AN ANECDOTE OF RODNEY.
pro TIDE EDITOR Or THE " SPECTATOR."]
SIR,--The version which is given by Duruy in his "Histoire de France " of a very familiar incident • in Rodney's career, and which is quoted by Colonel Swiney in his letter in last Saturday's issue, is a very picturesque one,—but palpably inaccurate. The incident itself—viz., the magnanimous loan advanced by Mariana do Biron which enabled Rodney to release himself from his Parisian creditors and to return to England in May, 1778--is described in exact detail in Mundy's Life of Rodney (Vol. I., pp. 177-85), in Barrow's Life of Anson (p. 328), in Hannay's " Rodney " (pp. 84.85), and in the " Memoires de la Duchesse de Gontaut " (p. 75). This chivalrous offer by de Biron, for the payment of Rodney's debts in Paris, was made and accepted (and the loan itself repaid) during the months of April and May, 1778; it obviously, therefore, could not have -been consequent upon " the success of the naval expedition under Count d'Orvilliers," Which, as Duruy himself mentions, took place in July of that Year; still less so upon naval events which occurred " in
1779," and which are also summarised by Duruy ih the section of his " Histoire" from which Colonel Swiney quotes.—I am, Sir, &c., WILLIAM GREY. 9 Cleveland Row, St. Tames's, S.W.
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