The Press. — London, England, 1857-01-24 00:00:00

lortunt 24, 1857. does not fairly argue nut the case, and we have read abler defences of the Duke of Welling ton's strategy in the Waterloo campaign. The following passage, in which Sir F. Head undertakes to show what Napoleon ought to have done, is positively ridiculous : If instead of hurrying on an army of 120,000 men, newly assembled, unaccustomed to act together, unacquainted with their officers, and whom he had commanded in person only one day, to attack a cool and experienced antagonist, Napoleon had pursued a more cautious plan of defensive operations ; if, for instance, he had thrown his troops into the line of frontier fortres"es in his possession, snit if, instead of risking all by a brilliant coup de-matn, he hail there patiently awaited the result of that moral, or tospeak correctly, immoral power within the Parliament of Eng. land which, though feeble, was boldly and loudly pro. testing against the injustice of Europe interfering with the French people in reapp , ,inting as their ruler the Demon of War; no doubt, if Bonaparte had taken such a course as this. a different result would have ensued. It might have been a good one—it might have been a bad one ; most certain it is, however, that no plan could possibly have ended more fatally for Napoleon's ambition than the one be voluntarily adopted. A policy of delay would have been ruinous to Napoleon. A treaty had been entered into between England and all the great powers to destroy Napoleon ; and Sir F Head egre giously overrates the force of the Opposition at that time, which had been weakened by the defeats of the Grenvilles and Mr. Grattan, who ardently supported the Liverpool Cabinet in its determination to crush Bonaparte. His emphasis about Napoleon commanding the army "only for one day" is puerile ; and he forgets that the plea points both ways, for the Duke of Wellington had never fought a battle, nor made a previous campaign, with " the army that fought at Waterloo." They were new troops, freshly raised, for the Penin sular army has been scattered over the globe, and some of it disbanded. it adds to the renown of English valour that new troops could have stood their ground in such glo rious style, under the tremendous assaults to which they were exposed. We prefer Sir F. Head as a writer of original books of travel, or of his own personal expe riences. As a reviewer or an essayist he is deficient in circumspectiveness, and his illus• trations are always to be watched for their pleasant sophistry. He is extremely clever, and never fails to entertain ; and be must he taken for what he really is, one of the most agreeable light authors who ever catered to a voracious publia in the "run-and read " age of literature. The Letters of Horace lValpole, Earl of Or ford. Edited by Peter Cunningham. Now First Chronologically Arranged. In Eight Vols. Vol. I. London : Bentley. (Second Notice.) ONE great fault of Mr. Cunningham as an an notator is, that he has no fixity of standard for solving the question as to what he should cancel or insert. We could give several in stances of this fault. Thus (at p. 199) Wal pole alludes to " all the blood of all the " Howards." Upon which we are treated to the important note:— A line from Pope.+CUNNINOHAV. Prodigious ! Surely there need have been no note, but, if there were, it should be aorrectly penned. Two feet are wanted before the quotation could be made " a line from " Pope," for which the editor should have written, "from a line of Pope." But mark the absence of any standard of annotation. In the last page of the volume Walpole alludes to Lyttelton's wife, and the annotation runs :— Lncy Fortescue, sister of Lord Clinton, first wife of Sir George, afterwards Lord Lyttelton.—W..LeoLs She died in January, 1747, at the age of twenty nine.—Watnicr. Au ordinary reader might be far more thankful if the annotator told him that the lady men tioned in the text was the " Lucy " of the celebrated monody, than ho would bo for the information that Popo used the phrase about " all the Howards." At page 218 Walpole writes, " Shippon was "in great rage at Murray's apostacy." Mr. Cunningham subjoins, " From Toryism— Dov Na." It would have been more correct to hare written, " From Jacobitism, real or sup posed." Shippon himself could scarcely have becu called a "Tory." He was a Jacobite by THE PRESS. connection, and " a speculative Republican* by political profession. Walpole writes at page 242, " Patapan sits " to-morrow to Wootton for his picture." The note by Mr. Cunningham is singularly mala• droit John Wootton, the Sir Edward Landseer of England between 1740 and 1760. He died in 17115. Wootton's picture of Patapan sold at the Strawberry-hill sale fur 4L —CUNNINORAII. Landseer will not be highly complimented at being classed with Wootton. The compari son is more unlucky, since the annotator records that the picture of "the Landseer" between 1740 and 1760 sold for 41. We have marked several other notes, but we must proceed to the four original letters printed in this volume. The first original letter is to John Chute, of the Vine, in Hants. Under date of August 20th, 1743, Walpole writes from Houghton : Indeed, my dear sir, you certainly did not use to be stupid, and till you give me more substantial proof that you are so I shall not believe it. As for your temperate diet and milk bringing about such &metamorphosis 1 hold it impossible. I have such lamentable proofs every day before my eyes of the stupifying qualities of beef, ale, and wine, that I have contracted a most religious veneration for your spiritual nouriture. Only imagine that I here every day see men who are mountains of roast beef, and only seem just roughly hewn out into the outlines of human form, like the giant-rock at Pratolino ! I shudder when I see them brandish their knives in act to carve, and look on them as savages that devour one another. I should not stare at all more than I do if yonder alderman at the lower end of the table was to stick his fork into his neigh bour's jolly cheek, and cut a brave slice of brown and fat. Why, I'll swear I see no difference between a country gentleman and a sirloin ; whenever the first laughs or the latter is cut there run out just the same streams of gravy. Indeed the sirloin does not ask quite so many questions. I have an aunt here, a family piece of goods, an old rem nant of inquisitive hospitality and economy. who, to all intents and purposes, is as beefy as her neighbours. She wore me so down yesterday with interrogatories, that I dreamt all night she was at my ear with " who's " and " why's," and " when's" and " where's," till at last in my very sleep I cried out," For God in heaven's sake, madam, ask me no more questions." He then continues in his equally characteristic style, passing from lively anecdotism into mock philosophy : Oh, my dear sir, don't you find that nine parts in ten of the world are of no use but to make you wish your self with that tenth part? I am so far from growing used tc mankind by living amongst them that my natural fero- city and wildness does but every day grow worse. They tire me, they fatigue me ; I don't know what to do with them ; I don't know what to say to them ; I fling open the windows, and fancy I want air; and when I get by my self I undress myself, and seem to have had people in my pockets, in my plaits, and on my shoulders ! I indeed find this fatigue worse in the country than in town, be- cause one can avoid it there and has more resources, but it is there too. I fear 'tis growing old, but I literally seem to have murdered a man whose name was Ennui, for his ghost is ever beforo me. They say there is no English word for ennui ; I think you may translate it most literally by what is called " entertaining people," and doing the honours "—that is, you sit an hour with somebody you don't know and don't care for, talk about the wind and the weather, and ask a thousard foolish questions, which all begin with, " I think you live a good deal in the country," or " I think you don't love this thing or that." Oh, 'tis dreadful! The most striking of these letters relate to the borough of Castle Rising. Mr. Cunning ham says : The death of old General Churchill (a few weeks only after his friend, Sir Robert Walpole) caused a vacancy for Castle Rising, in Norfolk ; and Horace interested him• self, gregtly to the annoyance of his elder brother Edward, in returning the new member for the family borough. Horace had his way. The member returned was John Rigby. Sir Edward Walpole thus commenced the cor respondence in the following "remarkable letter," as Mr. Cunningham rightly calls it : lil. SIR EDWARD WALPOLE TO HORACE wAtrocr. ....-•- Pall.mall, May 17, 1745. Sir,—Castle Rising is a family borough. Lord Orford's son ought to be brought in there preferably to anybody. Next to him, I, and then you. My uncle and his children have the nest claim, then the Townahends and the Ham monds, who altogether make an large a number that J did nut imagine there was a possibility of a recommendation of mine taking place ; otherwise, as I have frequently wished it, I should have spoken to my lord long ago; but I always thought he was bound to offer it to some one of them whether they applied or not; and in case they should all of them decline it, I did imagine my lord must have out of his own particular friends more than one whom he would wish to distinguish by so great a favour ; for which reason, besides the consideration of our near relations, I should have thought it presumption in me to apply, though there is no one thing I should covet more than thus to support a friend, and by it to give myself an additional credit and weight in Parliament, How you came never to think of me who stand so direotly before you, or, if you 40 think of we, how you happened to ituasine that I wk 89 not to be consulted in an affair of this consequence, where birth and seniority give me so just and natural a preten sion, I cannot conceive. It is so contemptuous and arro gant a treatment that it is not easily to be forgotten ; for to be sensible yourself how very desirable a thing it is either in a private view in regard to i friend or in the eye of the world in respect to oneself, and to think that I either did not desire it or did not know its advantages, is to de- Anise me beyond measure. But your conduct to me has always been of the same kind, and has made it the most painful thing in the word to me to have any commerce with you. You have, I must confess, showed a great dis position to me and to my children at all times which is agreeable to the good nature that I shall ever do you the justice to think and say you possess in a great degree ; but it has been mixed with what I dare say you can't help and never meant offence by, but still what I am not obliged to bear—such a confidence and presumption of some kind of superiority that, my sentiments not tallying with yours upon that head, it has been very unpleasant. You have assumed to yourself a preeminence, from an imaginary disparity between us in point of abilities and character, that, although you are a very great man, I oannot submit to; and you have crowned the whole with this most evident proof that I have not mistaken you ; therefore, since the conditions of your friendship and kindness are such that I must be subject to direct injuries, such as this cruel wrong done me now, or those kinds of hurts that a man feels most when they have the face of kind ness, 1 must be excused if I beg it of you as a favour never to be kind to me again.--I am, your humble servant, ED. WALPOLL Horace Walpole drew up an answer to that letter which he did not send, but lie kept the draft of it in his papers. It thus oom mences Brother, I am sorry you won't let me say, Dear Bro- ther, but till you have still farther proved how impos- sible it is for you to have any affection for me, I will never begin my letters as you do—" Sir," Before I enter upon your letter, I must be so imper- Client even as to give my elder brother advice, and that is, the next letter you write to consider whether the person it is addressed to has any dependence upon you, or which I am sure your heart will tell you T have not cny obligation to you. if they have neither, they may happen to laugh at your style. - - " Castle Rising is a family borough." This is your first proposition, but not very definite. It is a borough in our family, but I never heard that it was parliamen tarily entailed upon every branch of our family. If it was, how came Mr. Churchill to be always chosen there ! However, before I ever undertake anything again I will certainly examine our genealogical table, and be sure that Lord Walpole. yourself, end all our eleven first cousins have no mind to the same thing. He then takes up seriati►n the points in Sir Edward's letter, and answers them with ex cessive sharpness : " I always thought he was bound to offer it to some one of them." He does not seem to have been of your opinion. "T give myself an additional credit and weight in Parliament." You might have left out " additional." " How you came never to think of me." For your sake I won't answer this. " Or how you happened to imagine 1 was not to be con. stilted." 1 will ask von another question, how you happen to imagine that it was necessary for me to consult you ? Have you ever given me any en'ouragement to consult you in anything? How must I consult you? By letter? You never would see me either at your own house or here ! The authority you affect over me is ridiculous ; and for consulting you, good God! do you think you ever judge so dispassionately, as that any man living would con• suit you! " Whose birth and seniority give me so just and natural a pretension." To my father's estate before me, to nothing else that I know of. "It is so contemptuous and arrogant a treatment." Those words 1 return you, being full as proper and decent from me to you, as from you to me, whose birth, though thank God not my seniority, is as considerable as yours. And again : " The most painful thing in the world to have any corn• merce with you." I believe it, for I have always seen it, and in vain endeavoured to make it more tolerable to you. " You have, I must confess, showed a great disposition to me and to my children at all times." Thank you. " Good nature, which I think and say you possess in a great degree." Dear brother, I wish 1 could think the same of you. So on throughout. The composition is keen, angry, and virulently severe. It was too long, and would have made one of the pam phlets of the time. The answer really sent was tame enough ; HORACE /ILLPOLZ TO Silt YDWARD WALPOLK. May 17,1743. Dear Brother,—You have used me very ill without any provocation or any pretence. I have always made it my study to deserve your friendship, as you yourself own, and by a submission which I did not owe you. For consulting you in what you had nothing to do, I certainly did not, nor ever will, while you profess so much aversion forme. I am still ready to live with you upon any terms of friend• ship and equality ; but I don't mind your anger, which can only Burt yourself, when you come to reflect with what strange passion you have treated me, wbo have always loved vou, have always tried to please you, have always A