enough, I think, to convert such men as go upon the highway of fortune into privateers; but what a figure do we make in Europe! Unable to raise the sums we want for the war, the members of that Parliament that is told so, are vet occupied in preying on the distresses of the Government! What comments must Dr. Franklin make on every newspaper to the French Ministers !

27th.

I find nothing new in town. Rumours of peace continual. I doubt it is easier for both sides to be sick of the war, than to know how to agree. I doubt, too, that we want peace more than we desire it; and as we must buy it dear, we shall not be so ready to pay the price. It will not be very sincere to the Americans, if we do conclude; and the intentional insincerity often promotes peace, and at least makes the sufferers shut their eyes to their own loss. We have betrayed such propensity to duplicity, that the other side will aggravate the bargain; for, as cunning is no new invention, it is equally in the power of both parties to employ it.* Mankind will not remember that honesty cannot be detected.

I should not send away this scrap, and with so little intelligence, if I were not glad to tell you that I am easier about your disorder. I will not write again soon without more substantial news.

LETTER CCCV.

Strawberry Hill, May 9, 1779.

An invasion announced by the common post from Paris, attempted, repulsed, given up, and known here: all this has happened in eight days, and in miniature; but it was a large object, and a long and anxious interval to me, for the object was Jersey, Mr. Conway's government, and he went post to defend it. He has no idea of danger, and has the strongest one of doing his duty to a scruple; but I will now be methodical, for you want information, not a rhapsody on my sensations.

On the 1st of May, yesterday sevennight, there were forty letters

* "We have no kind of faith in your Government," wrote Dr. Franklin at this time to Mr. Hartley; "it appears to be as insidious and deceitful as it is unjust and cruel: its character is that of the spider in Thomson,

'Cunning and fierce, Mixture abborred!'

Besides, we cannot see the necessity of our relinquishing our alliance with France in order to a treaty, any more than your relinquishing yours with Holland."-ED.

in town that proclaimed an intended attack on Jersey, of fifteen hundred men commanded by a Prince of Nassau, who was to be declared King of the island. A secret expedition advertised with so slender a force, exceeded by the troops on the isle, to say nothing of the ridicule of such a Roi d'Yvetot, did not make much impression: however, Mr. Conway spread his wings, with my approbation; and on, confirmation arriving on Monday, set out that night.* It seems the islanders, besides provoking France by their privateers and numerous captures, had imprudently advertised a sale, in August next, of prizes, to the amount of a vast sum, which would have been a kingdom indeed to a little necessitous Prince. He collected a small army of vagabonds, like his predecessor Romulus; but who had so little taste. for the adventure when its destination was known, that he was forced to select fifty men from his more regular regiment to defend his person against the companions of his armament. It happened that Admiral Arbuthnot, who was going to convoy four thousand recruits to America, had been detained, though probably the French thought him sailed; and, hearing of the invasion, immediately sailed to Jersey, without staying for orders. The attack, however, had been made on the 1st of the month: the French had attempted to land, but Lord Seaforth's new-raised regimen of seven hundred Highlanders, assisted by some militia and some artillery, made a brave stand and repelled the intruders; and, and as every Nassaut does not conquer a British island merely by his presence, the visionary Monarch sailed back to France on the 2nd, and King George and Viceroy Conway remain Sovereign of Jersey-whom God long preserve!

We herd of the repulse on Thursday; but it was not till late in the night of Friday that an account came of the retreat, and I did not learn it till Saturday morning; in which interval there seemed to be twice eight-and-forty hours, and yet I had concluded that the French would be retired before Mr. Conway could reach his dominions. We had reports of the Brest fleet being sailed, and this little episode does look like a feint. Negotiation is said to be at an end or a pause. Arbuthnot's activity, though greatly commendable, is a detrimental delay; and we have reason enough to expect other damage. I did hint to you that we had more thorns than one in our pillow: it is now too publicly known to be disguised any longer, that Ireland has much the air of Americanizing. Our oppressive partiality to two or three manufacturing towns in England has revolted the Irish, and they have entered into combinations against purchasing English goods, in terms more offensive than the first associations of the Colonies.‡

* Gibbon, in a letter of the 7th to Mr. Holroyd, says, "You have heard of the Jersey invasion: every body praises Arbuthnot's decided spirit. Conway went last night to throw himself into the island."-ED.

The Prince of Nassau, who commanded the attack upon Jersey, claimed relationship to the great house of Nassau.-ED.

"When the people of Ireland," says Hardy, in his Memoirs of Lord Charlemont, "found the session closed in England, and nothing substantial accomplished, they

In short, we have for four or five years displayed no alacrity or address, but in provoking our friends and furnishing weapons of annoyance to our enemies; and the unhappy facility with which the Parliament has subscribed to all these oversights has deceived the Government into security, and encouraged it to pull almost the whole fabric on its own head. We can escape but by concessions and disgrace; and, when we attain peace, the terms will prove that Parliamentary majorities have voted away the wisdom, glory, and power of the nation.

The House of Commons has exposed itself wofully these last days in a less affair. They have refused, voted, unvoted, and revoted an inquiry into the conduct of the war; and all the Generals at the bar have declared the impossibility of conquering America: so, the House has nothing to do to preserve its consequence, but to vote it shall still be conquered.

Palliser's trial has ended as shamefully.* He is acquitted, with honour, of not having obeyed his Admiral's signals; which is termed blamable for not having given the reason why he did not; and that reason was the rottenness of his mast, with which he returned to Portsmouth, without its being repaired yet. The world is expecting his restoration; for, when Keppel risked his own reputation to save Palliser's, ought not the latter to be recompensed for accusing his benefactor? But I am sick of specifying all our ignominy; I wish I had any tittle-tattle of less consequence to fill my letters with. I will go answer yours, and try to forget England, as it has forgotton itself! Oh! but you ask if Byron has beaten D'Estaing and taken Martinico Not quite; on the contrary, our conquerors are swept

did not fold their arms in foolish despair. They were then taught, as distress will indeed effectually teach any nation or individual, that their best dependence was on themselves. They had recourse to that policy which Swift had in vain advised half a century before. They not only used their own manufactures, but entered into a non-importation agreement of any whatever from England. This resolution was embraced with the usual characteristic ardour of the Irish. The despondency of the manufacturers, of the lowest order, was changed to thanksgiving; some of the fashionable gentry, who had been more supine than others, were reanimated to a sense of their duty; while the volunteer bands increased not more in numbers than in spirit." Vol. i. p. 389.-ED.

* Sir Hugh Palliser's trial lasted three-and-twenty days, twenty of which were spent in examining witnesses, and three in debating upon the sentence; during which time it is said the members of the court were sometimes so loud in dispute, that the people were obliged to be turned off the deck of the Sandwich to prevent their overhearing it. In announcing Sir Hugh Palliser's acquittal to George Selwyn, Dr. Warner writes, "Here are the exact and all the words which the King said to him the first time he was at Court, Sir Hugh, how does your leg do?"— ED.

Lord Carlisle, speaking of his relation to the Admiral, in a letter to George Selwyn, says, "Byron's situation is a very hard one; for ignorant people conceive it is as easy to hinder D'Estaing from coming out of Martinique, as it would be to hinder the Duke of Northumberland driving out of his gate, supposing you was su perior in coal-carts and hackney-coaches to make a blockade."-ED.

away by a mortality in Santa Lucia and in Georgia. Content yourself with privateering; we have no other success.

The Presbyterians of Scotland will not condole with you on the Pope's illness; they forswear him tooth and nail.* Mrs. Anne Pitt is confined, and, the last time I heard of her, was very bad. Make many compliments, pray, for me to the House of Lucan; but, between you and me, I am not at all delighted with their intending to bring me a present. I do not love presents, and much less from any body. but very dear friends. That family and I are upon very civil terms; our acquaintance is of modern date, and rather waned than improved. Lady Lucan has an astonishing genius for copying whatever she sees. The pictures I lent her from my collection, and some advice I gave her, certainly brought her talent to marvellous perfection in five months; for before she painted in crayons, and as ill as any fine lady in England. She models in wax, and has something of a turn towards poetry; but her prodigious vivacity makes her too volatile in every thing, and my lord follows wherever she leads. This is only for your private ear. I desire to remain as well as I am with them; but we shall never be more intimate than we are. I am not at all acquainted with your Lord Bishopf and my lady, his wife. His

* Walpole here alludes to a motion made on the 5th of this month by Lord George Gordon, that a petition of the Papists of Scotland, which had been recommended by the King to the House through Lord North, might be thrown over the table. As the motion was not seconded, the Speaker declined to read it. The Earl of Carlisle says, in a letter of the 7th," Lord George Gordon made a speech upon the state of Scotland, for which he ought to be shut up; he wept several times in the course of it, produced an old print of the Marquis of Huntley, offered to make Lord North a present of it, and called upon twenty members by their names."-ED. † Lady Lucan was the daughter and co-heiress of James Smith, Esq., of Cannons Leigh, Devon. She was married, in 1760, to Sir Charles Bingham, who in 1776, was created Baron Lucan, and, in 1795, advanced to the earldom of Lucan. In 1781, her daughter Lavinia was married to John, first Earl Spencer. She died in 1814. In a notice of Walpole's " Anecdotes of Painting," which appeared in the Annual Register for 1780, Lady Lucan is said to have arrived at copying the most exquisite works of Peter Oliver, Hoskins, and Cooper, with a genius that almost depreciates those masters."-ED.

The Honourable and Reverend Frederick Hervey, in 1767 presented to the bishoprick of Cloyne, and in 1769 promoted to the see of Derry. In the December of 1779, he succeeded his brother Augustus as fourth Earl of Bristol. His wife was the daughter of Sir Jermyn Davers, Bart. Hardy in his Memoirs of the Earl of Charlemont, gives the following striking account of this eccentric nobleman: "In one respect he was not unlike Villiers, Duke of Buckinham, Every thing by starts and nothing long.' Generous, but uncertain; splendid, but fantastical; an admirer of the fine arts, without any just selection; engaging, often licentious in conversation; extremely polite, extremely violent. His distribution of church livings must always be mentioned with warin approbation. Though he scarcely ever attended Parliament, and spent most of his time in Italy, he was now (1783) called upon to correct the abuses of Parliament, and direct the vessel of state in that course, where statesmen of the most experience, and persons of the calmest judgment, have had the misfortune totally to fail. His progress from his diocess to the metropolis, and his entrance into it, were perfectly correspondent to the rest of his conduct. Through every town on the road he seemed to court, and was received with all warlike honours; and I remember seeing him pass by the Parliament-house in Dublin, (Lords

mother, who was much my friend, I believe, did not highly reverence his sincerity; I never in my life met him at her house.

Adieu! my dear sir. Do not let rumours good or bad agitate you. Bear public misfortunes with firmness. Private griefs hurry away our thoughts, and belong solely to ourselves; but we may be excused taking more than our share in general calamities.

LETTER CCCVI.

Arlington Street, May 29, 1779.

I HAVE two letters from you unaswered of the 14th and 15th of this month. I begin to reply to them; though I believe my response will not set out before June for want of corporality. The best news I know is what you tell me of the Spanish monarch's resolution of remaining neuter. We seem able to cope with France, who makes war in our own piddling style. We both fish for islets that used to escape through the meshes of former military drag-nets. Some attempt on Ireland we expect; I hope the Prince of Nassau will command it. All this last week we were whispered ministerially into a belief of Byron having demolished, taken, and killed D'Estaing and all his squadron. Some doubted whether it was not an artifice to fill the loan; and so it has proved. The two Admirals looked at one another, but did not hurt a pendant of each other's head. The house of Commons sits from day to day, examining into the conduct of all the other Generals and Admirals that have been looking at the Americans and French for these five years, and of the Ministers who sent them to look the colonies into unlimited submission. Future historians will have a brave collection of papers to revel in.

You shall certainly have my tragedy when your nephew returns; but I doubt it will shock more than please you, for nothing can be more disgusting than the subject. I approve and exhort you not to preach to your nephew. Wait till you see him, and then you can instil your sentiments by degrees. As he has already corrected many effervescences, I trust to his good sense and good heart for his still improving; but, believe me, there must be a very solid fund to resist the depravation of this country. It is lost, it is distracted. It sinks every day, and yet its extravagance and dissipation rather augment than subside. Though we have danced like Bacchanals all the winter, there is a new subscription on foot for a sumptuous ball at the Pantheon. We are like the Israelites that capered round the golden

and Commons were then both sitting) escorted by a body of dragoons, full of spirits and talk, apparently enjoying the eager gaze of the surrounding multitude, and displaying altogether the self-complacency of a favourite Marshal of France on his way to Versailles, rather than the grave deportment of a Prelate of the Church of England."-Ed.

*The Mysterious mother.