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After Doctor's Commons had lain fallow for a year or two, it is again likely to bear a handsome crop of divorces. Gallantry in this country scorns a mask. Maids only intrigue, wives elope. C'est l'étiquette. Two young married ladies are just gone off-no, this is a wrong term for one of them; for she has just come to town, and drives about London, for fear her adventure should be forgotten before it comes into the House of Lords. It is a Lady Worseley, sister of Lady Harrington. On hearing she was gone away with a Major Blisset, another young gentleman said, at St. James's coffee. house, "I have been very secret; but now, I think, I am at liberty to show this letter." It was couched in these laconic and sentimental terms: "I have loved Windham, I did love Graham, but now, I love only you, by God." I am a little angry for my nephew, Lord Cholmondeley, who has been most talked of for her, and who is thought to have the largest pretensions to her remembrance. If you see him, you may tell him I resent her forgetfulness; we believe him in Italy. Adieu!

LETTER CCCLXVII.

Berkeley Square, Jan. 17, 1782.

I HAVE received yours of the 29th of last month, and will answer it in this as well as I can; though I have but one hand at liberty, having been confined these ten days by the gout in the other and its elbow. I am not void of all hopes that the fit will proceed no farther; and then, though my prison may last as much longer as it has done, I shall think myself very fortunate, for it will be the shortest fit I have had these ten years; nor am I young or fond enough of the world to pant after much liberty beyond that of my limbs.

There has been no public event since my last, but the French purchase of St. Eustatia from our Governor of it. What shame

* Secure in their inaccessible situation, the British garrison at St. Eustatia conducted themselves in so negligent a manner, that the Marquis de Bouille was induced to make an attempt to regain it. Having sailed from Martinico, he suc ceeded in landing, with much loss and difficulty, about four hundred men during the night of the 26th of November. Trusting to the negligence of his enemy, and the consequent probability of a surprise, the Marquis pushed forward with the ut most expedition. A division of the garrison, who were exercising in a field, mistook a body of Irish troops, which attended the French commander, for their com rades. A volley of small-arms, fired almost at their breasts, and which killed seve ral men, was the first knowledge the soldiers at exercise had of their danger. Colonel Cockburne, the Governor, who had been taking an early ride, returning at the instant of the surprise, was made prisoner. The island was lost in a few mi nutes, and without the expense of a man to the enemy. The marquis behaved with great magnanimity. A considerable sum of money, which the Governor claimed as his property, was restored to him; but a very large sum, being a remainder of the produce of the late sales, and said to be the property of Admiral Rodney and General Vaughn, became a prize to the victors. The moderation and clemency

there is in that transaction the buyers, I suppose, will make over to the seller, unless the Opposition borrow part of it for the Ministers. The Parliament is to meet next week, and the town expects that, before that, Lord George Germain's resignation will be notified-not that I tell you he has resigned, but such is the universal persuasion; and the last symptom on which conjectures are formed is, that his family have said he would not be at the Queen's birthday to-morrow. Your nephew, I conclude, will now come to town, and send you fresher and more authentic Parliamentary intelligence than I can.

We hear with some surprise of the Emperor's very rapid suffocation of nunneries.* Do not the monks regret their helpmates, and tremble for themselves? If Cæsars could tremble, I should ask if Cæsar had no apprehension for himself. Are all the Jesuits extinct that despatched poor Ganganelli ? Is not the Vatican hung with sackcloth? I suppose the next thing we shall hear will be, that those pillars of toleration, the King of Prussia and the Czarina, have opened asylums on the road for all those chaste doves that choose to leave their first spouse. The next century will most probably exhibit a

of the Marquis upon this occasion was warmly eulogized by Mr. Burke in the House of Commons. "Two British commanders," he said, "plunder every unfortunate inhabitant of the island; the Marquis de Bouille restores, as far as he can, to every man his property." In a letter to a friend, of the 24th of January, Sir Samuel Romilly makes the following reflections on the re-taking of St. Eustatia-"What infamy! The Governor is too prudent undoubtedly ever to return to England; he must either drag on the load of his life in France, in the receipt (for he cannot know the enjoyment) of the wages of his treachery, or be more actively infamous, and take up arms against his country. I am wrong, perhaps, to speak as if his treason were proved; but can it possibly be doubted! How unfortunate we are in our commanders; some cowards, some traitors, others brave indeed, but the slaves of party, or the more abject slaves of avarice! The Ministers have often availed themselves of some circumstances which seemed for the moment fortunate, to boast that we had Providence on our side. What will they say now? Never did the hand of Providence appear more conspicuously than at present. We took St. Eustatia like pirates, violating in the persons and property of the prisoners the law of nations; but we did not profit by our guilt. The effects seized were retaken on their passage home, and the island itself is lost in the most disgraceful manner. We encouraged treachery in the rebel Arnold, but all we gained by it was empty promises; the same treachery is retaliated on us, and what we lose by it is the only pledge we had, by which we might have purchased back the friendship of the Dutch." Life, vol. i. p. 199.-ED.

* The reform of German monasteries was begun in the year 1781, by the Emperor Joseph II. The hasty manner in which he set about it, without sufficient regard to the necessities and feelings of the older inmates, who are turned adrift into the world with only small pensions, and in some cases even without any, occasioned considerable dissatisfaction at the time.-ED.

In April 1774, Clement XIV., the principal event of whose pontificate was the suppression of the order of Jesuits, was taken dangerously ill, under suspicious symptoms, and lingered on till the following September, when he died. Rumours were spread abroad that poison had been administered to him; but the post-mortem examination of the body, and the report of his physicians, did not countenance the suspicion, to which Walpole appears to have given credit.—ED.

very new era, which the close of this has been, and is, preparing. The annihilation of the Jesuits paved the way. Popery totters, though we preposterously stepped in to save it; but when old follies grow exploded, what can save them? not their own gibberish nor legerdemain, which gave them success. This is no impeachment to new impostures; but for the old, I would not answer how far the Revolution may extend.

The enfranchisement of America will be another capital feature of the New Era, and, sooner or later, will extend beyond British colonies. Whether mankind will be advantaged by these bouleversemens, I am not so clear; I mean, in their capacity of Reason and Liberty, -charters seldom obtained and confirmed without much bloodshed. Soldiers, I fear, will not be laid aside, though Priests may; and then what signifies whether one is chained or murdered by a fellow in a black coat, or a fellow in a red one?

18th.

Lord George Germain has indubitably resigned, it is said, to be a peer; and that the office will not be filled up, its province being gone. His second tome has not been brilliant, but has made the first the more remembered-no advantage neither. What reasons he assigns for retirement I have not heard; his associates nor the public wished him to stay. The next chapter will be his principal enemy Lord Sandwich's, who has numerous foes too, but more friends.

LETTER CCCLXVIII.

Berkeley Square, Feb. 7, 1782. I ANTICIPATED Lord George Germain's exit before it was complete: nay, it is not yet, though imminent.* It is not, I believe, entirely a

* Disagreeing with the other members of the cabinet on the future conduct of the war, Lord George Germain, on the 11th of February, resigned his office of one of the Principal Secretaries of State, and was raised to the peerage by the title of Lord Viscount Sackville. The particulars attending this elevation are thus given by Sir Nathaniel Wraxall; who professes to have received them from Lord George's mouth on the day they took place,-“The separation between the Sovereign and the Secretary was not unaccompanied by emotion on both sides. After regretting the unfortunate events that had dictated the measure, and thanking Lord George for his services, his Majesty added, Is there any thing that I can do to express my sense of them!' 'Sir,' answered he, if your Majesty is pleased to raise me to the dignity of a peerage, it will by the best proof of your approbation of my past exer tions.' By all means,' said the King; I think it is very proper.' Then, Sir,' rejoined Lord George, if you agree to my request, I hope you will not think it unbecoming or unreasonable in me to ask another favour. It is to create me a viscount; as, should I be only raised to the dignity of a baron, my own secretary, my lawyer, and my father's page will all take rank of me.' The King, expressing a wish to know the names of the persons alluded to, The first,' replied Lord George,

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voluntary act, much less a disgrace, but merely the effect of disagreement with some of his colleagues; consequently, I should think, would not produce much variation of measures, as Lord George certainly did not resist such as made his court best. That he was no unwelcome servant is plain, as he is to be a Viscount; and his nephew, the Duke of Dorset, succeeds Lord Falmouth, who is just dead, as Captain of the band of Pensioners. Mr. Ellis is to be Secretary of State in the room of Lord George.t

*

If your nephew has written to you lately, you will have seen that I had no event to tell of any public notoriety. There have been some ineffectual efforts at opposition in both Houses, and not very remarkable. Nor do I imagine that the prosecution of Lord Sandwich in the House of Commons will have any serious termination. Lord Cornwallis is arrived, and that man of wretched fame Arnold.‡ There was something of humour mixed with the severity which the Americans meditated for him, had they taken him in his passage, as they attempted and were near doing. They intended to cut off his leg, which had been wounded in their service, and bury it with military honours, and then hang the rest of his person.§ I think he cannot do better now than consort with General Paoli.

'is Lord Walsingham, who was for some time Under-Secretary of State in my office, when Mr. De Grey; the second is Lord Loughborough, who has always been my lawyer; and the third is Lord Amherst, who, when page to my father, has often sat on the braces of the state-coach that conveyed him, as Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland, to the Parliament-house in Dublin.' The King smiled, adding, What you say is very reasonable; it shall be so.' This is one of the few peerages conferred by George the Third wholly independent of Ministerial intervention. Lord North had not the smallest share in the business." Historical Memoirs, vol. ii. p. 493.-Ed. * Captain of the Yeomen of the Guard.-ED.

The Right Honourable Welbore Ellis, at that time Treasurer of the Navy, was appointed to fill the office of Colonial Secretary. The portrait of this gentleman is thus sketched by Wraxall; “In his figure, manner and deportment, the very essence of form, he regularly took his place on the Treasury Bench, dressed in all points as if he had been going to the drawing-room at St. James's. His eloquence was of the same description as himself, precise, grave, and constrained; unilluminated by taste, and calculated to convince more than to exhilarate or electrify his audience. The respect due his age, character, and employment, commonly secured him a patient hearing. Burke, after felicitating him on succeeding as heir to Lord George, at whose feet he had been brought up, and whose political opinions he implicitly adopted, compared him to a caterpillar, who having long remained in a torpid state within the silken folds of his lucrative employment as Treasurer of the Navy, now bursting his ligaments, fluttered forth the Secretary of the hour."-ED. "Lord Cornwallis and Arnold,” writes Sir Samuel Romilly on the 21st of January, are both arrived at Plymouth; the latter is said to have brought with him a very great fortune." When the House of Commons went to St. James's, on the 4th of March, with their address against the further prosecution of the American war, the circumstance of the appearance of Arnold at Court, standing close to his Majesty's chair, made a deep impression on the public mind, which was construed into a development of the royal feelings towards his American subjects. The Earl of Surrey designated it, a few days after, in the House of Commons, a wanton and indecent insult offered by Ministers to the representatives of the people.-ED.

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Dr. Franklin, in a letter from Paris of the 11th of May, 1781, thus writes to the Marquis de la Fayette: "I hope that, by this time, the ship which has the VOL. II.-19

There has been lately the most dreadful catastrophe in the City of which I ever heard or read. A stationer's wife, a very fond mother, went up, as she did constantly, to see her children in bed. She had seven, the eldest not nine years old. By some strange inadvertence, she left a candle near a curtain of one of the beds. It caught; the house was burnt, and every one of the poor babes! Lady Molesworth's tragedy was not so horrid, for she was so happy as to be consumed too. These poor parents are both alive.

I think, when I wrote last, I was confined with the gout. It has proved the slightest fit I have had for many years, was only in my left hand and elbow, and did not last a month; yet both my hands are terribly afflicted with chalk-stones. However, it is plain that my bootikins, regimen, temperance, and perseverance in my cold system have prodigiously lessened my sufferings; and, if I live to a hundred, I suppose I shall be a very healthy young fellow. Still, I do not intend to cut my colt's-tooth till past ninety. So far from juvenile airs, I lead a most recluse life, and scarcely ever go into any public, indeed only to very private places, except, what I cannot avoid, the public nights at Gloucester-house, and they are not very numerous. I have been once to the Opera to hear the Allegranti, whom I like, and who is almost as much in fashion as Vestris the dancer was last year the applause to her is rather greater. Pacchierotti is much admired too, and the dancers are a capital set. So, you see we bear our disgraces with eminent philosophy. Pleasure does not seem to know that there is any want of money, or weight of taxes. I have not heard from you long. I expect you to tell me a great deal of the Pope's lamentations. To be sure the Great-Duke does not compliment him with a suppression of your carnival.

The inquiry on Lord Sandwich died suddenly this three o'clock, of a vote of approbation of 205 to 183.†

Friday, 8th. morning, at

honour of bearing your name is safely arrived. Your friends have heard of your being gone against the traitor Arnold, and are anxious to hear of your success, and that you have brought him to punishment. Enclosed is a copy of a letter from his agent in England, captured by some of our cruizers, and by which the price or reward he received for his treachery may be guessed at. Judas sold only one man, Arnold three millions. Judas got for his one man thirty pieces of silver, Arnold not a halfpenny a head. A miserable bargain! especially when one considers the quantity of infamy he has acquired to himself and entailed on his family." The intercepted letter here spoken of was from a banker in London to General Arnold, stating that he had received from him bills to the amount of five thousand pounds sterling, which the banker said he had invested it the stocks. See Franklin's Works, vol. ix. p. 29, Spark's edition, 1839.--ED.

* In May 1762 Lady, Molesworth's house in upper Brook Street was burned to the ground, and she herself, two of her daughters, her brother, and six servants, all perished.__ See Collective Edition, vol. iv. p. 272.—Ed.

† Mr. Fox, on the 24th of January, had moved for a committee of inquiry into the causes of the want of success which had attended our naval forces during the war, and more particularly in the year 1781. The motion being agreed to, he followed it up, on the 7th of February, with a second, "that there had been gross misma.

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