French, and George I. not understanding English, all their intercourse, down to the time of the King's death, took place in the Latin language." Walpole's Two Drawbacks.-A friend of mine (says Dr. King), who dined with Sir Robert Walpole one day tête-à-tête, took occasion to compliment him on the great honour and power which he enjoyed as Prime Minister. "Doctor," says he, "I have great power, it is true; but I have two cursed drawbacks-Hanover and the avarice." A Grateful Supporter.-Sir Robert Walpole wanted to carry a question in the House of Commons, to which he knew there would be great opposition, and which was disliked by some of his own dependents. As he was passing through the Court of Requests he met a member of the contrary party, whose avarice, he imagined, would not reject a large bribe. He took him aside, and said, “ Such a question comes on this day; give me your vote, and here is a bank bill of 20007.," which he put into his hands. The member replied, "Sir Robert, you have lately served some of my particular friends; and when my wife was last at court, the King was very gracious to her, which must have happened at your instance. I should therefore think myself very ungrateful (putting the bank note into his pocket) if I were to refuse the favour you are now pleased to ask me." Magnanimity.-Lord North related the following anecdote to Dr. Johnson: Sir Robert Walpole having got into his hands some treasonable letters of his inveterate enemy, William Shippen, one of the heads of the Jacobite faction, he sent for him and burned them before his face. Some time afterwards, Shippen had occasion to take the oaths to the Government in the House of Commons, and while he was doing so, Sir Robert, who stood next him and knew his principles to be the same as ever, smiled. "Egad, Robin," said Shippen, who had observed him, that's hardly fair." Even Temper.-Dr. Johnson had a high opinion of Sir Robert Walpole, notwithstanding that he had written against him in the early part of his life. He said of him that he was a fine fellow, and that his very enemies deemed him so before his death. He honoured his memory for having kept this country in peace many years, as also for the goodness and placability of his temper. Pulteney, Earl of Bath, in a conversation with Johnson, said that Sir Robert was of a temper so calm and equal, and so hard to be provoked, that he was very sure he never felt the bitterest invectives against him for half an hour.-Hawkins' "Life of Johnson.” Unusual Excitement.-In general (writes Brougham) Walpole's manner was simple, and even familiar, with a constant tendency towards gaiety. In vehemence of declamation he seldom indulged, and anything very violent was foreign to his habits at all times. Yet sometimes he deviated from this course, and once spoke under such excitement (on the motion respecting Lord Cadogan's conduct, 1717) that the blood burst from his nose, and he had to quit the House. But for this accidental relief, he probably would have afforded a singular instance of a speaker, always good-humoured and easy in his delivery beyond almost any other dropping down dead in his declamation, from excess of vehemence; and at this time he was between forty and fifty years of age. An Unseemly Conflict.-The following account of a scene between the brothers-in-law, Lord Townshend and Sir Robert Walpole, shortly before the retirement of the former from their joint ministry, shows that Walpole could occasionally lose his self-command. It is given in Ewald's biography:-Returning from the palace after a conference with the Queen, Walpole called upon Colonel Selwyn at Cleveland Court. Talking to Mrs. Selwyn was Townshend, and in the room were the Duke of Newcastle and his brother Mr. Pelham. The conversation turned upon a question of foreign politics, which Walpole had advised should be abandoned. Townshend, disapproving of this suggestion of his colleague, recommended that the House of Commons should be informed of the nature of the measure, and be told that it had fallen through at the instigation of the First Lord of the Treasury. Walpole replied somewhat shortly that such a proceeding was inexpedient, and only calculated to give unnecessary trouble. To this Townshend hotly answered, "Since you object, and the House of Commons is your concern more than mine, I shall not persist in my opinion; but, as I now give way, I cannot avoid observing that, upon my honour, I think that mode of proceeding would have been most advisable." Walpole, whose rage had long been smouldering against Townshend and only wanted the slightest provocation to break out, said in his most scornful tones, "My lord, for once there is no man's sincerity which I doubt so much as your lordship's; and I never doubted it so much as when you are pleased to make such strong professions." The choleric temper of Townshend was unable to brook this taunt, and, forgetful that Mrs. Selwyn was in the room, he rushed forward, seized Walpole by his collar, and biography has to record that these two distinguished men were not ashamed to resent their wrongs by a personal struggle, which might have been approved of by the frequenters of a village taproom, but which was certainly out of place when we remember the high position of the combatants, and that the scene was laid in the house of a friend and in the presence of a lady. When the scuffle had ended, the rival ministers laid their hands on their swords, and prepared for an immediate duel. Mrs. Selwyn, in terror, was on the point of summoning the guards, but was prevented by Mr. Pelham. Happily, the friends now interposed (indeed, one is surprised that they did not interfere sooner), and a cold and hollow reconciliation between the two was effected-but neither ever forgot that day, and the bitterness with which it was remembered endured in the minds of both to the last. Patriotism.—In his speech on his own vindication in 1741, Walpole remarked: "Gentlemen have talked a great deal of patriotism; a venerable word, when duly practised. But I am sorry to say that of late it has been so much hackneyed about that it is in danger of falling into disgrace; the very idea of true patriotism is lost, and the term has been prostituted to the very worst of purposes. A patriot, sir! why, patriots spring up like mushrooms. I could raise fifty of them within the four and-twenty hours. I have raised many of them in one night. It is but refusing to gratify an unreasonable or an insolent demand, and up starts a patriot." The Balance of Power.-This expression occurs in the speech by Sir Robert Walpole in 1741, in which he defended himself against the motion for an address to George II. to remove him from his counsels. Alluding to the pacific policy of his administration, he said, "We were not in honour obliged to take any share in the war which the Emperor brought upon himself in the year 1733, nor were we in interest obliged to take a share in that war, as long as neither side attempted to push its conquests farther than was consistent with the balance of power in Europe, which was a case that did not happen." His Resignation.-The immediate cause of the Minister's resignation was the virtual success of Pulteney's motion (p. 108) in January, 1742. His once powerful majority (writes Ewald) had dwindled down to three, and in a few days, when the question of the Chippenham election petition came before the House, even that feeble majority could not be commanded, and Walpole found himself for the first time for twenty years in a minority. He was strongly advised to give up the seals. "I must inform you," he writes to the Duke of Devonshire, "that the panic was so great among what I should call my own friends that they all declared my retiring was become absolutely necessary, as the only means to carry on the public business." His own family also urged him to submit to the verdict of parliamentary fortune, and not to oppose a hostile House of Commons. Had he consulted his own wishes, he would, he said, still have remained at the head of affairs, in spite of his political reverses; but when he found that, in addition to a formidable majority in the House of Commons, and to a strong feeling against him out of doors, his Cabinet declined to serve under him and threatened desertion, he saw that there was no alternative but to tender his resignation. On handing the seals to the King, the Minister knelt down to kiss the royal hand, and it is said that his Majesty was so moved at the departure of his chief adviser, after the many years of faithful service he had rendered the Crown, that he burst into tears. Walpole was raised to the Upper House by the title of the Earl of Orford, and a handsome pension was granted him. Faulty Premiers.-The Duke of Argyll said all First Ministers had been faulty, but that Sir Robert Walpole had the least faults of any minister with whom he had ever been concerned. Inquiring after Robin.-When Walpole resigned, and was raised to the peerage, the old clergyman of Walsingham, who was master of the first school in which Sir Robert was instructed, went to his country seat at Houghton, and told him he had been his first master, and had predicted that he would be a great man. Being asked why he never called upon him while he was in power, he answered, "I knew that you were surrounded with so many petitioners, craving preferment, and that you had done so much for Norfolk people, that I did not wish to intrude. But," he added, in a strain of good-natured simplicity, "I always inquired how Robin went on, and was satisfied with your proceedings." His Opinion of History.-Upon his retirement, in 1742, he went immediately to Houghton; but, accustomed all his life to political excitement, having never been fond of reading, and much of his old company failing, his time must have hung heavy on his hands. It is recorded that his son having one day proposed to read to him, and taking down a book of history, he exclaimed, "Oh, don't read history; that I know must be false: "-the judgment (remarks Earl Russell) of a man better acquainted with pamphleteers than with historians. His Political Axiom.-Sir Robert Walpole is justly blamed (says Coxe) for a want of political decorum, and for deriding public spirit, to which Pope alludes: "Seen him I have, but in his happier hour He does not think me what he thinks mankind." Although it is not possible to justify him, yet this part of his conduct has been greatly exaggerated. The political axiom generally attributed to him, that " all men have their price," was perverted by leaving out the word "those." Flowery oratory he despised; he ascribed to the interested views of themselves or their relatives the declarations of pretended patriots, of whom he said, "All those men have their price;" and in the event many of them justified his observation.-Coxe's "Life.” Character of Walpole.-Lord Campbell thus sums up the character of Walpole: "He was probably the most dexterous party-leader we have ever had-equally skilled to win royal favour, to govern the House of Commons, and to influence or be influenced by public opinion. He likewise well understood the material interests of the country, and, as far as was consistent with his own retention of power, he was desirous of pursuing them. But, that he might run no personal risk, he would make no attempt to improve our institutions; he was regardless of distant dangers; he plunged into a war which he admitted to be unjust and impolitic, and, by his utter neglect of literature and literary men-in spite of the example set him by his immediate predecessors, Whig and Tory-he gave to official life in England that aristocratic feeling, and vulgar, business-like tone, which it has ever since retained."-Mr. Massey, in his " History," says: "Every variety of invective which faction, jealousy, and personal hatred could suggest, was heaped upon his head; but the topics principally relied upon, and which could not be disputed, so far from being a reproach, are the very grounds on which his reputation as a wise and faithful minister must ever rest. That he was not scrupulous in the application of public money is undoubted; but the charge of personal peculation, by which the vindictive rage of his enemies sought his life as well as his honour, not only failed, but is discredited by the fact that he died largely in debt. The really vulnerable parts of his character were never attacked. The evil example of his private life; his utter contempt of decorum; the proverbial grossness of his conversation, and the perio dical debaucheries of Houghton, which were the talk of the whole county -all these passed uncensured. The truth is that the habits and manners of Walpole were congenial to the coarseness and depravity of the times." WILLIAM PULTENEY. (1682-1764.) A Powerful Speaker.-Sir Robert Walpole said of his great rival that he feared Pulteney's tongue more than another man's sword; and his character as a debater was thus drawn by Speaker Onslow, who was also a political opponent: "He had the most popular parts for public speaking that I ever knew; animating every subject of popularity with the spirit and fire that the orators of the ancient commonwealths governed the people by; was as classical and eloquent in the speeches he did not prepare, as they were in the most studied compositions; mingling wit and pleasantry, and the application even of little stories, so properly to affect his hearers, that he would overset the best argumentation in the world, and win people over to his side, often against their own convictions, by making ridiculous that truth they were influenced by before, and making some men to be afraid and ashamed of being thought within the meaning of some bitter expression of his, or within the laugh that generally went through the town at any memorable stroke of his wit." A Farcical Illustration.-Pulteney's speech against Walpole's Excise Bill gives us an example of his humour. "I must say," he remarked," that the honourable gentleman has been of late mighty bountiful and liberal in his offers to the public. He has been so gracious as to ask us, Will you have a land tax of two shillings in the pound? a land tax of one shilling in the pound? or will you have no land tax at all? Will you have your debts paid? Will you have them soon paid? Tell me but what you want, let me but know how you can be made easy, and it shall be done for you.' These are most generous offers; but there is something so very extraordinary, so farcical in them, that really I can hardly mention them without laughing. It puts me in mind of the story of Sir Epicure Mammon in the Alchymist.' He was gulled of his money by fine promises; he was promised the philosopher's stone, by which he was to get mountains of gold and everything else he could desire; but all ended at last in some little thing for curing the itch." A Horatian Bet.-On February 11th, 1741, Sandys informed Walpole in the House of Commons that he should, on the following Friday, bring an accusation of several articles against him. The minister, who received the intimation with great dignity and composure, immediately rose, thanked him for his notice, and, after requesting a candid and impartial hearing, declared that he would not fail to attend the House, as he was not conscious of any crime to deserve accusation. He laid his hand on his breast, and said, with some emotion "Nil conscire sibi, nulli pallescere culpæ." Pulteney observed that the right honourable gentleman's logic and Latin were equally inaccurate, and declared he had misquoted Horace, who had |