one detests one's own face; They pucker one's cheeks up and furrow one's brow, And one's skin looks as yellow as that of Miss Howe!"

After an epigram that seems to have found out the longitude, I shall tell you but one more, and that wondrous short. It is said to be made by a cow. You must not wonder; we tell as many strange stories as Baker and Livy:

A warm winter, a dry spring, A hot summer, a new King.

Though the sting is very epigrammatic, the whole of the distich has more of the truth than becomes prophecy; that is, it is false, for the spring is wet and cold.

There is come from France a Madame Bocage,[1] who has translated Milton: my Lord Chesterfield prefers the copy to the original; but that is not uncommon for him to do, who is the patron of bad authors and bad actors.

She has written a play too, which was d.a.m.ned, and worthy my lord's approbation. You would be more diverted with a Mrs. Holman, whose pa.s.sion is keeping an a.s.sembly, and inviting literally everybody to it.

She goes to the drawing-room to watch for sneezes; whips out a curtsey, and then sends next morning to know how your cold does, and to desire your company next Thursday.

[Footnote 1: Madame du Boccage published a poem in imitation of Milton, and another founded on Gesner's "Death of Abel." She also translated Pope's "Temple of Fame;" but her princ.i.p.al work was "La Columbiade." It was at the house of this lady, at Paris, in 1775, that Johnson was annoyed at her footman's taking the sugar in his fingers and throwing it into his coffee. "I was going," says the Doctor, "to put it aside, but hearing it was made on purpose for me, I e'en tasted Tom's fingers." She died in 1802.]

Mr. Whithed has taken my Lord Pembroke's house at Whitehall; a glorious situation, but as madly built as my lord himself was. He has bought some delightful pictures too, of Claude, Caspar and good masters, to the amount of four hundred pounds.

Good night! I have nothing more to tell you, but that I have lately seen a Sir William Boothby, who saw you about a year ago, and adores you, as all the English you receive ought to do. He is much in my favour.

_DEATH OF WALPOLE'S BROTHER, AND OF THE PRINCE OF WALES--SPEECH OF THE YOUNG PRINCE--SINGULAR SERMON ON HIS DEATH._

TO SIR HORACE MANN.

ARLINGTON STREET, _April_ 1, 1751.

How shall I begin a letter that will--that must--give you as much pain as I feel myself? I must interrupt the story of the Prince's death, to tell you of _two_ more, much more important, G.o.d knows! to you and me!

One I had prepared you for--but how will you be shocked to hear that our poor Mr. Whithed is dead as well as my brother!...

I now must mention my own misfortune. Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday mornings, the physicians and _all the family of painful death_ (to alter Gray's phrase), were persuaded and persuaded me, that the bark, which took great place, would save my brother's life--but he relapsed at three o'clock on Thursday, and died last night. He ordered to be drawn and executed his will with the greatest tranquillity and satisfaction on Sat.u.r.day morning. His spoils are prodigious--not to his own family!

indeed I think his son the most ruined young man in England. My loss, I fear, may be considerable, which is not the only motive of my concern, though, as you know, I had much to forgive, before I could regret: but indeed I do regret. It is no small addition to my concern, to fear or foresee that Houghton and all the remains of my father's glory will be pulled to pieces! The widow-Countess immediately marries--not Richcourt, but s.h.i.+rley, and triumphs in advancing her son's ruin by enjoying her own estate, and tearing away great part of his.

Now I will divert your private grief by talking to you of what is called the public. The King and Princess are grown as fond as if they had never been of different parties, or rather as people who always had been of different. She discountenances all opposition, and he _all ambition_.

Prince George, who, with his two eldest brothers, is to be lodged at St.

James's, is speedily to be created Prince of Wales. Ayscough, his tutor, is to be removed with her entire inclination as well as with everybody's approbation. They talk of a Regency to be established (in case of a minority) by authority of Parliament, even this session, with the Princess at the head of it. She and Dr. Lee, the only one she consults of the late cabal, very sensibly burned the late Prince's papers the moment he was dead. Lord Egmont, by seven o'clock the next morning, summoned (not very decently) the faction to his house: all was whisper!

at last he hinted something of taking the Princess and her children under their protection, and something of the necessity of harmony. No answer was made to the former proposal. Somebody said, it was very likely indeed they should agree now, when the Prince could never bring it about; and so everybody went away to take care of himself. The imposthumation is supposed to have proceeded, not from his fall last year, but from a blow with a tennis-ball some years ago. The grief for the dead brother is affectedly displayed. They cried about an elegy,[1]

and added, "Oh, that it were but his brother!" On 'Change they said, "Oh, that it were but the butcher[2]!"

[Footnote 1: The elegy alluded to, was probably the effusion of some Jacobite royalist. That faction could not forgive the Duke of c.u.mberland his excesses or successes in Scotland; and, not contented with branding the parliamentary government of the country as usurpation, indulged in frequent unfeeling and scurrilous personalities on every branch of the reigning family:

Here lies Fred, Who was alive and is dead: Had it been his father, I had much rather; Had it been his brother, Still better than another; Had it been his sister, No one would have missed her; Had it been the whole generation, Still better for the nation: But since 'tis only Fred, Who was alive and is dead-- There's no more to be said.

Walpole's _Memoirs of George II._]