CHAPTER II.

HORACE AT ETON. 1717 To 1735.

THE offspring of great men possess, in the appreciation of intelligent minds, a peculiar and permanent interest. Every one may, through them, claim fellowship with the eminent and the gifted, belonging like himself to the great family of man; and though the heir rarely succeeds to the intellectual estate of his sire, he is sure of a large inheritance in the gratitude of his fellows. The Bernouillis and a few other gifted families appear to have made genius hereditary; but it would be too much to expect of Nature, that excessive fertility should always be manifested in the same stock. In general, one luxuriant crop exhausts the land, which is either left fallow through future generations, or its produce in a succeeding age becomes too insignificant to attract attention for its own merits. If the children of that great statesman of the last century, whose progress to eminence we have just traced, did not inherit his more eminent gifts, one of them at

least succeeded him in a reputation equally lasting and equally extended. By his first wife, Robert Walpole had three sons, Robert, Edward, and Horaio; and one daughter, Mary.

The most eminent of the family, Horatio, the third son of Sir Robert Walpole and Catherine Shorter, was born on the 5th of October, 1717. He was named after his uncle, to distinguish him from whom in after years, he was styled Horace Walpole the younger. The gallantry of his father was sufficiently notorious, but Horace had personally the further misfortune of having doubts thrown upon the chastity of his mother. He bore a striking want of resemblance to the Minister, and there were said to be cogent reasons for believing that he owed his existence to Carr, Lord Hervey, (the elder brother of the ultra-exquisite, who succeeded him in the title,) a nobleman of superior talents and accomplishments, holding a distinguished post in the royal household.

It is probable that the origin of this slander, in an age when slander appeared a virulent epidemic that spared neither sex nor age, was Sir Robert's being so absorbed in his official duties, as to have no time to spare for those which were domestic. Lady Walpole, one of the most accomplished and beautiful women of her time, found herself too frequently left to the society of crowds of gay courtiers, who sagaciously fancied that to stand well in the opinion of the powerful Minister, the readiest way was to recom

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mend themselves to his handsome wife. Some carried their civilities much further than would be allowable in these days of "propriety;" indeed, a century ago, the word appears to have had no meaning. Lord Hervey was not among the least attentive in her Ladyship's train; and after the birth of her third son, the most knowing, or rather the most malicious of the scandalous circle in which she moved, circulated those whispers which proved so prejudicial to her reputation.

Little, however, as we may believe this story, it has been confidently affirmed that it was credited by "the good-natured husband," ironically alluded to in Pope's couplet, as a man who

"Never made a friend in private life,

And was, besides, a tyrant to his wife."

Sir Robert, we are told, notwithstanding his presumed indifference to his own honour, regarded his son Horace during his childhood with a neglect so marked, as, in the opinion of his friends, strongly to confirm the suspicions which those malicious whispers had excited. But whatever the boy lost by this treatment, must have been made up to him by the affection of his mother, whom he ever regarded with a devotion that showed how deep was the impression made upon his mind by her untiring attention to him throughout his sickly and delicate childhood. Writing a few years after her death, when the fortunes of the family were threatened with immediate and total destruction, he says, "One reflection

I shall have, very sweet though very melancholy; that if our family is to be the sacrifice that shall first pamper discord, at least the one, the part of it that was interested in all my concerns, and must have suffered from our ruin, is safe, secure, and above the rage of confusion: nothing in this world can touch her peace now."*

His fondness for her, which was well known to his friends, speaks eloquently in her favour, and ought to render us extremely distrustful of the evil reports which have been alluded to. Had she been a woman unmindful of her reputation, it is doubtful that she would have inspired her gifted son with that affectionate reverence with which he invariably mentioned her name. Her tender solicitude was accompanied with a thousand delicious gratifications, such as are in the exclusive gift of a loving and watchful mother. Perhaps to her, too, he owed those invaluable first impressions, so important, because in the oft-quoted words of our ablest modern poet, they make "the child the father of the man." There was also something feminine in the manners and to a great degree in the tastes of Horace Walpole. As a boy, as a youth, and as a man, his character bore but faint traces of masculine impress; owing, no doubt, to that motherly influence to which he often acknowledged his infinite obligations.

According to his own statement, Horace was a weak and delicate child, of whom some of those * " Walpole Letters." Vol. 1, p. 108.

"good-natured friends," who haunt every household, like the family ghosts in certain old mansions, that never appear but to prophesy evil, averred, that "That child cannot possibly live." Happily their auguries were false, for owing to the unremitting attention of the most affectionate of mothers, the boy triumphed over an apparent predisposition to disease which proved fatal to two of his sisters.

Horace Walpole has not preserved many anecdotes of his childhood. There is one, however, to which he refers, at the age of seventy-three, as showing how intensely ignorant was one part of the metropolis as to what was being transacted in another part. He states that when the opposition to his father was at its height, Lady Walpole requiring some bugles, which were then out of fashion, was directed to a little shop in an obscure alley in the city, where she purchased what she wanted, and bade the shopman send it home. On his asking where, she replied, "To Sir Robert Walpole's;" upon which he rejoined, "And who is Sir Robert Walpole?"*

It is clear that he had no cause of complaint as regards his manner of life at this early period. His fond mother was ready to anticipate his every wish, and his father, however neglectful of home ties he may have seemed, readily indulged her slightest request regarding the little invalid.

The first gratification which made any impression on Horace's mind, was that of seeing the King. He * 66 Walpole's Letters." Vol. 6, p. 407.