The Hon. Horace Walpole to the Right Hon. W. Pitt. November 19, 1759.

SIR,

ON my coming to town I did myself the honour of waiting on you and Lady Hester Pitt, and though I think myself extremely distinguished by your obliging note, I should be sorry to have given you the trouble of writing it, if it did not lend me a very pardonable opportunity of saying what I much wished to express, but thought myself too private a person, and of too little consequence, to take the liberty to say. In short, sir, I was eager to congratulate you on the lustre you have thrown on this country; I wished to thank you for the security you have fixed to me of enjoying the happiness I do enjoy. You have placed England in a situation in which it never saw itself,-a task the more difficult, as you had not to improve but to recover. In a trifling book, written two or three years ago, I said (speaking of the name in the world the most venerable to me,) "sixteen unfor tunate and inglorious years, since his removal, have already written his eulogium." It is but justice to you, sir, to add, that that period ended when your administration began. Sir, don't take this for flattery; there is nothing in your power to give that I would accept,-nay, there is nothing I could envy, but what I believe you would scarce offer me your glory. This may sound very vain and insolent, but consider, sir, what a monarch is a man who wants nothing; consider how he looks down on one who is only the most illustrious man in Britain. But, sir, freedoms apart, insignificant as I am, probably it must be some satisfaction to a great mind like yours, to receive incense when

you are sure there is no flattery blended with it: and what must any Englishman be that could give you a minute's satisfaction, and would hesitate!

Adieu, sir,—I am unambitious, I am disinterested-but I am vain. You have by your notice, uncanvassed, unexpected, and at the period when you certainly could have the least temptation to stoop down to me, flattered me in the most agreeable manner. If there could arrive a moment, when you could be nobody, and I anybody, you cannot imagine how grateful I would be. In the mean time permit me to be, as I have been ever since I had the honour of knowing you, sir, your obedient humble servant,

HOR. WALPOLE.

The Hon. H. Walpole to the Rev. W. Cole.

Arlington Street, Jan. 28, 1772.

MR. MASON has shown me the relics of poor Mr. Gray. I am sadly disappointed at finding them so very inconsiderable. He always persisted, when I inquired about his writing, that he had nothing by him. I own I doubted. I am grieved he was so very near exact. Since given to the world for twelve guineas! Gray valued them as "nothing," and Mason would not publish even a scrap. I speak of my own satisfaction. As to his genius, what he published during his life will establish his fame as long as our language lasts, and there is a man of genius left. There is a silly fellow, I do not know who, that has published a volume of letters on the English nation, with characters of our modern authors. He has talked such nonsense of Mr. Gray, that I have no patience with the compli. ments he has paid me. He must have an excellent

taste! and gives me a woful opinion of my own trifles, when he likes them, and cannot see the beauties of a poet that ought to be ranked in the first line. I am more humbled by any applause in the present age, then by hosts of such critics as Dr. Milles. Is not Garrick reckoned a tolerable author, though he has proved how little sense is necessary to form a great actor! His Cymon, his prologues and epilogues, and forty such pieces of trash, are below mediocrity, and yet delight the mob in the boxes, as well as in the footman's gal lery. I do not mention the things written in his praise, because he writes most of them himself. But you know any one popular merit can confer all merit. Two women talking of Wilkes, one said he squinted; the other replied, "Well, if he does, it is not more than a man should squint." For my part, I can see extremely well how Garrick acts, without thinking him six feet high. It is said that Shakspeare was a bad actor. Why do not his divine plays make our wise judges conclude that he was a good one? They have not a proof of the contrary, as they have in Garrick's works-but what is it to you or me what he is? We may see him act with pleasure, and nothing obliges us to read his writings. Adieu, dear sir, yours most truly,

H. W.

Mr. Garrick to Miss H. More.

MY DEAR NINE,

We have been upon the ramble for near three weeks, and your ode did not reach me till Monday last. Good, and very good-partial, and very par

tial. Mrs. Garrick (who sends her best wishes) and her lord and master set out for Bath the be ginning of next month. Though my doctors have extorted a vow from me that I shall neither dine out nor give dinners while I stay at Bath, yet I had a mental reservation with regard to Bristol However, if I continue sick and peevish, I had better keep my ill-humours at home, and for my wife alone. She is bound to them, and so reconciled to them by long use, that she can go to sleep in the midst of a good scolding, as a good sailor can while the guns are firing.

Mrs. Garrick is studying your two acts. We shall bring them with us, and she will criticize you to the bone. A German commentator (Montaigne says) will suck an author dry. She is resolved to dry you up to a slender shape, and has all her wits at work upon you.

I am really tired-my thumb is guilty, but my heart is free. I could write till midnight, but if I don't finish directly, I shall be obliged, from pain, to stop short at what I have most pleasure in declaring, that I am, please your Nineship, most truly yours, D. GARRICK.

Have you kindly excused me to Dr. Stonehouse? My friend Walker intends trying his lecturing acumen upon you very soon. Why should not Ï come one day, and kill two birds with one stone?

The same to the same.

Shame! shame! shame!

Adelphi, Oct. 17, 1777.

You may well say so, my dear madam; but indeed I have been so disagreeably entertained with

the gout running all about me, from head to heel, that I have been unfit for the duties of friendship, and very often for those which a good husband, and a good friend, should never fail performing. I must gallop over this small piece of paper: it was the first I snatched up, to tell you that my wife has your letter, and thinks it a fine one and a sweet one.

I was at court to-day, and such work they made with me, from the Archbishop of Canterbury to the Page of the Back Stairs, that I have been suffocated with compliments. We have wanted you at some of our private hours. Where's the Nine? we want the Nine! Silent was every muse.

Cambridge said yesterday, in a large company at the Bishop of Durham's, where I dined, that your ode to my house-dog was a very witty production; and he thought there was nothing to be altered or amended except in the last stanza, which he thought the only weak one. I am afraid that you asked me to do something for you about the parliament, which, in my multitude of matters, was overlooked; pray, if it is of consequence, let me know it again, and you may be assured of the intelligence you want.

The last new tragedy, “Semiramis," has, though a bare translation, met with great success. The prologue is a bad one, as you may read in the papers by the author; the epilogue is grave, but a sweet pretty elegant morsel, by Mr. Sheridan; it had deservedly great success. Mr. Mason's Caractacus is not crowded, but the men of taste, and classical men, admire it much. Mrs. Garrick sends a large parcel of love to you all. I send mine in the same bundle. Pray write soon, and forgive me all my delinquencies. I really have not time to