The Sun.
London, England, 1847-01-12 00:00:00

DEATH OF G. BYNG, ESQ., M.P.
Twenty years ago, the subject of this notice was an
exceedingly fine specimen of the old English country
gentleman; but for some time past, ceasing to be a fine
old man, he became a very feeble old man, and the more
onerous duties which appertain to the representation of
Middlesex devolved upon his colleagues. Still, on all
great party divisions, he managed to get down and re-
cord his vote, generally in favour of what are called
liberal principles; but, gleel his attenuated form was
only a rernnent of what had once been a magnate
amongst English squires--a venerable wreck—the skele-
ton, it not the shadow, of his former self. At length,
however, to the great regret of his numerous and affec
tionete friends, he has reached the goal to which all
een are inveltint oily hastening. He who so long was
father of the House of Commons has, after attaining
a ripe old age, descended into toe tomb of his own fathers,
forgetting the world, and soon to be by the world for-
gotten. He was born in London, on the 18th of May,
in the year 1764, and had therefore attained the great
age of 82.
The lineage of Mr. Byng is the same as that of the
Viscounts Torrington, a family of great antiquity in the
county of Ksnt ; its honours in the peerage, however,
are of comparatively recent date. Admiral George
Ilyng, crewed a baronet by Queen Anne, was raised, in
1721, by George 1., to the dignity of a viscount. His
third son, Robert, became the father of George Byng,
who for some yrars represented the county of Middle-
sex in Parliament, and who married Anne, daughter of
the Right Hon. William Cottony, of Castletown, in Ire-
land, by whom he had several children. Of these the
eldest was the very estimable person whose name stands
at the head of this notice. Being the heir-apparent
of his father, whose fortune was considerable, having
good expectations, which were subsequently realised,
from Mr. Conolly, who had no sons, and who possessed
great estates in Ireland, Mr. George Byng never once
thought of engaging in any profession, but was natu-
rally regarded as the probable successor of his father in
the representation of Middlesex. Down to the period,
therefore, of his becoming a member of Parliament, the
greater part of his time was spent as that of
country gentlemen usually was in those days ;
tie participated in the field sports of his
neighbourhood, and he shared with his father the cares
and the responsibilities which belonged to the possession
of those estates to the ownership of which he was des-
tined to succeed, but which do not now descend to any
offspring of his own; for, though he married in early life,
Harriet, the eighth daughter of Sir William Mont-
gomery, Bart., and sister of Anne, Marchioness Towns-
hend, yet he leaves no issue. Mrs. Byng died about a
year ago, and Lord Strafford is, we believe, the nearest
surviving relative of the excellent gentleman whose death
we have now to record. The father of Mr. Byng died
,n the Sear 1790, and his son (who had previously been
a candidate for Maidstone, the principal town of that
county in which his family had been originally seated)
offered himself for Middlesex; and was returned as the
colleague of Mr. Mainwaring, sen. From that time
till he expired at two o'clock yesterday, he never
ceased (except during dissolutions of Parliament) to
be knight of the shire for the great metropolitan
county; he enjoyed the confidence of its constituency
always
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was obliged to contend against considerable difficulties.
At the g' neral election in 1806 he presented himself
under some circumstances rather unfavourable to his
popularity, in consequence, it was said, of an unfortunate
allusion in his advertisement to one of the three candi-
lates (Sir Francis Burdett). 'Notwithstanding, how-
ever, a declaration against him on the part of the county
club, and notwithstanding a violent struggle on the part
of Mr. Mellish, Mr. Byng was returned by a majority of
two to one ; but, for the first time since be entered Par-
liament, he was not placed at the head of the poll, and
when he returned to St. James's-square in his triumphal
car, he was nut received with those enthusiastic plaudits
which usually greeted him upon such occasions. The
election of 1806 was an exception to the general rule of
Mr. Byng's Parliamentary lite, for he almost always
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Kent, and Essex, still those counties being of great ter-
ritorial dimensions are not yet quite impregnated to
their extremities with a town population; Middlesex,
however, is not only of more limited extent than any of
the other three counties, but it happens to contain three-
fourths of this monster metropolis; its two representa-
tives, therefore. may be regarded as the organs not only
of a vast trading and commercial race of men, but of the
most wealthy, dignified, and enlightened body of electors
who can be found amongst those classes. Yet George
Byng was not the greatest of legislators. Although he
represented a powerful constituency, he was not a power-
ful man. It is quite true that Pitt, Fox, Peel, and Can-
ning, occasionally sat for important places, yet throughout
a great portion of their respective careers they derived no
reflected influence from the dignity of their constituents.
Byng's Parliamentary weight, however, was not in
himself, but in those who sent him. Tiverton has long been
represented by Lord Palmerston; Dungarvon, and such
places, by Sheil; Caine, for many a year, by such men
as Macaulay and Mackintosh ; Winchilsea, by
Brougham ' • Burke was generally returned for a nomi-
tiers borough, and Sheridan by the potwallopers of Staf-
ford ; while innumerable instances every day arise of
men acquiring the confidence of large constituencies
without any higher intellectual attainments than those
which Mr. Byng possessed •, but orators and statesmen
must often be content with the refuse of the electoral
bodies. The man who for more than half a century
represented Middlesex was a thoroughbred, true-hearted
gentleman—a staunch partisan—and, on the whole,
diligent in the discharge of his public duties, yet nei-
ther learned, eloquent, nor profound. But the influence
of unimpeached political character and high personal
honour is always practically recognised by the con-
stituencies of England. If Mr. Byng were to give
an account of his own political life, he would pro-
bably recall, and endeavour to revive, that admira-
tion of genius to which youth is more prone than
age, and say, " I entered the House of Commons
when its councils were guided by a race of
intellectual giants. My early days were spent
amongst such men as Pitt, Burke, Fox, Windham, Dun-
ning, Wedderburne, Erskine, Dundas, Grenville, Sheri-
dan, and Grattan. Amidst such associates I gave my
entire confidence to my illustrious friend, Mr. Fox ; and
I have lived to enjoy the satissaction of seeing many of
his principles carried out into practice—religion set free,
Parliament reformed, the restrictions on the importation
of food in course of being abolished, the slave trade, and
even slavery itself suppressed, and the Whig part}
filing the Cabinet of the Sovereign." Such, no doubt,
were the conscientious feelings of the excellent and
honourable man just deceased ; but almost every tyro
in politics knows that the true principles of the Whig
school were not those upon which Mr. Byng acted. In
the Regency debates of 1789 Pitt said of Fox, " I'll un-
whig the gentleman;" but Fox unwhigged himself, and
his party followed that example. Mr. Byng put his
faith in the great opponent of Pitt, and renounced all
ether lenders. Mr. Byng, throughout his long life,
proved how fully he believed that the doctrines which
the Ministers of George 111. and Georgia IV. held
were " datnnable and retical." He loved his
country, but, judging from his Parliamentary
votes, ~ne would say he sometimes thought
that the interest of the Whig aristocracy was the same
thing as the interest of the British nation. As we have
referred to the measures which he supported, let not
those which he opposed be forgotten. He uniformly
raised his voice against everything proposed by Pitt,
Pe-ceval, Liverpool, Wellington, and all other Tories.
He was ready to make peace with the French regicides,
then with the usurping Emperor, or by any process to
arrest that glorious resistance to foreign tyranny which
has already given to Europe thirty-two years of repose,
and secured to England empire, and freedom, and fame.
Unhappily, the influence of party darkened the intel-
lectual vision of Mr. Byng. But, though he might
have been in some respects a mistaken politician, he
was always an honest man. He had the moral courage
often to vote in small minorities ; often to support
measures which of late years ceased to be unpopular
—which have been accepted by the nation, and ex-
posed with advantage to the test of prolonged and
practical experience. Having said thus much of
Mr. Byng's votes in Parliament, justice to his me-
mory requires that a willing testimony should be
borne to the readiness and cordiality with which out
of the House he supported the interests of his party and
the maintenance of what he believed to be liberal princi-
ples. He was always ready to meet and account with
those whose " most sweet voices" sent him into the
House of Commons, and they, in return, never deserted
him. Whether Wood, or Hume, or Pownal, Forbes,
Lillie, or Mellish, Whitbread, Burdett, or Mainwaring,
started for the county, George Byng's name was almost
always at the head of the poll. Old age and declining
strength finally induced Mr. Byng to relax his hold
upon the representation of Middlesex. On the last day
of the year 1846 he issued an address, taking leave of
his constituents. It was an affecting farewell from a
man who had seen two generations of electors pass away,
and who had lived to witness so many changes in the
political constitution and social condition, not only of
England, but of the whole family of nations. Mr. Byng
his residence Wrotham-hall, Middlesex.—
expired at a quarter past two o'clock yesterday after-
noon, at
Times of yesterday.

DEATH OF MR. HAWKINS, THE VOCALIST.—It iS
with deep regret that we announce the death of this
talented and much respected musician, which took place
at his residence on Saturday morning. Mr. Hawkins
had for many years past occupied a distinguished po-
sition in the musical profession. He was looked up
to by his compeers as an artist thoroughly proficient
iu tha science of music. He was member of the choirs.
of Westminster Abbey and the Chapel Royal, and has
for many, years been considered the first alto singer in
the metropolis. His death, which was quite unexpected,
was caused by internal inflammation. He had but a
short time previously been in the enjoyment of excel-
lent. health.
THE PENINSULAR MEDALS.—The number of medals
likely to be required will not, we are informed, exceed
half a million.