party could discuss the question of the peace of Utrecht with calmness and impartiality. That the Whig Ministers had sold us to the Dutch; that the Tory Ministers had sold us to the French; that the war had been carried on only to fill the pockets of Marlborough; that the peace had been concluded only to facilitate the return of the Pretender; these imputations and many others, utterly unfounded, or grossly exaggerated, were hurled backward and forward by the political disputants of the last century. In our time the question may be discussed without irritation. We will state, as concisely as possible, the reasons which have led us to the conclusion at which we have arrived. The dangers which were to be apprehended from the peace were two; first, the danger that Philip might be induced, by feelings of private affection, to act in strict concert with the elder branch of his house, to favour the French trade at the expense of England, and to side with the French government in future wars; secondly, the danger that the posterity of the Duke of Burgundy might become extinct, that Philip might become heir by blood to the French crown, and that thus two great monarchies might be united under one sovereign. The first danger appears to us altogether chimerical. Family affection has seldom produced much effect on the policy of princes. The state of Europe at the time of the peace of Utrecht proved that in politics the ties of interest are much stronger than those of consanguinity or affinity. The Elector of Bavaria had been driven from his dominions by his father-inlaw; Victor Amadeus was in arms against his sons-in-law; Anne was seated on a throne from which she had assisted to push a most indulgent father. It is true that Philip had been accustomed from childhood to regard his grandfather with profound veneration. It was probable, therefore, that the influence of Lewis at Madrid would be very great. But Lewis was more than seventy years old; he could not live long; his heir was an infant in the cradle. There was surely no reason to think that the policy of the King of Spain would be swayed by his regard for a nephew whom he had never seen. In fact, soon after the peace, the two branches of the House of Bourbon began to quarrel. A close alliance was formed between Philip and Charles, lately competitors for the Castilian crown. A Spanish princess, betrothed to the King of France, was sent back in the most insulting manner to her native country; and a decree was put forth by the Court of Madrid commanding every Frenchman to leave Spain. It is true that, fifty years after the peace of Utrecht, an alliance of peculiar strictness was formed between the French and Spanish governments. But both governments were actuated on that occasion, not by domestic affection, but by common interests and common enmities. Their compact, though called the Family Compact, was as purely a political compact as the league of Cambrai or the league of Pilnitz. But The second danger was that Philip might have succeeded to the crown of his native country. This did not happen; but it might have happened; and at one time it seemed very likely to happen. A sickly child alone stood between the King of Spain and the heritage of Lewis the Fourteenth. Philip, it is true, solemnly renounced his claim to the French crown. the manner in which he had obtained possession of the Spanish crown had proved the inefficacy of such renunciations. The French lawyers declared Philip's renunciation null, as being inconsistent with the fundamental law of the realm. The French people would probably have sided with him whom they would have considered as the rightful heir. Saint Simon, though much less zealous for hereditary monarchy than most of his countrymen, and though strongly attached to the Regent, declared, in the presence of that prince, that he never would support the claims of the House of Orleans against those of the King of Spain. "If such," he said, "be my feelings, what must be the feelings of fully aware. others 2" Bolingbroke, it is certain, as it had before rallied round him. For many years the favourite hope of his heart was that he might ascend the throne of his grandfather; but he seems never to have thought it possible that he could reign at once in the country of his adoption and in the country of his birth. These were the dangers of the peace; and they seem to us to be of no very formidable kind. Against these dangers are to be set off the evils of war and the risk of failure. The evils of the war, the waste of life, the suspension of trade, the expenditure of wealth, the accumulation of debt, require no illustration. The chances of failure it is difficult at this distance of time to calculate with accuracy. But we think that an estimate approximating to the truth may, without much difficulty, be Yet, though it was at one time probable that the posterity of the Duke of Burgundy would become extinct, and though it is almost certain that, if the posterity of the Duke of Burgundy had become extinct, Philip would have successfully preferred his claim to the crown of France, we still defend the principle of the Treaty of Utrecht. In the first place, Charles had, soon after the battle of Villa-Viciosa, inherited, by the death of his elder brother, all the dominions of the House of Austria. Surely, if to these dominions he had added the whole monarchy of Spain, the balance of power would have been formed. seriously endangered. The union of the Austrian dominions and Spain would not, it is true, have been so alarming an event as the union of France and Spain. But Charles was actually Emperor. Philip was not, and never might be, King of France. The certainty of the less evil might well be set against the chance of the greater evil. The Allies had been victorious in Germany, Italy, and Flanders. It was by no means improbable that they might fight their way into the very heart of France. But at no time since the commencement of the war had their prospects been so dark in that country which was the very object of the struggle. In Spain they held only a few square leagues. The temper of the great majority of the nation was But, in fact, we do not believe that decidedly hostile to them. If they had Spain would long have remained under persisted, if they had obtained success the government either of an Emperor equal to their highest expectations, if or of a King of France. The character they had gained a series of victories of the Spanish people was a better as splendid as those of Blenheim and security to the nations of Europe than Ramilies, if Paris had fallen, if Lewis any will, any instrument of renuncia had been a prisoner, we still doubt tion, or any treaty. The same energy whether they would have accomplished which the people of Castile had put their object. They would still have forth when Madrid was occupied by had to carry on interminable hostilities the Allied armies, they would have against the whole population of a again put forth as soon as it appeared that their country was about to become a French province. Though they were no longer masters abroad, they were We are, therefore, for the peace of by no means disposed to see foreigners set over them at home. If Philip had Utrecht. We are indeed no admirers attempted to govern Spain by man- of the statesmen who concluded that dates from Versailles, a second Grand peace. Harley, we believe, was a soAlliance would easily have effected lemn trifler, St. John a brilliant knave. what the first had failed to accom- The great body of their followers conplish. The Spanish nation would sisted of the country clergy and the have rallied against him as zealously country gentry two classes of men country which affords peculiar facilities to irregular warfare, and in which invading armies suffer more from famine than from the sword. who were then inferior in intelligence | Lord Dover performed his part dilito decent shopkeepers or farmers of gently, judiciously, and without the our time. Parson Barnabas, Parson slightest ostentation. He had two Trulliber, Sir Wilful Witwould, Sir merits which are rarely found together Francis Wronghead, Squire Western, in a commentator. He was content to Squire Sullen, such were the people be merely a commentator, to keep in who composed the main strength of the background, and to leave the forethe Tory party during the sixty years ground to the author whom he had which followed the Revolution. It is undertaken to illustrate. Yet, though true that the means by which the willing to be an attendant, he was by Tories came into power in 1710 were no means a slave; nor did he consider most disreputable. It is true that the it as part of his duty to see no faults manner in which they used their power in the writer to whom he faithfully was often unjust and cruel. It is true and assiduously rendered the humblest that, in order to bring about their literary offices. favourite project of peace, they resorted to slander and deception, without the slightest scruple. It is true that they passed off on the British nation a renunciation which they knew to be invalid. It is true that they gave up the Catalans to the vengeance of Philip, in a manner inconsistent with humanity and national honour. But on the great question of Peace or War, we cannot but think that, though their motives may have been selfish and malevolent, their decision was beneficial to the state. But we have already exceeded our limits. It remains only for us to bid. Lord Mahon heartily farewell, and to assure him that, whatever dislike we may feel for his political opinions, we shall always meet him with pleasure on the neutral ground of literature. HORACE WALPOLE. (ОСТОВЕР, 1833.) Letters of Horace Walpole, Earl of Orford, to Sir Horace Mann, British Envoy at the Court of Tuscany. Now first published from the Originals in the Possession of the Earl of WALDGRAVE. Edited by LORD DOVER. 2 vols. 8vo. London: The faults of Horace Walpole's head and heart are indeed sufficiently glaring. His writings, it is true, rank as high among the delicacies of intellectual epicures as the Strasburg pies among the dishes described in the Almanach des Gourmands. But as the pâté-de-foie-gras owes its excellence to the diseases of the wretched animal which furnishes it, and would be good for nothing if it were not made of livers preternaturally swollen, so none but an unhealthy and disorganised mind could have produced such literary luxuries as the works of Walpole. He was, unless we have formed a very erroneous judgment of his character, the most eccentric, the most artificial, the most fastidious, the most capricious of men. His mind was a bundle of inconsistent whims and affectations. His features were covered by mask within mask. When the outer disguise of obvious affectation was removed, you were still as far as ever from seeing the real man. He played innumerable parts, and over-acted them all. When he talked misanthropy, he out-Timoned Timon. When he talked philanthropy, he left Howard at an immeasurable distance. He scoffed at courts, and kept a chronicle of their most trifling scandal; at society, and WE cannot transcribe this titlepage was blown about by its slightest veerwithout strong feelings of regret. The ings of opinion; at literary fame, and editing of these volumes was the last of left fair copies of his private letters, the useful and modest services rendered with copious notes, to be published after to literature by a nobleman of amiable his decease; at rank, and never for a manners, of untarnished public and moment forgot that he was an Honourprivate character, and of cultivated able; at the practice of entail, and mind. On this, as on other occasions, | tasked the ingenuity of conveyancers 1833. to tie up his villa in the strictest settle ment. The conformation of his mind was such that whatever was little seemed to him great, and whatever was great seemed to him little. Serious business was a trifle to him, and trifles were his serious business. To chat with blue stockings, to write little copies of complimentary verses on little occasions, to superintend a private press, to preserve from natural decay the perishable topics of Ranelagh and White's, to record divorces and bets, Miss Chudleigh's absurdities and George Selwyn's good sayings, to decorate a grotesque house with pie-crust battlements, to procure rare engravings and antique chimneyboards, to match odd gauntlets, to lay out a maze of walks within five acres of ground, these were the grave employments of his long life. From these he turned to politics as to an amusement. After the labours of the printshop and the auction-room, he unbent his mind in the House of Commons. And, having indulged in the recreation of making laws and voting millions, he returned to more important pursuits, to researches after Queen Mary's comb, Wolsey's red hat, the pipe which Van Tromp smoked during his last sea-fight, and the spur which King William struck into the flank of Sorrel. glass, and from setting up memorials of departed cats and dogs. While he was fetching and carrying the gossip of Kensington Palace and Carlton House, he fancied that he was engaged in politics, and when he recorded that gossip, he fancied that he was writing history. He was, as he has himself told us, fond of faction as an amusement. He loved mischief: but he loved quiet; and he was constantly on the watch for opportunities of gratifying both his tastes at once. He sometimes contrived, without showing himself, to disturb the course of ministerial negotiations, and to spread confusion through the political circles. He does not himself pretend that, on these occasions, he was actuated by public spirit; nor does he appear to have had any private advantage in view. He thought it a good practical joke to set public men together by the ears; and he enjoyed their perplexitics, their accusations, and their recriminations, as a malicious boy enjoys the embarrassment of a misdirected traveller. About politics, in the high sense of the word, he knew nothing, and cared nothing. He called himself a Whig. His father's son could scarcely assume any other name. It pleased him also to affect a foolish dislike of kings as In every thing in which Walpole kings, and a foolish love and admibusied himself, in the fine arts, in lite-ration of rebels as rebels; and perhaps, rature, in public affairs, he was drawn while kings were not in danger, and by some strange attraction from the while rebels were not in being, he really great to the little, and from the useful believed that he held the doctrines to the odd. The politics in which he which he professed. To go no further took the keenest interests, were politics than the letters now before us, he is scarcely deserving of the name. The perpetually boasting to his friend Mann growlings of George the Second, the of his aversion to royalty and to royal flirtations of Princess Emily with the persons. He calls the crime of Damien Duke of Grafton, the amours of Prince" that least bad of murders, the murder Frederic and Lady Middlesex, the of a king." He hung up in his villa squabbles between Gold Stick in wait- an engraving of the death-warrant of ing and the Master of the Buckhounds, Charles, with the inscription “Major the disagreements between the tutors Charta." Yet the most superficial of Prince George, these matters en-knowledge of history might have taught gaged almost all the attention which him that the Restoration, and the Walpole could spare from matters more important still, from bidding for Zinckes and Petitots, from cheapening fragments of tapestry and handles of old lances, from joining bits of painted crimes and follies of the twenty-eight years which followed the Restoration, were the effects of this Greater Charter. Nor was there much in the means by which that instrument was obtained that could gratify a judicious lover of had acquired the language of these liberty. A man must hate kings very men, and he repeated it by rote, though bitterly, before he can think it desirable it was at variance with all his tastes that the representatives of the people and feelings; just as some old Jacobite should be turned out of doors by dra- families persisted in praying for the goons, in order to get at a king's head. Pretender, and in passing their glasses Walpole's Whiggism, however, was of over the water decanter when they a very harmless kind. He kept it, as drank the King's health, long after he kept the old spears and helmets at they had become loyal supporters of Strawberry Hill, merely for show. He the government of George the Third. would just as soon have thought of He was a Whig by the accident of hetaking down the arms of the ancient reditary connection; but he was essenTemplars and Hospitallers from the tially a courtier; and not the less a walls of his hall, and setting off on a courtier because he pretended to sneer cru ade to the Holy Land, as of acting at the objects which excited his admiin the spirit of those daring warriors ration and envy. His real tastes perand statesmen, great even in their petually show themselves through the errors, whose names and seals were thin disguise. While professing all affixed to the warrant which he prized the contempt of Bradshaw or Ludlow so highly. He liked revolution and for crowned heads, he took the trouble regicide only when they were a hundred to write a book concerning Royal Auyears old. His republicanism, like the thors. He pryed with the utmost anxcourage of a bully, or the love of a iety into the most minute particulars fribble, was strong and ardent when relating to the Royal family. When there was no occasion for it, and sub- he was a child, he was haunted with a sided when he had an opportunity of longing to see George the First, and bringing it to the proof. As soon as gave his mother no peace till she had the revolutionary spirit really began to found a way of gratifying his curiosity. stir in Europe, as soon as the hatred of The same feeling, covered with a thoukings became something more than a sand disguises, attended him to the sonorous phrase, he was frightened into grave. No observation that dropped a fanatical royalist, and became one of from the lips of Majesty seemed to the most extravagant alarmists of those him too trifling to be recorded. The wretched times. In truth, his talk French songs of Prince Frederic, comabout liberty, whether he knew it or positions certainly not deserving of not, was from the beginning a mere preservation on account of their incant, the remains of a phraseology trinsic merit, have been carefully prewhich had meant something in the served for us by this contemner of mouths of those from whom he had royalty. In truth, every page of Wallearned it, but which, in his mouth, pole's works bewrays him. This Diomeant about as much as the oath by genes, who would be thought to prefer which the Knights of some modern his tub to a palace, and who has nothing orders bind themselves to redress the to ask of the masters of Windsor and wrongs of all injured ladies. He had Versailles but that they will stand out been fed in his boyhood with Whig of his light, is a gentleman-usher at speculations on government. He must heart. often have seen, at Houghton or in Downing Street, men who had been Whigs when it was as dangerous to be a Whig as to be a highwayman, men who had voted for the Exclusion Bill, who had been concealed in garrets and cellars after the battle of Sedgemoor, and who had set their names to the declaration that they would live and die with the Prince of Orange. He He had, it is plain, an uneasy consciousness of the frivolity of his favourite pursuits; and this consciousness produced one of the most diverting of his ten thousand affectations. His busy idleness, his indifference to matters which the world generally regards as important, his passion for trifles, he thought fit to dignify with the name of philosophy. He spoke of himself as of |