mented by all his connections, whether relatives, friends, or domestics. Ile is thus described by the right honourable George Resc, than whom none can be more capable of judging, and he thus expresses himself: "I have hitherto confined my. self to matters within the immediate department at which Mr. Pitt presided; but considering the pre-emiuence he long held in the councils of his majesty, and that unhappily for the country he is no longer among us, I may, I hope, be al lowed to refer very shortly to some of the principal matters that occurred during the eventful period of his administration, and to say a few words respecting his character. "If we look to naval and military operations, it will be seen, with no small degree of astonishment as well as satisfaction, that in the period referred to, we took and destroyed more ships of the line of our enemies,+ than in all the wars we have been engaged in since the Revolution, viz. those in the reign of King William, Queen Anne, during the hostilities with Spain, in the reign of George the First, when the fleet of Spain was destroyed in the Mediterranean, in the wars of 1742, of 1756, and the American war. "That the French under their emperor Buonaparte, were driven out of Egypt by an inferior army, composed of troops from the banks of the Thames and of the Ganges, who met in that country, and there gained immortal honour; and that they were deprived of every foot of land they had on the continent of India, as well as of almost all their colonies in the West Indies; and that many of those of Spain and Holland were taken by the British arms, while the numerous and ex tensive possessions of Great Britain in all parts of the world, were com pletely protected. "If we turn our attention to what has passed within these king. doms, under our immediate view, we shall not have less reason to admire the character, and to revere the memory, of one of the most able, firm, virtuous, and disinterested men, that ever lived in any nation or in any time. His conduct du. ing the long and dangerous illness of our beloved sovereign, in 1788-9, will not soon be forgotten by his grateful countrymen It is the pride of the British constitution, as now understood and administered, that the personal interest of the mo narch is so much identified with the interests of the people, that the lat ter feel every circumstance tending to the health, the comfort, or the dignity of their sovereign, as a favourite acquisition to themselves: and I think I may venture to say, there never was a period of more genuine national joy, than when out beloved king, after a considerable interval of alarming indisposition, was restored to the enjoyment of health, and to the exercise of his public See a brief examination into the increase of the revenue, commerce, and navigation of Grea: Britain, during Mr. Pitt's administration. "These amount to 110 ships of the line; while those in the former wars were in number only 109. In this comparison the ships destroyed in the very arduous enterprize at Copenhagen, are not included, although the expedition was equipped under Mr. Pitt's government, nor several ships of the line lost in a storm, when the invasion of Ireland was attempted." -public functions. At that juncture tunities of appreciating Mr. Pitt's services, and of calculating the magnitude of those dangers which he opposed and overcame, the recollections of that acuteness, and clearness of perception, that soundness of judgment, that composure and fortitude of mind, which there were particular circumstances in the political state and political opinions of Europe, which tended more than ever to endear to every good and virtuous man, the monarch they saw re-established, and the tranquillity which that happy event had restored The display of wis dom and firmness evinced by Mr. Pitt, during that interval of national anxiety which the king's illness occasioned, did him infinite honour: he took that high ground which his virtue as well as his ability, entitled him to take, and with a dignity and courage inspired by both, rebuked at once the fears of the timid, and supported the rights of his sovereign: not less faithful to his country than loyal to his king he devoted his services to both in a manner equally manly and disinterested. We rejoice that the danger, "Which overcame us like a sum mer's cloud," was too short to give all the effect to his services, which circumstances less favourable might have shewn them calculated to produce. 166 Nor should the perils with which the country and its constitu, tion were for some time threatened, in consequence of what may be termed the mania of the French revolution ever be forgotten; though, perhaps, not now strong in the imagination of the people (and to some of the less considerate or less candid seem to have been exaggerated beyond the truth) from the very success with which they were opposed: by those, however, who had better oppor. never forsook him on the most trying occasions, and with which he met the difficulties of his own and of the public situation, will be now remembered, as at the time they were acknowledged, as not less admirable in themselves, than important in their consequences. "An intention is entertained of a history of Mr. Pitt's whole life being given to the public. In the mean time I trust I shall be excused in making some very short observations respecting him, as few had better. perhaps none so frequent, opportunities of forming a judgment on the subject, in the last two-andtwenty years of his life, during which per d I had the happiness to possess his affectionate friendship and perfect c nfidence, without the slightest or shortest interruption. To those who enjoyed his intimacy I might safely refer for the proof of his possessing those private virtues and endowments, which, though they may sometimes be accounted foreign to the public character of a statesman, the congenial feelings of Englishmen always dispose them to regard as the best pledges of a minister's upright administration. Around these, in the present case, an additional lustre as well as sacred-ess has been thrown by the circumstances of his death; by the manner in which he met it; and by the composure, the fortitude, 3L3 the kind. The strength of his attache ment to his sovereign, and the ar dour of his zeal for the welfare of his country, led him to forego, not only every pleasure and amusement, but almost every pause and relaxa tion of business, necessary to the preservation of health, till it was too late, in a frame like his, alas! for the preservation of life! That life he sacrificed to his country; not certainly, like another most valuable and illustrious servant of the public, (whose death has been deeply and universally lamented) amidst thoe animating circumstances in which the incomparable hero often velltured it in battle, and at last resigned it for the most splendid of all his unexampled victories, but with that patriotic self devotedness which looks for a reward only in its own consciousness of right, and in its own secret sense of virtue. the resignation, and the religion, most laborious and unremitting which marked his last moments. With a manner somewhat reserved and distant, in what might be termed his public deportment, no man was ever better qualified to gain, or more successful in fixing the attachment of his friends, than Mr. Pitt. They saw all the powertul energies of his character softened into the most perfect complacency and sweetness of disposition, in the circles of private life, the pleasures of which no one more cheerfully enjoyed, or more agreeably promoted, when the paramount duties he conceived himself to owe to the public, admitted of his mixing in them that indignant severity with which he met and subdued what he considered unfounded opposition; that keenness of sarcasm with which he repell d and withered (as it might be said) the powers of most of his assailants in debate, were exchanged, in the society of his intimate friends, for a kindness of heart, a gentleness of demeanour, and playfulness of good humour, which none ever witnessed without interest, or participated without delight. His mind which, in the grasp and extent of its capacity, seized with a quickness almost intuitive, all the most important relations of political power and political economy, was not less uncommonly susceptible of all the light and elegant impressions, which form the great charm of conversation of cultivated minds. This sensibility to the enjoyments of private friendship, greatly enhanced the sacrifice he made of every personal indulgence and comfort, to a rigid performance of duty to the public; that duty, for the last year of his life, was, indeed, of the "The praise of virtue, of honour, and of disinterested purity, whether in-public or private character, need scarcely be claimed før his memory; for those his enemies (if now he has any, which I am unwilling to be lieve, although some are frequently endeavouring to depreciate his me rits) will not venture to deny; and his country, in whose cause they were exercised to the last, will know how to value and record them. That they should be so valued and recorded, is important on every principle of justice to the individual, and benefit to the community. To an upright minister ia Great Britain, zealous for the interest and honour of his country, there is no reward or profit, eme lument or patronage, which can be esteemed a compensation for the labours, the privations, the anxie tics, or the dangers, of his situation; it is in the approbation of his sovereign, and in the suffrage of his countrymen, added to his own conviction of having done every thing to deserve it, that he must look for that reward which is to console him for all the cares and troubles of his station; the opposition of rivals, the misrepresentation of enemies, the desertion or peevishness of friends, and sometimes the mistaken censures of the people. 'Tis the honourable ambition that looks beyond the present time, that must create, encourage, and support a virtuous and enlightened statesman; that must confer on his mind, the upright. ness and purity that rise above all self-advantage; the courage that guards the state from foreign hostility or internal faction; the firmness that must often resist the wishes, to ensure the safety of the people. "This is the legitimate ambition of a statesman; and that Mr. Pitt possessed it, his friends are convinced; but he has been sometimes accused by those who, although their opposition was active and systematic, yet knew how to honour the man) of a less laudable, and less patriotic ambition, that wished "to reign alone," to exclude from the participation of office and of power, other men, whose counsels might have assisted him to guide the country amidst its difficulties and embarrassments, or might have contributed to its safety in the hour of its danger. It is, however, per. fectly well known to some of the highest characters in the kingdom, that Mr. Pitt, after the resignation of Mr. Addington, in the summer of 1804, was most anxiously desirous that lord Grenville and Mr. Fox should form a part of the new ad ministration, and pressed their admission into office in that quarter where only such earnestness could be effectual; conceiving the forming a strong government as important to the public welfare, and as calcu lated to call forth the united talents as well as the utmost resources of the empire; in which endeavour he persisted till within a few months of his death. I am aware of the delicacy of such a statement, but I am bold in the certainty of its truth. My profound respect for those by whom such averment, if false, might be contradicted, would not suffer me to make it, were it not called for, to do justice to that great and virtuous statesman, whose unrivalled qualities, both in private and in public life, will ever be in my recollection. "Dum memor ipse mci, dum spiritus hos regit artus." Memoirs of the Right Honourable Charles James Fox. Charles James Fox, second surviving son of Henry, the first lord Holland, and lady Georgina Carolina Lenox, daughter of the duke of Richmond, was born on the 24th day of January, 1749. His lordship's immediate ancestor, sir Stephen Fox, was the youngest son of William Fox, of Farley, in Wiltshire, and born there the 27th of March, 1627. He married his first lady, Elizabeth, the only surviving issue of Mr. William Whittle, of Lancashire, and afterwards went abroad with king Charles the Second in his exile. While accompanying the king abroad, Stephen, his eldest son by this marriage, was born and 3L 4 buried Sir Stephen Fox married his second wife, Miss Hope, daughter of the rev. Mr. Hope, in 1703, and the only surviving issue of the marriage. On the death of sir Stephen, there were two sons, Stephen and Henry, and also one daughter, named Charlotte. The first son was created earl of Ilchester, the second lord Holland, and the daughter was married to the hon. Edward Digby, second son of lord Digby, and was grandfather to the present earl Digby. Of this sir Stephen Fox, who appears to have been a man of great liberality, as well as high honour, Collins, in his peerage, vol. 6. p. 392. records, amongst others, the following acts of munificence: buried in France. His second son seat of Holland house, at Kensingby this marriage was born in 1659, ton. and the king standing for his godfather, was christened Charles. After the restoration he had five other sons born in England; Stephen, who was buried in Westmin. ster Abbey; William, who was buried by him, aged 20; Edward, buried in the same place, aged 7; James, who died, aged 13; and John, who died aged one. He also by the same marriage, had three daughters, Elizabeth, married 27th of December, 1673, in Henry the Seventh's Chapel, to the Honourable Charles Cornwallis, who succeeded to the peerage, 1676, and from which marriage the present marquis Cornwallis is descended; Jane, the youngest daughter of sir Stephen Fox, by his first wife, married George Compton, fourth carl of Northampton, from which marriage the present earl of Northampton is lineally descended; Margaret, the second daughter, was buried in Westminster Abbey, unmarried. Charles, the eldest surviving son of sir Stephen Fox, by his first mar. riage, held several offices and honourable employments to the end of his life. He was joint paymaster general of the forces, at the age of twenty-three years, and his abilities, candour, integrity and honour, were so conspicuous, that he held the same office of pay-master general under the successive reigns of Charles II. James II. and queen Anne. He was vice-treasurer to king William, and treasurer to Catherine of Braganza, the queen dowager. He married Miss Trollop, daughter of sir William Trollop, by whom he had no issue, and he died in his 54th year, A. D. 1713. A very fine portrait of him is preserved at the family "The just profits of his offices enabled him to provide for his family, and excrcise those acts of generosity and charity, which in the course of his whole life he gave such extensive and uncommon instances of. His disposition to all who had any claim to his assistance, and that diffusive charity which was visible in, him to the last of his life, begun with the increase of his fortune, at an age when most are inclined to pleasures, and at the time when the court was in the greatest gaiety. His first regard was to the place of his birth, for at Farley he built the church at his own charge; and in 1678 built and founded there an hospital for six old men, and six old women; a neat building, with a chapel in it, and handsome lodgings for a chap. lain, who resides there, and hath the title of warden of the hospital. This he endowed with 1881. per annom; and there is likewise a charity school, wherein are taught six boys and six girls, all at his sole charge. He |