The trial of Lord George Gordon is put off till November-I do not know why. Dissatisfaction grows again on the continuance of the camps, and on the numbers of boys that have been executed for the riots; for the bulk of the criminals are so young, that half a dozen schoolmasters might have quashed the insurrection.* There does not appear to have been the least connexion or concert between the several mobs; nor any motive in them but a sudden impulse of mischief, actuated by the contagion of example and encouraged by the inactivity of all gradations of Government. The Ministers did nothing to prevent or stop the tumult; the justices of peace shrunk ; the courts of justice thought of shutting up shops; the House of Lords adjourned, and so did the House of Commons, even after the worst was past. A capital blazing, and held in terror for a week by so contemptible a rabble, will not tell well in story! I pity our future historians, who will find plenty of victories in our gazettes, and scarce any where else! Adieu!

LETTER CCCXXXIV.

Strawberry Hill, Aug. 24, 1780.

I HAVE waited for news, till I can send you none but bad. The Russian fleet is stalking in our channel, and our own East and West India outward-bound fleets are gobbled up by the Spanish squadron off Cape Finisterre. This is the heaviest commercial blow we have yet received at once. It is an age since we have heard from America. We attributed the silence to an obstinate east-wind that blew for nine-and-twenty days. There have been parentheses' of West since, and we expect news every moment, and with anxiety.

*Of the one hundred and thirty-five individuals tried for riots, fifty-nine were convicted. With a view to the extension of the royal mercy to the chief part of the unhappy rioters, Mr. Burke drew up "Some Thoughts on the approaching Executions," and exerted his influence in pressing letters to the Lord Chancellor, the President of the Council, and the Secretary of the Treasury, to submit his opinions to the King and to Lord North. "Every circumstance of mercy and of comparative justice does," he says, "in my opinion, plead in favour of such low, untaught or ill-taught wretches: but, above all, the policy of Government is deeply interested, that the punishments should appear one solemn and deliberate act, aimed, not at random and at particular offences, but done with a relation to the general spirit of the tumults; and they ought to be nothing more than what is sufficient to mark and discountenance that spirit." For the guilty instigators of the tumults Mr. Burke had no such consideration; for it is stated, that on seeing some of the leading Associators in the lobby of the House of Commons, he exclaimed loudly in their hearing, "I am astonished that those men can have the audacity still to nose Parliament."-Ed.

† On the 9th of August, a rich and considerable convoy for the East and West Indies, under the conduct of Captain Moutray of the Ramilies, and two or three frigates, which had sailed from Portsmouth, were intercepted by the combined fleets under Don Louis de Cordova. The Ramilies and the frigates had the fortune to escape.-En

Thus you see I do not resign my post of your gazetteer, though it is but an irksome office when it is to record our wane. The re-conquest of America, I believe, is less near than you foreigners conjecture, and than has been so confidently foretold at home. All I know is, that we have been gaming for what was our own. When we leave off play, we shall see whether we have won or lost; nay, should we recover our stake, we must compute what it has cost. The card-money has not been cheap.

The Countess Cowper,* mother-in-law of your pinch-beck Prince, is dead of a cancer. Her own son Lord Spencer, is in a bad state of health. Each gets a jointure by her death.

Mr. Windham, I hear, is at Brussels, on his return. I am peevish with him for having looked on you through our ill-humoured foggy eyes. I have almost always been out of luck in my recommendations; but I assure you I do you ample justice, and have always been completely convinced that they have been in fault. Your temper and flowing benevolence for forty years have been always uniform; and it is least of all likely that you should grow sour only to those I interfere for. I know you and my countrymen better. The latter have retained few of their virtues, but I do not find that they have exchanged them for urbanity. Mr. Windham, I believe, is a worthy man, but I wish he had been less morose.

P.S. I have heard this evening, that an account is arrived of Walsingham having joined Rodney,† and that the Russian fleet is returned to the Pole. Do not imagine, by this short letter, that, though I do not drop our correspondence, I am curtailing it by degrees. I could lengthen my letter by dwelling on circumstances; but that is not my manner. I seldom even inquire after them. The result of events is all I wish to know and to communicate. How can one wish to learn what one does not wish to remember? The newspapers give you details. I pretend but to skim the current of facts, and to mark what is true for your information. The multiplicity of lies coined every day only perplexes, not instructs. When I send you falsehoods, at least I believe or think them probable at the time, and correct myself afterwards, when I perceive I have been misled. I, who am in no secrets, trust to facts alone, as far as they come to light. Mercy on future historians, whose duty it will be to sift the ashes of all the tales with which the narratives of the present war

* Giorgina, daughter of John Carteret, Earl of Granville, first married to John Spencer, only brother of Charles Duke of Marlborough; and secondly to the second Earl Cowper, to whom she was second wife.

Even when joined by Commodore Walsingham's squadron, Rodney still found his force so inferior to that of the enemy, that he could only act on the defensive, and was consequently unable to seek an engagement. Owing to the pestilential disorder among the Spanish forces, and the dissension in the combined fleet, nothing material was attempted before the belligerent powers found themselves obliged to quit the Indian seas, in order to avoid the fury of the hurricane months. See Life of Keppel, vol. ii. p. 284.-ED.

have been crammed! Some will remain inexplicable. This jaunt of the Russian squadron will be one of the enigmas.

LETTER CCCXXXV.

Berkeley Square, Sept. 19, 1780.

As I think you do not suspect me of neglect when I have any thing worth telling you, you will perceive that there are periods when it takes a good deal of time to form events-a whole campaign may not produce two. At other seasons the market is overstocked; or, after a glut there is a scarcity. The dissolution of the Parliament could not surprise you, it had been so announced. Your nephew, I see by the papers, is re-elected. I have no other intelligence; and, of all articles of news, those on elections are the last I seek. I know as little what the fleets are doing; or where they are, doing nothing. One thing I do discern, that the approaching recovery of America is about as near as the Millennium. Prophecy will sink as low as fortune-telling: no gipsy is less to be credited than our predicting politicians, who, for these last five or six years, have been cruelly brought to shame on the conquests they have announced. By their bubbles the nation are almost stripped of their last shilling, like the dupes who hunt after the philosopher's stone. America is now like the Holy land; none but bigots and madmen will think of subduing it: nor does the tone of resumption much become us, who are not in the ascending scale.

Admiral Keppel has been thrown out at Windsor, and, it is pretended, by the personal veto of the first inhabitant of the Castle: the consequence already has been that the counties of Surrey and Suffolk solicited the honour of electing the Admiral, who has accepted the offer from the former.*

Seven new barons are made: Earl Talbot, that the peerage may descend to his daughter's† children; Sir William De Grey, late Chief Justice; Lord Gage, turned into an English peer; General Fitzroy ; Mr. Brudenel; Mr. Herbert ; and Sir William Bagot. There have

* On the dissolution of Parliament, Admiral Keppel, who had represented Windsor for nearly twenty years, repaired to the electors to solicit a renewal of their suffrages: but since he had last appeared before them, he had become such an object of dislike to the Court and the Government, that their joint influence was exerted against his return. In his speech from the hustings, the Admiral after alluding to the report that the King had personally taken a part in the proceedings against him, said, "This cannot be true. It ought not to be believed. It must not be believed." Life, vol. ii. p. 285. Mr. Erskine, in a pamphlet which he wrote at the time, affirmed, that "the highest power of the Government, not contented with having deprived the nation of Keppel's abilities in his profession, had made itself a party to rob it likewise of his zeal and honesty in the senate."—ED.

+ Lady Cecil Rice, wife of George Rice; on her father's death she became Baroness of Dinevor.

Sir W. De Grey was created Lord Walsingham, General Fitzroy Lord South

been some shiftings of places of the second rate, and some promotions, but none of consequence.

This is literally the sum total of my knowledge; as I have such a fair field of paper lying before me, you may be sure I would embroider it if I had wherewithal. However, I have less scruple in sending such a scrap, as I must write to you again soon, for I hear Mr. Morrice is arrived in England. Where he is, I cannot tell, but I trust I shall see or hear from him soon; and then I am as certain of having cause to thank you-which, by the way, I do d'avance: but, though my gratitude will always last, you are to remember that it is never to receive any additional fund.

LETTER CCCXXXVI.

Berkeley Square, Oct. 4, 1780.

I HAVE received your packet by Mr. Sutherland, and am delighted with its contents. Your news would be much the best part, but I doubt is not so far advanced as to expect sudden effect. The History of the House of Medici will be welcome indeed. I see one has but to form wishes early, and live long enough, and they will all be fulfilled. The Famiglia estinta* made me smile. If that condition brings one acquainted with their true story, it would not make one very zealous for successors in some foreign royal families; for instance, I should not pray for issue to the Great Duke of Russia. I beg you will subscribe for three sets for me and two of my friends. I should like to have carta cerulea; not because it is dearest, but because I do not know what it is, and therefore conclude like the vulgar, that it is something mighty fine. I hope no soul that has interest to stop it, will get an inkling of the work.

Your ring I have not yet received, though Mr. Morrice is arrived.

ampton, and Mr. Herbert Lord Portchester. James Brudenel, made Lord Brudenel was next brother of George Duke of Montagu, and Earl of Cardigan.

* It was written by Galluzzi, from authentic papers furnished by the Austrian Grand-Duke Leopold; who said that, as the House of Medici was extinct, there was no reason for not writing their true story. This History was published in 1781, after the death of the Empress-Queen; whose prejudices would probably have prevented it, had she known of her son's intention; as it is not at all favourable to the Court of Rome. [Galluzzi's work is entitled " Istoria del Gran Ducato di Toscano sotto il Governo della cassa Medici," and was published in five volumes quarto. Sir Nathaniel Wraxall, who visited Florence in 1779, says of sir Horace Mann, that he had long outlived the extinction of the House of Medici, for which race of princes he seemed to preserve the same predilection, which Brantome always manifests for the family of Valois above the line of Bourbon. He adds, that Sir Horace personally knew the last Grand-Duke of the Medicean line, John Gaston, who died in 1737; in consequence of whose decease without issue, those beautiful portions of Italy, constituting his dominions were finally transferred to a Prince of Lorraine.-ED.]

Indeed, displeased as I was at your superabundant kindness in sending it, I am now afraid I shall never possess it. All my disinterestedness could not resist dunning Mr. Morrice; and, behold, he has sent me word that by some mal-entendu it was packed up in his heavy baggage, which by another, is still at Margate! Oh! how can one flatter one's self that a ring in a bottle of heavy baggage will ever be found! or, rather, will not be found and stolen by some custom-house officer! Mr. Morrice was a fine person to trust a gem to! I suppose he would have stuffed a lady's picture for her lover into a jackboot!

General Dalrymple is arrived from Sir Henry Clinton with heavy baggage indeed, full of bad news! The Gazette has produced only samples, strewed over with fine sugar, to make it as palatable and little bitter as possible; but the sum total is, that adieu to America! All the visions that mounted in fumes into our heads from the capture of Charlestown are turned to smoke; and it were well if it would rest there. To be cured of that dream would be no calamity; but I wish we may have no collateral losses!" I fear we ache in some islands, and are not quite without twitches on the continent of America. Well! as I was right in foreseeing some miserable issue from the American war, I have a mind to try my skill in foretelling peace. 'Tis sure I wish it most fervently.

Last week I was alarmed with a calamity nearer to my heart than politics. General Conway broke his arm by a fall. But I have been with him, and he is in the most favourable way possible, and has not had the smallest degree of fever.

You must reckon this short letter the second part of my last, which was short too; or as the beginning of my next, for if ever I get my ring, I shall certainly write again to thank you, though I should have nothing else to say. I could have made this longer, but I do not like to entertain every foreign post-office with what they would not dislike.

LETTER CCCXXXVII.

Strawberry Hill, Oct. 7, 1780. PART the second behold already-for I have received the gem, which from ignorance I called a ring, and beg its pardon: it is much too large for so little an appellation, and is most beautiful too, and of exquisite sculpture. All this makes matters worse, for, the finer it is, the more I am ashamed; and therefore cannot thank you half so much as it deserves. Yet I will be very grateful, upon condition of its never having a successor. You must tell me what the connoisseurs have baptized it. Is it an Apollo or an Amazon? A handsome young god and a heroine approach so much to the boundaries of the sexes, that they are not easily discriminated in so small an area. Mr. Morrice has fairly excused his delay. After he had put to sea, they apprehended a privateer; on which he sent back his baggage to Ostend,

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