BOOKS.

MEMOIRS OF THE REGENCY.* THIS continuation of the Buckingham Papers, under the title of "Memoirs of the Court of England during the Regency, 1811- 1820," has more original narrative and fewer original documents than the four preceding volumes, devoted to the Court and Ca- binets of George the Third." hey are not on the whole so in- forming, scarcely perhaps so interesting. The power and im- portance of the Grenvilles had began to wane at the opening of the period ; before it passed they had passed away. In the nego- tiations or intrigues of the Regency question, the position they Occupied was more important than the part they bore. A few in- terviews and a few formal letters settled their portion of the busi- ness. With the establishment first of the Perceval and next of the Liverpool Ministry, but more than all with the ruin of Napoleon, the hope of the Opposition to an early accession to power vanished. Indeed, desire for office on the part of Lord Grenville and his brother Thomas seems to have ceased. Some sense of his own unfitness for the Premiership or very high place, in the times on which he had fallen, might be present to Lord Grenville's mind ; for, whatever his genius as a statesman might be, and we think it overrated, he was unfitted by nature to play the part of a modem constitutional Minister, wanting flexibility, plausibility, adaptability, and unscrupulousness. His short taste of power after Fox's death, with " All the Talents " around him, seems to have been unpleasant; what was in his days called "an extreme party " was coming forward in strength,—Brougham, Burdett, and others not Whigs, whose measures and speeches were very distasteful to the old patrician politician, and indeed at a later time broke up the Grenville party. Time seems to have told upon his strength and tastes ; and somewhat early too. He writes thus at fifty-three during the Regency negotiations.

" Camelford House, June 5, 1812.

." My dearest Brother—I have been able only to write to you a few short notes ; but you will allow for the hurry of such a moment, especially as I sensibly feel that I am not what I was, and that I must now have air and exercise and relaxation, which I could formerly dispense with, when busi- ness was to be done, and make the business itself stand for all. But this will not do now ; and as often as I try it, I am tired out and obliged to atop."

Feelings such as these, and circumstances such as we have in- dicated, removed Lord Grenville, and to some extent his imme- diate family coadjutors, from the earnest strife of politics ; and this as naturally limited political communications. In fact, after the establishment of the Liverpool Ministry there is for some time almost a political blank ; Lord Grenville drops out of view, and hardly emerges again till the Manchester massacre drew him out as a civil Coriolanus, more Ministerial than the Ministers. some years after the death of the first Marquis of Buckingham, and the succession of Lord Grenville's nephew the late Duke, this nephew took the post , of political leader as well as head of the family. His object and that of his clients was to form a sort of neutral party, not encouraging the violence of the Opposition, waiting for Government propositions of some kind, and trimming between both sides. They got as far as a separate bench to sit upon, but not very much farther. Indeed, they differed among themselves. Wynn leaned more to the Opposition than Free- mantle, and had his own position in the House to look to. He states this clearly to the Marquis in reply to a suggestion. " With reveet to what you say about staying away, it may suit others, but will not do for me. The place I fill in the House of Commons has been gained by constant attendance and exertion only, and would be lost imme- diately if they were discontinued ; besides which, in the number of new Members who hang as yet perfectly loose, there are some who look to me in a degree, and who, as they have at the iime and since stated, gave their votes on the question of Brougham entirely on my speech."

A good deal of party politics with some personal gossip turns up in the correspondence relating to this family scheme of "the deep-revolving witty Buckingham " ; but it wants the interest possessed by the larger questions connected with the time when the Grenvilles were a power in the state, or with the various in- trigues and negotiations relating to the Regency. On this latter subject the information is full, and the particu- lars are curious. Some perhaps do not rest on the highest class of evidence as regards authenticity, depending upon private re- ports, some.perhaps upon gossip • but they have all as much au- thority as the greater number of historical facts possess. Some is of the very highest kind, being original or "first-hand." Of the greater portion it may be said that it is not recorded by mere gos- sipa, :bat by men who can weigh testimony, and draw distinctions between conduct and motives, and mark that distinction clearly to the reader.

The most striking point in the story of the Regency is the con- duct of the Regent. We lately observed in noticing Mrs. Fits- herbert's Memoirs that the Prince of Wales made that connexion worse thin it inherently was by the taint of his own qualities. A similar remark may be applied to the Regency negotiations. Pub- licly these were three in number : 1, on his nomination as Regent with restrictedpowers, while a hope was professed to be entertain- ed of the King's restoration ; 2, his accession to the entire Royal prerogatives ; 3, the breaking-up of the Pereeval Ministry on the assassination of its head. If it were the Prince's wish, as it seems to have been, to retain the actual Ministry, he certainly had • Memoirs of the Court of Bagland during the Regency 1811-1820. From Ori- pine Family Documents. By the Duke of Buckingham and Chandos, K.Q. In two volumes. Published by Hurst and 'Hackett. ostensible grounds so to do, and by a straightforward course, could he by any possibility have been straightforward.- On the first occasion, he might justly have said—" Parliament has re- stricted my *era, making me rather an agent of the policy it is supporting t a de facto ruler it is hoped that my father's mind may yet be restored ; but if so, and he found his old ser- vants displaced and a new policy adopted in opposition to his con- victions, it would be the readiest way to cause a relapse : I there- fore retain the present Ministry, and give them my full confidence so far as is necessary to carry on their government ; but I reserve my future decision as to men and measures." Whether all that he did is known, may be doubted. What he is said to have done was, to require Lords Grey and Grenville to prepare an answer to the two Houses [touching the Regency] ; then to ask Lord Moira to draw up another, but to consult Lords Grey and Grenville. This assistance was declined ; the two magnates drew up their paper ; the Prince and Sheridan perused it, disapproved of it, and concocted another, which Sheridan took to Grey. This off-hand substitution of their literary efforts could not have been pleasing to the Whig patricians ; the subordinate position of the ambassa- dor in political and social rank, as well as his loose character, must have been equally distasteful; his manner in the interview with Grey is said to have been exulting and abounding ; the quarrel was improved by Court intrigues, and Perceval kept his place. He was, however, subjected to the same indignity: M'Mahon and Turner were made the medium of communication between the Regent and his Ministers.

A little simplicity and plain dealing would have equIlly enabled the Prince to retain the Perceval Ministry with credit on the expiration of the restrictions. Instead of the rigmarole which Moore parodied in

"At length, dearest Freddy, the moment is nigh,

When with Perceval's leave I may throw my chains by,"

the Regent would have been politically justified in saying—

"1. The violence of the Irish Catholics, the public opinion of Great Britain, and the pressure of foreign affairs, render it neceessry to postpone the consideration of the Catholic claims.

"2. It is my conviction that the interests of Europe and the safety of this country require the continuance of the Peninsular war."

Whether he would have been justified in calling upon Grey and Grenville, in consideration of the .public difficulties, to coalesce with men so_ opposite to them in opinion as Perceval and Eldon, may be doubted. He clearly had no right to insult men on whose public honour not a stain of sordidness rested, by ignoring all question of political principles, or even of Ministerial power, and proposing that they should go shares in places with Perceval and Co. And his rigmarole was all needless. The mere postpone- ment of the Catholic question would have sufficed, at least for Grenville. It is needless to do into the third epoch. The Prince, frightened by Pereeval's murder and the difficulties of the position, seems to have behaved fairly at first ; while it is generally acknowledged that the Whigs were much too haughty, abrupt, and obviously distrustful in the negotiation. In reality, however, Grenville had made up his mind not to take office. In the same letter that we have quoted from as regards his health, he writes—"I grieve to say it, but my opinion now is that the thing [office] must finally come to us in a shape in which we shall be compelled to look at it." This was written a few weeks after Perceval's death. Up- wards of a twelvemonth earlier, just before the expiration of the restrictions, he expresses a similar feeling.

LORD GRENVILLE TO THE MARQUIS OF BUCKINGHAM.

•• Camelford House, January 6, 1812.

"My dearest Brother—I arrived here on Saturday, but found nothing very new. The Prince is still very unwell, and it is much believed that the at- tack in his arm is paralytic. The language of his Court is that he has taken i no decision, and is to take none till the 18th. This is only to put off the evil day for a few weeks longer. " I suspect the pretence about the Catholics is to be that it will be indeli- cate to do anything for them so long as the King lives. That is very pos- sibly, and not improbably for fifteen or twenty years. Will the rest of the world stand still for them ? and will Ireland be as easy to be settled then, as it would even now, when it is about ten times more difficult than it was ten or twelve years ago ?

"I shall take an early opportunity, probably tomorrow, of protesting against i

one hour's more delay in that business. That will do my business at Carl- ton House, if, indeed, that remained to be done. But, in fact, that was done five cars ago, .when I recalled Lord Yarmouth [the late Marquis of Hert- ford from Paris.

" am therefore, God be thanked, out of the question. There is no misery I should dread like that of undertaking in such a state of the court and country any share in the government of either."

The following letter written when the " dearest Freddy " epistle was concocted but not shown, exhibits a slight feelin against Grey of the jealousy disclaimed, and a well-founded distrust in the Regent.

LORD GRENVILLE TO THE MARQUIS OF BUCKINGHAM.

" Camelford House, February 18, 1811 [1812.]

"My dearest Brother—Grey has this instant been with me to show me a letter which he had just received from the Duke of York, desiring to see him this evening on particular business. This business is (as we already have learnt) to deliver to him some paper or message about forming an united government—the plan of which united government begins, you will observe, by the same step which the King employed (very unnecessarly) to disunite Lord Rockingham and Lord Shelburne, namely, the sending for the latter in preference to the former, though he was the avowed head of the partthen in Opposition. " That this trick will entirely fail as to creating any jealousy between Grey and me, I very confidently believe. But it will 'of course strengthen, if possible, the determination which I had already taken to keep out of this maudite galare, in which no good could be dono but by the cooperation of the whole crew, instead of having, as the rowers infallibly will, be the who they may, 'the whole efforts of the master employed against them. To

drop the metaphor, I have been betrayed once by the King, and I have no taste for affording to his son the same opportunity, when I have so little cause to doubt that he has the same disposition. . " As to coalescing with Perceval or Wellesley, I believe Grey quite as de- termined against it as myself. The whole will end, I doubt not, in the continuance of Perceval, with Castlereagh and Sidmouth to help him.. And this, I belime, is what Lord Yarmouth means, whose intentions are those which-are alone of any consequence. * * * " It is not till this evening that Grey will see the Duke of York ; and as his Royal Highness is a parleur indffiratigable, as Mirabeau described him, the conference will probably last beyond my bedtime. But I shall know the result tomorrow."

That Lord Grenville was right in his determination is undoubted. It is always difficult to speculate upon what might have been. Still it seems clear, that an attempt to settle the Catholic ques- tion, in the existing state of public opinion and circumstances of the world, might have caused confusion. To have withdrawn Wellington from the Peninsula, and to have tried to patch up a peace with Napoleon, would have reduced this country to an in- ferior position, and possibly led to a change in the history of the world. Whether a man all but determined not to take office, is warranted in continuing the leader of a party whose object is office, is a different question. The important documents connected with the Regency dis- cussion are accompanied by numerous private letters, describ- ing the more private sayings and doings of noted persons, par- tieularly of the Prince, his advisers, and, the leading politicians, and containing a good deal of courtly anecdote or fashionable gos- sip. The anonymous writer who occasionally transmitted informa- tion in the former volumes is more active in the earlier part of the present collection. His information, too, is of a more important or secret kind ; and apparently, given, so far as the Marquis of Wellesley was concerned, with the knowledge that it would be used. Much of it relates to an internal intrigue that was going on during a great part of the restricted Regency ; the Marquis of Wellesley endeavouring to oust Peroeval and set himself up as Premier, with the assistance [if he could not manage otherwise] of the Opposition. Whether Lord Wellesley as a colleague of Pereeval was quite justified in the course he pursued, we will not undertake to say ; but he was amply punished at last. These oc- currences took.place after the negotiation had been broken off with

Grey and Grenville on the cessation of the restrictions. -

" Lord Wellesley went to Carlton House by appointment; when an apolo- gy was made to him for the Prince's absence, and he remained with M'Ma- hon till half-past four exactly. In the course of the conversation which took place, M'Mahon told him that that very morning the Prince told Lord Moira;-in leis presence, that, ' let Perceval and his myrmidons do what they would, no earthly consideration should induce him to part with Wellesley, whom he could not go on without.' " dust, as Lord-Wellesley was going to dinner at Apsley House, he re- ceived a communication from the Prince, that the difficulties which Lords Grenville and Grey's conduct had thrown upon him had induced him to continue Perceval as his Minister ! This top date half-past 5 to. m.' Lord Wellesley immediately Wrote for permiesion to wait upon the Prince that night, which W'as conceded, and about nine he carried the Foreign Seals, with Culling Smith, to Carlton House.

" As soon as he saw M'Mahon he said, Colonel M'Mahon, I have every reason to think you an honourable man, but as liable to be deceived as my- self or any other person. Were you aware of the contents of this note (showing him the recent communication) at the time I saw you this day, when you everything but assured me that I was to be the Prince's Minister ?'

" M'Mahon immediately turned pale and red, and in an agitation not to be described, assured Lord Wellesley that he was not only ignorant of the contents of it, but, to that moment, of the change in the Prince's mind ; add- ing, And I hope, my Lord, you will not, after what has passed, leave this house a Minister.'

"The Prince received Lord Wellesley with extreme agitation ; which was not lessened when Lord Wellesley announced his having brought the seals, and that he would not serve under Perceval eight-and-forty hours. The Prince grasped at this expression, and said, entreat of you, then, may dear Wellesley, as a personal favour to myself, that you will not resign for two or three days longer. The Chancellor shall call upon you tomorrow, and satisfy you that this arrangement with Perceval is merely temporary, and that I am entirely my own master, and untrammeled with respect to my choice of a Government.'

Lord Wellesley then returned home, and his friends were reassured in some degree by what had passed of his being yet the Prince's Minister.

" On Sunday (16th) the Chancellor saw Lord Wellesley at Apsicy House, about two in the afternoon. When, upon Lord Wellesley's beginning the discourse by saying that he understood the Prince's continuance of Perceval was merely temporary, Lord Eldon said, There must be some strange mis- apprehension in this business. I can assure your Lordship, from the Prince himself, that ho (Pereeval) is the Prince's permanent Minister, and it is upon this basis that I am to confer with you."

There is from the pen of the same writer a long and very cu- rious account of the Continental coalition secretly formed against Napoleon when he began to threaten war against Russia. There are also many anecdotical letters, chiefly from Admiral Free- mantle, descriptive of the Court of Sicily and of some things in the Peninsular war.

The correspondence of a later day has not the political interest of the Regency period, nor so much social anecdote or gossip, but there is some. This description of the Prince of Hesse Hom- burg, the husband of the Princess Elizabeth, is from Freemantle's letters to the Marquis of Buckingham, date 1818. It should be borne in mind that the feeling or prejudice against foreigners, and especially Germans, was then strong, and that it was the fashion to shave close ; even large whiskers dubbed a man " Don Whisker- andos."

" The town is now full of two events; the Princess Elizabeth's marriage, and Croft's death—the former universally quizzed and condemned. It is impossible to describe the monster of a man—a vulgar-looking German Cor- poral, whose breath and hide is a compound between tobacco and garlick. What can have induced her, nobody can guess; he has about 3001. per annum. The Queen [Charlotte] is outrageous, but obliged to submit. It will be a dreadful blow to her, and -I should not wonder if, after the Prin- cess is gone abroad, she sinks under it. She is much altered, and I think breaking fast." -

Wynn, whose studies would not seem to have left less leisure for such gossip, was still more struck. " I have just seen H * * H • • * at the Levee ; and an uglier hound, with

a snout buried in hair, I never saw. • * • • "I hear that a few evenings ago, the Queen dropt her fan at York House, and Humbug stooped with so much alacrity to pick it up, that the exertion created so parlous a split, and produced such a display, that there was nothing left to the bride's imagination. Nothing remained but for the royal brothers to interpose their screen, and for him to retire as fast as he could. It was then proposed that he should go home ; but he declined this- ' As the Duke of York vas so much more large, dat he vas sure his breeches would go on over all.' The valet was called, the Duke's breeches drawn on over the poor remains of Humbug's, and succeeded to admiration." ,

This anecdote of the Regent, recorded by Wynn, refers to the grant of 10,0001. a year to the Duke of York for taking care of his father after the Queen's death ; a very 'unpopular act.

" With the exception of Lord Castlereagh, who spoke in his very worst and most perplexed style, the debate last night was unusually good. Tier ne3r, the Solicitor-General, and Scarlett, excellent. Peel, eloquent, and productive of great effect, but laying himself extremely open on many points, some of which Scarlett hit, but missed others at least equally vul- nerable. The Duke of York's anxious wish was to have avoided the ques- tion, by declining all salary - but General Grenville says, the Regent com- pelled him to take it.' And one of the Duke's most intimate friends, whe came down to vote for him last night, told Phillimore, in confidence, that the answer to the Duke's request was, So, sir ! you want to be popular at our expense.' " As already intimated, the annotations pass from the character of commentary to that of historical narrative, so as to become almost a history of the Regency further illustrated by family documents. The politioal views of the writer are somewhat limited, and of course are in favour of the Grenville party. He is very hostile to the Princess of Wales (afterwards Queen Caro- line) and her advisers or followers ; equally so to the Radicals and Reformers of those days. To the character of the Regent he is far more favourable than the story he has got to tell, still more than the documents he is editing, support, except as regards his taste in art and the stimulus he gave to architectural improvement, it might perhaps be added to social refinement, at least in the " silver fork " way : life in all rank!, is more " stylish " aim* the Regent set the faahio' n. The most original point in the nar- rative is the position whioh the writer assigns to Lord Castle- reagh in relation to the war against Napoleon. He perhaps rates the Foreign Secretary too highly, and ascribes him the merit-4 actions unsupported by evidence. There is no doubt but that from the time of Castlereagh's accession to the Foreign Office, PercevaPs miserable plan of starving the Peninsular war ceased ; as little, that Castlereagh has not received just appreciation for the firmness, comprehensiveness, and tact with which he con- ducted Continental affairs during the perilous and trying struggles of 1812-1815.