SPECTATOR'S LIBRARY.

DIPLOMACY,

The Diplomatic Correspondence of the Right Hon. Richard Hill, (LL.D., F.R.S., &c.) Envoy Extraordinary from the Court of St. James to the Duke of Savoy, in the Reign of Queen Anne from July 1703 to May 1706. With Autographs of many illustrious individuals. Edited by the Rev. W. Blackley, B.A., Domestic Chaplain to the Right Hon. the Viscount 11111. In two volumes Murray.

TRAVELS,

Iinpresslons of Australia Felix, during Four Years' Residence in that Colony; Notes of a Voyage Round the World; Australian Poems, &c. By Richard Howitk

MRTEOEOLOGY, Longman and Co. Observations made at the Magnetic and Meteorological Observatory at Toronto, in Canada. Printed by order of her Majesty's Government, under the Superintend- ence of Lieutenant-Colonel Edmund Sabine, of the Royal Artillery. Volume L- 1840, 1841, 1842 ' Longman and Co.

RICHARD HILL'S DIPLOMATIC CORRESPONDENCE FROM THE COURT OF SAVOY: 1703-6.

Tan author of this bulky correspondence was a collateral ancestor of Lord Hill, the late Commander-in-chief; and a clear, coolheaded, straight- forward man of official business, in the reigns of King William and Queen Anne, by both of whom he was employed, and promoted—so far as merely useful abilities will admit of promotion under the most aristo- cratic government in the world. Beyond his public appointments, how- ever, little is known of his career. He was born in 1654; and from this period till 1692, when he emerged into public life, nothing has been dis- covered respecting him, except that he was educated at Shrewsbury School, and afterwards graduated at St. John's, Cambridge. Betham, in his English Baronetage, enumerates some of his appointments ; and Speaker Onslow, in a note to Burnet, thus mentions him- " He was very able in business, and much esteemed by King William, whom he almost adored, and often reflected with some severity on his own party (he was a lay) for their false notions of foreign affairs, with regard to England, and for their not better supporting the King m the war. I have read many of his letters; and they prove him to have been a very considerable person, and made for higher Stations than he arrived to. He was some time in the Admiralty, and everywhere in general estimation with people of all denominations for his abilities and his virtue. He had an academical education, was a scholar, and had taken Deacon's orders, which he laid aside while employed in civil affairs; but upon his with- drawing from them, he resumed his clerical character, took Priest's orders, and became a Fellow of Eton College. He lived the latter part of his life in no high shion, at Richmond, in Surrey; where, however, he was much resorted to by the Most eminent persons of that time. The Royal Family showed him very par- ticular regards. He continued a Tory to the last; but of that sort who were earnest for the succession in the house of Hanover, when that was a very small ParLY-"

He died in 1727; and was buried in Hodnet Church, Shropshire, nnder a monument of his own erecting, with a Latin epitaph, probably written by himself.

His most independent if not his most important appointment was his embassy to the Duke of Savoy ; the correspondence relating to which has been discovered, by the perseverance of the Reverend W. Blackley, among the family papers of Lord Berwick at Attingham, and is here printed in two ample volumes, with appendixes of curious illustrative documents. The "domestic chaplain to the Right Honourable Lord Hill," has, how- ever, somewhat overvalued the importance and attraction of the letters of this "great gun" of the Hill family. A selection from the correspond- ence would have answered every useful purpose, and produced a far more readable book, at about one-fourth of the expense of type and paper. All that could be attractive to the miscellaneous reader, or even the historical student, are the personal characteristics of the Duke of Savoy, Marshal Staremberg, and other great personages ; the accounts of the gallant defence of Vexrue, and of the fortified village of Chivas ; with particulars of the Italian wars, and traits of persons or opinions, of which many might be picked out. But; Mr. Blackley prints everything, even down to memorandums that on such a day Mr. Hill wrote to cer- tain persons, or statements of accounts between him and his money- agents; which we must really characterize as an experiment on the public patience. Even in the case of Marlborough, where a personal interest attaches to the man apart from any intrinsic importance in his letters, Sir George Murray very properly omitted much and might beneficially have omitted more. And we can perceive nothing in these volumes that would induce a new conclusion upon the history of the times, while particular facts or characteristic traits might be embraced in the selection we have indicated.

We think the family chaplain equally overrates the importance of Hill's diplomatic services. He did his duty, without question, and he did it *ell—honestly and discreetly: but that duty was little more than to transmit intelligence according to the best of his judgment, to manage the English affairs on the coast of Italy, and to pay the Duke of Savoy the stipulated subsidies. Had the case been otherwise, Victor Amadeus was not the man to be turned from his purposes by the arts of diplomacy, even had Marlborough come to win him or Talleyrand to cajole. The history of the manner in which he turned his peculiar position to account, and maintained himself against apparently overwhelming odds by means of military skill, undaunted resolution, and diplomatic art, is indeed One of the most remarkable on record,—not meaning by diplomacy, "speaking pretty" and spinning protocols, but a thorough compre- benaion of his own position and that of the other powers, with skill to take advantage of every circumstance, and civil courage to brave apparent destruction, because he saw it was not yet real, and he retained the power of extrication. A man who could baffle all the arts and power of France under Louis the Fourteenth, was not very likely to be done by a common diplomatist. On the contrary, the reverse was more to be expected : and perhaps something of this kind did take place, though upon leaser matters. For Hill clearly saw that trifles should not be allowed to stand in the way of keeping up the war in Italy ; and he may fairly claim the merit of seeing the essential point of his duty, and forwarding it without tegard to personal feelings or suspicion. The ease stood thus.

At the opening of the War of the Succession, Victor Amadeus had

joined the French with the view of driving the Germans out of Italy, for purposes of his own. But, though nominally generalissimo of the forces in Italy, he soon discovered that he could not command them for his own objects, and quickly began to suspect that in case of success France would not only appropriate the lion's there of the prize, but might be a much more formidable neighbour than the heavy Germans under a then dis- tracted rule. At an early period of the war, (1703,) some intimations induced the Court of Vienna to send a diplomatist., the fat Count D'Avers- berg, to Turin; where he was kept incog. for some time, and apparently " amused " by Victor : at least this was the deduction which the well, known politic character of the Duke of Savoy induced diplomatists to draw. In consequence of this favourable disposition, Hill was appointed to the Court of Turin (July 1703) ; but Stepney's opinion, given front Vienna, that Victor Amadeus was not in earnest, caused Hill to remain at the Hague. In the interim, through the incautiousness of the Courts of Vienna and St. James, the fact of the treaty transpired ; the troops of Savoy, serving with the French, were suddenly disarmed and made prisoners of war. This settled the question for the present. Victor Amadeus became an enemy of France, and Hill went on to Turin ; which he reached in January 1704. No treaty, however, was signed for a long time; and its point as regards England was, that we should pay a regular subsidy and take care of the Duke's interests at a general peaoe, whilst he undertook to keep up a certain number of soldiers. The secret clause to secure freedom of worship to the Vaudois, which Hill in com- pliance with his instructions procured, was simply this. The subsidies were originally to be paid only till the conclusion of the war. Victor Amadeus truly argued, that he could not reduce his war-establishment the moment peace was signed, and required the payments to be stipulated for two months afterwards. To this Hill consented upon his own responsibility, for the secret clause ; which, as Victor Amadeus was then protecting the Vaudois, cost him nothing. Besides the advantage for the Protestant interest, Hill truly argued in his despatch, that if the Duke continued the alliance till the end of the war, he was worth the 106,666 crowns ;* if he did not, there would be nothing to pay.

This importance of the Duke of Savoy arose in part from his firmness, capacity, and military skill, but chiefly from his position. Allied against France, he acted as a diversion; not only compelling her to maintain large armies in Italy, where they sank under the climate, but employ- ing her against a double line of operations, himself in Piedmont, and the Imperialists, such as they were till the arrival of Eugene, in the Tyrol. Had Savoy united with France, the Germans would soon have been driven from Italy, and left Louis the Fourteenth at full liberty to rein- force his armies on the Rhine, in the Low Countries, or in Spain. Of this position Victor Amadeus made a wonderful use; and though seem- ing to risk every thing, yet perhaps risking little save the interests and comforts of his subjects, which suffered grievously from the war. Although deprived of some of his best troops at starting, he saw so clearly that he held the balance in his hands, that he would not give up any thing to the Emperor ; standing upon subordinate matters, that, without a due con- sideration of his position, looked like a dogged self-will: and something of the same spirit of resolute self-seeking was visible in his behaviour towards the other allies, though less palpable, because the main point of the alliance was a money-payment to keep up the war. He played off his position with the Allies as skilfully against Louis the Fourteenth as he played off the French against the Allies. When, in despite of his mi- litary abilities, the poverty, confusion, neglect, and mismanagement Of the Imperial Government, had left him without the means of keeping the field, he defended every defensible place with untiring pertinacity, and spun out the war by taking advantage of his utility to either belligerent, to induce France to enter into negotiations. The following passage from a despatch of Hill's, for the most part written in cipher, will furnish a specimen of his own cautious business style, indicate the extremities to which the Duke was reduced by the fault or fate of the Germans, and show the use he made of diplomacy : by which he was enabled to stave off the siege of Turin till the weather and Eugene's operations rendered it impossible for that campaign.

"His Royal Highness seems determined to believe that he must now no longer expect any relief from P. Eugene, or from anybody but the Queen. His Royal Highness does therefore send another courier today to London, with new and more pressing instances to her Majesty, desiring her orders to my Lord Peterborough to land the Queen's troops at Nice, and to march them into Piedmont, which he looks upon as his last anchor; and if this does not hold, we must be lost. I durst not make any objections, or raise any difficulties which will naturally occur, in complying with this desire of his Royal Highness, for fear he should say, that since he is abandoned by all the world, he must shift for himself. I will not venture to assure [you], that his Royal Highness does not ask now what he does foresee may chance to be refused; or, if granted, will be ordered so late, that my Lord Peterborough will not receive those orders in time. I durst not so much as ask who shall pay those troops if the Queen should order them to be left here; or how they shall be recruited; or how they shall ever get home when they hate done, or not done, their work? I will not observe that I have seen 12,000 Ger- mans, whom Count Guido [ Staremberg] brought hither, (hardy Germans accus- tomed for three years to the sun of Italy,) worn down to 4,000 in eighteen months. But I must not conceal from you that the inaction and indolence of La Feuilliade for these twenty-two days past, in which he has not committed the least act of hostility; that his sending the bombs and ammunition which were at Chivas and Crescentm down the river, instead of bringing them up; and his not making any magazines at Sure, or anywhere else, equal to any design of besieging us herein Turin; that the moderation of the enemies in living quietly between the Dolre and the Stara, when they might so easily pass the first of these risers, and live so much more in plenty in the plains of Piedmont; that the condition we are re- duced to in Turin, where all our forces, both Germans and Savoyards, cannot ex- ceed 5,000 men on foot and 2,500 horse: I must not conceal from you, I say, that these and other such considerations do make most people here beheve that his Royal Highness has some way to save his crown, which we do not yet see. But perhaps his own letters to the Queen will give you security. against all our suspicions; and I must tell you, that I do verity believe the enema will not.eome up to his price, or he come dovm to their conditions yet."

• England and Holland stipulated to pay 80,000 crowns per month, England paying two-thirds. We were as "regular as the Beat," Holland not qatiasci! punctual; but it seems to be thought that she paid as well as she could. The most interesting feature of the Italian war, when Turin was really besieged and was relieved by Eugene, is not contained in Hill's corre- spondence • for the Envoy was recalled, in compliance with his request, and quitted Italy in the early part of 1706. For the two years 1704-5, however, his correspondence contains a great number of particulars, and graphic sketches of persons and events. Had these been judiciously selected, and arranged in conjunction with the matter having an interest of its own, so as to tell the story of Hill's mission to Savoy, a very use- ful and attractive volume might have been produced. As it is, the really interesting is overlaid in a mass of commonplace.

The space that would be required to exhibit the war and camp of Savoy prevents us from attempting it ; and will induce us to confine our extracts to miscellaneous matters. Here is an example of the first use of a British alliance. It was the earliest notification Stepney had at Vienna that the Duke of Savoy had really treated.

" Count Tarin tells me his Royal Highness gave him express orders at parting to be very urgent here in having the Emperor's ratification despatched as soon as possible, and notification thereof given immediately into England and Holland, that the subsidies designed him may be got ready."

On the other hand, our people had a shopkeeping plan of getting the money back again, by inlicmg the Duke to deal with us. Nottingham thus writes to Hill upon the subject of obtaining a reduction of duty on English goods, especially woollens.

allies; and it cannot be to any Prince with greater likelihood of success

on may remember hoprowe popular a thing it is to clothe the armies of our

than to the Duke of Savoy, use it may be made very plain to him that we can

4o it for him much cheaper than it can be afforded to him from other parts. In the last war he bought it from contractors who had all the materials from France; and therefore it is to be hoped that he will make no difficulty of choosing to be supplied at cheap rates from his Mends rather than at dear rates from his enemy. ,This, therefore, you are to endeavour to obtain and if, in order to it, you shall want patterns and prices of what we would furnish, I will send them to you; and though perhaps it may be too late to furnish the clothing of this year, yet in this case we wish that you could prevent any contract to be made by the Duke that may prevent him from taking and us from vending our commodities, that the Feat subsidies which we are to pay him may not help to drain us of our money in specie, which is the greatest evil we have any reason to apprehend in the course of this war."

GoDOLPHIN ON GIBRALTAR.

Our last news from Sir G. Rieke gave an account that he had possessed him- .self of Gibraltar; which, I suppose, you hear sooner than we. I know not how far it is tenable' or can be of use to us: those at Lisbon will be the best judges and 'directors of that matter.

A SAMPLE OF ROBERT BARLEY.

"Whitehall, the 6-17th June 1704.

"Sir—Though I am unfortunately pressed into the public service, in a difficult and dangerous post, yet you willgive me leave to enter myself a volunteer in your service, and to assure you that you shall find me very ready and zealous to obey any of your commands, or to promote your interest."

The naval men, as on all other occasions that we have met with them, ,come out the most racy and natural in their epistles. The following is from Rooke the hero of Gibraltar; the capture of which, as we have seen, 'was undervalued, or rather not valued at all.

"I will only tell you, that my services of the last year have been so Ill received by some and so ill rewarded by others, that I could no longer forbear gratifying my inclinations to quit the command of the fleet; to which my long indisposition gave me a fair pretence, though I should be very sorry not to be able to give better reasons to my friends. "It was very apparent that my enemies' upon any misfortune, would be sure to persecute and condemn me, and as plain that my friends would not support or protect me; so that I thought fit, though with some reluctance, to quit the honour of meeting Monsieur Thoulouse this summer, to those who may hope to obtain some justice in consideration of their service. 'The House of Lords have been, by a private Committee, the Duke of Bolton in the chair, all this session upon the cold hunt to discover miscarriages in the fleet the last summer; and not be,ing able to find any faults, they have thought fit to say nothing; so that where I cannot be marked with a public censure, I must not expect to be justified.

"Gibraltar has been shamefully neglected, as if it was to be lost because I had the honour to take it. But whenever that happens, it will be a French port and garrison, and a thorn in the side of England, and Holland, and all the trading world, so long as the sun and moon endure."

Here is another example of the Admiral, the year before, when he had conveyed the German claimant of the Spanish crown to Lisbon ; whose poverty seems to have driven him upon shifts.

"Hampton Court, off of Cape St. Vincent 10th March. 1701, 0.5.

"Dear Sir—Since my last, wherein I told you I had hopes of getting my liberty and retirement, I was prevailed upon to proceed the voyage' having satisfaction given me in the matter of Captain Wishart by his being made Rear-Admiral of the Blue, in preference to Captain Whetstone: but it was done in such an awk- ward manner, as if it were with all their hearts in spite of their teeth. • * * "1 am very sorry to tell you, the diamond sword that went at Dusseldorp was a damned true jest; for they have fobbed me of [it], with one set with mall dia- monds and a buckle and cock for a hat; which, if they were all well sold, might produce 2501. or 2601. I believe it was all they could do; and I wish the King as good success as if I had the present [which] was intended me. But, to Mend the matter, you must know the Queen has taken away all the plate I mean that of the ring's cabin, which has ever been a perquisite to the .eldiLad. So that by this voyage, which my friends expected would make my fortune, I am more than 1,0001. out of pocket."

PETERBOROUGH ON HI S CAPTURE OF BARCELONA.

It is trite, our successes here have been beyond hopes and expectations; but not by the measures of those that kept us here, who would bare lost our little army, rendered these mine attempts of sea and land contemptible • which I am sure will prove of the consequence I pretended, when rightly managed; for so vain

• and mad an attempt as the Prince of Hesse always insisted upon could have ended

• in nothing but ram, so ignorant be was (though he had been so long in the place) of the proper way of attacking it. How desperate soever it might seem, the only way that could succeed was the attack of Mon 'oui; which I undertook without the knowledge of the King of Spain, any of his Mlnisters,ofthe Prince of Hesse, or any of our own officers, for I was weary of doing nothing, and of councils of war, the copy of two of which I send you.

THE REPORT OF BLENHEIM: HILL AT TURIN.

We had, two days since, an express from Switzerland, which brought us advice of a second battle, and complete victory obtained by my Lord Due of Marl- borough and Prince Eugene on the Danube. We expect every moment an express from one of those glorious men, with a more certain account of that action; but, in the mean time, we abandon ourselves to all the excess of joy and satisfaction, which such a blessing will require. The very report of this victory does us more good than the ten or twelve thousand Imperialists which lie useless in Tyrol, and which can come no nearer to us, for want of shoes, and everything else.

CONFIRMATION OF BLENHEML

The Duke of Vendome is now within five miles of Ivrea, and would, I believe, be nearer to it if the Duke of Marlborough had not hindered him the 13th instant. That strange man has fixed us with amazement. Our enemies in Italy believe that he is a Hun, a Goth, a very Attila. They are afraid of him at Rome, and at Florence, where they picture him like a Saracen, with a great broad square flat face, and two great round eyes as large as a platter. Our friends on this side the Alps (for there are some now who dare own themselves so) picture him like the Angel Gabriel announcing salvation to the world. Both our friends and our enemies imagine that he is to come into Italy now he has saved the Empire: anil, indeed, nothing else can save us here, but he or Prince Eugene with a fresh arniy of Imperialists.

THE FRENCH AND THE GERMANS.

The subjects of this state [Venice] are eq.ually devoured both by Germans and French. The only difference that I can find is, that the French have money, and pay sometimes; the Germans have none. But, whereas these good folks only take and eat what they can get, the French do insult the Republic on all occasions, and prostitute the honour and the dignity of the Senate.

So far as regards explanatory matter and facility of arrangement, the work is well edited ; but the arrangement of the letters is bad. It will have been seen that the correspondence not only contains Hill's epistles but great numbers written to him. These are printed first by themselves, instead of the whole arranged in regular chronological order. Thesonse- quence is, that the reader has to peruse letters without their replies, et vice versa, and is put into a maze.