of Contents
1 Preface to the “Memoires of the Last Twelve Years of the Reign of George the Second,” p. xxvi.
2 Postscript to the “Memoires of George the Second,” p. 40.
3 Preface to the “Memoires of the Last Twelve Years of the Reign of George the Second,” p. xxxii.
4 Mr. Wright’s notes on Lord Chatham’s Correspondence and his edition of Cavendish’s Debates are also most useful aids to the student of English History. He died not many months ago, in circumstances which proved his labours to have been very inadequately rewarded by the public.
5 Mr. Clavering—he was a near relative of a North country baronet of the same name.—E.
6 Sir Henry Wilmot, Bart., M.D., Physician-general to the Forces, an eminent medical practitioner, and the son-in-law of Dr. Mead; he died in 1786, at a very advanced age.—E.
7 He was Serjeant-surgeon to the King, and had attended George II. at the battle of Dettingen.—E.
8 John Stuart, third Earl of Bute.—This nomination was severely criticised in publications of the day. It is treated by Mr. Adolphus as a simple nomination to the Privy Council, and is defended as such, on the ground that the Groom of the Stole had been always constituted a Privy Counsellor. This is a misconception. The empty honour of the Council could be grudged by no one to a great officer of the royal household. The real grievance was his admission into the Cabinet.—E.
9 The Duke very soon discovered his power to be gone. Lord Bute’s predilection for the Tories was undisguised, and it soon became evident that the Court had determined to break up the Whig party, the effect of which would be to reduce the Duke to insignificance. See an interesting letter from Mr. Rigby to the Duke of Bedford (19 Dec. 1760), giving an account of an interview of the former with the Duke of Newcastle.—Russell Correspondence, vol. ii. p. 467.
10 William Cavendish, fourth Duke of Devonshire, and Lord Chamberlain.
11 William Henry Nassau Zulestein, fourth Earl of Rochford. He was descended from General Zulestein, a natural uncle of William the Third; and his grandfather, the first Earl, had been one of the favourite generals of that Monarch. Lord Rochford had been minister at Turin from 1749 to 1755, when he was appointed Groom of the Stole, to the great disappointment of Earl Poulett, the first Lord of the Bedchamber, who in consequence resigned his employment. Walpole’s Memoirs, vol. i. p. 381.—E.
12 The Duke of Bedford was no favourite of Walpole, owing to a private quarrel. There is no reason for suspecting that it could have been intended to remove his Grace from the Government of Ireland, a post which he had occupied with great reluctance (Walp. Mem. vol. ii. p. 105), and was glad to vacate shortly afterwards.—E.
13 Granville Leveson, Earl Gower, brother of the Duchess of Bedford.
14 James Brudenel, brother of the Earl of Cardigan, to which title he afterwards succeeded. He died without issue in 1811, aged 86.—E.
15 Eldest daughter of John, Earl of Bute; afterwards married to Sir James Lowther.
16 Afterwards third wife of Granville Leveson, Earl Gower.
17 He had been dismissed for joining Mr. Pitt, and the Prince had at the time promised to restore him, upon coming to the throne.—Doddington’s Diary, Appendix.—E.
18 Richard Temple, Lord Cobham, who had been much engaged with Frederick Prince of Wales, being asked by Henrietta, Lady Suffolk, what was the real character of the Princess, replied, “She was the only woman he could never find out: all he had discovered was, that she hated those most to whom she paid most court.”
19 This criticism of Lord Bute is not borne out by facts. The fine collection of pictures made by his lordship at Luton, prove the munificence and discernment with which he patronized painting. Luton itself, the building, or rather the enlargement of which he is known to have personally superintended, with many faults had likewise many beauties, and was surpassed in taste by few of the mansions of that date, and certainly not by Strawberry Hill. He had, in fact, a genuine love both of painting and architecture, and his efforts to infuse the same into the mind of his royal pupil did not entirely fail, for George the Third’s example was unquestionably a great improvement in this respect on his immediate predecessors. Of the other charges here brought against Lord Bute, the Editor has spoken elsewhere.—E.
20 Archbishop Secker has been in more than one instance misrepresented by Walpole. It is most improbable that he should have entertained the views here ascribed to him. As the head of the Church, it necessarily became his duty to attend frequently at Court on the commencement of a new reign, as has since happened to his successors without their incurring any such imputation.—E.
21 When Prince of Wales, Scott, his sub-preceptor, reproached him with inattention to his studies. The Prince pleaded idleness. “Idle! Sir,” said Scott; “your brother Edward is idle; but do you call being asleep, being idle?”
22 George Keppel, third Earl of Albemarle, a favourite of the Duke of Cumberland, and afterwards conqueror of the Havannah.
23 George, eldest son of Charles Lord Viscount Townshend (afterwards Marquis of Townshend). His name often appears in these Memoirs.
24 A Letter to the Honourable Brigadier General, Commander-in-Chief of his Majesty’s Forces in Canada.—London, 1760.—It is written with a point and spirit, and we may add, with a degree of malignity, closely akin to Junius, to whose pen, indeed, it has recently been ascribed. (See Preface by Mr. Simons to the new edition of this Pamphlet.) A reply, under the title of “Refutation of a Letter,” &c., composed, evidently, under the eye of Townshend or his family, appeared shortly afterwards, and is equally intemperate, but very inferior in ability. The controversy is so far prejudicial to Townshend, as convicting him of an ungenerous indifference to the memory of the great man who had led him to victory—his only excuse for the slight manner in which he notices Wolfe in the despatch being, not “want of esteem, but because of the impropriety of writing a panegyric to a Minister, when nothing but the situation and exigence of affairs is mentioned.” Townshend virtually admitted the justice of the charge,
