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CHAPTER XXX.

THE rebellion in Scotland and the consequent recall of the British troops from Flanders, left that country an easy conquest to the French. Marshal de Saxe, unexpectedly renewing his operations in the midst of winter, invested Brussels; on the 20th of February that important capital surrendered, and its large garrison became prisoners of war. Antwerp, Mons, and Charleroi followed in their turn. Even Namur, which had so long withstood the arms of King William, capitulated on the 19th of September, after a siege of only six days. Meanwhile the command of the allied army had been assumed by Prince Charles of Lorraine, and he had gradually received both British and Hanoverian reinforcements: but, on the 11th of October, he was repulsed in an engagement at Roucoux, near Liège; and, at the close of the campaign, the French were in possession of nearly the whole of the Austrian Netherlands.

But their successes on the Scheldt and Meuse were balanced by reverses on the Po. The Austrians, freed from their Prussian enemy by the peace of Dresden, had sent large reinforcements over the Alps; they recovered Parma, Guastalla, and Milan, and completely defeated the French and Spaniards at a battle near Placentia on the 17th of June. Pursuing their victory, they entered Genoa in September, and urged their preparations for an immediate invasion of Provence.*

Another event unfavourable to the Court of Versailles was the death of Philip the Fifth of Spain, on the 9th of July. His son and successor, Ferdinand the Sixth, felt but a slight interest in the establishment of Don Philip in Italy—the main object of the war in the preceding reign -and he accordingly pursued that war languidly, unwillingly, and with diminished forces. Thus France, deserted by Prussia and Bavaria, and faintly supported by

* Muratori, Annal. d'Ital. vol. xii. p. 346. et seq.

Spain, had no longer any one efficient ally; and notwithstanding her conquests in Flanders, was not disinclined to peace on reasonable terms. Some conferences were opened at Breda, but from the high pretensions of England and of Austria at that time, led to no result.

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In this summer the British Ministers despatched an expedition to the coast of Brittany, the troops under General St. Clair, the fleet under Admiral Lestock. The object was to surprise Port L'Orient, and destroy the ships and stores of the French East India Company, but the result attained was only the plunder and burning of a few helpless villages. Thus much only might be boasted, that the fleet and troops returned with little loss. "The "truth is," says a contemporary, "Lestock was by this "time grown too old and infirm for enterprise, and, as is “ alleged, was under the shameful direction of a woman "he carried along with him; and neither the soldiers nor the sailors, during the whole of the expedition, seem to have been under any kind of discipline." At home the tranquillity of the Cabinet was slightly ruffled by the resignation of Lord Harrington. That Minister -so lately the King's favourite - had incurred His Majesty's most serious displeasure by his courage in heading the seceders of February, 1746. In the same proportion-for common minds have only a certain stock of friendship or of enmity, which is never increased or diminished, but only transferred from one person to another had His Majesty's feelings relented towards Pitt and Chesterfield: to the former he began to show signs of esteem-of the latter he no longer opposed the admission into office. Thus, when Harrington, mortified at the King's antipathy, and feebly supported by the Duke of Newcastle, for whose sake he had exposed himself, gave up the Seals on the 29th of October, they were immediately entrusted to Chesterfield, while Chesterfield's appointment as Lord Lieutenant of Ireland was transferred to Harrington.*

*Tindal's Hist. vol. ix. p. 271.

I must observe, in justice to Newcastle, that though not sufficiently firm in supporting his friend in the Cabinet, he insisted on obtaining for him the Lord Lieutenancy, which the King was unwilling to grant. See Coxe's Pelham, vol. i. p. 343.

Philip Dormer Stanhope, fourth Earl of Chesterfield, one of the most shining characters of his age, was born in 1694. His father a man of morose and gloomy temper appears from his earliest years to have conceived a coldness, nay aversion to him.* But the parental place was in a great measure supplied by his grandmother, the Marchioness of Halifax, who with great accomplishments combined an overflowing benevolence. At the age of eighteen young Stanhope was sent to complete his studies at Cambridge. According to his own account, many years afterwards, " at the University I was an "absolute pedant. When I talked my best I quoted "Horace; when I aimed at being facetious, I quoted "Martial; and when I had a mind to be a fine gentle<< man, I talked Ovid. I was convinced that none but "the ancients had common sense, that the classics con"tained every thing that was either necessary, useful, or ornamental, to men; and I was not even without "thoughts of wearing the TOGA VIRILIS of the Romans,

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instead of the vulgar and illiberal dress of the moderns."† Yet there is reason to suspect that this was not the real fact with himself, but only an encouraging example held forth to his son to show him how pedantry may be successfully surmounted. Certain it is, that the few letters preserved of Chesterfield, during his nonage, display wit, acuteness, and knowledge of the world. Thus, from Paris, in 1715, he writes satirically: "I shall not give you my opinion of the French, because I am very often "taken for one of them; and several have paid me the "highest compliment they think it in their power to be.66 stow; which is,Sir, you are just like ourselves!' I "shall only tell you that I am insolent; I talk a great "deal; I am very loud and peremptory; I sing and dance 66 as I walk along; and, above all, I spend an immense "sum in hair-powder, feathers, and white gloves!" His correspondent, on this occasion, was M. Jouneau, a tedious old gentleman, of whose acquaintance he was evidently

p. 24.

See a letter, dated 1703, in Atterbury's Correspondence, vol. ii. 't Letter to his son, June 24. 1751.

Chesterfield's Works, vol. iii. p. 17. 8vo ed. 1779.

weary; but it is, I fear, in some degree characteristic of Chesterfield, that this, the very last letter he ever wrote to that person, contains the following expressions: →→→ "You reproach me, and not without cause, for not having "written to you since I came to Paris. I confess my "fault; I repent of it, and you will be convinced of the "sincerity of my repentance by the number of letters "with which I shall in future overwhelm you. You will cry out for quarter, but in vain; I shall punish you for "not having known your first happiness!

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Chesterfield had entered the House of Commons even before the legal age*; but allured by pleasures, into which he plunged with no common eagerness, he shrunk from the arduous labours of a statesman. It was not till the death of his father, in 1726, that he began in earnest to tread the thorny paths of ambition. Nature had endowed him with a brilliant and ready wit, which was sometimes the delight, sometimes the scourge, but always the wonder, of his companions; and which shone alike in his most laboured writings, and his least premeditated sallies. His own care had formed manners, till proverbial for their excellence, and, in his own time, the model for the world of fashion; while attaining the highest degree of courtly polish, they had neither relaxed into insipidity, nor stiffened into superciliousness; but were animated and enlivened by a never-failing anxiety to please. As is acknowledged by himself—" Call it vanity, if you will "-and possibly it was so; but my great object was to "make every man I met like me, and every woman love me. I often succeeded, but why? By taking great pains." But these more superficial graces and accomplishments were, it speedily appeared, supported by what alone can support them in public life; a large and solid fund of reading. Nobody," says he to his son, ever "lent themselves more than I did, when I was young, to "the pleasures and dissipation of good company; I even "did it too much. But then I can assure you, that I always found time for serious studies; and when I "could find it no other way, I took it out of my sleep; "for I resolved always to rise early in the morning,

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* See vol. i. p. 132.

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† To his son, July 21. 1752,

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however late I went to bed at night; and this resolu"tion I have kept so sacred that, unless when I have been "confined to my bed by illness, I have not, for more than "forty years, ever been in bed at nine o'clock in the "morning, but commonly up before eight."—" But," he adds, "throw away none of your time upon those "trivial futile books published by idle or necessitous "authors for the amusement of idle and ignorant readers: "such sort of books swarm and buzz about one every "day; flap them away; they have no sting: CERTUMÍ દર્દ PETE FINEM; have some one object for your leisure moments, and pursue that object invariably till you "have attained it." †-With Chesterfield that main object was oratory. "So long ago as when I was at Cam"bridge, whenever I read pieces of eloquence (and, in"deed, they were my chief study), whether ancient or "modern, I used to write down the shining passages, and "then translate them as well and as elegantly as ever "I could; if Latin or French, into English; if English, "into French. This, which I practised for some years, "not only improved and formed my style, but imprinted "in my mind and memory the best thoughts of the best "authors. The trouble was little, but the advantage I "have experienced was great." Whether from such studies, or from natural genius, Chesterfield's speeches became more highly admired and extolled than any others of the day. Horace Walpole had heard his own father; had heard Pitt; had heard Pulteney; had heard Wyndham; had heard Carteret; yet he declares, in 1743, that the finest speech he ever listened to was one from Chesterfield. §

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The outset of Chesterfield in public employments was his first embassy to Holland, in which he displayed great skill and attained universal reputation. Diplomacy was indeed peculiarly suited to his tastes and talents: he was equally remarkable for a quick insight into the temper of others, and for a constant command of his own: with foreign languages and history he had long been familiar:

*Letter, December 13. 1748.

Letter, February 1. 1754.

g To Sir H. Mann, December 15. 1743. .

Ibid. May 31. 1752.

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