The Express.
London, England, 1851-04-12 00:00:00

LITERATURE.

Memoirs of Horace Walpole asd his Contemporaries.
Edited by ELIOT W,IIIIICUTON, Esq. Colburn.
Horace Walpole enjoys a reputation in h;e
country's literature of an altogether peculiar cha-
racter. lie is as well known and almost as much'
read
fumenybody of his century. But on what does!
his depend? He has written history and °
poetry--hut nobody can call him historian or poet.
See Was left more letters than any celebrated writer!
—but there an fur finer letters than his in our epis-
tolatory collections. Byron s, for insiaacc, if not so
finishea (Byron having done something else), are
quite us shrewd, vigorous, and witty; Lady Wort-
ley Montague's arc at least as lively; while in
the higher qualities of writing the letters of Swift,
Gray, and Cowper are altogethir much superior pro-
&crone. We have wits with more wit than he. •
And yet Horace Walpole decidedly ranks among our!
writing magnates. Why? Mr. Horace's admirers
must be told that scandal, acerbity, and the influesee l
of a petty (though strongly marked) individuality, go
to help their hero's reputation with the "reading pub-
tic." ln the first plum, there is an enormous love of gos-
sip among that enlightened body; in the second place
that love of gossip leads to a wish to have it strongly
easoured. We all remember the Irish witness aho
said that his mother's religion was "taking whiskey
In her tea :" in the same tendency society agrees
with that old woman, and likes scandal and sarcasm
with its tattle. Mark likewise a simple but strangely
orerlooked fact, that any writer can produced strung
efiiet whu will 'crib. himseljr: Horace Walpole has
left us, himself, with all his weaknesses, vanities,
prjudices, and affectations. Having failed to do any
great thing in literature, he has left us what perhaps
will last just as long—a picture in his extremely
clever letters of his own spites, whims, and real
personal notions of liking and disliking. Accordingly
men love to look at him—men love to read his letters
and talk about him: take away this egotistical ele-
ment, and his mere literary powers are not very ee-
l/lark:dile. }knee the peculiarity of his fame; it is
of the wan Walpole that we think when we ',peak of
him. lie has (yen helped himself to the reputation
of nn author —by disclaiming any wish to
have it. 'the perpetual affi ratite' and irritabili.y
with a hich his letters diedaini it, arc themselves
highly provocative of attention and interest. A
mere egotist and a mere wit, are comparatively no-
bodice ; but hue we have u man who was extremely
clever, and had the weaknesses of fops into the bar-
gain. IValpole had real good sense, and even a is-
alum in his nature, but scarcely gives them even fair
play ; 6t is a wise man unemulered by fine clothes ;
his tense, like that of the proverbs in trench clack-
ers, creaks attention, while the samdereby are
gaping at the snapping noise, and looking out for
the almond! The first thing, accordingly, that the
pdient leader thinks when he sees the alsive two
patty %cameos is s surely I knew enough about
Borace Wulpile berme: The editor, Mr. Eliot
Warburton, mast have beta dreamier; (a process
likely to be facilitated by a perusal of the proof's)
when he se'd (Introduction, p. 1) " there are few
public iiereons with whims: private life we are leas
acquaintid." Why, what is the meaning of this?
Wsa, ass Horace* " public life" as distinct from
his s orate life?" lle was no-wise a public man
CXII 11. as a silent " member," and a fat sinecurist !
His pi:rate life, in fact, is the fuundat ion of his public
history. His claim to public notice rests on his
letters which are the results of his observations of
fashionable litis and eareSul gleaning of ancedetee,
and a gs maid record of his preeredings- -his build-
ing, collecting, and btu-playing—his sarcasms and
those of his friends—the a inknemses of his relations,
and the health of his dog. His house, " Strawberry,"
is as well known to us, and was before the e Me-
moirs" as the "(mice of Mare" was to Juvenal—
'. Nola ooljt's Hall thooos si sue!" Nobody has lelt
such a t Laved of himself.
Thew Memoirs" add nothing to the personal
portrait of the man; they don't make hint a bit dim-.
tincter to the eye. W but they do accomplish is
this--they furnish an external history of lion, joined
with amounts of people a itls a how he was brought in
contact. YOU will know Walpole as a human cha-
racter no better by reading these "Memoirs' than
you would know Shaktspenre's features better'
by ruling the migrations of the niundos permit.
At the WOW time shat they du give is well given.
The nurrative is clear, and rises occasionally into a
capital How of livelinier and point. The render who
th sine to be informed of the personal notabilities of
the last century will find a great deal of information
about them. The book has no higher pretensions; in
point of thought it Si nen herdeep nor sure. Indeed.ae .
may notice us a remarkable (Mitre that distinguislus
it, that at one part the writer adopts Walpole's pre-
judices about men greater than himself, in order to
support his hero; while in another Walpole's weak-
neseest are relentlessly commenteil on. This arises
from an affectation of impartiality which deceives
nobility but it's author. IVe huve once or take
fancied we could perceive the employment of dif-
ferent hands in the work: in fact, each hand being
employed on the portion which he was least fitted to
undertake. The general result, indeed, is, on the
whole, rather tedious. For, chapter after chapter,
Horace himself is lost sight of, while other
people, re tely teomeeted with him, ore
talked about at length. There is a good deal, too,
of what a critic has called the "Tomb etone" style of
editing—such as was very notable in Lord Dover's
edition of " Horace's Letters to Sir 11. Mann." We
memo, an accumulation of information about obscure
people, which is antiquarian without being iastrue-
tive; a parish-clerk styli of obscure illustration. We
really don't see why a living nublumun should be
gratified at the mention of a great-great-grandfuther,
ho was ceantially nobady in his time. But perhaps
all this is harmless. In a word, these memoirs are
tolerable reading for the idler portion of the public;
as illustrative of English literature, they have next
to no value at all.
As this is, perhaps, the last time Horace Walpole
will be called before oar generation for a formal
notice of his claims by any such book as the present,
it will be as well to look once more at his career.
He was the third son of the great minister, and born
on the sth October, 1717. It haslxem often asserted
that he was in reality the son of Curr. Lord Hervey.
Nothing has yet been decided.nor can he decided, on
the point. lie certainly resembled the Henrys in
character and style of intellect more than he did the
Walpoles. Sir (lobed liked hint little. However,
no one has a right to sully the memory of a mother
whom Horace honoured (or such good qualities, on
suspicion. It wes an age of suspicion, and moreover
bus avowed guilt enough to answer for without it.
Horace was educated at Etou and Cambridge, and
was the schoolfellow of Gray. Of course we have
an account of his childhood and youth from our
biographer, which amounts to anybody else's child-
hood and youth. That he admired Milton at college
is very probable, and it is still more probable that he
said so. But we see no trees of Milton in kis life or
writings; his love of hint was, like his love of repub-
licanism, entirely on the surface. An easy way of
settling those difficulties is to call the man a" con-
tradiction," and pass lightly on. But fig-trees don't
boar both thistles and figs ; there is consistency to be
seen, by looking for it, in men as well as things.
Horace Walpole was, from his youth, a very clever
boy, and perfectly conscious of itt—at the same time
he was a prime minister's son, and conscious of that.
It naturally followed that he partook of both in-
fluences; he was much too clever not to sec that
there was merit in Milton, and that many of the
phenomena of royalty in his own day were ridiculous.
This would account for his talking republicanism;
but as to his doing anything—that was another
matter. That broached a little too close on being
ridiculous the other way! In fact, he seems
never to have thought of doing anything at all; he
never, so far as we can learn, had any predominant
sense of duty. Eyes he had, and the qiuckest vision
of the sense or nonsense of anything. They were
very clear eyes—and they needed to be, for they
were the only lights he had. Thus, for instance, his
a love" of art and artistic matters—so prominent a
feature in him—was only a matter of taste, the result
of a cultivated judgment. It had nothing to do with
his heart or soul, did not at all affect him (as it does
artists of ;the high class) in his notions of life and
duty. Ho was indeed an extremely able egotist, and,
all the apparent contradictions in his life arise from
Ins attempts to reconcile his selfishneuswithhis quick
vision of right sad .wreng—ocoordiog to the best
worldly Nance of these words.

His history presents no very remarkable features
of interest, as a narrative. He travelled, after leaving
college, in company with Gray, when they had their
well-known quarrel. When he retu-ned he entered
parliament, and spoke once during the time of that
ferocious struggle which precedeal his father's down-
, fall, us aU ministerial secessions from office arc oddly
;enough called. His speech was neat in expression,
but had really little enough in it; paliament was not
his place; he was too acutely sensible of what he
could and what he could not do to risk ridicule by
;
• trying too much. Anything but ridicule! You see
Kat motto on his arms everywhere. He must not be
laughed nt : so his speech is faultless, though
mediocre, he must not be laughed at. Sa Sir
Horace Mann is cautioned not to speak of his learning,
and l)u Duffand is checked in the indulgence of her
sentiment Not that Horace objected to be thought
• " learned," if people really would think so. But
he knew that the learned of the age would not think
so, and kept clear! In his aching out in life, we
notice in him, while young, always the same quali-
ties--quick sight, personal caution. Vanity is asso-
ciated with extreme perspicacity in him—as the pea-
; cock has a hundaed eyes in his tail. There is some-
thing not very pleasing, however,in the contemplation
of his going into society—playing the quiet, modest
man of society, and then returning home to chronicle
his malignant observation, and elaborate his savers
in a letter! The letter was just the form for his
character to use in literature ; there, his egotism had
full play, his talent entire leisure, and his cautious-
ness full protection.
When we look at his public actions—few as they
arc—his praise must be mingled. He heartily
worked for Ilyng—for which let him have all honour.
But the hoax he played in forging a letter from
the King of Prussia to Rousseau was certainly a dis-
creditable one. It had no ingenuity, and did great
mischief. Then his talking afterwards about " play-
ing contrition,' and his abuse of all the parties con-;
eerned—such men as D'Alembert, Rousseau, &c.—is
paltry in the extreme. By-the-bye, the present
biographer joins in most of Walp I ole's abuse of
Literal,. He has to say, as his contribution to lite-
rary criticism, that Hume has "shrewdness." Chat-
terton--in spite of all that Wordsworth, Coleridge,
and a host of men of genius have said of him—is
growily, treated by the biographer also. We are
not going here into the old controversy about Wal-
poles treatment of Chatterton. He acted just as
might be expected of him, and showed compunction
afterwards. In his 01%Ory letters. he speaks of him,
too, as an "astonishing genius." But of course such
remarks are lost on a biographer who could take poor
Chatterton'a wild and sad gaiety about Beekford's
death as a fair sample of that tine, noble nature.
We are bound to say iliai there was not one paro-
chial member of the inquest which sat on his remains
who was not better qualified to judge of him thou a
biographer like this.
We have men,ioncd Walpole'm good qualities; he
had such, certainly—had the friendly virtues of the
average gentlemen of his time. We like his fidelity
to the ('onways, for example; we hold it very ha-
portant in his favour that he inspired the affections I
Ned regard of his friend Miss Berry. Indeed his!
letters show a degree of sympathy with very various
forms of human leis, indicative of what is called a
good disposition. We are inclined to think that it
was the canker of aristocracy" which Shelley saw
iajuring the good in Byron, which helped to spoil
Walpole. In another walk of lift: and a diffirent
fortune, Walpole might have heartily admired John-
son, instead of meanly underrating hint'as he every-
where does ; his MAIM', wit, playfulness, and liveliness
wool(' have been Goldomithisett—if we may coin a
word. He would have developed naturally, and not,
lived an anomalous half-life—living the right, and
not striving for it—twaddling brilliantly, because
he was afraid of being laughed at if he set up to
teach,—and repudiating fair authorship, while always
struggling for reputation in less elevated ways.
His literary reputation must depend on his letters,
and those alone. Byron called them income aiable,"
and so they are, in their way. They are clear, easy,
elegant, and inimitably sty What a pity that
egotism and a false position should have placed a
man with such gifts in the position of a mere letter-
writer! 'When we BCC Plieh flume literary qualities •
employed in tattle, scandal, and /Novi/Nye, we think
of the jewels in a 'Radon idol : we pity the anoma-
lous waste as we gaze on the splendeseent ugliness.
And then, the too great liveliness and levity punish
themselves. Walpole's letters sometimes weary us,
by their methodical sprightliness.
•We would advise all readers to confine the ad-
miration of this celebrated man within limits. For
a thick-and-thin admiration' of Walpole indicates
an unwholesome mind, and a not over-good nature,
too. by-the-by. If literature could not well spare
the man himself, she could spare a good deal of the
laudation he has had, and could spare, with least
loss of all, the above two volumes.

Italy in IMS. Itv L. M tniorri.
The revolutions of Berlin and Vienna, and the
great insurrection of Hungary, have found histo-
rians without number, but the origin, process, and
issue of the Italian war of liberation in 1814 remain

untold. Fragments and contributions have not. in-
deed, been wanting. The German General Willisen
watched the campaign from the fortress of Verona,
and has criticised the
.generalship both of Radetzsky
and Charles Albert with a skill which is not equalled
by impartiality. The Earl or Ellesmere has endea-
voured to penorm the like service fin. the lmadit of
the English public. Messrs. Macfarlane awl IlailFe
Cochrane have celebrated the political sagacity and
integrity of the King of Naples. o,hose faithlessness •
has been exposed by General Pepe. M. Mazzini
has drawn in terrible characters the fatal fickleness
of Charles Albert, and celebrated the noble a.uira-
tions and heroic feats of the democratic party. Hut
no one of these, nor the whole taken together, give
us a due to the impulse which converted the pro-
verbially enervated Italians into a nation of wamors,
or fully explain that circle of fatalities which began!
on the ith of March, ls4B, with the evacuation of,
Milan by Itadetzky, and ended with the re-entrance!
of the Austrians into the city within a period of five
months.

M. Mariotti does this in an octavo volume of 500
pages. During the events he commemorates he was
where every good Italian must have wished himself,
in his native country. Ito was thus able to study
the chief characters under all the advantages of dale
inspection. and eon now appreciate their movements
in the memory of the uncertainties under which they
were resolved on. Many a public act too which seemed
chivalrous to distant spectators, lax Jules very com-
mon-place, to use a mild expression, in M. Mariottrs

Page s. I ;
We have been in the habit of believing that Pio
Nino commenced his reign by indulging his gene- I ,
rous and patriotic impulses. Lord Brougham has
given him credit for originating the whole Italian
l
movement. Nothing of the sort, says M. Marotti.
Pius originated nothing, in Italy. at least. Tho
world has no idea how greatly it has been im- '
posed on by the well-assumed enthusiasm of the wily
Italians for their new Pope. When it becomes
knovni how few of all the line things said and done
in her name ever received his sanction, the wonder I
will be that men should now be accounting for his
inconsistency, instead of seeing in his declared abso-
luast predilections the natural fruits of his vain and
imbecile character. The beginning and the end of his
offence was simply that amnesty of the lith of June,
for which he suffered his people to clamour for more
than a month, andwhich was only yielded at last to the
importunities of private friendslup. It should seem
that again and again measures repudiated by the
Pope were, nevertheless, carried through and issued
as if bearing his seal and signatu-e. Such are M.
Mariotti's assertions; and, as a specimen of the acts
intended, he adduces the blessing of the standards
previous to the departure of the Roman volunteers
to the war in Lombardy in April, 1848. General
Ferrari, appointed to these legions, applied to the
Pope to bless their standards; the Pope refines ; the
general insists; the Pope is inesorabk ; no matter;
the deputation sent to the Quirinal return with word
that the holy father has prayed for their holy ban-
ner, on which the simple warriors leave Rome happy.
Mr. N. tariotti aye of

Tli Pan AND num.
From the beginning there was mutual bad faith and wil-
-Ito daception between Piva sad Italy. The pope, " sheet-
sisbasd and self-wammited," Nattered himself that he could
mats Italian patriethia • prop to the church. The patriots,
hardly lees Wad. gatedthey could use the pope es a toot
to be 'broken 011 NW Stab M•bm• ity. We do not, indeed,'
think that many swhshed the dell intention expressed by