The Sun.
London, England, 1849-07-09 00:00:00

itri4.
44Nn C

LONDON, MONDAY, JULY 9, 1849.

Since Sir James DUKE was inaugurated on the
ninth of last November as Chief Magistrate of the
City of Landon, it has devolved upon us as journal-
ists to announce repeated, and we might almost say
unprecedented, evidences on his part of hospitality
and munificence. The hospitality of the Mayoralty
of the metropolis is proverbial, and has been so for
many centuries. Yet, from that very circumstance,
it becomes difficult for any one newly elected to the
dignity of presiding over the conservation of
law, orier, and property in the capital
of England to render himself in that
respect in any degree remarkable. The pre
sent Right Hon. the LORD M 4YOU has, however,
rendered himself so fur conspicuous for hospitalits
during the eight months of his mayoralty which
have already elapsed, as to call to remembrance
those among his predecessors who have shown
themselves more than usually profuse iu their ex•
penditure, and sumptuous in their entertainments.
What has, nevertheless, peculiarly characteriled
the conduct of Sir JAMES DUKE, has not been s'.
much the number and splendour of his banquets, as
the blending in them at once of taste, of interest, and
magnificence. Beyond the usual annual dinners at
the Mansion-house, there have been under hie
auspices others of a particularly unusual, if not of a
wholly unexampled, character. After the re•
ception of the Prime Minister of the coun-
try and his colleagues, we have witnessed the
welcome afforded by him towards the leading states-
men of the Opposition. No political prejudices, or
party predilections have interfered with the impartial
distribution of hospitality by the LORD MAYOR. On
one evening he has thrown the civic halls open
to Lord JOHN RUSSELL and his coadjutors in
the House of Commons, and to the 'Marquis of
LA.NSDOWNE with his colleagues in the House of
Lords. Oa another he has acted with
similar corilality in his banquet to Lord
STANLEY, to Mr. DISRAELI, and to their
brother Protectionists. Nor has he overlooked that
illustrious division of the popular representatives who
may be well declared to be still proud to call the
Right Hon. Sir ROBERT PEEL their leader. Various,
however, and striking as have been the successive
entertainments at the Mansion-house during the
Mayoralty of the Right Honourable Member for
Boston, it was reserved to last Saturday evening for
Sir JAMES DUKE to evince in the most apparent
manner his eminent capacity to act as the principal
functionary in the first municipality in the empire.
On that occasion the city of London presented
an unfrequent though not entirely unprecedented
spectacle—the spectacle of the chief magistrate of a
great mercantile municipality extending the band
of fellowship and raising the voice of admira-
tion to the accumulated genius of the nation,
to those men among our contemporaries who
have made themselves illustrious by their
labours in art and letters. Wealth and Commerce
then did homage to Liteialure. Round the festive
board.; of the Lour. Mavoa of London were assem-
bled men whose names are household words, not
only to Englishmen, but to every one who
is acquainted Is ith the literary or artistic
achievements of Great Briton), men whose powers
are appreciated as well un the margin of the
Ganges and of the as upon the banks of
the Shannon and the Thames. There was the LE SAGE
of his age, still ) outh tub although in the maturity of
his reputation. There, too, was the CLAUDE LORRAINE
of the nineteenth century, whose brush had not only
rivalled in its creations the exqui,ite beauties and
miracles of Nature, but whose astonishing ablities,
in spite of their occasionally fantastic exaggeration,
have evoked a celebrant as eloquent in prose delinea-
tions of scenery, as Tuoxisor4 was in poetical. There