Star.
London, England, 1830-11-08 00:00:00

LORD BLANTYRE.

We are assured that the following account of the death of Lord
Blantyre is the result of an inquiry instituted into the circumstance by
a relative, and may be relied on :
" It has been generally said, that Lord Blantyre was killed by a
random shot. The fact wan otherwise. The shot which killed him
was discharged by a Dutch soldier, in the wantonness of power, and
without (for, at that time, as eye witnesses can abundantlyi
testify, there was no firing from any house in the Rue Royale, nor re.
sistance offered by the few citizens who were falling back in front of
than)—not with the aim, it may be, of killing Lord Blantyre, but
most certainly with the situ of killing the individual who was seen
looking out of a window in his house. And, in this respect. the act
was quite eta piece with the whole conduct of the Dutch officers and
soldiers during their attack on Brussels. No sooner did they enter the
Rue Royale, than they seemed to consider every person who sat not
in their awn ranks, and who presumed to look at them from a door,
window, or round the corner of a street, as a rebel. and levelled
at him accordingly ; and when they had reached the Park, in-
stead of boldly attempting, like the Garde Royale at
Paris, with Mammal at their head, though engaged in a bad cause, to
penetrate Into the city and scour the streets at all hazards, they hid
themselves behind trees, and in the vast excavations or hollows on the
south side of it; and there, like true cowards, they continued to fire under
shelter for four days upon the only part of Brussels that lay directly within
their reach,withoot compromising their personal safety; and that_tras
,pre-
clsely the finest part of it,and the part, too, inhabited bythe best Mends of
the Government, the most respectable English and Belgian fami.
lies. And when, at length, they were forced out of their lurking-places
into a disgraceful retreat, they wreaked the vengeance of their disap-
pointment on every thing that came in their way. A glance of the eye
or the least inquiry might have satisfied them, that Lord Blantyre's
house was juiced by some family of note ; but to this they paid no at-
tention. On the contrary, being a corner house, in the street opposite
the great gate in the middle of the Park, it was mere open to their attack
than. mast others; and, of mune, they directed their fire particularly
towards that quarter, and continued it through the whole day,
after be was killed; while his poor lady, now a desolate widow, ab-
sorbed in the depths of her grief, and heedless of every sort of danger,
was sitting by the body, from which she could not be removed, within
reachtof their shot. Not was this all ; for next morning, after a trtend
(whose house, on the aide of the Park, had been turned into a sort of
head-quarters) had proceeded under an escort, which he had procured
front the Dutch officers, and with the permission of the ekizenseto Lord
Blantyre's place of residence, to ascertain the state of his family,
and had on his return reported that the husband and father, a no.
Menton and a soldier, was lying a corpse, and his poor family in
the deepest affliction, they renewed their fire upon it, and co ttinued
to fire for four hours, till the family, by the kind exertions of one
of the citizens, were taken through a back window, by a laddtr, a
cannon-ball having penetrated the apartments just as the Lun was
escaping), and conveyed to the cellars of a neighbouring houst..
And let it be remembered, that, during all this time, the citi.
tens offered no provocation to the Dutch, by either mitring
or firing from Lord Blantyre's house. On the contrary, they respected
his family, and knowing what had happened, they considered th4t abode
of affliction to be sacred; and no one ever attempted to enter it un :I me
family were removed. lf, therefore, William the First has lot: his
claim to the fait provinces of Belgium we doubt not be has for
ever,) we must add that he moat richly 'deserved it ; for a more h:ghly
impolitic, barbarous, and cowardly attack than that made on the City of
Brussels, under his auspices, is not in the records of modern watarr.—
Spectaier.