formerly ambassador from the court of Spain at Petersburgh, told me in Hanover, that he served as general in the Spanish army against the Portuguese, commanded by the count of Buckeburg*. The Spanish generals were so much struck with the external appearance of the count, when they first saw him on reconnoitring parties, by means of their glafses, that they all exclaimed, Have the Portuguese got Don Quixote for their general? Count de Lacy, however, (himself a man of great abilities,) spoke with rapture of the whole conduct of the count of Buckeburg in Portugal; of the greatnefs of his mind, and of his character. It is true, he had at a distance a very striking appearance, arising from a certain romantic deportment; his loose hair; his excefsively tall meagre figure; and particularly from his long oval head, which very naturally suggested the idea of the knight of la Mancha. But when he came nearer, he imprefsed one with very different sentiments. Magnanimity, acutenefs, refinement, generosity, good nature, and serenity, were written in the most legible characters in every feature of his countenance. I never saw and conversed with the count, without a secret inclination to exclaim, How mild and elevated a character! Heroic sentiments, and great thoughts, flowed from his lips with * Many of our readers will recollect, that the count la Lippe commanded the Portuguese forces, during the war before last, when Spain, in conjunction with France, overran a great part of that kingdom, bęcause he was allied with Britain. On which occasion the British light horse so peculiarly distinguished themselves in Portugal; and, with the masterly conduct of la Lippe, and the British officers, effectually secured the independence of Portugal at that time. Edit. all the ease and profusion with which they ever came from the mouths of the most distinguished characters of Greece or Rome. He was, to be sure, outrè. He was born in London. I was told by a very accomplished reigning count in Germany, a relation of count William's, what perhaps is not generally known, that, in his youth, he was a rival to every Englishman he met. He betted, for example, that he would ride backward from London to Edinburgh; that is, with his horse's head directed towards Edinburgh, and his own face towards London. In this mannner he rode through several counties in England. He not only travelled on foot through England, but, as a beggar, in company with another German prince. He was told. that the current of the Danube, below Ratisbon, was so rapid, that nobody had been able to swim across it; he swam so far, that he was saved with difficulty. One of the wisest politicians and best philosophers in Hanover*, told me, that, in the war, when he commanded the artillery under prince Ferdinand against the French, he invited several Hanoverian officers to dine with him one day in his tent. While the company were indulging themselves in mirth and good humour, several cannon balls flew over the tent. The officers said that the French certainly were in the neighbourhood.-No; replied the count, the French are not near us; you may safely finish your My late bosom friend, the privy counsellor, Strube, private se cretary to the ministry in Hanover during the war from 1756, and till his death in 1777. 15 dinner. Soon after a pair of balls went through the top of the tent; upon which the officers rose, and maintained that the French were certainly there.No, said the count; the French are not there; keep your seats, and take my word for it. Ball came after ball; the officers ate and drank quietly, and whispered to one another their observations on this extraordinary entertainment. At last the count rose, and said, gentlemen, I wanted only to fhew you how much I can depend upon my artillerists; for they had orders, as long as we fhould sit at table, to fire with loaded cannon at the ornaments on the top of the tent, and they have done it with the greatest exactnefs. The attentive reader will readily discover, in these extraordinary traits, the character of a man who wanted to exercise both himself and others in every thing that had the appearance of difficulty.I stood one day with the count by a powder magazine which he had built under his bed-chamber in the fortrefs of Wilhelmstein. I said, that I should not sleep soundly there in a sultry summer night. The count told me, I had forgotten that the extreme of danger, and no danger at all, were the same thing. The first time I saw this extraordinary man, he entertained me in the presence of an English and Portuguese officer, full two hours, on the subject of Haller's great work on physiology; which he had got by heart. Next morning he insisted on my going with him in a wherry to his fortrefs of Wilhelmstein, which he had built, according to a plan which he fhewed me, in the middle of the Steinhuder sea, with out having an inch of ground to found it on. He himself was at the helm. In the great alley at Pyrmont he entertained me one Sunday in the midst of some thousand persons, who walked, and danced, and gossipped, full two hours on one spot, with an account of all the evidences which had been adduced for the existence of a god, of the defects in these evidences, and in what manner, in his opinion, they might be better stated; and all this, with as much composure as if we had been the only persons in the world. And that I might not give him the slip in the midst of this lecture, he held me fast, for two hours uninterruptedly, by the button of my coat. He fhewed me in his palace at Buckeburg, a large folio Mss. written with his own hand, on the art of defending a small state against the attacks of a powerful one. This work was intended for the king of Portugal, and complete *. He read to me many defence of Switzer pafsages from it relating to the land. The count considered Switzerland as invincible. He mentioned to me not only all the important posts which must be occupied against every enemy, but also every path by which a cat could *He printed an extract from this work in the year 1775, in Buckeburg, under the title, Memoires pour l'art militaire defensif, in six small volumes. But the whole imprefsion consisted, alas! of only ten copies; all which were lately in a locked chest in the library of the present count in Buckeburg. Two volumes, however, I have heard, have been rescued by some person unknown, and translated. But it is said, that the plan of the copies still lying in the chest in Buckeburg, hoch bound and unbound, have been cut out and taken away and thus the work may be said to be thereby annihilated, scarcely enter. I believe a more important work for my country has not been written than this.; for to all the objections which the Swifs had been able to make to him, he showed me convincing answers in this Ms. My friend Meses Mendelsohn, to whom the count had read the introduction to this work in Pyrmont, considered it as a chef d'oeuvre of philosophy and stile. The count wrote French, when he pleased, almost as well as Voltaire; but his German was artificial, diffuse, and wanted perspicuity. It does him much honour, that after his return from Portugal, two of the greatest geniuses in Germany lived many years constantly with him; first Abbt, and afterwards. Herder. Those who knew him longer and more intimately, and marked his character with a more penetrating eye than I did, might tell a thousand more important things of this truly great and singular man. I fball only add, partly in the words of Shakespeare, count William of Schaumburg Lippe "wore no man's chains." He was much avoided; he read much; ke was a great observer; he looked quite through the deeds of men; he loved no plays; seldom he smiled, and smiled in such a sort, as if he laughed at others. Such were the outlines of this solitary character, which has been so grofsly misunderstood. Such a man may well smile, when he sees persons who venture to laugh at him. But with what shame and confusion must their silence be accompanied, when they look at the monument, which the great Mendelsohn has erected to his memory? or when they read the history of the principal occurrences in his VOL. Xiii. |