refused to comply with this demand; and although Mr. M'Namara, the gentleman who was sent to him, who has a natural eloquence, and an excellent understanding, urged the most cogent reasons, and used all the arts of persuasion to induce him to part with his mistress, and even proceeded so far as to assure him, according to his instructions, that an immediate interruption of all correspondence with his most powerful friends in England, and in short that the ruin of his interest, which was now daily increasing, would be the infallible consequence of his refusal; yet he continued inflexible, and all M'Namara's intreaties and remonstrances were ineffectual. M'Namara staid in Paris some days beyond the time prescribed him, endeavouring to reason the Prince into a better temper; but finding him obstinately persevere in his first answer, he took his leave with concern and indignation, saying, as he passed out, "what has your family done, Sir, thus to draw down the vengeance of heaven on every branch of it through so many ages?" It is worthy of remark, that in all the conferences which M'Namara had with the Prince on this occasion, the latter declared, that it was not a violent passion, or indeed any particular regard, which attached

I believe he spoke truth when he declared he had no esteem for his northern mistress, although she has been his companion for so many years. She had no elegance of manners: and as they had both contracted an odious habit of drinking, so they exposed

him to Mrs. Walkenshaw, and that he could see her removed from him without any concern; but he would not receive directions in respect to his private conduct from any man alive. When M'Namara returned to London, and reported the Prince's answer to the gentlemen who had employed him, they were astonished and confounded. However, they soon resolved on the measures which they were to pursue for the future, and determined no longer to serve a man who could not be persuaded to serve himself, and chose rather to endanger the lives of his best and most faithful friends, than part with an harlot, whom, as he often declared, he neither loved nor esteemed. If ever that old adage Quos Jupiter vult perdere, &c. could be properly applied to any person, whom could it so well fit as the gentleman of whom I have been speaking? for it is difficult by any other means to account for such a sudden infatuation. He was, indeed, soon afterwards made sensible of his misconduct, when it was too late to repair it for from this era may truly be dated the ruin of his cause; which, for the future, can only subsist in the N-n-ing congregations, which are generally formed of the meanest people, from whom no danger to the present government need ever be apprehended.

themselves very frequently, not only to their own family, but to all their neighbours. They often quarrelled and sometimes fought: they were some of these drunken scenes which, probably, occasioned the report of his madness.

apprehended. Before I close this article, I must observe, that during this transaction, my lord M- was at Paris in the quality of Envoy from the Kof P- ; M'Namara had directions to acquaint him with his commission: my lord Mnot in the least doubting the Prince's compliance with the request of his friends in England, determined to quit the K of P's service as soon as his embassy was finished, and go into the Prince's family. This would have been a very fortunate circumstance to the Prince on all accounts, but more especially as nothing could be more agreeable to all those persons of figure and distinction, who were at that time so deeply engaged in his cause; for there was not one of all that number who would not have reposed an entire confidence in the honour and discretion of my lord MBut how was this gentleman amazed, when he perceived the Prince's obstinacy and imprudence? who was resolved, by a strange fatality, to alienate the affections of his best friends, and put an absolute barrier to all his own hopes. From this time my lord M

would never concern himself in this cause; but prudently embraced the opportunity, through the K- - of P- 's interest of reconciling himself to the English government.

MR. HOWE.

[From King's Anecdotes.] About the year 1706, I knew one Mr. Howe, a sensible well

natured man, possessed of an estate of 7001. or 800l. per annum: he married a young lady of a good family in the west of England, her maiden name was Mallet; she was agreeable in her person and manners, and proved a very good wife. Seven or eight years after they had been married, he rose one morning very early, and told his wife he was obliged to go to the Tower to transact some particular business: the same day, at noon, his wife received a note from him, in which he informed her that he was under a necessity of going to Holland, and should probably be absent three weeks or a month. He was absent from her seventeen years, during which time she neither heard from him, or of him. The evening before he returned, whilst she was at supper, and with her some of her friends and relations, particularly one Dr. Rose, a physician, who had married her sister, a billet, without any name subscribed,

was

delivered to her, in which the writer requested the favour of her to give him a meeting the next evening in the Birdcagewalk, in St. James's Park. When she had read her billet, she tossed it to Dr. Rose, and laughing, "You see, brother," said she, "as old as I am, I have got a gallant.' Rose, who perused the note with more attention, declared it to be Mr. Howe's handwriting,; this surprised all the company, and so much affected Mrs. Howe, that she fainted away; however, she soon recovered, when it was agreed that Dr. Rose and his wife, with the other gentlemen and ladies who

were

were then at supper, should attend Mrs. Howe the next evening to the Bird-cage Walk: they had not been there more than five or six minutes, when Mr. Howe came to them, and after saluting his friends, and embrace ing his wife, walked home with her, and they lived together in great harmony from that time to the day of his death. But the most curious part of my tale remains to be related. When Howe left his wife, they lived in a house in Jermyn-street, near St. James's church; he went no farther than to a little street in Westminster, where he took a room, for which he paid five or six shillings a week, and changing his name, and disguising himself by wearing a black wig (for he was a fair man), he remained in this habitation during the whole time of his absence. He had had two children by his wife when he departed from her, who were both living at that time but they both died young in a few years after. However, during their lives, the second or third year after their father disappeared, Mrs. Howe was obliged to apply for an act of parliament to procure a proper settlement of her husband's estate, and a provision for herself out of it during his absence, as it was uncertain whether he was alive or dead: this act he suffered to be solicited and passed, and enjoyed the pleasure of reading the progress of it in the votes, in a little coffee-house, near his lodging, which he frequented. Upon his quitting his house and family in the manner I have mentioned,

Mrs. Howe at first imagined, as she could not conceive any other cause for such an abrupt elopement, that he had contracted a large debt unknown to her, and by that means involved himself in difficulties which he could not easily surmount; and for some days she lived in continual apprehensions of demands from creditors, of seizures, executions, &c. &c. But nothing of this kind happened; on the contrary, he did not only leave his estate quite free and unencumbered, but he paid the bills of every tradesman with whom he had any dealings; and upon examining his papers, in due time after he was gone, proper receipts and discharges were found from all persons, whether tradesmen or others, with whom he had any manner of transactions or money concerns. Mrs. Howe, after the death of her children, thought proper to lessen her family of servants, and the expenses of her housekeeping; and therefore removed from her house in Jermyn-street to a little house in Brewer-street, near Golden-square. Just over against her lived one Salt, a cornchandler. About ten years after Howe's abdication, he contrived to make an acquaintance with Salt, and was at length in such a degree of intimacy with him, that he usually dined with Salt once or twice a week. From the room in which they eat, it was not difficult to look into Mrs. Howe's diningroom, where she generally sate and received her company; and Salt, who believed Howe to be a bachelor, frequently recommended his own wife to him as a suit

able

able match. During the last seven years of this gentleman's absence, he went every Sunday to St. James's church, and used to sit in Mr. Salt's seat, where he had a view of his wife, but could not easily be seen by her. After he returned home, he never would confess, even to his most intimate friends, what was the real cause of such a singular conduct; apparently, there was none: but whatever it was, he was certainly ashamed to own it. Dr. Rose has often said to me, that he believed his brother Howe* would never have returned to his wife, if the money which he took with him, which was supposed to have been 1,000l. or 2,000l. had not been all spent: and he must have been a good economist, and frugal in his manner of living, otherwise his money would scarce have held out; for I imagine he had his whole fortune by him, I I mean what he carried away with him in money or bank bills, and daily took out of his bag, like the Spaniard in Gil Blas, what was sufficient for his expenses.

HORACE WALPOLE. (Letters from the Hon. Horace Walpole to the Rev. W. Cole, and others.)

I have been eagerly reading

And yet I have seen him after his return addressing his wife in the language of a young bridegroom. And I have been assured by some of his most intimate friends, that he treated her during the rest of their lives with the greatest kindness and affection.

I

Mr. Shenstone's Letters, which, though containing nothing but trifles, amused me extremely, as they mention so many persons I know; particularly myself. found there, what I did not know, and what, I believe, Mr. Gray himself never knew, that his ode on my cat was written to ridicule lord Littleton's monody. It is just as true as that the latter will survive, and the former be forgotten. There is another anecdote equally vulgar, and void of truth: that my father, sitting in George's coffee-house (I suppose Mr.Shenstone thought, that, after he quitted his place, he went to coffee-houses to learn news), was asked to contribute to a figure of himself that was to be beheaded by the mob. I do remember something like it, but it happened to myself. I met a mob, just after my father was out, in Hanover-square, and drove up to it to know what was the matter. They were carrying about a figure of my sister. This probably gave rise to the other story. That on my uncle I never heard; but it is a good story, and not at all improbable. I felt great pity on reading these Letters for the narrow circumstances of the author, and the tormented with; and yet he had passion for fame that he was

much more fame than his talents intitled him to. Poor man! he wanted to have all the world talk of him for the pretty place he had made; and which he seems to have made only that it might be talked of. The first time a company came to see my house, I felt his joy. I am now so tired

of

of it, that I shudder when the bell rings at the gate. It is as bad as keeping an inn, and I am often tempted to deny its being shown, if it would not be illnatured to those that come, and to my house-keeper. I own, I was one day too cross. I had been plagued all the week with staring crowds. At last it rained a deluge. Well, said I, at last, nobody will come to-day. The words were scarce uttered, when the bell rang. A company desired to see the house. I replied, Tell them they cannot possibly see the house, but they are very welcome to walk in the garden.

*

You know I shun authors, and would never have been one myself, if it obliged me to keep such bad company. They are always in earnest, and think their profession serious, and dwell upon trifles and reverence learning. I laugh at all those things, and write only to laugh at them, and divert myself. None of us are authors of any consequence; and it is the most ridiculous of all vanities to be vain of being mediocre. A page in a great author humbles me to the dust, and the conversation of those that are not superior to myself, reminds me of what will be thought of myself. I blush to flatter them, or to be flattered by them, and should dread letters being published some time or other, in which they should relate our interviews, and we should appear like those puny conceited witlings in Shenstone's and Hugh's Correspondence, who give themselves airs from being

in possession of the soil of Parnassus for the time being; as peers are proud, because they enjoy the estates of great men who went before them. Mr. Gough is very welcome to see Strawberry-hill; or I would help him to any scraps in my possession, that would assist his publications; though he is one of those industrious, who are only reburying the dead-but I cannot be acquainted with him. It is contrary to my system, and my humour; and, besides, I know nothing of barrows, and Danish entrenchments, and Saxon barbarisms, and Phoenician characters-in short, I know nothing of those ages that knew nothingthen how should I be of use to modern litterati? All the Scotch metaphysicians have sent me their works. I did not read one of them, because I do not understand, what is not understood by those that write about it; and I did not get acquainted with one of the writers. I should like to be intimate with Mr. Anstey, even though he wrote Lord Buckhorse, or with the author of the Heroic Epistle-I have no thirst to know the rest of my cotemporaries, from the absurd bombast of Dr. Johnson down to the silly Dr. Goldsmith; though the latter changeling has had bright gleams of parts, and the former had sense, till he changed it for words, and sold it for a pension. Don't think me scornful. Recollect that I have seen Pope, and lived with Gray.