THE DIARIES OF A LADY OF QUALITY.
THOUGH nominally "diaries," the ten manuscript volumes from the contents of which Mr. Hayward has compiled the book before us can scarcely be said to correspond with the ordinary accepta- tion of the term. The writer was Miss Frances Williams Wynn, daughter of Sir Watkin Williams Wynn (the fourth baronet) and Charlotte, daughter of George Grenville, whose tenure of office as Premier occurred about thirty years previous to the commence- ment of her diaries. She was consequently niece to tho first Marquis of Buckingham, Lord Grenville, Thomas Grenville, sister to the Right Hon. Charles Williams Wynn, and Sir H. Williams Wynn, British Minister at Copenhagen, sister-in-law to Lord Delamere and Colonel Shipley, M.P., and a near relative to Lords Braybrooke and Nugent. During a lifetime of close upon eighty years spent in various parts of Europe, and in constant intercourse with the most prominent members of the governing classes in England, and the most distinguished European circles, Miss Wynn acquired a habit of committing to writing all the more important political gossip and personal anecdotes coming within, her knowledge, extracts from letters of friends on sub- jects of the day, her own criticisms on musical or fine art questions, and anything, in fact, exclusive of purely personal detail that seemed to her worth recording. Horace Walpole quotes Gray to the effect that "If any man were to form a book of what he had seen and heard himself, it must, in whatever
* TheI)iariuo/aLadgof Quality. from 1797 to 1844. Hated with n3tes by A. Hayward, BK., Q.C. Loudon: Lingwaus. 1891
hands, prove a useful and entertaining one." This is a sweeping assertion, but in the case of Miss Wynn there is no doubt of its applicability. She seems to have been an extremely well-in- formed person, with an equal desire to know what was going oa in all countries and circles of the day, and a considerable ability in relating an anecdote with conciseness combined with due
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regard to effect. Mr. Hayward has edited his materials with. judgment, selecting such anecdotes or descriptions as were- either presumably new to the majority of readers, or original. and authenticated versions of those already known.
Miss Wynn seems to have had a full share of ladies' curiosity in ghost stories, undiscovered mysteries, cases of mistaken identity and successful personation, which gratified the organ of wonder in our ancestors, before the invention of sensation novels. The authorship of Junius, the name of the man who executed Charles I., and the Tyrone Ghost are amongst the subjects that seem to have appealed most forcibly to her imagination. As to the executioner of Charles, she produces a copy of a singular old manuscript found behind an engraving of Charles at time parson- age-house of Inkberghe, Worcestershire, where Charles slept on the night of May 10, 1615. The writer of the paper, whoever he might have been, narrates a story told him by Dr. Smallbrooke, Bishop of St. David's, who had it direct from Archbishop Tenison. It relates how the latter, when Rector of St. Martin's, was sent for to pray with a dying man in a poor house in Gardner's lane, Westminster. When he got there he found the man dead, but was told by the people of the house that he had wished to con- fess that he was the executioner of Charles, that every man in a certain troop having refused, Cromwell made them draw lots, and that he was the man selected. Unfortunately neither the name of the narrator nor that of the alleged regicide are given in this curious document. Mr. Heywood identifies the man with Hulet, who was tried in 1660, found guilty by the jury, but par- doned on the recommendation of the judges. With regard to Junius, Miss Wynn does not contribute any very striking or original evidence. The only theory mentioned by her was started in conversation at Stowe by Mr. Windham, who declared Gibbon to have been theonly man capabale of writing the letters. This, untenable on intrinsic evidence, is curiously enough argued against on the fallacious ground of Gibbon having beets absent from England throughout time period over which the letters of Junius were spread. Gibbon was its England at the time, but this is not the only instance ia which Miss Wynn has impaired the value of her recollections by inaccuracy and carelessness in dates. Miss Wynn was, if not a believer in ghost stories, at least an impartial collector of evidence bearing upon them. Those who are fond of such things will be delighted with her two versions, both " well authenticated," circumstantial, thrilling, and equally inconsistent with names, dates, and other stubborn facts, of the well-known Beresford Ghost story.
Miss Wynn was at Stowe in 1814, and her diaries are full of particulars connected with the host of notables who visited Eng- land, and subsequently of stories of Napoleon after Waterloo. A long letter from an officer on board the Northumberland on the voyage to St. Helena is full of interest. Napoleon talked much of Trafalgar, and. threw the whole blame of the failure of his. scheme for invasion on Villeneuve, who, lie said, " might have as- well been at the West Indies as Cadiz." There is a good deal of gossip, too, about the Buonaparte family in general, and parti- cularly of Lucien and his children. At one time Napoleon wanted to marry one of Lucien's daughters to Prince Ferdinand- of Spain or Prince Paul of Wurtemberg. Lucien objected, " L'un etait fou, l'autre pire que fou ;" but, he determined to obey his brother, and sent his daughter Charlotte to Paris. On making her obeisance to the Emperor he said, " Lavez roue, Princesse." She replied "Non, Sire, je ne suis pas princesse, je ne suis qua Charlotte Buonaparte ; pertnettez moi, Sire, do retourner chez mon !mere." Time request was granted.
There are also many anecdotes connected with the times of the French Revolution, and heard by Miss Wynn from time lips of those concerned. Altogether this is a decidedly entertain- ing book, though of course subject to time disadvantages of all selections of the kind—want of coherency and confusion of tales told first and second hand. It is not always quite easy to detect whether Miss Wynn's stories are given on her own authority or- that of others, but they are generally amusing, if her views are not always original. There is a collection of epitaphs at the end of the volume which contains several rather curious and little „.„.. known specimens selected front thcse accumulated by Wynn.
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