Chapter 29

[236]Lord Guilford, better known as Lord North, died August 5, 1792.[237]Sir Joshua Reynolds died February 23, 1792.[238]The Duke of Brunswick, as commander-in-chief of the combined armies of Austria and Prussia, issued his manifesto on July 25, 1792, before crossing the French frontier and directing his march on Paris.[239]Lally left France for Switzerland after October, 1789, and thence passed to England. Realizing the dangerous position of the king and royal family, he returned to Paris in May, 1792, and with Bertrand-Molleville, Malouet, La Fayette, and others, endeavoured to effect the escape of the king and queen. On August 10, 1792, he was arrested and imprisoned in the Abbaye. On August 22, 1792, ten days before the September massacres, the French Minister of Foreign Affairs informed the National Assembly that Lally Tollendal demanded a passport for England, of which country he had become a naturalized subject. He also produced a letter from Lord Gower claiming Lally as a British subject. According to Madame de Staël he owed his escape to Condorcet.[240]Madame de Staël, in herConsidérations sur la Révolution Française(ed. 1818, tom. ii. ch. x.), describes her appearance before Robespierre at the Hôtel de Ville in the Place de Grève, and attributes her escape, on September 2-3, 1792, to Manuel.[241]Marie Thérèse de Savoie-Carignan married, in 1767, Louis de Bourbon-Penthièvre, Prince de Lamballe. She was murdered at La Force in the September massacres of 1792, and her head, raised on a pike, was paraded before the windows of the Temple where the queen was confined. The Swiss Guard, nearly eight hundred in number, were massacred in the attack upon the Tuileries on August 10, 1792. Of the few who escaped, fifty-four were murdered in the Abbaye at the September massacres. Their death is commemorated by Thorwaldsen's lion at Lucerne.[242]See letter of May 30, 1792.[243]On September 21, 1792, without any declaration of war, Montesquieu entered Savoy, seized Montmélian and Chambéry, and in a few days overran the whole duchy. In Piedmont the French troops under General Anselme, supported by Admiral Truguet and the Toulon fleet, captured Nice and Villa Franca. The Duchy of Savoy was incorporated with France in November, 1792, as the Department of Mont-Blanc, and the Comté of Nice as the Department of the Maritime Alps.[244]Etienne Clavière (1735-1793), formerly a banker in Geneva, had been banished in 1784 for his writings. As a member of the Executive Council, he urged upon his colleagues the attack upon Geneva, and orders to that effect were given to Montesquieu by Servan, the Minister of War. Geneva appealed for aid to Zurich and Berne under a treaty of 1584, and prepared for defence. A treaty was signed, October 22, 1792, between Montesquieu and the Republic of Geneva, slightly modified by a fresh treaty signed on November 2. By its terms the French troops were to withdraw, and the Swiss troops, sent by the cantons of Zurich and Berne, were to evacuate Geneva by December 1, 1792. Clavière committed suicide in 1793.[245]At Geneva.[246]At Geneva the Government was vested in the two hundred and fifty citizens who composed thePetit Conseiland theConseil des Deux-Cents. Against this hereditary oligarchy Rousseau gave the signal of revolt by hisLettres de la Montagne(1764). Two parties were formed: one, theReprésentants, demanding a revision of the constitution; the other,Négatifs, opposing it. In 1781 the popular party gained the upper hand. The aristocratic party, appealing to the treaty of 1738, which only allowed constitutional changes to be made with the sanction of France and Sardinia, demanded the help of those two powers. A combined Swiss, French, and Sardinian force was sent, and in July, 1782, the popular party, who had promised to emulate the citizens of Saguntum, surrendered the city without a struggle, and the aristocratic constitution was restored. Brissot de Warville, asle Philadelphien à Genève, and Mallet du Pan were both eye-witnesses of the events of the revolution.[247]Albert, the second son of Madame de Staël, was born at this time.[248]Adam de Custine (1740-1794), a veteran of the Seven Years' and American Wars, commanded part of the French army of the Rhine. He made himself master of Spire, Worms, Mayence, and Frankfort; but was afterwards driven out of the two latter places by the Prussians. He was executed at Paris January 3, 1794.[249]The Prussian army, entangled in the wood of Argonne between the Meuse and the Marne, were outgeneralled by Dumouriez and Kellerman. The Duke of Brunswick, after the battle of Valmy (September 20), opened negotiations with Dumouriez (September 22-28) at Ste. Menehould, and then (October 1) retreated across the French frontier. The Austrians failed to take Lille, and, at the approach of Dumouriez, retired into the Low Countries (October 8). Dumouriez, following them, won the battle of Jemappes (November 6), and overran Belgium. At the same time the French troops were masters of Savoy and Nice, and of the country between the Rhine and the Maine. Fox rejoiced at the flight of the invaders. "No public event, not excepting Saratoga and York Town, ever happened that gave me so much delight" (C. J. F. to Lord Holland, October 12, 1792).[250]The French Revolution had stirred the political spirit of the Irish nation as, ten years before, it had been aroused by the American War. It appealed most strongly to the people by the abolition of tithes and all religious disqualifications. The Presbyterians of the North were Republican in their sympathies, and ready to make common cause with the Roman Catholics for the repeal of all penal laws and the extension of the franchise. The United Irishmen were the growth of this approximation of parties. Among the Roman Catholics also there was a rapid spread of the democratic spirit. The English Government was ready to grant a liberal measure of Catholic relief and to extend the suffrage to the Roman Catholics. At first the Irish Government strongly opposed any change which threatened the maintenance of Protestant ascendency. But the danger of union between the Protestant Republicans and the Catholic democrats became apparent, when the Catholic Convention met at Dublin in December, 1792, and a Relief Bill, repealing many oppressive enactments and conceding the franchise, was carried, almost without opposition, in the beginning of 1793. The Roman Catholics, it may be added, were excluded from the Irish Parliament in the reign of William III. (3 W. & M. c. 2) and deprived of the franchise in that of George II. (1 Geo. II. c. 9). Lord Sheffield, as a later letter shows, agreed with the Lord Lieutenant, Lord Westmorland, in advocating resistance to the Catholics "in limineandin toto," and in thinking that the suspicion, that the "British Government means to take up the Catholics, and to play what is called a Catholic game," would disastrously weaken the hold of the Government upon the country. Burke (Correspondence, vol. iv. p. 32) seems to suggest that Lord Sheffield was prejudiced by the possession of Irish property in the county of Louth.[251]Miss C. Moss, a frequent visitor at Sheffield Place.[252]Mdlle. Pauline de Pully.[253]The massacres of September, 1792.[254]The Duc de Liancourt (1747-1827) took the title of Rochefoucault-Liancourt on succeeding to his cousin, the Duc de la Rochefoucault who was murdered at Gisors in September, 1792. He had been a distinguished member of the Feuillants, or constitutional reformers. He escaped to England and thence to the United States. On his return to France he occupied himself with philanthropic works and the management of his estates. Both he and his cousin were generous patrons of Arthur Young during his travels in France (1787-89), and promoted that revival of agriculture at the close of the eighteenth century which corresponded with the similar movement in England.[255]The Princesse d'Hénin was rescued from Paris by Madame de Staël (Forneron,Hist. des Emigrés, vol. i. p. 244). It was at her house that Malouet, La Fayette, and the Constitutionnels had planned an escape for Louis XVI. in May, 1792.[256]The Duchess of Fitzjames was the daughter of the Comte de Thiars, anddame de palaisin the household of Marie Antoinette. Charles, her eldest son, died with the army of the princes. Edward, her second son, who succeeded to the title, distinguished himself by his oratorical powers in the Chamber of Peers at the Restoration, and in that of the Deputies under Louis Philippe.[257]On September 17, 1792, seventy-six French priests, and among them the Bishop of Avranches, landed at Hastings.[258]The report of the French Diplomatic Committee upon the two treaties of October 22 and November 2 was delivered by Brissot on November 21. It neither ratified nor rejected the treaties, reserving the question whether a free people could bind itself by treaties. At the same time the Convention ordered the French troops to respect the neutrality of Geneva, if the Swiss troops evacuated the city by December 1, 1792.[259]The Duke of Brunswick was charged with being bribed to retire. No ground for the accusation has ever been alleged, except that, on the duke's return, he paid off heavy debts. The charge was made by Talleyrand in 1802. It is repeated by both Lacretelle and Thiers in their histories. It is omitted by Michaud in his article on Brunswick, which appeared in theBiographie Universellein 1812; but it is given in the articles which the same writer contributed on Dumouriez and Drouet to the supplementary volume (1837). It is also made by the Comte d'Allonville in hisMémoires Secrets(vol. iii. pp. 94-97).[260]The Comtesse Charles de Noailles,néeNathalie de Laborde, the daughter of the banker of that name, married in 1790 Charles de Noailles, son of the Prince de Poix.[261]Louis Philippe Antoine de Noailles, Prince de Poix, eldest son of the Maréchal and Maréchale de Mouchy, who were guillotined on July 22, 1794. He commanded the Noailles Company of the Royal Body-guard. He was arrested in August, 1792, but escaped on his way to the Abbaye. He married Anne de Beauvau, who died in 1834.[262]The Comte de la Tour-du-Pin Gouvernet had been aide-de-camp to Bouillé at the repression of the mutiny at Nancy. He was entrusted with the task of opening the plan, formed for the rescue of the king and royal family in the early summer of 1792, to Marie Antoinette. Her distrust of La Fayette caused its failure. "Plutôt périr qu'être sauvé par La Fayette et les Constitutionnels!" was her well-known exclamation. Gouvernet subsequently went to America, and died at Lausanne in 1837.[263]The seat of the Duke of Portland.[264]Bigot de Sainte Croix, Minister for Foreign Affairs, was one of the agents in the schemes for the rescue of Louis XVI.[265]Terrier de Monciel, a member of the Constitutional party, Minister of the Interior from June 18 to July 9, 1792, endeavoured to organize a military force for the protection of the king which should be disassociated from the foreign allies of theémigrés. It was the discovery of this and other schemes for the king's rescue, in which Bertrand, Malouet, Mallet du Pan, and Clermont-Tonnerre were the leaders, that led to the disbanding of the Constitutional Guard, and the insurrections of June 20 and August 10, 1792. Monciel died in 1831.[266]The Marquis de Bertrand-Molleville (1744-1818) wasMinistre de la Marinein 1791. He took refuge in England in 1792, and there wrote hisMémoiresand hisHistoire de la Révolution de France.[267]Victor Malouet (1740-1814), distinguished by his explorations and his services in the French colonies (see hisCollection des Mémoires sur l'administration des colonies, Paris, 1802, 5 vols.), was a bold and skilful supporter of Louis XVI. in the Constituent Assembly. He returned to France in 1801, and was employed by Napoleon in the administration of the navy. He was appointed Ministre de la Marine by Louis XVIII. in 1814.[268]Probably the Baron de Gilliers, whose estates were near Romans in Dauphiné, and of whom Rivarol tells a story to illustrate the suspicion with which every aristocrat was regarded. Suspected of a royalist plot, the baron was charged with manufacturing cannon when he was only making drain-pipes; his house was occupied by hundreds of armed men, and his family narrowly escaped with their lives. He was gentleman-in-waiting to Madame Elizabeth.[269]Burke's plan for the settlement of the refugees in Maryland is discussed by him in a letter to his son, dated November 2, 1792 (Correspondence, vol. iv. pp. 25, 26).[270]Miss Holroyd.[271]Sheffield Place.[272]Joseph Servan (1741-1808), author of theSoldat Citoyen(1780), Minister of War in the Girondin administration (March to June, 1792). Dismissed by Louis XVI., he was restored to his office after August 10, 1792. He resigned his post in October, 1792, and afterwards commanded the troops which opposed the march of the Spaniards upon Bayonne in April, 1793.[273]Prince Charles of Hesse-Rheinfels-Rothenburg (1752-1821) entered the French service as a young man. He was made a lieutenant-general in 1792, and took up the command at Besançon, where he was received with enthusiasm as thecitoyen-général-philosophe. He accompanied his words with gestures which were almost convulsive in their violence, and closed his sentences by grinding his teeth, "un tigre doué de la parole." As a journalist (1795-99) he came into collision with the Government, and was imprisoned for several years in the island of Rhé. He died at Frankfort in 1821.[274]Henriette d'Aguessau, who married the Duc d'Ayen, was, like Madame de Biron, guillotined.[275]Marie, Princess of Hesse-Rheinfelz, married the Duc de Bouillon, the head, and last direct representative, of the family of La Tour d'Auvergne. She was by her marriage connected with the Princesse de Poix, and her cousin, the Princesse d'Hénin. The three ladies were known asles trois princesses combinées. Madame de Bouillon and her husband both died in exile.[276]Necker'sRéflexions offertes à la nation françaiseappeared in November, 1792.[277]Louis Pierre Manuel (1751-1793) was one of the leaders in the insurrections of June 20 and August 10, 1792. He was at this timeprocureurof the Commune of Paris. At the king's trial he defended Louis XVI., and, accused of being a counter-revolutionist, was guillotined in November, 1793.[278]Jean Marie François Dulau.[279]They were brothers, and belonged to the family of Rochefoucauld-Bayers.[280]Lord Loughborough accepted the Great Seal as Lord Chancellor in January, 1793.[281]I.e.the treaty of November 2.[282]The report of the Diplomatic Committee (November 21) on the treaties which Montesquieu had signed with Geneva, speaks of him as a man who "had put his name to many fraudulent and usurious proceedings, and who appeared to regard the Revolution as a speculation and a new kind of stock-jobbing."[283]François Christophe de Kellerman (1735-1820) was the hero of the battle of Valmy. In 1804 he was created Duc de Valmy by Napoleon.[284]Gibbon's surmise proved correct. On December 3, and again on December 27, theReprésentantsrose in arms, threatened to call in the aid of the French army if they were opposed, and replaced the Petit Conseil and the Conseil des Deux-Cents by two committees, organized on a popular basis, who exercised all the powers which were previously in the hands of the aristocracy.[285]Quà tamen usque potest, vires sibi demere tentat.Nec, quo centimanum dejecerat igne Typhœa,Nunc armatur eo: nimiùm feritatis in illo.Est aliud levius fulmen; cui dextra CyclopumSævitiæ, flammæque minus, minus addidit iræ:Tela secunda vocant Superi.[286]On December 1 an Order in Council was passed, calling out part of the militia. Another portion was called out on the western and southern coasts by a second Order of December 5. Parliament met on December 13 to ratify the step taken by the Government, within the fourteen days required by statute.[287]An association was formed, in November, 1792, at the St. Alban's Tavern, of members of Parliament and other persons of influence, including Lord Sheffield. A declaration was issued, stating that, in the opinion of those who signed it, it was in the present moment incumbent upon us "to give to the executive government a vigorous and effectual support, in counteracting the numerous efforts of sedition, in detecting and bringing to legal punishment the persons concerned therein, and in suppressing in their beginnings all tumults or riots, on whatever pretence they may be excited." Another association at the Crown and Anchor, presided over by Mr. Reeves, a barrister, and containing in the list of signatures the name of J. T. Batt, Lord Sheffield's friend, issued a similar declaration. Other associations were formed with the same object by the merchants and bankers of London, by the merchants, etc., at Lloyd's, by the general body of Protestant Dissenters in London and Westminster, by many of the Livery Companies, and by the Corporation of the City of London. The declaration to be signed in the county of Sussex is quoted in full at the beginning of theGentleman's Magazinefor July to December, 1792. The following note is added: "Association, on the best principle, is taking place throughout England, and nowhere in a better form than in Sussex, under the auspices of Lord Sheffield."[288]Fox, on December 13, declared the calling out of the militia to be a "ministerial manœuvre," and moved as an amendment to the address, "That his Majesty's faithful Commons, assembled in a manner new and alarming to the country, think it their first duty, and will make it their first business, to inform themselves of the causes of this measure, being equally zealous to enforce a due obedience to the laws on the one hand, and a faithful execution of them on the other."[289]Lord Malmesbury thus analyzes the minority: "21 were reformers, 4 Lord Lansdowne's members, and the rest people personally attached to Fox, and who, from this feeling, andagainst their sentiments, voted with him. Such were Crewe, Lord Edward Bentinck, Lord George Cavendish, Lord Milton, Lionel Damer, and others" (Diaries and Correspondence, vol. ii. p. 476).[290]On Saturday, December 15, Fox moved that an address be presented to his Majesty, "that a minister may be sent to Paris to treat with those persons who exercise provisionally the functions of executive government in France." The motion was negatived without a division.[291]"Some of the very worst of the French murderers on the 10th of August and beginning of September have been here, particularly oneRotundo, who was a principal performer in the massacres of the prisoners on the 2nd and 3rd of September. He was one of the executioners of Madame de Lamballe, of which I understand he boasted when in England, for I hear he is gone back" (Life and Letters of Sir Gilbert Elliot, vol. ii. p. 91). It is difficult to trace the foundation for the statement. One Petit Mamin was accused of having boasted that he had killed the princess; but he denied having made the boast, and proved, to the satisfaction of the jury, that he was not in Paris at the time (Mortimer-Ternaux,Histoire de la Terreur, 1792-94, vol. iii. pp. 632, 633). In Lescure'sVie de la Princesse de Lamballe(pp. 426-428) the names of the murderers are given as Charlat and Grison. M. Feuillet de Conches (Louis XVI., Marie Antoinette, et Madame Elisabeth, vol. vi. p. 316) says that Gonchon was the name of the man who first struck down the princess.[292]François, Marquis de Barthélemy (1750-1830), concluded three treaties at Basle in 1795—with Prussia, the United Provinces, and Spain. He was a member of the Directory; but, suspected for his moderation, was sent, first to Cayenne, then to Sinnamari. Thence he escaped to England. He assisted in drawing up the charter at the restoration of Louis XVIII.[293]Boydell was Lord Mayor in 1790-91.[294]On December 21, 1792, a copy was read to the House of Commons of the instructions sent to Earl Gower, the British Ambassador at Paris, signifying his recall in August on the ground that, as the executive power was withdrawn from Louis XVI., the credentials under which the ambassador acted were no longer available. In the instructions, the king, while "adhering to the principles of neutrality in respect to the settlement of the internal government of France," considered it "no deviation from those principles to manifest, by all the means in his power, his solicitude for the personal situation of their most Christian majesties, and their royal family; and he earnestly and anxiously hopes that they will, at least, be secure from any acts of violence, which cannot fail to produce one universal sentiment of indignation through every country of Europe." It was unanimously resolved that the paper should remain on the table of the House. The king was sentenced to death by the Convention, January 17, 1793. His appeal to the nation was rejected, January 19-20, and the final sentence announced to him on Sunday, January 20. He was executed the following day.[295]Chauvelin had been accredited by Louis XVI. in May, 1792. But he now (December 27) addressed a note to Lord Grenville, as agent of the Executive Council of the French Republic, asking whether Great Britain was to be considered as a belligerent or as a neutral power. Lord Grenville declined (December 31) to acknowledge his official position, but explained the policy of the British Government. On January 18, 1793, Lord Grenville replied to M. Chauvelin that the British Government would continue its preparations to protect the country and its allies, and to oppose a barrier to French views of aggrandizement and the propagation of destructive principles. On January 24, M. Chauvelin was ordered to leave the kingdom within eight days. He left on January 25. The Convention declared war against England and Holland, February 8, 1793, and against Spain, March 7.[296]Lord Sheffield alludes to the debate on the second reading of the Alien Bill (December 28, 1792). Fox opposed the Bill; Sir Gilbert Elliot spoke for it, and stated that the Duke of Portland was in its favour, and that the majority of the Opposition, of which the duke was the leader, intended to support the Government. After the debate, Elliot, Wyndham, and Fox met at the Duke of Portland's, when the duke stated that Sir Gilbert had correctly expressed his views. Fox, however, recovered his ascendency over the Duke of Portland, who authorized the Marquis of Titchfield (December 31), his eldest son, M.P. for Buckinghamshire, to confine the support of the Opposition to this particular measure. The marquis ended his speech with an attack upon the individual ministers, a passage added, it is said, by Fox, which neutralized the effect of his support (Diaries and Correspondence of Lord Malmesbury, vol. ii. pp. 494, 495).[297]The Parliamentary recess lasted from January 4 to January 28, 1793.[298]Louis XVI. was executed in the Place de la Révolution at 10.22 in the morning of Monday, January 21, 1793.[299]The message was delivered on January 28, laying before the House the correspondence between Lord Grenville and M. Chauvelin, and asking for an augmentation of the forces by sea and land.[300]The Heads of Illustrious Persons of Great Britain, with their Lives and Characters, 2 vols. fol., 1743-52, by the Rev. Thomas Birch, D.D. The engravings are by Houbraken, Gravelot, and Vertue.[301]Hugues Bernard Maret, afterwards Duc de Bassano (1763-1839), was editor of theBulletinin which were reported the debates of the National Assembly. He had served in Belgium in concert with Dumouriez. He had already been sent to England by the Convention. He now returned with fuller powers. He remained in London till February after the dismissal of Chauvelin, and only left when the war was declared. He was a favourite of Napoleon, and Minister of the Interior under Louis Philippe.[302]Jean Nicolas Pache (1740-1823) replaced Servan as Minister of War in October, 1792. In February, 1793, he became Mayor of Paris, and was responsible for many of the worst horrors of that year.[303]The debate on the king's message for the augmentation of the forces took place on February 1. Fox spoke against the increase. It may be added that Mr. Whitbread, speaking on the same side, and alluding to the Duke of Brunswick's manifestos, said that they breathed the spirit of Attila, "who, in the emphatical words recorded by Mr. Gibbon, had said, 'Where Attila's horse sets his foot, the grass never grows.'"[304]Probably Mr. George Nicol. See p. 359.[305]This letter is printed in Lord Campbell's life of Lord Chancellor Loughborough as from the Rosslyn Manuscripts, and Lord Campbell remarks in a note that in 1796, when about to publish the first edition of Gibbon's miscellaneous works, Lord Sheffield applied to Lord Loughborough for permission to include this letter, but was refused. He made a second application, offering to erase his name and the name of his office (which in effect was done), but "Lord Loughborough was sensitive upon the subject of his coalition with Mr. Pitt, and he remained inflexible." However, the letterdoesappear in the first edition, a fact which must have escaped Lord Campbell's attention.[306]"All ranks of people have put on mourning for the unfortunate king." Lady Malmesbury to Lady Elliot, January 28, 1793 (Life and Letters of Sir G. Elliot, vol. ii. p. 110).[307]Throughout 1793, and especially in September, Lord Chatham as First Lord of the Admiralty was in dispute with the Master of the Ordnance, the Duke of Richmond. One alleged that the fleet was ready but that the guns were not; the other stated that the ships were not ready to take the guns. Lord Sandwich was Lord of the Admiralty during the American War.[308]TheSonge d'un Angloisand thePlaidoyer pour Louis XVI., both by Lally Tollendal, are printed in the second volume (pp. 251-286 and 357-388) of the "Collection des meilleurs ouvrages qui ont été publiés pour la Défense de Louis XVI.," par A. J. du Gour: Paris, 1796. From an autograph letter in George III.'s copy ofStrafford, it appears that Lally, through Lady Sheffield, presented a copy of thePlaidoyerto the king.[309]Probably Horace Walpole'sEssay on Modern Gardening, which was written in 1770, and printed at the Strawberry Hill Press in 1785 (4to), with a French translation on opposite pages by the Duc de Nivernois.[310]"Madame de Staël, daughter of M. Necker, is now at the head of the colony of French noblesse, established near Mickleham. She is one of the first women I have ever met with for abilities and extraordinary intellect." Miss Burney to Dr. Burney, February 4, 1793 (Diary and Letters, vol. v. p. 394).[311]Lord Porchester, son of Gen. the Hon. W. Herbert, fifth son of the Earl of Pembroke, was created Earl of Carnarvon in July, 1793.[312]The Duke of York.[313]Lady Sheffield died April 3, 1793. Her death is said to have been occasioned by her attendance upon the sickémigrésat Guy's hospital (Gentleman's Magazinefor 1793, part i. p. 379).[314]Wilhelm de Severy.[315]A select committee appointed (April 25, 1793) to consider the state of commercial credit reported (April 29), recommending,inter alia, that five millions should be issued in Exchequer Bills for the relief of credit. The report was considered on April 30; a resolution, and subsequently a Bill, were carried for the issue of the Bills. A commission was appointed (May 3), with Lord Sheffield at the head of it, to effect the necessary arrangements.[316]Mayence was invested by the Prussian and Austrian forces early in April, 1793. It was surrendered July 22, 1793.[317]Thomas, Lord Elgin, was appointed in August, 1792, Envoy Extraordinary at Brussels. Subsequently appointed Ambassador at Constantinople in 1799, he collected the Elgin marbles.[318]Madame de Sylva.[319]John Augustus, Lord Hervey, a captain in the Royal Navy, second son of the Bishop of Derry, and brother to Lady Elisabeth Foster, was ambassador at Florence from 1787 to 1794. In 1793 he insisted in a violent note on the dismissal of the French Minister, La Flotte, from the court of the Grand Duke of Tuscany. "It was generally supposed," writes Lord Holland, (Memoirs of the Whig Party, p. 56), "in themaldicentecity of Florence, that resentment at the French Minister for having supplanted him in the good graces of a lady quickened his hatred of the French Republick, or at least gave it the turn of insisting on the dismissal of his rival." Lord Hervey, in consequence of the affair, was recalled from Florence in 1794.[320]New toll-gates had been placed on the bridge at Bristol; but they were burnt by a mob which, from September 30 to October 3, attacked the toll-houses, and broke the windows of the Guildhall and Council-house. The Herefordshire Militia were twice called out and ordered to fire on the mob; eleven rioters were killed and forty-five wounded. The attempt to raise a toll was abandoned.

[236]Lord Guilford, better known as Lord North, died August 5, 1792.

[237]Sir Joshua Reynolds died February 23, 1792.

[238]The Duke of Brunswick, as commander-in-chief of the combined armies of Austria and Prussia, issued his manifesto on July 25, 1792, before crossing the French frontier and directing his march on Paris.

[239]Lally left France for Switzerland after October, 1789, and thence passed to England. Realizing the dangerous position of the king and royal family, he returned to Paris in May, 1792, and with Bertrand-Molleville, Malouet, La Fayette, and others, endeavoured to effect the escape of the king and queen. On August 10, 1792, he was arrested and imprisoned in the Abbaye. On August 22, 1792, ten days before the September massacres, the French Minister of Foreign Affairs informed the National Assembly that Lally Tollendal demanded a passport for England, of which country he had become a naturalized subject. He also produced a letter from Lord Gower claiming Lally as a British subject. According to Madame de Staël he owed his escape to Condorcet.

[240]Madame de Staël, in herConsidérations sur la Révolution Française(ed. 1818, tom. ii. ch. x.), describes her appearance before Robespierre at the Hôtel de Ville in the Place de Grève, and attributes her escape, on September 2-3, 1792, to Manuel.

[241]Marie Thérèse de Savoie-Carignan married, in 1767, Louis de Bourbon-Penthièvre, Prince de Lamballe. She was murdered at La Force in the September massacres of 1792, and her head, raised on a pike, was paraded before the windows of the Temple where the queen was confined. The Swiss Guard, nearly eight hundred in number, were massacred in the attack upon the Tuileries on August 10, 1792. Of the few who escaped, fifty-four were murdered in the Abbaye at the September massacres. Their death is commemorated by Thorwaldsen's lion at Lucerne.

[242]See letter of May 30, 1792.

[243]On September 21, 1792, without any declaration of war, Montesquieu entered Savoy, seized Montmélian and Chambéry, and in a few days overran the whole duchy. In Piedmont the French troops under General Anselme, supported by Admiral Truguet and the Toulon fleet, captured Nice and Villa Franca. The Duchy of Savoy was incorporated with France in November, 1792, as the Department of Mont-Blanc, and the Comté of Nice as the Department of the Maritime Alps.

[244]Etienne Clavière (1735-1793), formerly a banker in Geneva, had been banished in 1784 for his writings. As a member of the Executive Council, he urged upon his colleagues the attack upon Geneva, and orders to that effect were given to Montesquieu by Servan, the Minister of War. Geneva appealed for aid to Zurich and Berne under a treaty of 1584, and prepared for defence. A treaty was signed, October 22, 1792, between Montesquieu and the Republic of Geneva, slightly modified by a fresh treaty signed on November 2. By its terms the French troops were to withdraw, and the Swiss troops, sent by the cantons of Zurich and Berne, were to evacuate Geneva by December 1, 1792. Clavière committed suicide in 1793.

[245]At Geneva.

[246]At Geneva the Government was vested in the two hundred and fifty citizens who composed thePetit Conseiland theConseil des Deux-Cents. Against this hereditary oligarchy Rousseau gave the signal of revolt by hisLettres de la Montagne(1764). Two parties were formed: one, theReprésentants, demanding a revision of the constitution; the other,Négatifs, opposing it. In 1781 the popular party gained the upper hand. The aristocratic party, appealing to the treaty of 1738, which only allowed constitutional changes to be made with the sanction of France and Sardinia, demanded the help of those two powers. A combined Swiss, French, and Sardinian force was sent, and in July, 1782, the popular party, who had promised to emulate the citizens of Saguntum, surrendered the city without a struggle, and the aristocratic constitution was restored. Brissot de Warville, asle Philadelphien à Genève, and Mallet du Pan were both eye-witnesses of the events of the revolution.

[247]Albert, the second son of Madame de Staël, was born at this time.

[248]Adam de Custine (1740-1794), a veteran of the Seven Years' and American Wars, commanded part of the French army of the Rhine. He made himself master of Spire, Worms, Mayence, and Frankfort; but was afterwards driven out of the two latter places by the Prussians. He was executed at Paris January 3, 1794.

[249]The Prussian army, entangled in the wood of Argonne between the Meuse and the Marne, were outgeneralled by Dumouriez and Kellerman. The Duke of Brunswick, after the battle of Valmy (September 20), opened negotiations with Dumouriez (September 22-28) at Ste. Menehould, and then (October 1) retreated across the French frontier. The Austrians failed to take Lille, and, at the approach of Dumouriez, retired into the Low Countries (October 8). Dumouriez, following them, won the battle of Jemappes (November 6), and overran Belgium. At the same time the French troops were masters of Savoy and Nice, and of the country between the Rhine and the Maine. Fox rejoiced at the flight of the invaders. "No public event, not excepting Saratoga and York Town, ever happened that gave me so much delight" (C. J. F. to Lord Holland, October 12, 1792).

[250]The French Revolution had stirred the political spirit of the Irish nation as, ten years before, it had been aroused by the American War. It appealed most strongly to the people by the abolition of tithes and all religious disqualifications. The Presbyterians of the North were Republican in their sympathies, and ready to make common cause with the Roman Catholics for the repeal of all penal laws and the extension of the franchise. The United Irishmen were the growth of this approximation of parties. Among the Roman Catholics also there was a rapid spread of the democratic spirit. The English Government was ready to grant a liberal measure of Catholic relief and to extend the suffrage to the Roman Catholics. At first the Irish Government strongly opposed any change which threatened the maintenance of Protestant ascendency. But the danger of union between the Protestant Republicans and the Catholic democrats became apparent, when the Catholic Convention met at Dublin in December, 1792, and a Relief Bill, repealing many oppressive enactments and conceding the franchise, was carried, almost without opposition, in the beginning of 1793. The Roman Catholics, it may be added, were excluded from the Irish Parliament in the reign of William III. (3 W. & M. c. 2) and deprived of the franchise in that of George II. (1 Geo. II. c. 9). Lord Sheffield, as a later letter shows, agreed with the Lord Lieutenant, Lord Westmorland, in advocating resistance to the Catholics "in limineandin toto," and in thinking that the suspicion, that the "British Government means to take up the Catholics, and to play what is called a Catholic game," would disastrously weaken the hold of the Government upon the country. Burke (Correspondence, vol. iv. p. 32) seems to suggest that Lord Sheffield was prejudiced by the possession of Irish property in the county of Louth.

[251]Miss C. Moss, a frequent visitor at Sheffield Place.

[252]Mdlle. Pauline de Pully.

[253]The massacres of September, 1792.

[254]The Duc de Liancourt (1747-1827) took the title of Rochefoucault-Liancourt on succeeding to his cousin, the Duc de la Rochefoucault who was murdered at Gisors in September, 1792. He had been a distinguished member of the Feuillants, or constitutional reformers. He escaped to England and thence to the United States. On his return to France he occupied himself with philanthropic works and the management of his estates. Both he and his cousin were generous patrons of Arthur Young during his travels in France (1787-89), and promoted that revival of agriculture at the close of the eighteenth century which corresponded with the similar movement in England.

[255]The Princesse d'Hénin was rescued from Paris by Madame de Staël (Forneron,Hist. des Emigrés, vol. i. p. 244). It was at her house that Malouet, La Fayette, and the Constitutionnels had planned an escape for Louis XVI. in May, 1792.

[256]The Duchess of Fitzjames was the daughter of the Comte de Thiars, anddame de palaisin the household of Marie Antoinette. Charles, her eldest son, died with the army of the princes. Edward, her second son, who succeeded to the title, distinguished himself by his oratorical powers in the Chamber of Peers at the Restoration, and in that of the Deputies under Louis Philippe.

[257]On September 17, 1792, seventy-six French priests, and among them the Bishop of Avranches, landed at Hastings.

[258]The report of the French Diplomatic Committee upon the two treaties of October 22 and November 2 was delivered by Brissot on November 21. It neither ratified nor rejected the treaties, reserving the question whether a free people could bind itself by treaties. At the same time the Convention ordered the French troops to respect the neutrality of Geneva, if the Swiss troops evacuated the city by December 1, 1792.

[259]The Duke of Brunswick was charged with being bribed to retire. No ground for the accusation has ever been alleged, except that, on the duke's return, he paid off heavy debts. The charge was made by Talleyrand in 1802. It is repeated by both Lacretelle and Thiers in their histories. It is omitted by Michaud in his article on Brunswick, which appeared in theBiographie Universellein 1812; but it is given in the articles which the same writer contributed on Dumouriez and Drouet to the supplementary volume (1837). It is also made by the Comte d'Allonville in hisMémoires Secrets(vol. iii. pp. 94-97).

[260]The Comtesse Charles de Noailles,néeNathalie de Laborde, the daughter of the banker of that name, married in 1790 Charles de Noailles, son of the Prince de Poix.

[261]Louis Philippe Antoine de Noailles, Prince de Poix, eldest son of the Maréchal and Maréchale de Mouchy, who were guillotined on July 22, 1794. He commanded the Noailles Company of the Royal Body-guard. He was arrested in August, 1792, but escaped on his way to the Abbaye. He married Anne de Beauvau, who died in 1834.

[262]The Comte de la Tour-du-Pin Gouvernet had been aide-de-camp to Bouillé at the repression of the mutiny at Nancy. He was entrusted with the task of opening the plan, formed for the rescue of the king and royal family in the early summer of 1792, to Marie Antoinette. Her distrust of La Fayette caused its failure. "Plutôt périr qu'être sauvé par La Fayette et les Constitutionnels!" was her well-known exclamation. Gouvernet subsequently went to America, and died at Lausanne in 1837.

[263]The seat of the Duke of Portland.

[264]Bigot de Sainte Croix, Minister for Foreign Affairs, was one of the agents in the schemes for the rescue of Louis XVI.

[265]Terrier de Monciel, a member of the Constitutional party, Minister of the Interior from June 18 to July 9, 1792, endeavoured to organize a military force for the protection of the king which should be disassociated from the foreign allies of theémigrés. It was the discovery of this and other schemes for the king's rescue, in which Bertrand, Malouet, Mallet du Pan, and Clermont-Tonnerre were the leaders, that led to the disbanding of the Constitutional Guard, and the insurrections of June 20 and August 10, 1792. Monciel died in 1831.

[266]The Marquis de Bertrand-Molleville (1744-1818) wasMinistre de la Marinein 1791. He took refuge in England in 1792, and there wrote hisMémoiresand hisHistoire de la Révolution de France.

[267]Victor Malouet (1740-1814), distinguished by his explorations and his services in the French colonies (see hisCollection des Mémoires sur l'administration des colonies, Paris, 1802, 5 vols.), was a bold and skilful supporter of Louis XVI. in the Constituent Assembly. He returned to France in 1801, and was employed by Napoleon in the administration of the navy. He was appointed Ministre de la Marine by Louis XVIII. in 1814.

[268]Probably the Baron de Gilliers, whose estates were near Romans in Dauphiné, and of whom Rivarol tells a story to illustrate the suspicion with which every aristocrat was regarded. Suspected of a royalist plot, the baron was charged with manufacturing cannon when he was only making drain-pipes; his house was occupied by hundreds of armed men, and his family narrowly escaped with their lives. He was gentleman-in-waiting to Madame Elizabeth.

[269]Burke's plan for the settlement of the refugees in Maryland is discussed by him in a letter to his son, dated November 2, 1792 (Correspondence, vol. iv. pp. 25, 26).

[270]Miss Holroyd.

[271]Sheffield Place.

[272]Joseph Servan (1741-1808), author of theSoldat Citoyen(1780), Minister of War in the Girondin administration (March to June, 1792). Dismissed by Louis XVI., he was restored to his office after August 10, 1792. He resigned his post in October, 1792, and afterwards commanded the troops which opposed the march of the Spaniards upon Bayonne in April, 1793.

[273]Prince Charles of Hesse-Rheinfels-Rothenburg (1752-1821) entered the French service as a young man. He was made a lieutenant-general in 1792, and took up the command at Besançon, where he was received with enthusiasm as thecitoyen-général-philosophe. He accompanied his words with gestures which were almost convulsive in their violence, and closed his sentences by grinding his teeth, "un tigre doué de la parole." As a journalist (1795-99) he came into collision with the Government, and was imprisoned for several years in the island of Rhé. He died at Frankfort in 1821.

[274]Henriette d'Aguessau, who married the Duc d'Ayen, was, like Madame de Biron, guillotined.

[275]Marie, Princess of Hesse-Rheinfelz, married the Duc de Bouillon, the head, and last direct representative, of the family of La Tour d'Auvergne. She was by her marriage connected with the Princesse de Poix, and her cousin, the Princesse d'Hénin. The three ladies were known asles trois princesses combinées. Madame de Bouillon and her husband both died in exile.

[276]Necker'sRéflexions offertes à la nation françaiseappeared in November, 1792.

[277]Louis Pierre Manuel (1751-1793) was one of the leaders in the insurrections of June 20 and August 10, 1792. He was at this timeprocureurof the Commune of Paris. At the king's trial he defended Louis XVI., and, accused of being a counter-revolutionist, was guillotined in November, 1793.

[278]Jean Marie François Dulau.

[279]They were brothers, and belonged to the family of Rochefoucauld-Bayers.

[280]Lord Loughborough accepted the Great Seal as Lord Chancellor in January, 1793.

[281]I.e.the treaty of November 2.

[282]The report of the Diplomatic Committee (November 21) on the treaties which Montesquieu had signed with Geneva, speaks of him as a man who "had put his name to many fraudulent and usurious proceedings, and who appeared to regard the Revolution as a speculation and a new kind of stock-jobbing."

[283]François Christophe de Kellerman (1735-1820) was the hero of the battle of Valmy. In 1804 he was created Duc de Valmy by Napoleon.

[284]Gibbon's surmise proved correct. On December 3, and again on December 27, theReprésentantsrose in arms, threatened to call in the aid of the French army if they were opposed, and replaced the Petit Conseil and the Conseil des Deux-Cents by two committees, organized on a popular basis, who exercised all the powers which were previously in the hands of the aristocracy.

[285]Quà tamen usque potest, vires sibi demere tentat.Nec, quo centimanum dejecerat igne Typhœa,Nunc armatur eo: nimiùm feritatis in illo.Est aliud levius fulmen; cui dextra CyclopumSævitiæ, flammæque minus, minus addidit iræ:Tela secunda vocant Superi.

[285]

Quà tamen usque potest, vires sibi demere tentat.Nec, quo centimanum dejecerat igne Typhœa,Nunc armatur eo: nimiùm feritatis in illo.Est aliud levius fulmen; cui dextra CyclopumSævitiæ, flammæque minus, minus addidit iræ:Tela secunda vocant Superi.

Quà tamen usque potest, vires sibi demere tentat.

Nec, quo centimanum dejecerat igne Typhœa,

Nunc armatur eo: nimiùm feritatis in illo.

Est aliud levius fulmen; cui dextra Cyclopum

Sævitiæ, flammæque minus, minus addidit iræ:

Tela secunda vocant Superi.

[286]On December 1 an Order in Council was passed, calling out part of the militia. Another portion was called out on the western and southern coasts by a second Order of December 5. Parliament met on December 13 to ratify the step taken by the Government, within the fourteen days required by statute.

[287]An association was formed, in November, 1792, at the St. Alban's Tavern, of members of Parliament and other persons of influence, including Lord Sheffield. A declaration was issued, stating that, in the opinion of those who signed it, it was in the present moment incumbent upon us "to give to the executive government a vigorous and effectual support, in counteracting the numerous efforts of sedition, in detecting and bringing to legal punishment the persons concerned therein, and in suppressing in their beginnings all tumults or riots, on whatever pretence they may be excited." Another association at the Crown and Anchor, presided over by Mr. Reeves, a barrister, and containing in the list of signatures the name of J. T. Batt, Lord Sheffield's friend, issued a similar declaration. Other associations were formed with the same object by the merchants and bankers of London, by the merchants, etc., at Lloyd's, by the general body of Protestant Dissenters in London and Westminster, by many of the Livery Companies, and by the Corporation of the City of London. The declaration to be signed in the county of Sussex is quoted in full at the beginning of theGentleman's Magazinefor July to December, 1792. The following note is added: "Association, on the best principle, is taking place throughout England, and nowhere in a better form than in Sussex, under the auspices of Lord Sheffield."

[288]Fox, on December 13, declared the calling out of the militia to be a "ministerial manœuvre," and moved as an amendment to the address, "That his Majesty's faithful Commons, assembled in a manner new and alarming to the country, think it their first duty, and will make it their first business, to inform themselves of the causes of this measure, being equally zealous to enforce a due obedience to the laws on the one hand, and a faithful execution of them on the other."

[289]Lord Malmesbury thus analyzes the minority: "21 were reformers, 4 Lord Lansdowne's members, and the rest people personally attached to Fox, and who, from this feeling, andagainst their sentiments, voted with him. Such were Crewe, Lord Edward Bentinck, Lord George Cavendish, Lord Milton, Lionel Damer, and others" (Diaries and Correspondence, vol. ii. p. 476).

[290]On Saturday, December 15, Fox moved that an address be presented to his Majesty, "that a minister may be sent to Paris to treat with those persons who exercise provisionally the functions of executive government in France." The motion was negatived without a division.

[291]"Some of the very worst of the French murderers on the 10th of August and beginning of September have been here, particularly oneRotundo, who was a principal performer in the massacres of the prisoners on the 2nd and 3rd of September. He was one of the executioners of Madame de Lamballe, of which I understand he boasted when in England, for I hear he is gone back" (Life and Letters of Sir Gilbert Elliot, vol. ii. p. 91). It is difficult to trace the foundation for the statement. One Petit Mamin was accused of having boasted that he had killed the princess; but he denied having made the boast, and proved, to the satisfaction of the jury, that he was not in Paris at the time (Mortimer-Ternaux,Histoire de la Terreur, 1792-94, vol. iii. pp. 632, 633). In Lescure'sVie de la Princesse de Lamballe(pp. 426-428) the names of the murderers are given as Charlat and Grison. M. Feuillet de Conches (Louis XVI., Marie Antoinette, et Madame Elisabeth, vol. vi. p. 316) says that Gonchon was the name of the man who first struck down the princess.

[292]François, Marquis de Barthélemy (1750-1830), concluded three treaties at Basle in 1795—with Prussia, the United Provinces, and Spain. He was a member of the Directory; but, suspected for his moderation, was sent, first to Cayenne, then to Sinnamari. Thence he escaped to England. He assisted in drawing up the charter at the restoration of Louis XVIII.

[293]Boydell was Lord Mayor in 1790-91.

[294]On December 21, 1792, a copy was read to the House of Commons of the instructions sent to Earl Gower, the British Ambassador at Paris, signifying his recall in August on the ground that, as the executive power was withdrawn from Louis XVI., the credentials under which the ambassador acted were no longer available. In the instructions, the king, while "adhering to the principles of neutrality in respect to the settlement of the internal government of France," considered it "no deviation from those principles to manifest, by all the means in his power, his solicitude for the personal situation of their most Christian majesties, and their royal family; and he earnestly and anxiously hopes that they will, at least, be secure from any acts of violence, which cannot fail to produce one universal sentiment of indignation through every country of Europe." It was unanimously resolved that the paper should remain on the table of the House. The king was sentenced to death by the Convention, January 17, 1793. His appeal to the nation was rejected, January 19-20, and the final sentence announced to him on Sunday, January 20. He was executed the following day.

[295]Chauvelin had been accredited by Louis XVI. in May, 1792. But he now (December 27) addressed a note to Lord Grenville, as agent of the Executive Council of the French Republic, asking whether Great Britain was to be considered as a belligerent or as a neutral power. Lord Grenville declined (December 31) to acknowledge his official position, but explained the policy of the British Government. On January 18, 1793, Lord Grenville replied to M. Chauvelin that the British Government would continue its preparations to protect the country and its allies, and to oppose a barrier to French views of aggrandizement and the propagation of destructive principles. On January 24, M. Chauvelin was ordered to leave the kingdom within eight days. He left on January 25. The Convention declared war against England and Holland, February 8, 1793, and against Spain, March 7.

[296]Lord Sheffield alludes to the debate on the second reading of the Alien Bill (December 28, 1792). Fox opposed the Bill; Sir Gilbert Elliot spoke for it, and stated that the Duke of Portland was in its favour, and that the majority of the Opposition, of which the duke was the leader, intended to support the Government. After the debate, Elliot, Wyndham, and Fox met at the Duke of Portland's, when the duke stated that Sir Gilbert had correctly expressed his views. Fox, however, recovered his ascendency over the Duke of Portland, who authorized the Marquis of Titchfield (December 31), his eldest son, M.P. for Buckinghamshire, to confine the support of the Opposition to this particular measure. The marquis ended his speech with an attack upon the individual ministers, a passage added, it is said, by Fox, which neutralized the effect of his support (Diaries and Correspondence of Lord Malmesbury, vol. ii. pp. 494, 495).

[297]The Parliamentary recess lasted from January 4 to January 28, 1793.

[298]Louis XVI. was executed in the Place de la Révolution at 10.22 in the morning of Monday, January 21, 1793.

[299]The message was delivered on January 28, laying before the House the correspondence between Lord Grenville and M. Chauvelin, and asking for an augmentation of the forces by sea and land.

[300]The Heads of Illustrious Persons of Great Britain, with their Lives and Characters, 2 vols. fol., 1743-52, by the Rev. Thomas Birch, D.D. The engravings are by Houbraken, Gravelot, and Vertue.

[301]Hugues Bernard Maret, afterwards Duc de Bassano (1763-1839), was editor of theBulletinin which were reported the debates of the National Assembly. He had served in Belgium in concert with Dumouriez. He had already been sent to England by the Convention. He now returned with fuller powers. He remained in London till February after the dismissal of Chauvelin, and only left when the war was declared. He was a favourite of Napoleon, and Minister of the Interior under Louis Philippe.

[302]Jean Nicolas Pache (1740-1823) replaced Servan as Minister of War in October, 1792. In February, 1793, he became Mayor of Paris, and was responsible for many of the worst horrors of that year.

[303]The debate on the king's message for the augmentation of the forces took place on February 1. Fox spoke against the increase. It may be added that Mr. Whitbread, speaking on the same side, and alluding to the Duke of Brunswick's manifestos, said that they breathed the spirit of Attila, "who, in the emphatical words recorded by Mr. Gibbon, had said, 'Where Attila's horse sets his foot, the grass never grows.'"

[304]Probably Mr. George Nicol. See p. 359.

[305]This letter is printed in Lord Campbell's life of Lord Chancellor Loughborough as from the Rosslyn Manuscripts, and Lord Campbell remarks in a note that in 1796, when about to publish the first edition of Gibbon's miscellaneous works, Lord Sheffield applied to Lord Loughborough for permission to include this letter, but was refused. He made a second application, offering to erase his name and the name of his office (which in effect was done), but "Lord Loughborough was sensitive upon the subject of his coalition with Mr. Pitt, and he remained inflexible." However, the letterdoesappear in the first edition, a fact which must have escaped Lord Campbell's attention.

[306]"All ranks of people have put on mourning for the unfortunate king." Lady Malmesbury to Lady Elliot, January 28, 1793 (Life and Letters of Sir G. Elliot, vol. ii. p. 110).

[307]Throughout 1793, and especially in September, Lord Chatham as First Lord of the Admiralty was in dispute with the Master of the Ordnance, the Duke of Richmond. One alleged that the fleet was ready but that the guns were not; the other stated that the ships were not ready to take the guns. Lord Sandwich was Lord of the Admiralty during the American War.

[308]TheSonge d'un Angloisand thePlaidoyer pour Louis XVI., both by Lally Tollendal, are printed in the second volume (pp. 251-286 and 357-388) of the "Collection des meilleurs ouvrages qui ont été publiés pour la Défense de Louis XVI.," par A. J. du Gour: Paris, 1796. From an autograph letter in George III.'s copy ofStrafford, it appears that Lally, through Lady Sheffield, presented a copy of thePlaidoyerto the king.

[309]Probably Horace Walpole'sEssay on Modern Gardening, which was written in 1770, and printed at the Strawberry Hill Press in 1785 (4to), with a French translation on opposite pages by the Duc de Nivernois.

[310]"Madame de Staël, daughter of M. Necker, is now at the head of the colony of French noblesse, established near Mickleham. She is one of the first women I have ever met with for abilities and extraordinary intellect." Miss Burney to Dr. Burney, February 4, 1793 (Diary and Letters, vol. v. p. 394).

[311]Lord Porchester, son of Gen. the Hon. W. Herbert, fifth son of the Earl of Pembroke, was created Earl of Carnarvon in July, 1793.

[312]The Duke of York.

[313]Lady Sheffield died April 3, 1793. Her death is said to have been occasioned by her attendance upon the sickémigrésat Guy's hospital (Gentleman's Magazinefor 1793, part i. p. 379).

[314]Wilhelm de Severy.

[315]A select committee appointed (April 25, 1793) to consider the state of commercial credit reported (April 29), recommending,inter alia, that five millions should be issued in Exchequer Bills for the relief of credit. The report was considered on April 30; a resolution, and subsequently a Bill, were carried for the issue of the Bills. A commission was appointed (May 3), with Lord Sheffield at the head of it, to effect the necessary arrangements.

[316]Mayence was invested by the Prussian and Austrian forces early in April, 1793. It was surrendered July 22, 1793.

[317]Thomas, Lord Elgin, was appointed in August, 1792, Envoy Extraordinary at Brussels. Subsequently appointed Ambassador at Constantinople in 1799, he collected the Elgin marbles.

[318]Madame de Sylva.

[319]John Augustus, Lord Hervey, a captain in the Royal Navy, second son of the Bishop of Derry, and brother to Lady Elisabeth Foster, was ambassador at Florence from 1787 to 1794. In 1793 he insisted in a violent note on the dismissal of the French Minister, La Flotte, from the court of the Grand Duke of Tuscany. "It was generally supposed," writes Lord Holland, (Memoirs of the Whig Party, p. 56), "in themaldicentecity of Florence, that resentment at the French Minister for having supplanted him in the good graces of a lady quickened his hatred of the French Republick, or at least gave it the turn of insisting on the dismissal of his rival." Lord Hervey, in consequence of the affair, was recalled from Florence in 1794.

[320]New toll-gates had been placed on the bridge at Bristol; but they were burnt by a mob which, from September 30 to October 3, attacked the toll-houses, and broke the windows of the Guildhall and Council-house. The Herefordshire Militia were twice called out and ordered to fire on the mob; eleven rioters were killed and forty-five wounded. The attempt to raise a toll was abandoned.

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