set; but they dare not do it, and having notified it without effect, are ridiculed by the whole town, as well as by the persons threatened, particularly by Lord Albemarle, who has treated their menaces with the utmost contempt and spirit. This mighty storm, like another I shall tell you of, has vented itself on Lord Shelburne and Colonel Barré,1 who were yesterday turned out; the first from aid-de-camp to the King, the latter from adjutant-general and governor of Stirling. Campbell, to whom it was promised before, has got the last; Ned Harvey, the former. My present expectation is an oration from Barré, in honour of Mr. Pitt; for those are scenes that make the world so entertaining. After that, I shall demand a satire on Mr. Pitt, from Wilkes; and I do not believe I shall be balked, for Wilkes has already expressed

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1 Isaac Barré was a native of Ireland, and born in 1726: he entered the army early in life, and rose gradually to the rank of colonel. He was in 1763 made adjutant-general and the governor of Stirling Castle, but was turned out on this occasion, and even resigned his half-pay. He continued to make a considerable figure in the House of Commons: in 1782 he became a privy-councillor and treasurer of the navy, which latter office he soon exchanged for paymaster of the forces; but on the change of government he retired on a pension of 32004., which his political friends had previously secured for him. From this time his sight failed him, and he was quite blind for many years previous to his death, which took place in 1802.-C.

2

Captain James, afterwards Sir James Campbell, of Ardkinglass: a captain in the army, and member for the county of Stirling.-E.

I

3 Major-General Edward Harvey, lieutenant-general in 1772-E. * Colonel Barré, previous to his dismissal, had distinguished himself by an attack on Mr. Pitt, which is not reported in the Parliamentary Debates.-C. [In the Chatham Correspondence, vol. ii. p. 171, will be found the following passage, in a letter from Mr. Symmers to Sir Andrew Mitchell, dated January 29, 1762:-" Would you know a little of the humour of Parliament, and particularly with regard to Mr. Pitt? must then tell you that Colonel Barré, a soldier of fortune, a young man born in Dublin, of parents of a mean condition, his father and mother from France, and established in a little grocer's shop by the patronage of the Bishop of Clogher; a child of whom the mother nursed; this young man (a man of address and parts), found out, pushed, and brought into Parliament by Lord Shelburne, had not sat two days in the House of Commons before he attacked Mr. Pitt. I shall give you a specimen of his philippics. Talking of the manner of Mr. Pitt's speaking, he said, There he would stand, turning up his eyes to heaven, that witnessed his perjuries, and laying his hand in a solemn manner upon the table, that sacrilegious hand, that had been employed in tearing out the bowels of his mother-country!' Would you think that Mr. Pitt would bear this and be silent; or would you think that the House would suffer a respectable member to be so treated? Yet so it was."]

his resentment on being given up by Pitt, who, says Wilkes, ought to be expelled for an impostor. I do not know whether the Duke of Newcastle does not expect a palinodia from me. T'other morning at the Duke's levée he embraced me, and hoped I would come and eat a bit of Sussex mutton with him. I had such difficulty to avoid laughing in his face that I got from him as fast as I could. Do you think me very likely to forget that I have been laughing at him these twenty years?

Well! but we have had a prodigious riot: are not you impatient to know the particulars? It was so prodigious a tumult, that I verily thought half the administration would have run away to Harrowgate. The North Briton was ordered to be burned by the hangman at Cheapside, on Saturday last. The mob rose; the greatest mob, says Mr. Sheriff Blunt, that he has known in forty years. They were armed with that most bloody instrument, the mud out of the kennels: they hissed in the most murderous manner; broke Mr. Sheriff Harley's coach-glass in the most frangent manner; scratched his forehead, so that he is forced to wear a little patch in the most becoming manner; and obliged the hangman to burn the paper with a link, though fagots were prepared to execute it in a more solemn manner. Numbers of gentlemen, from windows and balconies, encouraged the mob, who, in about an hour and half, were so undutiful to the ministry, as to retire without doing any mischief, or giving Mr. Carteret Webb3 the opportunity of a single in

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In the House of Commons, a few days before, Mr. Pitt had condemned the whole series of North Britons, and called them illiberal, unmanly, and detestable: “he abhorred," he said, "all national reflections; the King's subjects were one people; whoever divided them was guilty of sedition: his Majesty's complaint was well-founded; it was just; it was necessary: the author did not deserve to be ranked among the human species; he was the blasphemer of his God and the libeller of the King."-E.

2 This improbable event a few weeks brought about. We shall see that Mr. Walpole did sing his palinodia, and went down to Claremont to eat a bit of mutton with the man in the world whom (as all his writings, but especially his lately published Memoires, show) he had most heartily hated and despised.-C.

3 Philip Carteret Webb, Esq. solicitor to the treasury and member for Haslemere.-E.

formation, except against an ignorant lad, who had been in town but ten days.

This terrible uproar has employed us four days. The sheriffs were called before your House on Monday, and made their narrative. My brother Cholmondeley,1 in the most pathetic manner, and suitably to the occasion, recommended it to your lordships, to search for precedents of what he believed never happened since the world began. Lord Egmont, who knows of a plot, which he keeps to himself, though it has been carrying on these twenty years, thought more vigorous measures ought to be taken on such a crisis, and moved to summon the mistress of the Union Coffeehouse. The Duke of Bedford thought all this but piddling, and at once attacked Lord Mayor, common council, and charter of the city, whom, if he had been supported, I believe he would have ordered to be all burned by the hangman next Saturday. Unfortunately for such national justice, Lord Mansfield, who delights in every opportunity of exposing and mortifying the Duke of Bedford, and Sandwich, interposed for the magistracy of London, and, after much squabbling, saved them from immediate execution. The Duke of Grafton, with infinite shrewdness and coolness, drew from the witnesses that the whole mob was of one mind; and the day ended in a vote of general censure on the rioters. This was communicated to us at a conference, and yesterday we acted the same farce; when Rigby trying to revive the imputation on the Lord Mayor, &c. (who, by the by, did sit most tranquilly at Guildhall during the whole tumult) the ministry disavowed and abandoned him to a man, vindicating the magistracy, and plainly discovering their own fear and awe of the city, who feel the insult, and will

1 George, third Earl Cholmondeley; born in 1703: married Mr. Walpole's only legitimate sister, who died at Aix in 1731; and as all Sir Robert Walpole's sons died without issue, Lord Cholmondeley's family succeeded to Houghton, and the rest of the Walpole property, as heirsat-law of Sir Robert.-C.

2 John, second Earl of Egmont, at this time first lord of the admiralty. Lord Egmont had been in the House of Commons what Coxe calls" a fluent and plausible debater;" but he had some peculiarities of mind, to which Walpole here and elsewhere alludes.-C.

from hence feel their own strength. In short, to finish this foolish story, I never saw a transaction in which appeared so little parts, abilities, or conduct; nor do I think there can be anything weaker than the administration, except it is the opposition: but an opposition, bed-rid and tonguetied, is a most ridiculous body. Mr. Pitt is laid up with the gout; Lord Hardwicke, though much relieved by a quack medicine, is still very ill; and Mr. Charles Townshend is as silent as my Lord Abercorn1-that they two should ever be alike!

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This is not all our political news; Wilkes is an inexhaustible fund on Monday was heard, in the Common Pleas, his suit against Mr. Wood, when, after a trial of fourteen hours, the jury gave him damages of one thousand pounds; but this was not the heaviest part of the blow. The Solicitorgeneral tried to prove Wilkes author of the North Briton, and failed in the proof. You may judge how much that miscarriage adds to the defeat. Wilkes is not yet out of danger they think there is still a piece of coat or lining to come out of the wound. The campaign is over for the present, and the troops going into country quarters. In the mean time, the house of Harrington has supplied us with new matter of talk. My lord was robbed about three o'clock in the night between Saturday and Sunday last, of money, bills, watches, and snuff-boxes, to the amount of three thousand pounds. Nothing is yet discovered, but that the guard in the stable-yard saw a man in a great-coat and white stockings come from thereabouts, at the time I have named. The servants have all been examined over and over to no purpose.

'James, eighth Earl of Abercorn, a nobleman," says his panegyrist, "whose character was but little known, or rather but little understood; but who possessed singular vigour of mind, integrity of conduct, and patriotic views." Mr. Walpole elsewhere laughs at his lordship's dignified aversion to throwing away his words.-C.

2 An action brought by Wilkes against Robert Wood, Esq. late under-secretary of state, for seizing Wilkes's papers, &c. It was tried before Chief Justice Pratt, and under his direction the jury found for the plaintiff.-C.

3 Sir Fletcher Norton was not made attorney-general till after this trial.-E.

Fielding1 is all day in the house, and a guard of his at night. The bureau in my lord's dressing-room (the little red-room where the pictures are) was forced open. I fear you can guess who was at first suspected.

I have received yours, my dear lord, of Nov. 30th, and am pleased that my Lady Hertford is so well reconciled to her ministry. You forgot to give me an account of her audience, but I have heard of the Queen's good-natured attention to her.

The anecdotes about Lord Sandwich are numerous; but I do not repeat them to you, because I know nothing how true they are, and because he has, in several instances, been very obliging to me; and I have no reason to abuse him. Lord Hardwicke's illness, I think, is a rupture and consequences.

I hope to hear that your little boy is recovered. Adieu! I have filled my gazette, and exhausted my memory. I am glad such gazettes please you: I can have no other excuse for sending such tittle-tattle.

TO THE EARL OF HERTFORD.

Arlington Street, Dec. 16, 1763.

On the very day I wrote to you last, my dear lord, an extraordinary event happened, which I did not then know, A motion was made in the common council, to thank the sheriffs for their behaviour at the riot, and to prosecute the man who was apprehended for it. This was opposed, and the previous question being put, the numbers were equal; but the casting vote of the Lord Mayor3 was given against putting the first question—a pretty strong proceeding; for though, in consequence and in resentment of the Duke of Bedford's speech, it seemed to justify his grace,

Sir John Fielding, chief police magistrate.-E.

2 The robbery was committed by one Bradley, a discharged footman, and one John Wisket. The former was admitted a witness for the crown, and the latter was hanged on his evidence, in Dec. 1764.-C. › William Bridgen, Esq.—E.