WALPOLE'S MEMOIRS OF GEORGE THE THIRD. THESE volumes complete Walpole's

History of George the Third so far as he carried it on ; taking up the story in the early part of 1767, with the Parliamentary debates on the East India Company's affairs—which we might call paltry and discreditable to a national assembly did we not remember those on New Zealand ; and ending, in 1771, with theyoung Duke of Cumberland's marriage with Mrs. Horton, sister of the notorious Colonel Luttrell : a beginning and an end which are not bad types of the character of the volumes, wherein party politics and courtly doings form the -staple matter.

The principal intermediate home subject of the volumes is really Wilkes, and the riots and Parliamentary disputes consequent on the 'Middlesex election ; for though the debates themselves had a limit, there was no end to the effects of that ill-judged act upon society. The large foreign event is the dispute with Spain relative to the Falkland Islands. All the rest of the political matter consists of curt reports of debates, not always well done ; tedious narratives of Ministerial intrigues, or rather of intrigues for office ; with notices of Irish and foreign affairs. The sketches of social events and contemporary characters, with the mingled narrative and remark on royal and noble personages, have greater interest, pos- sessing more of the spirit of anecdote. Except in the case of the King, however, or such prominent characters as Lords Chatham and Mansfield, • the reader will not take much interest in this species of contemporary gossip, unless he is read in the story of the times.

Compared with the two first volumes, the work rather exhibits a fall- ing off. A ridiculous importance is given to self and cousin Conway. Any- body reading the Memoirs for the first two or three years would suppose that the important event of the period was whether Conway should keep or resign his place; and that Walpole, in removing his scruples or pre- tended scruples, had deserved well of his country and achieved a conspi- cuous niche in history. The return of Wilkes, his untiring activity and restless audacity, with the Ministerial and Parliamentary difficulties which • his persecution by Royalty produced, have at least more largeness and public character ; besides that the reader's mind is familiar with the subject. Yet it does seem as if an undue prominence were given to that demagogue ; whilst the Letters of Junius, which stimulated the public mind as much as Wilkes, and have a more enduring interest, are only cursorily noticed. Not professing to write history but only memoirs, it was to be expected that Walpole should give space and prominence to what fell within his personal knowledge : but in an account of pub- lic events patent to all the world the reader is entitled to require some keeping in the piece. He, however, seems to have proceeded upon the principle of only giving what excited his attention in the events of the day. We consequently have not a picture of the times, but such as it ap- peared the somewhat narrow and jaundiced vision of the individual et:-on. This want of scale, proportion, and wholeness, must ever be the case when men undertake to write what they call history front their o wn impressions, instead of from records and a large survey. But loose- ness of structure and a barren heaviness can only be avoided by the writer's confining himself to his personal knowledge, and not writing narratives of what is common to all the world as well as himself.

This circumstance of peculiar information, coupled perhaps with greater freshness of subject, renders a few chapters on France, or rather the ,Nrench Court, about the most interesting portion of the volumes. Part of the doings Walpole saw in some excursions to Paris ; the others he heard lattfidentially from actors in the scene ; and the picture is quite sufficient to justify the French Revolution, or any other revolution. In England, however mean might be the motives of politicians, they made at least a professkn of public objects, and pursued them in an open manner, and isAth a regard to the constitution. .Anintelligible principle was avowed by each aide "love of liberty," "fear of popular licence," "the rights of the crown," "the people, the same of all legitimate power," were well-sounding phrases, under which an honest man might honestly enlist, though knaves might use them as a cloak to conceal their own self-in. terest. Even the King was forced to beg, beseech, and buy his instru- ments, and could not always get them. But the Court of France was neither more nor less than a large brothel; and the most exciting topic was worthy of such a place. Madame de Pompadour was just dead, and the King had chosen Madame du Barry. However, let Walpole tell the tale at large. It is different from other reports; but Walpole wan doubtless well-informed on a congenial subject of this kind.

"There was a Comte du Barry, said to be of a noble family. It was much more certain that he was a sharper and a 'limp, nominally to the Markle!, [Richelieu,] frequently so to the young English that resorted to Pads, where he furnished them with opera-girls, and drew them into gaming. Two years before he was known for loftier intrigues, he Lieutenant de Police civilly warned some English Lords not to haunt Du iarry's house, lest he should find them there when, as he expected, he should be forced to visit a place so scandalous. Du Barry, in quest of a more plentiful harvest, came to London, and exercised his vocation at taverns. In his Parisian seraglio was a well-made girl of the town, not remarkably pretty, called Mademoiselle L'Ange. After passing through every. scene of prostitution, this nymph was pitched upon by the Cabal for overturning the ascendant of Choiseul [the Prime Minister]. To insure her attachment to them, and to qualify her for the post she was to occupy in the state, they began with marrying her to the brother of her pander, Du Barry. The next step was to prevail on Belle, the King's first valet-de-chambre and first minister of his pri- vate hours, to introduce her to the Monarch. After such a succession of beauties as be had known, and no stranger to the most dissolute, too, the King was caught with such moderate charms, which had not even the merit of coming to his arms in their first bloom.

"At first a sort of mystery was observed. But the fair one gained ground rapidly, and Solomon soon began to chant the perfections of his beloved. The Court was shocked to hear to what an idol of clay they were to address their ho- mage. They were accustomed to bow down before a mistress, but took it into their heads that the disgrace consisted in her being a common girl of the WW2. The King's daughters, who had borne the ascendant of Madame de Pompadour in their mother's life, grew outrageous though she was dead, at the new favourite, for being of the lowest class of her outrageous, and instead of regarding this amour as only ridiculous, treated it with a serious air of disobedience, that would have offended any man but so indulgent and weak a father, or a very wise one. The poor King blushed, and by turns hesitated and exalted his mistress. In private the scene was childish: his aged Majesty and his indelicate concubine romped, peltol one another with sugar-plums, and were much oftener silly than amorous. Tile Faction did not sleep: the next point was that Madame Du Barry should be pre- sented publicly. The King promised: her clothes and liveries were made. "Instead of attempting to remove or buy the new mistress the Disc De Choiseurs conduct was as imprudent and rash as the King's was pitiful. He spoke of Madame Du Barry publicly, without decency or management; which being quickly carried to her, and she complaining of it, he said at his own table, before a large company—' Madame Du Barry eat tree mush informee; on no parle pas de catins chez mot' The King's irresolution and the Minister's insolence suspended the abjection of the courtiers."

To go through the whole affair would be to quote fifty or sixty pages Of Walpole's best style of gossip. Suffice it to say, that the Mistress eventually triumphed ; the Minister was dismissed ; and the story ends with a visit paid to her by the Corps Diplomatique with the Pope's Nuncio at the head, except the Spanish and Neapolitan Ambassadors.

About the same time, a case for scandal occurred in England, on the intrigue of the King's younger brother with Lady Grosvenor ; though it had no political results, and was merely scandal. If Walpole's closing conjecture is true, George the Fourth might plead the "last dying speech and confession" excuse for his misconduct—a bad education.

ROYAL EDCCATION.

Daring the absence of her Royal Highness was decided, against her young* son the Duke of Cumberland, the suit for adultery with a young woman of quality, whom a good person, moderate beauty, no understanding, and excessive vanity, had rendered too accessible to the attentions of a Prince of the Blood. Their letters were produced at the trial, and never was the public regaled withu collection of greater folly ! Yet, to the lady's honour be it said, that, bating a few oaths, which sounded more masculine than tender, the advantage in grammar, spelling, and style, was all in her favour. His Royal Highness's diction and learn- ing scarce exceeded that of a cabin-boy; as those eloquent epistles existing in print, may testify. Some being penned on beard of ship, were literal verificatien,of Lord Dorset's ballad- " To you, (air ladles, now at land,

We men at sea do write ; But first would have you understand

How hard 'its to Indite."

Grievous censure fell on his governor and preceptor, Mr. Legrand and Mi. Charles and not less on the Prmcess herself, so totally bad his education bean neglected. He had been locked up with his brother, the Duke of Gloucester, till the age of twenty-one, and thence had sallied into a life of brothels and drunken- ness, whence the decency of the elder [George IlL] and his early connexion wit,h Lady Waldegrave preserved the Duke of Gloucester. The younger was pelt, insolent, senseless, and not unwillingly brutal So little care taken of a Prince of the Blood did but confirm the opinion of the public, that the plan of the Princess Lord Bute, and the King, had been to keep down and discredit the King's brothen3 as much as possible. The Duke of Cumberland, at least, did not disappoint the scheme; as will hereafter appear. As a dozen years afterwards it was evident that no greater care, though with still more rigorous confinement, had been taken of the morals and style of the Prince of Wales who issued from that palace of supposed purity, the Queen's House, as if he had been educated in a night-cellar, it gave but too much ground for suspecting that, undeterred by what had hap- pened to his brother, the jealousy of his heir had not been less predominant in the King than it had been in the neglect of his brothers.

The following samples of Barrd in debate afford a singular example of freedom of speech in a polished age. It is probable that the publication

of the debates has had a hand in shaming the orators into more measure and reason.

"Dyson, as usual, was shrewd, and, as usual, ill-treated by the Oppoeition; Colonel Barre, the day before, having baptized him by the name of Afungo black slave in a new farce called The Padlock,' who is described as employetsIly everybody in all jobs and servile offices. Burke ridiculed the Ministers as ,he done the day before with greater applause; and Barre, repeating his attacks, VMS called to order by Rigby, whom he had described as a jolly, eating, drinkinitett, low, who finding himself now in a comfortable situation, seldom spoke. provoked' at the interruption, Barre rejoined surlily—' The gentleman denies being a Ifinister, and calls me to order: but I have not done with him yet. Whether Minister or not, he lies in a bed' to himself. I do not envy hint ; nor would I base • Alluding to the roymootott piaeo,orbickhott been split Into two, but was meellt siren to Rigby alone.

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his principles to lie in his bed.' This unpleasant attack thunderstruck Rigby; who coloured, and, not choosing to have the last sentence explained, made no • • • •

Olft the 13th, Lord George Germaine moved for a conference with the Lords on their late expulsion of the Commons. His motive, he said, was to recommend unanimity between the two Houses; insinuating, in order to create variance between them, that they had quarrelled. But the motion was rejected by a large majority; but not till Colonel Barre had drawn a severe picture of the Court- Lords, particularly of the Earls of Marchmont and Denbigh, who had dis- tinguished themselves with most bitterness against the Commons. All had been going on quietly, said Barre, when on a sudden a set of raggamuffms had in- terrupted the debate, and first turned out the Lords and then the Commons. They were the most ill-favoured rogues he had ever seen; one with a long meagre face and long nose, whom by his brogue he presently knew for a Scotchman; another, still worse, with such a villanons aspect, squinting eyes, and features so compressed that his hooked nose could scarce squeeze itself into its place, was so hideous that he had been persuaded it was not a human face but a mask. The likenesses were too strong to be misapplied; yet the two Lords took care not to acknowledge their portraits.

AN EARLY TRAIT OF THE KING: 1760-1767.

In all my experience of the King or knowledge of his measures, he never inter- fered with his Ministers, scarce took any part in his own business, (I speak of the past years of his reign,) unless when he was to undo an Administration. Whe- ther hating or liking the persons he employed, the moment he took them he seemed to resign himself entirely to their conduct for the time. If what they proposed was very disagreeable to him, at most he avoided it by delay. The text of Walpole does not leave the space that Sir Denis Le Mar- chant anticipated for his appendix of biographical notices of some of the persons mentioned in the Memoirs. Instead of these, he has inserted se• veral passages from the autobiography of the Duke of Grafton, relative to his joining the Ministry on Lord Chatham's accession to office, and his quitting it in 1770, soon after the dismissal of Lord Camden, and the suicide of Charles York; (persuaded to accept the place of Chancellor); whose "murder" Junius charged upon Grafton and the King. The au- tobiography is addressed by the Duke to his son Lord Euston; and it must have been written when the author was well advanced in years, as he alludes to an incident during the Reign of Terror. The style is simple, the temper calm and moderate, and the passages printed leave a more favourable opinion of the author's disposition and ability than will be de- rived from other sources. The present Duke of Grafton, the grandson of the autobiographer, placed the manuscript at the disposal of Sir Denis Le Iiiarchant, for the purposes of this edition : Sir Denis has quoted such parts as were necessary to illustrate some of the statements in the text ; observing that it is of sufficient importance to deserve a separate publi- cation, and it would undoubtedly form a curious addition to our collection of family memoirs.