Part 7

The D. of Bedford has been living here a great deal; he likes Ld. H. very much, and has grown to vanquish his prejudice against me, enough almost to like me. He would be ungrateful if he did not in some degree, as he is one of the very few persons of whom I think thoroughly well: he is honourable, just, and true. Lady John Russell[109] has been here several times, and is remarkably gracious. This I owe to the Duke’s frequent visits, as she is curious to ascertain what object attracts him here, and politic enough to adapt her taste to his. The probability is that, without her caution even, he will not marry, unless indeed he should fix upon Ly. Georgiana Cavendish,[110] an alliance long arranged for him by the world. Ly. G. is a most charming girl--sensible, pleasing, full of information and totally without a particle of affectation, and if she bestows herself upon a man equal to her in situation, I have no doubt she will make a most delightful wife. Little Lewis is upon the eve of making himself a great fool about her, and, as he is not _séduisant_ in person or manner, will not gain her heart, and a bundle of sonnets in lieu of title deeds will not operate in his favour with the elders of ye family.

Ld. H. brought Sheridan and Ld. John Russell home from the H. of Commons to a late dinner here at 8. By some accident Sheridan happened to be out of the House just at the moment when a division might have been made with advantage, as Sir Wm. Scott’s[111] speech made so much impression _against_ the Bill. Sr. Wm. denied the fact asserted in the preamble to the Bill, as to ye increased frequency of divorces. He, who is the head of the Ecclesiastical Court, spoke with weight when he declared that the _crime_ was diminishing, as there had been fewer suits from ’90 to 1800 than from ’80 to ’90, or from 1770 to 1780. The whole tenor of his speech was full of tenderness and right feeling towards women.

I went on Monday evening to Mrs. Walker’s masquerade. I chatted pleasantly enough with some of my old acquaintances. Mr. Grey introduced Mrs. Grey to me,[112] as did Mr. Whitbread his wife, Grey’s sister. Mrs. Grey is pretty and gentle, without looking so; she is handsome Ponsonby’s sister. Mrs. W. has something pleasing in her appearance, but ill-health and the hereditary irritability of the Grey temper gives a certain fractious expression to her countenance: _au reste_, she is a very worthy, excellent woman.

[Sidenote: THE KING SHOT AT]

Sheridan entertained us with a circumstantial account of the whole affair at the theatre on the night of the assassination. He was in the Royal box when the pistol was fired, and saw most plainly the man take aim. Ld. Chesterfield advised His Majesty to retire to the back of the box, but the King said, ‘Not an inch, not an inch,’ and upon the Queen’s entrance he waved his hand to make her keep behind, upon the pretext of her fear of squibs. S., as soon as the poor wretch was dragged out of the orchestra, examined him. He declares his answers were collected and distinct, until Sr. Wm. Addington[113] questioned him, who was extremely drunk, and suggested to the man ye plea of insanity by his mode of examining--a plea the man craftily availed himself of.

When Sheridan went to Court, the King spoke to him upon indifferent subjects and seemed undecided whether or not he should notice the occurrence. At length he said how much he was struck with the behaviour of the audience, which gave S. an opportunity of saying they only followed His Majesty’s example. After a few such flourishes the King ended by saying he should despise himself if he had acted otherwise, for every man ought to feel his duty, and his was to stay quiet and not add to the alarm.

Mr. Abbot[114] has brought forward a Bill respecting Public Debtors, which alarmed us until it was explained, but it seems fair in principle, tho’ ultimately we may be affected to a degree. All who have balances in hand will hereafter pay interest upon such sums. The debt from this family now due to Government is 53,000_l._; the assets are near 46, the odd thousands Ld. H. must supply. The difference of the Bill taking effect will be that the interest must go to Governt., instead of making an accumulating fund, which in a few years would pay off the whole. Mr. Moore is afraid from rumour that a clause is to be moved by Mr. Baker to make the operation of the Bill retrospective. In that case, to the last shilling of Ld. H.’s property must go, as the amount would be enormous, but it seems so unjust that the alarm is, I trust, groundless.

[Sidenote: SIR G. WEBSTER’S DEATH]

Early on Wednesday morning last, ye 4th of June, we were roused by a loud rapping at the bedroom door opening into the drawing-room. My mother cried out that she had brought great news, that Sir Godfrey Webster was dead; that he expired the evening before in a fit. He had been indisposed for some days, which made the event more natural. I could not hear of his death without emotion, and was for some time considerably agitated. But, my God! how was I overcome when Drew showed me a hasty note written to him by Hodges to apprise me of the manner of his death. He shot himself, he added, in consequence of heavy losses at play. With him dies all resentment, and, great as my injuries have been, willingly would I renounce all that may accrue to me from this dreadful event to restore him again to existence, with the certainty of his paying the _natural_ debt of nature. Unhappy man! What must have been the agony of his mind, to rouse him to commit a deed of such horror. Peace to his soul, and may he find that mercy I would bestow.

His confidential servant gave the following details: that he had appeared frequently disordered in his mind in the course of the winter, and that latterly his spirits were gone, and a physician attended him for a slow fever. But the malady was deeper; it was on his mind. Twice within the last weeks he had attempted to destroy himself by laudanum, but each time his man interposed, once by wrenching the phial out of his hand, and the other by compelling him to swallow an emetic. On Saturday he despatched his relation, a Mr. Whistler, to fetch from Sussex titledeeds of some estates, merely a device to get him out of the way. On Tuesday he went out at nine o’clock, and purchased at Egg’s a brace of pistols, and after various devices and stratagems to get his servants out of the way, he but too fatally succeeded, and at half past four shot himself in his front drawing-room in Tenterden Street. Have mercy on him, Oh heaven!

Business compelled me to go to town, and my coachman drove me to the square; the shock of being almost within sight of those mangled remains was too much, of him, unhappy man, who now lies a melancholy proof of feelings too acute for existence. I would not have the self-reproach of having added one particle to the agony he endured, and am thankful that this sad catastrophe did not arise two years ago, altho’ I should have been as guiltless a cause as now; but the world and my own readiness to upbraid myself would have assigned my quitting him as the cause. Ld. Egremont,[115] with whom he had lately lived in habits of social intercourse, called at his door just after the perpetration of this dreadful act; he was excessively shocked, and went three times that night in great agitation to Ld. Ossory’s. He declared his intention of sending for the boys from school, and is now gone to Petworth with Webby. Henry is with my mother. The dear girl remains at school. Hitherto no will subsequent to that of ’86 has been found; perhaps upon a strict examination one may be discovered. The funeral went down this morning to Battle, very privately attended. Mr. Plummer was with me, and told me he was a creditor to the amount of seventeen thousand pounds.

_8th June, 1800._--The average produced by my estates is estimated at seven thousand pr. anm. We shall not touch a stiver for these 18 months, and only till then incur trouble and expense. To recover the money to fulfil the complement dictated by my grandfather’s will, I must go to the seizure of his personal property. The sound is at first repugnant, seize the property to which my son is heir, but, in fact, it is only ascertaining my right, by which I shall prevent his coming upon the Holland estates after my death.[116]

I have abstained from seeing company since this horrid business, chiefly from feeling unfit for society; and, besides that, I would not that any person should say that I exulted in an acquisition so obtained, and I think, if I did not feel strongly myself, it would be judicious to do nothing that might be reported to my children as offensive. The anxiety about their guardianship is great; it does not yet appear to whom the charge devolves. I wait quietly till the will is found, or the one of ’86 acted upon. If none is found, the verbal injunctions laid upon his family to exclude me from the happiness of seeing my children will operate but slightly. I shall openly seize every occasion of making them know how near an object it is to my heart to be loved by them, and opinion will side with me, however the Chaplins may act to annoy me. If the will of ’86 is to be in force, then nothing will be done but by the advice of the executors.

[Sidenote: ‘LEGAL RECLUSES’]

There is a curious but violent quarrel carried on between Lord Carlisle and Lord Kenyon; they abuse each other bitterly in their different _courts_, publicly and separately. On the night of the debate upon the Divorce Bill, in favour of which the lawyers are very eager, Lord Carlisle, in adverting to the various arguments, said that lawyers were from their sedentary occupations and retired habits incapable of judging the offences and punishments of the upper classes, and he applied to the corps of lawyers the term of ‘legal recluses.’ Ld. Eldon, who officiated for the Chancellor, took up the expression and was indignant at its being applied to the enlightened body who from their employment in human affairs were generally supposed to understand mankind. The Bishop of Rochester was furious, and said many cutting things to Ld. Carlisle, such as, he supposed that he would have the offence decided upon by those only who had committed, and in a marked manner showed he thought Ld. C. in that case entitled to judge. The next day, Ld. Kenyon, in the Court of King’s Bench, in summing up a charge to the jury, contrived to introduce the expression of ‘cloistered recluses’ as having been used in the H. of Lds., and again declared his knowledge of human life to be equal to his wishes, and thanked his God he had not the knowledge of it which was acquired by ‘titled adulterers at Newmarket, in Bond Street, and in the Stews.’ Ld. C. has taken notice of this reference to his speech in Parliament as unparliamentary, and means to move some resolution against the printer. He has been with Ld. Holland this morning, who has advised him to adopt another mode, and furnished him with the words; accordingly he will follow his advice.

_9th June._--Erskine came unexpectedly to dinner yesterday. He is, as I could not help telling him, by far the most extraordinary man I ever met with. An incomprehensible compound of wit, ability, absurdity, folly, vanity, and sagacity. He repeated to me some lines he had written in court upon Serjeant Lens,[117] who was examining a witness with some pertinacity:--

The Lenses that common opticians have Are plano convex, or plano concave; But the Lens of the law being formed to perplex, At no time is plain, but concave and convex; Convex his own case to enlarge and expound, Concave his opponents t’obscure and confound.

He can pun in rhyme, but to harmony of verse he has no pretence. He wrote the following epigram upon a very parsimonious lady, a Mrs. Wharton, when at Tunbridge:--

Oft has my soul, puft up with pride, The truth of sacred writ denied, And to myself I still have said, ‘Sure mankind ne’er of dust was made;’ Till thou, dear Peg, revers’d my creed And showed me we were dust indeed.

[Sidenote: BILL AGAINST PUBLIC DEBTORS]

The clause in Abbot’s Bill was not designed by him to have a retrospective operation upon those who have balances in bond due to Governt., but it was worded with such ambiguity that it threw persons so circumstanced into the power of the Auditors of the Exchequer. Ld. H. begged some confidential friends to attend to get it otherwise worded, and employed Adam as counsel to get Abbot and Baker to alter it. Tierney promised zeal and attention; Sheridan undertook it warmly. When the day came I grew afraid of Tierney’s candour, and thought he might yield to Abbot’s assurance of the harmlessness of the words; for Tierney would sacrifice the interests of anybody to obtain the occasional popularity of conciliating an opponent. I therefore enjoined Mr. Moore to rely _solely_ upon Sheridan, who tho’ _never_ punctual and not famously steady, yet would, I was persuaded, exert himself where he thought his services material. I was right. Tierney acquiesced in all Abbot alleged in behalf of the clause, and it was just going to pass into the Bill, when Sheridan arrived breathless from haste, examined the words, declared the sentence neither grammar, logic, or sense, and employed near two hours to convince the Committee that the ambiguous words should be expunged. They were so. The difference lay between ‘_shall have been declared_,’ and ‘_shall be_.’ I provoked Tierney by telling him before Whitbread, that my instructions to Moore were to shun the honest, candid man, as he would never help a friend at a pinch, too timid to essentially serve, too timid to commit himself by an opinion against any man, were the grounds not public and popular.

Interest commences from the enacting of this Bill, thus the interest cannot be reserved as usual to make a fund, and thus pay off the whole of the debt in a few years without touching us. But the principle is just, and nothing can be said against it with any decorum: and as it now stands it is certainly an expense, yet compared to what it _might_ have been I am satisfied.

_11th June._--D. of Bedford dined with us, and gave an account of the debate last night. Ld. Carlisle was to have made his motion against Kenyon, but a shuffling sort of compromise made it go off tamely; he agreed to withdraw it if Grenville desired it. A languid, half shabby business. The Duke spoke. It is comical how eagerly these seceding gentlemen embrace every opportunity of speaking; on the most unimportant subjects unconnected with politics they attend, and say their say. Last night the Divorce Bill was thrown out in the Commons: not even admitted into a Committee. The mortification of its rejection _thus_ will be double to Ld. Auckland; such marked contempt. Sheridan made an admirable speech, and did not mar the effect of it by too much wit; his matter was excellent. Ld. H. supplied him. At his request he wrote a little treatise which is full of sound reason and practical good sense. I have a copy of it.

Ld. H.’s epigrams on Horsley[118] were lying upon my table; Ld. G. Leveson, in rummaging over the papers upon it, found them and took them. Ld. H. being jokingly angry, wrote this:--

Though in private my Muse in a profligate humour Her nakedness never withheld from your view, Yet she liked not that all who at tea in the room are Should have the same privilege too, and would you?

The following he said would suit ----, an impotent husband, to his wife:--

As women wish to be who love their lords You wish to be, and ask why it delayed is. Because I’m not (what need of many words), As husbands ought to be that love their ladies!

[Illustration:

_Louis Gauffier, pinx._ _Emery Walker Ph.sc._

_Henrietta, third Countess of Bessborough_]

[Sidenote: CHIRAC]

Dumont mentioned a curious anecdote of Chirac, the celebrated physician of Louis XIV.,[119] told to him by Condorcet. At 84 years old he fell into a violent illness, which was his last. He lay for two days in a state of insensibility; he suddenly jumped up and sat upright in his bed, felt the pulse of his left hand with his right, shook his head, and in a loud voice cried, ‘On m’a appelé trop tard, le malade est mourant,’ He immediately fell back, verified his own prediction, and expired. He was the man roused in the night to attend a dying Cardinal, a person of very profligate life and infamous character. To hasten the physician, the messenger said, ‘Venez donc, il souffre comme un damné.’ ‘Comment déjà?’--a bitter sarcasm in one word. He was present at a dispute upon the Resurrection of Christ; some thought it was impossible that he should have arisen after death. Chirac only said, ‘Si il était mort de ma façon,’ implying without levity, his own incredulity.

We have had a consultation with three lawyers, Piggott, Erskine, and Richards, upon the propriety of taking out a licence, or getting an Act of Parliament for my name, as it is particularly enjoined by my grandfather’s will that the person to whom the estate goes by descent should bear his name. There is some nicety in ye question, because, tho’ I am only just come into the profits of it, yet I was virtually possessed of it when that unhappy man compelled me to renounce it to him, and it may lead to an examination as to our signatures. This would be troublesome, as out of accommodation to him I signed two bonds without the name of Vassall. Ld. H. has only a marital dominion over it, and cannot be subject to forfeiture. Richards and Erskine think the title of honour supersedes all, and that no mischief has been yet incurred. It is not yet decided. Ld. H. went yesterday to Plummer’s. I wrote to Ld. Ossory, and begged him to accompany him--a proposal certain of pleasing, not only as it showed confidence and attention, but that it gratified his curiosity.

It appears that the average of the net produce, deducting outfit, annuities, mortgage, jointure, insurance, and, in short, every expenditure, is within a hundred or two of six thousand pr. anm., an ample acquisition, but as yet must not be anticipated or enjoyed. Sir G. W. has left property, however, to answer all debts. Webby must have 1000_l._ pr. ann. certain; that accumulating for ten years and half will be something. Henry and Harriet five thousand each.

Canning is immediately to be married to Miss Scott;[120] she has an immense fortune. He has just been made a Privy Councillor and Joint Paymaster; if ever a man was born with a silver spoon in his mouth, surely it was him.

Ld. H. was telling us to-day of the whimsical effect produced by a droll manner of compressing the substance of a man’s speech. A Mr. Robson, who is neither witty nor clever by-the-way, gave his whole attention to one of Windham’s speeches; he did not listen to the other debating, and when it came to voting he rose and said that ‘The Honourable Gentleman had declared that we were not fighting _for_ the Restoration of the Bourbons, but that we _should_ fight till they were restored, therefore he should give his vote against him.’ This done with gravity would get the laugh on his side, and provokingly perplex his adversary.

[Sidenote: AN UNJUST WILL]

Erskine told us a singular cause that he was called to at Uxbridge. It was to decide upon a will supposed to have been made whilst the testator was under the influence of some morbid, mad affection of the mind. He was the elder brother of a man with whom he had lived in the closest habits of friendship, and to whom he was sincerely attached. One day he came home heated and fatigued, complained of the colic, and was advised by his brother to go to bed and drink warm rum and water. He followed his advice, but whether the disease was naturally fever, or that the rum created it, is not known; but the effect was raging madness, during which he furiously inveighed against his brother for having poisoned him in the drink. The frenzy continued, and he was put under a mad doctor. In a few months he recovered his reason to all intents and purposes, acted as a magistrate, fulfilled all the functions of his station, gave law opinions, and betrayed no tokens of insanity. But some years after when he died, it was found by the will that he had excluded his brother, upon the old accusation of his having administered poison to him. It came out that the man, in favour of whom the younger brother had been disinherited, used to listen and rather encourage his rhapsodies. Erskine substantiated the will, but made the heir by will share alike with the lawful heir.

This story of rational madness reminded Ld. H. of one which Fontana was fond of telling, because it squares with the common definition of madness, and proves that a man may reason logically upon false premises. A very intelligent Jesuit went mad, and his predominating madness was that he believed himself to be a Cardinal. He was a loss to their community, and being a very subtle logician two or three of the cleverest of the Order undertook to argue with him, and convince by reason that he laboured under an illusion, which he might dissipate by force of mind. They asked him several questions as to the ceremonies necessary to be undergone previous to the instalment of a man in the College of Cardinals, to all of which he pleaded ignorance. ‘Why then,’ said one, ‘how can you imagine yourself to be a Cardinal?’ He replied, ‘I tell you that I am a Cardinal, and if you do not believe me such when I assure so, you must suppose me to be mad, and if I am mad, how can you be so mad as to try to convince by reason one who in that case must be labouring under an alienation of it?’ This syllogism posed the Reverend Brothers.

Wm. Lamb is returned from Glasgow quite bitten with a Scotch mania. He thinks the Scotch have outdone in moral philosophy and ethics all who have gone before them. To use his own expression, ‘They have gone far beyond Locke and Paley,’ ‘Yes,’ replied Ld. H., ‘so far, that they are unintelligible,’ He was under Professor Millar,[121] a friend of Ld. Lauderdale’s, a man who has written upon Governt., and who is the greatest enemy of all _belles lettres_ and poetry; the latter he calls a mere jingle which proves no facts. Lamb is very clever and pleasing, and will improve when he gets out of his love for singularity.

[Sidenote: LORD HENRY PETTY]