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PARK PLACE.

vice; he was, indeed, second in command of the British forces in Germany, during the seven years war; and was distinguished in the House of Commons, by one of our great statesmen, by the title of an enlightened General, on some military opinion which he had given in parliament. Nor was this an idle or unmerited compliment; for there was not an officer of his time who possessed an higher degree of theoretic attainments. His history of the German war was declared, by those who had seen it, to have been a work of first rate merit, both as a professional and literary production; but unfortunately for his own fame and that of the nation, whose glories it described, the manuscript was consumed, in the fire which took place in his town residence, with all the materials from which it was composed; and he was thereby disqualified for renewing a labour of which no common expectations had been formed.

He certainly possessed superior talents, and the character of pre-eminent virtue was never denied him. But though he was good-he was not gifted with those qualities which, in the general acceptation of the term, render a man great. He was deficient in that spirit of decision, and in that promptitude of action, which are necessary to produce the more splendid actions of human life. In all important and exalted stations they are leading qualities; but in no character are they so essential as in that of a soldier, in which without what is called presence of mind, and an ever ready spirit of activity, such laurels as were worn by a Wolf and a Marlborough, a Hawke and a Nelson, cannot be reaped. The want of these qualities, though it did not prevent Marshal Conway from being a good man, nay the very defect might aid his private virtues, certainly obstructed his being what is called a great one. This inferior state of his mind, which might, as we doubt not it did, arise from an anxious principle of rectitude, certainly unfitted him for taking the lead in his military or civil capacities, though it was calculated to render him efficiently useful, as a counsellor in both. As a

secretary of state, he maintained his station with ability; as a speaker in parliament he was always heard with a respectful attention; and even Junius, in his severe phillipics against his colleagues, touched but lightly upon him, and softens his expression, when he mentions-" the gentle Conway's undetermined discretion."

Of his taste nothing need be said, when Park Place has been seen, or the foregoing description been read. As a man of literature, he must not be forgotten. There is one, if not more, of his political pamphlets, which if they had been written at an earlier period, would have secured him a distinguished place in the late Lord Orford's work on Royal and noble Authors. Many of his poetic effusions are in the port-folios of high life, and they, according to their subjects, beam with fancy, wit, or tenderness. He once gave a comedy to the stage, which, as it disdained ribaldry, and was not a vehicle for grimace, but such a picture of the mind and human life, as he had been accustomed to contemplate; though it was well received, and gave great delight to the polished auditors which attended its representations, was not formed to be a stock play; and is now known only to those who knew its author.

In private life, as an husband, a father, a master, and a neighbour, we wish it were in our power to recollect more than we do who are his equals. He married the Countess Dowager of Aylesbury, who was the counterpart of himself, and who united with him to give a very long, uninterrupted, and rare example of matrimonial felicity.

That lady cannot be named, in a work of this nature, without mentioning the extraordinary productions of her needle; and which were the most interesting decorations of the different apartments in Park Place house. They consisted of imitations of Cuyp, Rosa de Tivoli, Vandyck, Gainsborough, and other eminent masters, and are scarce inferior, in effect, to the originals. They are worked in worsteds with so much taste, and the various tints so

PARK PLACE.

happily managed, as, at a small distance, to be absolute deceptions. Among them, a portrait of Vandyck was so successfully imitated, that it actually appeared, across to be an undoubted work of that great

the room,

master.

Some years have passed away since, at a very advanced age, they left the world which they had adorned. Lady Aylesbury was the survivor.

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