Plymouth he always spoke very highly. He once declared in the Houfe of Commons, that no book had ever been perused by him with equal inftruction with the Lives of Plutarch *. Lord Chatham was an extremely fine reader of Tragedy; and a Lady of rank and taste, now living, declares with what fatisfaction fhe has beard him read fome of Shakespeare's Historical Plays, particularly thofe of Henry the Fourth and Fifth. She however uniformly obferved, that when he came to the comic or buffoon parts of those plays, he always gave the book to one of his relations, and when they were gone through, he took the book again. Dr. Johnson fays acutely, that no man is a hypocrite in his amufements; and thofe of Lord Chatham feem always to have born the stamp of greatnefs about them. Lord Chatham wrote occafionally very good verfes. His tafte in laying out grounds was exquifite. One fcene in the gardens of South Lodge on Enfield Chafe (which was defigned by him), that of the Temple of Pan and its accompaniments, is mentioned by Mr. Whateley, in his "Obfervations on Modern Gardening," as one of the happiest efforts of well-directed and appropriate decoration. * Lord Monboddo on the Origin of Language. Of Of Lord Chatham's eloquence who can speak that has not heard it? and who that had the happinefs to hear it, can do juftice to it by defcription? It was neither the rounded and the monotonous declamation, the exuberance of images, the acute fophiftry, or the Attic wit and fatirical point, that we have seen admired in our times. It was very various; it poffeffed great force of light and shade; it occafionally funk to colloquial familiarity, and occafionally rofe to Epic fublimity. If he crept fometimes with Timæus, he as often thundered and lightened with Pericles. His irony, though ftrong, was ever dignified; his power of ridicule irresistible; and his invective fo terrible, that the objects of it fhrunk under it like fhrubs before the withering and the blasting East. Whoever heard this great man fpeak, always brought away fomething that remained upon his memory and upon his imagination. A verbum ardens, a glowing word, a happy facility of expreffion, an appropriate metaphor, a forcible image, or a fublime figure, never failed to recompenfe the attention which the hearer had bestowed upon him. Soon after Sir Robert Walpole had taken away his Cornet's commiffion from this extraordinary man, he used to drive himself about the country in a one-horse chaife, without a fervant. At each town to which he came, the people gathered round about about his carriage, and received him with the loudeft acclamations. Lord Chatham thought very highly of the effects of drefs and of dignity of manner upon mankind. He was never feen on business without a full-drefs "coat and a tye-wig, and he never permitted his Under-Secretaries to fit down before him. A General Officer was once afked by Lord Chatham, How many men he fhould require for a certain expedition?" Ten thousand," was the anfwer. "You fhall have twelve thousand," faid the Minifter, "and then if you do not fucceed, it fault." is your The original of the character of Praxiteles, in Mr. Greville's very entertaining book of Maxims, is faid to have been Lord Chatham. When Cardinal Stoppani (furnamed in the Conclave of Cardinals Il Politico) was informed that Lord Chatham had ceafed to be Minister of England, he told an English Gentleman that he could not give any credit to it. "What heir," he added, "on coming to a confiderable eftate, and finding "it excellently well managed by a steward, would "difmifs that steward merely because he had ferved "his predeceffor?" The late King of Pruffia, in his History of the Seven Years War, thus defcribes Lord Chatham : L'eloquence et la genie de M. Pitt avoient rendu "l'idole |