The Press.
London, England, 1854-09-02 00:00:00

MI

Nittraturt.

The Life and Correspondence of Charles Lord
Metcalfe. By John William Kaye. Lon-
don : Bentley.
AMONGST the important class of our colonial
administrators the late Lord Metcalfe held a
well-won rank by services which attracted
notice during his life, and ensure to his
memory the honour of posthumous fame.
Surpassed by some of his predecessors in
originality, and rivalled by one or two of his
colonial contemporaries in the noble art of
winning personal masterdom over the passions
of those committed to his charge, in pure zeal
towards the State and in chivalrous devotion
to the Sovereign's service Lord Metcalfe was
second to none. He was thoroughly suited to
that sphere of exertion where reference
to the precedents must be alternated with
reliance on the sterling common sense of the
statesman. Liberally endowed with all the
leading moral qualities, and possessed of more
than the average of intellectual faculties, it
was only a question of time with a man of his
high character and connections when he
should attain official eminence. Less romantic
than the career of many of his contemporaries,
the life of such a man who gloriously died in
the public service well deserves attentive
study.
But we are sorry to be obliged to record
that Mr. Kaye's volumes are less interesting
than we anticipated. There is no concealing
the fact that general readers will find much
of these volumes heavy in perusal, and only
those acquainted with Indian affairs will
appreciate their value and importance. The
narrative is not close enough, and there is
only occasionally that clearness of exposition
and vivid felicity of description which our
reading public require as their right, when
asked to peruse the personal history of those
who have vastly served the State.
The Metcalfes were of a good old Yorkshire
stock. The father of the hero of these volumes
was Thomas Metcalfe, who went as a cadet
to India, with a letter of introduction to
Lord Clive. It appears, however, that he had
to depend on his own resources in rising in
the world. He married a Miss Debonuaire, a
name that smacks of Huguenotic ancestry,
whose blood generally supplies vivacity and
intellect. Of this union Lord Metcalfe was
the second son. He was first sent to school
•
at Bromley, and afterwards to Eton, where he
spent the time between his eleventh and
fifteenth years. He was remarkable for dili-
gence ; and several pages of his diary are
copied by Mr. Kaye, in which the number of
books read by him are enumerated. He had
studied the English essayists carefully, and,
like other juvenile writers, reproduced his
favourites in his own phraseology. His father
had a high opinion of the talents of young
Metcalfe, and sent him out to India to seek
his fortune, having first armed him with a
letter of introduction to Lord Wellesley, who
was at that time the Governor-General. We
have read no portion of these volumes with so
much pleasure as those parts in which we get
transient glimpses of the great man who was
the first founder of the glories of the house of
Wellesley, and to whose vast conceptions and
mighty energies we do not think that adequate
literary justice has ever been rendered. The
view which we obtain of him in these memoirs
corroborates all that we knew of Lord Welles-
ley. He had some weaknesses of character,
and amongst them was his extraordinary love
of pomp, as thus described by young Metcalfe.
The writer is recording the Governor-General's
visit to Lucknow in 1802:
I do not think a finer spectacle could have ever before
been seen. Every display of Asiatic and European magnifi-
cence was to be seen in our procession. We had a large
TIN: 1) i look of Etropean soldiery (the finest sight we know of in
knglatid), at the sametime everything of Asiatic splendour
(A&,/.if; .'"
h elnind can fancy. The innumerable concourse of
ti:'..' \the grandeur of which animal seems to have
, '':t . ~,,,,i • -07t4particularly for
.a procession of this nature),
1 - „id, •:: • h costly trappings, was no small part of my
i - 4 ts. I % ••Wm.'. The very dresses formed a spectacle of
• - •-,, ; . . . , and the two nations seemed to vie with each
4 , Alio P' . . .eir splendour. The Calcutta cavalry, I can
1 --•••.7ofti. was not the least elegant. His lordship, in
I!i'i tIVi I FiM VN:' le s'i. "astern pomp, distributed his rupees with