The Onslow Family 1528 1874 With Some Acccount Of Their Times

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53-53010

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Onslow family.
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Biography

VOLTAIRE

ROUSSEAU '

JOHN WESLEY

JAMES BOSWELL

WILLIAM PENN

MRS. THRALE

ROYAL GEORGE

URSA MAJOR

CALICO PIE
FUSILIER BLUFF
HENRY PLUMDEW

Archeology and Anthropology

OUR PREHISTORIC FORERUNNERS

IMMORTAL MAN
ARCHEOLOGY OF MIDDLESEX AND LONDON

History

OUTLANDERS

CRIMEA
MAN AND THE ATOM

Satire

THE MONTAGU-PUFFINS
THE POLDEROY PAPERS

DR, PHILLJGO
EDWIN AND ELEANOR

PRODWIT'S GUIDE TO WRITING
Fiction

THE VICAR'S EXPERIMENTS

FAMILY MATTERS

LOBELIA GROVE

SCARWBATHER

Belles Lettres

THE ENGLISH LETTER WRITERS
ROCKING HORSE JOURNEY
THE ANATOMY OF SATIRE

Printed in Great Britain

by T. and A* CONSTABLE LTD,, Hopetoun Street,
Printers to the University of Edinburgh

CAT. TO, 4167/4

To
P. L. E. O.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

MY thanks are due in the first place to the present Earl of Onslow for
permission to make use of the family papers and other collections at
Clandon Park, to obtain photographs of pictures and of the house, and
to consult the invaluable MS. history of the family compiled by his
father, the fifth EarL My indebtedness to the Countess of Onslow,
who has generously assisted me throughout the work of research, in
the provision of illustrations, and in so many other ways, is acknow-
ledged with the deepest gratitude. I have also to thank the Countess of
Iveagh for lending me a monograph on "Les Onslow*' of Auvergne;
Lord Herbert, and his publishers (Messrs. Jonathan Cape) for allowing
me to quote from the Pembroke Papers, Mr. D. H. Jones for permis-
sion to make use of his excellent "dissertation" on Speaker Onslow,
the first competent analytical study of this remarkable man; Messrs.
Michael Joseph, for leave to reproduce passages relating to Viscount
Cranley (Tom Onslow) from The Letters of Private Wheeler; Mr,
Eric Parker for giving me references concerning Guildford Races;
the staff of the London Library (especially Miss Joan Bailey);
Lieutenant-Colonel C. W. G. Ince for drawing my attention to
relevant papers and cuttings in the library at Clandon Park; Mr.
J. W. Lindus Forge, for allowing me to reproduce his excellent
photographs of the house at Clandon 5 and finally, though with equal
emphasis, my publishers, Messrs. Chapman and Hall, for their
undeterrable encouragement.

C, E. V,

CONTENTS

CHAP - PAGE

INTRODUCTORY NOTE ix

I. ONSLOW ORIGINS t

II. RICHARD THE FOX g

III. FAMILY FORTUNES 23

IV. AUGUSTAN ENGLAND 39
V. DICKY DUCKLEGS 5 o

VI. THE VISITATION OF GOD 61

VII. CLANDON PARK 74

VIII. THE GREAT SPEAKER 87

IX. HERESY AND SCHISM 102

X. TWENTY YEARS XI g

XI: THE KING'S MEN 134

XII. BLACK GEORGE 149

XIII. A TRIMMER'S PROGRESS 164

XIV. PARSON TO PATRON 179
XV. THE TRIMMER REWARDED i 9 6

XVI. LITTLE T. O. 210

XVII. TOM AND EDWARD 222

XVIII. CHIAROSCURO 239

XIX. SPLENDID YOUTH 252

APPENDIX A. Recent History of the Family 268

APPENDIX B. Family Pictures at Clandon Park 269

APPENDIX C. Additional Note on, Clandon Park 271

APPENDIX D. George Wither and Sir Richard Onslow 272

275

x THE ONSLOW FAMILY

The Onslows have represented for more than three centuries, both
in strength and in weakness, a noble family of immense though varying
territorial prestige; a succession of men who, without attaining the
highest offices in the State, frequently played a part that was by no
means inconsiderable in politics, war and administration. Not every
Onslow displayed the high integrity of the great Speaker: the first
Earl, for example, was a time-server whose loyalties and leanings were
continually modified by the tactics which he considered necessary for
his personal advancement. But the Onslows of Clandon also repre-
sented the English country gentleman in his more magnificent form.
They produced characters of startling eccentricity and of dark aloof-
ness; but they preserved, upon the whole, the respect and interest of
their neighbours, and were not unfittingly known as "the rulers of
Surrey."

I have chosen for specially detailed study three men (father, son and
grandson) who illustrate the Onslow paradox in a peculiarly striking
way; the Speaker Arthur Onslow, one of the greatest of English
Parliamentary figures; "Black George," the first Earl; and the
eccentric and uxorious Tom Onslow, the second Earl, who wrote
scurrilously witty verses, but whose principal delight was the driving
of black horses in a phaeton.

CHAPTER I

Onslow Origins

A LONG and illuminated pedigree is a pretty thing, and
-Instill affords a great deal of pleasure to those who can
acquire the necessary materials. Unrolled from the highest
shelf in the library, and sometimes refusing to ascend again,
the lovely colours of blazonry and the exquisite writing of
the genealogical scribe are beautiful in themselves and excite
the admiration without any further examination of detail.
He must feel a more than Common delight who knows that
he is descended from the mighty Bedwig or the famous
Itermod, or those remote and long-lived heroes of Genesis
Cush, Mash, Phut, Lud, Heth, Hul and Aram, and all the
builders of Babel

But the social value and relevance of such a display depend
less upon the number of the shields, the intricacy and extent
of the tree, than upon the quality of the people who are thus
heraldically represented; and also, it may be, upon some
other proof of their existence.

A member of the Onslow family (not, let me hasten to
add, one who will be mentioned again) devised in all serious-
ness a pedigree which began with Adam and Eve and ended
with himself. Of course he had his authorities. For the
earliest part of the line, passing through Noah, Shem,
Bedwig, Huala, Huatha and Itermod, he could depend
with assurance upon Asser (A.D, 850), Simeon (1070) and
Florence (1080). We have his convincing statement that
"tte above Pedigree was certified as correct" by. these
ancient and eminent recorders; and I, for one, have neither
the knowledge nor the desire to question their accuracy,
, Thetfe ttay possibly be a little doiibt z$M tbe^todibility
of what fd|lws: the uturoling of the linq % wy%6erdic,
Creoda, G&f)!^^^ . . to'

4 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

of increasing importance and wealth. Edward Onslow (who
died in 1535), the grandfather of Richard the Speaker, was
a member of the Mercers' Guild, He was a good repre-
sentative of the Onslows of Shropshire, a family which, up
to the second half of the sixteenth century, could only have
claimed in their own commendation such terms as "ancient"
and " respectable." He also established the useful Onslow
practice of marrying heiresses.

Roger Onslow of Shrewsbury, who, like his father,
Edward, was a member of the Mercers' Company or Guild,
was the first of the Onslow family to move out of Shropshire
and into the affairs of the larger world, and certainly the first
of the Onslows who for the greater part of the year lived in
London.

The second son of Roger Onslow by his first wife,
Margaret Poyner, was the Speaker Richard (1528-71),
whose elder brother, Fulk or Fulke, held the office of Clerk
of Parliament.

Richard the Speaker was a most remarkable man who, by
merit, industry, learning and a noble presence, raised the
family from acknowledged respectability to perceptible
renown. In accomplishment and unblemished integrity he
was never surpassed, and hardly equalled, by any of his
descendants. And we should remember that he did not
possess the advantage an advantage always conspicuous in
the later family records of being steadily supported by
influential and assiduous patrons. It is not enough to say that
he founded the family fortunes. Fortunes are made in many
ways, not always creditably, but this man, by virtue of his
own gifts and incomparable dignity, gave the family a name
and a reputation far beyond anything which could reason-
ably have been predicted. At the same time, it may be observed
that he was not without some notable though indirect
associations through family matriages. Through the Corbets
he could claim relationship with the Devereux family; and
through his uncle Humphrey's wife he had some claim upott
the attention of Lord Richard Dudley, , , '

He was called to the Bar from the Inner Temple an4 was
appointed "Autumn Reader" in 1562, He had sat m the

ONSLOW ORIGINS 5

Parliaments of 1557-58, and again in 1562-63 for the
borough of Steyning in Sussex, which he continued to
represent until his death.

So remarkable was his legal aptitude that, in 1563, at the
age of thirty-five, he was Recorder of London. He was also
Attorney-General of the Duchy of Lancaster and the Court
of Wards. In 1566 he received the high distinction of being
appointed Solicitor-General, and in the same year he was
induced against his will to become Speaker of the House of
Commons. His election to the Chair was contested (a some-
what unusual event) and he was chosen by 82 votes to 60.

His reluctance to occupy the Chair was excusable. The
Commons were beginning a debate on the prickly subject of
the royal succession and also the delicately dangerous pro-
blem of the Queen's marriage. The tension between Eliza-
beth and her Parliament, her peevish obstinacy in the
Darnley affair and the bill for Prayer-Book reform, her
fretfulness and impatience, her quick recessions and im-
petuous advances, the fiery arrogance of a woman resolved
at any cost to prove herself equal or superior to any man or
assembly of men, these things brought into the debates of
the House of Commons a grim vigilance, an embarrassed
courtesy, and even a touch of personal danger that obviously
made the Speaker's position anything but a happy one*
However, Parliament was dissolved early in the following
year (1567) and before the next session had begun Richard
Onslow was dead. He died of a "fever" (which he caught
when he was visiting his uncle, Humphrey Onslow, at
Shrewsbury) after an illness of about five days. At the time
of his death (1571) he was forty-three.
. The death of Richard Onslow at so early an age may well
have deprived|the Onslow family of the noblest figure in
their records. His fine appearance and honourable nature,
his ability as a lawyer, the modesty of a great man, as well as
the ste&dy balance of one who could move uprightly among
the schemers of a court, Bis piety and resolution, these were
gifts or %$i!ities that would have -tastotod hm of a wcnted
eminence^* JWieed, ^tibey 'had ^ake^dy pro<aredi^o^lim no
ordinary distiiidtlon, If he is

THE ONSLOW FAMILY

the great Speaker Arthur Onslow, who occupied the Chair
in the House of Commons exactly two hundred years after
the birth of this notable Elizabethan, he seems potentially
the finer man of the two; for Arthur, in all his glory, was
never remarkable for modesty of deportment.

Richard Onslow has been described as "a very learned
lawyer" and he is credited with the authorship si Arguments
Relating to Sea Landes and Salt Shores. But he is of particular
significance in the family records because he established the
Onslows in the county of Surrey.

On the yth of August 1559, he married Catherine Hard-
ing, daughter of Richard Harding of Knoll or Knowle near
Cranleigh, not far from the southern border of the county.
He thus acquired, in time, a very considerable estate, and we
are told that he was also the owner of " large properties 7 ' in
Middlesex, Gloucester, Shropshire, Sussex and Wiltshire.
When in London he lived at the Blackfriars' Convent, of
which he had a grant from the Queen.

The transformation of the Onslows from relative medio-
crity in Shropshire to the highest importance in Surrey was
thus due to the ability of Richard Onslow and his good
fortune in marrying an heiress. Even so, the ascendancy of
the family was not immediately assured.

Knoll was not well situated, in- those days of slow transport
and uncertain communications, for a county family of com-
manding influence. It was not until the headquarters of the
Onslows had been moved from Cranleigh to Clandon by the
grandson of Richard Onslow that the family acquired, in the
words of the Speaker Arthur Onslow, "that interest in^the
county and in the town of Guildford . , . kept up t6 a height
that has scarcely been equalled in any county by any one

family."

It was largely owing to the Puritan mood of the county
that the Onslow influence was destined, in the course of a
century, to become virtually paramount. By their stern re^-
ligious temper and the uncoloured austerity of their line,, as
well as by a natural desire to preserve the integrity of the
law, the Onslows found themselves transplanted into a
thoroughly congenial soil.

ONSLOW ORIGINS 7

They did not represent the splendours of the Elizabethan
renaissance. Their England was never the England of
Eupkue$) nor did they show in their manners, dress and
accomplishment the warbling, listless and effeminate eleg-
ance of the courtiers and the men of high fashion. But they
did represent at the outset, very emphatically, those move-
ments which aimed at preserving the rights of Parliament,
the freedom of the people and freedom of worship.

These fine ideals, the product as much of ancestry as of
clear thinking, were sometimes a little contaminated by the
yeoman's propensity to make a good bargain or to strike a
compromise. In other words, the quality known to some as
laudable shrewdness and to others by a more obnoxious term
did indeed play its part in the Onslow history. And yet so
much depends upon the position that was occupied at any
given moment either by the Onslows or by their detractors,
He who is true to conscience must often be false to party.

Richard Onslow, sometimes known as the Black Speaker
in reference to his dark hair and swarthiness, was followed as
the owner of Knoll by his second son, Edward. This Edward
appears to have been noted for nothing more serviceable
than "piety," but he still managed, in his correct and un-
obtrusive way, to maintain the family reputation. His de-
scendant, Arthur Onslow (who repaired his neglected tomb),
speaks of him as "eminent for the virtue and sanctity of his
life." He married Isabel, daughter of Sir Thomas Shirley of
Westenston, and of Preston Place, in Sussex, by which
marriage, among more substantial and useful benefits, the
Onslows became Founder's Kin of All Souls.

For some reason which is not sufficiently clear, he was the
first of the family to receive the honour of knighthood. He
died in 1615, leaving two daughters and three sons. His
eldest son died without issue, and the estate of Knoll was
inherited by his second son, Richard, who later became
knowfi as the Red Fox.

CHAPTER II
Richard the Fox

ICHARD THE FOX was born in 1601. Of his educa-
JVtion there is little record, though it is known that he was
a student of Lincoln's Inn in 1618, two years after the death
of his elder brother. Sir Thomas, Onslow of Knoll.

This man, one of the most interesting of the Onslows, on
account of his place in history and his personal character,
presents many difficulties of interpretation. He is both con-
spicuous and elusive, definite and uncertain, apparently
strong In principle and yet ambiguous in performance. He
had inherited and accepted the Puritan ethos and was a
Presbyterian of the most rigid order.

At the same time he was not unacceptable to James I, a
King whose views concerning the rights of Parliament and
the uncontrolled extent of the royal prerogative were totally
at variance with Onslow's political and religious opinions.
He was, in fact, knighted by James at Theobald's in 1624
(the last year of the King's reign) when he was only twenty-
three.

For what service, with what intention, was this knight-
hood conferred ? Perhaps the strategic potential of the Surrey
families, particularly of those likely to resist the encroach-
ment of a King upon the privileges and rights of the
Commons, may have supplied the motive. It was now clear
to all observers that the climate of Surrey was one in which
the flowers of independence, if not of active revolt, were
likely to flourish. Indeed, the Puritan opposition to the
luxury and effeminacy of the Court, as well as to the influence
of the King's homosexuality on the general conduct of
affairs, was already evident in 1620. One cannot suppose
that Richard's father, Edward, a man of such unseeking and
retired virtue and of such unassertive piety, could ever have

RICHARD THE FOX

done anything that was likely to involve the continued
support of the monarch. But here we have one of the first
appearances of the Onslow paradox an ostensible, though
possibly an unreal, discrepancy between achievement and
reward.

A final consideration is the importance at this period of
almost any well-established county family; for the power of
the country gentlemen in forming local opinion and in pro-
moting respect for the law (so eminently vital to their own
interest) was very much greater than we commonly imagine.
There were no provincial newspapers and the mass of the
people were illiterate. News and opinions were therefore
propagated by personal contact, and the good will of the
greater families was a matter of high importance to the
administration*

Like the majority of the Onslows, Sir Richard married an
heiress Dame Elizabeth, the daughter of Arthur Strang-
waies or Strangways of Durham and London. He had four-
teen children, of whom six sons and five daughters reached
maturity. He served as a Knight of the Shire for Surrey in
the Parliament of 1 628 and as a Justice of the Peace. In 1 63 8
he was one of the Deputy Lieutenants.

So far there is little that is remarkable in the history of
Richard the Fox unless it be his consolidation of the family
position in Surrey and the steadiness, of his advance in
personal prestige and in dignity of office; but he was pres-
ently to play a part which, to this day, is among the minor
mysteries or historical biography.

The date of Richard's marriage appears to be unknown,
but he was clearly married at a very early age, for his eldest
son, Arthur, was born in 1621 or 1622. It is obvious that
the family at Knoll were strictly Presbyterian, and in the
course of time both Richard and his son Arthur carried out
their duties as Elders of the Church.

From 1,629 to 1640 King Charles and his ministers
usurped the functions of Parliament and the .affairs,: of 'the
country ^se controlled by the personal jp^lifc^ypf die
monarch; D^^g,tihbi,pejri<^i, of .eleven jeaw^^<^mta-
tional op<&ii^^ '

io THE ONSLOW FAMILY

Although Richard was a Puritan he maintained friendly
relations, at least up to 1640, with the Lord Lieutenant,
Nottingham, a Cavalier, and with Thomas, Earl of Arundel,
who, until 1 642, was joint Lieutenant. He was, moreover,
during the whole of his life, on friendly terms with the
Howard family. But the Cavalier influence in Surrey was
rapidly declining from 1638, and Richard's personal power
as Deputy Lieutenant became steadily stronger until, in the
opening years of the Civil War, it was virtually supreme.

Richard Onslow served in the Short Parliament of 1640,
dismissed by the King after a session of only three weeks
(April 1 3th to May 5th), and was returned to the Long
Parliament in November of the same year. By this time the
national issue was clearly emerging as that of Parliament
against the King, and Richard's position was temporarily
well defined as that of a resolute and active Parliamentarian*

In 1641, as the prospect of a civil war became imminent,
and as the prestige of Richard in Surrey developed into one
of paramount importance, a vital decision was made and the
headquarters of the Onslow family were eventually moved
from Knoll to West Clandon, about three miles from Guild-
ford, This move on Richard's part was directed by the prin-
ciples of high strategy. Every reason political, social,
military and economic was in favour of such a move. The
owners of a property in Clandon would be in close touch
both with the affairs of the county and those of the important
borough of Guildford. They would be within reasonable
distance of London, and well placed on the line of com-
munication between the. capital and Portsmouth. They
would also be within convenient reach of the other great
landowners in the county, with whom or against whom they
would form the necessary alliances of power. For the
Onslows were now resolved upon the acquisition and re-
tention of the highest influence as a county family. (The
Onslow properties in Shropshire were sold by Richard.)

There would appear to be something faintly ironical ift
the purchase by Roundhead Richard of a Cavalier mansion.

This mansion, a large and extremely well-proportioned
Elizabethan-Renaissance house in Clandon Park, was the

RICHARD THE FOX n

property of Sir Richard Weston. It seems likely that it was
built on the site of a smaller and much earlier house known
as "the Lodge" or "the Hunting Lodge," for we have an
exact representation of Weston's house, painted by Knyff
early in the eighteenth century: clearly a house which could
never have been described by so humble a term as "lodge."

The house was a brick structure of noble dimensions,
covering the same, or possibly a larger area than that of the
present building, with a large block for the accommodation
of horses, coaches and retainers on its northern flank. There
was a handsome clock-tower over the main entrance. It was
surrounded by a most elaborate system of formal gardens
and the regiments of orderly trees that were so typical of
English properties up to the second or third decades of the
eighteenth century. There were three fountains; and a
strange ornamental water with rounded ends, hedged in by
a trim though bosky plantation of trees, dark where they met
the water, though touched above with a delicate silvered
light. Fields on the one side and orchards on the other pro-
vided evidence of good husbandry; and the Knyff picture
certainly presents a view of opulence and of comely order
where nature and sophistication were happily united.

Sir Richard Weston of Button Place was at this time
(1641) a man of about fifty. He had inherited the estates of
Clandon and of Sutton in 1613 after his father's death. He
was a Catholic and a Royalist, practically and expensively
interested in devising canals, weirs ahd locks, besides being
deeply concerned in agriculture. In 1642 he fled from
England and occupied himself congenially in the study of
waterways and farms in the Low Countries, which he had
visited in his youth. He died ten years later.

From this point, after his move to Clandon, the history of
Richard the Fox becomes complicated and exciting.

Sir Richard who, like so many of the Onslows, had any
amount of dashing physical bravery and was undismayed by
steel or powder, quickly made up his mind. He would-be a
fighting man: he would lead the horsemen of Surrey against
the armies of t&e King. The time for talking and iwrijt&g was
past long ago $ *wl ?$1|4 tjasl^ tibi^t ;pf pifeevlwd fire of

12 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

musketoon these were the only arguments that could now
prevail. Let them call upon the avenging Lord who is mighty
in battle, for the struggle would be decided, and that soon,
upon God's field of glory.

And so, while Dame Elizabeth and the family were
settling themselves (we may assume) in their new home at
Clandon, Sir Richard Onslow and the men of Surrey pre-
pared for the fight.

In 1 642, when the Civil War began, Onslow was forty-
one, and his eldest son, Arthur, had come of age. It does not
appear that Arthur was engaged at any time in military
operations, but it may well be that he was deputed by his
father to look after the property and the household at
Clandon, although the actual date of the completed family
move to Clandon is uncertain.

The figure and action of Arthur are somewhat vague. The
long face and the low brow that are to be seen in his portrait
at Clandon do not indicate any strength or precision of
character. He sat with his father in the two Parliaments of
Cromwell, and also in the Convention Parliament, We have
evidence that his political attitudes (for perhaps they were
scarcely opinions) did not always agree with those of his
father, and he was by no means unprepared to accept with
a good grace and a respectful demeanour the restoration of
the Stuarts,

Sir Richard already commanded the county Train Bands
or Militia. This gave him a promising start; but there were
difficulties. The arms and ammunition for his men were
stored at Kingston, and Kingston was almost the only town
in Surrey that was Royalist by inclination. Early in 'the year
(i 642) it became known that a group of Royalist supporters,
under arms, were assembling at Kingston, a rallying centre
where Digby had already made his appearance. When Sir
Richard entered the town at the head of his Train Bands he
was not well received; but the Royalist officers presently
withdrew (one of them was arrested) and the town relapsed
into a state of ostensible neutrality.

In the wars of this period and indeed up to a much later
date cavalry were of supreme importance; not only because

RICHARD THE FOX 13

of their decisive impact in battle, but also as mobile patrols,
observers, pursuers, despatch-riders, troops on the lines of
communication, skirmishers, guards and escorts. Both sides
understood this very well, and upon the quality of their
horsemen the issues of the war might well depend.

It is an obvious though remarkable tribute to the military
competence of Onslow that he was ordered to raise a Surrey
regiment of horse and to lead it into action as a colonel.
Until the appearance of Cromwell himself in the field, the
Parliamentary forces had no cavalry leader to compare with
Royalist Rupert, who combined the knowledge of a special-
ist with a highly imaginative and audacious tactical ability.
The training and leadership of horse was therefore a matter
of vital concern.

Onslow raised his regiment of Surrey horse with great
speed and efficiency, but again there were troubles. He was
responsible for the maintenance of a garrison at Farnham
Castle, ten miles west of Guildford. The commander of the
garrison was George Wither or Withers, a mettlesome
elderly poet of powerful religious conviction and austere
bearing.

Wither at this time was about fifty-four. He had produced
in his earlier years pastoral and satirical poems as well as
religious verses. He was a vicious pamphleteer, and was not
infrequently in the Marshalsea or Newgate. For many years
he lived in a cottage at Farnham, addicted rather grimly to
theological studies. This turn of mind led him to write a
great deal of religious poetry which is not usually considered
of the highest order. He sold his little property in 1642,
raised a troop of horse for the Parliament and was then
placed in command at Farnham Castle with the rank of
Captain. His garrison included some of Onslow's militia.
When Rupert's cavalry threatened Farnham, Wither seems
to have lost his nerve; and eventually, in circumstances
which are by no means clear, he withdrew the garrison and
its military stores. He was afterwards captured by the Kkig's
forces and-QWed his life to tie intercession of,
Denham,, wfe .flipantly : -observed that , if /
executed he

i 4 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

The affair of the Castle at Farnham was intensely annoy-
ing to Sir Richard Onslow, who thus lost an important
position on his flank, until the Castle was reoccupied by
Waller* The quarrel between Onslow and Wither flared up
unpleasantly in 1644, when Onslow deprived Wither of his
command of militia in the middle and eastern divisions of
Surrey and also succeeded in getting him removed from the
Commission of the Peace; whereupon the poet retaliated
venomously with a pamphlet which he called Justitiarius
Justificatus (see Appendix D), and accused Sir Richard of
secretly corresponding with King Charles. Obviously the
matter had to be cleared up: Sir Richard was eventually
vindicated by Parliament, and the Justificatus pamphlet was
burned publicly in Guildford by the hangman.

There seems no doubt whatever that Wither's charges
against Onslow were mainly though not entirely untrue.
The poet was a rancorous and unstable man. He has been
satirically represented in his own time by Ben Jonson as
Chronomastix, and was retrospectively denounced by Pope
as "wretched Wither" and by Swift as "Bavius." It is true
that his verses were praised by Lamb and also by Coleridge;
but he was damned in the most effectual manner by the
commendation of Robert Southey.

One of the first acts of Sir Richard Onslow in the early
stages of the conflict was the arrest of Mr. Justice Mallett,
who, after being warned at Kingston, removed the Assizes
to Dorking, where he was apprehended. The excuse for this
high-handed breach of legality, this outrage upon the very
body of Justice, was the rumour that Mallett intended to
adjourn the Sessions and then make his way to^ the King's
party in the field. Whether he was acting under instructions
or not, this was one of the deeds which made things ex-
tremely unpleasant for Richard at the time of the Restora-
tion,

In November 1642 Rupert's cavalry were in Farnham,
and it seemed as though Kingston were in danger of a
Royalist advance across the Thames. Again Richard Onslow
was in trouble. He had established his personal headquarters
at Kingston, and he now felt uncertain about the temper and

RICHARD THE FOX 15

action of the Surrey men if the town became involved in a
battle.

He therefore withdrew himself and his forces: thus
following the example of Wither at Farnham. There is, one
must allow, something a little disturbing about this with-
drawal, but no doubt we can justify it by the prompt use of
those convenient and restorative words, the saviours of much
greater military reputations "strategic" or "tactical." At
any rate, the evacuation of Kingston was a matter of no
military consequence. The troops of Waller swept into
Surrey very soon afterwards, and it was then the turn of
the King's men to withdraw from the whole county*

Sir Richard Onslow did not see active service until the
summer of 1644 when he was ordered to join the forces of
Norton at the siege of Basing House, He took with him the
Red Regiment of Surrey, two Farnham regiments and three
troops of horse.

Basing House, the home of the Marquess of Winchester,
a Catholic, was a fortified position of great importance
covering the southern approaches to Oxford. (Thus, Basing
in the south, like Banbury in the north, was vital to the
strategy and security of the Royalist armies.) It is said that
Onslow " distinguished himself " at the siege of Basing
House. I do not know how this was done, but I have no
.doubt whatever as to the accuracy of the statement.

On the ist of July the horsemen of Cromwell swept away
the troopers of Rupert in the terrible fight of Marston Moor,
the King's position in the north collapsed in hopeless dis-
order, and a vigorous campaign might have secured an early
victory for the Parliament. But the higher command of the
Puritan forces, then represented by men like Manchester
and Essex, could not bring themselves to attempt the
annihilation of the Royalist armies and the capture of the
King.

The siege of Basing House dragged on, where Richard
Onslow, after the dispatch of Norton's cavalry to the, north
in Jun% was in locaLcommand of the entire mounted force.
His post wasjme of great responsibility and shw$ ? beyond
any question cthts t^M^AC^ o Ms jof^cm^^^m^ the

i6 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

ability of Sir Richard himself. The siege was raised in
November after Waller's defeat in Hampshire, and Richard
was again stationed at Farnham.

It was now realised that a reform of the Parliamentary
army was needed, and a change in the whole system of the
higher command, if the campaign was to end in an over-
whelming victory* All members of Parliament were in-
structed to resign their commands, and Fairfax undertook,
with rapid and astonishing success, the shaping of the New
Model. This ended for the time the military career of Sir
Richard Onslow, but we are told by his descendant, the
fifth Earl of Onslow, that "he still continued in adminis-
trative charge of the County, and throughout the year we
read in the State Papers of orders being sent to him from
Derby House/'

The New Model won the war at a single stroke when it
broke the Royalist force at Naseby in June 1645. The
storming of Basing House in October, with its complete
destruction and the slaughter of most of its defenders, was
little more than a clearing-up operation. After painful and
aimless wanderings the King surrendered to the Scots at
Newark in May 1646.

A phase of intrigue and of treacherous plotting followed,
with a spasmodic renewal of the war in 1648, at which time
Sir Richard Onslow was a member of the Derby House
Committee. He and his son Arthur were among the Presby-
terian members who were anxious to save the life of the
King; they were expelled from the House by the Purge of
Pride, and Richard returned to Surrey, where his influence,
though perhaps a little obscured, was by no means ex-
tinguished. The King was executed at Whitehall on the
3oth of January 1649.

The Onslow records are broken off in 1650, but in the
following year Richard was in harness again. A summons
to Clandon in the summer of 1651 called upon him once
more to raise a regiment of Surrey cavalry and once more to
be their colonel. This, I think, is decisive evidence of
Onslow's renown as a leader of mounted troops, a renown
which appears to have been greater than his fame as a

RICHARD THE FOX 17

dependable Parliamentarian, He received his final orders on
the aoth of August: he was to raise and arm a regiment of
horse and to effect, as rapidly as possible, a junction with
Cromwell's forces in the neighbourhood of Worcester where
a battle was imminent between the Commonwealth troops
and Prince Charles, already proclaimed as Charles II by
Montrose in Scotland.

After the defeat of Charles by Cromwell at Dunbar
(September 3, 1650) the Prince for he had no other legal
title in England still commanded a force of misled or
fanatical Scotsmen. He rashly invaded England in 1651,
slipping through to the west of the Pennines, while Crom-
well marched on a parallel route on the other side of the hills.

In August the two main forces were converging upon
Worcester. On the 27th Cromwell had swung up front
Evesham at the head of some 28,000 men, while the forces
remaining with Charles were now only about 16,000 a
crowd of dispirited and ragged Scotsmen, already alarmed
by the hostile attitude of the English and certainly not in
good order for a battle against such terrifying odds. But men
often fight at their best when the situation is desperate.
Moreover, the obstacle of the Severn obliged Cromwell to
divide his force in order to control both banks of the river.
He had received welcome reinforcements before the battle
and he went into the field with a total strength of about
30,000 men : a superiority of nearly two to one,

Onslow had quickly raised his regiment and was quickly
on the road. He moved off from Surrey before the end of
August; the precise date of departure seems to be unknown.

From this point, it has to be allowed, Colonel Sir Richard
Onslow marches into a strange obscurity wherein the
shadow of more than one suspicion is discernible. In this
obscurity he won for himself, not renown in battle, but the
sobriquet of the Red Fox. The plain fact is that he did not
arrive on the outskirts of Worcester until the 4th of Sept-
ember, the day after the battle. What was he doing, and
where ^aiSfee, on the 3rd of September ? : ^

Upon tlife answer to this question depends ultimately die
good fame of & Ei^u?d/Onsi0^. But the uirtMB.iriffl never

iS THE ONSLOW FAMILY

be known. According to his descendant, the great Speaker
Arthur Onslow, "he had no good Will towards the Service
and did not come up to the army until after the Fight, which
Cromwell imputed to his not being very hearty in the Cause
and said in a passion that He should one time or another be
even with that Fox of Surrey, though Whitelock . . . says he

marched hard to come up to the Engagement " There is

a reference to "a paper in his handwriting" in which he said
there was a plot to ruin him, and he therefore kept away
from the battle on purpose. This is unintelligible and only
serves to thicken the obscurity. It is also alleged that he was
concerned in Penruddock's insurrection and had often ex-
pressed his regard for the royal family. In view of the fact
that Onslow was later among those who urged Cromwell to
accept the Crown, this is entirely bewildering, and the
investigation is thus led into a cul-de-sac from which a
baffled return is the only possible course.

The issue of the battle of Worcester was of course a fore-
gone conclusion, and the arrival of a few hundred mounted
men from Surrey could have made no difference whatever;
although a troop or so of cavalry might have been of some
use in the pursuit of the routed Scots none of whom ever
saw his own country again. But everything connected with
Richard and his behaviour (which is, after all, of no great
historical consequence) remains vague and unsatisfactory.
It has been suggested that his apparent reluctance to take
part in the battle, and also the "paper in his own hand-
writing," can be taken as evidence that he had in mind the
possibility of a Stuart restoration, and that he was, in fact, a
trimmer. The Speaker Arthur Onslow described him as one
who had "a sort of Art and Cunning about him/' though he
adds the very shrewd observation that he lived in times that
were very difficult for a man who disliked extremes. This
may be so, and Cromwell's angry assertion that Onslow
"had Charles Stuart in his belly " need not be taken as
anything more than a burst of petulance.

The relations between Onslow and Cromwell after the
battle of Worcester and during the seven years that followed
are complex and obscure. The Fox had a way of writing

RICHARD THE FOX 19

papers referring to past events, in which he seems anxious
to prove his own practice of double-crossing, his disloyalty
to the disloyal, his treachery to the treacherous, and his claim
to be regarded all along as a crypto-Royalist. It is now
impossible for any biographer to arrive at the whole truth
in these matters.

The main facts are that Richard sagaciously retired to his
estates at the end of 1651 and was inconspicuous in politics
until the time of the Protectorate. He opposed the military
government of the Major-Generals, an instance of political
decision and a brave assertion of principle by no means
frequent in his ordinary behaviour. In one of his precau-
tionary papers he stated that he was involved in the Pen-
ruddock insurrection at Salisbury, and in February 1657 he
opposed the Pack motion urging the Protector to accept the
title of King an attitude that he quickly reversed when it
became known that Parliament was to consist of two Houses
and he himself was likely to become a bogus "Lord."

In April 1657 Richard was accordingly a member of the
Committee which offered the Crown to His Highness the
Lord Protector. By the end of the year he was one of the
"Lords" in the Upper House, an assembly referred to by
the scoffing opposition as "the other House" and not "the
House of Lords," of which it was, indeed, a short-lived
and inexcusable travesty.

Cromwell died on the 3rd of September 1658, the anni-
versary of the great battles of Dunbar and of Worcester.
From this time, although we are assured that the influence
of Richard Onslow in Surrey was paramount, he ceases to
be a figure of political significance. In 1664, while visiting
the Duke of Norfolk in London, he died.

It seems clear that Richard Onslow had principles; but
whether his principles were those of an ambitious egoist or
those of a political idealist must remain uncertain. He aimed,
I think, at what is now called "stability," and it mattered
little to him whether stability was achieved under King
Charles or King Oliver. His, political activities during
the Commonwealth, a$ they had no decisive influence upon
the course of affairs, and reveal nothing that is i^a% definite

20 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

concerning his true character, may be left in the obscurity
of incomplete records.

The fifth Earl of Onslow, to whose work on the family
history I am so much indebted, expresses the view that
Richard, while serving in the Protector's Parliament, "was
doubtless in touch widi what was going on upon the Royalist
side"; though he concludes that Richard was "an honest
man with a clear idea of the principles he believed in."

This "clear idea," most unfortunately, has not been pre-
served. The best way of supporting Richard's claim to
"honesty" is by appeal to the splendid vagueness of what is
known as "the Constitution," a thing both substantial and
amorphous and only definable by implication in a magnifi-
cent series of negatives.

Onslow himself, though not his son Arthur, was looked
upon with disfavour at the time of the Restoration. The
special charges brought against him were the arrest of
Justice Mallett, the seizure of the King's powder-mills at
Chilworth, the fact that he had referred to his Majesty as
"a porcupine," and his indictment for high treason at
Oxford in 1642. He was in grave danger of being excluded
from the Act of Indemnity. That no action was taken against
him was probably due to his friendship with Monk (certainly
a double-dealer) and with Ashley Cooper, and the influence
of Sir Ralph Freeman, whose son had married one of
Onslow's daughters. In order to make himself entirely
secure he obtained a Pardon tinder the Great Seal.

A printed pamphlet which is preserved among the Clan-
don archives, bearing the title Gratitude in Season, or a Word
for Sir Richard Onslow and published in 1661, defends him
vigorously against "the aspersions of a late scandalous Libel
Called Policy Unmasked." The defence proves, not so much
the politicalintegrity of Onslow as the constancy with which
he protected his friends, regardless of party. There was, it
appears, a "secret friendship" between Onslow and "Cap-
tain Edward Andrews of Flexwood ... in his suffering for
His late Majesty" the same Andrews who published the
tract. Onslow twice rescued Andrews from trial by a
military court. Among others greatly indebted to the friend-

(Photograph ; A. C, Cooper Ltd,}

Sir Richard Onslow (1601-1664). From the picture in the possession of
the Earl of Onslow. (Artist unknown.)

RICHARD THE FOX 21

ship of Onslow were the Norfolks, "Mr. Henry Hyldegard
of East Horsley, Mr. Edward Thurland of Rygate, Mr.
Zouch of Oking, Mr. Rogers of Lethered, and Mr. Munger
of Goddlemane."

What are we to think of Richard the Fox ? Was he, as he
may well seem, the first of the Onslow trimmers ? One has
to allow that he has gone to earth in the completest way.

Did his professed enlargement of principle actually repre-
sent a true political philosophy, a system of liberal ideas, or
was he casuistically defending his tactical essays as a place-
hunter? (His contemporaries, both Parliamentarian and
Royalist, looked upon him as a man whose fidelities were
doubtfuL) Or was he a man whose behaviour can be taken to
represent an unresolvable conflict of ideas, the common
predicament of one who is timid and ambitious, cunning and
unwary at the same time? This, I think, may have been his
peculiar trouble that he tried to merge in a single code of
action various principles that refused obstinately to coalesce
in any pattern which he knew to be safe and respectable.
Perhaps he allowed the smaller vices of craft and irresolution
to nibble at the props of his integrity until the whole struc-
ture was insecure. He was thus incapable of displaying in the
fullest measure either villainy or virtue.

Frederic Barlow in his Complete English Peerage (1775)
has a good deal to say about Sir Richard:

"We are told . . . that he was no favourer of a commonwealth; that
he was at none of the meetings for bringing the King to his trials
and that he accepted no employment from those in power . . . that
he was in principle for monarchical government, and for that reason
did not accept of being one of the council of state, either under
Oliver or his son Richard; but for the most part lived retired at his
seat in Surry."

The face of Richard the Fox as we see it in the Clandon
portrait reveals an inscrutable reserve, the subtlety or the
indecision of a character whose action was never predictable.
It is neithei* female nor malevolent, but studiously neutral.
Whatever ft i&Rjrbe, it is not the face of a simple outspoken
man, implicitly la Me tinted :; not the face .of a iflaw ^rito could

a* THE ONSLOW FAMILY

welcome a stranger, or necessarily entertain his own rela-
tions, with unaffected warmth.

I think it may be said of Red Richard that he had in mind,
as a thing above all others desirable, the formation of a stable
government, whether monarchy, republic or commonwealth.
He did not therefore consider himself committed by par-
tisan loyalty to persons or politics, except to those who
appeared, at any given time, in a position favourable to the
accomplishment of his ideal.

It would be unfair and historically unscientific to read in
his face and his record the temporising and watchful egoism
that appeared in more than one of his descendants. During
the Civil War he proved himself a capable and active com-
mander ; and it is not unlikely that the events which occurred
between the execution of Charles and the battle of Wor-
cester may have modified his opinion of Cromwell and his
policy.

Although Wither's main attack in the Justificatus pamph-
let (Appendix D) was doubtless unwarranted, he seems to
have been right in accusing Onslow of having assumed in
Surrey the powers of a truculent and unforgiving dictator,
one who aimed at nothing less than "the Supremacie over
all Causes and all Persons/* That he was guilty of "arming
Malignants," and was "the most bitter and implacable
Enemy " to those who supported the Parliament is clearly
false.

The problems remain, and Richard the Fox moves dimly
in the troubled shadows of distant, unhappy events, a man
very strangely unable to excite any emotions whatsoever.

CHAPTER III

Family Fortunes

SIR RICHARD THE FOX was the first and the last of
the Onslows who got himself dangerously entangled in
political schemes. From his time onwards the family steered
a course which, although sometimes erratic, was finely
adjusted to the state of the tides and the weather.

This happy steersmanship was due to the steady increase
of territorial prestige, the advantages of a progressive outlook
which led, as though by nature, to an orthodox Whiggism,
and the felicitous acquisition of wealth partly through
commercial enterprise, partly (and perhaps more largely)
through the almost unbroken Onslow practice of marrying
heiresses.

Arthur Onslow, the son of the Fox, only represents in the
mildest way the qualities which procured for the Onslows
their later renown. He is prim, dim, distant and unassertive.
Like his great-grandfather, the Elizabethan Speaker, he was
an accomplished lawyer, and he also resembled his great
ancestor in being a man whose principles were consistent
and whose honour was never in question. By marrying the
daughter of Sir Thomas Foote, Lord Mayor of London, in
1649, he acquired, by grant in 1666, a reversion of the
baronetcy of his father-in-law; a reversion justly described
as "a positive sign of Stuart favour. 1 ' He also acquired a
fortune. John Evelyn visited him in September 1670 "at
West Clandon, a pretty dry seat on the Downs, where we
dined in his great room/*

In 1673 he was High Steward of Guildford in succession
to the Duke of Norfolk, and in 1685 declared himself in
favour of the Exclusion Bill, and so made himself obftoxious
to James. As result of this, ^^nstractws^fWe^^ven to
the High Sheriff of Swrey .that he was to pre^Hf^ijet
c 33

24 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

to Parliament of Arthur and his colleague, George Evelyn :
their supporters were intimidated, and the candidates were
forced to withdraw. Although his son, Richard, was re-
turned for Guildford, this was the end of Arthur's political
activities. He died in 1688.

Sir Arthur Onslow was an honest man, and it was through
honesty, not through calculation, that he set the family
course on the right bearing. He loved a country life and its
ordinary pursuits. He rode and hunted and was interested
in improving the breed of the fish in his modest lake. What
is more, this quiet and reasonable gentleman greatly ex-
tended the family influence. One reads with regret that his
monument, and those of his father and mother, were thrown
out of the church at Cranleigh and lost when the church was
" restored " in 1845,

His brother Denzil was another pleasant and useful
country gentleman, of whom, and of whose teeming estate,
we have an account in Evelyn's Diary. He also has a fine
score on the matrimonial side, for he married a double
heiress : his wife (the sister of Arthur's wife) was not only
the daughter and co-heiress of Sir Thomas Foote, but also
the widow of Sir John Lewis, who had acquired a vast
fortune by trading in Persia and India. The two sisters had
thus married the two brothers, greatly to the brothers*
advantage.

Denzil was a country gentleman of the more splendid and
exuberant order. Although described as a fervent Whig, it
is clear that he took his politics lightly and was immersed in
the pleasures and inventions of his fine estate at Pyrford,
near Ripley, where he feasted his neighbours in a style that
must have outshone anything which could have been accom-
plished by his brother and (later) by his nephew Richard
at Clandon.

The most notable of his devices was a series of wicker
duck-tunnels, more properly described as a decoy (painted
by Francis Barlow). It was covered with netting and thatched
at the sides, with peepholes for the operators.

John Evelyn dined at Pyrford in August 1681 whei* he
was staying with his brother at Wotton. There was > he said,

FAMILY FORTUNES z$

"much company, and such an extraordinary feast as I had
hardly ever seen at any country gentleman's table/* Every-
thing came from the estate venison, rabbits, hares, pheas-
ants, partridges, pigeons, quails, poultry, "all sorts of fowl
in season from his own decoy near the house," and every
kind of fish. "After dinner we went to see sport at the decoy,
where I never saw so many herons." Evelyn described the
house, which Onslow had bought from Sir Robert Park-
hurst, as built of timber "but commodious, and with one
ample dining-room, the hall adorned with paintings of fowl
and huntings, &c., the work of Mr. Barlow ." Two of
these excellent pictures, one of an ostrich and one of a
cassowary, are now at Clandon Park, as well as two large
canvases, one of them showing the "decoy*" Francis Barlow
(1626-1702) was easily supreme among the sporting and
animal painters of the seventeenth century, and a very
accomplished etcher.

Denzil Onslow died in 1721 at the age of eighty. His
political activities, though varied, are of no great conse-
quence. His house at Pyrford no longer exists.

The second son of Sir Richard the Fox, another Richard,
was the first of the Onslows to take an active part in the
trade with Turkey: he lived for some time in Smyrna.

But the fortunes of the Clandon Onslows, after the death
of Sir Arthur, were in the hands of his eldest son. This man
has been most unjustly described as one of small abilities.
On the contrary, he was a man of splendid ambition and of
more than ordinary competence and resource. To the family
he is generally known as "the second Speaker," and in this
capacity his dark enigmatical face, contemptuously smiling,
looks down from the large frame in the " Speaker's Parlour"
at Clandon. But his brief occupation of the Chair was the
least important of his activities.

Richard Onslow, the first of the Onslow Barons, inherited
the estates in Surrey after the death ohis father in 168,8.
He inherited also the solid and undeviating principles; of a
Whig, to %fhiph he was consistently true. These principles
were ultimate iy ; of the; greatest advantage $^ Jfe 1 ; but
they were

2 6 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

were never degraded as the instruments of a mere place-
hunter.

Misrepresented, as I think he was, both by contemporary
opinion and by recent reference, Richard Onslow is one of
the most important members of his family. He was the first
Onslow to receive the immediate favours of a royal counten-
ance (even if the countenance was a little repulsive), the first
who desired to invoke the prestige and the beauty of splendid
architecture and of noble planning, and the first who com-
bined the advantages of a politician with those, of a company
director. This may not be the description of a great man,
though it certainly is the description of one who should be
given a very high place in the Family record. His claim to
this eminence goes even further. He it was who persuaded
the greatest of all the Onslows, the Speaker Arthur, to enter
public life at the age of twenty-four, and so gave him the
impulse of steady confidence which led him in time to such
high renown in Parliamentary history.

Richard was born in 1654, matriculated from St. Edmund
Hall at Oxford in 1 67 1, left the University without a degree,
was admitted a student of the Inner Temple in 1674 but
was never called to the Bar. This is clearly the start of a man
of personal independence, from whom a great deal may be
expected.

Through his father's influence he was returned as the
Member for Guildford in 1678, at the age of twenty-four,
and he continued to represent the borough until the dissolu-
tion of Parliament in July 1687 by the impatient and arbit-
rary action of James II.

It was clear to Onslow that he had everything to gain
through the revolution of an outraged country, as anxious
now to be rid of the Stuarts as it had been zealous for their
restoration less than thirty years previously. He represented
the Puritan temper with, perhaps, a touch of the Puritan
sourness and irritability as well as the Puritan emphasis upon
discipline. He was now, in 1 68 8, to see the glorious victory of
those principles and ideas which his grandfather had simulated
or diluted and which his father (who died in this very year of
triumph) had represented with gentle though firm sincerity.

FAMILY FORTUNES 27

Sir Richard Onslow, who had succeeded to the reversion
of the baronetcy in 1688, was thirty-four at the time of the
Revolution. He stood at one of those junctures in history
when the sudden acceleration of events, the changing of a
whole order, divides one period from another with a cleaving
line so sharp and precise that it seems to involve a break in
continuity.

For this change he was well prepared by nature, place,
tradition and opportunity. He had, of course, married an
heiress (in 1676); the lusciously beautiful daughter of Sir
Henry Tulse (Lord Mayor of London), whose portrait by
Kneller, painted at the time of her marriage, shows her in
the voluptuous disorder of the Stuart fashion. (Richard's
own portrait, also by Kneller, was painted at the same time.
He lolls with confident ease, richly though informally
dressed, a dark unhandsome youth, but obviously one of no
ordinary sort,)

Thus equipped, Sir Richard became a member of
William's Convention Parliament, to which he was returned
for the county of Surrey. Apart from an interval in 1710-13,
after his brief occupation of the Chair in the House of
Commons and his failure to be re-elected for his constituency
during the phase of Tory reaction (following the impeach-
ment of Sacheverell), he represented the county until his
elevation to the Peerage in 1716. And even this interval did
not exclude him from Parliament. Through the obliging
influence of Godolphin he slipped in by way of the controlled
or rotten borough of St. Mawes in Cornwall. A rotten
borough in the hands of a good friend was one of the greatest
of political blessings. He was eleven times elected Knight
of the Shire for Surrey.

Richard Onslow was a man of impetuous temper, kind-
ling on some occasions to pugnacious violence. It was not
within his nature to be impartial or to simulate agreement in
matters which he privately opposed. But he was a kind man
and a trusted man. His nephew, the Speaker Arthur Onslow,
described lum as "tall and very thin, not well shapdd, and
with a face excreting plain, yet there was a c^ctain^^etiiess
with a dignity ia&is jcountenance* . . ," Fiirth^rniQre, "He

28 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

had always something to say that was agreeable to everybody,
and used to take as much pleasure in telling a story to a man's
advantage, as others generally do to the contrary." Lord
Dartmouth described him very differently as "a trifling vain
man of ridiculous figure, full of party zeal/* and usually
known as "Stiff Dick." Queen Caroline, on the other hand
(when Princess of Wales), said "that notwithstanding the
plainness of his Countenance and Person there was some-
thing Great in his manner and carriage that drew a particular
respect for him as soon as he was seen."

Although his honesty compelled Sir Richard to oppose
the King's retention of troops after the Peace of Ryswick
(1697) and always to support the principle of a limited
militia, William had a great respect for Onslow: he called
him to his closet not long before his death and "bade him
continue the honest man he had always found him." This
quality of the "honest man," or, to use Burnet's variation,
the "worthy man," seems to me one of the distinctions of
Sir Richard Onslow.

It has been alleged in a modern work that he abused his
power during his brief office as a Lord of the Admiralty
(1690-93) in order to obtain special privileges for the
Turkey Company, of which he was Governor, This dis-
ingenuous and ill-considered attack does not mention the
very short period during which Onslow held his post at the
Admiralty; nor can I see why the assistance of trade, in
matters which did not involve the slightest illegality or
betrayal of trust, should be regarded as particularly nefarious.
Not only is there no evidence of criminal action, but it must
also be remembered that Onslow did not possess absolute
authority.

Onslow was the Whig choice for Speaker of the House of
Commons in the predominantly Tory Parliament of 1701 ;
but Harley secured the Chair. His chance came again in
1708 when the Whigs, who had been rising to power in the
warm enthusiasm generated by Marlborough's great victory
at Blenheim, were now the strongest party. He was elected
in preference to his neighbour in Surrey, Sir Peter King of
Odkham, who, in the same year, was made Recorder of

FAMILY FORTUNES 29

London and received a knighthood. (King was a leading
Whig, the son of a grocer and drysalter of Exeter by the
daughter of Peter Locke, John Locke's uncle. He rose to
great eminence in the law, and in 1718 was raised to the
Peerage as Lord King, Baron of Ockham in Surrey, and
Lord Chancellor* Illness compelled him to resign the Great
Seal in 1733, an d He died in the following year.)

As a Speaker, Richard Onslow was not distinguished. I
have already said that it was not in his nature to be impartial,
and his conduct in the Chair was flagrantly favourable to his
own party. "Many," according to Dasent, " would have
preferred Sir Peter King." No doubt King, with his judicial
training, would have been infinitely more dependable, though
his morbidly nervous diffidence, and the promptings of an
inflexible conscience which always demanded the most
ample consideration of the most ridiculous trifle, would have
sorely tried the patience of the House. But Stiff Dick, unable
as he was to neutralise the zeal and eagerness of his political
faith, was at least a master of procedure, which he enforced
with imperious and even choleric authority.

Towards the end of his term in the Chair and also
towards the end of the Whig ascendancy when his party
was demanding the impeachment of Sacheverell, he sternly
quelled the impertinence or the awkwardness of Black Rod
in the House of Lords. Imagining himself to be obstructed
by this official, he cried out with anger: "My Lords, if you
do not immediately order your Black Rod to behave properly
... I will return to the House of Commons at once." (A
very similar fracas took place in 1739 when Richard's
nephew, the great Arthur, was piloting an address to the
King.)

In 1714 Onslow was sent to Flanders for consultation
with Marlborough. From the 2ist of October in the same
year to the nth of October of the following year he was
Lord of the Treasury and Chancellor of the Exchequer. On
his resignation in November 1715 he was made otie pf the
Tellers oJP^^Exchequer for life. 111,171 6 he was ap^aiixted
Lord Lieuteijai* of Surrey (he had ibera r Higl^.j|iyv^rd of
Guildford fr&m i488) a$d was elevated ^^IWage' as

3 o THE ONSLOW FAMILY

Lord Onslow, Baron of Onslow in the County of Salop and
of West Clandon in the County of Surrey. On the ^th of
December 1 7 1 7 he died.

Lord Onslow's political existence, thus briefly related, is
hardly spectacular; but at least it is the record of an ex-
tremely competent and honest man, and one who never
deviated from what he believed to be right. However, the
family historian will, I think, be more concerned with his
private life and the immensely important part he played in
building up the family fortunes.

Of Lord Onslow's three sons Thomas, Daniel and
Richard only the first, who was born about 1680 (the
exact date is unknown), lived to maturity and became the
owner of Clandon. It was clearly Richard's intention, the
usual intention of dutiful though ambitious fathers, to give
the boy a thorough polish and send him out into the world of
politics and affairs with all the assurance of good breeding,
an elegant style and a courtly approach. In this enterprise he
was only moderately successful The assurance of Thomas
Onslow was that of a privileged though occasionally un-
pleasing buffoon, of elegance he had none at all, and his
approach was, in the words of Arthur the Speaker, "gener-
ally distasteful and sometimes shocking."

A letter from Sir Richard Onslow (as he then was) to a
member of the Embassy at the Hague in 1697, possibly
Matthew Prior, throws a passing light on precious Tom, a
youth of sixteen or seventeen (Clandon MSS.):

"I have not often heard from my son, but reed his acknowledge-
ment of yr great favours to him. I hope neither of us will ever omit
any opportunity to convince you a more grateful acceptance is
hardly possible in nature. Since he has already seen the most con-
siderable places in Holland, &c, to see Hambourgh or any other
parts of Germany will take up more of his time than I can prevail
with his Mother or other Relations to allow him, for I am by this
very post obligM to let him know he is desir'd to take the very first
opportunity to return to England, and that he should wait at the
Hague for it. Our hopes of peace dayly decline with so much
dissatisfaction. Being in town for a day or two was yesterday at ye
Exchange and Garraways,"

FAMILY FORTUNES 31

This letter, which has no formal beginning, must have
been written before October. Its pessimism is unjustified,
for the Peace of Ryswick was concluded in that month.

The sons of noble families, in those days, entered Parlia-
ment as a matter of course, and Thomas Onslow was re-
turned for Gatton in 1702, when his father represented the
county of Surrey* There is a reference to him in the first of
two interesting letters from the Duke of Somerset to Sir
Richard Onslow, These letters, now in the Clandon archives,
were written in June 1713 when Queen Anne was ill and
there were grave apprehensions very well founded of a
Jacobite rising. The first is dated June 2oth:

"Sir, Hearing that you and your Son are now at Clandon, because
you thought nothing more was to bee done of consequence this
Session than what you had already been engaged in, I doe therefore
give you notice that on Munday next there will be a motion made
in both houses; of the last moment to us, & as I know you will bee
glade to bee at it, I doe beg you both to bee in Town Sunday night
or Munday morning very early: the perticulsrs I will inform you,
if either of you will come to mee next Munday morning at eleven
aclock as it is of soe great consequence, it must be kept secrett,
till the time comes. I am

** Your very very [sic] humble Servant

"Somerset/*

In spite of this flattering appeal, Sir Richard and his son,
having made their excuses, remained at Clandon; and
Somerset writes again on the 3Oth of June:

"Sir, Since your own privatte affaires doe keep you in the Coun-
try, I will with great satisfaction tell you, that the House of Lords
have this day voted an Address to the Queen to take effectuall care
to remove the Pretender to Her Crown from the court of Lorrain,
& all other Princes & States in amity and correspondence with Hers.
This address wee have carryed, & is resolved to bee presented by the
wholle House when Her Majesty will apoynt a time. Wee durst
not send it down to your house least some untoward amendments
might bee added, but if our friends will make the like modern the
House of CojpBQjis to morrow or Thursday*, wee^aft^ve it to
them , . . I aip ,yyj :*seiisib|e you ^11 be ^^^J^^f^hat the

32 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

House of Lords have done this day, & to bee in the House of
Commons when it is moved there: I doe therefore acquaint you
with that by this night's post."

Somerset, who at this time was forty-one, had outdone
everyone else in the marrying of money and influence, both
of which he needed. His wife, Elizabeth Percy, held in her
own right six of our most ancient baronies, and her wealth
is incalculable. The Duke himself was not unfairly described
as " witless " by Marlborough. He was a man of splendid
appearance, looking well on a horse and exceedingly well in
a stately ceremonial. That he should have written thus to the
Onslows can be readily understood. The Queen was fond
of him; and whatever may be said of his capacity as a
politician, he was consistent in loyalty. What is more signi-
ficant is that a man of such extreme aristocratic haughtiness
that he was known as "the proud Duke" was on terms of
close friendship with Onslow and his son. This alone proves
my belief that Sir Richard Onslow had raised his family to a
position from which real political eminence was attainable.

What was the business at Clandofa which kept Sir Richard
and his son so fully occupied that even the affairs of the
nation were of less immediate importance? It is possible that
these all-absorbing "privatte affaires" may have been the
planning of a new house.

The decision to pull down the old house at Clandon and
to build one in the fashionable style a Palladian mansion
was one in which both father and son were vitally concerned.
This decision was apparently made by Sir Richard Onslow
in or before 1713, for in that year, according to the fifth
Earl's private history of his family, the plans and contracts
were already prepared.

But here one has to face more than one problem. The
Palladian house of Clandon Park was the work, possibly the
masterpiece, of Giacomo Leoni, a Venetian architect who
came to England at some unknow;n date early in the eight-
eenth century. It has been assumed, very incautiously, that
he may have come over at the invitation of Richard Boyle,
third Earl of Burlington, to assist in the publication of
Pdladio's Architecture. This is most improbable. The first

FAMILY FORTUNES 33

edition of Leoni's Palladio, a costly and elaborate work with
a series of magnificent engravings by Picard for which
Leoni himself was entirely responsible, was published in
1715 and is clearly the result of many years' labour* But
Richard Boyle was born in 1695; and if Leoni was in Eng-
land as early as 1713 it seems unlikely that he would have
come over on the invitation of a youth of seventeen or
eighteen years of age. It is, however, true that Burlington,
who had succeeded his father, the third Earl of Cork, in
1704, was a member of the Privy Council in 1714, and in
1715 was Lord Lieutenant of the West Riding of Yorkshire
and Lord High Treasurer of Ireland at the age of twenty.
It is equally true that he altered and partly rebuilt Burlington
House, Piccadilly, in 1716, but let it be observed that his
architect for this work was Campbell, not Leoni.

The problem of the building of Leoni's house at Clandon
Park is further complicated by the question of dates. If the
plans of 1713 were those of Leoni, it is entirely incredible
that the work should have taken twenty years before it was
completed, unless it was interrupted for years at a time; and
the date on the leaden rainwater-heads is 1733. The fifth
Earl of Onslow states that the house was not finished until
1731; the Dictionary of National Biography gives (as an
approximate date for the building) 1732; and Sir John
Evelyn of Wotton described a visit to Clandon Park
almost certainly, though not conclusively, referring to the
present house in 1729.

With every allowance for contemporary methods, and the
time occupied in demolishing the old house and in clearing
the site (the stable block was not demolished until 1814), it
seems very unlikely that the building of Clandon Park was
begun much earlier than 1723-25: architecturally the plan
is remarkably straightforward and by no means of extra-
ordinary size, lacking all the more elaborate structural
features of the Palladian style; and it should be remembered
that Rysbrack, one of the collaborators in the decotati&m ; bf
the great hall, and probably elsewhere in the house^^id ndt
come to Eflgkiid tuatil October 172^ It 4$ MM Wthy of
note that a refertete>to the iiopse iA -edition of

34 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

Aubrey's Antiquities of Surrey most unmistakably describes
the old mansion. Moreover, the whole credit for building
"the noble house at Clandon" is ungrudgingly given by
Speaker Arthur to his cousin Thomas Onslow, whom he
greatly disliked.

By 1713, the date which is given for "the first plans/'
Thomas Onslow had already married Elizabeth Knight,
"the West India Fortune/' whose money is supposed to
have been sunk in the new house. This may or may not^be
true; there is no reason for supposing that such an accretion
was necessary, for Sir Richard Onslow must have built up
an amount of capital that would have been more than
sufficient. The fact that does emerge from the consideration
of these problems is that the idea of building the Palladian
mansion, or a new house of some description, occurred in
the first place to Sir Richard Onslow, and not to his son.

It may also be concluded that Leoni was not the architect
who was originally employed on this design. The statement
in a recent work on country houses that Clandon Park was
"begun in 1715 for Richard, first Lord Onslow" is wholly
untenable. Conjectures ought to be excluded from biography,
but one may at least observe that the first English house
known to have been erected by Leoni was Bramham Park.
This was followed by Moor Park (1720) where, as at Clan-
don, Leoni had the experience of building upon a site
originally occupied by a brick mansion. He then built in
succession Queensberry House and Latham House (1721-
1725), and, at some time between 1723 and 1732, the
strictly Palladian front of Lyme Hall. In 1730 he was
engaged upon Bold Hall in Lancashire, His last work was
Barton Park in Sussex (1740). These dates, as well as those
which I have previously cited, would certainly suggest that
Clandon Park was built (as I believe it was) between 1723
and 1733. An architect tells me, however, that ten years is
a period very much longer than would have been necessary
for this work under normal conditions: the date 1725 for the
beginning of the building is therefore entirely reasonable.

Onslow had acquired a town house in Soho Square pre-
sumably before the end of the seventeenth century. The

FAMILY FORTUNES 35

Square was then fashionable Evelyn had a house there in
1689 though its respectability was much reduced in later
times.

The establishment of the Hanoverian dynasty in 1714,
and the entrenchment of the Whigs in a position that was
able to resist and repel every attack upon the main body for
nearly forty-eight years, lifted the Onslow family high indeed
upon the tides of good fortune. When the King, the German
George, arrived in England he naturally found his principal
supporters and all his honest friends among the Whigs.
Among these Whigs, Richard Onslow was presented to the
King as "the most considerable country gentleman in the
realm." This was perhaps going a little too far, but at least
it can be said of Onslow that his adherence to his principles
had always been a matter of true conviction, sometimes
asserted with rage and rancour, not a fabricated instrument
of policy. He was a Protestant, a monarchist and a great
landowner. He had brought his family 'to a height from
which capable and honest leadership would take them into a
land of unlimited promise.

Whether in fact they showed the capacity and the honesty
that would have enabled them to exploit fully and without
reproach the splendid opportunities which lay before them
in 1714 is perhaps open to question.

In 1717 the King visited Clandon (the old house), the
first royal guest to be received in the home of the Onslows.
This was on the 22nd of June. He came over from Hampton
Court for an early dinner, and afterwards went up to the
Downs to see the Guildford Races, a famous meeting estab-
lished by his predecessor King William. Only three years
previously Queen Anne, who loved racing, had entered a
grey horse to run for the Ladies* Plate on Merrow Downs.
It was "a fine circular course" and the races in the general
order of things were run every year in Whitsun week, and
always under the patronage of the Onslows.

Six months after this meeting, Richard Onslow die cL-

His character has perhaps been depicted adequately in
the record of his life. He was a man of magnificence^ not
endowed with loftiness 'of mind or manner, butsterling and

36 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

effectual. What he did was done with assurance and a solemn
splendour. Evelyn relates how, in 1698, he "treated almost
all the gentlemen of Surrey" at Clandon. His temper,
especially when his faith and honour were in question, could
be explosive and unreflecting,

In 1703 he fought a duel with young Lewis Oglethorpe,
the member for Haslemere, a young Tory with Jacobite
inclinations. The occasion of this brawl, according to
Evelyn, was "some words which passed at a Committee of
the House." Richard was then close upon fifty and Ogle-
thorpe was not twenty-two. The young man was wounded
and disarmed.

Nor was this the only occasion when Onslow sought or
provoked a duel. Had it not been for the order of the House
he would have crossed swords with Sir Edward Seymour.
It is indeed on record that the House intervened on several
occasions between Onslow and Seymour, a fiery fellow who
had been Speaker before him.

The advice and opinion of Onslow were always respected,
and he had the reputation of being kind as well as trust-
worthy. Among the Clandon papers there is a note written
to him by Lord Hervey on the Fenwick affair in 1706. This
notable case was brought before the King's Bench in 1 703
and was a dispute between Mrs. Fenwick and her husband
concerning the disposal of an estate after the death of their
only son, who died without issue. The suit was apparently
prolonged and complicated by the death of Mr. Fenwick
himself.

"Since my last," wrote Hervey> "Mrs, Fenwick has wrote to me
& desires (in wch I think she is wrong) to be totally left free . . .
& prayes you wd please to represent her as resolved to be under no
Tye to do any thing therein "

Of Lord Onslow's brother, Foot or Foote Onslow, the
father of the great Speaker Arthur Onslow, and the direct
ancestor of the present family, very little is known. He was
born in 1655, matriculated at St. Edmund Hall, Oxford, in
1672, and in due course became a member of the Levant
Company and lived for some years in Turkey possibly in

itograph : A. C. Cooper Ltd.]

Richard, First Baron Onslow (1654-1717). By Sir Godfrey Kneller.
the picture in the possession of the Earl of Onslow.

From

FAMILY FORTUNES 37

Smyrna, where his uncle Richard would have been well
known. But instead of making a fortune, the customary
Onslow procedure, he lost money. He returned to England
before 1688 and served in William's Convention Parliament
as a member for Guildford. The fifth Earl has recorded in his
MS. family history that Foote Onslow represented Guild-
ford in "several Parliaments of King William." In 1701 he
retired from Parliament and his place was taken by his
prosperous uncle Denzil of Pyrford.

Foote Onslow was appointed a Commissioner of Excise
in 1694, and in 1699 he was promoted to First Commis-
sioner. We are told by his son Arthur that he was "a sensible
and worthy man, well bred, modest and very brave." His
wife, whom he married in 1687, was Susannah, the daughter
of Thomas Anlaby of Etton near Hull and the widow of
Arnold Colwall: she is exceptional among the Onslow wives
in not being an heiress. Finally comes the astonishing in-
formation that Foote Onslow died in 1710 "in embarrassed
circumstances" at the age of fifty-five. Had he been deeply
concerned in the loss of the Turkish* fleet in 1694 "to the
almost utter ruin of that trade " ?

His portrait at Clandon shows him as a plump, ruddy man
dressed in a plain brown suit with many buttons. He wears
a handsome lace cravat and ruffles. Were his history un-
known, it might well be taken for the portrait of a shrewd
and exceedingly prosperous merchant. The face is kindly,
firm and open, and of a most engaging manliness.

The record of this worthy but unfortunate man, though
brief, is not a little surprising. In view of the great wealth of
his uncle Denzil and his brother Richard, how is it that he
was allowed to die "in embarrassed circumstances" at the
age of fifty-five? (Denzil, it will be remembered, did not die
till 1720.) Is it because of his failure to be successful that he
was disregarded by the rest of the family ? and is it also for
this reason that no documents of his are to be found among
the Clandon archives?

No doubt the implication of any such questioning is
extremely di^teis^iil; and affirmative answers irotjld t>die
what is known ;^^ Rktord Ofcslow and tfed ^fuire of

38 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

PyrforcL At the same time, the clean and honest character of
the unhappy Foote makes it hard to understand why the
family did not come to his help, and why he passes through
the Onslow record so inconspicuously. Even the dates and
circumstances of his life in Turkey seem to be entirely
unknown ; and there is no account of what he did in the nine
years between his political retirement and his death. One
does not even know where he lived. His importance and
celebrity consist in one fact alone that he was the father
of the greatest of the Onslows.

CHAPTER IV

Augustan England

r I \HE story of the rise and decline of the Onslows is a
A story of the eighteenth century ; just as the story of their
relapse and their happy revival is a story of the nineteenth.

At the beginning of the eighteenth century the family was
representative of the aristocratic Whigs, typically associated
with the acceleration of liberal ideas and the accumulation of
wealth by trade, as well as by a series of profitable marriages,
and still resting securely upon the basis of their Presbyterian
origins. Their proximity to London, which then contained
about one-tenth of the whole population of England, was
also an immense advantage.

But the political and social patterns of the country were
shifting and variable. The Jacobite or quasi-Tory factions
were powerful and obstinate, and it should be remembered
that the doctrine of the Protestant Succession, while it was
justified by one of the basic principles of the English mon-
archy, flagrantly violated the principle of descent.

During the reign of Queen Anne it was fashionable,
among the loftier but less intellectual Tories, to compare
Charles I with Christ; a strange and repulsive blasphemy
which indicates what may happen when religion is travestied
and reason expelled. In the Bodleian Library at Oxford there
were two pictures: one of them representing the death of
Christ, and the other (its companion) showing the execution
of Charles the Martyr. Thus the Jacobite infatuation was a
menace, not only from without, but also from within. It was
combined, sometimes honestly, with the antagonism between
the High Church party and the Dissenters, and betweea the
older county families and the swiftly emergent aristocracy of
the Whigs, amongst whom the Onslows were now in a
prominent, though cot a, leading position.

40 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

All this is part of a strange complex of social change which
has to be considered if we are to understand the strategic
position of the Onslow family: a family which then stood, in
the most unmistakable way, for the higher levels of the
new order.

The first three decades of the eighteenth century were
those of a rhyming, jesting, witty and irreligious age. The
more florid splendours of the Renaissance were collapsing
and the people were set upon a return to more sober manners,
represented in literature and architecture by a move towards
classical austerity, and in poetry by a correct elegance of
expression. But the reaction from the Baroque style and the
Stuart immorality was not accompanied by the revival of
religion. On the contrary, the initial temper of the eighteenth
century was patently materialistic. And so, despite the noble
example of Joseph Butler, the discourses of the godly Clarke,
the fervent reasoning of William Law, the gentle morality of
Shaftesbury and of Hutcheson, the orthodox faith was in a
state of melancholy decline indeed, of pale decrepitude.

This was accompanied by a degree of corruption in public
affairs that was vitiating the whole field of political life; in
which, to their great credit, the Onslows were not yet
participators.

The Onslow family certainly represented one of the not-
able tendencies of those times in their desire to build the
largest possible houses, to live in the stateliest and, one must
add, the most ostentatious way. The craze for building in the
new style, the Burlington style, possibly reached a climax
about 1730, and invited the satire of Pope and Young. In
his Love of Fame, Young sends an arrow in the direction of
Chandos and Burlington:

"Belus with solidary will be crown'dj
He buys no Phantome, no vain empty sound,
But builds himself a name* and to be great,
Sinks in a Quarry an immense estate,"

Pope, while respecting, and indeed imitating, the taste of
Burlington, refers to the blunderers who

"call the winds thro' long arcades to roar,
Proud to catch cold at a Venetian door."

AUGUSTAN ENGLAND 41

Although Pope lived within easy distance of Clandon, it
would be going too far to suppose that his reference to
Villario's "ten years' toil" or the house where "a hundred
footsteps scrape the marble Hall" were even remotely
connected with Lord Onslow's Palladian mansion : they have
in view a larger target.

The barriers or curtains between the classes, especially
between the merchants and the aristocracy, were beginning
to disappear, although rank was never more assertive.
Whereas the burial of a poor man cost little more than four
or five shillings, that of a Duke ran to at least fifty pounds;
which was not much more than the price of a really first-rate
wig or flowing Falbala. For this was the age of the pro-
fessional beau, with his clouded cane, his periwig of women's
hair (whores' hair), his long and awkward sword, his quizz-
ing glass or "pocket perspective," his elegant snuff-box
(often with a spring lid and the miniature of a courtesan), a
brush for his eyebrows and a pick for his teeth.

His female counterpart, the belle, had not acquired the
magnificence of a later style, and her dress does not bear
comparison with the full-blown splendour, the vast and
lovely extravagance of the two decades from 1760 to 1780.
But she is to be noted for making fashionable the Indian
stuffs, then a novelty: baguzees, gorgorans, seersuckers, deri-
bands, niccannees, humhums, garnacs, tepoys, periascoes,
pallampores, mulmuls, brawles and allejars. She darkened
her hair with a leaden comb. She was fond of cordials made
at home in the still-room; and even the richest and the
noblest only changed their linen when it became impossible
to walk into good society without doing so. Cleanliness, in
the modern sense, hardly existed at all, and the use of scent
lavender, bergamot, benjamin, jessamine, coriander
was almost compulsory in any assembly where the noses
were tolerably well-bred.

Apait from the normal exercise of the human passions,
her emotions were perpetually stimulated by gambling: not
indeed a featwe > .peculiar to this time, but then carried^ an
excess that waiSjflevfcr equalled.* Tfa>e fine lady ^Id^! spent
a day without ter gtj&es <? emibf^ ;wfti^c jta;pjteifoo. Her

42 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

conversation, if Swift is to be trusted, was unbelievably
inane, consisting almost entirely of catch-words or current
phrases or the proverbs of the people.

Little pages in rich liveries, their parentage not infre-
quently the object of scandalous rumour, were treated with
ambiguous affection by their employers; while the "India
Blacks," the negroes found in every large household, were
so much addicted to running away that many of them wore
metal collars riveted on their necks and bearing the names
and addresses of their owners*

As the lower servants of a great house were treated less
well than the dogs of the establishment, it is not surprising
that masters and mistresses were cheated, robbed and
deceived in every possible way^ The maids, if they were
pretty, were not expected to resist the advances of the master
of the house or those of his sons. Thus a high degree of
comeliness and loyalty among the retainers or tenants was
often directly due to a liberal transfusion of his lordship's
own blood. There were of course some instances where the
maids outwitted the masters and there were scandalous
marriages with younger sons, and even with minors, which
had to be undone if such undoing were possible,

As I have already said, the sharper distinctions between
the classes were disappearing. Particularly at the watering-
places or the spas there was an unavoidable, slackening of
convention; although a gentleman felt that he was justified
if he cut> when in London, the unassuming merchant with
whom he had amicably drunk the waters of Tunbridge or
Bath. These relaxations were already beginning to make the
more rigid of the sticklers appear somewhat ridiculous.

And even in London, where social privilege had to be
jealously preserved by the courtiers, men of different classes
were able to meet each other in the coffee houses* (Arthur
Onslow, the Speaker, used to sit in the chimney corner of
the Jew's Harp "about a quarter of a mile north of Portland
House, " until his identity was discovered by the landlord.)

These early decades of the century were the supreme
period of the London coffee houses, of which the more re-
spectable were sometimes elevated to the standing of clubs.

AUGUSTAN ENGLAND 43

And certainly, when you entered the coffee house you found
yourself in a cheerful, warm and enlivening promiscuity.
The line of pots was ranged in front of an open fire, the
mistress or "bar keeper" stood in her little enclosure; wear-
ing an overall, but with hair neatly dressed in the prevailing
fashion. If the mistress were a handsome and amusing
woman, her charm and her merry talk were powerful attrac-
tions; and there might be a brace or two of young girls who
appeared, with little ambiguity, on the staircase which led
to the upper rooms.

The benches were hard, the tables not over-clean, but the
company was excellent. In some of the coffee houses (Will's
and White's, for example) men of letters, wits, gamblers,
politicians gathered about them a congenial group of
listeners or debaters, and so, in time, the different houses
acquired a distinctive character. There was even a coffee
house that was habitually patronised by the clergy. Nor was
coffee the only drink obtainable in these places. Brandy, rum
and arrack were mingled in steaming bowls of punch; while
those who liked something milder could be supplied with a
cooling glass of sherbet.

There was also a community of interest in music and
opera. It was the beginning of that singular conflict between
the Handelian and Italian styles which became an aspect of
the conflict between political and royal factions, between the
Haymarket and Lincoln's Inn. The advocates of dull mor-
ality were trying to reform the theatre and abolish the
scintillating lewdness of the comedy and the pasquinade.
So far they were not very successful.

In literature, the age was one of unsurpassed achievement.
Steele and Addison were advocating good morals in better
prose. Pope's Iliad was finished in 1720, Swift was at the
height of his diabolical powers. Gay, Arbuthnot and William
King showed what could be done in the lighter forms of
parody and satire; while Berkeley, Toland and Whiston
combined a, sonorous excellence of style with a blinding
subtlety of disquisition, ,

Below the splendour of the upper structure .tfjere was
much that was bloc^^lmd^VQltk^^ BWIS and bulls

44 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

were baited, cock-fighting was a popular sport patronised by
noblemen: the gentlemen of Cambridge and Essex matched
their birds in savage battle against the gentlemen of Surrey
and London. But the state of the working classes, though
deteriorating, was not unendurable: the tragedies of human
degradation in England belong to the later part of the
century, when the increase of population was enormously
accelerated. At the time of Queen Anne the total population
of the whole country could have been little more than six
millions.

Politically, the scene from the accession of Anne (1702)
to the death of George I (1727) is extremely complicated. It
would have been less complicated if the Georgian Whigs
could have acted as a simple unanimous party, and if the
King himself had not been personally so unpopular; but the
lack of unanimity among the Whigs, fortunately for them,
was equally marked among their rivals, more particularly in
the reign of Queen Anne. It was an age of political oppor-
tunism, of which the most flagrant and unabashed example
is that of Marlborough : a man whose reptilian baseness in
court intrigue has to be set against his genius in the field.

To be loyal to the Whigs, without being dangerously
conspicuous, was the happy fortune of Sir Richard Onslow,
Neither his office nor his inclination thrust him into the
central activities of his group. At the same time a friendship
with Newcastle after 1714 (which became a family tradition,
even more firmly established by alliance) kept him in a good
place on the party register, and I have been able to show that
he was a man of some consideration with Somerset as well*

All the political oscillations of the reign of Queen Anne
left him untouched and secure. Those fantastic devilries
which made young St. John, a freethinker, take sides with
the High Church party, while his friend and enemy, Harley,
gave a private impetus to the plotting of Mrs* Masham,
were not such things as were to be tolerated in the camp of
the Whigs, Even Marlborough, the most experienced
veteran of intrigue, found himself unable to prevail agaimt
"the malice of a bedchamber woman/' When the Whigs
made the fatal blunder of prosecuting Sacheverell and the

AUGUSTAN ENGLAND 45

chief ministers of the party were dismissed by Anne, Onslow
was in the nominally uncommitted position of Speaker,
Again, in 1 7 1 3 when the Queen was ill and Oxford (Harley)
was ready to get in touch with James, while Ormonde was
known to be corresponding with the Pretender, Onslow and
his son (as we have seen) were exceptionally busy on the
estate at Clandon.

And when that ill-mannered royal cuckold, George I,
came over in 1714 the position of the loyal Tories and
there were many of them was clearly desperate. Within a
little time St. John (Bolingbroke) was in the service of the
Pretender, and Oxford was in the Tower, although it was
not then known that he had been in correspondence with
James. (Oxford was released from the Tower in 1717:
Bolingbroke was allowed to return to England in 1723,- but
was excluded from his seat in the House of Lords.) Robert
Walpole, before long to become the leading figure in English

JT * O O O O

politics, had already observed the shrewdness, wit and
intelligence of the Princess of Wales, Caroline of Branden-
burgh Ansbach, who was thirty-one at the time of her
father-in-law's accession, and was preparing to secure^ her
friendship and support an example of strategy combined
with honourable affection and the understanding of a con-
genial mind.

The King's ugly foreign appearance and his ungraceful
devotion to the ruder pleasures of life, his dislike of England
and his love of Hanover, his inability to speak English and
his limited control of French and Latin, were circumstances
which could be more easily tolerated by the bluffer Whigs,
the men of land and wealth, but, in the words of Leadarn,
"drove wits and men of letters into opposition." At the
beginning of the reign the cleavage between the Whigs and
the Tories was greatly accentuated, the more so as the Whigs
had obviously secured a monopoly of the royal favour* In
addition, they had virtually secured the control of the r?alm,
for the King was never present at the Cabinet meetings^and
if he had beeii present, he could not have .ugde^g^ what
was going en,, - _ , ; , _; -^ >_ , ; ,/ v<";#* ':;. '

At the same tugge er^4m^ was

4* THE ONSLOW FAMILY

overwhelmingly Protestant (though the term Protestant has
to be understood in a political rather than a religious use)
and the people greatly preferred the coarseness and uncouth-
ness of their Hanoverian King to the treacherous and lecher-
ous elegance of a Stuart.

The Jacobite rising of 1715 reduced the opposition of the
Parliamentary groups and was easily suppressed. It is true
that Jacobitism was not extinguished in one form or
another it has never been extinguished but it ceased for a
time to be a source of concern to the Government. No
sensible man could have supposed that a second "restora-
tion" was possible: the military force of Scotland might
indeed be involved (as it was in "the Forty-five") but the
people of England were still in the habit of looking upon the
Scots as a barbarous and alien race. It was not the Jacobites
who were the curse of England in the eighteenth century,
but the wars in Europe; the bloodiness of which was only
equalled by the triviality and intricacy of their alleged causes.

There was a slightly disturbing revelation in 1721-22
when a Jacobite conspiracy was discovered, led by the Bishop
of Rochester, Atterbury (for many years an open and en-
thusiastic Jacobite), and supported by the Duke of Norfolk,
Lord North and Grey, and Lord Orrery. A Mr, Layer, who
had enlisted men to fight for the Pretender, was hanged and
quartered: an effective way of checking any other misguided
recruiters who might otherwise have been active.

England under the Whigs appeared to be entering upon
a period of settlement and ease at home. If George I was a
sensualist, he was at least a sensualist of the dogged un-
romantic sort, well contented with his Maypole and his
Elephant the lean Schulenburg (Duchess of Kendal) and
the megalopygous Kilmansegge (Countess of Darlington).
These were the official mistresses, kept as a necessary part
of the royal household, and of no more consequence than
a couple of mares in the royal mews.

The whole concept of royalty was undergoing a change,
and eventually a change for the better. Queen Anne had
represented or revived for the last time the quasi-divine,
miracle-working status of the royal person, a strange residue

AUGUSTAN ENGLAND 47

of paganism particularly dear to the Stuarts. Nobody could
have seen any striking manifestation of divinity in George I,
and although he was a man whom the most ardent royalist
cannot very well admire, I think it may be said that what was
lost in romance and illusion (and superstition) was less im-
portant than what was gained in common sense.

The year of Bubbles (i 720) badly shook the reputation of
British finance* Many private reputations were shaken as
well, and even the cautious Onslows dabbled in the stock of
the South Sea Company a stock which rocketed up in June
to the fantastic figure of jio6o. For the organisation of this
Company, which proposed a reduction of the National Debt
in return for the absolute control of the Spanish trade,
Harley (in 1 7 r i) was responsible. The crash of the Company
brought misery and ruin to thousands. Stanhope, who
shared with Sunderland the responsibility of Government,
died of shock; Craggs, the Secretary of State, died of terror;
and the Chancellor of the Exchequer, Aislabie, was sent to
the Tower. But this Company was not the only one that
lured the crazy speculator: there was a company for "carry-
ing out an undertaking of great advantage, but nobody to
know what it is/' another for "importing jackasses from
Spain" (surely most unnecessary), and yet another for
placing perpetual motion on the market. Those for "trading
in human hair" and "fishing up wrecks'* were at any rate
more plausible.

Arthur Onslow, later to be the Speaker, and his cousin.
Lord Onslow of Clandon, were both implicated in South
Sea transactions. Their part in these transactions will be
considered later.

One result of the South Sea disaster was to bring Walpole
into power as the leading minister: a post which, in spite of
turmoil and opposition within his own party, he held for
twenty-one years. The rise of Walpole to power was of the
greatest importance to the Onslow family, though not in a
manner which could then (in 172,1) have been anticipate!.

Never had a county family with a strong political-Interest
been in a riiore Advantageous position* &<iffi r g>66$ they had
been unwavering WM^ in principle if ftetlii^me. From

4 8 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

a much earlier period they had been among the ranks of the
Presbyterians and the Puritans, When the Hanoverian
succession was established they had been singled out for
royal favour and were the masters of a splendid estate. They
had acquired wealth as well as distinction. Their political
connexions were such as to justify the hopes of a rise to high
eminence in the affairs of the country. Nothing stood in the
way; nothing more was requisite nothing, that is, except
ability.

Clandon might well have become one of the great political
centres of the kingdom. A great house was being built, or
was contemplated, in the most handsome of the modern
styles. This noble mansion was within easy reach of Hamp-
ton Court or Kensington. It was in one of the most important
areas of one of the most important of English counties. A
man living in this house, with all the additional advantages
that were now possessed by the Onslows, could have set
himself on an equal footing among the greatest of the polit-
ical families of England; not by virtue of eminent ancestry,
but by virtue of an accumulation of privileges and of
temporal opportunity such as few men have ever enjoyed.

The Onslow family had been led to this position, as I have
tried to show > by the good fortune, the considerable ability
and the principles of the first Lord Onslow. When he died
in 1 71 7 it was to be expected that his son, Thomas, who had
at least added substantially to the family wealth and suc-
ceeded his father as Lord Lieutenant of the county (a post
which he held, with no memorable distinction, until his
death), would now secure for the name of Onslow something
far wider than provincial renown.

Any such expectation was illusory* The second Lord
Onslow, though he was not incapable, and in many ways an
interesting character, did not possess any of those qualities
which raise a man to the highest honours or expose him to
the dangers of resounding public disgrace. His importance
and influence were local, and were not of such an order as to
give him a place in our Dictionary of National Biography*

Here the name of Onslow might have lapsed into obscur-
ity had it not been for a still inconspicuous young man> the

AUGUSTAN ENGLAND 49

son of the unsuccessful and unhappy Foote Onslow, who
died "In embarrassed circumstances " just before the tem-
porary return of the Tories in 1710.

This inconspicuous and rather timid young man repre-
sented the borough of Guildford in 1720, when he was
twenty-nine years old. His name was Arthur Onslow, and
he it was, not his magnificent though ineffectual cousin of
Clandon, who gave the name of Onslow its highest and
most unassailable place in English history.

Meanwhile there had occurred a melancholy event in the
family records, for the widow of the first Baron Onslow
drowned herself in a pond at Croydon,

CHAPTER V

Dicky Ducklegs

IN the eighteenth century the Onslow family was echeloned
in two lines: on the one side are the three Barons of
Clandon, whose line ended when the third Baron died with-
out issue in 1776; and on the other are Foote Onslow and
his descendants, the Speaker Arthur Onslow and his son the
first Earl, who are the direct progenitors of the present
family.

Too long in the body, too large in the posteriors, too short
in the legs: these were the anatomical features which dis-
tinguished the second Lord Onslow. His full-length portrait
at Clandon shows him as a man with a plain, smooth,
pompous face; not the face of one who is likely to be dis-
tinguished in great affairs or brilliant enterprise.

I have already suggested (and it is indeed sufficiently
evident) that the opportunities which lay before this man
were almost unlimited. He was about thirty-seven when, in
1717, he succeeded his father. He had met the King and
was assured of a good reception at Court. In 1705, when on
his travels, he was present at the wedding of George (after-
wards George II) to Caroline of Ansbach. His family, though
not of high distinction in the history of England or among
those of ancient rank, was now in a position of almost
unrivalled advantage. It represented, in a divided and rest-
less nation, everything that was acceptable to the new
dynasty. Whatever else the Onslows may or may not have
been at that time, they had rightly earned the reputation
since the days of Sir Arthur of being thoroughly dependable
Whigs.

The new Baron was a man of great wealth, to which he
had added by marrying a fortune. He had been a Member of
Parliament, inconspicuously, since he was a young man of

50

DICKY DUCKLEGS 51

twenty or twenty-two. It is true that he had not succeeded in
forming any close political alliances; but he was now
(in 1717) Lord Lieutenant of Surrey, High Steward of
Guildford and a Teller of the Exchequer. He was also an
Outranger of Windsor Forest; and what is more though
it seems fantastically inappropriate an LL.D. of the
University of Cambridge. At a somewhat later date he was
Deputy Lieutenant for Westminster. He had assumed, or
was granted, the leadership of the gentlemen of Surrey,
though not without considerable dissatisfaction and even
bitterness among the older county families, such as the
Mores, Westons and Oglethorpes.

Here, then, was a magnificent opportunity for the man
who, in reference to his peculiar build and waddling pro-
gress, came to be known as Dicky Ducklegs. And here was
a man for whom the opportunity was nothing more than an
occasion for provincial aggrandisement. Is it possible that
his wife may have been a retarding influence, though not
the only one?

The wife of Dicky Ducklegs, Elizabeth Knight, is a
woman of whom very little is known; an observation which
applies, very significantly, to the women of the Onslow
family in general. She is described by the fifth Earl of
Onslow as belonging to "a well-known Jamaica family."
Who, in fact, were known in those days as "Jamaica
families," and for what reason? -

This is a matter which may, I think, be discussed briefly:
it obviously has a direct bearing upon the family status.

The island of Jamaica was captured, almost inadvertently,
in 1655, by a Cromwellian expedition. This expedition was
under the command of Admiral Sir William Penn, the
Quaker's father, who had privately offered his fleet to the
prospective King (then in exile). But sailors have to do as
they are told, and in 1 654 he was sent, with Venables, to the
West Indies, in order to worry the Spaniards, rob their ships,
and above all to* seize the rich and useful island of San
Domingo. Tk? attack on San Domingo was beaten off with
lamentable losses to the invaders, but this was not enough
to break the sf>irit -OB blunt the resolve of such a man as

$z THE ONSLOW FAMILY

Penn. Without orders, although with commendable enter-
prise, he landed the forces of Venables on Jamaica (May
1 655) which he captured without very much trouble.

Hoping for compliments, rewards or promotion, and
probably for all three, he then sailed for England. His re-
ception by Cromwell surprised him very considerably* He
was arrested and sent off, with a storm of anger buzzing in
his ears, to the Tower, This might have been anticipated, for
Penn was guilty of treacherous correspondence, of having
failed in his mission, of having acted without orders and
returned without leave.

However, the island of Jamaica passed into British con-
trol, and it was not long before English families, and among
them the Knights, were speeding over to an acquisition that
was obviously full of promise. This move it was almost a
rush began very soon after the capture of the island. Some
of those who went across were political refugees, many of
them former Cromwellians, but the greater number were
traders and adventurers; by no means people worthy of the
highest respect. None would appear to have been distin-
guished in any particular way or to have differed from the
general type of those who used to exploit acquisitions of
territory.

In an eighteenth-century history of the island we are
informed with great candour: "Although the gaol delivery
of Newgate is not poured in upon this island; yet it is an
occasional asylum for many who have deserved the gallows*
These fellows are no sooner arrived than they cheat away to
the right and left, and off again they start; carrying all away
with them, except the infamy of their proceedings, which
they leave behind/* The story of European colonisation is
remarkably uniform.

That the settlers were successful, in at least one respect,
is to be gathered from the export figures. These reached
the value of ^629,533 in 1698; in 1720 they were up
to ji,i 1 7, 576; and were heading towards four millions by
the end of the century. The trade, which depended upon
the labour of negroes, Creoles, mixed whites and other
unclassified varieties, was mainly concerned with sugar,

DICKY DUCKLEGS 53

rum, molasses, piemento, coffee, cotton wool, indigo, ginger,
tobacco, mahogany and logwood*

The branch of the Knight family from which Elizabeth
was descended appears to have been mercantile, and we
know that in 1706 she was living in the house of a City
merchant, Humfrey South. It is stated that she inherited
two fortunes: one from her father and one from a childless
uncle, described as "Colonel Knight." This Colonel Knight
is probably the Charles Knight whose name appears in 1691
as that of an island Councillor, who was afterwards (in 1696)
given the command of Port Royal, The fifth Earl of Onslow
refers to him as "the Hon. Charles Knight of Kingston in
Jamaica," and to his brother, the father of Elizabeth, as
"the Hon. John Knight ": I do not know from what sources
he derives this information. There was also a Sir Andrew
Knight who was chief Judge of the Court of Common Pleas
in Jamaica and Gustos Rotulorum of Clarendon. All the
information that I can add (and it amounts to little) is that a
Mr. Ralph Knight's widow and niece were among those
killed in the earthquake of the yth of June 1692. What
is at least clear is that the Knights were present in the
island in considerable force by the end of the seventeenth
century.

Now, Elizabeth Knight is important in more ways than
one. She brought a fortune to Dicky Ducklegs. Did she at
the same time bring a handicap ?

The well-painted life-size portrait of Elizabeth Onslow
at Clandon (possibly from the studio of Kneller) is not very
communicative: it is not the kind of portrait that is able, as
many are, to speak unambiguously for itself. You would say
that she was neither well-bred nor vulgar, neither attractive
nor ugly, rather homely than aristocratic, and certainly
unfashionable. Whatever she may have been, it seems
doubtful whether she could have taken her place with ease
in the higher ranks of society. She could have done !wsU
enough/ o^ may suppose, as the unpretentious* wiffe ,'icrf a
country sqtix$| tnisy with, her store-cupboard and -jhttt? Mil-
room. As thfe 4}fe of a man of rank who could.fcayeii^actired
a high positioii im tie State if he i^d-b^ii^guided and

54 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

impelled by the social prestige and adroit manoeuvres of a
well-bred and fascinating woman, Elizabeth Knight could
only have been a failure, possibly an encumbrance.

She had been married for money. In return, she had
become the wife of a Baronet's son and heir, and she was the
mistress, though only for a year or two, of the great house
at Clandon, partly built with her wealth. She was, in the
words of Speaker Arthur Onslow, "a Woman of the truest
goodness of Mind and Heart I ever knew." In 1731 she
died, leaving behind her one son, a youth of eighteen.

According to family tradition, Elizabeth Onslow was not
a happy woman. Probably this tradition is not far from the
truth. And those of an imaginative disposition may like to
know that Elizabeth is the Clandon ghost. Her pale un-
fashionable spirit wanders in the gentlest way, a sad whisper-
ing wraith in silver brocade, along the gallery above the
hall. ...

Nothing that is known of Ducklegs himself produces even
a transient impression of amiability. His claim to social
acceptance would seem to depend upon the talents of a
clown. He had, according to his cousin Arthur (who had no
reason to like him), some capacity for liveliness, a limited
knowledge of the world, and a gentlemanly taste for the
" magnificence" that was proper to his position. But he was
wrong-headed and rude and awkward. In the South Sea
transaction with Arthur he was despicably mean. It has been
alleged that a contract of marriage with Thomas Onslow
was produced by Lady Harriet Vere, which he offered to
buy back for ^5000 in cash and a handsome annuity.
Scandal (like the anonymous letter) frequently presents a
distorted variation of truth and should always be received
with due appreciation and even with gratitude. In any
case, the association of Onslow's name with that of Lady
Harriet Vere is worthy of note.

His previous biographer, the fifth Earl of Onslow, can
say little in his favour, except that he had "a talent for
buffoonery," a thing hardly to be reckoned among the high-
est accomplishments of a gentleman. Writing to her mother
on x the 3rd of March 1737, Mrs, Delany refers to him on

photograph : A. C. Cooper Ltd.)

Elizabeth Knight, afterwards wife of Thomas, Second Baron Onslow. From
the picture in the possession of the Earl of Onslow. (Artist unknown.)

DICKY DUCKLEGS 55

the occasion of Queen Caroline's birthday celebrations at
Hampton Court (Autobiography^ 1861-62):

"The King looked in good humour ... he was excessively fine on
the Birthday, and the Princess Amelia's clothes very beautiful.
There was nothing else remarkable, but that my Lord Onslow was
very near being demolished j he went to help some ladys into the
foreigners box, his foot slipped, and he tumbled backward among all
the crowd, and had like to have beat Princess Mary off her seat. He
lay sprawling some time before he could recover himself, and caused
much mirth throughout the assembly, the King and Queen laughed
heartily."

Neither performance nor audience appears worthy of
rational admiration; and this episode of sprawling in royal
company, however funny it may have been, is unfortunately
the only picture that we have of Ducklegs in the world of
high fashion.

Thomas Onslow greatly enlarged his estate by the pur-
chase of land in Surrey: he acquired Guildford Park and
divided it into four farms. He was also concerned in the
promotion of insurance companies, particularly the Royal
Exchange Assurance Corporation.

His popularity with George I and George II gave him an
assured position at Court, where, like a later Thomas
Onslow, he seems to have endeared himself as a grotesque.
Although he had no place in contemporary politics he was
provincially eminent in Surrey, and especially in his own
district that of Guildford.

In 1722 the town was visited by the King (George I):

"On his Majesty's Return from his Progress, he was met at Guil-
ford by great Numbers of the Nobility and Gentry, who were led
by the Lord Onslow, When he arrived at Guilford the Recorder
welcomed him in a very handsome Speech, and presented Iiis
Majesty with a Plum-Cake, which it seems is the usual Present to
the Sovereign when he passes through that Town."

Wixen George II succeeded his father on the throne of
England (1727) Lord Onslow became a mote accomplished
courtier. Not only did he keep 00 excellent terns iwith the
King and Queei% vfeiit : ^\ : k^^t^t^dMm^^^^t t adroitly

56 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

with Frederick, Prince of Wales, their Majesties' detestable
son. The Prince was described by his father as "my dear
first-born . . . the greatest ass and the greatest liar and the
greatest canaille and the greatest beast in the whole world " ;
while his mother declared roundly, "Fred is a nauseous
little beast, and he cares for nobody but his nauseous little
self/' Parents are sometimes united by their children, though
seldom by a sentiment so genuinely reciprocal.

Fred had been brought up in the stupid and licentious
court of Hanover. He came to England early in 1728 and
was created Prince of Wales in January 1729. In the May
of that year he visited Clandon Park. The Prince's visit to
Clandon the new Palladian house, probably not yet com-
pleted was described by Sir John Evelyn of Wotton
(quoted in the Clandon MSS.) :

"Being invited by my Lord Onslow I went on horseback to
Clandon about twelve o'clock. About one came the Prince of Wales
from Kensington in an open Berlin ... as soon as he had new
dress'd himself he walkt round part of the garden & into the
Orangery in the midst of a Wilderness of Greens . . . then he went
into the great roome above stairs to dinner . . . there were seven
piramids of sweetmeats & fruit & five dishes between each , . . the
company consisted of about forty, ye chief of which were the Lord
Chancellor King, the dukes of St. Albans & Ancaster ... the
Speaker Mr, Onslow . . . Mr. North Lord Guildford's son, Mr.
Boscawen . . . dinner being over between four and five his Royal
Highness after speaking to Lady Onslow & some other ladys . . -
mounted a grey horse & was followed by most of the company to
Meroe downs where he got into the Stand, five horses ran. . . ."

The great Speaker Arthur Onslow was there: he had been
in the Chair for about a year and a half. Much fine company
was there, including the Duchess of Bedford and Lady
Essex, both of whom sat with Frederick in the stand on the
race-course. But Lady Onslow, the homely and incon-
spicuous Elizabeth, does not seem, to have cut much of a
figure. She was "spoken to" by the Prince of Wales before
he went off with his grander ladies, and that was all, * .

Lord Onslow was concerned in very different ways in two
very different cases. He was shot off his horse by a murderous

DICKY DUCKLEGS 57

though probably instructed lunatic in 1723, and he played
a leading part in what may be called the Tofts Enquiry (one
of the most extraordinary hoaxes of any time) in 1726. The
shooting affair, one of great interest and of many implica-
tions, will be described in the next chapter. Our immediate
concern is with Mary Tofts, "the Woman of Godlyman."

Mary Tofts or Toft was the wife of John Tofts, a journey-
man clothier. She lived in Godalming and had three children.
At the time of her celebrity she was about twenty-five* She
was poor, humble and exceedingly dishonest; but she has a
place in the records of our island as an imaginative and
successful impostor whose fantastic deception excited con-
troversy, rage and astonishment throughout the entire realm
and ultimately demanded the intervention of the Crown
itself.

The Tofts imposture began with a declaration by Mary in
November 1726. According to her, she was at work in the
fields on the 2 3rd of April in that year and was very strangely
frightened (one cannot say precisely how) by a rabbit. It is
to be presumed that she also declared herself to be pregnant
at this time. However that may be, the alarming appearance
of the rabbit was to have consequences of a very peculiar
nature.

Attended by John Howard, an apothecary, Mary was
delivered, first of the guts of a pig (a strange irrelevance)
and then of a litter of fifteen rabbits. It does not seem that
Howard was present at the actual event, but he had been
fully convinced of the presence of the rabbits by the
ordinary methods of palpation.

It seems incredible that anyone, let alone men of sense
and science, could have believed in such a fable for a single
moment. But Howard was deceived, and was presently
active in propagating deception from one end of the country
to the other. Where were the rabbits ? What was the evidence
of Mr. John Tofts, if he was at home? In fact, what evidence
was there of any description apart from the word c$ Mary
herself? These were questions that were soon to b^ mvesti-
gated by Lord-Oiislow* ,, , : .',../ ^ ;? ,,'3-:W

In the mean whie Howard wrote to jpjiysician

5 8 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

of much eminence who was then practising in Westminster
Hospital. Upon getting this report, St. Andr^ at once posted
off to Guildford with his friend Samuel Molyneux, whose
qualification was that of secretary to the Prince of Wales.

One might have supposed that the whole affair would now
be shown as a peculiarly nauseating fraud. On the contrary,
St. Andre himself became the victim of imposture. He drew
up A Short Narrative of an Extraordinary Delivery of Rabbets^
in which he deposed that he himself had delivered Mrs.
Tofts of two rabbits, or portions of rabbits.

Lord Onslow wrote a slightly guarded letter to Sir Hans
Sloane, a man advanced in years and of great learning. In
this letter he declared that the Godalming rabbits were
acquiring dreadful celebrity: the affair had "almost alarmed
England, and in a manner persuaded several people of sound
judgment that it was true." Pope recorded the conflict of
opinion in the whole of London, In the royal circle there
were many believers, despite the wholesome ribaldry of the
Prince of Wales.

The King now decided that it was necessary to confirm or
demolish the assertion of Mary Tofts and her babbling
supporters. IJe therefore sent no less a person than Ahlers,
one of the surgeons of the royal household, to Guildford,

Now, now at last, you would suppose, the horrible
imposture of Mary Tofts would be exploded. But it was not
long before Ahlers found himself extracting pieces of rabbit,
. . . And still the wonder grew. The great surgeon returned
to the royal household, where he said that he was unable to
give a definite explanation.

Mary was now prepared to go on producing any number
of rabbits, and would no doubt have done so had it not been
for the decisive intervention of Limborch and Sir Richard
Manningham, both of whom were dispatched by the King.
What happened then may be described in the words of the
Daily Post of the 6th of December 1726:

"No notice hath hitherto been taken in this Paper of the Woman at
Godalmin in Surrey, said to have been delivered of sixteen or seven-
teen Rabbits, it being a filthy Story at best, and having withal the
Appearance of Imposture: That Matter is now under strict Exam-

DICKY DUCKLEGS 59

ination, and some odd Discoveries having been made, we hear the
said Woman was yesterday committed by Sir Thomas Clarges to the
Custody of the High Constable of Westminster for a Fortnight, it
being pretended that she is near her Labour (as they call it) of more
Rabbits now jumping in her Belly (as the phrase is) otherwise she
had been sent to Bridewell."

Manningham had at once detected the imposture, and
after Mary Tofts was taken to London she was actually
caught endeavouring to procure a rabbit.

Onslow was now directed to obtain sworn depositions
from witnesses in Godalming as well as Guildford, and this
was accordingly done. Nothing remained of the rabbits and
the story of their alleged mother. Under the minatory coun-
tenance of Sir Thomas Clarges the magistrate, Mary Tofts
made a full confession. Although she was sent to the Bride-
well in Tothill Fields and a prosecution was demanded, it
was thought better to drop the case, which had already
impaired or reduced several important reputations.

Mary Tofts returned to Godalming and for some ye^rs
nothing was heard of her until, in 1740, she was imprisoned
for receiving stolen goods. In 1 763 she died, having secured
for herself a sure and certain place in the annals of roguery.
She was commemorated at the time in a series of lively and
obscene pamphlets (as well as in learned literature), cartoons
and satires. Hogarth depicted her very crudely in the second
version of Credulity Superstition and Fanaticism, a plate
published in 1762, and also in The Cunicularii, or the Wise

Men ofGodliman in Consultation. . . .

.#

The story of Ducklegs may well seem to be a story of
success without any notable achievement or personal merit.
Mrs. Delany's picture of his buffoonery and the Speaker's
picture of his bad manners, obstinacy and irascibility could
not have been derived from a charming and intelligent
character, nor does anything we know of him, directly or
indirectly, place him in a favourable light. But at least we
have to allow that he gave the family a noble house, whatever
his motives may have been in dbing so (and I shall discuss
them presently), and adequately maintained, though he did

60 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

not advance, the family position in Surrey. Like his father
he was much concerned with commercial enterprise and
with methods of raising money. One has to remember that
men who devote themselves to the concerns of trade, estate,
office or speculation, without achieving great eminence in
any of these activities, do not strongly impress the minds of
their contemporaries or leave behind them any notable
account of themselves in the memoirs of their time. ^

Ducklegs can hardly be described as a court favourite. He
was also remote from the intellectual and literary life of his
age, escaping thus from wit or satire, not sufficiently ^con-
spicuous even for the malice of the scandalous magazines:
affluent, he lived in a state of elevated though sterile
mediocrity.

No doubt the assumption that he was a loyal and con-
sistent Whig is entirely correct. The fact would have been
creditable, had it not been for the obvious advantage of being
a Whig, and the very serious disadvantage of being anything
else, in the reigns of the first two Georges. Besides, it had
been up to now the Onslow tradition, and it ought to have
provided, through Ducklegs, the supreme Onslow oppor-
tunity. This opportunity was lost.

Finally, one is left in the contemplation of an unsatis-
factory and unpleasing character. Is there nothing to soften
what may seem to be the harsh and ungenerous portrait of a
covetous, proud and rather stupid man ? Perhaps it may be
found in the opening clauses of his Will: "I desire to be
buried very privately at Merrow, and that my body may be
carried to the grave by my tenants by daylight, and without
state/'

CHAPTER VI

The Visitation of God

/~\N the ^8th of August 1723, Thomas, Lord Onslow, had
v^been "out with Gentlemen a hunting a Fox Chace." He
was riding home. On the one side of him, also riding, there
was a Mr. Flutter; and on the other, a Mr. Fawks. There
was also a Mr, Parsons, not far away. It was about half-past
nine in the morning when these four gentlemen were mak-
ing their way down a sunken and sandy lane, not fat from
Katherine Hill near Guildford.

Approaching them on foot was a man upon whom the
hand of God lay heavily. His name was Edward Arnold,

The face of this man was white and wild; he was carrying
a musket, and he was carrying it very oddly the hammer
cocked and the muzzle pointing forward.

No one seems to have paid much attention to him except
Mr. Flutter. This gentleman, noticing the ghastly paleness
and the surly resolution of Mr. Arnold, asked him why he
was carrying his gun so improperly, and what were his
intentions. At this moment, Flutter was on the left of
Onslow, riding level, and Fawks was a little way behind on
the right.

White as chalk and with a madman's fanatical stare, Mr.
Arnold was now passing on the side of Flutter when he
suddenly wheeled, brought his gun to the shoulder, fired a
charge of heavy shot at Onslow, and fairly blew him off his
horse.

The first concern of Mr. Fawks and Mr. Flutter was to
see whether his Lordship were def d or dying, or ;inerely
surprised and angry. His actual tonditipn was that ela very
seriously wounded .man. He had received the charge of the
musket, not in;th$ h^{phich; would jb^il^^^im)) but

61

6 2 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

just below the neck, in the right shoulder. His friends lifted
him carefully onto the bank of the lane.

Onslow believed himself to be a dying man, and he cried
out with bitterness and anger "The villain . . . hath killed
me." By this time some other horsemen (including Parsons)
had come up and were quickly in pursuit of Arnold.

The maniac Arnold was now in a furious condition. He
shouted and raged, he swore that he would reload his
musket. But his pursuers drove him against the bank and
secured him, though it is to be observed that they left him
in possession of the gun. "You villain!" cried the zealous
Mr. Parsons, "you have killed my Lord, and you will be
hanged for it." "You won't hang me to-day," replied Arnold.

They took him back, still holding the gun, to the place
where his Lordship lay by the side of the lane. Upon seeing
that Onslow was alive, the frenzy of Arnold was ungovern-
able. He had been pale, he had been white; he was now
"livid." he made as though to club the prostrate Baron
with his butt-end.

In the meanwhile Flutter had galloped off to Guildford,
and the surgeons were soon on their way to the scene of this
extraordinary affair. The wound in the shoulder was deep,
lacerated and extremely dangerous. Even so late as on the
7th of November of this year, Daniel Pulteney wrote: "Lord
Onslow is far from recovering of his wound and is likely to
fall into a languishing condition." To say that a man was
near a languishing condition was equal to saying that his
death might be anticipated, the surgeons having failed
entirely to set him on his feet.

Now, what was behind all this ?

I think there was a good deal behind it. Although it is
quite clear that Arnold was a lunatic, it seems fairly obvious
that he was incited and infuriated by sane and unscrupulous
people who had a reason though perhaps no adequate or
justifiable reason for getting rid of Onslow. The evidence
comes out very clearly in the astonishingly detailed account
of the trial of Arnold which was printed not long after the
event.

In 1679 Evelyn was already making a reference to the

THE VISITATION OF GOD 63

excellence of the reporting and recording of all capital trials.
He was not often present at such trials, he said, "we having
them commonly so exactly published by those who take
them in short-hand/' Edward Arnold was tried on what had
recently become a capital charge (attempted murder); the
proceedings were most admirably "taken in short-hand"
and were subsequently published.

Although the shooting occurred on the 28th of August
1 723, the trial did not take place until the 2oth of March in
the following year (1724). For seven months the crazy and
wretched man, Edward Arnold, was detained in the House
of Correction, where he was at all times subjected to the
teasing cruelty, the boorish curiosity, 1 the taunts and insults
of the people. Who was not anxious to see < ' such a Monster ' * ?
Who could resist the spectacle of this pale, mouthing,
frenetic man, tossing in chains upon a pallet of straw?

Not every visitor was drawn by this hateful curiosity.
There was a very worthy Justice, a Mr. Allen, who visited
the prison with the object of extracting from Arnold a
coherent account of his act and its motives. What he did
extract is of great significance to the historian of the Onslows,
but will be more fittingly unrolled when we examine the
particulars of this very extraordinary trial.

The first circumstance to be noted is the immense concern
of King George (it will be remembered that he had visited
Onslow's father in 1 7 1 7), who personally instructed no fewer
than four of his Council, four of the most eminent Sergeants-
at-Law, to act for the prosecution. He would, he said, "have
his own Servants appear in this Prosecution, to see that Right
be done." This alone gives the trial a more than provincial
importance, and I think it points towards the influences as
well as the agents who were the chief instigators of the
madman. However this may be, the four Sergeants of the
King's Council Cheshyre, Whitaker, Comyns, and Darnell
appeared at Kingston on the day of the Assizes, which
were presided over by Mr. Justice Tracey.

A note on the criminal procedure at this period is neces-
sary if the case is to be properly understood. Tites crime of
Arnold was dearly defined at the trial--r"Xhe Etct by him

64 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

committed is Felony without Benefit of Clergy/' It was a
capital offence. In all such cases, the object of the Judge was
to conclude the entire hearing and to obtain the verdict of
the Jury in a single day; and if the accused were found
guilty he was executed a day or two later. From the legal and
humane points of view there is much to be said for and
against the swiftness of these proceedings. It was hardly
possible to obtain a reprieve, and there are harrowing stories
of the reprieve arriving only a few minutes after the con r
victed man had been hanged. Not infrequently the examina-
tion of witnesses might be arbitrarily curtailed, or the less
important witnesses might be excluded altogether. (But
here it is important to remember that all the witnesses were
simultaneously present in the Court.} On the other hand, it
was far better to be executed speedily than to be left for
many days in the horrors of the Condemned Hold. Moreover,
the restriction of the evidence on both sides to that of the
critical witnesses presented the case with a clarity and energy
that were immediately comprehensible to the jurymen. In
those days, the expert witness as we know him in our own times
was not in existence at all; a circumstance which greatly
reduced the time taken up in the argumentative examination
of cases (and often taken up so foolishly) and also contributed
to the general clearness or the picture.

These were the circumstances in which Edward Arnold
had to face his trial at the Kingston Assizes in 1724.

Although it was very unusual to allow a man accused of a
capital offence to have the benefit of a defending counsel, it
will be observed that a person described as " solicitor for the
prisoner," after some discussion, does manage to slip in a
word or two* It was also unusual to allow the defence of
lunacy, but here again ^a most interesting point in legal
history this line of defence had to be considered.

And who was Edward Arnold?

He was described as "of a good family." Good families
may produce lunatics as well as any other, but I think the
phrase must here be taken as meaning a respectable family:
one that had not previoulsy got into trouble. No doubt they
were a family of small artisans or middling farmers. It was

THE VISITATION OF GOD 65

established that Lord Onslow knew nothing of Arnold and
had never, to his knowledge, seen him before the day of the
shooting. Nor had Arnold, so far as can be gathered from
the evidence, ever had anything to do with Lord Onslow
until he met him in the lane. He must, of course, have known
him by sight.

Even a lunatic is unlikely to feel that the whole purpose of
his life has to be directed towards the killing of one particular
man, if he is not assiduously prompted by those who wish
him to commit the murder. It may, of course, be dangerous
to employ a lunatic to do this work for you; but then he is
a lunatic, quite incapable of understanding right and wrong,
truth and untruth, and who is going to believe a word he says ?

All this may sound extremely fantastic: it is much less
fantastic than to suppose that Arnold, who had had no deal-
ings whatever with Onslow, should have spontaneously
conceived the idea that here was a man whose enormous
wickedness was bringing disaster upon the whole country
and who, by some diabolical projection of hatred, was be-
witching Arnold himself* This is what Arnold actually did
believe; and we shall presently see the evidence of prompt-
ings and insinuations, and also what is far more suspicious
the deliberate suppression of names.

The trial began with procedures that have long ago passed
out of use. First of all the charge was read in the tortuous
absurdity of law-Latin. The Court was informed how the
prehonourable Thomas Lord Onslow, Baron Onslow of
Onslow "in Com' Salop et de Clandon in Com' Surrey*' was
confronted by "Edrus Arnold " whose gun was loaded
"cum pulvere Bombardino" with bombard-powder or
gun-powder and with "plumbeis Globulis" or leaden
shot ; and how Arnold feloniously and of malice aforethought
"displosit et exoneravit" disploded and exonerated his gun
(did shoot), and wounded the said Thomas Lord Onslow . . *
contrary to the peace of our Lord the King.

Now, although Arnold had four of the King's Copacil
against him, he had the advantage of being tried before one
of the most huinane, as well as one of
Judges of his time: Mr. Justice Tfacfey.

66 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

Robert Tracey was the eldest son of the second Viscount
and Baron Tracey of Rathcoole. He had been a Judge of the
King's Bench in Ireland, and was transferred to England as
a baron of the Exchequer. In 17165 after the rising, he had
tried the Jacobite leaders at Carlisle. At the time of the
Arnold case he was in his sixty-ninth year; he retired two
years later with a magnificent pension. A contemporary
describes him as "a complete gentleman ... of a clear head
and an honest heart/' whose judgments were delivered with
such " genteel affability " that even those who suffered con-
demnation were "charmed with his behaviour." His attri-
butes of learning, fairness and humanity were never more
fully displayed than they were at this trial.

After reading the charge, the Clerk of Arraigns put the
question to the prisoner: "How say'st thou, Edward
Arnold? Art thou Guilty of the Felony whereof thou
standest indicted, or Not Guilty?"

The prisoner having pleaded Not Guilty, the Clerk then
says: "Culprit, How wilt thou be tried?"

To which the prisoner answers: "By God and my
Country"; and the Clerk solemnly replies: "God send thee
a good Deliverance."

There was then, after the Jury had been sworn, a pro-
clamation by ' ' the Cryer " :

"O Yes: if any of you can inform my Lord, the King's
Justice, the King's Attorney, or Solicitor General, of any
Treason, Murder, Felony, or other Misdemeanor, com-
mitted by the Prisoner at the Bar, come forth, and you shall
be heard; for the Prisoner at the Bar now stands upon his
Deliverance; And all Persons bound by Recognizance to
prosecute the Prisoner, come forth and prosecute, or you'll
forfeit your Recognizances."

After this came an argument as to whether Arnold was
entitled to the benefit of a solicitor for his defence, or
whether the plea of insanity could be upheld. This was
opposed hotly by Cheshyre, Comyns and Whitaker. The
Judge himself supported the argument of the prosecuting
counsel, but added, " It is my Duty to give all the Assistance
I can; and that I will do."

THE VISITATION OF GOD 67

Mr. Sergeant Cheshyre then said: "We that are Council
for the King will do nothing that is hard." Mr. Sergeant
Whitaker also declared: "No, I never will, while a Man's
life is at Stake. None of us will do any thing that is hard."
And the kindly though impartial Judge added: "I don't
believe you will."

The whole of the evidence made it clear that Arnold was
a lunatic, though a lunatic of the sort that is capable of
systematic premeditation and of procedures that are per-
fectly rational in themselves. According to the prosecution,
"he had a steady and resolute Design, and used all proper
Means to effect it." He was "a Marksman 7 ' who always
"aimed at the Head" of rabbits, in the ordinary course of
things. On the day of the shooting he had gone to the shop
of a Mr. Smith where he usually bought his powder and
shot, having previously borrowed a gun. So far there was
nothing out of the ordinary. What was very much out of the
ordinary was Arnold's request for shot of the largest size, a
request which he had never made before. Most fortunately
for his Lordship, the largest size was out of stock, and
Arnold had to be content with No. 2, described as "Rabbit
Shot." He went off, thus provided, and then, to make sure
that the gun was neither foul nor damp, that the flint, the
pan and the trigger were acting properly, he fired a charge.
After this he made enquiries as to the whereabouts of Lord
Onslow.

These actions were consistent with "a steady and resolute
design," though obviously the steadiness and resolution were
those of a lunatic. Of the shooting itself I have already given
an account.

Nothing in this trial is more remarkable than the fierce

impropriety of Mr. Sergeant Cheshyre (in spite of his

rotestations) and the calmly impartial dignity of the

en Arnold, after a gentle questioning by the Judge,
affirmed that " I am sorry for what is done; and I can't think
how I came to take that Way," Cheshyre rapped out
savagely: "The Devil worked with him** stood M fa& right
Hand, and directed him, ? * :Aa4 agai% ^hisa -Arnold said

6g THE ONSLOW FAMILY

"I have had the Gun go off several times in my Hand; but
never, till now, had this Accident/' the diabolical Cheshyre
quite irrelevantly sneers : " He never before shot a Lord in
the Shoulder. He can ask better Questions when he holds
up his Head; but if his Guilt makes him hold it down, I
can't help it."

On the other hand, Mr. Justice Tracey was quick in
straightening or questioning the evidence, and frequently
asked the prisoner whether he did not wish to make any
comments.

Arnold's wild ravings against Onslow might in them-
selves have been taken as the fullest imaginable symptoms
of madness. Even Cheshyre had to allow, "He did behave
like a Lunatick."

By day, by night, at all times, Arnold was tormented by
"Lord Onslow in his Belly." He could neither sleep nor eat.
He was beset in the wickedest way by "the Buggs, the
Bollies and the Bolleroyes."

God damn my Lord Onslow! He would shoot him when-
ever he got a chance: he would shoot him at the Races. He
asked his tailor, Mr. White, what sort of a man was Lord
Onslow. Doubtless a very good man, said Mr. White
cautiously. And what about Lady Onslow? said Arnold. A
very good woman, said Mr. White; at least he had never
heard to the contrary. Then why don't she cut his throat?
roared the crazy and intimidating Mr. Arnold, slabbering at
the mouth and striking his bosom with a furious fist.

He would frantically scratch and lacerate his bosom; my
Lord Onslow was there, and he would scratch him out.

This grim lunatic, with his clawing hands and lousy hair,
was known as Mad Ned. He had a house, but there was no
furniture in it. Mouthing, mumbling, with nauseous antics
and unmeaning words, he was a butt and amusement to
some, a terror to others, a source of scandal and apprehen-
sion to his family. He was noted for saying "abominable,
wicked and distracted things" and of making wild accusa-
tions as, for example, that Lord Onslow had misbehaved
himself with an innkeeper's wife, after the drinking of many
bottles of wine. There were times when he went about

THE VISITATION OF GOD 69

hooting like an owl. He was obsessed with a passion for
guns, pistols, hog-knives and other deadly weapons* More
than once he had "let off his gun in the kitchen." He talked
"extreamly inwardly" and would often "catch at his words/*
The family had been advised to put him in the mad-house.
An attempt was made to settle him in Yorkshire, but he
came back. They sent him to sea as a marine, on a Court
order granted by the first Lord Onslow; but " at the first
Opportunity he ran away and came home again, naked and
out of Repair." f

On the day after the shooting Arnold was visited in the
House of Correction by a Mr. Coe> who seems to have been
an intelligent and well-disposed person. He found the
prisoner in a sad way:

"He sat quite double, and did not speak a Word, I went the next
Day and he was brought into a Rooms he seem'd under a Confusion,

but not Lunarick Says he, My Lord Onslow is the Plague, the

Occasion of all the Plagues and Troubles in the Country. ... A
hundred People say so, the very Boys in the Street cry out upon My
Lord Onslow. . . . When he did answer, it was always rational. He
would rail at My Lord Onslow, and say he was the Occasion of
all our Plagues and Troubles, and a Man of evil Devices. Says I,
Are you not afraid to suffer Death ? Says he, it is better to die than
to live miserably. ... I ask'd him if he would drink some White-
wine; says he, The White-wine here is too strong for my Stomachs
then I calPd for some Sack, and he had it. I ask'd him how he did,
and he held down his Head and said, In a bad Condition. I said to
his Keeper, I believ'd he would die, he should have some Care of
himj the Keeper said, It was common: The Prisoner said, These
Irons are very heavy and troublesome, and sat down in a Chair, very
ill. He desired me to speak to my Lord, and tell him how he was
iron'd. ... I did speak to my Lord, and afterwards came to see him
again. ... I told him, It is a hard Case, that a Man of such good
Family should suffer so, you ought to declare all that you know .
if you know any body that set you upon this, you ought to declare
who it is. ... But he never did name any body to me, but le tqid
me, I have signM a Paper, what is in that Paper is true / r V*

Arnold wrote two letters to Lord Onslow aik^S^diclated
a statement; 1 "He,wa$:exldt3^
Resentment he, -express^ ;"

70 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

from several Persons perswading him that my Lord Onslow
was the Occasion of all his Troubles ."

The evidence of Mr. Allen, a Justice of the Peace, was
even more significant.

Allen was respectfully addressed by Sergeant Cheshyre :
"I think, Sir, you have the Honour of acting in the Com-
mission of the Peace ? "

To which Mr. Allen replied: "I have the Trouble of it,
I don't think it any Honour."

His evidence was very startling. He had examined Arnold
in the gaol, and Arnold had made his usual crazy allegations
concerning Onslow. But there were additional statements of
an extremely important nature. According to Arnold him-
self, "he had long and deliberately intended to murder my
Lord Onslow. . , . Ever since last Horse-Race was Twelve-
month; and he had communicated such his Intention to his
Friends, and they had encouraged him to it." (The italics are
mine.) He then proceeded to name two persons. . . .

At this point in the evidence of Mr. Allen, the solicitor
for the prisoner intervened and said these persons were
friends of Onslow the names were not given to the Court
so that the defence (of lunacy) was now strongly rein-
forced.

An argument followed, as to the disclosure of the names.
Having given the names of these persons to Mr. Allen, it
seems that Arnold was much distressed by the thought of
getting them into trouble. At last Mr. Sergeant Cheshyre,
very reasonably, asked Allen the decisive question: "I
desire you'll declare upon your Oath, Were these Persons
that were so named by the Prisoner remarkable Friends, and
in the Interest of my Lord Onslow, or opposed him in his
Interest?"

The reply was equally decisive and extremely sensational:
"They very remarkably opposed him, and were ever under-
stood to be bitter Enemies to my Lord Onslow." Again the
italics are mine.

This rsply and the decision to withhold the names leave
one in little doubt as to the fact of incitement. What remains
to be decided, if possible, is the motive of the inciters ; and I

THE VISITATION OF GOD 7*

think we may here find a clue in the opening speech of
Mr. Sergeant Cheshyre:

"This noble Lord is known to you all, he hath always appeared in
the Service of his Country, an Assertor of the Liberties thereof,
always endeavour'd to support the present Government, in the
House of Hanover, and is for the Protestant Religion, against
Rebels, and for suppressing Clubs, and Places of Meeting jfor
People's wicked Enterprises; and if that be a fault, I hope it is a
Fault most of you are guilty of, and will be guilty of . . . and if this
Man is to be believed, the People had inspired him, brought him to
a Pitch of Enthusiasm, I don't know what to call it, that my Lord
was an Enemy to his Country, and he thought he should do God
and his Country good Service by destroying him. . . . Gentlemen,
though he acted like a wicked Man, void of Reason, you will have
little Reason to think he acted like a Madman."

Surely the inference is plain enough, especially when it is
noted, in addition, that Arnold, in his mad though method-
ical ravings, declared that the King was at fault as well as
Onslow. The King, he said, "put my Lord Onslow upon
doing and making these disturbances/'

The reference to clubs, meetings and wicked enterprises
can have only one meaning: it is a reference to the scattered
though persistent activities of the Jacobites in Surrey. There
was known to be a secret society of Jacobites in Godalming,
and there were many others. There were, for that matter,
Jacobites in Parliament (e.g., Shippen); and it was only a
few years since the treacherous correspondence of Atterbury
had been revealed. One may well suppose, as Cheshyre
evidently did suppose, that the "bitter enemies" of Onslow
were political enemies who had selected a madman for the
accomplishment of their sinister design. Further support is
given to this hypothesis by the extremely active interest of
the King himself, who had personally organised the prosecu-
tion against Arnold.

When the Judge asked Arnold what He had to s$yv tjie
prisoner replied: "May God forgive ^e; if it is, my i*i*lt,
I am sorry for it f s . . . I ask ; pardon for all giy ofetos and
faults/' . . ',?>::n tw -:o -

The summimg^p ; gf , ; ft&* : Ju&tke Ifotay M:

72 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

humane and equitable; one of the finest of all the expositions
which, in a criminal case, have ever been heard in our courts
of law. After reviewing the evidence, he finished on the
critical question: " Whether this Man hath the use of his
Reason and Sense." Was he, at the time of the shooting,
sane or insane? The end of his great speech is a noble
example of close reasoning and of judicial clarity:

"If he was under the Visitation of God, and could not distinguish
between Good and Evil, and did not know what he did, though he
committed the greatest Offence, yet he could not be guilty of any
Offence against any Law whatsoever^ for Guilt arises from the
Mind, and the wicked Will and Intention of the Man. If a Man be
deprived of his Reason, and consequently of his Intention, he cannot
be guilty. . . . Punishment is intended for Example . . . but the
Punishment of a Madman, a Person that hath no Design, can have
no Example ... On the other Side, we must be very cautious; it is
not every frantick and idle Humour of a Man that will exempt him

from Justice and the Punishment of the Law It must be a Man

that is totally deprived of his Understanding and Memory . . .
therefore I must leave it to your Consideration, whether the
Condition this Man was in ... doth show a Man who knew what
he was doing . . . and it is to be observ'd, they admit he was a
Lunatick, and not an Ideot. A Man that is an Ideot, that is born
so, never recovers, but a Lunatick may, and hath his Intervals. ...
You are to consider what he was at this Day, when he committed
this Fact Gentlemen, I must leave it to you."

The Jury withdrew for a short time. When they came
back into the Court, the Clerk of Arraigns put the question
to the foreman:

"Edward Arnold, hold up thy Hand. Look upon the
Prisoner. How say you? Is Edward Arnold guilty of the
Felony whereof he stands indicted, or not guilty?"

The foreman replied " Guilty "; whereupon the Clerk put
another question: "What Goods or Chattels, Lands or
Tenements ?" and the foreman replied, "None, to our
Knowledge."

Sentence of death was passed accordingly "But at the
intercession of the Right Honourable the Lord Onslow, his
execution was respited."

Of Arnold, nothing more need be said except that his was

THE VISITATION OF GOD 73

the usual fate of a respited criminal: he died in gaol after a
few years' imprisonment.

What conclusions are to be drawn from the trial of
Edward Arnold ? First, it seems clear that Onslow's enemies,
whoever they were, had worked upon the crazy mind of this
man in order to make him the instrument of their own
criminal purpose. There were two principal instigators, and
the careful withholding of their names would imply that they
were people of some standing.

To kill a political opponent by means of assassination,
especially one who is not in high office, is not a common
practice in England. There may have been other, or con-
current, motives. The manners of Onslow were pompous
and overbearing, he did not represent an indigenous family,
and he was at this time building what appeared to be an
unduly pretentious mansion. He was one of the few country
gentlemen who were on intimate terms with a King still
regarded as a foreign ruler.

It must be allowed that the sum of these facts does not
provide a really good case for assassination, nor does it seem
to justify so potent a degree of hatred. But there were
"bitter enemies," and those enemies had made it their
business to work Arnold up to the necessary pitch of lunatic
fury. They, indeed, were responsible for the outrage; even
if their intentions were not literally murderous. \

The evidence also shows, though in a less direct way, a
more diffused hostility to Lord Onslow. There was a Mr.
Darby who was sent by Onslow expressly to question
Arnold in the gaol as to the promptings, the motives of his
action, the other persons who were concerned with him in
the felony. These enquiries were of no avail, but they show
that Onslow (to whom the names of the chief instigatots
were presumably known) was cognisant of, or suspectedj n
wider popular dislike. I must not exceed the limits; pf
reasonable or justified speculation, and I must lea^cit'to
the reader to decide upon the full implications of this
extraordinary episode*

CHAPTER VII

Clandon Park

I HAVE already shown that the date or the dates of the
building of the Onslows' Palladian house cannot be
determined. It is at least certain that the second Lord
Onslow, whether the idea originated with him or not, may
be described as the builder.

We know that Leoni was the architect, and we know that
the superb fireplaces in the hall (and, I think, others as well)
were the work of John Michael Rysbrack, the son of a
Flemish painter. It is probable that Leoni and Rysbrack
worked in concert, and Rysbrack did not arrive in England
until the end of 1720, (It may be noted relevantly that he
was the sculptor of the magnificent Baroque monument of
the Lord Chancellor, Peter King, who died in 1734, in the
church at Ockham, near Clandon Park,)

In Aubrey's Antiquities of Surrey (1718-19) there is a
reference to the Onslows' house "a fine Seat . . . under
the Downs." We are also told that "The present Lord . , .
was married to Mrs. Knight, a West-Indian, a Lady of a large
Fortune." Here, of course, "the present Lord" is Thomas,
Dicky Ducklegs, the second Baron; and the "fine Seat" can
only refer to the original Elizabethan house. The copy of
Aubrey in the Library at Clandon, which I have seen, was
the property of the Speaker Arthur Onslow, a man who
never missed an opportunity of making a note of any kind
in any sort of book. He has made many notes in Aubrey,
but none on the passage relating to the house,

Leoni's beautiful and austere building, whether it be a
monument of taste or of ostentation, is one of the most
enchanting of English houses, though it has not escaped the
misfortunes of "improvement." It is based upon an oblong

74

7 6 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

which is here set between the second and third floors. In this
feature, perhaps, there was an original weakness, depriving
the house of an impressive entrance to the great hall: at the
same time it preserved the stately simplicity which is a char-
acteristic of the whole building. Moreover, the entrance
was approached by a double flight of balustraded steps,
exquisitely designed and of a most harmonious proportion.
The hand of "improvement" fell drastically upon this front
in 1 876, when the fourth Earl (then a youth of twenty-three)
added to the centre of the front an enormous and ugly -pone
cochlre^ at the same time pushing Leoni's balustraded
approach outside this horrible protrusion.

The south side or " garden front, " one of the narrow ends
of the oblong, is architecturally perfect; one of those happy
associations of solidity with elegance which give the Anglo-
Palladian style its peculiar grace. Tall pilasters emphasise
the slight advance or bay of the central portion, and above
them is a plain entablature having an architrave and frieze.
The long elevation on the eastern side, with its grave but
rhythmic economy of decoration, shows in fullest measure
the warm and enticing quality of the brickwork: in this
particular it may be considered the loveliest aspect of the
house.

Each side of the building has its own architectural
features, though all are subordinated to a general theme. I
am not prepared to say that the ascription of English, French
and Italian styles can be maintained without the risk of
professional repudiation, nor is there agreement among
those who endeavour thus to discriminate.

A beautiful and light severity is preserved along the sky-
line of the house when viewed from below. The true
Palladian architect aims at a straight edge without the
domestic importunities of chimney-stacks or the vulgarity
of superfluous decoration. This has been admirably achieved
at Clandon where a delicate balustrade (few of the original
balusters remaining) runs evenly along the top of the brick-
work. The illusion is that of a flat roof; but there are no
fewer than twenty-three separate low-pitched or "hipped"
roofs three rows of seven each, and two others placed

CLANDON PARK 77

across them at the ends. Some of these roofs are covered
with red tiles which may represent the use of materials from
the older building, A very intricate system of guttering
carries the rain-water from this curious arrangement of
sloped surfaces.

These red roof-tiles naturally raise the question as to
whether any of the bricks from the demolished Elizabethan
house were used in the present building. Certainly the bricks
used in the Palladian house are not entirely uniform, either
in colour or texture, nor is the pointing everywhere the same,
but I am assured that none of them belong to an earlier
period. Apart from the unhappy porch, the only other
indications of modern interference are to be found in the
metal bars of some of the windows: these are certainly not
original, but may date from about 1820.

Beyond any question the most remarkable interior feature
of Clandon Park is the magnificent hall, with its fine stucco
ceiling, and the superbly elaborate marble fireplaces by
Rysbrack. The space enclosed by this hall is a forty-foot cube,
in which it resembles the halls at Moor Park and at Hough-
ton; and here it has imposed very severe restrictions upon
the planning of the rest of the house. None the less, it is
nobly conceived, with a surface-treatment of unsurpassable
dignity in which the highest resources of craftsmanship have
been lavishly employed without running to excess or ex-
travagance. The discipline of taste is well observed in the
Baroque plasterwork of the ceiling, where a design which
might well have got out of hand is beautifully and relevantly
controlled by a sense of harmonious relation. The Rysbrack
fireplaces are certainly among the finest works of this master
the "best sculptor," said Horace Walpole, "that has
appeared in these islands since Le Sueur," and one whose
great skill in the carving of marble placed him above his
rivals and won the patronage of Queen Caroline. Every-
thing, in fact> has been subordinate, in size and deoohtttpti,
to the great hall; superb, lofty and ostentatious,
representing the, pride of aggrandisement.

But the extodkw.rffcctf

of its completion^ja^ is,

7 8 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

until 1814), was grievously marred by the continued exist-
ence of the old stable block which lay athwart, and close to,
the north elevation of the building. The sad incongruity and
obstruction of this complicated mass is well shown in a
picture of Leoni's house, painted not long after it was built,
in the possession of Lord Onslow. A procession of grooms
and race-horses, out for a morning walk, passes between the
new house and the old stables, and a young tree near the
balustrade has to be protected from nibbling animals by
means of a boarded enclosure.

Lady Onslow " the West Indian " died in 1 73 1, as though
the new house, which had exhausted her fortune, had now
exhausted her desire to live. Her husband lived only for
another nine years, dying in 1740 when he was a little over
sixty years of age.

The great house now became the property of the third
Baron Onslow, a young man of twenty-seven. Of his educa-
tion I know only that he was at Eton in 1725.

Richard Onslow, third Baron Onslow, is an equestrian
figure. Impressively solid, though gallantly poised, he rides
a grey horse in his notable portrait by John Wootton (at
Little Clandon); one of the best of Wootton's smaller, more
intimate works. At first, perhaps, the heavy oval face of the
rider seems to indicate little more than a pompous nullity;
an impression which is borne out by a somewhat earlier
conventional portrait. But although he was greatly concerned
with running and rearing horses he cannot be dismissed as a
simple country character. On the contrary, he is one of the
strangest, though not one of the most distinguished, of the
Onslows.

The natural inheritance of provincial office or representa-
tion, a thing taken for granted in those days, returned him
as the Member for Guildfprd in 1 734 (when he came of age),
and after the death of his father he became automatically
Lord Lieutenant of the County and Gustos Rotulorum. He
was also High Steward of Guildford.

Lords Lieutenants were then persons of much importance
and their advice to the Crown on all matters of local ad-
ministration was usually decisive. At the time of the Jacobite

CLANDON PARK 79

rising in 1 745 Onslow had to raise a regiment of militia. He
was nominally in command of this regiment, but it seems to
have been little more than a cadre: at any rate, it was never
on active service. In 1759 he was again required, under
Pitt's unpopular Militia Bill of 1757, to raise a county
regiment.

The men of Surrey habitually disliked service in the
militia, and even showed their dislike in the form of riots
and angry shoutings. At this very time (i 757) the Guildford
mob chased the Speaker Arthur Onslow (in his coach) all

the way back to his house at Ember Court, a distance of
about fifteen miles, nor could he get rid of them "but by
promising no further steps should be taken till the next
session of Parliament" (Horace Walpole), It is thus hardly
surprising that Lord Onslow had some trouble in getting his
men together, or to learn that he resigned the command of
his unwilling regiment to Sir Nicholas Carew. However, he
seems to have been concerned in recruiting for some time,
and a second regiment was placed under the command of
his cousin George (afterwards first Earl of Onslow). His
colours were carried ceremonially at the head of the regi-
ment and were painted on the drums. The Surrey militia
were disembodied in 1762 but were revived in 1779 under
George Onslow (son of the Speaker), and were for many
years one of the curses of the family.

The state of the counties bordering upon London was
then such as to cause anxiety to the administrators, and this
was especially true of Surrey. Robbery with violence, in
spite or the gibbeting of scores of highwaymen, occurred so
frequently that it was accepted as a feature of metropolitan
and suburban life. On Clapham Common, Bagshot Heath,
Kennington Common, Banstead Downs, Ditton Common,
Sutton Common, at Peckham Gap and in the green lane at
Streatham, on Wandsworth Heath, Putney Heath and alo&g
the lonely tracks near Cobham, the gentlemen of the road
were always busy.

In any of these places you might find yourself confronted
suddenly with "a b$atte4>tow r d, black-ey/d, ^tp^4oak*d,
well-set Man, "-^-so described 1% the pap^alier.one of his

go THE ONSLOW FAMILY

terrifying escapades. Or you might be mysteriously beset, as
"several Gentlemen " were "in the road to Kingston/' by a
swiftly moving commando, a band of dodging fellows, be-
wildering in the darknesss, "who appear'd sometimes two,
sometimes three, and once four together." In 1736 a gallant
though unfortunate gentleman, with two pistols and a
blunderbuss, fought a running battle for half an hour
against several footpads : although the sounds of this engage-
ment were heard by many, no one came to his assistance and
he was robbed of money and watch.

One of these Surrey highwaymen was the son of a clergy-
man and had seen active service in the army. Others were
known only by description. "The man had on a close blue
coat, with the cape buttoned up to the chin, and a black
crape over the upper part of his face." Another was "dressed
in a blue surtout coat, had a pigtail wig on, and a narrow
gold-laced hat"; and another was "a middle-aged man, thin
visage and long nose, dress'd in a light-coloured duffil
surtout, black stockings, and no boots ... has his nose broke
much ." In 1742 Piggott and Roof were hanged on Ripley
green for robbery and murder "on the said green. " At
Guildford, a highwayman sentenced to death at the Assizes
obtained a pardon "on condition of transporting himself
for seven years."

Lord Onslow's most formidable undertaking against law-
breakers took place in 1769 when he sent out a force to
capture or disperse "not less than five hundred gypsies and
smugglers" camped in a wood on a hill near Guildford from
whence they raided the field$ and the farms below them.
The force consisted of "a body of constables." That is reas-
onable enough; but one is astonished to hear that these men
had the support of artillery and were accompanied by
"fourteen pieces of cannon mounted upon carriages." Un-
fortunately the account of this expedition (which I have
extracted from the Clandon archives) does not say whether
the fourteen pieces of cannon were called on to open fire.

The more peaceful, ordinary and enjoyable occupations
of Lord Onslow were concerned with horses. He loved
racing and hunting. Every year in Whitsun week, from

CLANDON PARK 81

Tuesday to Friday, there was a great concourse of gentlemen
and their nags on Merrow Downs, where the Guildford
Races were run, and a jolly day finished up with "a great
Cock-Match." All disputes were settled by Lord Onslow
or "whom he should appoint."

These races were strenuous, prolonged and exciting, such
as would exhaust the most powerful horses, the most frantic
and obsessed of riders. His Majesty's Plate was won by the
best performer in three four-mile heats: "any horse carrying
twelve stone, not more than six years old." On the following
days there were races for the Ladies' Plate, the Gentlemen's
Contribution Plate and the Town Plate which was again
for the best in three four-mile heats: "Fillies and Mares
allowed to carry three pound less than Colts and Horses."
Anyone who subscribed not less than one guinea to the
plates was allowed to sell liquor on the Downs. And the
farmers "entreated the Favour of the Company not to ride
or drive over the Corn."

The popularity of Guildford Races gradually declined.
This decline was chiefly due to the increasing attractions of
Epsom and Ascot, and by 1841 the grand-stand was pulled
down and only one race was run, that for the Queen's
Plate (formerly the King's Plate). According to the Victoria
County History the last meeting on Merrow Downs took
place in 1870. William Hillier, the fourth Earl of Onslow
(then a boy), wrote in his diary in that year " saw a lot of
roughs going to the races."

A picture at Clandon Park shows the course on the
Downs with a flimsy grand-stand and white posts and rail-
ings. In the foreground a fox-hunt crosses the scene, with
Lord Onslow in a white overcoat scudding along in the
group of horsemen.

This brief account of the sporting Baron would be in-
complete without a reference to his two famous hdrse^
Victorious and Whynot, celebrated occupants of the stables
in the Park In three years he won eighteen fifty-^>\tod
plates with Ms potable nags ; and Whynot (whose likeness is
preserved in a coloured engraving at Qaodoa)'! l&n* at
Hounslow, Epsom* Chesterfield, Guildford,

S2 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

Leicester, Northampton and Aylesbury. This great horse
died at a respectable age in 1761.

A more private view of Lord Onslow shows him as a man
of strangely complicated and rather forbidding character.
In 1741, the year after he succeeded his father, he married
the second daughter of Sir Edward Elwell, one of the
Members for Guildford. This lady has passed irrecoverably
into the shades, without leaving so much as a miniature, a
lock of hair, a sribbled album, a patch of embroidery to
record her existence. Of her we know nothing at all, apart
from what has been preserved in family tradition, or very
briefly related in the MS. history of the fifth Earl. According
to this tradition Lady Onslow and her husband did not
speak to each other and, so far as was possible, did not look
at each other. Messages were conveyed by "a humble
companion/' and a movable screen on the dinner-table kept
them, when properly adjusted, mutually invisible.

"Set the damned thing higher, you rascal!" the Baron is
alleged to have roared at his footman. "I can still see her
face!"

Whether the legend is exactly true or not, it would seem
to indicate that the marriage was not an exceptionally happy
one. This may have been partly due to Lady Onslow's
failure to bear children. And thus the line of the Barons
came to an end.

In 1749 Lord Onslow, like his father, and with no dis-
cernible reason, was given the degree of an honorary LL.D.
by the University of Cambridge. Equally mysteriously he
was created a Knight of the Bath in 1752, an event recorded
by Horace Walpole: " Prince Edward, the young Prince of
Orange, and the Earls of Lincoln, Winchelsea and Cardigan,
were declared Knights of the Garter: the Scotch Earl of
Dumfries had the Green Riband, and Lord Onslow the
Red/' A mixed company.

The comparative political uselessness of the third Baron
had the effect of giving prominence to George Onslow, the
son of the great Speaker, and the more so when it became
evident that the barony would pass to George after the death
of Richard.

CLANDON PARK S 3

This event was anticipated by George, a most ruthless
political schemer, with pleasurable anxiety. Evidence of this
anxiety, and perhaps also of the general view concerning the
Baron's character, is preserved in the unpublished letters of
John Butler himself an equally ruthless, though ecclesi-
astical, schemer, who wrote in the most unguarded manner
to George Onslow under the (fortunately) mistaken im-
pression that Onslow was a man of honour and that his
letters would therefore be destroyed. Instead of these letters
being burnt, they were carefully bound in two handsome
volumes which are now of the greatest value to the Onslow
historian. I shall have much to say of Butler, and much to
quote from his letters, in later chapters: it is my purpose
now to show what he had to say about the master of Clandon.

Butler, at the time when most of these early letters were
written, lived at Farnham: it was not until some years later
that he received the high preferments that were procured
for him by his patron, George Onslow* Naturally he was
himself concerned in the demise of the third Lord Onslow,
a demise that would bring rank, and consequently increased
influence, to George. In June 1768 he wrote:

"We dined at Clandon last week, and had a more agreeable day
than I expected. His Lordship was full of Conversation and very
polite. He looked thin, and appears to have lost all Appetite. I am
ashamed to own, that notwithstanding his Courtesy to me, I was
flattering myself with hopes of a happier day in the same house not
many years hence."

In Butler's impatience at the inconvenient prolongation
of the Baron's life, George Onslow certainly participated.
In 1771 Butler is even more outspoken, and he refers with
callous indecency to "the apparent recovery of one, who does
great hurt by living and would benefit the world by dying/'
In 1773, when Lord Onslow had returned t from Bath,
impatience and indecency go further still:

"I am . . . hurt to hear, that a certain Patient has dragged the in-
cumbrance of hk ife from Bath, where I was in hopes, fad ivould
have done us the &rar to resign it. He is very te&zfag and ffenreise
with that useless breath of his,'*

8 4 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

In the following year (1774) Butler's exasperation breaks
out in frequent impious ejaculations: "Lord Onslow is alive.
What a strange world we live in!" Then comes another
visit to Bath, and renewed hopes:

"If any good news should come from Bath, you will let me have
the happiness of hearing it. My thoughts are often there, but they
only take Bath on their way to you/'

And still the good news of the Baron's decline, the blessed
intelligence of his death, were deferred. He was little more
than sixty, but there were hopeful signs of decay : a thinness,
a loss of appetite, a dangerous irritability. Surely Providence
would have some regard for the advancement and interest
of worthier men. In October 1775 Mrs. Butler was de-
spatched on a bad-will mission to Clandon. "I shall be
impatient," writes her husband, "for the observations she
may bring with her/*

"Oh that death had visited a greater man than Sir
Francis!" cries Butler in the same year; and then, in 1776,
the Baron, who for so long had been so obstinately dis-
obliging, actually dies.

What raptures for parson, what raptures for patron, what
noble, natural hopes of advance and aggrandisement! My
dear Lord! "How happy I am to address you thus! . . *
Every body here is glad of your exaltation ."

Lord Onslow, the third Baron, was sixty-three when he
died, thus ending the line of direct baronial succession. His
character, whatever it may have been, does not rise to the
surface. We are told that he was both wealthy and generous,
and also that he was "a patron of the arts." This may seem
a little strange, though certainly no stranger than his posses-
sion of an honorary doctorate. He bought, according to the
fifth Earl, "a magnificent Greek statue/' afterwards pre-
sented by George to Lord Pembroke. One should remem-
ber, perhaps ungenerously, that the owning of "antique"
statuary was then extremely fashionable. Possibly he intro-
duced the decorations in the Adam style which are to be
observed in several of the rooms at Clandon. His activities
were never remarkable. He was described by that elegant

CLANDOH PARK 85

scandalmonger, Hervey, as a "Yes-and-No man/' who
spoke on one side and voted on the other.

In Barlow's Complete English Peerage (1775) there is an
extraordinary passage relating to the third Baron Onslow,
who was then still alive:

"This nobleman's good nature and hospitality have had very dis-
agreeable consequences; they induced his heirs to believe that he
would by extravagance greatly prejudice his fortune, and he has
calmly submitted to such regulations as were imposed upon him;
whereby from being the proprietor of a very ample fortune he can
now command but a very scanty pittance."

The meaning of this is obscure, and would seem to imply
that his cousin George Onslow had induced him to agree to
some form of entail or reversion, or to some transference of
capital, which would be to his own advantage.

Of the first three Barons Onslow, the builders and
embellishers of Clandon Park, one may be inclined to
suppose that the second and third obtained an extent of
recognition and a profusion of reward that seem unwar-
ranted by their actual performance. This is combined with
an apparently tenuous and uncertain contact with con-
temporary society, in spite of magnificent entertainment,
the amiable presence of royalty, and a more than adequate
amount of ostentation. One might assume the existence here
of something in the nature of an illusion or paradox; but I
think it important to remember that the earlier Onslows did
not possess those qualities which could have brought them
to the notice of intellectually brilliant people and of the
better-known letter-writers.

However, they are not to be dismissed lightly as nothing
more than county grandees, men of the stables, the chase,
and the more lordly direction of provincial affairs. The mere
marrying of money, though it went a long way, could not
have accounted for their position. Nor would the inheritance
of rank* though vastly more important in those days th^ji it
is now, have explained the paradox. There must faaro J>een
something more solidly commendable in these ineu, some-
thing more evident to their contemporaries itt&n it is to us,

86 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

something which made the name of Onslow prominent, and
for a time pre-eminent, in the county of Surrey.

No doubt there was a fairly intimate relation between the
fortunes of the eighteenth-century Onslows and their ready
acceptance of the Hanoverian dynasty,

The first three Georges, like the first three Barons Onslow,
cannot be described as men of great intellectual powers, to
whom the society of scholars and wits could have been
acceptable. All of them had a bluntness and a simplicity,
with an obstinate belief in their own practical knowledge, a
primitive liking for the ordinary pleasures of life, which
made them prefer the dignified rusticity of the country
gentleman to the subtlety and impudent sarcasm of the pro-
fessional courtier or the talk of men of taste and erudition.

It seems quite certain that the second Baron, Thomas
Onslow, did not feel himself on an equal footing with the
older families of the Whig aristocracy; nor could his wife,
Elizabeth, however worthy and wealthy, have been received
as a friend or familiar by the wives of the ruling noblemen.
In such a state of affairs ostentation becomes almost inevit-
able, and I think the building of Clandon Park was an act of
pure truculence, the assertion of a consuming family pride.
It was also an act of consolidation. The Onslow influence in
Surrey required the crowning prestige of a great house, a
house in the modern taste.

CHAPTER VIII

The Great Speaker

FROM 1714 to 1762 the Whig supremacy in Parliament
was unbroken. Although disquieting arguments and
extremely bitter clashes of opinion took place within the
party, and although personal rivalries or hatreds blazed up
in the most violent of encounters, the structure of the Whig
system as a whole was firm and reliable. In the essential
matter of supporting the Hanoverian dynasty and opposing
the treasonable Jacobite activities of the Tory party the
Whigs were solidly united; not only because of principle,
but also because of immediate personal interest. They had
the support of the land-owning aristocracy (whom, indeed,
they represented in person) as well as of the rising commer-
cial classes, the religious independents, the Broad Church-
men, and those who in later times would have been described
as Liberals.

This dominance of a single party, the Whigs in clover, was
not in all respects a thing to be admired. Men in power come
to regard their power as a personal right; one might almost
say, as a personal habit, a condition of identity. It meant the
retention of social status, the prestige of great estates and of
noble names. As a means of retaining or displaying power,
corruption was practised with horrifying candour aad
accepted as a necessary part of the political system. We
cannot say that such practices have been expelled from tfee
countries of civilised men today, but no party in a&y $$&
country is now prepared to condone those practices ^bfch,
in the eighteenth century, were not -even
offensive, let alone aimmal For this W;e Jiave tio
so much our ir

sing news.
. .At thfe

88 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

his appearance; not a man of rank or fortune, but one of
supremely fine personal endowment.

Arthur Onslow was "the elder son of Foote Onslow, the
honest and unprosperous Turkey merchant of whom I have
already spoken. He was born in the village of Kensington
(not Chelsea, as stated in a standard work of reference) in
1691.

In youth he was melancholy, diffident and without
ambition; serious in mind and of a heavy deliberate be-
haviour. He seems to have been responsible for adopting the
motto Festina Lente (engraved on his book-plates), and it
suited him extremely well. (The three Barons used the
earlier motto: Semfer Pidelis?) Grave and reticent in speech,
he was not incapable of the warmest affections, the most
loyal attachment. In appearance he was dignified without
any vain pomposity, handsome without the airs of a fop.
His belief in the orthodox religion of the Church was the
result of a deep natural conviction, not of mere conformity
and usage,

The family was poor. His father died ("in embarrassed
circumstances," you will remember) when Arthur was nine-
teen, and it became necessary for him to think of earning a
living and to help in the education of his brother (afterwards
Lieutenant-General Onslow). He had been educated at
Winchester and matriculated at Wadham, though he took
no degree. The only profession for which he appeared to be
at all fitted was that of the Law. In this he was encouraged by
the kindly intent of his uncle, Richard, the first Baron
Onslow, at Clandon, where he spent his holidays. But it soon
became apparent that his diffidence, the lack of impulse and
enthusiasm in his manner, precluded him from any hope of
success; and although he was called to the Bar in 1713 he
made no headway.

This failure threw him, as he says, into a state of "great
despondency as to the future course of his life/* His melan-
choly and his lack of confidence became dangerousiy
obsessive, although his conduct was "in general virtuous
and regular. 1 * /

Between Arthur and his widowed mother there existed

THE GREAT SPEAKER S 9

occasionally a state of tension. He was not her favourite child
and they argued, though not importantly, about their
private affairs: in his own words, he was "not entirely
satisfied with her management of them." She was a woman
of "rather too quick a spirit," ready to act without proper
deliberation a form of careless impulse that was especially
hateful to Arthur's well-regulated and orderly mind* But
Arthur was bitterly grieved when she died in 171$, and his
account of her slightly difficult character ends irrelevantly
with the statement "and she had been in her younger years
extremely handsome." Thus, the good looks of Arthur
Onslow (by no means common among the Onslows in
general) may have been inherited from this quick though
undependable woman.

The Clandon holidays had many advantages for Arthur.
Not only did he acquire a well-tempered and salutary know-
ledge of the world from his uncle, but he became known in
the district as a young man of a trustworthy nature and of
good sense.

It did not seem likely that he was to acquire any further
distinction, but in 1715 his uncle, for a while Chancellor of
the Exchequer, offered him a post as private secretary* He
was then twenty-four, earnest and honest, with no other
claim to be remarkable. But a footing in administrative
circles, once gained, offers many choices of direction or
career. In 1716 Arthur left the Treasury for the Post Office.
He found that he was gradually overcoming his diffidence
and was even growing, in his temperate methodical
way, ambitious. Public life was not so difficult after all,
and the knowledge acquired in his Clandon holidays,
added to the confidence he acquired at the Treasury and
the Post Office, gave him a steadily increasing personal
momentum. - - ' "-

Athst^jfo;!.72O, he firmly entered the Onslow procession
as one of ti^.Mjem^rs for Guildford. By this tim$ he had
acquired tli^ipfppcrty- of Levyl's Grove (now Lev$[k| '$
Merrow, < i^rifli^ 9 ? * i 6 ^ ^i^^
cousin, Dlck^^^
time he began,/wifft^

9 o THE ONSLOW FAMILY

always taking a wise and wide view of events, to make his
way in the world. He had become a Justice of the Peace.
Although he still retained his diffidence when speaking in
public, he had the great gift of winning the confidence of
others and of quietly conveying a true impression of his
general worthiness.

This general worthiness, a term which calls for no mitiga-
tion, was not incompatible with dealings in the South Sea
stock while, at the same time, he lamented "the corruption
of mankind" that was evident in those dealings, and was
careful not to show himself any more than was necessary in
the "place of resort " where speculators of every kind
"appeared almost every day to the shame and dishonour of
their rank and Characters." He was merely "trying his
fortune," and one has to assume that he had found a way,
possibly rather casuistical or tortuous, of avoiding the con-
tamination of such a procedure. At any rate he was only
moderately successful. Although he held 9000 of the stock,
he sold the shares to his cousin at Clandon, receiving a bond
in exchange. This, unlike most of Arthur's proceedings } was
remarkably ill-considered. When the stock fell in one dismal
crash, Arthur timidly compounded with Ducklegs for less
than one-third of the total amount; a meanness on the part
of Lord Onslow of Clandon that was doubly reprehensible,
though not untypical of the manner in which wealthy men
commonly treat their poor relations.

But a more important concern than speculation in South
Sea stock absorbed Arthur's attention in 1720. In this year
he married Anne Bridges, the daughter of John Bridges of
Thames Ditton. She was also the niece and co-heiress of
Henry Bridges of Ember or Imber Court, a very handsome
property in the same parish.

It is not certain when Arthur moved from Levyl's Grove
to Ember Court, but this move was one of great importance :
it brought him within two miles of Hampton Court and
provided him with a fine property at no great distance from
London. It also had the advantage of keeping him in touch
with the Duke of Newcastle, the Onslows* political friend,
at Claremont. But for some time, at any rate, when Parlia-

THE GREAT SPEAKER 91

merit was not in session he withdrew gladly to his " little
retirement near Guildford."

Arthur had not yet escaped from the Onslow predicament
of being timid and ambitious at the same time. He was a
man who would have been ruined by rank and its obliga-
tions. As it was, he moved through timely experience,
deservedly acquiring the good will and the confidence
of his fellows, into a position of neutral eminence which
exactly suited him.

As a private member of the House of Commons he was
rather watchful than assertive. From 1720 to 1727 he sat in
the House during the Parliaments of the Stanhope-Sunder-
land ministry and the first ministry of Walpole. He did not
often speak. In 1722, when it was proposed to plunder the
estates of the Roman Catholics, he expressed his abhorrence
of "persecuting any body on account of their opinions in
religion." He was among those who, in 1725, opposed the
annulment of Bolingbroke's attainder. In a finely character-
istic utterance he supported the petition of Richard Hamp-
den in the following year "in consideration of his great-
grandfather, who made a most noble and courageous stand
against arbitrary power . . . and fell the first victim in the
glorious cause of liberty."

He appeared to very considerable advantage also when
Thomas Parker, first Earl of 'Macclesfield, was impeached
in 1726 on a charge of embezzling vast sums of money
which had been paid into the hands of the Masters in
Chancery. In a trial which lasted in the House of Lords for
thirteen days, Arthur Onslow was one of the "managers"
for the Commons. Although Macclesfield (who was then
sbcty) made an eloquent defence, he was found guilty and
was ordered to pay a fine of ^30,000 and to be imprisoned
in the Tower until the money was handed over. Tke King
struck Jbmi off the roll of the Privy Council, though he .said
that he MnBelf would repay the amount of the fia: a
generous isteiitkm thwarted by death. The cash deficiencies
in Chanceay ITCF& sfeted to fee abopl j08a,ooo, anti Macples-
field remairied m-t^'itSb^tsr-ta^Slf OT*ey ''n! raised for
paying his im.'iSto\Jbsl!fa ^tew:sfei4 tore been one

92 THE OtfSLOW FAMILY

of the "managers" in this affair shows how steadily he was
rising in trust and importance.

Onslow described himself as one of "the old Whiggs,"
and he preserved the independence which properly belongs
to such a character. "I kept firm/' he says, "to my original
Whigg Principles, upon conscience, and never deviated
from them to serve any party-cause whatever." He voted
with entire freedom, on the side which he considered to^be
in the right* His mind was liberal and independent, refusing
always to accept the restrictions of party discipline. If there
is something a little ostentatious, even a little smug, in his
profession of these principles, they were certainly those of an
unaffected honesty, and they gave him an honourable
renown in the House of Commons such as few men pos-
sessed in those days of corruption and effrontery.

His reticence in speaking was not due to an excess of
modesty, for that was never among his faults ; it was due to
the fear of not making a good impression, the natural fear
of an ambitious mind. His delight when he found that he
was able to speak effectively is recorded in his memoirs with
naive saisfaction.

As he sat in the House, Onslow began to feel that his
entire future was to be associated with Parliament, its
dignity and its well-ordered proceedings. His respect for the
House merged and expanded in a form of true ^and even
passionate devotion. The very Chamber had, for him, some-
thing between the sanctity of a temple and the exhilarating
intimacy of a club-room. To occupy the central position in
the House, to wear the splendid robes of the Speaker, to sit
in the nobly ornamental Chair, to be the just arbitrator, the
servant and yet the master of the whole assembly that was
presently his ambition and ideal.

In June 1727 George I died in Hanover. A general
election followed in August, and Arthur Onslow was re-
turned in a double capacity as the Member both for Guild-
ford and the county of Surrey with the highest majority ever
recorded. His descendant, the fifth Earl of Onslow, observes
that "plenty of money was at Arthur's disposal and he had
so much support that he began to have to fear for the result/'

THE GREAT SPEAKER 93

It was the common gossip In the county that Arthur Onslow
would be elected Speaker when Parliament assembled. We
are told that Walpole "spoke openly of it and Lady Lech-
mere called him 'the intended Speaker V

Parliament reassembled in January 1728 under the
leadership of Walpole. Onslow decided that he would
represent the county of Surrey. He was now in his thirty-
seventh year, the close friend of Sir Robert Walpole, and a
man universally respected, if not universally popular, in the
House of Commons. His election to the Chair, without a
single dissentient voice, was no surprise to anyone. He was
proposed by the Marquess of Harrington, seconded by Sir
William Strickland. It was not "plenty of money/' it was
the fine renown of Onslow which had brought about the
happy realisation of all that he had hoped for and raised him
to the summit of his personal felicity.

Mr. Speaker Onslow's position and influence,^ though
mainly due to his magnificent integrity, depended in a con-
siderable degree upon his political and royal associates:
that is, at the beginning of his long Speakership, to Sir
Robert Walpole and Queen Caroline.

Walpole, who regarded Onslow with true affection, was
at this time (1728) in his fifty-second year. His character has
been- frequently analysed, though never with entirely con-
vincing results. He was a coarse and rugged man, obstreper-
ously virile, totally unscrupulous in employing for political
purposes every imaginable kind of bribery, completely
cynical, sometimes dishonourable, alternating between a
harsh insistence upon what he believed to be right and a
sudden concession to expediency, earnest in promoting the
good of the realm, and equally earnest in acting for party
advantage or the indulgence of personal spite. His principles
were those of a man who detested war and who believed
that financial stability was the first concern of politics. pCiiese
principles ^vrere the hard and immovable centre of .fef ol-
itical thinkfe^ but his manoeuvres, deviations and : i^^sals
were those of m experienced and ruthless ta^ti<to%i[Jt is
characteristic i>f fafe attfeQes& and unab^lieil ^e^i^tency,
that he first of all made a fortune ouM> Soo&Sdi stock, bv

94 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

selling his .entire holding at the proper moment, well know-
ing that the crash would come, and immediately afterwards
denounced the horrid immorality of the whole concern. It
is equally characteristic that he first opposed r *and then
supported the Schism Act, and abandoned his Excise Bill
in order to mollify public opinion.

In his cool and objective assessment of character Walpole
was unsurpassed. He was not hampered in this by any soft-
ening intrusion of sentiment or the inconvenience of a
romantic bias. That is not to say that he was incapable of
affection: he loved those with whom he could talk upon
terms of cynical agreement, those who concurred in his
opinion of the world at large, those who could be relied on
to express their own affection, without verbosity, in phrases
of mutual understanding. One of the few occasions when he
did actually display a spontaneity and warmth of true
friendly emotion was recorded by Onslow when he met him
at the time of the King's death in 1727.

The opposition to Walpole at this time was led by
Pulteney and Bolingbroke, powerfully supported by Ches-
terfield, the meanest and wittiest of little gossiping fops. He
owed his retention in office to that remarkable woman,
Caroline of Ansbach, the wife of George II; not only the
friend of Walpole but also the friend of Arthur Onslow,
and the godmother of his son.

Caroline was no common Queen. She was a philosopher
who had corresponded with Leibniz, and who set up in her
grotto at Richmond a bust of John Locke. Her views in
theology, though unquestionably theological, were broad
and accommodating. She offered a bishopric to Berkeley,
and protected the Jacobites in Edinburgh. Her fine loyalty
to the most obtrusively disloyal of all husbands was not the
least of her admirable qualities, and her support of Walpole,
whom she saw as the most important of contemporary
statesmen, revealed the soundness of her judgment in
political affairs. In art and literature her discernment was
equally good. She sat on several occasions to the gentle-
manly dapper Rysbrack, and even persuaded her grumbling
Sind ugly King to do the same.

aph : A. C. Cooper Ltd.)

Foote Onslow (1665-1710). From the picture in the possession of the
Earl of Onslow. (Artist unknown.)

THE GREAT SPEAKER 95

Having been sworn a Privy Councillor in July 1728,
Arthur Onslow was appointed Chancellor and Keeper of the
Great Seal to Queen Caroline.

The accounts of the Queen's household and her instruc-
tions to Onslow are preserved among the archives at
Clandon, Annual payments were made to the Queen's
household at the following rates, which I have selected as
representative:

The Queen's Chancellor and Keeper of Our Great Seal, 54.

Ladies of Our Bed Chamber, each 500.

Maids of Honour, each 300.

The Seamstress, ^150.

Twenty-four Watermen, each ^3 3 o.

Clerk of the Stables and Keeper of Carriages, ^150.

Three Equerries, each ^220.

Page of Our Robes, ^30.

Porter to Our Back Stairs, 20.

Master of Our Barges, 30.

Seven Coachmen, 45.

Seven Postillions, 20 10 o

Nineteen Footmen, ^41 i o.

Four Chairmen, ^39 17 6.

Apothecary, 200,

First Physician, ^150.

Bottleman, Linnen Money, a Nag's Livery, etc., 55 10 o.

And here are the instructions as to the Seals, under the
personal signature of Caroline:

"Our Will and Pleasure is, That you cause to be engraved for Our
Service One new Great Seal and One new Privy Seal in Silver, as
also One new Signet in Steel, according to the respective Draughts
hereunto annexed. . . * Given at Windsor the Twenty Sixth Day
of August 1730 in the Fourth year of the Reign of Our Dearest
Lord and Husband."

It is difficult to estimate the annual emoluments of Arthur
himself* He received five pounds a day while the House, was
in session; he had an allowance of ^100 per session* for
stationery^ anetj^iooo at the beginning of each new^arlk-
ment for "eq:i%metit money/' He a$$0 had a.'&0dfor each
bill introduced by a jpfi$te '.member*.

9 6 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

has allowed me to read and make use of his unpublished
thesis on Speaker Onslow, estimates that his average income
from private bills did not exceed 200. This may be so, but
in all discussions about eighteenth-century finance one has
to remember the immense difference between the value of
the pound then and the value of the pound in our own
lamentable days. One should also remember that there was
no Income Tax. According to the fifth Earl of Onslow
(MS. History), Speaker Onslow received about 1232
every session in various fees : at a fixed rate for every enacting
clause, every private bill, and also for bills relating to pro-
vincial administration. He was, moreover, given a service of
plate by each Parliament, worth about ^1000 (possibly this
refers to the "equipment money " already mentioned) and
he had a claim not specified on the Secret Service Fund.
It follows that Arthur Onslow, who, in addition to his
emoluments, had married a wife with a very substantial
dowry, must be looked upon as a man of comfortable
fortune, well able to entertain handsomely and^to enjoy the
modest pleasures of a cultured and sensible existence.

One of his accounts for official stationery has been pre-
served, including a "Sattin Bag with gold & Silk Strings &
Tassels," a "red Turkey Leather Trunk," the Laws of
Scotland and Ireland, a Bible, wafers, bags of sand, and so
forth, with a subsidiary list for "His Honour's Chaplains/'
which does not indicate^ any undue expenditure.

The Speaker's importance in those undemocratic days,
when there was no press gallery and no authorised publica-
tion of debates, is hardly calculable. By his control of
procedure he affected in a decisive way the course of
political history. He could speak freely on all matters con-
cerning the rules of the House, and on any subject whatever
when the House was in Committee. What is more, he acted
as the sustainer of the privileges of the House against any
encroachment, and even against the King.

A man of liberal ideas,, encased in the full armour of
Parliamentary discipline, with an insoluble ^gravity of
demeanour and a stern refusal to be relaxed or intimidated
by wit or dispute, Arthur Onslow was the most effective and

THE GREAT SPEAKER 97

efficient of all Speakers. In his portentous integrity and
adherence to prescribed order he, in his lower sphere, may
be said to have resembled the great Lord Chancellor, Hard-
wicke. It is true that he sometimes invested the trivial details
of procedure with an importance and a solemnity that were
faintly absurd; and I think it is also true that he delighted
inordinately in the mere exercise of authority and the
archaic pageantry of its external show.

In the House, majestically robed and occupying the
central position in his Baroque Chair, he presided over the
assembly as a priest would have presided over the holiest of
rituals, undeterrably exact and of unshaken stateliness.
Clearly the man was made for the Chair, the Chair was made
for the man ; never in the course of history were a seat and a
person more ideally united.

One has to realise how respectably strange and how
strangely though valiantly respectable Onslow appeared in
the eyes of his contemporaries. In his time, votes were
bought, pkces were sold, and loyalties were cast aside upon
the slightest pressure of expediency. Interest and intimida-
tion were the factors which settled election results, and a
rotten borough could change hands over a game of cards.
No politician was concerned with the mass of the people,
except when the people had to be considered as the source
of industrial profit or the defenders of national security.
Indeed, the politician in the more respectable modern sense
did not exist at all. Instead of politicians there were pro-
fessional statesmen, principally concerned with foreign
affairs and the adjustment of internal finance; and very much
concerned with personal advantage. Nor had the Chair been
previously exempt from this contamination. '

The absolute impartiality of Onslow, concerning which,
there can be no question, was a thing new and of tremendous
importance in Parliamentary affairs: it was this which con-
stituted, aa^d rightly, his title to greatness. / ;

He lacfa^:iEje has to allow, the flexibility of a fawqmus
mind; suck a tfahig*s* the invention or ;the .tolarafimaF a
joke was not witJfa iris capacity;: Nor didJie ; ;pl^l^y;iii any
(Uscernible measwf|i&ii^ often

98 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

among the pleasures of the austere. When he prayed, for
example, it seemed very natural and very proper that he
should place himself, and then his friends and his family, a
long way before "the rest of mankind. "

Speaker Onslow was a man who delighted in the scribb-
ling of notes, commentaries, memoranda, little snippets
and oddments of information at every opportunity. His
mental pabula were notes, the very sustenance and joy of his
life depended upon these jottings and records.

They range from the immensely important (unpublished)
commentaries upon the Journals of the House of Commons
which are contained in a vast folio at Clandon Park to hasty
remarks written on the margins of his books. A few of these
will be quoted in the appropriate context; most of the
Parliamentary notes are records of procedure and amend-
ment, or references to modifications in the Standing Orders
of the House, but some are of biographical value.

These manuscript relics show that even the smallest
matters, as well as the most vital, received the scrupulous
attention of the Speaker* No Member was to keep a place in
the House during his absence "by Book, Glove, Paper or
otherwise, till after Prayers, & then only for himself." But
this has to be elaborated : it is resolved "That the Declaration
of the House . . . That no Member is to keep any Place &c
does not extend to a Member who takes a place by and for
himself: If only before Prayers, & leaving a Book, Glove,
Paper & other mark of the same, provided such Member be
at Prayers." I hope this was sufficiently clear. Of rather
more significance, and with an authentic Onslow touch, is
the personal declaration that "all Debates in this House
should be grave and Orderly, as becomes so great an
assembly; and that all interruptions should be punished,"

Possibly it may seem that Arthur Onslow was addicted
over-much to the record and observation of mere trivialities.
This view, I think, is entirely mistaken. He saw in the
procedures of the House a compact and irrefragable whole,
a canon or testament, a thing to be preserved and upheld in
every particular. They constituted a machine, from which
the extraction of the very smallest of parts, or the iiilure to

THE GREAT SPEAKER 99

apply a single drop of oil at the right place at the proper
time, would endanger smooth and efficient running. But it
was more than this. For Onslow had a legalistic mind, a
respect for accumulated wisdom succinctly deposed. He set
before himself the ideal of completeness, the absolute
security of a code so extended and amplified that it could be
applied without hesitation to any emergency at any moment.
If he was the priest of the House (as he appeared to be) then
the Rules of Procedure were his Kblia sacra.

Onslow's record as Speaker of the House is extraordinary.
He held this position, without a break and without a possible
rival, for thirty-three years. He presided over the debates
of the Commons during five ministries, and for the greater
part of a sixth; and this with no diminution, but rather with
an increase, of the trust and affection of the House. No man
can dispute the correctness of Dasent's account of him as
"the great Arthur Onslow . . . unquestionably one of the
most distinguished Speakers the House has ever known."

Until 1752 (when he moved into a large house in Soho
Square) Arthur Onslow lived in very modest quarters in
Leicester Street, a narrow lane which led into Leicester
Fields at the north-west corner. Here he lived while Parlia-
ment was in session. When not in London he spent his time
at Ember Court and occasionally visited Clandon, though his
relations with the second and third Lords Onslow were never
cordial. At the same time, the aggrandisement of the family,
so richly and rosily displayed by "the noble house at Clan-
don," was immensely gratifying to Arthur's faintly snobbish
proclivities. "You are descended," he proudly observed to
his son George, "of a Gentleman's family, equal in its
antiquity to most of the best Families in England."

In 1730 the famous picture of the House of Commons,
with Onslow in the Chair and Sir Robert Walpole standing
by him (with the air of a head boy receiving instruction from
his master), was painted by Thornhill and Hogarth. At the
time when this picture was painted Hogarth the slightly
unacceptable son-in-law of ThoriAill was aboati /thirty-
three, and Tfaorahil! was yiityr-ioBT; ' Mo0lpp^a]b^ /the
greater part of thep ict^&pittt^^ 73m^Ml$ indeed, it

IOO

THE ONSLOW FAMILY

was categorically stated by John Lane, an authority on
eighteenth-century portrait-painting, that Thornhill painted
all the faces. A manuscript note by Speaker Onslow himself
states that " Some of the figures were done by Mr. Hogarth."
He refers to Thornhill as "His Majesty's painter . . . who
drew this picture" ; and a scroll in the picture itself bears the
inscription "Done by Sir James Thornhill then a Member
of theHouse of Commons, 1730." Thiswould seem to imply
that the part played by Hogarth was entirely subsidiary, and
in this with deference to more expert opinions I concur.

The picture contains two Onslow portraits, for the central
figure in the front row of the Members, between Godolphin
and Thornhill himself, is Arthur's brother, the General (at
this time Colonel Onslow, and the Member for Guildford).
Of these three lesser portraits, the Speaker observes that
they are "very like." Sidney Godolphin was the Member
for Helston, and the "father" of the House; and Thornhill
represented Weymouth. The clerk sitting at the table is
Edward Staples; and his assistant, decently shaded, and
now in danger of melting into the blackness of total oblivion,
is Mr. Aiskew.

Arthur's unworthy son, George, was born in 1731. The
Speaker had also a daughter, Anne, of whom I know only
that she died unmarried in 1751, and that she figures, with
her father and mother, in a print showing the notables at
Tunbridge Wells in 1 748 .

Mr. Speaker Onslow was affected, though not dismayed,
by the increasing opposition to Walpole and by the with-
drawal of the Excise Bill in 1733 the result of political
malevolence and of > popular tumult, as well as by the
manoeuvres of what we now describe as "the black market/'
Effigies of Walpole and of "a fat woman," intended by the
City mob to represent Queen Caroline^ were burned in
public, and the danger of rioting on a formidable scale could
not be ruled out. The Queen was no truckler, and would
have had these riots put down by force; but Walpole, wisely
or unwisely, decided upon the withdrawal of the bill. This
reverse, though at first seeming to be a triumph for the
opposition, did not impair the prestige of Walpole: on the

THE GREAT SPEAKER tor

contrary, it strengthened the support of the royal household,
and especially of the King.

In all probability Onslow was more concerned in the same
year (1733) by the proposal to build a new House of Com-
mons on the fashionable lines of Burlingtonian architecture.
Plans were prepared by Burlington himself in consultation
with Onslow; but all that came of this was a report to the
Office of Works by the Speaker, relating merely to "neces-
sary repairs to the passage leading from St. Stephen's Chapel
to the Painted Chamber, the roof and gable end of the Court
of Requests, the roof of the Speaker's private chambers, and
the chambers belonging to the Clerk of the House."

Thus the name of Onslow, through a natural honesty of
heart, a stately demeanour, and a warm devotion to the
English Parliament, acquired indestructible fame. But
Onslow's position cannot be understood without some refer-
ence to the strange political events of which he was the
umpire and observer. These events constituted, perhaps, the
most curious phase of internal dissention ever seen within
an English political party.

CHAPTER IX

Heresy and Schism

A J ART from the close friendship between Arthur and
Sir Robert Walpole, it has to be allowed that the political
friends of the Onslows in the eighteenth century, however
useful and however powerful they may have been, were not
usually men of the highest intellectual order. For example,
there were the two Temples (uncle and nephew) and the two
Pelhams (the Duke of Newcastle and his brother Henry).

Although the activities of the Pelhams and of the younger
Temple belong more properly to a later phase than the one
we are now considering, it will be convenient to speak of
them here* They represent the less dependable and less
effective components of the Whig party: those who had
time to listen to smaller men and to carry on the smaller
kinds of political intrigue.

The elder Temple, Richard, first Viscount Cobham, was
a soldier whose more rugged and ribald aspects were miti-
gated by a liking for poets, gardens and lordly architecture.
He was the friend of Pope and of Congreve, and, like
Arthur Onslow (whom he met there), a member of the Kit-
Cat Club. Described as "a true Whig/' he showed how easy
it was for a true Whig to become something else without
being a Tory. His fortunes resembled those of the Onslows
in bringing him rapidly into favour when George I became
King of England. In the first year of the new reign he was
created Baron Cobham of Cobham in Kent, and in 1 7 1 8 he
became Viscount Cobham. He was appointed Colonel of the
" King's Own Horse" in 1721, and in the following year was
Comptroller of the Accounts in the Army, and Governor of
Jersey for life. Then came a clash with Robert Walpole; he
opposed the Excise Bill and expressed a fretful disagreement
in other matters. As a result, he was dismissed from his

HERESY AND SCHISM 103

regiment and openly joined the Prince of Wales's party in
opposition to the King and Walpole.

Although he was now (in 1733) sixty-four, he was a
principal instrument in forming the Whig opposition known
as "the Boys"; an opposition which included William Pitt.
Becoming, somewhat oddly, a General, and then a Field
Marshal, he continued to oppose Walpole, and shortly
before his death he joined the brothers Pelham.

Richard, Earl Temple, who became the intimate friend
of Arthur Onslow's son, George, was the eldest son of
Richard Grenville by his wife, Hester Temple, the second
daughter of Sir Richard Temple, and sister and co-heiress
of Richard, Viscount Cobham of Stowe (the Field Marshal).
His mother succeeded as Viscountess Cobham on the death
of her brother in 1 749, and her son Richard in 1 752 entered
the House of Lords as Earl Temple, owning the vast estates
of Stowe and Wotton in Buckinghamshire.

Temple was pert, vindictive, arrogant, and a dirty
schemer of almost inconceivable stupidity. He ran about
whispering petty scandals and inciting scurrilous and libel-
lous pamphleteers. There is nothing here to his credit,
except that he was supposed to have encouraged the author
of " Junius." He never attained high office and was mortally
injured, to the great benefit and exultation of all honest men,
when he was thrown out of his pony-carriage at Stowe.
According to the King, he had always been "so disagreeable
a fellow, there was no bearing him" and "in the business
of his office" as First Lord of the Admiralty "he was
totally ignorant."

And what is to be said of Newcastle, the intimate
friend both of Arthur Onslow and his trimming son,
George?

Newcastle himself was a trimmer who had a place in
almost every administration from 1724 to 1766. It cam
hardly be said that he changed his opinions, because it is
doubtful ^HbtetJter lie ever had any. He is the very type and
example of a ia^ who owed everything to mo&^j^A and
influence; and ntitlraig whatever to brains, c< Iw ppv^life,"
says Lecky, "the glaring weakness of his chapter would

xo4 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

have been comparatively unnoticed. . . . He was the most
peevish, restless and jealous of men ... so hurried and un-
dignified in manner, so timid in danger, and so shuffling in
difficulty, that he became the laughing-stock of all about
him." This opinion is largely based upon the assessment of
Horace Walpole, who said that he had "a borrowed import-
ance, a real insignificance " which "gave him the perpetual
air of a solicitor, though he was perpetually solicited; for he
never conferred a favour till it was wrested from him. . . *
He always caressed his enemies, to list them against his
friends; there was no service he would not do for either, till
either was above being served by him. . . . He aimed at
everything; endeavoured nothing ... a man of infinite
intrigue, without security or policy, and a Minister despised
and hated by his master, by all parties and all Ministers,
without being turned out by any." Incessantly twittering
"Est-il permis? est-il permis?" he was nothing more than
a foolish figure in politics until, when the power of Walpole
began to decline, he attached himself tentatively "est-il
permis?" to the opposition. He supported Carteret, one
of Walpole's most intelligent enemies, in 1737, thus bring-
ing upon himself the scornful and virulent denunciation of
Queen Caroline; whose language, in such a case, could bear
comparison with that of Walpole himself. This was one of
the last of her strokes in defence of the great Minister. She
died later in the year.

Such, I fear, were the more notable of the Onslow sup-
porters (always excepting Walpole and the Queen) in the
eighteenth century. From the contamination of such men as
these indeed, from all political and social contamination
the great Speaker was entirely immune: it was otherwise,
and lamentably otherwise, in the case of his son.

The opposition of such men as Newcastle and the elder
Temple would have caused little disturbance, and only
moderate annoyance, to Walpole. In the sullen hatred of
Pulteney, the brilliant assaults of Carteret, and the cold
oozing venom of Chesterfield, he had to face an intelligent
hostility directed at the weakest point in his defence.

These men were of a very different stamp from the

HERESY AND SCHISM 105

Pelhams and the Temples. Pulteney (afterwards Earl of
Bath) was by some years the youngest of the three. He owed
his influence rather to place than to ability; his powers were
those of an obstinate, not a resourceful, man. Both Carteret
and Chesterfield belonged to the older party in the opposi-
tion, founded and inspired by Bolingbroke and known as
"the Patriots," though Chesterfield had not formally joined
this group until 1733. The younger dissentient Whigs,
"the Boys," were not openly in opposition until their alliance
with Frederick, Prince of Wales, that lamentable Fred who
was better dead, in 1736.

Carteret was a man of laughing, impetuous temper who
had for many years disliked the predominance of Walpole.
He took his seat (as Lord Carteret) in the House of Lords
when he came of age in 1711, and at once declared himself
in favour of the Protestant Succession. His knowledge of
German, as well as his Whig principles, made him the
favourite Minister of George I, with whom he frequently
travelled in Hanover. This increased the personal enmity
between himself and Walpole, while his great interest in
German affairs made him unpopular with his countrymen
as a whole.

But Carteret is not to be judged as a mere politician. He
was a gifted and exceedingly versatile character: drunken,
learned, sensual, of robust independence and invincible
hilarity. In a class of men not highly distinguished for
intellectual achievement at any time, he was almost alone in
being able to make apposite quotations from classical Greek,
and his friendship with Dean Swift is evidence of his ability
as a wit and a talker.

Of Chesterfield, that sleek and insinuating dandy, little
need be said here. His portrait by Allan Ramsay and his own
writings amply reveal his character. He is described as<a
Whig, but in politics, as in all other matters, his only, prin-
ciple was to have no principles at all. According to Herveyi
he was "a, dishonesty irresolute, impudent creature^.capable
only of being; a disagreeable enemy/' whik ri (^ofge II
described him, very wittily and acc^ tea-

table scoundrel,, tbftj&fip^^ * and tries

10 6 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

to make women lose their reputations ... as if any body
could believe a woman could like a dwarf-baboon."

From 1733 he was the most bitter of Walpole's enemies,
and more than any other man was directly instrumental in
bringing about his downfall; for Chesterfield possessed the
most formidable of a scoundrel's weapons, a keen and
lacerating wit, unrestrained by any considerations of decency.
Although he was associated with Carteret in the van of the
opposition to Walpole, he was foremost among those who
attacked the successors of Walpole, including Carteret him-
self in whose forced resignation he played a leading part.
His official activities came to an end in 1 748 after a quarrel
with Newcastle.

In this confusion and uncertainty of political strife and of
personal hatreds the position of Arthur Onslow, had it not
been for his insistence upon a cool neutrality, might well
have been difficult. He owed much to the friendship and
influence of Walpole, and one does not wish to believe that
his neutrality could have sterilised his affection and regard
for the Minister. This, I believe, was never the case, for
Speaker Onslow always retained the respect of the House,
and although he was accused of pride and ridiculous pom-
posity, he was never accused of being either a bigot or a
place-hunter or a man disloyal to any friend.

Onslow was undoubtedly at his greatest in those years of
bewildering cross-currents and under-currents, those rapidly
changing scenes of complicated and unpredictable intrigue,
between the failure of the Excise Bill in 1733 and the fall of
Walpole in 1742. It was now, when tie coherence of
Government was threatened with disruption, that his im-
partial watchfulness and his complete assurance in matters
of procedure gave the House a feeling of central stability
and of wise control. He, and he alone, was able to maintain
the dignity and the order of Parliament at a time when these
things might have been seriously impaired. In this respect,
as a stabilising and controlling authority, the influence of
Arthur Onslow upon the course of English Parliamentary
history is one of the utmost importance.

He was a happy man: one whose temperament, capacities

HERESY AND SCHISM 107

and ambition were most harmoniously adjusted. He had
aspired honourably to a most honourable position, which he
occupied with a just and inoffensive pride, and in which he
acquitted himself so admirably that even his critics (and they
were not numerous) could charge him with nothing more
than a few peculiarities of manner.

Yet there was one feature of the English political system
which he greatly deplored the unrestrained and open
practice of bribery and the ensuing corruption both of the
electorate and the elected. In 1740 he wrote to Sir More
Molineux: "God knows there is so much of it [corruption]
about everywhere that I dread the consequences of it with
regard to the religion and morals of the nation, and to tell
you the truth I am quite sick of the world." But this lament,
the natural cry of a scrupulous and religious man, did not
represent the customary mood or seriously impinge upon
the serene and thankful temper of Onslow. The absolutely
complete fulfilment of his ambition gave him the sense of an
integrated and eminently useful life. It was no shallow pride,
but this true realisation of completeness and usefulness
which contributed so much to his external influence and
his inward peace.

Onslow's position and importance have thus to be con-
sidered in relation to the strange difficulties of politics, and
the conflict, not only of policies but of persons.

The difference between parties could often be described
as a difference between families, or even as a difference
between men who disliked each other. Public opinion,
though it might occasionally intimidate or deter, was without
the means of exerting a steady influence upon the administra-
tion ; and although the influence of the military or mercantile
cksses could indeed be felt, that of the people as a whole
did not exist at all in any effective form. The intrigues
of the Court and the impact of internal discord between
members of the royal family were factors of the highest
importance; and although monarchs were niojmipaly con-
stitutional, tiieir personal predilections .rate?, *fawjpea^j
decisive p^rticolarly m the appomtnieiitaf i$itfefcers.

I have already ob^etireci thtft t&e prfftfcg$ JQ the House,

loS THE ONSLOW FAMILY

which forbade the reporting of debates in the public press,
became a political issue of great significance; for the public
were thus denied all authentic knowledge of what their
representatives were actually saying or doing. There were,
it is true, thinly disguised and usually inaccurate accounts,
depending upon memory alone, of Parliamentary proceed-
ings, reported under the transparent fiction of " The Senate
of Lilliput" or some other device; but these were properly
regarded as tendentious, incorrect or misleading.

Speaker Onslow was very much concerned with this
particular question, and his attitude, though it certainly
represented the sense and opinion of the House, was that of
a reactionary.

In April 1738 he himself brought this matter before the
House; a debate followed, and a full report was preserved.
It is interesting to notice that the only Member who took a
broad and enlightened view of the subject was not a Whig,
but a conspicuous and able Tory Sir William Wyndham.
He allowed that the so-called reports which were printed
publicly were inaccurate, but contended that, when accuracy
was assured, "no gentleman . . . ought to be ashamed that
the world should know every word he spoke in the House."
This the public had a right to know, and he would not
oppose the publication of genuine reports.

Onslow took an exactly opposite view: he could not bear
the notion of what seemed to him almost an invasion of
sanctity, an indecent exposure, an attack upon the very
foundations of Parliamentary prestige. The objection was
put with particular force and ingenuous candour by Win-
nington: "You will have every word that is spoken here
misrepresented by fellows who thrust themselves into our
gallery , . . we shall be looked upon as the most contemptible
assembly on the face of the earth." This damaging predic-
tion, however well founded, was expressed in one form or
another by everyone who took part in the debate. And even
accurate reports, verbatim, reports, would undermine aH
public respect for the administration: they would show the
British people how remarkably silly and ill-tempered : their
could be. The dignity of the House, that haHowed

HERESY AND SCHISM 109

illusion, would be lost in a tumult of ridicule and abuse.
Even the imperfect reports that were leaking out already
were to be repressed with the utmost rigour.

For once, Pulteney and Walpole found themselves in
perfect agreement. There was to be no compromise with
Demos. The common man was not to know that Members
of Parliament were very like ordinary people; only, perhaps,
on occasion, pettier, more stupid. It was absolutely neces-
sary, said Pulteney, to stop the detestable practice of publish-
ing garbled versions of debates, and to forbid the publication
of debates in any form whatsoever. Walpole said that he had
read so-called reports in which he was represented as saying
"the very reverse of what he meant."

Mr. Speaker Onslow had the satisfaction of recording the
unanimous resolve that the public printing of debates was
"a notorious breach of the privileges of the House, and that
all offenders should be prosecuted with the utmost severity,"
The battle between the House and the Press continued for
many years before the final victory was won by the re-
porters,

Arthur Onslow was always as much concerned with his
personal dignity as he was with upholding or defending the
dignity of the House; or perhaps it would be more correct
to say that he looked upon himself as the centre and embodi-
ment of Parliamentary prestige, a person sanctified and
inspired by the indwelling spirit of that great institution as
a priest is inspired by, and actually represents, his particular
deity. In his unpublished manuscript notes at Clandon there
is an account of a scene in the House of Lords which
admirably displays his attitude in such matters:

"On March i8th 1739 Both Houses went with a joynt Address to
die King, and I as- Speaker (according to Custom) went even (on
the left hand) with the Lord Chancellor. Upon our entering tfre
room where die King was sat ... Sir Charly [sic] Dalton, 'Gftitte-
man Uslier of the Black Rod, attempted t*> put himself beoMa&dfee,
CbaneeBor & me^ saying He must be tfeere, for it 'wa^'^p^:
I thrusting Mto away wi& soHfc Ifl&%n&tioi!, the D^i*^ftoii 5

ducting us up to the King, put his White Staff upon the Black Rod

no THE ONSLOW FAMILY

for him to retire, wch he did to my left hand. Upon our withdraw-
ing from the King He slightly endeavoured, as I thought, to inter-
pose himself again . . . but I would not suffer it."

Thus the mere impression of a slight endeavour was
enough to ruffle Onslow; and .this little scene by no means
little in the opinion of the Speaker shows how jealously he
guarded and asserted the smallest particulars of ritual.
White Staff, Black Rod, the dressing of the line, right hand,
left hand, the exactly proper position of each person in
the approach to royalty, these were things of the most
solemn consequence; and on such things depended, not
only the defined and unbroken dignity of the House, but
also the dignity of one who could almost be described as
its President.

The appointments of Onslow included in 1737 those of
Recorder of Guildford and High Steward of Kingston. In
1734 he had become Treasurer of the Navy, a post of con-
siderable and remunerative importance; but this he resigned
in 1742, sooner than give countenance to the base assertion
that he held the post only for personal interest and ad-
vantage, and not because of any special fitness. This gesture
was doubtless very noble, but his emoluments from an eight
years* tenure of the office were not insignificant.

The Speaker's brother, Lieutenant-General Richard
Onslow, is a man concerning whom there is surprisingly
little information: the Dictionary of National Biography
ignores him altogether, and contemporary references are
negligible.

Arthur Onslow, when his mother died in 1715 (it will be
remembered that his father, Foote Onslow, had died five
years previously), was very much and very properly con-
cerned with finding a place in the world for his younger
brother; the date of whose birth is unrecorded. Trade, he
thought, was "below his station": not an observation which
came particularly well from the son of a Turkey merchant.
He saw in Richard the qualities of courage and resolution,
and describes him as "of a large and fine make in his person
ai*d of a very handsome and manly countenance/' He there-
ferecliose the army, and bought for his brother a coninussion

HERESY AND SCHISM in

in a marching regiment: what we should now describe as
infantry of the line.

The portrait of Richard in the House of Commons picture
bears out his brother's opinion as to his looks, and there is
another portrait at Clandon Park, painted in the last year of
Richard's life (1760), showing him wearing a cuirass and a
blue uniform and holding a baton in his hand, which is also
that of a handsome confident man with a firm and resolute
presence.

In the unpublished family history written by the fifth
Earl there is an account of an unseemly brawl it cannot be
called a duel between Richard Onslow and James Edward
Oglethorpe in Haslemere,

This affair shows in a very disagreeable way the enmity
which existed between the Onslows and the Oglethorpes: it
will be recalled that a fight of a more decorous nature took
place between Sir Richard Onslow (the " second Speaker ")
and Lewis Oglethorpe in 1 702.

The name of James Edward Oglethorpe is well known to
readers of Boswell. He was a colonist, a soldier and a poli-
tician, and a philanthropist of the highest order, and for
many years the friend of Johnson, whom he survived. From
the age of fourteen he had held a commission in the army,
and in 1743 he was promoted to Brigadier-General, The
Oglethorpes were a Jacobite family, and James Edward
himself had supported the treason of Atterbury. In 1745 he
had to face a court-martial on the charge of having shown a
most unmilitary slowness in his pursuit of the retreating
Scotsmen, Thus, for many reasons, both social and political,
the Onslows had no liking for the Oglethorpes. The brawl
took place in 1722 when Oglethorpe, at the age of twenty-
six, was the Member for Haslemere, General Onslow left
behind Mm a description of this encounter (Clandon MSS.):

"Mr. Ogtethorpe and Mr. Burrel meeting Mr. Sharp and myself
In the Market Place at Hastenere, Mr. Burrd oompbined-of-Mr.
Sharp's going at>o*it the town and offering t*> discharge hfe Mis,
which he said *ias,aa Insult he could not suffer, upoa wMA Mr.
Oglethorpe stefip&I tip *p Mr. S^aip and said * I
JTQU of these practices,* and k

II2 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

and then drew his Sword, as also did Mr. Burrel; upon which I
went between the Oglethorpes [sic] and Mr. Sharp and said to
Mr. Oglethorpe, 'You last night promised we should have no
Disputes, which you now begin by striking Mr. Sharp/

" He answered me 'Sir, if you speak to me, it must be at the point
of the Sword/

"I recovering myself beat down Mr. Oglethorpe's Sword and
secured it with my left hand, closed with him and told him his life
was within my power: He then bid me do my worst.

"I said, *I scorn to take advantage/

"He then endeavoured to take his Sword out of my Hand; and
wounded me; which he perceiving said 'You are wounded in the
Hand/ and upon my opening it he took his Sword away/'

Five years after this affair Richard had attained the rank
of Lieutenant-Colonel and was one of the Members for
Guildford: he continued to represent the borough until his
death. In 1726 he married Rose Bridges, the sister of his
brother's wife; she died in the following year (i7 2 7)> an 4 * n
1730 he married Pooley Walton the niece of Vice-Admiral
Sir George Walton. As both of his wives were heiresses it is
safe to assume that General Onslow was a man of wealth.
After service as Colonel in the 39th and 8th Regiments of
Foot (the Dorsetshire Regiment and the King's Liverpool
Regiment) he became in 1741 Adjutant-General to the
Forces. He was present at the battle of Dettingen, but
although he "distinguished himself" (as all generals do in
every battle) I can give no account of his personal actions.
He remained with the army in Germany until, in 1745, he
resigned the command of the King's Regiment for that of
the First Troop of the Grenadier Guards.

This appears to have been the end of his active service.
In 1752 he was the Governor of Fort William in Scotland,
and was promoted to Lieutenant-General soon afterwards.
It was a long way from Fort William to Guildford, but he
sometimes came south in order to give a little attention to his
Parliamentary concerns. He had a town house in Henrietta
Street, Covent Garden, and another house at East Ad&n.
There is no record, so far as I know, of anything thatjhe Said
or did in the House of Commons. His politics were con-

HERESY AND SCHISM 113

sistently those of a Whig, and he died before his party was
removed from power.

His death would seem to have been that of a well-fed man
of a choleric disposition, for it occurred in the form of
apoplexy when, as Governor of Plymouth Dock, he sat on
the court-martial that was trying Lord Charles Hay.

This fiery but efficient man left behind him, by his second
wife, Pooley, two sons very different in constitution and
record, both of whom will appear in later pages of this his-
tory : George ("Little Cocking George*'), an irascible, clown-
ish military statesman; and one of the most worthy and
distinguished of all the Onslows, Sir Richard the Admiral.

While Arthur Onslow had reason to congratulate himself
that all was well in the family, his brother handsomely
placed in the Service and comfortably seated in the House,
things were going badly for his friend Walpole and the
Walpole Whigs, as we have already seen. For these lament-
able divisions Walpole himself was largely responsible* He
had one of the customary weaknesses of a great man, par-
ticularly of a great man who is growing old: intolerance of
anyone who might threaten the supremacy of his own posi-
tion or diminish, whether by ability or luck, his own
popularity. He had therefore expelled from office many of
the best men of his own party, replacing them by statesmen
of a subservient and inferior type. Advancing age made him
jealous of those who might be his rivals, and his position was
gravely shaken in 1737 by the death of his friend and most
able supporter, Queen Caroline.

The last thoughts of this gallant woman as she lay dying,
in great pain of body and anxiety of mind, were largely
concerned with Walpole and the fate of the country. They
were less concerned with her blubbering and ludicrous
husband (already thinking of new mistresses) and not at aH
concerned with her puppy of a son, j

Queen Caroline, shortly before she died, spoke ak*i*e?witib
Walpole for about a quarter of an hour*
very properly concealed by Walple$ but the fa# qfAttdr

" " "" ..... -

close association, both in

1I4 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

between these two strong characters. They had concerted
much that was of high importance in the government of
England, and their friendship had largely neutralised the
malign and insidious plotting of Leicester House, where the
Prince of Wales encouraged "the Patriots" to oppose the
policies of Walpole and the King. (It will be remembered
that "Ducklegs" Onslow, the second Baron, had enter-
tained the wretched Fred at Clandon.)

But other events, besides the death of the Queen, were
beginning to tell against Walpole.

Captain Jenkins of the Rebecca produced in 1738 a
severed human ear (or what looked like one, or a bit of one)
at the Bar of the House of Commons. It was alleged to have
been his own ear, villainously hacked off by the sword of a
Spanish coastguard lieutenant in 1731. He had preserved
this ear for a considerable time, and he now displayed it,
with a passionate account of the whole episode, and a very
nasty one it was, at a time when the House and the people
were clamouring for a war with Spain. So Captain Jenkins's
ear % brown, crinkled, unseemly scrap of a thing, never
very critically examined, possibly not human was the silly
trifle that started a war, greatly to the joy of "the Boys" and
"the Patriots," and the distress of Walpole, no longer strong
enough to resist the clamours of the mob and the intrigues
of his personal enemies.

Another reason, and one seldom adequately stressed by the
historian, was the desire of the nation as a whole for a change
in leadership, the ordinary political rhythm of a mob's mind
when it is tired of peace and wants the excitement of blood-
shed. In 1739, when the war with Spain began, Walpole
had been in power for eighteen years. He was sixty-three;
an age when statesmen, however able, are scarcely in their
prime. Moreover, he had clung to power with the deplorable
tenacity of an ageing dictator, almost of a tyrant: a sad
example (and not the only one) of what may happen when
Parliaments tolerate a gerontocracy.

Speaker Onslow, who understood the weakness as well as
the greatness of his friend Walpole, has admitted that the
great Minister "went very unwillingly out of his offices and

HERESY AND SCHISM u*

power," and represents him as devising "a popular act to
save himself" a spectacle of which modern history pro-
vides many examples. This act was to be "a message from
the King to the House of Commons declaring his consent
to having any of his family after his own death to be made
by Act of Parliament incapable of inheriting and enjoying
the Crown and possessing the Electoral dominions at the
same time." This proposal he put before Onslow, who
declared rapturously, almost fulsomely, "Sir, it will be as a
message from heaven." Walpole replied that it should be
done, "but," says Onslow, "it was not done, and I have
good reason to believe it would have been opposed and
rejected at this time, because it came from him, and by the
means of those who had always been most clamorous for it"
(Coxe's Walpk, II, 571).

This anecdote reflects in a strange way upon the characters
both of Walpole and of Onslow, It shows Walpole's truck-
ling desire to retain power, even at the cost of a measure
designed for no other purpose; and it also shows the clarity
and the shrewdness, if not the hardness, of Onslow's
judgment.

On more than one occasion the Speaker had to reprimand
"old" Horace Walpole, the brother of Sir Robert. He has
left a note of one of these occasions in his MS. commentaries.
It occurred in the year of Walpole's resignation, 1742
(Clandon MSS.):

"Mr. Horatio Walpole senr and Mr. Will Chetwynd quarelTd in
the House, went out and fought, but were parted and words ^ of
threat pass'd between 'em to renew the quarrel The House in-
form'd of a quarrel betwixt *em & they being both come into the
House, the usual assurances given not to prosecute the matter any
further."

About the same time (1740-42) he made one of his
punctilious notes upon " Receiving great men and strangers
in the House:

"Note, the Judges (or Lord Mayor of London) who fead e&aiirs set
for *em, did not however sit down in the chairs tm were ever
cover'd [i.e., did not ptit &W tos on]/* Whffe* J>f# comes in,

u6 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

the Speaker says " My Lord, your Lordship will be pleased to repose
yourself in that Chair." Then "the Lord sits down in it and puts on
his Hat, & after some time rises from the Chair, pulls off his Hat,
& going to the back of the Chair, leaning thereon, speaks uncover'd
to the House."

Thus, while Ministers went and were replaced by other
Ministers, the Speaker remained in his presidential Chair,
watching over, elaborating and enforcing the thousand and
one rules, orders, procedures, customs and usages which
preserved the decency and the dignity of the House and
conferred upon the Speaker himself the full effulgence, the
perennial and impersonal glory of unassailable dominance*

There is a noble engraving by John Pine (one of Arthur's
friends), showing the House of Commons "in the Session
1 74 1 / 2 [sic] " with Onslow in the Chair, formal and ornate. In
front are the Onslow arms and the motto Festina Lente, and
a stately dedication "This Plate is most humbly dedicated
by his Honour's most obliged and most obedient humble
Servant John Pine Bluemantle." Pine (1690-1756) was a
notable though sometimes humdrum engraver who was the
friend of Hogarth and appears in " Calais Gates " as the fat
priest in the middle of the picture. He engraved, among
other well-known pieces, Rocque's Map of London, and
was Bluemantle Pursuivant-at-Arms at the College of
Heralds* This handsome print is perhaps the best pictorial
record that we have of Arthur Onslow in the fullness of his
glory and in the very place upon which the glory shone and
from which it was derived.

Here he was to watch the melancholy stages of Walpole's
decline. Already, in February 1741, Carteret in the House
of Lords, magnificently eloquent, had moved a resolution
that the King should expel Walpole from "his Presence and
Counsels for ever/* The same motion, moved by Sandys in
the House of Commons, was defeated after a masterly
defence by Walpole himself. But Walpole was now a broken
man and in the following October he was "extremely ill,"

Yet even illness could not defeat the pride, the pugnacity
and obstinate will of this great though sometimes uiidigni-
jBed Minister, He could still fight. On the 2ist of January

HERESY AND SCHISM 117

the end was near. Pulteney called for a Committee to enquire
into the conduct of the war. His motion was defeated by
the narrow margin of 253 to 250, and shortly afterwards the
Government fell in the vote on the Chippenham election;
a disaster equal to a vote of no confidence. Walpole resigned.
Arthur Onslow was now to preside over his second Parlia-
ment, and he was elected unanimously to the Chair in the
short-lived Ministry of Carteret and Wilmington.

CHAPTER X
Twenty Years

DURING the twenty years between 1741 and 1 76i^the
Onslow family group is one of strange diversity. This is
in fact the period of maximum Onslow concentration, when
some half-dozen of the more conspicuous members of the
family appeared simultaneously upon the stage.

At Clandon the third Lord Onslow was proudly strolling
round his estate, or scampering over the downs on one of his
famous nags, or dodging his wife in the Palladian rooms of
their splendid mansion. With equal pride and solemnity he
carried out the duties, the sonorous and rumbling duties of
a Gustos Rotulorum, and tried to learn something about the
training of a reluctant hobbledehoy militia.

The great Speaker, though always maintaining his
prestige at its fullest height, was gradually approaching ill-
health, old age and retirement.

At the very beginning of this notable Onslow phase (in
1741), when the results of the elections clearly indicated tie
steady decline of Walpole's power, the challenge to the
Speaker's position, meanly conceived as, a blow aimed at
Walpole himself, was unacceptable even to the bitterest
opponents of the Minister. Chesterfield himself, in a letter
to Bubb Dodington, spoke well of Onslow, though he gave
him the credit tor nothing more than "a certain decency of
behaviour." And when the House proceeded to the election
of the Speaker, men of all parties joined in the cry of
"Onslow! Onslowl" Nor could anything have exceeded the
calm propriety of Onslow's thanks to the House, "Since
these Gentlemen have elected me to this Eminence," he
said, "I have only now to return them my humblest thanks
for this particular instance of their favour to me, the sense
6f which I hope I shall always retain ."

118

(Photograph : Central Press Photos Ltd.)

The " Bacchus " Fireplace by Rysbrack at Clandon Park.

TWENTY YEARS 119

In the middle of this period, Arthur Onslow showed signs
of increasing affluence and began to enjoy the sober com-
forts and orderly pleasures of a handsome town house.

His brother, the General, had achieved rank if not emi-
nence in his profession. He had made the name of Onslow
known and respected in the Service; and if he has no re-
markable feat of arms to his credit, at least he has the most
uncommon distinction of being a General who avoided the
worst of military blunders.

The two sons of the General were also doing extremely
welL George had risen to the rank of Lieutenant-Colonel in
1759 and in the following year entered Parliament; while
Richard, the sailor, had gone into the Navy at the age of ten,
and after serving with Pocock on the East India Station he
was commissioned Lieutenant of the Sunderland in 1758;
and in 1760 was on board the flagship.

This was a fine family record, but the diversity to which I
have alluded was to be shown, though not until some time
later, in the Speaker's only son, George Onslow.

George, an ugly, dark-haired little man of a sly and
saturnine appearance (even from youth), conducted himself
respectably enough during the lifetime of his father: indeed,
he fitted very well into the honourable, successful and
admired group of the Onslow family. He had been educated
at Westminster and Peterhouse, and had been smuggled
into Parliament through the Newcastle influence as the
Member for Rye in 1754. In the previous year (1753) he
had married, with great advantage to himself, the daughter
of Sir John Shelley. She was also the niece of the Duke of
Newcastle.

What George did afterwards, and how he became,
through a set of curious chances, the first Earl of Onslow,
will form a large part of the ensuing narrative. Here he is
only shown as a figure, not yet very definite, in the Onslow
group of 1 741-61 . .This group, it will be observed, is that of
a family whose f>romlse and achievement (excluding ite cme
titled member,, the , third Lord Oaslow) can scarcely be
equalled by any comparable group of the same period.

The Onslow expansion at this time cannot be understood.

120 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

nor can its developments be appreciated, without some
knowledge of the changing state of England, both social and
political. It is particularly necessary to have this knowledge
in order to appreciate the circumstances, to visualise the
setting and to perceive the motives which, taken together,
help to explain the serpentine, wriggling career of George
Onslow, eventually to become the first Earl. He indeed is
one of the most distinguished members of his family, but his
distinction is of a most unpleasant order.

No doubt the story of George Onslow is extremely amus-
ing, and replete with a rich variety of satirical delights; he
was no worse, and even a little better, than the politicians
and the courtiers of his time (and he was both a politician
and a courtier); it may be said that he was never involved
personally in a scandal of really splendid magnitude; still,
the history of this dark and ugly man, though I trust it may
adorn a tale, certainly points to no moral unless anyone
chooses to consider that honesty is the worst of all policies.
He abjured almost every decent principle, and received the
highest reward.

After the retirement of Walpole and his elevation to the
Peerage as first Earl of Orford, the political situation was
extremely complex, especially in the House of Commons. It
was also extremely paradoxical. Although Walpole had been
removed from the House of Commons, he continued to be
the most influential figure in politics, and the only statesman
who had the trust and respect of the King. Even Carteret,
for many years the favourite, and now, in 1743, the actual
head of the administration under the nominal leadership of
Wilmington, was being discredited by Hs own brilliant
impetuosity and his failure to think seriously of serious
matters.

Wilmington died in July (i 743) and Carteret endeavoured
to have Mm replaced, as first Lord of the Treasury, by
Pulteney, who was now Earl of Bath. He was quietly
thwarted by Walpole, who persuaded the King to give this
high office to Henry Pelham a safe and honest mediocrity,
and thus the ideal choice at a time when brilliance couldonly
promote continuous disruption. , t ;

TWENTY YEARS 121

The "Drunken Administration " of Carteret did indeed
stagger on for a while. But Carteret (now Earl Granville),
though undismayed and always contemptuously unaffected
by opinion, always laughing with unrepentant cycnicism,
never lapsing into seriousness for a moment, knew that his
administration was crumbling under the steady pressure of
the Walpole Whigs the "old Whiggs" of the glorious

Revolution. He did not care. He had been present with the
King at the battle of Dettingen, and remained on the friend-
liest terms with George. As for his political power; well,
that was not a matter of much consequence to him, and he
resigned it with a bantering smile.

In trying to understand the alarming and apparently
capricious intricacy of eighteenth-century politics in Eng-
land one has always to remember the intensely personal
nature of so much that appeared outwardly as the con-
scientious and well-considered activities of Parliament.
These personal affinities and reactions, these quarrels and
alliances, not only between men of different parties but also
between men of the same party, were frequently the ruling
factors in political decision. And the complexity of the
political scene is greatly increased by the fantastic changes
of temper and attitude which made friends of enemies and
enemies of friends, thus introducing the vagaries of personal
emotion where questions of the utmost importance and
urgency ought to have been decided by impartial judgment
alone. The academic historian who persists in believing that
Parliamentary decisions were always the result of pure and
earnestly debated policy, and of simple differences of honest
opinion between one course and another, or one man and
another, is not likely to see his way clearly through the
tangle* the jangle and enervating confusion of eighteenth-
cenMy history.

AH this has to be taken into account when estimating the
causes which led to the resignation of Carteret and the rise
of the PelhaiBS* One cause was emphatically

antagonism be$wfop Carteret ai3i apo^ ao tf eiiy
lations betw^Watp^

relations

reason was the*eid^*,il^^

122 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

in the country. Yet another was the grim hostility between
Walpole and Pulteney, with whom he had quarrelled on
purely personal grounds as far back as 1725. So violent
was this quarrel, this emotional hatred, that Pulteney had
allied himself with Bolingbroke and assisted him in directing
The Craftsman, a political periodical whose one purpose was
the destruction of Walpole and his government. The
alliance between Pulteney and Carteret was therefore
natural; though it should be added that Carteret abandoned
Pulteney after 1744*

For the Onslow family the rise of the Pelhams was a piece
of extraordinary good fortune. Newcastle that vacillating,
timid and ludicrous man had always been the friend of the
Onslows, and his wealth and influence, the immense power
of his family connexions, made him one of the most im-
portant figures in the political scene. The Speaker knew him
extremely well, and it was safe to assume that the Pelham
interest would procure the advancement of his son, George
Onslow; an assumption that was to prove entirely correct.

When Henry Pelham (Newcastle's brother) became the
principal Minister in 1744 he was about forty-seven: New-
castle himself was forty-nine. The new administration was
founded upon a principle of toleration or timidity that was
politically somewhat ambiguous : it included Whigs of every
colour and size, and a few Tories as well. But this 'Broad-
Bottom Administration" failed to include one of the most
ambitious and unforgiving of all the politicians of his age
William Pitt, then thirty-six. Here again, a purely personal
dislike was operative at the highest level in the field of
politics; for Pitt and Newcastle detested each other. There
were, besides, other elements of internal discord, and the
Pelhams themselves were in strong and bitter disagree-
ment with each other at the time of the Peace of Aix-la-
Chapelle.

Arthur Onslow was never drawn into the jostle and reper-
cussion of any personal feud. His inviolable honour and
resolute independence preserved him from all such dangers.
When Pelham came into power Onslow told him with brave
ionesty that he acted always in obedience to his conscience;

TWENTY YEARS 123

which, he said, "was not always pleasing to Ministers/* To
this, Pelham, with equal honour and honesty, replied that,
although he could not be supposed to like a Speaker who
opposed him systematically, neither could he be supposed to
like a Speaker who was "over-complaisant/'

Pelham was not a vigorous war-minister; he saw very
clearly that England, while concerned with defeating any
European combination that was hostile to her interest and
security, or a menace to her trade, could only prosper in
those conditions of peace and amity that were favourable to
the expansion of commerce. Although the Pretender was
encouraged by our defeat at Fontenoy, the Jacobite rising of
1 745 was quickly and easily suppressed (while Finchley was
preparing to defend London), and the Peace of Aix-la-
Chapelle, though it had little more value than an armistice,
was generally looked upon as a triumph for the adminis-
tration.

The Pelham Ministry, however timid its leaders, was
thoroughly dependable in matters of internal finance. More-
over, in spite of the King's unsavoury and unsuccessful
intrigues with the Pelhams' enemies, Bath and Granville, the
administration had the support of Parliament and the con-
fidence of the people. It was conciliatory and accommodating
to a surprising degree; and one of the most astounding of all
imaginable accommodations, personal as well as political,
was the inclusion of Granville himself (Carteret) in 1751,
"broken by excessive drinking," as President of the Council
"1 am," he said with a sly grimace, "the King's President."

In a long and somewhat incoherent letter from Lord Hyde
to Speaker Onslow, written in 1750 and lamenting "this
Age of Variations" and "this Age of Corruption," Hyde
states his intention of giving his countenance to the Pelham
Ministry- He says:

"Government is my Principle I wish always to uphold Govern-
ment; tat I have not yet seen an Administration with which I
could personally take part. I thought Sr Robert Walpole a great
Minister & a great Man in many Respects . . . & Ao* 1 Knew his
Faults to this Cctofif I respect Ms to accounts

& love his Memory upw A^s^4t nekton tfee Greets, the

I24 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

means nor the Language of Sr Robert Walpole were respectable
enough to engage me then to connect with Him. . . . the Object of
the Pelham Administration I take to be right/' (Clandon MSS.)

Such were the Parliamentary complexities, temporarily
reduced by the soothing hand of mediocrity, when the
Speaker's young son, George Onslow, took his place in the
House of Commons through the Newcastle interest as
the Member for Rye in 1754, at the age of twenty-three.
In the same year Henry Pelham died and his brother became
the head of the administration.

The Speaker himself, in this year (1754)* was in ill-health
and was actually contemplating retirement.

OnsWs health, as a factor in his Parliamentary life, has
been discussed very ably by Mr. D. H. Jones in the un-
published thesis to which I have already referred. But the
nature of this ill-health or disability is not clear. It is known
that he was frequently at Bath or Tunbridge Wells : he was
at Tunbridge in 1748, when he met Gibber, Garrick,
Richardson, Johnson, Pitt and Lyttelton, and where he was
accompanied by his wife and daughter. In the previous year
( 1 747) there had been a week's adjournment of the House on
account of his illness.

It is possible that the Speaker's health may have been
among the causes of the irascibility, the red-faced and angry
blustering of an authoritarian, which occasionally broke the
dignity and impressiveness of his behaviour. His speeches
to those who sinned against the rules of the House were apt
to be "long and severe/* and when, in 17513 Mr. Crowle
was reprimanded by Onslow for having insulted the orders
of Parliament, and was ordered to apologise while kneeling
on the floor, there was not a little amusement when Crowle ?
having done as he was directed, rose and ostentatiously
wiped his knees, observing tartly that "it was the dirtiest
house he had ever been in."

Very shortly after this episode there was one of an even
more disturbing nature.

Here the culprit was the Honourable Alexander Muiray,
the fourth son of the fourth Baron Elibank, He was accused
of seditious behaviour, and he entered the House jauntily

TWENTY YEARS 125

"with an air of confidence," we are told by Horace Walpole,
"composed of something between a martyr and a coxcomb."

This was precisely the kind of behaviour that would have
infuriated Onslow, and infuriated he was.

"Your obeisances, Sir!" he thundered, "remember your
obeisances! You must kneel!"

"Sir, I beg to be excused," replied Mr. Murray, the
martyr-coxcomb. "I never kneel but to God."

Such a reply could only be interpreted by Onslow as the
purest insolence, nearly amounting to blasphemy, for God
was undoubtedly concerned in the dignity of the Chair.

The Speaker at once ordered the Sergeant-at-Arms to
remove Mr. Murray, and this produced a series of lengthy
and loud arguments. Pelham, taking a hand in the Speaker's
own game, quoted precedents; and while Henry Fox was in
favour of the Tower, Sir William Yonge recommended a
less honourable confinement in Newgate. So intemperate
was Admiral Vernon that Onslow several times called him
to order. This went on until the small hours of the morning,
when Murray was taken in a hackney coach to Newgate
under guard. "He sang ballads all the way," says Walpole,
"but on entering the gaol burst into tears, kissed the
Sergeant, said he was very ill, and must have a physician."

This ridiculous though disquieting affair dragged on for
nearly five months. Beyond a doubt the high reputation of
Onslow was a little shaken, and he felt himself obliged to
vindicate what he had done by "warm and solemn speeches."
What made the situation even more uncomfortable was the
serious illness of Murray in his Newgate cell; but even the
"gaol fever" had no effect upon his idiotic defiance.

The manoeuvres in the Murray affair need not be related
here? "Murray was eventually released, and his return
home was the occasion of a brief though noisy personal
"triumph/* It might perhaps be said that Murra:y and
Onslow Md been equally stupid; for the Speaker, ^%h
undoubtedly right in his adherence to rule, might at least
have conducted the affair, and punished the offender; with-
out such' a tertifeiHTOhg^^
Murray could-i^l 1 b^lrfe^^^er^^^Mfef period of

iz6 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

nominal imprisonment; which would have satisfied auth-
ority without subjecting the man to the risk of death.

There were other occasions, particularly when Onslow's
health was deteriorating, when the Speaker allowed his
"warmth" to get the better of his dignity and his judgment;
but on no occasion could it have been said that his rulings,
in themselves, were incorrect. The great MS. folio in the
library at Clandon shows with what enthusiastic and un-
relenting precision he noted and annotated hundreds upon
hundreds of all imaginable procedures, resolutions and
accounts. As a mason lays brick upon brick, so he with line
upon line, with note upon note, built for himself an im-
pregnable, unalterable edifice of precedent and rule.

Is there something a little cramped, a little obsessive, in
such a character? Is there a touch of madness in the method,
or at least a mental aridity in this dependance upon regula-
tion ? Is there a lack of courage arid resource in the man who
thus refers, whenever he is confronted by perplexity or
dilemma, to the written word, the automatic decision ? On
page after page of the great volume, in contrast with the
elegant and leisurely penmanship of the clerks, the rapid and
agitated hand of Onslow puts down his comments and
records:

"Address to prosecute at Law such persons as counterfeit, or
otherwise fraudulently make use of the Handwriting of Members
of this House

"The House sitting till the next morning three o' the dock
adjourned rill eleven o'CIock the same morning. , . .

"That's a mistake. He was not admitted to Bail

"Consider the word transit. . . .

"Upon the Speaker's declaring for the Noes, a Member said the
Yeas had it. The Speaker sd the Yeas must go forth, and one person
only went out, and none left for the Tellers on that side. The
Speaker, after the door had been shut, called to have it open'd, & for
the Member, who went out, to come in, and then declared again
that the Noes had it, without any Telling. . . .**

The notes on the proper use of the Mace run to nearly
three of the folio pages, and there is no conceivable circum-
stance relating to the business of the House sail the be-

TWENTY YEARS 127

haviour of its Members which is not elucidated, or confused,
by passage after passage in Arthur's wriggling and rambling
script.

Yet there were times when the ruler was overruled, times
when the grand system, Arthur's own scriptural system,
failed, and the sense of the House overcame the wishes and
arguments of the Speaker. This occurred in 1757 when
Onslow proposed that Byng should be expelled from the
House, in order that no Member of Parliament should suffer
an ignominious death; and the House rejected his proposal.
And here the " warmth " of Onslow was exceeded by the hot
intolerance of Pitt, who was called to order no fewer than
three times. (This was another instance of personal dislike,
for Pitt, who had been atrociously rude to Newcastle, had no
patience with "old Whiggs" like Arthur,) The same thing
occurred in 1759, and again in connexion with a court-
martial: the trial of Lord George Sackville for cowardice at
the battle of Minden. The Speaker objected that, as Sack-
ville was a Member of Parliament and no longer an officer,
he could not be examined before a military tribunal; and
again Onslow was overruled.

Of Mr. Onslow's more social aspects during his tenure of
the Chair there is a lack of detailed information. In 1752,
when he moved from Leicester Street to Falconbergh House,
a town mansion in Soho Square^ he certainly became an
entertainer: he gave dinners, he instituted levees. And
perhaps it was at this time that the silversmiths of London
produced the "Onslow tea-spoon " a very pretty spoon
with the top of its handle curved round in a scroll or
hook.

That the Speaker lived in moderate splendour is shown
by Johnson's anecdote of Richardson, a visitor at Soho
Square* When he went to Falconbergh House "his desii of
distinctim was so great that he used to give large vais to
the Speaker Otoslow's servants, that they might treat ym
with respect/*

As to the Itoi^se, the finest iii lite Square aixLone 6f the
finest in Lcmd% feiailjt it tfe
it was occupied afer^ Duke

i 2 g THE ONSLOW FAMILY

of Argyll, and in modern times by the celebrated pickle-
making firm of Crosse and BlackwelL

With the accession of George III in 1760 it was evident
that a new political orientation was to be expected, unfavour-
able to the strange Pitt-Newcastle combination that was then
in power. One can hardly avoid the supposition that
Speaker Onslow's decision to retire, though mainly due to
age and ill-health, was not unaffected by the ominous chill of
impending events.

He was now seventy. The thought of quitting the Chair
in the House of Commons, which he had occupied so
happily, so momentously and so honourably for thirty-three
years, was extremely painful to him; but he was a man of
cultured and literary tastes and there was no reason for him
to suppose that he would not be happy in retirement.

His wife was still alive, his son (now married) lived with
him in Falconbergh House and had the appearance un-
fortunately misleading of being an earnest and upright
young politician.

Nothing could have been more characteristic of Arthur
Onslow than one of his last actions as the Speaker: it was a
triumphant, a culminating assertion of procedure, the most
superb of all his insistencies; for one can hardly go further
in such matters than the holding-up of the Sovereign him-
self and this is what he did. Could there have been a more
resounding finale, a finer moment for the dropping of the
curtain?

It was January 1761, and the King was in the House of
Lords, waiting to give his assent to the Money Bill. The King
waited and the Lords waited; they could do nothing else
until the Speaker appeared at the Bar. And still they waited;
and still there was no Speaker. There were questions,
agitations, whisperings, titters, growlings: what had become
of old Arthur? But old Arthur was behaving, as usual, with
exemplary correctness* He could not leave the House of
Commons; indeed, he could not regard the House and the
Speaker as being officially in existence at all. Fewer than
forty Members were present, and Arthur could noty would
budge until he had the necessary quorum.

TWENTY YEARS 1*9

Shortly afterwards, on the i8th of March 1761, he bade
farewell to the House,

This was a deeply moving occasion. Even those who had
thought Onslow a pompous, praise-loving autocrat, owing
his prestige entirely to a dry, harsh and imperious assertion
of precedent and rule, a man whose austerity and integrity"
were plainly professional, concealing behind an immense
thickness of parade and ostentation a shallow, ungenerous
mind even those who thus misjudged the man felt their
hearts warmed into sympathy*

That elegant fribble, the neatly malevolent Horace
Walpole, was present in the House and recorded his own
impressions of the scene. And even he, so careful to avoid
the sturdy and honest emotions of ordinary folk, was not
unmoved.

First of all he teUs us how Sir John Philipps moved the
address of thanks "but so wretchedly, that the sensibility
the House showed on the occasion flowed only from their
hearts ."

Then "others threw in their word of panegyric/' and a
statue of the Speaker, to be set up in some public place, was
proposed by "Mr. More of Shrewsbury/* He was followed
by the stupidly jocular Velters Cornwall, "teazing the
Speaker under pretence of complimenting him; while the
good old man sat overpowered with gratitude, and weeping
over the testimonies borne to his virtue. He rose at last, and
closed his public life in the most becoming manner .**

The Speaker was moved by the deepest emotions of
gratitude and regret. He was occupying for the last time a
position which> for him, had represented the fullness and
the happiness of his life. There had been, necessarily, many
scenes in which he deliberately acted a part, and sometimes
a part that was priggish and overbearing; but he was not
acting now 8 , when, with a dignity that was a little tremulous,
a voice by ncTzneaos unfaltering, he replied to the expressions
of kindness, &pj>redatioB and regret which came mmerarjr
part of the House. ' , * * * ; ; i( ''' - ' ' '

"I was ne^'Qftlitf^ he

said, "to

I3 o THE ONSLOW FAMILY

Indeed it is almost too much for me, I can stand against

misfortunes and distress But I am not able to stand this

overflow of good will and honour to me. It overpowers me;
and had I all the strength of language, I could never express
the full sentiments of my heart upon this occasion, of thanks
and gratitude/'

And then came the most touching words of all: "I owe
everything to this House ."

He finished with a steadier, more considered manner:
"And now, Sirs, I am to take my last leave of you. It is, I
confess, with regret, because the being within these walls
has ever been the chief pleasure of my life. But my advanced
age and infirmities, and some other reasons, call for retire-
ment and obscurity."

What did he mean by "other reasons " ? Free speculation
is inadmissible in a sober history, but there would appear to
be some justification for supposing that his "other reasons "
were not entirely unpolitical. He knew that the personal
disagreement between Pitt and Newcastle, and the encroach-
ing absolutism of a young and exceedingly foolish King,
would quickly destroy the Whig administration and would
substitute a form of Government opposed in all its funda-
mental principles to his own. Thus, although age and
infirmity were the principal factors in his retirement, it is
not unlikely that the "other reasons " made the retirement
less deplorable, more endurable, than it would have been
without them.

The House presented the King with an address asking
for "some signal mark of his royal favour" to be conferred
upon Mr. Onslow. The royal favour could hardly be ex-
tended with overflowing benevolence to the friend of New-
castle and the "old Whiggs," but the King replied, or was
advised to. reply, "that he had the justest sense of the long
services and great merit of Mr. Onslow . . . and had already
taken the same into consideration j and that he would do
therein what should appear most proper, agreeable to the
desire of his faithful Commons."

It would clearly not have been "most proper/' in the King's
view, to confer a title upon Onslow. What he did was at least

TWENTY YEARS

generous. He granted him a pension of ^3000 a year with
reversion to his son, which, according to Colchester (Charles
Abbot) when he put in his own claim to a pension, was
"more than equal to the full emoluments or his office/*
(Colchester was Speaker in 1802, 1806, 1807 and 1812.)

In May the Speaker was presented with the Freedom of
the City of London, the first of the Speakers of the House of
Commons to receive this honour. He refused the customary
gold box. In the same year (1761) he was admitted to the
Company of Grocers.

The England of the twenty years which I have tried to
review in this chapter was changing socially as well as
politically. The observable phases in social evolution were
three: the increasing brutalisation of the lower classes, the
rise of the money-makers or Nabobs, and the final stand of
the aristocracy as a ruling caste. All three of these phases or
processes were greatly emphasised in the years which
followed, but they were already marked. In 1751 a com-
mittee was appointed "to consider on amending the laws
enacted against the vices of the lower people, which were
increased to a degree of robbery and murder beyond
example/' The amusements of these people were represented
by cock-fighting and bull-baiting "a mad bull to be
dressed up with fireworks and turned loose ... a dog to be
dressed up with fireworks over him ... a cat to be tied to
the bull's tail ."

But if the sports of the people were almost unimaginably
savage, the diversions of the aristocracy were not less
immoral. Luxury was now passing from the phase of eleg-
ance into that of coarse ostentation and lewd indulgence.
Art had become the mere accessory of fashionable life, and a
taste for the Chinese and the Gothic replaced the earlier
delight in classical purity; while the dark surge of a liking
for horrors began to wash up in its bloody or muddy waters
the raw materials of the later romanticism.

The craze fbr lotteries and every sort of privat^ gambling,
the passion for ma*p^acte% tfoffipfttfit felgffity -of the
married woman, all these Indicated a gen*al f ^6dteening of

X3a THE ONSLOW FAMILY

the social structure. Effeminacy prevailed, while sodomy
walked the streets and openly "took the bread from much
more honest whores." Nor was the chorus of Sodom in-
audible among those who praised or led the literary fashions.

Apathy in the Church was matched by lethargy at the
Universities especially at Oxford, persistently Jacobite.
Learning was at the lowest of levels; and the discipline of
real study was unknown, except to a few eccentrics.

Hardly anything was done by administration to improve
the condition of the masses or seriously to check the manifold
evils of gin-drinking; for Jekyll's endeavour to restrain this
by the imposition of duties had the effect of bringing into
existence what we now call a "black market." It is true that
Hardwicke's Marriage Act (1753) did put a stop to the
"Fleet marriages" which had become so flagrant a scandal;
and in the same year the Pelhams organised a new police
force of picked men under the orders of the Bow Street
magistrates. But the only influence which, in^ spite of the
savage opposition of the country squires and their murderous
mobs, gradually improved and enlightened the state of the
"lower people" was the Methodism, of John Wesley.

One may tentatively put forward on the brighter side of
what was on the whole a very dark period of English social
history, a cult of cricket and of well-ordered gardens, the
patronage of talent by ministerial help, and a number of
improvements in agriculture greatly increased at a later
period by the interest of the King and the practical work of
Townshend, Coke of Holkham, Bedford and Rockingham.
There was also a general advance in literacy, shown by the
number of new magazines and the appearance of literary
reviews and also by the conversational importance of being
able to talk about books. None the less, people of the haut
monde were coarse and loose, both in sentiment and in
behaviour; and it is perhaps the solitary merit of George III
that his own mode of life and the dull propriety of his
immediate circle were of considerable effect in slowly im-
proving the manners and morals of the well-to-do, thus
helping to cure the disease which Lecky described as. "tfae
Defect of virtue."

TWENTY YEARS 133

Arthur Onslow's promising young son, George, was there-
fore starting on his career in a period of transition; a period
marked politically by the disorganisation of the Whigs,
partly because of the shuffling incompetence of Newcastle,
partly because of the suspiciously theatrical declamations of
Pitt, who could impose an awed silence upon the House by
the mere iteration of the word "Sugar." Politically the posi-
tion of an honest Whig was now extremely difficult, and that
of a dishonest Whig (like George Onslow) almost equally so.
But the unedifying though amusing history of George
Onslow will be unrolled in later chapters.

CHAPTER XI

The King's Men

f^EORGE ONSLOW had not followed the family
vJexample of marrying an heiress. He had married a lady;
again a deviation from the practice of many prosperous
Onslows. His wife, whom he married at the age of twenty-
three, as I have already recorded, was the daughter of Sir
John Shelley of Michelgrove Henrietta, whom some of her
contemporaries refer to as "Harriot." That he was a relat-
ively poor man during the Speaker's lifetime is shown by his
mention of his father's "munificence" in 1763, when George
was deprived of sundry profitable offices. In Henrietta he
had a wife of great charm, literary tastes and a witty style in
conversation. A portrait of her at Clandon shows her as a
young woman of pale though voluptuous beauty, dressed in
the fashionable disarray of the times. When the Speaker
retired in 1761 and moved from Soho Square to Great
Russell Street (to be near the British Museum in which he
was actively interested) George and his wife secured a house
in Curzon Street; in a quarter of the town that was then only
moderately respectable, though steadily improving. On the
site of Curzon Street the May Fair was held until 1756 : it
lasted for six weeks and entirely demoralised the district
as also did the crowd who passed on the way to see the
hanging at Tyburn.

George and his wife had two sons: Thomas Onslow, born
in 1754; and Edward Onslow, born in 1758. Two other
sons, and a daughter, died young.

Placed in the Parliament of 1 754 by Newcastle, George
Onslow began his political existence as a straightforward
Whig in the Onslow tradition that is, a Revolution Whig
of the older school. He sat under his father in this and the
succeeding Parliaments till 1 76 1 ; and at the general elec-

THE KING'S MEN 135

tion of that year (after the retirement of the Speaker) he was
returned for the county of Surrey.

Now, the Impending decay and ruin of the Whigs, dis-
cernible to everybody in 1761, placed young Onslow in a
singularly awkward position. Although he was not in any
way hampered by the inconveniences of honesty, he lacked
the courage and the countenance which would have been
required at that time for an entire reversal of direction. He
had also some respect for his father's principles. His tem-
porary advantage lay in the fact that he had been incon-
spicuous, for it can hardly be supposed that the youthful
colonel of a regiment of Surrey militia, and the silent
Member for an unimportant pocket borough, was a person
of much consequence. His weakness, on the other hand, was
always revealed in the defects of his political sense, and in a
timid man's desire for immediate safety rather than for
ultimate gain.

Had he taken into account the rhythm and rebound of
Parliamentary opinion and of popular moods, he would have
seen the more solid advantage, even of a simulated loyalty to
his own side and his own adopted principles. Here he failed.
And here began, though at first without attracting very much
attention, the devious manoeuvres of a third-rate amateur
political schemer. It would be less true to say that he made a
decision he avoided the making of decisions than to say
that he began to adopt a course, the course of timorous
vigilance, to develop, after the death of both Newcastle and
his father in 1768, into more flagrant opportunism and
occasional stridency.

Shortly after the move to Curzon Street, Onslow was
chosen a Knight of the Shire for Surrey and was given the
post of Surveyor of the King's Gardens and Waters, which
he refers to as "a very genteel office." He also received from
his father an allowance of about i 600 a year. His domestic
situation was thus extremely comfortable. But he had
ambitions. ^

Clandon w%& ip his eye, and, the secession to the barony.
Moreover Ms c^it^,|<^p2^e t|if Colome^ had bourne one
of the Members fm^l^^^^^^r^^ Qfljrfow family

i 3 6 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

was in a good entrenched position from which to make, at
the proper time, a political advance; but when, and where,
and how? These were George's problems, and those of many
other men at this time. If those problems are to be duly
appreciated we must know (or else recall) the entirely new
political situation, the appalling situation, brought about by
the accession of George III, a flurried and wrong-headed
youth of twenty-two already showing the signs of psycho-
genie disorder.

George III, although he declared that he "gloried in the
name of Briton," did not consider that the British reputation
was in any way lowered by a system of political bribery
which far exceeded anything put into practice by Walpole
and the Whigs. His theory of Government was the absolute
control of the State by the King's party under the personal
direction of the King himself. In his own view he could
neither think nor do anything that was wrong, for he
believed himself to be inspired and supported by the Pro-
testant Providence in its most assured form. He was a man
of small intellect and of mean character, though formidable
on account of his obstinacy and a gabbling spite that 'was
never modified by considerations of decency, dignity and
honour. To say this is not to say that he was always con-
sciously deceitful. On the contrary, he was persuaded that
his actions and ideas were founded upon the most authentic
and evident of religious principles, the powerful instigation
of Britannia's private though ubiquitous God ; and he led the
country into the greatest as well as the most humiliating
of all her political disasters in the genuine belief that he
acted for the good of his people and the righteous dignity of
his throne. It would be the gravest of injustices and in-
accuracies to describe him as a wicked or selfish man: he
was, quite simply, a calamitous blockhead. "A worse King,"
said Byron, " never left a realm undone."

This unhappy King was misdirected from his early youth*
The death of his foolish father, "poor Fred," when George
was thirteen, might have been a blessing, had it not been for
his equally foolish mother, who chose for her son's preoeptdr
a man whose chief qualifications for this important pdst were

THE KING'S MEN 137

a fine leg and a theatrical air John Stuart, third Earl of
Bute, This man secured the warmest affections of the
widowed princess and the almost hysterical admiration of
her son.

Before long Bute was everywhere: he was at Kew, pre-
tending to improve the gardens; at Carlton House, at
Leicester House, commanding and yet softly and insidiously
respectful; a sort of domesticated reptile, potentially
venomous.

Such influences, acting upon a mind and a constitution that
were never robust, could only produce the most lamentable
results. And so, when George came to the throne in 1 760,
urged by his mother and his "dearest friend" to "be a
King," he began at once to build up his own particular sort
of dictatorship.

The times were in his favour. As Lord John Russell
pointed out, it was politically a period of small parties
"divided from each other by personal predilections/' When
Pitt resigned in October 1761, forced out of office by the
intolerable machinations of Bute, the whole of the^constitu-
tional edifice was clearly seen to be in danger. This danger
could of course be attributed to the dissensions of the Whigs,
and that was partly true; but the real menace lay in the
deliberate subversion of every one of the English political
ideals. The popular voice, though loud and ribald, was at
first of no effect; and it is well to remember that, with a
population of about eight millions, only some 150,000
Englishmen possessed votes and of those votes, by far the
greater number were purchasable.

Bute became the chief Minister in May 1762. By April
1763 he had become so generally detested that he was
obliged to resign. The plans of the King and his men were
temporarily checked. Even so, while seeming to exploit the
lack of coherence among the Whigs, King George madc^the
worst of all possible choices by placing in power (after Pitt's
refusal toforma ministry) theparty of Grenville^nd Bedford.
Yet no sdoner -w^e tfeese Men in office than Bute-apd the
King were doiig : sdl tfu^fQodd/W'gst rid,o,*bflW- ,

For the next semi yean* fiat is, until the establishment

i 3 g THE ONSLOW FAMILY

of the royal autocracy under North ministry succeeded
ministry in a hopeless tangle of jealousy, intrigue and the
wildest corruption. No semblance of coherent policy re-
mained, parties could only be given the names of their
managers, and all political form, was lost in the angry be-
wilderment of confusing debates. Pitt, writing to his wife in
1766, justly observed that "all is confusion as usual," Nor
were matters at all improved by the shameful incompetence
of those who were now aligning themselves on the side of
the King* "There is not a man on the Court side in the
House of Commons," said Chesterfield, "who has either
abilities or words enough to call a coach/*

A phase of "national and individual woes" had now
begun, in which the course of an ambitious though cautious
young man like George Onslow, always anxious to be well
placed on the winning side, was one of dreadful uncertainty.
Which was the winning side? Who was to be supported or
courted, and who was to be abandoned ?

Moreover, two of the most influential of the Onslow
supporters were now in disgrace. The venerable though
unvenerated Newcastle had been thrust from office, after a
cackle of stuttering insults, by the King. All those who had
been given appointments by Newcastle were dismissed.

The other friend of the Onslows who might have been
depended upon as a political helper. Earl Temple of Stowe,
was equally out of favour owing to his opposition to Bute
and his open support of Wilkes. None the less, Temple was
not politically extinguished, he had "a pert familiarity" and
all the gifts of a muddy schemer (first the friend and then
the enemy of Pitt), and was in some hopes of being able to
form a family ministry of his own.

Certainly the way of the trimmer was exceedingly hard,
and at first the two George Onslows Black George and his
cousin the Colonel placed themselves with extreme caution
on, or near, the popular side.

George Onslow's attitude, at this stage, was in some
degree the result of his friendship with John Wilkes, the
brave, bantering, scurrilous and energetic advocate $f
liberty.

(Photograph : A. C. Coo^r Lid.)

larl of Onslow (1754-1827), as a child.
>mas Hudson, but possibly by Hogarth. From the picture
in the possession of the Earl of Onslow.

THE KING'S MEN 139

It is significant of the lack of statesmanship at this period
that Wilkes should have become one of the most important
figures in English history. That he was less than this cannot
well be asserted. He had entered Parliament in 1757 at the
age of thirty, and not long afterwards became the lewd and
laughing accomplice of Dashwood and Sandwich in the
Medmenham revels. But the fall of Pitt and the rise of Bute
showed him the dangers of the times and he turned his
attention to more serious matters.

He was grotesque in appearance and of abominable habits,
yet it was Wilkes who now became the most zealous and
effective supporter of the rights of the people. In this robust
and rollicking assertion of rights, Wilkes had all the ad-
vantages of being extremely amusing in male society. When
Gibbon (in the Hampshire Militia) met Wilkes in 1762 he
had to own that he had "scarcely ever met with a better
companion; he has inexhaustible spirits, infinite wit and
humour and a great deal of knowledge; but a thorough
profligate in principle as in practice, his life stained with
every vice, and his conversation full of blasphemy and in-
decency." Thus, too, he was remembered by Wraxall: "In
private society, particularly at table, he was pre-eminently
agreeable . . . converting his very defects of person, manner
and enunciation to purposes of merriment. . . . Even in
corporeal ruin, and obviously approaching the termination
of his career, he formed the charm of the assembly." Grafton
was non-committal "Mr. Wilkes may have dined with me
twice or thrice ."

On the th of June 1762 Wilkes produced the first
number of a lively democratic journal, The North Briton^
satirically titled in opposition to The Briton of Smollett. Its
price was a mere twopence-halfpenny. He was at this time
the Member for Aylesbury and a colonel in the Bucks
militia. t

Onslow undoubtedly made the acquaintance of Wilkes
through his friendship with Temple., In 1762 Wilfcss was
thirty-five and Oaslow thirty-three* Young Onslow was
never too fastidious m morals or in propriety -f language.
These two young ^mm 'ittli*',tifce. ekldrip SRaiajjIe got on

i4o THE ONSLOW FAMILY

famously together, Wilkes was addressed by Temple as "my
dear Colonel," "my dear Marcus Cato," "my dear Senator/'
in letters that were signed "your affectionately devoted ."
In 1 763 Temple wrote a poem to Wilkes that began : " What
Muse thy glory shall presume to sing?**

This was the year of the celebrated No. 45 of The North
Brim, in which the speech of the King in Parliament, and
obliquely the King himself, were attacked with unsparing
ferocity. It was published in April. Without hesitation the
law officers declared that No. 45 was a seditious libel; the
house of Wilkes in Great George Street was entered on the
night of the 29th of April by three officers of the Crown, and
Wilkes was arrested. The printers of The North Briton were
committed for trial.

What, in the meantime, were the political activities of
George Onslow? They were very curious.

He had made up his mind to keep in close touch ^with
Newcastle, who, timorous, old and insulted, was now living
in his noble white house of Claremont. After all, he might
still be of use. This fidgety and rather frightened old man
was master of an enormous rent-roll, and he still hankered,
with a sordid and unseasonable tenacity, after the prestige
of office: of any office in any administration.

Onslow therefore made a point of "waiting upon his
Grace" with all the odds and ends of information that he was
able to "pick up in Town.'* The young puppy, in fact, was
the attendant of the old though watchful dog. Not only was
this attendance "a happiness,** it was also "a duty.** Mr.
Onslow could assure his noble friend that not more than
two or three of the gentlemen of Surrey, "at most,'* were
ready to drink the health of Bute. He then gives him
the less pleasing news that he has been deprived of his
"genteel office" as the Surveyor of the King*s Gardens
and Waters.

On his side, Newcastle appreciated the services of his

"nephew Onslow": he sends his compliments to the old

Speaker, "that great and worthy man," and assures George:

that he is "ever most affectionately yours/' < : /

: IB March 1763 George Onslow was one of a large party

THE KING'S MEN 14,*'

of Whigs who dined at Devonshire House with the Duke.
Also present were Newcastle, Temple, Pitt, Hardwicke and
Rockingham. It was a very notable dinner. An opposition
club was formed, and the members of this arranged to meet
at Wildman's Tavern in Albemarle Street.

But the Whigs, though willing enough to dine or club,
were not a united opposition ; the personal desire for office
was too strong for loyalty. They were divided, so far as
divisions were coherent or discernible, in three groups:
(i) the Rockingham Whigs and the remains of Newcastle's
party (including the Onslows); (2) the Bedford Whigs; and
(3) the adherents of Pitt and Temple. It will thus be seen
that Onslow already had a foot in each of two camps the
camp of Newcastle and the camp of Temple and was ready
to move definitely towards one or the other whenever it
suited him.

The spearhead, the ultimate symbol of the opposition, was
Jack Wilkes. Although imprisoned for a while in the Tower,
he was released by Chief Justice Pratt (afterwards Lord
Camden), and in June he entered Aylesbury with a troop of
cheering gentlemen on horseback. The King had lost his
first round.

George Onslow wrote ecstatically to Newcastle telling
him that he had "infinite pleasure" in acquainting his Grace
with the fact that Mr. Wilkes was at liberty. At the same
time discreetly trimming already he feels extremely
sorry for the poor King, who must be deeply hurt by the
nastiiiess of the mob and the unpopularity of "those
Ministers he thinks fit to employ/ 5 "The genius of this
country," says George in a pompous period, "is Whiggism."
IB July the acquittal of the printers of The North Briton again
raises him to a pitch of ecstasy. His letters to Newcastle
show that he was in contact with every section of the Whig
forces, though not irrevocably committed to any.

Tempkj as Lord Lieutenant of Buckinghamshire^ had
been ordered to deprive Wilkes of hi$ militia command; he
did so with mpul* mirth and a compliment, and ygafy pf omptly
dismissed frap^l^ u , ;v ; , f< ^t ,, /: ; ;

However, WiX^ high

14* THE ONSLOW FAMILY

spirits*' (Wilkes to Temple, July 23rd 1763) and it was
gratifying to observe that Surrey was mainly in favour of
Wilkes and the Whigs. Nor was George Onslow unmindful
of his own interest in the constituency.

On the ^th of September 1 763 he was at the White Hart
Inn in Guildford, where Mr. Ledger, the Mayor, gave "an
elegant entertainment, consisting of a turtle, a brace of
bucks, with a great quantity of other game and a handsome
desert/' The company included Lord Onslow of Clandon >
Lord Middleton, Sir Francis Vincent, the two George
Onslows, and "most of the neighbouring gentlemen, clergy,

&c -"
Then Wilkes got himself into more serious trouble,

which involved Onslow as well.

Having set up a private press he printed off a wittily
obscene poem called An Essay on Woman: a parody of Pope
and of the hymn Veni Creator. There were appended to this
horrible indecency a number of lewd and ludicrous notes,
purporting to have been written by Warburton, Bishop of
Gloucester. In these notes Wilkes had the merry assistance
of Thomas Potter, the son of another bishop, and the alleged
lover of Warburton's wife. As to the nature of the poem, the
words of an outraged contemporary may be quoted: "The
natural abilities of the ass are made the subject of an unclean
description . . . and that sacred expression Thrice Blessed
Glorious Trinity is compelled . . * to convey an idea to the
reader impure, astonishing, and horrible/'

A copy of the Essay was obtained in a somewhat shady
way by the Reverend Mr. Kidgell and was handed over to
the Solicitor of the Treasury.

At this time Wilkes was in France, where his daughter
Polly was at school. When he returned to England, early in
November 1763, his movements were closely watched and
recorded by spies employed by the Secretaries of State,
These movements involved George Onslow somewhat
dangerously, as we can see from the reports published in the
Grenville Papers in 1852:

"Tuesday, November 8th, Mn Wilkes went out this morning at

half an hour after eight o'clock, in a hackney-coach to Mr* Beck-

THE KING'S MEN 143

ford's, the present Lord Mayor, in Soho Square . . . from thence he
went to Mr. Onslow's in Curzon Street, May Fair, and stayed an
hour and a half. Mr. Wilkes brought Mr. Onslow in a hackney-
coach to Spring Gardens, where Mr. Onslow got out, and said he
had some business there, but would call on Mr. Wilkes presently;
from thence he went home. ... At half after two o'clock Mr.
Wilkes, Mr. Onslow, and Mr. Cotes came out together, and parted
at the top of George Street.

"Sunday, November I3th. Mr. Wilkes went to St. Margaret's
Church this morning, and stayed till church was over. ... At half
after one o'clock he went out in his chair to the French Am-
bassador's . . . from thence he went to Mr. Onslow's ... but did

not stay At half an hour after five o'clock this evening he went

out in his chair to Mr. Onslow's in Curzon Street, and stayed until
near eight o'clock ."

Two days after the last entry, the attack on Wilkes was
opened in the House of Commons. Insulted by Samuel
Martin, Wilkes demanded satisfaction, a duel was fought,
and Wilkes received a bullet in the side. He behaved with
great courage and astonishing magnanimity: believing him-
self mortally wounded, he urged Martin to escape, and said
he would never reveal the circumstances of the affair. But
Wilkes recovered, and very wisely fled to France. He was
outlawed in the following year (1764).

George Onslow wrote the most affectionate and admiring
letters to Wilkes, whom he begged to look after himself and
not to allow his "wonderful flow of spirits" to get him into
further trouble. The letters of Wilkes to Onslow, on the
other hand, though urbane, are perceptibly guarded, for
Wilkes understood the subtleties of the human character
and had a prophetic eye for a sneak. But he was cordial
enough when he sent his compliments to "the good old
Speaker and to Mrs. Onslow/*

Men cannot foresee their own veerings or vacillations,
not even when they have the trimmer's instinctive caution,
and Onslow was remarkably indiscreet when he wrote to
Wilkes: "I att unalterably, Dear Walks [^], your faithful
and affectionate humble Servant ." Some of M& letters to
Wilkes were priitadi^i^r^ais "later, wife cxi&isable malice,

144 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

by Home Tooke and by Junius. They are memorable in the
records of shiftiness and apostasy:

"My dear old Friend/' Onslow writes to Wilkes, " Honest
Humphry has din'd with me here to day, and we have just drank
your Health as we have often done ." He then praises "the
amazing wit and abilities'* of Wilkes, and concludes, "Believe me,
dear John, your mentioning me as you do gratifies my pride, as it
will always do to show myself your Friend and humble Servant ."

The leaning of George Onslow towards the newer sort of
Whiggism, in which he was now inclined to place his trust,
was a little too obvious, and he was presently reminded how
important it was to keep on an even keeL

He was becoming less attentive to Newcastle, less regular
in sending his despatches to Claremont or Bath. Very
hurriedly, after a complaint from his noble friend, he assured
him that he would be, and indeed was, "the most melan-
choly and unhappy man in the world," if his Grace thought
him capable of "unfeelingness." The reports of the Whig
dinners are resumed, with an account of Temple speaking
"most violently and openly/* At the same time, Onslow was
in close alliance with the brilliant and irresponsible Charles
Townshend.

Mr. Onslow was now dividing his time between Ember
Court and the house in Curzon Street* He had always dis-
liked his Clandon cousin. Lord Onslow, and does not seem
to have visited him very often. For him the chief concern of
life was political prognosis; keeping an eye on the jumping
cat and being ready to jump, as though spontaneously,
whenever the jump was decisive. As for public and inter-
national affairs,, he cared nothing at all for such things, even
if he was capable of understanding them. And the intricacy
of events might well have baffled a much abler man.

Both Newcastle and Onslow were now hoping for the
collapse of the Grenville-Bedford Ministry, and the forma-
tion of a new administration with Rockingham at the head
of it. Nor was the hope unreasonable. At this time (1765)
Rockingham was thirty-five, a man lacking political experi-
ence, but honourable, well-bred, arid much liked Iby .his
Although he was nervously difiulejify it; 1

THE KING'S MEN 14*

known that he was incapable of treachery; and in such times
this was more than equal to high distinction.

Newcastle was anxious to know about Onslow's talks
with Temple. There was increasing Whig activity at the
dinner discussions, the tavern conspiracies, the closer debates
at Saville House. At Bath, Newcastle gave " a Tea in the great
Room" to nearly seven hundred people, who "seem'd," even
if they were not actually so, to be " Persons of Condition."
Here he received Onslow's despatches "by the Machine."
In May 1765 Onslow conceived the happy idea that both
of his powerful allies, Newcastle and Temple, might form a
joint administration. No contrivance could have suited
Onslow better; and, as Newcastle would serve with anyone,
provided that he was able to scramble into office again, it
seemed feasible enough. But, on the whole, Onslow was
more of a Temple man than a Newcastle man. He had in
fact the promise of employment in the Treasury if Temple
were in power.

Let him 3 then, cultivate rather more assiduously the good
will of Temple. In June the Onslows were at Stowe. The
talk of Temple and Onslow (not likely to have been com-
municated to Newcastle) was concerned with an alliance
between Temple and Pitt. It was now clear that Grenville
would have to resign, and a letter published in the Grenvitte
Papers (1852) from Onslow to Temple shows the hopeful
mood of the trimmer. It is dated June 25th, 1765 :
"The confidential conversation I had the honour of having last
night with you and Mr. Pitt encourages me to trouble you with
this to implore your acceptance of the Treasury ... for the sake of
the Country, for the sake of us all .1 know you will be supported
ii the House of Commons by the City of London, and the Voice of
the whole Kingdom; and I will venture to say, that with all the
difficulties that it must be owned there are to be encountered, it will
be the most popular administration that ever was in this country."

The King had made overtures (in desperation) to Temple :
but Temple refosad office; Pitt would not come in without
him; and Lytteltou and Townsheiid also* held alqo These
were indeed weefe^C'^c^^ (not unlike

the French olitiqalf^t^teto IB reee&t ii and at last a

i 4 6 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

Rockingham Ministry was formed, which excluded Temple
and Pitt but included the inglorious Newcastle. The occasion
was celebrated vinously by George Onslow, who was "very
ill all night" afterwards. Newcastle became Lord Privy Seal,
and Onslow was appointed a Lord of the Treasury.

This was immensely gratifying, but the relations between
Onslow and Temple were now unpleasantly complex. A
well-considered letter to Stowe was obviously demanded,
and this was accordingly posted from Ember Court:

"I long to go through with you all the intricacies and difficulties of
the last three weeks, and explain to you the extreme difficult part I
had to steer through them, more perhaps than any one man of
them all." He then apologises for having accepted his post at the
Treasury, and again expresses his desire for a long explanatory talk:
"It will be the greatest misfortune I can know, to see we differ
in the smallest degree ."

At the general election of 1765 a "new Ballad/' sung to
the appropriate tune of "There was a Jovial Beggar/' was
heard at Epsom when George Onslow was nominated as one
of the Members for Surrey:

"Known Foe to foul Corruption,
He prides in Being just;
And wou'd not, to gain Kingdoms,
Abuse his sacred Trust."

The words were not so appropriate as the tune. . . .

However, the Rockingham or "lutestring" Government
was only a makeshift, and Onslow felt that he would now be
well advised to keep his eye on Pitt and, if possible, to keep
Pitt's eye on him. Somewhat officious letters were therefore
sent to Pitt at Hayes (Chatham Correspondence, 1 838). Early
in 1 766 these letters are those of a self-appointed confidential
agent, recording events in the House of Commons, Pitt is
told about the reading of "the American papers," in order
that he may be spared the trouble of coming up to London.
"The House is so fatigued with these long sittings . . . that
I doubt whether they will be prevailed on to sit on Satur-
day." And here, inadvertently, Onslow finds himself on the
right though losing side; but not for long. America must be

THE KING'S MEN 147

relieved in order to save the trade and the good name of
Britain "Her dignity is concerned in doing justice, and in
giving happiness and tranquillity to every individual that
lives under her protection." In another letter George Onslow
thanks Pitt for some " expressions " concerning himself,
which he will preserve (he does not seem to have done so)
"that my family may know hereafter, I was within the notice
and esteem of Mr. Pitt." He dreads a combination "between
the late administration and those who call themselves Lord
Bute's friends." He favoured the repeal of the Stamp Act.
"The turn which affairs in the closet have taken confirm
[sic] the wisdom of your advice and way of thinking on that
Subject."

By this time George Onslow was beginning to acquire
political influence and was being solicited by less important
men. Evidence of this, in one of the most blatant letters
which a job-hunter ever wrote, I have discovered in the
Clandon archives. It was written in July 1766, at the time
of Buckingham's dismissal. The writer was the Reverend
John Butler, of whom we have seen something already. In
shameless candour and serene effrontery it is unsurpassable:

"I took the Liberty of writing to Lord Rockingham last Wednes-
day, on occasion of the present Church Vacancies, and on Thursday
I had the Mortification to hear the News of his Removal. I am
sadly out of luck in these things, and shall give over all thoughts of
them, unless you can make an Impression upon Mr. Pitt or the
Duke of Grafton in my favor. I wish it could be done with respect
to something that may now be vacated. At a farther distance of
time many Applications and Promises may stand in my way, and
I am not by nature qualified for a Scramble. . . . The Papers tell me
the Dean of Peterborough is to be the new Bishop. If so, his Deanery
would be very acceptable. I have reason to think, the Dean of
Winchester will come in for something. His Deanery would be still
more acceptable. I am persuaded a warm Party Application would
do the business, and better at this critical Juncture than ever. ... I
wrote to Mr. Townshend, and have no room to doubt his Con-

The trimmers and the trimmed were now in full activity.
Pitt had entered the Peerage as the Earl of Chatham and was

i 4 8 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

the associate of Grafton at the head of the Ministry. But the
Earl of Chatham was too ill, and the Duke of Grafton too
much occupied with his mistress Nancy, to give much
attention to affairs of State. The only man who did anything,
and what he did was usually wrong, was the mercurial
Townshend. All Parliamentary outlines are lost in a muddle
of dimly contending mediocrities and a confusion of intrigue.
Bute was busy. The "Bloomsbury gang" of the Bedfords
held a vague position in the offing. The Grenville and
Rockingham Whigs (if such a term as Whig is applicable to
these amorphous rallies) looked about them with dismay at
the general chaos. The King blithely informed General
Irwin that "ce metier de politique . . . ce n'est pas le metier
d'un gentilhomme" which indeed was true, and applied
nowhere more cogently than to his Majesty himself.

Mr. George Onslow still writes letters to the Duke of
Newcastle, still assuring him that he has "no greater
pleasure than shewing on all occasions that grateful atten-
tion I owe your Grace and the Dutchess of Newcastle/* The
letters are conveyed by "the Fish Man" from Curzon Street
to Claremont and from Claremont to Curzon Street. But
the times are changing and George himself will change (who
more able to do so ?) with the times.

CHAPTER XII

Black George

ON the 29th of December 1767 Lord Trevor wrote to
Grenville: "The old Speaker is given over of a mortifica-
tion in his leg." Of this "mortification," after much pain,
Arthur Onslow, the Speaker, died on the I7th of February
1768. His wife had died five years previously.

Speaker Onslow had many of the appearances and the
virtues of a great man, some of the weaknesses of a small
man, but none of the paltry vices of a place-hunter; though
it must be allowed that he assisted many others in their
place-hunting* After his retirement in 1761 he had enjoyed
the placid and reliable pleasures of collecting pictures, books
and engravings. He was the most urbane, the most ade-
quately civilised, of his family* Unlike the Clandon Onslows
(whom he rarely visited) he had no liking for horse or hound,
no interest in acres, timber, streams, crops and the affairs of
a rural district He preferred the pleasant meetings of the
Kit-Cat, or graceful and amusing talk, sober talk, in a
company of chosen friends.

Above all, as an old man, he delighted (as Hatsell relates)
in talking to young people about the laws and the constitu-
tion; and this he did with a kindled spirit and a mellow
eloquence that always delighted his listeners as well.

Although he was not a conspicuous friend of the eminent,
he was loved and esteemed by people of every condition and
age > both simple and learned. Some books, of no great im-
portance, were dedicated to him, and a gentle versifier wrote
a little ode "To the Right Honourable Arthur Onslow* In
the Country^ on receiving a Rose from that Gentleman":

"With joy miBSiial glowM my Breast,

Wieii tiotij retirtl to shady Bowers*
Wfaerd Peascafe &a&,iBMi viiteotis Rest, : ; , !

IS o THE ONSLOW FAMILY

The slightest Gift, in thy lov'd Name,
Rises in Worth; receives new Grace j

As meanest Metals Notice claim,

Imprinted with the Monarch's Face."

It is now, unfortunately, impossible to form an idea of
Arthur Onslow's collection of books. The whole collection
was moved to the library at Clandon in 1776 by his son, but
was dispersed at Sotheby's in 1 885, A few of the books were
bought in by the fourth Earl and are still at Clandon, but,
although the catalogue of the sale may be consulted, one
has "no clue to the particular volumes that were in the
Speaker's library.

A similar dispersal of his pictures makes it equally hard to
say which were, and which were not, collected by him.
Concerning one of these pictures, an extremely interesting
portrait of Milton as a young man, Arthur Onslow has left
a remarkable note in manuscript:

"This original picture of Milton I bought in the year 1 728 or '30,
and paid twenty guineas for it of Mr. Cumberland, a gentleman of
very good consideration in Chester, who was a relation and Executor
of the will of Milton's last wife, who died a little while before that
time. He told me it hung up in her chamber till her death, and that
she used to say her Husband gave it to her to show what he was in
his youth being drawn when he was about twenty-one years of
age. Mr. Hawkins Brown (author of the Poem, De Animi
immortalitate) told me (October 8th, 1753) that he knew this
Mrs. Milton, visited her often, and well remembered this picture
hanging in her chamber, which she said was of her husband."

A copy of this picture was made by Benjamin Van der
Gucht, a friend of George Onslow's, in 1 7 8 2 ; and it has been
assumed that the original was lost, or sold to an unknown
buyer, I have found among the MSS. at Clandon a holo-
graph note by Lord Harcourt, written in June 1908, in
which he says: "The MSS. at Nuneham record that this
copy of Milton's portrait was made for Lord Harcourt by
Vandergucht from the original at Clandon and that the
original was subsequently burnt at Clandon" Recent (verbal)
information seems to imply that the original may still be in
existence ; and the mystery is therefore unsolved. A charming

BLACK GEORGE 151

print of the picture was made for Arthur Onslow by
Houbracken.

Arthur Onslow's great interest in pictures and painters is
very strikingly shown in a hitherto unpublished letter from
Horace Walpole preserved in the Clandon MSS. It is
headed and dated "Strawbenyhill. March 31. 1764."

"Sir,

"I cannot express how much I am obliged to you for the great
trouble you have been so good as to give yourself. I have so slender
a title to it, that I cannot help attributing a little of it to your love
of and zeal for the arts. This sounds ungratefull: but I do not know
how to assume to myself alone the pains you have taken. All I can
do, both to pay the debt of the arts & my own, is, to improve my
next edition by your communications at the same time that I
must do justice to Vertue, by taking from him to myself many of
the faults, at least omissions, that you blame. My fear of making so
trifling and uninteresting a work too prolix, prevailed on me to omit
many stories that He had collected, especially on the less shining
Artists, for I think, Sr, you & I differ in nothing but when you
ascribe more merit to our English performers than I do. Some of
their paintings & some of their drawings, have & may have a degree
of merit, but when compared with the works of really great Masters,
I fear We ought not to say much for our Friends.

"Richardson, Thornhill & other Painters, whom, as you observe,
Sr, I have omitted, are reserved for the last Volume. The Etchings
of the First, some of which I have, I intended to mention in his
life there, He being so much more known as a Painter than En-
graverj & tho I have now and then mentioned a Person in both
capacities, it is but seldom, nor, as I said before, did I care to swell
my Volumes too much. I have been reproached already for saying
so much on the Artists of this country, for it is not every body, Sr,
that has your Candour & Indulgence.

"Among the many curious notices, Sr, which you have sent me,
I must particularly thank you for the Anecdotes relating to J.
Britton. I Ijave a print of him, & have long wished to know more
of Him j for I cannot, like my censors, think it an offence to tdt any
body what tSbey did not know before . . .

"I do not grticlge the pains this Work has cost me, while you, Sr,
& a few other curious and good-natured persons are pleasfcd with it.
Had I not midertafee^i^F^^s JilaB^scripts>ipi^t,^ve perished,
& the whole Work r^&i4iiiffacticable, Si&b as It is, there will

152 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

always be men glad of even such a history of the Arts In their own
country. They have flourished so little here, that I question whether
any man who could perform the Task better, woud have conde-
scended to it. The Assistance of Gentlemen, curious, communi-
cative & able, like you, Sr, may enable me to make the next Edition
more worthy of appearing in Public. It is for that Public, Sr, that I
beg you to continue your cooperation, &, if you do not think it too
much trouble, pray do not apprehend that you can tire me, who reap
such benefit from your correspondence & Who am, Sr,
" Yr bounded & much obliged
"humble Sevt

Walpole's Anecdotes of Painting in England was written in
1761 and published in two volumes in 1 762 ; a third volume,
written in 1762, was published in 1764 (clearly the one
referred to above) ; and the final volume, completed in 1 77 1,
was not published until 1780*

This letter from Walpole testifies clearly to his respect for
the old Speaker and his appreciation of his intelligent interest
in the arts. His actual opinion of Onslow varied from time
to time. He considered him "gentle and artful"; one who
"uttered pompous pathetics couched in short sentences";
though he owns that he was quick and unhesitating when
dealing with a situation in the House. But Walpole is in-
consistent. After saying of the Speaker that "his disinter-
estedness was remarkable/' he asserts that "popularity was
his great aim, impartiality his professed means, universal
adulation and partiality to f whatever was popular, his real
means of acquiring it* * , He had much devotion from the
House, few mends in it, for he was too pompous to be loved,
though too ridiculous to be hated; too much dignity in his
appearance not to be admired; and was top fond of applause
not to miss it"

The opinion of Hervey (Memoirs, 1 848) is more frankly
hostile; but Hervey was a professional hater, to whom the
majority were (like himself) shallow, pretentious, vain,
deceitful and absurd* He wrote: ; ^

"Mr. Onslow had just that degree of fitness for his office^ wldn he
was first put into it, that hindered the world from excfei|i^a^iinst

BLACK GEORGE 153

him, and yet was not enough for him to take it as his due. He was
a man naturally eloquent, but rather too florid . . . he had kept bad
company of the collegiate kind, by which he had contracted a stiff-
ness and pedantry in his manner of conversing . . . and . . . was
totally ignorant of the modern world. No man ever courted popular-
ity more, and to no man popularity was ever more coy; he cajoled
both parties and obliged neither. . . . [His] true Whig and laudable
principles were so daubed by canting, fulsome, bombast professions,
that it was hard to find out whether there was anything good at
bottom ... he was passionate in his temper, coxcombical in his
gestures, and injudicious in his conduct."

These estimates of Arthur Onslow cannot be overlooked
by anyone who endeavours to write a fair account of him;
but they are the estimates of men predisposed to look for all
that is ludicrous or deceitful in the human character; seldom
willing to observe, and even less willing to praise, what is
good and honourable. Their attitudes are typically those of
disingenuous intellectualism and of sour disappointment;
the icy malice of a wit and the sneering obloquy of a courtier.
None the less, they cannot be disregarded: they are the

* 9 O J

opinions of those who actually saw the Speaker in the House.
It is reasonable to assume that Arthur's manner was occa-
sionally pompous and his behaviour sometimes bigoted.
That he was fond of popularity may also be true. No more
than this, I think, may be conceded to Hervey and Walpole*
But even if the fullest implication is accepted, they describe
little more than superficial defects of character, by no means
incompatible with genuine worthiness and integrity.

To the honour of Walpole, it should be added that his last
Deference to the Speaker (1768) affirms "the good old man's
detestation of Corruption." Onslow had sent a message to
the Hotise, telling them that he died in peace after hearing
the wzm of the Bribery BilL

Few necofcied lives have been so entirely satisfying, so
near the ffi$$<a;e of absolute completeness, and so pleasant
in retrospect :^tb&t of r the great Speaker* It may -be said
that a very littfefciftgstf^ii' not tlie mere avoidance of corv
ruptiony w^t^i:^p^|!T|crfjp^e % tfari <x>mp|^0!ib, in any
eighteenth-century jMdUfttaei& That is true; iut Onslow

o *

l$4 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

was not a great man because of what he refrained from doing ;
he was great because his virtues were positive, direct and
immutable. . . ,

The death of Speaker Onslow undoubtedly had a very
marked affect upon the conduct of his only son Black
George, the trimmer.

Up to this time the manoeuvres of George Onslow had
not implied any disloyalty to the Whig party as a whole, but
only to his personal patrons. In 1 768 the death of Newcastle
deprived him of his most effective patron, while the death of
his father had removed the wise and salutary influence which
modified his activities as a political schemer. He still had
the uncertain support of Temple, but he failed to secure the
continued attention of Pitt. Thus he found it necessary to
assert himself with greater prominence on the winning side.
The affair of Wilkes and the Middlesex election now pro-
vided him with a first-rate opportunity, though he does not
seem to have reckoned with the possibility of retaliation.

His principal difficulty at this time was how to become a
King's man without cutting himself off entirely from the
orthodox Whigs. He might have to retire who could say?
to a prepared position. Here his position at the Treasury
gave him certain advantages. The Treasury was a citadel
from which, after recuperation and rearmament, he might
well sally out in a new direction. . . .

Wilkes, defying outlawry, came back to England early in
1768, immediately scattering all the precariously jointed
pieces of the new political puzzle and hilariously breaking
up the pattern in a jumble of revolt. After wild and rowdy
scenes of popular delight he was elected as one of the
Members for Middlesex on the 29th of March 1768.
Handed over to the Marshal of the King's Bench Prison on
the 27th of April, he refused to be rescued by the mob, for
he knew very well that imprisonment would make him
stronger than ever. On the 8th of June, Mansfield ruled
that the outlawry of Wilkes was illegal: but he was tried
again on the two previous charges relating to No. ^45 of
The North Briton and the Essay on Woman^ and again im~
prisoned.

BLACK GEORGE 155

A letter was sent to George Onslow from his trimming
ecclesiastical friend, the Reverend John Butler, on the I2th
of June:

"The Reversal of Wilkes's Outlawry seems to remove one strong
Objection to his Seat in the house. . . . It now appears, how pre-
cipitate the measure would have been to expel him as an Outlaw.
... I wish the whole Affair was over. The Public seems rather
weary of it, and Government seems not to have gained anything
by prosecuting him, as every step taken against him has been more
or less exceptionable, and die number of libels does not appear to
decrease. Moderation in punishing Party Offences best suits the
Genius of our Constitution, and as to Mr. Wilkes Vprivate Medita-
tions, I hope they will not become more public by being recited as
part of the punishable matter. I am not his Apologist, but shall be
sorry to see anything vindictive in the Proceedings against him for a
mere political Misdemeanour committed five years ago, and for
which he has suffered ever since."

Butler had been on the friendliest of terms with Jack
Wilkes (a very odd companion for a parson) during his
militia days. His very sensible letter reflects the opinions of
Onslow his letters invariably reflected these opinions.
Both were to change their tune and their trimmings with a
beautiful unanimity before long. In the meanwhile it was
known that Wilkes had the support of Temple, of the Duke
of Portland, and of Parson Home of Brentford a high-
tempered though formidable and eccentric champion of
liberty.

Onslow had been admitted to the Privy Council since
December 1 767. As a party man he was cooling rapidly, and
the new turn of affairs brought about by the Middlesex
election in 1768 and the terrifying violence of the Wilkes
mob in London evidently made him reflect upon his own
position* "God knows what next is to happen," he wrote in
what was probably his last letter to Newcastle. When the
Grafton Ministry came into office in October 1768, Lord
North prominent among the King's men was Chancellor
of the Exchequer, ^nd was thus brought into close personal
contact with George Onslaw. In a fragment of autobio-
graphy Onslow praises North for his "great Abilities and

156 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

manly Courage/* giving him the credit of saving the Con-
stitution and of upholding the dignity of Parliament.

I have discovered, in the Speaker's MS. folio at Clandon, a
very strange and illuminating note inserted by George
Onslow under the heading of "Punishment." It runs, in
part, as follows:

"I heard Lord Camden say publicly aloud in the H of Lords on
hearing that the Sheriffs had returned Wilkes, after expulsion, that
they ought to have been committed. . . .

"The whole Case merits being well and thoroughly considered,
& then the Proceedings of the House of Commons will be found to be
highly justifiable & proper, & the more so considering the dangerous
and Tory language that was too much talk'd not only in Wilkes's
Advertisements to the County of Mddx but in many Companys all
over the Kingdom in that mad time. . . . Such a diminution of the
reasonable & never disputed Power of the House of Commons,
must end in the Encrease of Power in the Crown, & therefore was
most wisely withstood by all those who understood and valued that
part of our Constitution, & were real Whigs . . . The Spirit of the
Nation as well as of the H of Commons began to rise against these
outrageous Acts. . . ."

Surely there was never a more tortuous, a more sublimely
inverted argument in the whole annals of trimming. That
the language of Radicals could be described as "Tory,"
while the flat repudiation of constitutional electoral pro-
cedure was the correct policy of "real Whigs," thus pre-
venting a dangerous increase in the power of the Crown; all
this is a muddled fantasy of such incomprehensible trash
that one is at a loss to understand what reason George
Onslow could possibly have had for writing it. After all, it
was inserted in a folio of procedural notes which few of his
family were likely to read; and the question is, what purpose
could it have served? Does the trimmer go to the length of
an inward mental falsification? Has he lost the sense of
objectivity as well as that of honesty? These are questions
which I cannot answer. Perhaps one may compare this
curious little essay with the retrospective papers composed
by Richard the Fox to save his face if things
Mm; but these at least were plausible.

(Photograph : J. W. Llndm Forge, A.R.LB.A.}
Clandoa Part.
Above; The East Front. Below: The South Front.

BLACK GEORGE i$7

Wilkes was returned for Middlesex in January, February
and March 1769. There were dangerous and bloody riots,
and Grafton was justified when he wrote in his autobio-
graphy "the internal state of the country was really alarm-
ing." In April there was another Middlesex election, and
again Wilkes was returned. The figures were decisive:
Wilkes, 1143; Luttrell (the Government nominee) 296;
and the dummy, Whitaker, $.

And now the "affectionate friend," the "unalterable
friend," the proud and loyal friend, the humble servant and
zealous entertainer of "dear John" Wilkes, discovered that
the time had come for throwing this "dear old Friend"
overboard. In this, the first of his more open treacheries,
George Onslow was at least unequivocal. The cat would
ultimately jump, he felt sure, towards the King, and now
was the proper moment for getting in among the leading
jumpers.

Good-bye to Mr. Wilkes and all thatl After all, a man is
justified in changing his opinions when he has been in the
wrong; and it had obviously been wrong to suppose that
such an impious and impudent wretch as John Wilkes could
be anything but a danger to the country and a foe to every-
thing that was decent and honourable.

Such a position could have been held, at this juncture,
without a serious loss of dignity. (The treachery of Grafton
was less inexcusable, for he had never committed himself so
deeply as the friend of Wilkes.) But Onslow, with all the
worst intentions in the world, never possessed the subtlety
of an adroit schemer. His tactics were awkward and his
manner devoid of conviction. In going over to the side of
the King, it was quite unnecessary for him to thrust himself
forward as one of the most open and active of all the enemies
of Wifces* An artful trimmer could have made the move
with a show of plausibility, and even with grace: he might
have won respect and applause, and avoided all dovtbt-apd
suspicion. Hare Onslow railed. He bounced forwmd when
he should have sMleduiiobtrusivelf into his place. Hfe raised
his voice when tactical requimiEtents demanded sifeace. He

I** THE ONSLOW FAMILY

On the 1 4th of April 1769 he moved on behalf of the
Government for the return of a Knight of the Shire for
Middlesex. The dignity of the House, he declared with a
stilted solemnity, was concerned in putting an end to the
Wilkes imbroglio. The people had no right to vote for
Wilkes, the Sheriffs had no right to return him; the House
was insulted, the constitution was in danger.

There was a good deal of surprise and a good deal of
opposition to Mr. Judas Onslow, but the election of Wilkes
was declared null and void. Upon this, exhilarated by his
own audacity and impudence, Onslow moved that the
Sheriffs, those misguided men, should attend the House
with the poll* Happily, the Sheriffs had guessed what was
afoot, and were careful to be late in arriving at the House:
too late for a discussion on the motion. At any rate, the
opposition, by no means friendly to George Onslow, made
so much disturbance that no debate was possible.

The following day was a Saturday, and again Onslow
stood forth. He now moved from the Treasury bench that
Luttrell ought to have been returned a Knight of the Shire.
The House buzzed and rumbled, tempers were lost, and red
anger blazed on the faces of many. Who was this man, this
canting Judas, to tell them what was right and wrong?

Undeterred and righteously elated, Mr. Onslow said that
Luttrell was ipso facto elected, let them say what they pleased*
Beckford assailed the Toryism of the Government, and
Onslow bawled a furious denial* Charles Fox took the side
of Luttrell : Burke supported Wilkes. The most enraged and
uncontrolled of all the speakers who attacked Onslow was
Gretiville, and this frantic spluttering man exerted himself
so furiously that he spat bhod. In this overheated situation
the debate went on until three in the morning, when
Onslow's motion was carried by a majority of fifty-four.

George Onslow thus made himself unpleasantly and un-
wisely conspicuous in the attack on Wilkes. It is very odd
that a man so incapable of bullish pugnacity, one by nature
so reticent, could have thus charged out among the leaders
of the line.

This attack upon Wilkes, although supported iby a

BLACK GEORGE 159

Parliamentary division, clearly injured the reputation of
Onslow in the House of Commons, and also in the county
of Surrey. It showed beyond the possibility of doubt that,
even in a corrupt administration, Onslow was neither suffi-
ciently able nor sufficiently trusted to be given any office of
high responsibility. He may have been indifferent to this,
having made up his mind to achieve prominence as a
courtier.

However that may be, George Onslow "while in opposi-
tion had proved a warm and strenuous supporter of Mr.
Wilkes . . . and was now . . * both considered and treated as
a deserter from the popular cause*' (Stephens, Memoirs of
Home Tooke y 1813). He was also disregarding opinion in his
own county (Surrey), which had refused to produce a "loyal
address" and was one of the petitioning counties which
deplored the unholy spectacle of "the representatives of the
people in opposition to the people/'

Certainly it was unfortunate for Onslow that he had now
made himself conspicuous enough to be attacked by the
most formidable of opponents: Home Tooke (then Parson
Home of Brentford), Wilkes himself (indirectly), Woodfall,
and all the scandal-mongering anonymous writers in the
magazines. He was not of sufficient eminence to be assailed
in person by the terrible Junius, who privately dismissed
him in a contemptuous phrase as "a false silly fellow " (letter
to Woodfall, August i6th, 1769). But Junius, who had
begun to publish his celebrated Letters in January 1 769, was
now, battering the Grafton Ministry, and Grafton himself,
with a ferocity and elegance unsurpassed in the history of
political or personal diatribe*

Piarson Home was about thirty-three in 1769*

He is a light and leaping figure who dances blithely >
cassock and afi, with a frequently changing rhythm, among
the more solemn shades of his time. His father sold poultry;
one brother was prominent in "the fruit line"; another was
"bred a fishmonger," unwisely becoming a poultry-merchant
and eventually dying in tfre alms-house. His four* sisters
achieved higher ^k>cal ptaiMiiBgc ene married 4 ^wine-mer-
chant; one married l)to^ occu-

jrfo THE ONSLOW FAMILY

pied an honourable and confidential position about the
person of the present king (George IV) "; another married
a colourman; and the fourth, "a woman of considerable wit
and vivacity, " became the wife of a haberdasher in Leicester

Fields.

Home began his education in the "Soho Square
Academy," and proceeded thence to Westminster and Eton.
He graduated from St. John's, Cambridge, in 1758, and in
1760 obtained the living of Brentford* He was a versatile,
vivacious man, an admirable talker, loving cards, company,
good food and good wine. On his travels he met Wilkes in
Paris, Voltaire at Ferney, Sterne at Lyons. At the time of the
Middlesex elections he became the violent partisan of
Wilkes, and in 1769 he was victorious in a tussle with the
Duke of Bedford over the appointment of bailiffs and a
mayor. He was now to be victorious in a more spectacular

way.

In July 1769 Home attacked Onslow by means of a
letter in the Public Advertiser. He accused him, by implica-
tion, of selling for 1000 "in a very common and usual
manner" a post at the disposal of the Treasury.

Whether accused rightly or wrongly, it was perhaps
unwise of Onslow to reply personally in the same journal;
though he made out a tolerably good case for himself and
alleged that the whole of this impudent fraud was the work
of "a woman of die name of Smith who lives near Broad
Street/' It was a pity, of course, that the name of this vile
defrauder should be such a common one and the place of her
abode so extremely ambiguous; and Home replied shrewdly
by asking whether "Mrs. Smith" had been taken into
custody. "Depend upon it," said Wilkes, "Mr. Onslow
will get nothing but shame by contending with Home."

This 'was true, and the shame was to fall even more
heavily upon a much more considerable man than Onslow
when, in the following year, the case was taken into the
courts. - *

Onslow now found himself (in his own words) treafiifil
with "scurrility ... in the public papers." His friend rjtafcfoe:
wasmervoms: "I am anxious," he wrote, "to

BLACK GEORGE 161

keep up your spirits, while the Spirits in Agitation against

you are more active than ever. . I have read a letter by

Junius, which made my blood run cold/* Later in the year,

Butler writes again (Clandon MSS,):

"A Friend of mine writes full of Horror about the State of things,

but I suspect he wishes them to wear a horrible aspect. . . . I am

doubtful whether it will answer any purpose to attack Junius. He

is a Match for any Writer, and being at present asleep, it seems

hardly worth while to awake him. It may be better to reserve him

for our Amusement in town.**

The first action of Onslow against Home was heard at
Kingston Assizes on the 6th of April 1770. The Judge was
Blackstone, and Onslow was non-suited on a small technical
point. A more important, indeed a famous, trial took place
on the ist of August at Guildford before no less a person
than Mansfield. To the charge of publishing two libels in
the Public Advertiser^ Home was now faced with the addi-
tional charge of having spoken defamatory words in a speech
at Epsom. In this speech. Home was alleged to have said:
"I expected to meet George Onslow here. ... I know him
well, I have carried many letters from him to Mr. Wilkes
... as for instructing him, I would as soon instruct the winds
or the waves; and if he will wave his privilege, I will wave
my gown/*

Asked whether the published form of Home's first letter
to Onslow was correct, Woodfall (the printer of the Ad-
vertiser) produced laughter in the court by saying that "his
men had ignorandy added the word Esquire to Mr. Onslow's
name." Legally, the case was difficult. The failure to produce
Original documents hampered the plaintiff, but the un-
disputed words of Home could certainly be construed as
Hbefei The defence was conducted with great brilliance by
Sergeant Glynn, and the summing-up was delivered with
careless Ill4^ture by Mansfield. Damages of ^400 were
awarded t0; Onslow,

This insignificant victory was turned into a crushing
defeat, not-esfily'fei* Otidbw btit for Mansfield as welL On
the 8th of NdfudMtt '>f 70 a rtle was^itovedJor in the

Court of Common li^*ftP*3lf^ verdict

* *

i62 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

should not be set aside. Tlie arguments presented with
scintillating eloquence and forcible reasoning by Sergeant
Glynn were heard on the 2 6th in the presence of twelve
judges. They listened imperturbably while Mr. Glynn
accused Mansfield of having "delivered a charge in express
violation of the received principles of law.*' Judgment was
deferred until the iyth of April 1771, when the judges
declared unanimously in favour of Home,

Such a resounding slap in the face for Mansfield was more
sensational than the defeat of Onslow. It was a personal
victory for Home, and a wider victory for Wilkes and the
opposition. The loss to Onslow, both in finance and in
reputation, was considerable. He had employed the most
expensive counsel: the case is said to have cost him 1500;
while Horne had spent no more than 200. It is true that
Mansfield may be said to have retaliated, some time after-
wards, when he fined and imprisoned Horne for expressing
sympathy with the rebels in America.

Horne Tooke, after quarrelling on paper with Junius and
in person with Wilkes, relapsed into the life of a placid
philologist; a Wimbledon host, rightly celebrated for the
excellence of his four o'clock dinners, when he entertained
such men as Thurlow, Erskine and Camelford. How
splendid was the talk! how succulent the dishes! White and
brown meats were there in plenty; fish of the more delectable
sort with "appropriate sauces"; pies, puddings, "excellent
in respect to composition and flavour "; at least three wines;
and then most ravishing of all high, glossy p^iles of
brightly-coloured fruits, dishes of Alpine strawberries and
Antwerp raspberries, pears, apples, the charmaentel, the
jargonel, the chrisan, the brown bury. . . *

George Onslow, in spite of hi$ reverse, and in some degree
because of it, now attached himself with ostentatious per-
tinacity to the side of the King and his men. The long and
honourable line of Onslow Whiggery was broken and
Onslow, most unexpectedly, was the name of a courtier.

Accumulated forces of indignation and rhetoric had swept
C^afton out of office "With what force, my lord," JB&IIJS
bad thundered, "with what protection are you prepared to

BLACK GEORGE 163

meet the united detestation of the people of England ?" On
the 27th of January 1770 the Government fell: Chatham,
Junius, Wilkes and the voice of the people (a harsh un-
prevaricating voice) had shown the King that he was not
infallible. It may be said that Wilkes was the winner. In due
time he was released from gaol ; he became Lord Mayor of
London; he took his place in the House of Commons
(1774); and at last, in 1782, he saw the resolutions concern-
ing the Middlesex elections very properly expunged from
the Journals of the House.

And yet, in another sense, it was the King, not Wilkes,
who had won. The fall of Grafton was almost immediately
followed by the rise of North, who was then thirty-eight.
In person ungainly, with a face as round as that of a trumpet-
ing cherub, he was so absent-minded that he left letters of
the utmost importance, even royal letters, in the water-
closet. However, he was dutiful, honourable, kindly and
loyal in private life, and himself incorruptible in the midst
of corruption. He was, in fact, a trustworthy, upright and
unselfish idiot. He cannot be said to have deserved the
malicious fury of Junius "Our language has no term of
reproach, the mind has no idea of detestation, which has not
already been happily applied to you, and exhausted." This
indeed was an overblow of needless virulence; a bomb in
the baby's basket.

With North in power, the autocracy of the King was
assured, for North believed that obedience to his royal
master was a sacred and immutable duty.

CHAPTER XIII
A Trimmer's Progress

ON the loth of December 1770, when there was a
horrible tumult in the House of Lords and the Com-
mons were expelled by force Chatham "roaring in vain
and unregarded" Horace Walpole noticed the behaviour
of George Onslow and described him as "a noisy indiscreet
man . . . whose connexions should not have led him to en-
courage the opponents in settingthe two Houses atvariance."

The "noisy indiscreet man" was now launched, with no
great velocity and a perceptibly nibbled reputation, upon
the hazardous voyage of a courtier. He had, one must allow,
a great deal of the necessary equipment. He had, for ex-
ample, a well-disciplined conscience and a wonderful way of
making the crooked appear straight even to himself. A
mere shifting of ballast is nothing, a simple adjustment of
opinion is often required by circumstances. And although he
betrayed or rejected all those principles which had given his
family an honourable name, he did not wholly discard a
tattered residue, a figment or pretence, to which he could
apply the term " Whiggism." But he did not feel safe until,
some twelve or fifteen years later, he had secured a line of
retreat through Carlton House; when he was in the trim-
mer's ideal position of serving and betraying his master at the
same time; not having to wait for the jumping of the one cat
or the other, King or Prince, but having both cats in his lap.

So the King could be sure of finding George Onslow's
name on the "right" side of the division lists ; the lists which
he scanned so regularly and read with alternations of
malignity and approval, devising therefrom a simple system
of reward and revenge, and marking off with pernicious
exactitude the sheep of the royal party and the goafs of the
opposition.

164

A TRIMMER'S PROGRESS 165

Another George Onslow, a red, rolling, preposterous,
fiery little creature, not unknown to the careral student of
English history, stamps and rants on the scene in 1771. He
was, in ludicrous perfection, the ribald, irascible, jocular,
Tory-glory comic English colonel, the cousin of George
Onslow the trimmer.

His passion was cock-fighting; a sport, let it be remem-
bered, that was eminently aristocratic, patronised enthusi-
astically by many of our Kings, from Henry VIII to
George IV; indeed, there were " gentlemen cockers" up to
1830 and even later, though cock-fighting was made illegal
in 1 849* It was one of those sports in which, as in racing or
boxing, the Peers and the People could meet with equal
enjoyment after "paying their tip for admission." Much
money was lost and won upon a "main" of cocks, and the
bloody battles were often continued until there was only one
survivor. The treatment of a surviving bird seems to have
been as inelegant as ineffective "Search and suck your
cock's wounds, and wash them well with hot urine/' The
neighbouring family of the Kings at Ockham were equally
devoted to this pastime, and matches were fought at the
Royal Cockpit, Westminster, between the Kings and the
Onslows, one of which consisted of thiry-four battles.

As a "cocking gentleman" the name of Colonel Onslow
is preserved in the noble annals of British sport, but he is
remembered more importantly in political history as the
leader of the attack on the general licence of printers, and
especially on those who misrepresented the speeches made
in the House of Commons, in 1771*
v Up to this time he had been a really progressive and
audacious Whig. Like his cousin, he admired Wilkes : going
far feeynd mere admiration, he declared that No. 45 of The
North, Briton was not a libel, and actually voted against the
expuMoa, Wilkes from the House of Commons. When
Wilkes; wa^.-yprnkded in his duel with Martin, the Colonel
wrote tohiatfltttetta^ :even i^riendliet than those of his cousin
George* The "regard and honour" which he felt for Wilkes
could only bee^ii^<^
he bestowed upcfriMii^ But

i66 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

although he played up to Newcastle, he once wrote a very
saucy letter to his Grace, who sent it off to cousin George in
a fury: "I send you a most Extraordinary and Impertinent
Letter * . . from your cousin George Onslow. You can easily
see, I can make no Reply to it ... I leave it to you ." With
all his irascibility, the Colonel (he had retired from the army
in 1760) was good-humoured and amusing, and enjoyed his
own buffoonery as much as anyone else. Not infrequently he
"diverted the House" with an appropriate or conciliatory
joke; and when he turned his coat, which he certainly did
when he deserted Rockingham and attached himself to
Grafton, he did so without any scheme of personal ad-
vantage. Although Horace Walpole says that he "followed
the banners of the Court, " and although (in 1768) he seized
a man who was "pasting up a speech of Oliver Cromwell,"
he was no place-hunter.

He was rough, he was rude; and a Guildford election
ballad " To the Tune of the Tanner, Sung by Mr. Doyle in
the Magic Cavern " may perhaps illustrate his public style :
"T\&.t famed Cocking George, he is quite in a Fuss,
And has flown here so quickly to get the first Buss;
With this Cocking George, to drink, lie, and swear,
Friend Pawling will tell you no Man can compare"

In the action of 1 77 1 against the printers, Colonel Onslow
was the leader or at least his cousin made him appear so.
For this he was attacked as "a paltry malignant insect/* His
cousin was assailed more ferociously in the papers, as will
presently be shown. Although the King advised caution, the
House ordered the printers (who had refused to attend the
Bar) to be taken into custody; but the Sergeant was "unable
to execute the order " Brass Crosby, the Lord Mayor,
Wilkes and Alderman Oliver defied the King and the House
of Commons. On the I2th of March, Colonel Onslow
brought in a new motion against sk other printers. Opinion
in the House was not unanimous, there were twenty-three
divisions, and the debate was prolonged until four in tfee
morning. ^ f

Crosby and Oliver were taken to the Tower (it was r con-
sidered wise to leave Wilkes alone), where they teaeived

A TRIMMER'S PROGRESS 167

numerous and important visitors. A hard apple was thrown
into the King's coach, and little Cocking George, the
Colonel, was hanged in effigy. The Princess Dowager and
the Earl of Bute (in effigies of a peculiarly offensive nature)
were beheaded by chimney-sweeps and roasted in a bonfire.
On the 8th of May the Mayor and the Alderman were
released, the Artillery Company fired a salute of twenty-one
guns, London was twinkling with gay illuminations, and the
windows of the Speaker's house were smashed to pieces. The
battle of the printers was nearly won.

Colonel Onslow was now as violently opposed to Wilkes
as he had once been warm in supporting him : his biographer,
the fifth Earl of Onslow, says that "his hatred of Wilkes
became almost a ruling passion/* After Wilkes had taken his
seat in the House of Commons (1774), it was Onslow who
most vehemently opposed his motion (1775) for expunging
the Resolutions of 1769 from the Journals of the House.

The rest of Colonel Onslow's career may be summarised
very briefly. As he grew older, he became louder but less
amusing. He supported North and agreed with Johnson
about the rebels in America, whom he would have hanged
or shot as long as a rope or a bullet remained. If we had to
retire, we should retire fighting. . He was called to order
"seven or eight times'* in the course of "an extraordinary
speech" which he delivered in February 1780 against the
proposals for economic reform. It is more to his credit that
he defended North against the attack of Thomas Pitt in
1783. He spoke in the House for the last time on the 22nd
of March 1784, when, in a characteristic tirade, he declared
as he had done so often that we should be well advised
to get rid of Gibraltar. Having retired, he lived at Duns-
borough near Ripley, still active as a Justice of the Peace and
a cock-fighter. He died in 1 792 after an accident in which he
was involved while returning from the Bench in Guildford.
His wife was Jane Thorpe (not an heiress), daughter of the
Reverend Thomas Thorpe of Chillingham in Northumber-
land. From thk nwriage there issued a covey of clergymen.

The following esiiiaate of, little Co^sMg George was
written by the fifth Bodflf.Oqslew (Ckadon JyiSS.): "He

M

x6S THE ONSLOW FAMILY

is a very attractive character. Perfectly straight and honest
. . perhaps coarse in his tastes and language, but he was
virile in both ... a fine specimen of the arrogant but good-
natured aristocracy of the eighteenth century, with a high
sense of duty, but a duty owed to his Country, to his pro-
fession and to his class, not to his countrymen and still less
to mankind in general/' Very attractive, if you like such
people; though scarcely very intelligent.

George Onslow of the Treasury had brought upon him-
self the full torrent of popular hostility after his treachery
to Wilkes, iis wretched action against Home, and his
persecution of the printers. In April 1771 the most venom-
ously scurrilous or personal attacks appeared in the Town
and Country Magazine.

Onslow was there represented as "a whisling^ wou'd-be
statesman" who, though deterr6d by North and asked to
withdraw his motion by the Speaker, insisted upon the
punishment of the printers. He was unable to write "a
common letter in common English" (which was certainly true).
His private morals were shocking. He had "appeared in an
open state of intimacy with * . . a girl of low extraction who
had passed through almost every stage of prostitution,'*
while treating his wife with brutality and refusing to give
her the money necessary for housekeeping. "By G d," he
is alleged to have shouted, "the woman's mad, I could no
more raise five guineas than I could raise the dead," while
hundreds of pounds were available for Miss Lucy. But Lucy
died, and then caine a Miss Power ("a vivacious, pretty
girl"); a little too sharp for George; who said she would
"like vastly to be a maid of honour" This came to the ears of
Grafton, who laughed rudely: "Egad, George, you had better
get her upon the list of necessary women\ it will be more in
character." After this came a Miss Evans, who was "under
the disagreeable necessity of seeing a variety of visitors, of
all ages, statures and complexions ; and their persons were
not less different than their amorous whims and caprices."

It is always difficult to assess the degree of troth, if there
is any, in scurrilities of this description, which were exceed-
ingly common in the eighteenth century. 'Tlieyv^ere a

A TRIMMER'S PROGRESS 169

feature of contemporary journalism from which no one, not
even so respectable a figure as Johnson, was immune* But in
one matter the charge of not being able to write a common
letter in common English the assailant was justified. Of
this I am able to give an amusing illustration from the
Butler MSS.

Towards the end of 1772 George Onslow was under the

impression that heaven knows why he was on the point

of being raised to the Peerage. Did he expect a royal reward

for his action against Wilkes and the printers ? Were there

flattering rumours, or signs of marked approval? At any

rate he wrote to Butler and asked him for a speech or address

which he could read to his constituents in Surrey. Himself

not unhopeful, Butler replies at once (Clandon MSS.):

"I have obeyed your commands, and send you herewith a few

periods, which I think will express your meaning . . . depend upon

my not being either Fool or Scoundrel enough to claim what you

subscribe as mine. I am clearly against confessing, that you solicited

the thing in order to get rid of them" (The first italics, only, are

mine.)

Here follows the sadly premature address to the electors :
"Gentlemen: Having this day accepted of His Majesty's most
gracious intention to call me to the House of Peers, I take the
earliest opportunity of informing you of it & of returning you my
hearty thanks for die great honor I have enjoyed . . . of representing
you in the House of Commons. ... I have had the misfortune indeed
of differing from some in a Case, in which I acted up to my heredit-
ary zeal for the power of the House of Commons. ... I wish you
success in the Election of a more able Representative. . . ."

This charming little exercise in prematurity, the trimmer
untrimmed, as it were, displays the hopes and the incurable
fatuity of Onslow; both of them shared, perhaps, by the
Reverend Jofcn Butler.

Earlier IB the same year (i 772) Onslow had supported a
motion for the relief of Protestant Dissenters, and his friend
the Reverend f ohn had published a pamphlet on the same
theme. But tiie;^imsr was becoming less concerned with

policies were still 'Gol^ABfiyy'Miftds p^ceptabfyCjpescliiced* The

17 o THE ONSLOW FAMILY

interest of Onslow was veering in a manner too obvious from
Westminster to St. James's, and his constituents had no
wish to be represented by a courtier, one who now upheld
the ruinous and reactionary measures of the King. In
August 1773 k e was cautioned in a friendly, though by no
means disinterested, way by John Butler (Clandon MSS*):

Butler is uncertain whether his Lordship at Clandon still drags on
his obstructive life or whether he has "left a Gap in the Creation by
slipping out of it." He proceeds to give some good advice about the
representation of the County: " do nothing hastily with respect to
the County, in case it should please God to deprive us of you as
our Representative. Much will depend upon your setting out in a
new Character. ... I must beg that you would be cautious in the
manner of taking leave of your constituents. You may remember,
we thought of a form last winter. . . . The dirt which has been
thrown upon your Character is dropping off every day . . . avoid
everything that may give the same enemies some handle to pelt
again . . . you know my zeal for you .' *

The zeal of Butler for Onslow was doubtless equalled by
the zeal of Butler for Butler. What is of significance here is
the plain indication that Onslow had made up his mind to
shake off his duties as a local representative, before he him-
self might be shaken off by the electors. He had not been
unaffected by the "dirt" which had been "thrown upon his
character," and his timidity, as well as his anticipated
advancement, made a withdrawal preferable to the disgrace
of rejection.

At the general election of 1774 George Onslow did not
stand. The borough of Guildford was still represented by
his cousin, the Colonel. His wisdom in withdrawing to the
citadel of the Treasury is evident. The activities of Home,
and of other less notable enemies, would have made his
return for the county extremely problematical, and a reverse
in the provincial field would have bruised his pride and
injured his prospects very considerably.

1 Then, in October 1776, came the welcome death of Lord
Onslow of Clandon; great expectations were realised, while
even greater expectations loomed in the golden distance;
and George Onslow, now Lord Onslow and Cntnley> Lord

A TRIMMER'S PROGRESS 171

Lieutenant of Surrey and High Steward of Guildford,
rushed into his estate. (He had been created Baron Cranley
in the May of this year.)

Splendours unimaginable were now contemplated. The
elderly Capability Brown was quickly summoned to Clandon
Park, a man who was now "supporting with dignity the
station of a country gentleman 7 * and was High Sheriff for
Huntingdonshire. To him we owe the lovely group of trees
to the south of the house, the pleasant irregularity of the
lake, so agreeably simulating an emergent river, the stables
of Temple Court, and the twin lodges at the Merrow
entrance to the drive.

This was only a beginning. The evidence all shows that
Onslow threw himself with a feverish disregard of cost and
a wild enthusiasm for display into the improvement and
aggrandisement of his property. This he did with a nervous
flurry of excitement which threatened to injure his health.
The obsequious John Butler declared in a letter to Onslow
that he would be "transported with joy" to see him at
Clandon, "providing for the Comforts, Conveniences and
Magnificence" of the rest of his life (October 1 776). He was
glad to hear that the previous Lady Onslow had "quitted
her hold" and was "rather curious to hear the particulars,
having a clear Idea of her Conduct, without inquiring into
facts." But a little later he wrote with some anxiety (Clandon
MSS.):

"I left you last Monday with a real concern for your health. I am
afraid the infinite confusions you are in will prove more than you
can bear. Is it not of more consequence, that you should be well,
and live long, than that Clandon should be in complete order before
Christmas, or that every thing about die Park should be in its
ri^bt place? I really thought, my Lord, that you looked pale and
worn, and am firmly of opinion, that one week's peace would do as
much for you as Bath and Spa do for other men. I was confirmed in
this opinion by the observations of John Knight * He thinks you
have a great d^al too much upon your mind. . . ."

Not only did Ouslow busy himself about the house and
the park; he vilaiii0Ksly } took pieces of stained glass, bearing
the family arms, out of Craideigh church, and put them into

i 7 2 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

the church at West Clandon. He flung out his money here,
there and everywhere with a heedless prodigality that led
him towards the precipice of ruin. In this way, at least, he
was able to force himself upon the notice of the world.
Mrs. Delany wrote to her sister, Mrs. Port of Ham, in
January 1778 (Correspondence^ 1861-62):

"Lord Onslow who was thought rich (and his lady had no reasons
to think otherwise) is now declared to be an hundred thousand
pound in debt, and they feel so little shame, so little sensible of their
folly and dishonesty, that they appear in the midst of all the numer-
ous assemblies and spectacles as gay and as fine as ever."

The phase of impetuous extravagance came to an end, and
a less enjoyable phase of selling properties took its place. In
1780 the Manor of Esher was disposed of; and Ember
Court and the Manor of Thames Ditton went the same way.
Other sales followed.

Still there were great pleasures in the life of a country
gentleman. Here, from the Clandon MSS., is a letter which
he wrote to a gentleman poacher in 1778 :

"Sir, I was some time ago inform'd that you had frequently
coursed & even shot Hares on the Downs close to my Warren &
Park, but taking it for granted that you would not persevere in a
Practice which none of my Neighbours thought of, knowing that
I wishM to preserve the Hares so close to my own House, I was
unwilling to think it necessary to desire the same attention from
you. But hearing today that you have even this week destroyed
several, I cannot help feeling it somewhat hard that an advantage
which I have hitherto (for the sake of giving the Hares strength)
denied myself & my family should be taken by you. ... I do re-
collect your speaking to me on the Subject last year, & my saying
you was welcome, as far as I had any Power, on any of my Manors,
to amuse yourself when in the Country; & Such a general Indulg-
ence I should never think of refusing you or any body 5 but when I
granted it, I certainly had it not in contemplation that your Request
extended to every place, nor could I suppose that it was to interfere
so much with my own immediate Sport, of which I have never had
any Objection to every body's partaking with me, when I was cmt.
But if what 1 hear be true of your Success this Year I shall n$ Ibe
likely to have the same Entertainment I have been used
t or to entertain any body else."

A TRIMMER'S PROGRESS 173

In the House of Lords, Onslow was never prominent as a
debater. When he spoke, it was not on matters of national
importance, but rather as a courtier desirous of pleasing the
King. Thus, in 1 777 he advocated a plan for discharging the
royal debts (that is, for refunding the cash expended in
bribery) and "launched into encomiums of the personal and
political virtues of the Sovereign"; and in 1778 he voted
against the attendance of the Lords at the funeral of the
Earl of Chatham a touch of petty malice and of ignoble
complaisance that was, of course, gratifying to the King,
who had made it known that a public memorial to Chatham
would be "an offensive measure to me personally/' This
was particularly disgusting in view of Onslow's fulsome
advances to Chatham some years previously.

George Onslow, in his little way, obtained his little
reward. He was, in succession, Comptroller of the House-
hold, and Treasurer, resigning the last appointment in 1 780
when he became a Lord of the Bedchamber,

Of the disasters which now fell upon the country there is
no need to speak in detail here they did not affect the
private schemes of George Onslow. The King's political
influence was rapidly declining, and while England feared a
French invasion the Americans were fighting victoriously
for independence. On the i6th of April 1780 the husky
voice of Mr. Dunning in the House of Commons produced
a startling motion against the increasing influence of the
Crown ; a motion that was carried with a majority of eighteen
against the Government. In June the Gordon riots flamed
and roared in London, and a wild orgy of liquor, fire and loot
was only quelled at last by platoons of grenadiers. In the
following year (1781) the defeat of Cornwallis at Yorktown
ended the American war, and the unhappy North, flinging
out Ms arms in a gesture of despair, cried out "Oh Godl
it is all over I"

Not only was the war lost: the King's political reputation
was lost also: his experiment in absolute monarchy had
ended in tbe gp^t^st, &e costliest and the most degrading
of our national d&tatans. BarBament, mnder ;Nora> had
ceased to be a reprtsertajfc^

i 7 4 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

country was in the gravest peril until the Ministry of Pitt
came to power in 1783.

In 1781 the two surviving sons of George Onslow, Tom
and Edward, were twenty-seven and twenty-three respect-
ively. The first had been the Member for Rye since 1775,
and the second was the Member for Aldeburgh.

Young Tom, a ribald, rhyming fellow, lived with his
father at Clandon; and so did Edward but Edward became
involved in a very disquieting scandal; he had to apply for
the Chiltern Hundreds and fly to France, where he estab-
lished what was known as the " French branch'* of the
family.

Both brothers, more especially Tom, will be discussed in
later chapters. Here it is only necessary to note their exist-
ence* Tom is of much importance in the family record, but
of no importance whatever in general history; while Ned
Onslow is a curiously aberrant individual, romantic, per-
verted, sensitive and by no means uninteresting.

Already fifty, well advanced, though not highly respected,
among the King's men, George Onslow had not yet attained
the full height of his ambition: he was looking forward to
nobler rewards, more splendid honours. As a means to this
end, and with an eye to contingencies and opportunities, he
was now making hopeful and successful advances to the
Prince of Wales.

This entirely reprehensible though captivating youth
came of age in 1783 and established himself in Carlton
House; thus escaping with delight from the "palace of
piety," the humiliating restrictions and embarrassing dull-
ness of his father. His behaviour became outrageous. Much
of his time was devoted to the pursuit of selected females
of any rank or no rank at all. He called his own sister, the
Princess Royal, "that bandy-legged bitch "; he drank him-
self into complete insensibility with his uncle Cumberland;
he went about, in disguise, to the resorts of infamy; he
brawled in the gardens at Ranelagh, causing the worst of
scandals; he whipped his way to Brighton, driving three
horses and rudely refused his father's kindly though not
exciting offer to play a game of chess. He sang> ke played

A TRIMMER'S PROGRESS 175

the 'cello, lie had a taste for the arts. When my respectable
ancestor, Mr. Papendiek, played his flute at the Prince's
musical parties, he felt himself obliged to protest when there
was "much disorder," because he attended personally on
the Queen and the Princesses. Whereupon the royal rake
shouted hilariously, " I'm glad the Queen has an honest man
in her service; and when Fm King why, damme, Papen-
diek! you shall be my Sergeant Trumpeter."

There is no doubt whatever that Onslow had confided his
hopes to his friend John Butler, who was now Bishop of
Oxford. Writing in November 1784 the Bishop observes:
"The circumstances you mention of a strong mark of favor
from the P. is very important to the object you have natur-
ally at heart. I wish success to that & every other means that
may contribute to so desirable an end." He refers to "diffi-
culties" that will have to be overcome.

The Bishop's allusion to "a strong mark of favor" pos-
sibly refers to the Prince's visits to Clandon, or to his
friendship with Tom Onslow, whose company he found
(for a while) congenial and amusing.

But George Onslow was concerned in a matter of the
utmost importance to Prinny his marriage to Mrs. Fitz-
herbert. That he should have been concerned in this affair
reveals the fullest extent of his treachery and the degree of
intimacy which existed between himself and the Prince.

The story though not Onslow's part in it is well
known. In the summer of 1784 the Prince fell in love (a
totally new experience for the methodical sensualist) with
Mrs. Fitzherbert, a beautiful and respectable widow. Find-
ing that he had many scruples to overcome, he resolved upon
a theatrkal stratagem: Mrs. Fitzherbert was to be conveyed
to Carlton House, whore she would find him self-wounded
and almost literally dying for love. This appalling spectacle,
and the realisation that she alone was the remedy, would be
likely enough to obtain a surrender.

A deputation was therefore sent from Carlton House to
Mrs. Fitzherbert. It consisted of Dr. Keith (a surgeon),
Lord Onslow, Lord : SoiitiiamptoB and Mr, Edward Bou-
verie. Mrs. Fitzherbert* r accompanied by tfae Duchess of

176 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

Devonshire and the entire deputation, went to Carlton
House, where she was overcome by the sight of the almost
expiring Prinny, and some sort of deposition was drawn up
and signed by all present. On the following day Mrs. Fitz-
herbert left the country and remained abroad for more than
a yean When she returned it was understood that she had
agreed to marry the Prince. As the Prince was not yet
twenty-five it was impossible for him to marry under the
terms of the Royal Marriage Act without the consent of the
King: that is to say, he could not marry at all, for no such
consent was possible. On the ist of December 1785 he was
"united" to Maria Fitzherbert (a Catholic) by "a Protestant
clergyman/* Her uncle and brother were the witnesses, and
all the members of the original Carlton House deputation
were present.

It is necessary here to stress the peculiarly base conduct of
Onslow in this transaction. He had helped the son to accom-
plish an infamy which caused the most agonising distress to
the father. His position as a Lord of the Bedchamber to the
King made his conduct even more execrable. To serve his
own purpose he had been guilty of a double treachery, a
culmination of the trimming practice for which no term of
opprobrium could be too severe. Even among courtiers,
even among those habitually practised in the snaky ways of
intrigue, this conduct was intensely shocking. It was never
made known to the betrayed Sovereign, whose confidence in
Onslow was unimpaired.

At Clandon, up to 1781 (when Edward Onslow had to
leave so precipitately) the family lived in harmony, and it
seems clear that George Onslow, however unscrupulous in
pursuing his personal ambition, was at least a tolerable
father. There is evidence to show that he was liked by his
two sons. For example, there are the rollicking letters in
rhyme (Clandon MSS.) which Tom wrote from Clandon to

his father when Lord Onslow was at Bath:

/*

"From the Library fire (where no Virtues we boast
But abusing our friends, while our arses we roast;
Where we laugh at your absence; and think with coutciem
Tbat eleven days more may complete your return^

h : A. C. Cooper Ltd.)

George,FirstEarlofOnslow(i73i-i8i4). By Thomas Stewardson. From
the picture in the .possession of the Earl of Onslow.

A TRIMMER'S PROGRESS 177

Where we murder our time, as the fancy shall suit,

In polite conversation and decent dispute;

That's to say that He only has claim to the Laurel,

Who can swear the most oaths in the course of the Quarrel),

To the realms of King Bladud, whose whimsical son

Gave a tun of Bath Waters by way of good fan,

I write

Mrs. Onslow but yesterday sent you a letter
To say that we spent our rime better and better:
A position, my friend, which I own by the bye,
Not to mince matters much, was a damnable lie, , , ,
Cloacina invites me, and while my guts grumble,
Believe me to be, Your affectionate humble ."

Ribald, if you like, but certainly indicating a most friendly
relation between George Onslow and Ids son. Another
rhyming letter, also of the same period (not later than 1781)
and written in the same circumstances, contains a jocose
description of his brother Ned, who was at Bath with Lord
Onslow* Tom's name for his brother was " great Garbage,"
and he showed a like propensity for juvenile rudeness in
finding names for everyone he knew. Of Garbage he draws
a lengthy portrait, which, for more than one reason, I have

"What a fat ars'd Alexis; so gay and so able,
Yet so awkward he throws down tea, partner and table.
When he hands about Coffee, I really cou'd wish
He'd prevail on his sleeve not to drink half the dish:
And believe me, there's ne'er a coquette or a flirt,
But prefers simple sugar and cream to his shirt
So Garbage may sigh himself thin as a lath,
Tho* they tell me he looks most delectably fet in
His velveret Coat and his breeches of satin:
In the which he's so fine at the ball and assembly,
When he pours out their tea, and he dances so nimbly,
That the girls all observe 'he can't fail to delight us,
Such an elegant motion he has of St. Vitus' . .
Miss Lovet declares when first Garbage survey'd her,

So deck'd out from his Zenith quite down to his Nadir

With an arse like an Ox, yet she ne'er ckpp'd her eyes on
One who shook it so parallel to its horizon ,'*

17$ THE ONSLOW FAMILY

Events were now tending (from his own point of view) to
justify the withdrawal of George Onslow from the murky
turmoil of politics to the more private and less perilous
manoeuvres of a well-placed courtier. The second Rocking-
ham Ministry, the Shelburne Ministry and the unscrupulous
Fox-North Coalition followed each other between 1782
and 1783,

Although the Whigs were still numerically as well as
morally and intellectually superior to the Tory party, they
were still disunited* None the less, they began to sweep the
grosser, more stinking forms of corruption out of the House*
A series of measures were introduced which effectively
diminished the autocratic powers of the Crown and put a
stop to the monstrous practices of bribery which for so long
had reduced or seduced English politics to a mere system
of jobbery, and of place by purchase.

The King employed for a time the most dishonourable,
the stupidest of methods in a last endeavour to re-establish
himself, his party and his policy. He broke the Coalition,
unscrupulous as it was, by an even more unscrupulous piece
of trickery: he circulated a note in the House of Lords
declaring that any peers who voted in favour of Fox's India
Bill would be considered by him as his own personal
enemies. The Bill was thrown out. But the King, in defeating
the Fox-North Coalition, had defeated himself. If Pitt may
be said to have introduced a phase of "constructive Tory-
ism," he 'did so at the expense of the "King's Friends" as
well as of the old Whigs. The King was now politically
extinct and his party disbanded for ever* The Commons
were resolved, whatever their presiding faction, that no
British monarch should ever again control their debates.

How fortunate for Onslow that he was no longer at the
mercy of the jumping cats! How fortunate that he was now
equally in favour with a crazy King and a rollicking Prince!
Whatever happened, he was on the road to honours though
not to honour.

CHAPTER XIV

Parson to Patron

I HAVE already quoted some of the letters written by
John Butler to his friend and patron, George Onslow. The
large collection of these letters preserved in the Clandon
archives made it clear to me that Butler was a character well
worthy of attention in his own right.

The published material relating to this ecclesiastical place-
hunter is neither plentiful nor easily discovered; the letters
not only illustrate the machinations and extremely varied
qualities of Butler himself, but they also form one of the
most diverting of all possible commentaries upon the most
important years of George Onslow's life (1766-1801); and
I have thought it well worth while to devote one chapter to
the Bishop and his letters. (Moreover, I think it may be said
that these letters are essential documents for the history of
the Onslow family.)

It will be seen that Butler, though possibly a rogue, was a
rogue of strangely insinuating charm, frequently witty,
sometimes unreservedly cordial, and in old age demanding
(not in vain) a sentiment of respect that will even border
upon affection. Sleek and subtle though he was, charlatan as
he may have been, there is a basic humour in the man which
counters our distaste for his obvious trimming or toadying,
In some ways he anticipates a character from Trollope, some
Barchester blackguard; but, as he is a real man, he is not
consistently villainous; and he is perfectly frank (unlike
Onslow). in showing his cards.

John Butler was born at Hamburg in 1717. There is no
record of his education, and he was never, so far as we know^
at any University* In later life he received the degree of
LL.D. from Cambridge, which does not seem to itave in-
volved very much diffictaltf for anyone. Hi youth is obscure.

179

!8o THE ONSLOW FAMILY

He was at one time secretary to Bilson Legge, Chancellor
of the Exchequer, of whom (according to Woodfall) he
wrote and published Some Account. He was also tutor in the
family of a banker, Mr. Young. His first wife is described as
"a lady who kept a school at Westminster," and it is obvious
that Butler was at that time an inconspicuous young man of
low social standing* But his second wife was the sister and
co-heiress of Sir Charles Vernon of Farnham.

Butler seems now, in his later thirties, to have made his
way with astonishing rapidity. He was described by those
who knew him as "a man of mild disposition," but he evi-

dently possessed the
advantages of a charlatan with a capacity for intrigue and a
lack of squeamishness, He took Orders (or professed to have
taken Orders), and his preaching drew large congregations
in London. In 1754 ,when he was thirty-seven, he published
a sermon which he had preached in St. Paul's to the Sons of
the Clergy, describing himself on the title-page as " Chaplain
to the Princess Dowager of Wales." This appointment was
again cited in 1758 when another sermon was published,
and he was "Minister of Great Yarmouth." His advance was
maintained, and in 1760 he was Prebendary of Winchester.

From this time, with a rapturous flexibility, Butler sprang
here and there within the domain of politics. In 1762 he
published a smart little squib on The Cocoa Tree> signed
"A Whig," in which he fell upon Bute and his Ministry:
a change indeed from the days when he was chaplain to the
Princess Dowager, The same exhilarating flexibility led him
towards private encounters of a most surprising nature.
When the Bucks Militia were quartered at Winchester he
made the acquaintance of Colonel John Wilkes, and the
acquaintance developed into a cordial friendship.

This friendship was one of the causes which produced the
untenable theory that Butler wrote the Letters of Junius.
In WoodfalFs 1814 edition of the Letters there is a remark-
able communication from a friend of the Bishop's to "a high
official character/' He says: "Mr. Wilkes had been intimate
with Bishop Butler . . . and from some very curious cc^t*
current circumstances, he (Wilkes) had strong reaso&s for

PARSON TO PATRON 181

considering that the Bishop was the author, and I had some
reasons for conjecturing the same. Yet I must confess . . .
I think I should require more substantial proofs*"

Butler himself was well aware of these absurd imputations,
and he referred to them in his letters to George Onslow. In
October 1769 he wrote;

"I almost forgot to tell you that Mrs. Aislabie wrote to her Sister
to know, whether I am the Author of Junius, some Gentlemen
having affirmed it very confidently. ... I do not like this Compli-
ment to my Abilities at the Expense of my Morals, My friends
know better, but as the Report is strongly propagated in Yorkshire,
I suspect it comes from Persons, who wish to mislead the Scent from
the real Author. . . . However . . * the Suspicion may screen me

from other Suspicions, which might not be so confidently denied/'

i

What these "other suspicions" may happen to be, in view
of Butler's complicated and subtle manoeuvres, is not easily
decided. But the rumours persisted, and on the 26th of
December of this year (1769) he is even more seriously
perplexed and annoyed. He accuses Junius of going beyond
the limits of seditious libel and of summoning people to " the
rebel standard/' And he is particularly indignant that people
of sound views and of correct judgment should "admire the
language" of this detestable rogue. There follows a remark-
able passage:

"I am fully of opinion with a noble friend of yours, that if Junius
were analysed, he would be found to be rather insignificant. I am
provoked to say so much of him by a letter I had from a friend last
week, who tells me, that a noble Earl, who has been Secretary of
State, declares no Man in England to be capable of it but your
humble Servant. As the Earl probably knows the Author, I am sure
my name is made use of to mislead the scent after him* I am
enraged at this, tho* it cannot hurt me, as my most valuable friends
know my innocence and know full well the size of my abilities. But
tho* I confess the fellow very superior to me, I cannot bear to pass
for sudb aa Assassin. I hope you will find him out a fartriight
hence, and lay Bands upon him and all the printers/*

It may be &$$iij&ed that "the noble Earl who had been
Secretary of State v> was;GrenviMe; though how it came
about that anyone aMd ik&fe seriously ixta^Md' that Butler

i&2 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

was the author of those terrible Letters is almost as much of
a mystery as that of the hidden author himself. Nor can it
be explained how the style of Butler, who had only published
a few very ordinary political tracts and a sermon or two,
could have been so well known and so highly rated; or how
so demure and inconspicuous a churchman could have been
suspected of such perilous audacity. These incredible sus-
picions must have been extremely distasteful to Onslow as
well, who was known to be the friend of Butler, and they
probably added a quantum of heat and resolution to his own
attack upon Wilkes and the printers.

In any case, it should have been sufficiently clear that
Butler did not possess as a writer the sturdy thump and
rattle, the startling chromatic virtuosity of the Junian style.

That Wilkes, of all men, should have given countenance
to this absurd theory is indeed astonishing, and Butler him-
self was justly annoyed. His mere denials and his attitude of
shocked respectability would not in themselves have proved
anything, coming as they did from a man to whom duplicity
was a familiar device. But in this instance, whether he was
genuinely annoyed or not, the denials were sincere.

Although the earliest of Butler's letters to Onslow in the
Clandon collection are dated 1766, when Butler was forty-
nine and his patron a mere thirty-five, it is impossible to say
when their association began, and the serene place-hunting
frankness of the first of these collected letters (already
quoted) would indicate that the friendship existed from a
much earlier period. Butler was living at Farnham for many
years, and his approach to George Onslow was almost
certainly by way of Clandon, where he visited, and disliked,
the third Baron Onslow.

In due course Butler was appointed chaplain to Hayter,
Bishop of London, at some date prior to 1762. And here it
is necessary to quote at length an anonymous letter sent in a
disguised hand to Grenville (then the chief Minister) in
May 1764 and printed in the Grentrille Papers in 1852:

"Sir, His Majesty having determined to give the Bishopric of

London to Dr. Terrick, a man in himself most unexceptionable, it

is hoped by those who regard his Majesty's honour, that care will

PARSON TO PATRON 183

be taken to prevent the Bishop's taking into his patronage Dr.
Butler, a particular friend of the infamous Wilkes, with whom he
lived in the closest connexion two summers at Winchester, whilst
he was engaged in the North Briton. It is feared the Bishop may
make him his Chaplain, or show distinguished marks of his fevour
to this man, from his intimacy with him in Bishop Hayter's time;
to whom he was a tool, and had a great hand in blowing the flame
betwixt the said Bishop and Lord Harcourt on one side, and those
on the other side, in the family at Leicester House, where he acted
as Hayter's spy; and has since distinguished himself by writing two
pamphlets against the present Ministry; who has often vindicated
in conversation that infamous North Briton, No. 45$ who at first
shammed Orders; then was preferred, when he got real Orders, by
Sir J. Astley, a true Blue, and who is now acting the part of a
Whig, so he calls himself; but he is much nearer to the character
of a Jesuit."

Bishop Hayter (1702-62) was at one time, after the death
of Frederick, Prince of Wales, preceptor in the Princess
Dowager's household to the youthful George. He would
thus have been brought into contact with Butler, who had
the status of a chaplain in the same household.

Assuming that the substance of this anonymous warning
is true, as it appears to be, we have here the portrait of a
double-dealer so varied and so unpredictable in posture that
he seems to have no central policy apart from that of tem-
porary interest. His friendship with Onslow is thus explic-
able on grounds of affinity: die veerings of Onslow corre-
sponded exactly with Butler's own shiftings, and the cynical
frankness of the Jesuitical parson must have been well
matched by the trimmings and the treacheries of his patron.
It was admittedly through Onslow's direct influence that
Butler was made one of the King's chaplains, and afterwards
(in 1769) Archdeacon of Surrey.

You may, if you please, describe the parson and his patron
as two rogues, though so harsh a term does injustice to their
confederated subtlety. But an awareness of mutual roguery
does not prohibit, and may even encourage, the growth of
affection. And if tibese two men are indeed to be described as
rogues, it is impossible -to resist the conclusion that Butler
was by far tbe more coogpoiajL There was drollery about

THE ONSLOW FAMILY

his most outrageous innuendo, a laughing transparency of
intention, greatly preferable to the solemn pretences of
George.

Butler was at least honest enough to profess no scruples
about the game he was playing; and witty enough to play
with an elegance that occasionally produced an engaging
liveliness of style, a supple turn or cavort of true felicity.

George Onslow, on the other hand, was a man who
fluttered about in the dusty gloom and anxiety of a situation
that was never quite clear to himself. An element of nervous
casuistry made him wish to believe that, in all his odious
machinations, he was only representing under many strange,
bedraggled and apparently discrepant forms an indescribable
something or other, both constant and elusive, which could
still be recognised as the offspring of Whiggism. We have
seen a surprising and interesting example of this lumbering
casuistry in his retrospective thoughts about the Wilkes
affair. His aim was to find unity in ubiquity, to be flexible
without the loss of apparent firmness, to be honest, or to
appear to be honest, without the sacrifice of advantage.

In all of these futile intentions Onslow could be sure of
the tact and the obliging pretences of Butler. He could also
be sure of a sentiment which appears in these letters as a
faintly cynical friendship. That it certainly was a friendship
is evident from the tone of the letters to be quoted pres-
ently which Butler wrote in extreme old age: in these
letters the cynicism has evaporated, in spite of some rather
stilted flattery; and I think Butler was right when, in a final
appeal that his Jetters might be destroyed, he speaks of them
as "letters of warm friendship/'

During the American war, Butler published a number of
pamphlets under the signature of "Vindex," in which he
very naturally supported the Government and the King. In
1 772 he issued A Letter to the Protestant Dissenting Ministers
who had asked for further relief in the matter of subscrib-
ing to the Thirty-Nine Articles. This pamphlet may be
taken as an example of Butler's considered style:

"Your Idea of the Toleration you desire is, a full liberty to jcesieh

Doctrines contrary to those, which have been esteemed Qmstian

PARSON TO PATRON 185

doctrines in all ages. . , Have you not heard of Confusions, arising
from diversity of opinion, warmly maintained, upon essential
points ? . . . The nature and design of civil Society are clearly
against you ... If you think fit to rally after your late defeat . . .
to treat the legal Toleration you enjoy as a Trifle. ... If this be
your future conduct, you will be considered as Men, who do not
follow after the things which make for Peace . . . and who, in their
Zeal against the Establishment, are more vehement and bitter, than
any Members of the established Church appear to be against them.*'

Clearly it is evident, even from these brief extracts, that
Butler never had the pen of a Junius.

His reward for supporting the North administration, and
supplying George Onslow with turtles, information and
advice, arrived in 1777 when he was appointed Bishop of
Oxford. His professions were now those of an enthusiastic
Tory, and ten years after his translation he was preaching to
the House of Lords on the death of the royal martyr, Charles
Stuart. At least he was not wholly deficient in scholarship,
and assisted Woide in copying the Alexandrine MS. of the
Bible. He seems also to have been reasonably diligent in
carrying out his episcopal duties. He succeeded Lord James
Beauclerc in 1788 as Bishop of Hereford, and died in 1802
at the age of eighty-five.

It may be that a rigorous moralist will find little if any-
thing to be said in Butler's favour; but those who can look
with tolerance upon the frailties of men, and those to whom
the deeper turpitudes of the eighteenth century are not
unknown, may take a broader view. As a minister of religion
Butler cannot be regarded with the highest respect; though
here again one should remember that the Church in his time
was lethargic to the point of exhaustion and was little more
than a field in which men of extremely moderate abilities
and of dubious piety contended with each other for lucrative
livings. He was a scheming, political priest, rather Romafi
than English; in bis passion for the intrigues of court or
council, his readiness to play many parts, and his dfcligh$ in
accomplished rifc^liry. He foujid in George OEs|G%'ia man
obviously mteodiftl J^ffroyiieiic to, be, ; ^ j^^|>^ailar
patron; not a man'wa^^^pmed^l 1 &ri|^& could' u$e

i86 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

for his own purposes by means of concealed or superior
cunning; but a man to whom his own frankness would be
entirely comprehensible and not in the slightest degree
shocking.

The gifts, the little blandishments, the jesting flattery;
all are understood equally well by both. To begin with, here
is the turtle:

"This letter comes upon a subject intirely new. I have just received
a letter from Jamaica, acquainting me, that a Turtle is consigned
to me on board a Ship which is now in the River. I wish She had
arrived sooner, that you might have treated the Grand Jury with
it I beg your acceptance of it." (i 768.)

A little later he says : "You are indeed my own, and cannot
depart from that relation to me, till you divest yourself of the
whole of your Character/* He then adds nervously, "I hope
none of our letters will miscarry."

Butler had no children, but his household was enlivened
by the presence of a niece, Louisa Yates, of whom he was
extremely fond. "The outlandish girl," he calls her play-
fully. He writes in December 1769:

"My Niece is as vain, as she can be, of the notice you and Mrs.
Onslow honoured her with. She has been talking Politics incessantly
since you left us, and has so well remembered what passed, that she
asked a Girl who visited her with false locks in her hair, whether
those locks were not false Rhetoric/*

In 1770, when Onslow was being assailed in the papers,
John Butler becomes appropriately indignant. He has seen
"an infamous paper 7 ' which is being distributed in Guild-
ford, presumably by the supporters of Sir Joseph Mawbey,
whose ambition it is "to thrust you out of the County and
himself in."

This was among the early intimations, so hurtful to
Onslow, that he was losing popularity among his constitu-
ents; and it seems that injurious reports about the finances
of the Claridon household (the household of the third Baron)
were being circulated as well: "This," Butler had observed,
"is only the malice against you diversified."

If the provincial influence of Onslow was declining (and

PARSON TO PATRON 187

it certainly was), there could be no doubt of his advantageous
position as one of the King's men. Accordingly, Butler was
requested by the Bishop of Winchester to ask Onslow
whether he would "apply to Lord North in behalf of his
Son in Law, Sir Chaloner Ogle, who tells him the Command
of the Fleet in the Jamaica Station is now vacant, and that
he, being a Captain rather high upon the List, wishes to be
appointed to it." And then, to complete this agreeable trans-
action in the most satisfactory bargaining way: "The Bishop
adds, that if the favor should be granted, he shall be happy
to oblige my Lord North in return, whenever he has it in his
power." Thus, let us hope, these gentlemen jobbers were
suitably rewarded. The episode is extremely significant as
an indication of the influence in the highest of circles which
Onslow possessed at this time.

To Onslow's expressions of concern about the writings of
Junius, he replies airily "leave these fellows to the Devil
and themselves/' It is most unwise to be unduly excited;
and he writes in September 1771 :

"I observe in your letter yesterday, that you are in a confounded
passion with somebody. Let me beg you for many reasons to stifle
it, and by no means appear to know more than you see. ... I am
glad to hear of the medical opinions ."

He stayed with the Onslows at Ember Court, where he
was made so comfortable and was fussed over so agreeably
that he was "in the dumps" when he left. But the social
pleasures of Ember Court were never allowed to interfere
with plans for preferment. " The prospect at a certain place/*
Butler demurely observes, "seems rather improved during
my absence. I made enquiries from one or two knowing
hands, and they gave me such answers as were satisfactory
to me, and approached very nearly to the final answer I look
for with impatience/'

When, in 1771, George Onslow and his wife install their
son, young TOID* at Cambridge, the Archdeacon hopes that
" Mrs. Onslow left her Son in the hands of an accomplished
Tutor and chast bednodker." In the same letter he says that
he is "busy considering wfof I subscribed to the $9 Articles

iSS THE ONSLOW FAMILY

thirty years ago." He adds, with professional sapience, "I
hope this little fence of Articles will be kept up."

The elements of a jocular friendship are frequently com-
bined with elements of the most frank and easy solicitation.
Thus, in June 1772, Butler writes:

"I thank you most cordially for your kind attention to me in

1 acquainting me with your safe return to Guildford at a dangerous

hour, when you might have been overturned by your postilion,

plundered by a Robber, or seduced by an harlot May I take the

liberty of reminding you of my friend Mr. Barnett's Ambition to
be a Member of the Council in Jamaica. I have no motive for
wishing it but pure friendship."

The general tone of Butler's letters, particularly those of
the later period, tends to become less formal, more friendly,
more genially illuminated by the flickering of a graceful wit.
Here are two passages from letters written in 1773, prettily
displaying the charm and elegance that were packed into the
Archdeacon's many-sided character:

"The town being at present deserted by Statesmen, Courtiers,
Lawyers, Nabobs, fine Ladies and well bred Clergymen, you must
excuse me if I supply the want of events by Words. I might indeed
create matter for your entertainment, but you will find that much
better done by those excellent Papers, from which men of all Ranks,
Principles and Religions derive the daily sustenance of their minds.
Blessed be the government which lets this intellectual Manna drop
down upon our Pates every morning. . . . The Queen Regent of
this house presents her Compliments." And later: "The Scotch
gardener is arrived, and has Centered upon his Office with a cool
Alacrity. He has already insinuated himself into the affection of my
Wife, by promising her early Roses. I shall not wonder, if in a year
or two he should supplant John Knight, and clandestinely marry
my Niece. I have given her all proper precautions against his pene-
trating eye, and flatter myself she has pride enough to resist his
ambition. But at all events, we shall have early Roses. ... As you
sometimes want paper at Brighthelmstone, I beg you to consider
this as mere paper, and make use of it accordingly,"

At the end of this year (1773) Butler professes to be tired
of seeking after places or promotions (and it must be allowed
that he had been slowed-up very considerably) and resolves
that he will "wrap himself in literary amusements/' In fact.

PARSON TO PATRON 189

he has no intention of doing anything of the sort : he is but
fifty-six a mere juvenile in the holy calling and the way to
preferment. We have already seen with what anxiety he and
his friend Onslow are waiting for the demise of Lord Onslow
of Clandon, who is now, parlously though prematurely, in
the condition of an invalid. The little jokes about his joy-
fully anticipated demise are not in the best imaginable taste,
but sometimes there is a grinning, roguish honesty about
them which tends to disarm the censorious. The hopes
founded upon the change of ownership at Clandon are
naturally combined with hopes of preferment; for George
Onslow will have much greater influence when he has
floated up to the Peerage. And so Butler writes (in three
separate letters) in 1774:

" I hope you will remember me when you have any intelligence true
or false. I have heard none since you left me, but that the weather
is cold, that Rheumatic disorders go about, that Mackerell are now
in perfection, that Pease will soon come in ... that Park will not sit
much longer. A very worthy Clergyman at Winchester has just
had an apoplectic fit, and will die. How strangely that fit has mis-
taken its direction! These observations occur to me much oftener
than I hope they will some time hence. . . . Lady Onslow dined with
us last Thursday, I inquired very affectionately after my Lord. She
told me he was better, but had been ill lately. You may imagine
how deeply I was affected. ... I shall ask no man to make my
transition easy, having had much disobligation to the Whigs."

This comment upon the subject of " transition " is pleas^-
antly significant. The Archdeacon, like his patron, is ready
to set sail on a Tory course if it suits him better.

In 1774, acting as a zealous watch-dog for Onslow, the
Archdeacon warns him that he has been "marked out as the
Author of the Middlesex measures*' a reference to the
Wilkes afiair and begging him not to appear at Epsom:
that is, not to show himself at the county political meeting.
By this time, it would seem, Onslow had already made up
his mind not to face the electors: he knew very well that his
reception as ^ titm-coat would be extremely unfavourable
to the family interest. It therefore happened ; that Wilkes
went into Parliament apd ;Q%sk>iW wept.

i 9 o THE ONSLOW FAMILY

Well might the Archdeacon cry with appropriate in-
dignation (October 1774): "Wilkes Lord Mayor & Mem-
ber for Middlesex!!!"

By 1776 the man who had resolved to "wrap himself in
literary amusements" was eager to push forward again on
the way to promotion. His friend Onslow was now "my
dear Lord/* with a corresponding increase of weight; and
the health of the more eminent men in the Church becomes
a matter of close and anxious consideration. The more
imminent the demise of these excellent men, the more
superbly inflated are the hopes of Archdeacon Butler. All
the signs of decay or disease are noted with ripening and
vigorous optimism, and recorded with complacent accuracy:

"Our Bishop . . . heard that the attack was followed by spitting
blood. I have known that cured, but not at 73. A week or fortnight
will be decisive. . . . The Abp of York is declining apace. The
powers of his Stomach are gone. . . . The Bp of Sarum is hastening
after him. There are others in the same road. So that something
will probably happen before Christmas, I care not what, but think
the first vacancy, whatever it is, will be the most desirable. . . . The
Abp of York is by this time out of breath. London has the refusal
of it, and has taken time to consider. You know how that ends in
the case of a Woman."

It should of course be remembered that the Archdeacon
is not necessarily in hopes of rising to York. What happens
when a member of the hierarchy dies is a general move-up
and a new shifting of places: a scamper in the holy musical-
chairs. This is when ambitious people like Butler try to
jockey themselves (and why not?) into a favourable position.
And Butler did not depend wholly upon the interest of
George Onslow: he trotted off to Lambeth, where he chatted
with chaplains and was apprised of the latest moves in the
game.

Then came some not unreasonable hopes of getting the
Bishopric of Oxford. Too confident of this, Archdeacon
Butler signed himself " J. Oxford elect." Like Onslow in
1772, he was congratulating himself prematurely. Many
polite regrets were expressed at Lambeth, and assurances
of a move at the next opportunity. " So there/' writes Butler,

PARSON TO PATRON 191

"there is an end of all the nonsensical part of the Dream.
If the rest should ever become more substantial than it
appears to me at present, I shall take to it calmly, for the
passionate enjoyment of it is impossible after this rub."

Whether the promotion to Oxford was "passionately
enjoyed" or not, when it came shortly afterwards, it certanily
produced, for a time, a noteworthy pomposity of style. A
Bishop with six chaplains is a person of consequence, par-
ticularly when he is more than half a man of the world with
a house in Hill Street,

With all his mundane levity and his frolicsome tricks,
Butler cannot be accused of neglecting his profession. He
was Bishop of Oxford for eleven years, and there is no evi-
dence to show that he did less than is usually done by the
occupants of that see. "I am engaged for six Sundays to
come," he wrote in 1779, "to preach about the Diocese for
the Society for propagating the Gospel, lest Mr. Gibbon
should intirely stop the progress of it." He considered that
Mr. Gibbon had been "demolished as an original historian"
by Mr. Davies who was honoured by an interview with
the King, and afterwards annihilated by Gibbon in his
Vindication*

He was "a little dumped" by the "bad news from the
West Indies" (the loss of Dominica and St. Lucia to the
French), and was perturbed by "some apprehension . . *
that when the dark nights come, the French will find their
way over to our coast," though not fearful of anything very
serious from "the operations of an enemy, which depend
upon the absence of the moon." When the outcome of the
American war could not be concealed, he observes cautiously
and sadly, "These are not times to hazard opinions upon
paper*"

By 1 780 the Bishop had moved into the extremely fashion-
able quarter of Grosvenor Square, where one of his neigh-
bours was the expiring Mr. Thrale. From this address Lord
Onslow gets a letter from a new Butler correspondent, that
"outrageous girl/' the Bishop's niece, Louisa:

" My Lord, I should not ha$e ventured to address a letter to your

Lordship, if my case had m& bee very hard and pressing, and your

i 9 2 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

Lordship has always been the Protector of distressed Virgins. You
did me the honor to promise my Unkle, that you would procure
three tickets from the Ld Chamberlain for the Ball, one for myself,
and two for the ladies, who undertook to guard me, for, I blush to
own it, no less than two are sufficient. I have feasted upon this
expectation ever since. My daily employments have been disturbed
by the Idea, and I have dreamt of it every night. Yesterday I was in
hopes to have seen your Lordship at my Uncle's, but there my un-
happy disappointment began. You sent an excuse. . . . Under this
uneasiness of mind I applied to Mr. Davies, and prevailed with this
good man to go to the Ld Chamberlain's office, where he was told,
all the tickets were gone. I thought I should drop down at the news,
but recovered a little and begged him to go in your name to the Ld
Chamberln, whose answer was, that your Lordship had not applied
to him, and that the gallery is fall. I cannot express the misery that
has possessed me all over at this unhappy intelligence. I have lost
the relish of all other enjoyments. Even if your Lordship ,were to
recommend me to a substantial, agreeable, tractable young husband,
I am doubtful whether at this present writing I should think it full
compensation. Your Lordship can feel for others more than most
men, especially for an unfortunate, dejected, desolate, destitute,
helpless young woman. Let me beg you to exert this amiable dis-
position of yours in my behalf. I am a real object of Charity. The
poor at your gate cannot want your bounty more than I do in this
my distress. I humbly beg you to take the whole with all its circum-
stances into your consideration, and I am sure, if you do, you are
too good to refuse to get me the tickets, or the husband, as above
described, which may possibly give me comfort."

This letter is dated January I4th from Grosvenor Square.
No doubt Uncle John had a hand in the writing of it.

A very strange letter is dated 23rd of May 1 78^ in which
the Bishop complains of scandalous rumours about himself:

"It distracts me day and night to find Nonsense and Illnature so
prevalent in the world. The happiness I had planned is interrupted,
if not defeated, ahd one slight natural slip is treated, as if it were
a Complication of Guilt.'*

I am unable to explain this, Butler was now sixty-five; he
had lived down the scandal of his association with Wilkes
twenty years previously and was occupying a distinguished
position in the Church. One cannot suppose that he was

PARSON TO PATRON 193

overtaken by some delayed political infamy, and it seems
likely that the "natural slip" was a private affair.

When, in his seventy-first year. Butler was translated
from the see of Oxford to that of Hereford, the move could
hardly be regarded as promotion, and the distance from his
friends must have been a grievance to one so fond of being
in close touch with the affairs of the temporal world. Writing
to Onslow on the ist of May 1 78 8 he speaks of the " trouble
and confusion " in which he has been living for a fortnight;
but he does not repine, " I am seated in my final home in this
world, and as well pleased as if the name of it had been
Durham or Winchester/'

No Bishop had preached in Hereford for five years, and
the state of the cathedral was appalling:

"The Cathedral is a most melancholy ruin. I walked with hazard

and difficulty over all the rubbish. We flatter ourselves it will be

restored in two or three years ."

Butler now described himself as "a man at a distance from
the whirlpool/' He deplored the illness, the mental decay of
"our excellent King." He foresaw innumerable evils. More
urgently than ever, he begged Onslow to commit his letters
to the flames. He wrote in confidence; he wrote in order to
"ease his pillow"; he wrote in freedom and assurance to a
friend in whose honour he placed his trust.

The Bishop saw nothing but harm in the "Arguments
against the Slave trade," He was not inhumane: it was pre-
cisely because of his percipient, prophetic and warm human-
ity that he wished the trade to continue (what did he really
know, one may ask, about the sickening horrors of the
slave-ships and the "Middle Passage"?). "The great
Champions of Humanity," he insisted, "will commit more
Cruelty in carrying this inhuman Law than they charge
upon the Planters." His views upon the French Revolution
are sounder, though curiously deflected:

"The Frendi affairs are the result of all the vanity, levity, folly,
treachery arid felse policy of that devoted nation for a century past.
But the American business has brought on their punisfiment forty
or fifty years sooner, by poisoning the frivolous understandings of
the people, and turning them from Puppies into Banditti."

i 9 4 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

'The Bishop's niece, Louisa, married in 1791 ; the health
of his wife began to cause anxiety; and it was not long before
he felt that he was "crumbling to dust by degrees." Yet it
cannot be said that he was querulous, or deficient in courage.
There is a gallantry and resource in his later letters which
reveal the finer side of a character that was not wholly
commendable.

When Onslow was concerned with raising the Surrey
Militia (once more embodied as a safeguard against invasion
or so it was hoped), he wrote a charming letter to Lady
Onslow, hoping "that Lord Onslow's fencible Cavalry,
brave as they are, will not be brought into action," and
trusting that he will live to see him a Field Marshal. He was
much gratified, a little later, when he heard that the Bishop
of Hereford had been "honoured with a Bumper" in the
officers' mess of "the Camp at East Bourn," his being a
name "so insignificant to Warriors."

Lord and Lady Onslow visited the Bishop at Hereford in
1797, finding him both ill and feeble. In the following year
he writes in a bravely rallying spirit:

"For three months past I have lived upon Artichokes, and cannot
say enough in praise of that plant. The elder branch of the family
became knights of the Thistle in Scotland."

The steady, fluent hand of the earlier letters now begins
to falter; though it is never illegible Butler wrote an ex-
ceptionally clear hand nor does it swerve away from a
remarkable straightness of line. "I thank God for the long
and happy life I have had, and submit with resignation to
my present State."

In 1801 he prepared a volume of sermons for the press.
Once more there was an appeal for the burning of his letters
"as in letters of warm friendship there is often some
escape of an open heart, which should not find its way into
the Press, the Public being an improper Judge of such
letters." And then comes a last flicker of the brightest
elation, when he is "writing to an Earl of Onslow, who has
ennobled the patrimony of his Ancestors many years back,
and recommended himself so highly to our present most

PARSON TO PATRON 195

excellent Fountain of Honour." It was also very gratifying
to see his book of sermons printed, and a copy presented
to the King and Queen.

The friend of "the infamous John Wilkes" had now
made his peace with all the world. He was to die, when the
hour came, respected by those who no longer remembered
the troubles and intrigues of the past; or who, if they did
remember them, could remember without any trace of
resentment or bitterness.

In December 1802 the Bishop's niece wrote briefly to
Onslow, telling him of her uncle's death. He was to receive,
under the Bishop's will, a legacy of 200 "by way of
Memorial."

CHAPTER XV

The Trimmer Rewarded

AMONG the pleasant thoughts of the Bishop of Here-
jMLford in the last year of his life was the fact of having
lived to see "an Earl of Onslow." How, in return for what
service, did this happen ?

One might suppose that the answer to such a question
would be extremely easy: but this is far from being so. If
Onslow's career was more than a little dubious, the long-
delayed though handsome reward of that career was more
than a little bewildering.

He would be a carelessly untruthful man who pretended
that Onslow had ever served his King and his country with
particular competence, or even that he had played the part
of a well-intentioned and honourable man. He had lost the
respect of all such men on account of his perpetual shiftiness.
As a Lord Lieutenant he had only shown the bare minimum
of ability that was necessary in order to prevent him from
being relieved of his duties; he had in fact become so negli-
gent or so helpless in the organisation of the militia that an
enquiry into his conduct was moved for in the House of
Commons in 1798. This motion, put forward by Tierney,
became a party issue; and for this reason alone it was
defeated by 141 to 22 ; but the fact remained that the Surrey
Militia was far below the strength required by the Act and
was both undisciplined and inefficient.

In the House of Lords, Onslow had never said anything
of the slightest importance; and after 1788 he never spoke
at all. He had no share in the policies of the nation, and was
apparently content with his purely domestic appointment as
a Lord of the Bedchamber,* which he held until his death; if
the passive acceptance of nominal duties can be described
by such a term as "holding." The best intentions in the

196

photograph : A, C. Cooper Ltd.]

Henrietta, Countess of Onslow (died 1802). By John Russell. From the
picture in the possession of the Earl of Onslow.

THE TRIMMER REWARDED 197

world cannot represent Onslow as anything but a moder-
ately successful time-server, as devoid of scruples as he was
of genuine ability. The most that can be said or hoped
in his favour is that he served the King reasonably well as a
palace official in spite of his treacherous correspondence
with Carlton House.

Lord Onslow's wife, Henrietta, seems to have been a
woman of charm, vivacity and intelligence. In one of the
most pleasant of his letters, Bishop Butler (speaking of
himself as "a Man, an old Man, an unfashionable old Man")
calls her "a Lady ... of consequence and understanding/'
In another letter (to Lord Onslow) he says that he has
"found a great entertainment for Lady Onslow." This is
"a periodical piece" that was published twice a month by
"a French gentleman of uncommon parts who had taken
refuge in England," and whose work appeared to him
"superior to anything he had read of Voltaire's." He adds,
"If I know Lady Onslow, she will be much pleased with
it."

There is other and more convincing evidence of Henri-
etta's brisk intelligence and lively conversation. George
Selwyn declared that he had "in the Onslows and Darrels
an inexhaustible fund of small talk," and old Horace Wai-
pole, a man who could only tolerate amusing people, was
fond of visiting Lady Onslow at Richmond, where she gave
him the most entertaining anecdotes: and she and her
husband had not infrequently dined at Strawberry HilL

Black George wore the Windsor Uniform, the strange
fancy of the King, borrowed from his cousin, Frederick the
Great, and somewhat resembling the Pembroke livery. He
seems to have been fairly regular in attending to his Bed-
chamber duties, and there were times when those duties
were not at all easy.

For the King was now lapsing more frequently and for
longer periods iato phases of definite lunacy. One of these
lapses tdok place in 1788, when he was deeply affected by
the suicide of hisTrincipal Equerry. He gabbled foolishly,
his popping eyes railed this way and that way to thke great
embarrassment of the ^oiirti^Sj his body swayed as he

xpg THE ONSLOW FAMILY

walked, and his arms moved awkwardly in meaningless
gestures. There was a soothing interlude at Cheltenham;
and then things were worse than ever. When driving with
the Queen in the Great Park at Windsor, he suddenly
exclaimed, "Ah! there he is!" handed the reins to the un-
happy Charlotte, got out of the phaeton and walked up to
"a venerable oak." Taking off his hat, he bowed politely to
the tree and shook with much cordiality one of its lower
branches. He then proceeded to make known (to the tree)
his views upon the state of Europe and America. To him, it
was not "a venerable oak" ; itwas His Majesty of Prussia

The treatment of madness in those days can only be
described as the treatment of lunatics by other, and worse,
lunatics. Plenty of James's Powder was given to the patient;
he was purged; he was bled; the "humour" was chased
from one part of the body to another; he was occasionally
tied up and whipped. As a result of such procedures, any
improvement in his condition could only be regarded as
miraculous. And when the King began to gobble away about
religion, the doctors "drew the worst consequences as to
any hope of amendment."

In February 1789 there were prospects of a Regency;
commemorative medals were distributed; Mrs. Fitzherbert
was dreaming of a Peerage at least; and Onslow must have
blessed his foresight in being well on the right side of the
Prince of Wales. The Regency Bill was passed by the
Commons; and then the King began to shows signs of
recovery.

As the Archbishop of Canterbury read the morning
service in his room, the King broke in with most unorthodox
responses of "Tallee ho! ware fox! hoy, forrard!" and
these cheerful though inappropriate sounds were taken to
indicate that "the prayers had done his Majesty a world of
good." Tremendous illuminations, including cows in col-
oured lights, were put up in London, and the Queen herself
ordered a specially fine transparency by Biaggio Rebecca;
it showed the King accompanied by Providence, Health and
Britannia.

One would like to suppose that the attentions of Onslow

THE TRIMMER REWARDED 199

at this time were considerate and effective and were re-
membered with gratitude by his royal master. This can only
be a supposition, but, in the absence of all proof to the
contrary, it seems not entirely unreasonable. In October
1791 Butler wrote, "I am glad to hear your Lordship is
returned to the Routine of Court duty . . . under such a
Master it is high Luxury and great honour." This would
seem to imply an absence from Court duties, but it may
imply nothing more than a respite at Clandon.

Of the life of the family at Clandon Park not much is
known. Although he was always on good terms with his
father, sharing with him a common taste for ribaldry (one of
the surest means of retaining affection), Tom Onslow seems
to have lived after his marriages for he was married twice
in Harley Street. His brother Ned was exiled in France.

There are no intimate contemporary accounts of life in
the great house at Clandon; one has only an occasional view
of royal entertainment or ceremonial festivity. This beauty
born of ostentation, this noble and enchanting home, does
not seem to have housed an equal splendour of warm
natural conviviality and elegance. None of the early Onslows,
despite a flickering attention to the arts (which appears to
indicate a respect for mere fashion rather than an expression
of taste), could be described as a man of learning or culture.
The figures who move in those lovely Palladian spaces are
those of country squires, morose and eccentric; tolerating,
and probably enjoying, the close and appropriate proximity
of the stables so effectively blocking the view from the
library windows, and so richly odorous on a frosty morning.

George Onslow, although he had been the friend of
Garrick, and although he was more of a courtier than a
country gentleman, was equally unconcerned with beauty
and learning. He was not even plausibly eccentric; though
it is alleged that he kept his father's heart in a marble u$rn
in his dressing-room. He, too, is a dark, unmoved ajid un-
moving figure; a saturnine whiskered man in later life;
always an ugly man; and oae whose personal dlegaiice could
well have been exceeded by his footmen.

Thus one is aware of a false ration btweea r ,the wasted

200 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

beauty of the house and the dull inelegance of those who, in
the eighteenth century, were its masters. They would have
been less at home among their books and their pictures than
lolling in the billiard-room, where they had "an exceeding
good full sized Table with Ticker Cover, with Maces, Cues
and Balls compleat," or throwing their guineas on the
"Trou Madame table" under the light of the sconces. As
for the "fine toned Forte Piano," this may have been
thrummed upon by their ladies; but music, so far, was not
among the tastes and abilities of the Onslows.

In 1 79 1 the Onslows received at Clandon the Princesse de
Lamballe, that lovely and unfortunate woman, the friend of
Marie Antoinette. She had escaped momentarily from the
furies of the Revolution, by whom, not long afterwards, she
was torn to pieces. Her first visit was to Brighton (Bright-
helmstone) where she had "taken the waters/' and she then
went on a round of the country houses. The Princesse de
Lamballe is said to have been the last person who slept in
the state bed at Clandon. She was murdered by the mob not
long after her ill-advised return to Paris.

Onslow's attendance upon the King involved him in
troublesome or painful scenes, and, on one occasion, in a
scene that was positively alarming.

This was in 1795, at the time of the "bread riots" in
London, when the people were exasperated by the un-
certainties of the war with France, the high cost of living,
and the usual (and continued) incompetence of the British
farmer. The King himself, though unjustly, was held re-
sponsible for the misdirection of affairs and the plight of the
poor. On the 27th of October there was a meeting of the
"Corresponding Society," a revolutionary or at least a
reformatory organisation, held in the open air near Copen-
hagen House at Islington and attended by a vast crowd
estimated at about 100,000. Two days later the King was
insulted, and actually assailed, when he was on his way to
open Parliament.

Accompanied in the state coach by the Earl of Westmor-
land and Lord Onslow, the King, undismayed by a threaten
ing and riotous mob, showed himself to great advantage.

THE TRIMMER REWARDED 201

The coach wobbled on its way through a mass of groaning,
hooting and angry people (who, at first, had been ominously
silent), and there were cries of "Bread! give us bread!
Peace! No King, no King!", and eventually a small
projectile, " either of lead or marble," was thrown, shot or
catapulted through the glass of the window, close to the
King. But the best account of what took place on that
horrible afternoon is given in the words of Onslow himself,
who wrote it down in a mood of perturbation mingled with
pious gratitude before he went to bed:

"Before I sleep, let me bless God for the miraculous escape which
my King, my Country and myself have had this day. Soon after
two o'clock, His Majesty . . . set out from St. James's . . . the
multitude of people in the Park was prodigious. A sullen silence . . .
prevailed through the whole. . . . No hats, or at least very few,
pulled off; little or no huzzaing . . . Nothing material, however,
happened rill we got down to the narrowest part of the street called
St. Margaret's between the two Palace yards, when the moment we
had passed the Office of Ordnance, and were just opposite the
parlour windows of the house adjoining it, a small ball . . * passed
through the window-glass on the King's right hand, and perforated
it, leaving a small hole, the bigness of the top of my little finger
(which I immediately put through it to mark the size), and passed
through the coach. . . . We all instantly exclaimed, 'this is a shot.'
The King showed no alarm." On the way back they had to face a
mob that was larger and more tumultuous and, in the words of
Onslow, "all of the worst and lowest sort." He continues: "The
insulting abuse offered to His Majesty was what I can never think
of but with horror, or ever forget what I felt when they proceeded
to throw stones into the coach, several of which hit the King, which
he bore with signal patience, but not without sensible marks of
indignation and resentment. . . . The glasses were all broken to
pieces, and in this situation we were during our passage through the
Park. The King took one of the stones out of the cuff of his coat
. . . and gave it to me, saying, *I make you a present of this, as a
mark of Si^avBities we l^ave met with on our journey to day;* ^

This accodMKL (which was published) corresponds ,veiy
closely with thatrgiye& by Colchester (Diary, cfc^,$&*}. He
says: "When the Stefc was fimd,. Ix>rd^istpcrla||d and
Lord Onslow . . . weire extremely agitated, Hut .tfee King

zoz THE ONSLOW FAMILY

bade them be still-; * My Lords, you are supposing this and
proposing that, but there is One who disposes of all things,
and in Him I trust/ When a stone was thrown he said, * That
is a stone you see the difference from a bullet/"

Bishop Butler of Hereford was inexpressibly disturbed
when he heard of this affair, and his comments are of interest,
both from the personal and historical points of view:

"I was indeed somewhat prepared for the infamous business of last
Thursday by the accounts we had of a field meeting in broad day
light, in which the preparatory steps were taken towards the in-
tended outrage. . . . When I heard of the danger our excellent King
was inland in which you was unavoidably involved, the appearances
of health I have felt of late vanished at once, nor can I hope for their
return till the Proclamation published has taken some salutary effect.
. . . We are all adrift, and in a State of Anarchy, unless means can be
found to extinguish the Association of avowed enemies to Peace
and Order." He thanks God that "the intended murder did not take
place": a touch of piety which may well seem faintly hysterical.

In 1799 Clandon Park was suggested as a possible and
suitable residence for "Monsieur"; the royal refugee who
was afterwards Louis XVIII. This proposal was rejected by
Onslow, who was again wrestling with his damnable militia
problems.

Do what he might, it was not easy to militarise the rustic
population, who, in Surrey, were obstinately peaceful, and
wilfully obtuse and ungrateful when called upon to show an
interest in politics and the warrior's glory. However, there
was a notable review of well-armed and well-uniformed
Volunteers in Hyde Park by the King. Although this took
place in June, we are distressed to know that the day was
"uncommonly wet" and that "many in consequence caught
cold and died."

At the age of seventy, and not ill-satisfied (we may sup-
pose) with his position and record, George Onslow received
the greatest honour, the most agreeable shock of his lifetime.
He had not anticipated any such thing; nor, indeed^ had
anyone else. It was the result of a royal caprice, or perhaps,
through a grim twist of irony, a misdirected impulse of
gratitude.

THE TRIMMER REWARDED 203

This event occurred on the ist of June 1801. The date is
of much importance.

At this time the mental state of the King was precarious.
He had been sadly worked up over Pitt's proposal for the
emancipation of Roman Catholics, or by the version of that
proposal which had been conveyed to him by Wedderburn.
He had spluttered out angrily that it was "the most Jaco-
binical thing" he had ever heard of, and he would regard
any man who talked such nonsense as his personal enemy.
In consequence, Pitt and his principal ministers resigned,
and a laborious mediocrity, Henry Addington (Speaker of
the House of Commons), was placed at the head of the
Government.

But his personal victory over Pitt and his preservation of
the Protestant Constitution for that was how he saw it
did not restore the King to his normal state; if he was ever
normal. It was in fact considered inadvisable for him to
make very many appearances in public between 1801 and
1 804. He was garrulous, flushed and irrelevant. In March
he relapsed in the most alarming fashion, his life was con-
sidered in danger, and it was noticed that "his person had
undergone a visible change." He made strange overtures to
the greatly embarrassed Duke of Portland. Those hateful
doctors, John and Thomas Willis how he detested them!
hovered professionally in the offing, and were able by a
mere diagnostic nod, a glance of silent affirmation, to lead
him away to a dark prepared room (withdrawn from all that
he loved and understood), perhaps to a final imprisonment.

In June 1801, the period we are now considering, he
observed querulously to Eldon that the people had not taken
proper notice of his "recovery"; and although on the 4th
of June he was "sufficiently recovered to attend at St.
James's Palace," where he received congratulations, he
could still be dangerously upset by the merest of trifles
even a broken key "gave more uneasiness than it ought,"
When Malmesbtiry saw Wm at Windsor in the antumji of
1801 he described him as "rather more of an old man . . .
he stooped ra&er more, ,and was . . . less firm oni his legs."
He chattered with a pai&frl -and aimless vol&bity, showed a

204 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

distressing "hurry" of mind, and when he was not in-
coherent he was usually indiscreet. It would be wrong to say
that he was now permanently insane: there were intervals of
relative lucidity (he had never shown complete lucidity at
any time of his life); there were dependable, decent appear-
ances of a public or semi-public nature; there was, at last, a
growth of popular sentiment, of affection for the stricken
elderly man who, though politically so catastrophic, was not
the worst of English kings, and whose country-gentleman
habits were now so touching.

This, then, was the state of the King's mental health when
he rode up to Onslow's house on Richmond Green, to the
great astonishment of the neighbours and the much greater
astonishment of Onslow himself.

A note written by George Onslow, and preserved among
the Clandon MSS., gives his own account of the scene:

"On Monday the first of June 1801 the King with the Queen &
the Princesses and Prince Adolphus . . . stopt at my house on
Richmond Green . . . when his Majesty from his horse in the most
gracious manner possible said he had determined to make me an Earl
& had chose to be himself the first to inform me of it, & desir'd I
would look upon it as a mark of his favour flowing from himself.
He added that he had only one Condition to make with me which
was that I would not quit the name of Onslow* . * I told him as well
as I could that I was most truly sensible of his Goodness, but I was
too much overpowered with it, as indeed I was, to express the
feelings of my Heart . . . this was in the presence and hearing of a
great Multitude of the Neighbours who had flocked together to see
their most justly beloved Sovereign recovered from his late severe
Indisposition. . . . May God bless and preserve him,"

Such was the final reward of deception and apostasy,
bestowed in ignorance by a half-witted King.

From Old Windsor, almost immediately, there came a
note from that extremely soured though venerable woman,
a formal voice from the shades of early Onslow history,
hardly remembered ... the long-surviving widow of the
third Baron:

"The Dowr. Lady Onslow returns thanks to Lord Onslow for H3s
pleasing intelligence of His going to be made an Earl, and that His

THE TRIMMER REWARDED 205

Majesty was so gracious to inform Him of it in Person, she begs her
best Respects of Congratulations also to Lady Onslow, & she shall
be happy to see the Earl and Countess here whenever it is agreeable
to them, wishes them the continuance of health which is the greatest
of all Blessings."

The Earldom was conferred on the I9th of June (1801).
In the same year George Onslow redecorated the so-called
"Speakers' Parlour" at Clandon in the taste of the Prince
of Wales. He made it appropriately grim, an ugly memorial
of his trimming career; heavy in brown, crimson, gold;
filled with dark shining polished furniture; and ultimately
graced with his own portrait in the Windsor Uniform.

Thus honoured, it might have been possible for Onslow
to reflect upon his good fortune in peace, were it not for
those damned louts, the Surrey Militia, the Onslow curse.
These reluctant warriors began to bother him again, and
in October 1801 Lord Hobart rudely reminded the new
Earl that the strength of his Militia was far below the
numbers required by the Act. The County was thus liable
for substantial fines and other penalties. Luckily for Onslow,
preliminary peace-talks had begun, and the short-lived
Peace of Amiens was ratified in March 1 802. Thank heaven !
the Militia, or what remained of it, was again disembodied,
without an inquest; and it remained in this entirely satis-
factory condition, a floating ghost of remembered anxieties,
for a whole year. In March 1803 the horrible thing was
revived again; the ghost was a body, a troublesome body of
weirdly varying dimensions.

There were three supreme difficulties: the first was to get
the men; the second was to prevent them from running
away after they had been enrolled; the third was to give
them proper training under efficient officers. To prevent
the runniag-away, Onslow marched his volunteers, ; under
guard^ from the place of enrolment to the headquarters of
their unit, "where they underwent such personal alterations
as would mak : them readily known to military teen and
consequently mo&e readily apprehended if thejT';49tetecL ? *
I wish I had : Afe p^iqpl^
which gave the due^^^f]^ but these

20 6 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

are lacking. There seems no occasion to follow the subse-
quent history of Onslow's Militia: whether embodied or
disembodied, it was a perpetual worry.

Henrietta, Countess of Onslow, died in 1802, and the
last twelve years of the Earl's life were overclouded by illness
and loneliness. He continued to carry out his duties as a
Lord of the Bedchamber so long as those duties were
required; but in 1 8 1 1 the King lapsed into a hopeless condi-
tion of senile dementia, led or carried about by silent
attendants from one room to another, wearing a purple
dressing-gown with the Star of the Garter pinned on his
breast. "I remember once, when I was living upon the
earth/' he would observe placidly, smiling at his unrespon-
sive attendant* . . .

The Earl of Onslow., dimly acting as Lord Lieutenant of
the county, lived until 1814. On the iyth of May in that
year he died at Clandon Park, aged eighty-two, and was
buried in Merrow Church.

During his thirteen years of old age and Earldom he had
observed many changes in the pattern of society which he
could not regard with approval. Under the whip and urge
of great revolutions industrial, political and social old
shapes, old ideas and old fashions were being destroyed or
modified with alarming, incautious and irreverent rapidity.
In dress alone, a thoroughly dependable symptom of radical
change, there was a more complete departure from the old
modes, between 1 795 and 1 8 10, than at any other compar-
able phase of our history, either before or after. These fifteen
years produced a greater revolution in clothes than the fifty
years between 1710 and 1760. But the social diagram at the
opening of the nineteenth century was extremely complex
and, to those who lived in it, extremely disturbing. In fifteen
years the population of the country had risen, on a rough
estimate, from ten to thirteen millions. Among those prolific
millions were the representatives of a new hybrid class, the
mercantile class which could now assume, or at least imitate,
the privileges of the aristocracy. To some extent this was
due to a more diffused education, including education in
manners a process not yet completed.

THE TRIMMER REWARDED 207

Elegant females were receiving carefully adjusted lessons
in natural history under the guidance of the Moral Zoologist,
who eliminated the more inconvenient and embarrassing
aspects of nature herself. But, according to the Anti-Jacobin
(1807)5 elegant females could go very much further:

"Hear them descant on carbon's varied use,
And o'er the pudding talk of gastric juice;
Show boils and gout to be, with all their pains,
Caloric vacillation in the veins;
Hysterics but some hydrogenic frolic,
And chyle coquetting bile the cause of colic."

Even philosophy was admitted to the drawing-room. And
yet superstition (as a relief perhaps) could still attract the
attention of people who imagined themselves both well
educated and well bred.

In 1804 a clergyman and his brother were charged at
Oxford with having "to the great displeasure of Almighty
God, the disparagement of Rachel Fanny Antonia Lee, and
the evil example of his majesty's subjects, forcibly carried
her away and defiled her, contrary to the statute'*; but the
prisoners were at once acquitted when it was known that
Miss Lee had wilfully thrown away the steel necklace and the
bag of camphor which preserved her chastity.

Some years later Joanna Southcott produced her Third
Book of Wonders and announced that she herself, being then
sixty-four, would presently give birth to the new Messiah.

Politically, the beginnings of reform were now appearing;
but the condition of the working classes was deplorable, and
the Luddite riots, which began in 1811, tragically revealed
the conflict between the population and the new machines.

When Onslow was in his seventy-ninth year he was en-
livened by the Jubilee celebrations at Windsor (October
25th, 1 809). "After divine service," we read, "Turnelli was
introduced to her Majesty and the Royal party and pre-
sented the Jubilee bust which his Majesty had ktely sat
for." After this, "a refined and classical entertainment" was
given at Frogmore. Twa cars, each drawn by a pair of
" sea-horses," appea*ted''Cfc "a beautiful piece of water,"

208 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

Neptune had one car to himself, while the other carried a
band of music. Flashing transparencies brightly shone above
the battlements of the Castle, spelling out in fiery letters
"Britannia rules the Waves," while the noble tune was
blared out of the trumpets of the band and the loyal throats
of the people. The central piece of the whole scene must
have been wonderfully moving: "Opposite the bridge an
elegant Grecian temple was erected on the mount, sur-
rounded by eight beautiful marble pillars. The interior of
the temple was lined with purple, and in the centre was a
large transparency with the Eye of Providence, fixed, as it
were, upon a beautiful portrait of his Majesty surrounded
by stars of lamps/'

In society there were some very unpleasant scandals. The
Earl of Pomfret had to appear in court and give recognisance
"to keep the peace towards his wife." Sentence of death was
passed upon Sir Henry Browne Hayes for absconding with
an heiress; but instead of being hanged he was packed off
to Botany Bay. A bill was filed by Lady Augusta Murray
against H.R.H. the Duke of Sussex and Mr. Coutts, to
recover the sum of 4000 a year "settled by deed upon
Lady Augusta in consideration of her educating and main-
taining the children she already had, or might have, by His
Royal Highness." Mr. Henry Wellesley, Secretary of the
Treasury, was awarded 20,000 damages against Lord
Paget who had seduced his wife.

A few months before Onslow's death London beheld,
with prescribed official rejoicings, the "solemn entry " of
Louis XVIII who, some years previously, had been denied
the hospitality of Clandon. Now it was all very different,
Louis walked into Grillon's Hotel, plump and assured, on
the arm of the Prince Regent, who was dressed "in full
regimentals."

The character of George Onslow has been displayed fully
in the preceding pages. It is a drab and ungrateful character;
not one of the darkest villainy, but one impervious to scour-
ing or washing or any process of biographical renovation,
even by the most improved of modern methods, whether

THE TRIMMER REWARDED 209

academic or popular. The fifth Earl of Onslow considers
that his ancestor, George, "had all the domestic virtues,"
while admitting his political shiftiness. I think it is true that
George Onslow did possess many of the domestic virtues:
it is quite certain that he possessed all the political vices as
well as those of a professional courtier. When he expressed
his deep respect for his father, the Speaker, he was probably
sincere; and he may also have been sincere in the rich
tributes he paid to his wife and the first of his daughters-in-
law. It would be ungenerous to raise a doubt. And yet the
unhappy impression of an unctuous formality cannot be
dispelled. His epithets are those of the genteel magazines
and his sentiments are those of bloodless orthodoxy. The
same touch of platitude lurks in his pious exhortations to
his children.

Great ambition, thwarted or deterred by timidity and the
absence of any gifts of a high order, is the recurring motive
in the life of George Onslow. He could rarely bring himself
to risk even a moment's insecurity. No doubt many others
were more treacherous than Onslow, but they were treach-
erous on a grander scale; they had the dark magnificence of
true villainy. Perhaps it is fair to add that they had greater
initial advantages those of high rank and influence and
less to lose. By a retributive irony, the conferment of the
Earldom coincided with a steady decrease of the Onslow
influence in Surrey, partly due to the lowered reputation of
the Earl himself, partly to the eccentricity of his eldest son,
Tom Onslow, and the exile of his second son, Edward, as
the result of a scandal that was not generally known but was
probably suspected. For fifty-six years after the death of
George Onslow the name of the family was of little account,
except on the level of ordinary provincial service, until it was
revived IE t bright efflorescence of youthful energy and
unassailable honesty of purpose by that astonishing boy,
William Hillier, the fourth Earl of Onslow.

CHAPTER XVI
Little T. 0.

IT is quite erroneous to suppose that Earls will be Earls.
There are times when they refuse to be persons of import-
ance and insist upon enjoying themselves in their own
ordinary way. This extremely sensible decision is looked
upon as a proof of the strangest eccentricity. It is not neces-
sarily so. An Earl can be an architect like Burlington, a man
of taste like Pembroke, or a whip like Tommy Onslow.

But certainly Thomas, the eldest son of George, was the
most un-Earlish of all imaginable Earls; the most improb-
able grandson of the Speaker. His consistent and over-
powering ambition was to drive a phaeton drawn by two,
four, or even six, black horses; to drive so adroitly, con-
trolling his wheelers and leaders with a flick of the whip^ and
a whisk of the ribbons, a click of the tongue, all so quickly
and precisely calculated, that no driver in the land, not even
the great Sir John Lade himself, could exceed him in this
particular skill. And why speak of Sir John Lade? It was
Tom's ambition to drive better than any amateur whip: he
aspired to the most supreme efficiency of the most accom-
plished of professional coachmen:

"Fm free to confess I should anxiously strive
Like a Lord to behave, like a Coachman to drive."

Whether his behaviour was that which is commonly ex-
pected of a Lord is more than doubtful. Nor did his appear-
ance correspond with general notions concerning aristocratic
dignity. He was a man of the Duckleg sort: very small,
robust and awkward. A stupid man of such a build would
possibly have made himself ridiculous by the affectation of
grand airs. But little Tom Onslow ("little T. CX" as they
called him) was not stupid. He was born a natural grotesque,
and he accepted this, not as a disadvantage to be deplored,

210

{Photograph : A, C. Cooper Ltd.)

Thomas, Viscount Cranley, afterwards Second Earl of Onslow (1754-1827).
From the picture in the possession of the Earl of Onslow. (Artist unknown.)

LITTLE T. O. 211

but rather as an excuse for jesting or buffoonery of his own
particular kind which, according to Wraxall, " baffled all
attempts at description."

Calling himself jocosely Tom Tit, or The Dwarf, or
Hunk, or Hogeypogey, he larked and laughed, he exerted
himself in spasms of excruciating mimicry, he poured out
immense gabbled sentences with such volubility that their
meaning (perhaps fortunately) was lost. And yet, as minia-
tures and a pastel undergraduate portrait very clearly show,
Tom was a youth by no means devoid of a smooth and
enticing elegance. Nor was he disliked by women, for
women are fond of men who amuse them; and his first wife
was a woman of extraordinary beauty.

Tommy Onslow was born on the i -Jth of March 1 754, an
event of some importance to the gentlemen who ran an
obstetrical sweepstake at White's. The entrance fee was
twenty guineas, and the runners (half a dozen expectant
ladies) were Lady Coventry, Mrs. Onslow, Lady Hilsbury,
Lady Duncannon, Mrs. Cholmondeley and Lady Diana
Egerton.

He was sent to Harrow, where he met Sheridan, who was
four years his senior; and thence to Peterhouse, Cambridge.
Graduating M.A, in 1773, when only nineteen, he can be
described as one of the best educated of the Onslows, and
Wraxall is doubtless right when he says "the great com-
positions of antiquity were familiar to him." Some time after
leaving Cambridge he was appointed a Deputy Lieutenant
for Surrey by his cousin Richard, the third Baron Onslow
at that time a declining invalid whose death was anticipated
with such eagerness by Tom's father. That he should enter
Parliament was of course a thing taken for granted, it was
the Onslow tradition; and family influence provided him
with a safe borough that of Rye, where his father had
made a start in the very year of Tom's birth.

Now> for most young men of twenty-one an election to
Parliament, eye^ when the result of the election is a positive
certainty, calls for, sobriety of demeanour and a speech of
well-considered aad^eyyotis eloquence,

Not so for Tom Qasji0vr* v : Although Bmtkty writing to

xiz THE ONSLOW FAMILY

George Onslow in 1 774, had described Tom and Edward
as "the two grave gentlemen, your sons/' he could hardly,
unless he were being intentionally facetious, have chosen a
less appropriate epithet. Nothing, except the shock of actual
calamity, could make little Tom serious for a moment. He
compiled for his electors a speech so extraordinary, so oddly
and originally compounded of juvenile fun and of plausible
shrewdness, that it must be unique among all documents of
its kind. It has fortunately been preserved among the Butler
MSS. at Clandon, and is dated April 1775:

"Gentlemen, I have set aside some very agreeable engagements in
town, to have the honor of waiting upon you and accepting your
disinterested invitation of me to represent you in Park. It is usual
to profess and promise upon these occasions. I hate both, and have
nothing at present in my thoughts, but to be elected. I approve of
your borough, as it will give me the least trouble, and can assure
you, I think it more honorable to represent you, than the City of
London, or the County of Middlesex. They talk of defending the
Constitution. I will do all they say. I will defend it against all the
world; not my own Constitution, for that must give way to time
and accidents . . . but the great magna charta constitution, you know
what I mean, the constitution which enables me to take my pleasure,
and you to follow your business, which defends us all against battery,
murder, robbery, forgery, swindlery, mock-patriotism, and against
every nuisance but libels and lies. They promise to reduce the
national debt. I promise no such thing, for I don't know how to set
honestly about it, else I would ease you at once of the duties upon
soap, candles, malt &c., that you might keep yourselves clean, sit up
late, and drink like your ancestors. As to America, I don't know
what to say. It cost many millions to conquer that country in
Germany. I am afraid those Patriots mean to turn that money
into a sinking fund. You know my meaning, and I wish you to
understand theirs. If they will send you an exact calculation of the
money we shall get by receiving none from thence, you shall com-
mand me, provided the balance is in our favor, for as you and I have
both frequent occasion for money, we must not lose sight of that
Necessary. Till they do this, I will not puzzle my head with schemes
and calculations, being convinced from the pleasures I take, that
taxation is no tyranny. I shall be against shortening the duration
of Parliaments, because I wish to belong to you for seven years at
least, tho' I may not have leisure to see you agaih till seven years

LITTLE T. O. 213

hence. I am no Nabob and no Creol. I am only a Gentleman. If
you can bear with that description of me, you may always command
me; and that you may not suffer unreasonably by your choice, or
think the Character of a Gentleman quite insignificant, I do, by
my own authority, suspend the Act of Parliament against Drunken-
ness, with respect to this Borough, for the present day."

One has to assume that young Tom actually read this
pleasant oration to the electors of Rye, If so (and there is no
reason for doubting it) the electors must have been cheered
by an harangue so delightfully different from the customary
political style. At any rate Tom was elected, and he continued
to represent the borough in unbroken silence until 1 784 ;
when he became an equally silent representative of Guild-
ford.

On the 2oth of December 1776 Tom Onslow married
Arabella, third daughter and co-heiress of Eaton Main-
waring-Ellerker of Risby Park, Yorkshire. Her portrait in
the drawing-room at Little Clandon shows her to have been
a strikingly beautiful woman of noble though gentle pres-
ence. By her he had three sons and one daughter, produced
with dreadful and exhausting regularity. Arabella died in
April 1782, and the following obituary notice appeared in
the London papers :

"Died in Harley Street . . sincerely and universally regretted. . . .
A few days ago she was in the bloom of health and youth; she was
the happy parent of a beautiful offspring, the affectionate wife of a
loving though now disconsolate husband, the pleasing friend of her
relations, the benevolent benefactress of the poor, and the admira-
tion of mankind; in these times of luxury and dissipation, when the
minds of other women of rank, fortune and fashion are bent on the
delusive pleasures of the age, hers was chiefly employed in the
domesdck concerns of her family, and in forming the minds of her
children to those paths of virtue, benevolence and Christianity
which she herself pursued. . . She died in the twenty-sixth year

,>',*,

A private and: (I think) a sincere tribute was paid to
Arabella Onslow bylier father-in-law, George* the trimmer:
"She was moral, Co^scienteoHs .and Religions* ^; * Her
Person and Gentitenes^ $FMa&mefcs (for

214 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

civil, elegant, cheerful, calm and composed at all times and
in all places) made her admired wherever she went." After
her death, Tom's children went to Clandon Park, -where
they were looked after by their grandparents.

As for Tom himself was he really so disconsolate? On
the 26th of September 1782, barely five months after the
death of Arabella, Mrs. Boscawen (the Onslows' neighbour
at Hatchlands) writes to Mrs. Delany:

"Mr. Onslow, so lately a sorrowful widower, marries Mrs. Dun-
combe, who was not an afflicted widow! She is a niece of my friend
Lady Smythe's."

Mrs. Buncombe, though morally as excellent as Arabella,
was a woman of a very different sort. She was the daughter
of William Hale of King's Walden, and the widow (and
third wife) of Thomas Buncombe of Buncombe Park in
Yorkshire. (It will be noted that both of Tom's wives were
the daughters of Yorkshire families.)

Charlotte Buncombe was in all probability the ideal wife
for Tom Onslow. Her face was that of a florid and resolute
woman, neither sensitive nor elegant, though not unkindly,
and of a thoroughly dependable, unsqueamish humour;
possibly a little coarse. There is indeed a touch of mascul-
inity in her style; a suggestion of dominance rather than of
docility in her firm and forthright features.

Mrs. Boscawen 's bit of gossip does not refer to the actual
marriage but to the engagement, which had certainly been
announced without any loss of time. At the moment of this
announcement Tom's father (and probably his mother also)
was visiting his other son, Edward Onslow, at Clermont-
Ferrand. Naturally his friend, the happy Bishop, writes
valuable and informative letters on the subject. In Nov-
ember 1782:

"I most heartily congratulate your Lp. and Ly. Onslow on Mr.
Onslow's intended marriage to a Lady, of whom all the world
speaks well. It is a great happiness, that he will not be long disused
to domestic life." He writes a little later: "His time of life drove him
into company again, and that of course threatened the evils, which
Marriage either prevents of cures. What coultf he do better than

LITTLE T. O. az$

make another good choice." Evidently George Onslow had ex-
pressed some concern at the rapidity of Tom's decision, and Butler
adds: "The great matter is, whether the Lady is of a grave domestic
turn; if not, I agree it is too soon, and would have been so at any
distance of time."

Early in the following year (1783) George Onslow was
still in France, and the wedding was arranged for February.
The Bishop had been approached by Tom, who wished him
to perform the ceremony, and the Bishop is willing, always
provided that Tom's father has no general objection to the
marriage: a point which, it would seem, has not yet been
made perfectly clear. So Butler writes in January:

"Mr. Onslow called upon me a day or two ago, on the subject of
his marriage, proposing to me the honor of performing the ceremony.
I tdok the liberty of telling him, that tho' I felt myself flattered by
it, my invariable attachment to you made it necessary, to inquire,
whether you approved. He assured me you did. . . . You shall hear
from me when the good or the mischief is done." The wedding
took place on the I3th of February, and Butler wrote: "She
appeared to me a most agreeable Lady in every respect, and will, I
think, invite him to domestic life, and ease him of domestic cares."

A most agreeable lady. There are many ways of being
agreeable, and there is no reason for supposing that Butler
was not entirely justified in his encomium. His opinion was
fully shared by Queen Charlotte, in whose household
Charlotte Onslow became a Lady in Waiting. To the Queen
she was "my dearest Crany," and to her she wrote, many
years later, the most touching and affectionate little notes.

Charlotte Onslow must have been some years older than
her husband. Her comfortable solidity, of mind as well as
of person, was admirably suited to endure, and probably to
enjoy, the coarsely whimsical fun and affection of her Tom
Tit, her boisterously amorous Hunk. It had been very
different with a woman so delicately refined as Arabella.

Among the archives at Clandon there is a manuscript
volume of "FaiBilj Verses/* composed at various times by
Tom Onslow. l*h^ water-ma^fe 0$ die /paper shows that this
collection, written 'in^veigr $lga$t d^whand, was made
at some period npti^fli^^^b^rlSja ^v ? e {jfttes after Tom's

2i6 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

death), and the internal evidence of the verses themselves
appears to indicate that most of them were probably written
between 1774 and 1804: only a few are dated. I doubt
whether any other family can produce a comparable assort-
ment. Examples have already been given, but the full value
of these verses as autobiography and as a part of the family
record can only be appreciated by quotation in detail. Many
are witty, others are tediously obscene* Most of them are
introduced by relevant warnings, enclosed in a whirling loop
of the pen in the margin: "Private and for few"; "This
requires great explanation to be understood"; "Private and
Unintelligible"; "Tho* this speaks for itself, some Explana-
tion is Necessary." Only rarely does one find a few stanzas
which "May be read by all." A certain number of prose
pieces are included, some of them very competently and
ingeniously written.

In this collection there are many references to Charlotte
Onslow, to whom Tom Onslow applies the disturbing and
uncouth name of "Bruin"; a rude endearment which,
apparently, was not resented. He also called her "Button,"
"Sow" and "Stote"; and heaven knows what besides. He
was fond of a punning recurrent rhyme, a device well
illustrated in a lubriciously playful ode which he wrote in
praise of his wife:

"Pretty sportive lovely Bruin
You're the Cause of my undoing,
And I lay my certain Ruin
At the feet of Matchless Bruin.
Talk of billing or of cooing,
I directly think of Bruin.
Pleasure there is nothing new in,
If it is not sharM with Bruin.
Love, tho* I am quite a Jew in,
Yet I spare it to my Bruin.
Meat that I've been all day chewing
I wou'd give to fat old Bruin.
London Paris Rome there's few in
But wou'd give their ears for Bruin. . . .
In the Dog Days Pd lay stewing
Chin to Chin with greasy Bruin;

LITTLE T. O. 217

Her arms were open'd & I flew in:
Cou'd I do otherwise with Bruin?
This we did: & by our doing
Out popp'd litde Carthorse Bruin:
Bye and Bye she'll fell a mewing,
And long keep up the house of Bruin."

But Bruin's one contribution to the "house" was a
daughter, afterwards Lady Georgiana Onslow, who died at
the age of forty-seven.

For some years Tom was the friend of the Prince of
Wales, who addressed him when writing as " My dear Torn/'
and signed himself "ever most affectionately yours/' He
often visited Clandon Park, announcing his arrival in the
most informal of princely notes (Clandon MSS.):

"I mean to do myself the pleasure of dining this day with you at
Clandon & am not quite certain whether I shall pursue my Journey
on to Brighton in the Evening or stay at Clandon till tomorrow
Morning. Adieu, I remain my dear Tom

"ever most affectionately

"Yours

"George P."

And there is one of an apologetic nature:

"Dear Tom, I am conscious of having been guilty of very great
neglect & incivility both towards you & Lord Onslow not having
come to yr House this Morning as I had appointed, but I was
prevented by very particular business; however, if Lord Onslow &
you wd be so good as to call upon me about two a Clock Tomorrow
I shd be happy to talk ev'ry thing over with you both."

This was addressed to Tom Onslow at his house in Harley
Street.

But Prinny's friendships, like his loves, were capricious
and ruthlessly annulled; and at some uncertain date before
1790 this particular friendship was irremediably broken.
The cause of tbf^ break is now unknown, but it was.pf esum-
ably known tortile ftftt Earl of Qnslow, who wrote (iGkndon
MSS.): '; -'':/,. : ' , ,rii : *

"It k needless ttgbtftttftii ^^mwd^^M foigdtten . '. .

the subject of qoa^fvwt j^i^crediiafefeii&r; t> Tom or to

2i8 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

the Prince. Tom, actuated by excellent and generous motives, acted
in a manner very inconsiderate to the Prince, and the Prince
naturally resented it. More need not be said, but the breach was
never healed."

Prinny came to Clandon for the Guildford Races in 1786,
when he was still on good terms with Tom, and he was
evidently the friend of Tom's father until the death of the
Earl in 1814.

There is no reason for doubting that Tom Onslow was a
loyal husband, though he lumbered amorously after many
women, with an abundance of loutish innuendo and of gutter-
boy raillery. But these antics, crude and offensive as they fre-
quently are, probably represent however strangely or per-
versely a complete innocence of intention. They are mere
jocularities, of a sort more likely to be found in the servants'
hall than in the drawing-room, though sometimes expressed
with a twinkling rude felicity and a sparkle of indelicate wit.

The mere fact of Tom's being a favourite in the most
correct of all societies that of Queen Charlotte and her
Princess daughters proves that he knew very well how to
behave properly when proper behaviour was required. It
was on such occasions that he displayed his abilities as a
grotesque, when, according to Wraxall, he could indulge
"his most eccentric flights of humour, fancy and mimicry,"
'and when "in order to spare the eye ... he usually performed
them behind a screen/'

And so he rattled on with his clowning and his verses,
growing a little coarse and lumpy, and red with wine and
weather. There was Emma Bristow (whom he could not
resist oh) ; there was Emma Scott (with whom he'd live in
lonely cot); there was lovely Charlotte Grimstone "who
undertook to teach an awkward fellow how to roll painted
papers up into Knots for a Work box"; there was Miss Call
("all yield to Nature's Call"); there was Lady Stowell; there
was Lady Evelyn, who received the present of a whip ; but
above all far above all there was Mrs. Bouverie.

Mrs. Bouverie, "Barbarina," was the daughter of Lady
Ogle. The Bouveries moved in Court circles and were the
friends of the Onslows (it will be remembered that Edward

LITTLE T. O. 219

Bouverie was a member of the deputation sent by Prinny to
Mrs. Fitzherbert in 1784).

Tom was Mrs. Bouverie's devoted admirer. He described
her rapturously to an anonymous correspondent who "had
requested him ... to commit to paper his real sentiments
relative to a most charming woman who had frequently been
the topic of their conversation/' The genuine simplicity of
her character, he declared, was in no degree lessened by the
polish of education or by the acquisition of the most fascin-
ating manners: it shone forth "in all its native charms, in
every thought she conceives, in every sentiment she ex-
presses." To herself, her entire life was a state of purity and
virtue: to the world, a state of constant admiration "She
is the only person who does not know that Ideots (if they
have eyesight) must adore her: and that men of sense (tho'
they were even blind) are inevitably her captives." She had
"the most ravishing voice that ever burst forth in syren
accents from the Loveliest and most perfect form that human
nature cou'd produce." To crown all, she was "the prettiest
and easiest Horsewoman in England " perhaps the highest
praise which a hippomaniac like Tom could have bestowed
upon any female.

The best of Tom's compositions, and one of much merit,
is a prose Journal to Mrs. Bouverie written in 1 784 (Clandon
MSS.):

"Sept. 1 6. Set out from Clandon to the most pleasurable of all
my visits, invariably so: naturally so: preeminently so. Caught
at Egham in a violent shower: Bruin bark'd, and Jacobs was nearly
doing so, as he had no great Coat, and the wind was full in his
face. Pitied the wind, and arrived at Ankerwyke. . . . Edward
Bouverie in Excellent spirits; very good-humour'd, lively and
agreeable* and seem'd glad to see Hunk. . . . Ran against Prayers
twice, but did not break my shins. ...

"Sept. 17, Feiry'd over the water. . . . Doubted whether the
Styx was? "equal to the Thames: Browne is a good judge^ aijd has
seen both. Mem: to ask his opinion when we meet: but #ever to
go over with four in hand, imless Charon's toll is more reasonable
than Hampton ferry % V ; ... Nwetoa is a charming plape: The finest
Verdure, richest Ijafogipg wockfeiand ost b^ri&tcoup d'oril I
ever saw . . . and fitnutaM^tofer Carietop Hops. * ;?, Grew bor'd

**o THE ONSLOW FAMILY

with his damned Guidos, Clauds, Vandykes and Boracios; and went
on to Oxford, where a good veal cutlet on a hot plate seem'd a much
more rational object of admiration than the portrait of any stupid
looking family calf upon cold canvas

"Sept. 1 8, Met Button at night, slept ... at Woodstock, and
went the next day to Sir John Rushout's. . . . Who shouM be there
but Lord and Lady Sandys ? a pretty pair as the Devil said when he
look'd at his Thumbs. . . . My Lord's a flashy young dog enough:
but I think Lord Paget the best looking of the two. Listened to
Sir John for some hours, because I was his guest and wish'd to
appear well bred. Button seem'd languid towards his close of no
very succinct account, of the rise, progress and conduct of the
American war; but as I was the strongest I was in for family
anecdotes and family pictures, now and then relievM by a digressive
extract from Joe Miller, or a pretty copious narrative of the
improvements he has made since his father's death

"The next pleasure to conversing with those we like, is to write
to Them: it is a sort of intercourse that mitigates the purgatory of
absence and keeps alive the cheering prospect of presence and its
attendant happiness. ... Do send me an old tooth pick! you ill-
natur'd thing you . . . you pert, vain, forward, haughty, overbearing,
nasty, ugly, immodest . . . thick-legg'd, affected, insincere, un-
natural, violent, masculine Toad, you! ."

The end is an example of that peculiar Tommy twist
which occurs very frequently; intended, as though by a
sudden boutade, to shake off a too-obvious accumulation of
sentiment or an excess of admiration that is probably causing
some alarm to Tommy himself. This trick is carried to an
extreme in a poem called The Bumfiddliad, address? d to Mrs.
Bouverie's Ass ("to be read by few") which I prefer to leave
unquoted. Nor do I think it wise to go beyond the title of
another poem: Extempore, on Miss Pelham's saying emphatic-
ally that both her Ends were empty (alluding to her purse). But
he is often very neat, in a prettily indelicate way, when he
throws off an epigram; as, for example, Advice to Sister
Betty, touching her Nuptials with the frisky old Prebend of

Try ** * * * *" J

Worcester*.

"Be led not by worldly affection
Thy Stillingfleet's hand to refuse^
You may gain by this holy connection,
But believe me, youVe nothing to lose."

LITTLE T. O. 221

He drove while he rhymed and he rhymed while he
drove: the jingle of the harness and the jingle of his doggerel

v w */ O OO

extemporisations ran along together. While he was "holding
the reins and exercising the whip in Piccadilly," says Wrax-
all, "his mind was not inactive/* If he saw his friend, "he
would sometimes stop, descend from the phaeton, and
entreat me to listen to a lampoon or a couplet which he had
just composed: he had in fact a poetic vein, though the
stream was shallow.

The stream was indeed shallow, and rarely poetic, but
there are times when it sparkles agreeably with a zest and
animation which can still be appreciated. When Lady
Burrell married the Revd* Mr* Clay, Tom saw the oppor-
tunity:

"Sir William Burrell died in May!
And she, in August, turn*d to Clay."

His political verses have all the rude and ribald pungency of
the times:

"Mr. Pitt, Mr. Pitt,

Your cause is b s t,-

Though the K g, Lords, and Mob, now may court you;
But you sure must have heard,
That no strength's worth a t d,
If the Commons Themselves won't support you.*'

And there is always the jovial but affectionate impropriety
of his lines to "Bruin" who

"Calls me 'pot-bellied Tom/ without wishing to palliate,

Or conceiving that / (if I dar'd) cou'd retaliate.

With such usage as this is; so kicfc'd, cuff'd, and frighted;

If I know what to do, may I live to be Knighted/*

We cannot say that Tom Onslow lived in vain or did
nothing to frierit the highest regard of the British people,
for he played and promoted cricket and was one of thfe
founders, or the M r CC Still, it was in his black phaeton or
the little bl^ck ^mi,green vis~d-vis that he enjoyed the highest
felicity; jingling <#fcd whipping along, a sqtiat , wercoated
little figure, ^^^kt^-'i^:^^^^ acid-fa faaatt full of
crude benevolent .**'

CHAPTER XVII

Tom and Edward

ONSLOW'S brother, Ned, was even odder, more
JL unexpected, than Tom himself. After all, it is possible
to regard little Tom as a horsy Duckleg Onslow of the later
baronial type: a jingling gentleman with a dextrous whip
and a playful pen. But Edward, the slightly regrettable
Edward, runs out of the orthodox family scene in a manner
likely to cause distress to some, diversion to others, and of
lively interest for all with an eye for the complexities of
human aberration.

Edward is revealed in miniatures and other portraits as a
youth of a rosy, smooth, well-rounded and amiably stupid
face; not in the least remarkable. When sixteen he matricul-
ated at Christ Church, but he took no degree. In 1 780, at the
age of twenty-two, he was elected, or returned, for the
borough of Aldeburgh. In 1781 he applied for the Chiltern
Hundreds, left the country, and settled at Clermont-
Ferrand in Auvergne.

The reason for this abrupt exit from Parliament, home,
country, family and everything which could have made life
pleasant for this young man, though hinted at in more than
one reference, both published and unpublished, was made
abundantly clear when Lord Herbert printed the Pembroke
Pafers in 1950. With Lord Herbert's permission I quote
the relevant passage from those Papers. Lord Pembroke
is writing to his son, Lord Herbert, on the 6th of May
1781:

"In the name of wander, My dear George, what is this Mindening
story of our cousin Ned Onslow, & Phelim Macarty Esq ? The
latter must, of course, by his name be a deflourer of Virgins; & I
should hope that no kinsman of ours donne dans le sexe masculin.
Pray let me know seriously about it by the return of the post ..-.-.

222

TOM AND EDWARD 223

Aideu, my dear George, pray be as quick and as particular as you
can about Ned Onslow & Phelim Macarty."

Here, then, was the expelling scandal which drove young
Onslow precipitately into exile. There is another published
reference to this troublesome affair in the Correspondence
of George Selwyn ; a letter also written in May 1781:

"I have told you perhaps that a nephew of Lord Chedworth's . . .

got into the same scrape at Epsoin as Onslow did at the Exhibition:

ceci prouve la force d'une passion qui est hors de la nature ."

The particulars of the date of Ned Onslow's departure
from England are not known. It is certain that he was at
Clermont-Ferrand by November 1781. He may have been
accompanied by his father and mother, both of whom
visited him when he was in France. His father, indeed,
seems to have visited him frequently and for long periods
and to have shown, in this unpleasant family disgrace, an
affection and attentive solicitude which are greatly to his
credit. Lord Pembroke's reference to kinship with Ned
Onslow, "our cousin," is due to his connexion with the
Fitzwilliam family, who were related to the Shelleys, and
thus to Ned Onslow's mother (Henrietta Shelley).

A strong though discreetly oblique light is also thrown
upon this affair by the Bishop of Oxford, the friendly and
admonitory Butler. He had always been fond of Edward,
though he may not always have approved of his oddities.
He thought it proper that Edward should "turn his thoughts
from pleasure to business." Butler writes in October 1 78 1
(Clandon MSS.):

"In your next, I beg to hear the best account you can give of
Mr. E. O., who I remember was once very anxious for my re-
covery, and I am bound in common justice to be solicitous for his,
as the wannest friend he ever had."

It appears that George Onslow, accompanied by Lady
Onslow,, decided to go to Clermont-Ferrand in November:
it seems probable that George Onslow had been there
previously. The Bishop warns hi^ Lordship that he must be
particularly carefol "aSjhejts : going into ropsli omntries"
to "keep clear of AtiN?%? He advises OasW not to think

224 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

of bringing his son home, though he would rejoice to see the
indiscreet and unhappy Edward "in statu quo/' He goes on :
" I think he will be so in a Country, where Men are more at liberty
to be charitable on one Subject. I protest I am afraid to encourage
you to hope for the same temper here. I have at times taken the
sense of Men of the world, and have been disheartened. Yet I do
not pretend to foresee the power of time."

However, the power of time did not prevail. In April
1782 the Bishop was evidently reproved by George Onslow
for " combating paternal affection/' He defends himself
from this charge and says that he "did not go further than
reporting . . . the opinions of other men."

Thus, it was considered inadvisable that Edward should
return to England for a very considerable period. In fact,
apart from a few occasional visits, he never returned at all,
nor did he preserve his British nationality.

Edward Onslow became, for all practical purposes, a
Frenchman, at a time when such a proceeding was peculiarly
dangerous. It is at this point, and only at this point, that the
Onslow history flows out upon the rosy ocean of pure
romance; the rapturous and elegant romance of a lady's
magazine. For Edward fell in love. He fell at sight, im-
pulsively and irrecoverably.

There are two accounts of this reassuring and happy
romance. According to one, he fell in love with a beautiful
voice which he heard at Blesle in the chapel of the Couvent
des Filles Nobles; according to the other (which is more
plausible) he fell in love, the moment he saw her, with a
beautiful, tearful and rebellious girl : in both cases it is agreed
that she was "en pension " at the Convent of the Ursulines
at Blesle, where the daughters "of the best families in
Auvergne" were educated. This lovely girl, in the words of
a recent French monograph, appeared suddenly to Edward
"avec tous les attraits que les larmes, sans grande douleur,
peuvent ajouter au visage d'une belle ingenue." Her name
was Rosalie (or Marie) de Bourdeilles de Brant6me, and she
was the daughter of Jean, Seigneur de Coutances.

The Seigneur, when formally approached, was not iti
favour of Edward's marriage to his daughter. His objefeticte

TOM AND EDWARD 225

was based upon difference of nationality, not upon discrep-
ancy in rank: he did not wish his daughter to leave her
native land or to become an Englishwoman. Upon hearing
this, Edward undertook to buy an estate in France, or (more
probably) to induce his father to buy one, on which he would
live for the rest of his life. He acquired in due course the
cMteau of Chalendrat near Vic-le-Comte, and was married
early in 1783. It seems likely that his parents were present
at the ceremony, for George Onslow was certainly in France
at that time.

And so the unhappy scandal evaporated and Edward
proved his normality and respectability in the most con-
vincing manner. The family which he founded was a French
family; a family of men gifted in the arts, and whose later
members, instead of crossing the Channel to England,
crossed the ocean to Canada. No break-away from the
Onslow family and all its traditions could have been more
complete.

But "les Onslow,' ' at the time of the Revolution, were
looked upon with ugly disfavour, and Edward himself was
seized and imprisoned by that serenely formidable agent of
the Terror, Couthon, in 1789. He was only released, in the
appropriately classical and romantic style a tableau in the
taste of David, or Benjamin West when his wife, accom-
panied by her clinging children, appealed in person to
Couthon himself. He died, two years after the death of
his brother, in 1829.

The eldest son of Edward Onslow, Georges, was born in
1784. He has been called, very foolishly, "le Beethoven
frangais," although it has been quaintly observed that his
music dispkyed a style in which "la s^cheresse et Tobjec-
tivit s'accordaient avec son fond d'atavisme britannique;"
The fifth Earl of Onslow (Clandon MSS.) says that Georges
"was ittdined ta resent the reception accorded to Ms ;Mtn-
positions and to attribute it to the crtoe for Beedmppjtbta
rampant/^ At feflM^ the words of the French eonptimatator)
he was a u g^5raite}bdmposer n ;wha opposc^mJ smvity
of the "Jiideo^Afiffia^^4H ,/ 1 ''".', '\ ; yKjfcjtf#$M^ J .K-.'/^

Georges (j 784-1 85^ rnra& *& aiiitourf^fo

Arthur George, the third Earl 0<OndtajA$ one of the

226 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

celebrity. He had been taught music as part of a " polite
education" and he wrote and published an extraordinary
number of very ordinary pieces. He had the leisure necessary
for composition and he had the money necessary to ensure
the publication of his works. His father sent him to England,
where he studied under Hullmandel and Dussek, and after-
wards under Cramer. When he returned to Auvergne he
brought with him (or so it is alleged) the first pianoforte to
be heard in the Puy-de-D6me. Later, he studied in Vienna
for two years. His taste was by no means impeccable, for he
greatly preferred M6hul to Mozart and was penetrated with
the profoundest emotions when he first heard the overture
to Stratvnice. In music, his aim was brilliance, dexterity and
the correct expression of sentiment. His writing is formal,
though not without invention and a sense of melodic variety.
At the age of twenty-two he began to write satisfactory
chamber music, and in 1 808 he resumed his musical studies
under Reicha, a pupil of Haydn. He composed in all three
operas, nine symphonies, thirty-four quintets in addition to
other forms of chamber music, and a number of sonatas.
He played the 'cello and is said to have been an excellent
pianist and organist. His works procured for him the support
and admiration of Spontini and Mendelssohn; the latter, at
Aix-la-Chapelle, "lui cda un jour le baton"; and he also
obtained what was pleasantly described as the "sympathetic
neutrality" of Berlioz. Perhaps Berlioz realised that Georges
was uncomfortably near his own level of pretentious medi-
ocrity. Schumann briefly criticised one of his symphonies.

Georges was one of the first honorary members of the
Philharmonic Society of London, and in 1 842 he was elected
to the chair at the Institute vacated by the death of Cheru-
bini. His works were much admired by the Prince Consort,
with whom he exchanged a set of compositions.

He was a tall and handsome man, described as "un des
plus beaux specimens de la grande race britannique, temp6r
et complete par un heureux melange de grice fran9aise . . .
le nez bourbonien, Fovale correct de la figure, la bouche
arque et souriante." From 1829 he was disfigured slightly
by a bullet which accidentally struck him when, in the course

TOM AND EDWARD 227

of a boar-hunt, he was reflecting, upon a musical theme at
Nevers. The bullet affected the nature of his theme, which
was developed in a quintet illustrating the various phases of
his illness and recovery.

He married in 1808 Delphine de Fontanges, the only
daughter of a rich landowner of Aurillac. But although he
had thus secured what was ultimately to be a very handsome
fortune, his early married life seems to have been that of a
relatively poor man. Indeed, the financial state of the Onslow
family in Auvergne was at that time precarious, and Edward
wrote anxiously to his father on the i<th of August 1808
(Clandon MSS.):

"I beseech you not to fail to have put into the funds the first rents
that Mr. Boughton will receive for me. ... P.S. For God's sake
let every means be taken to raise some of my farms, and to engage
Kirby not to oppose the raising of all the other farms except his.
The additional yearly expense occasioned by George's marriage
(which my love and my principles cou'd not let me miss) will distress
me terribly, and keep me in a constant state of alarm and suffering,"

At least it comforted Edward to know that "Delphine is
in every respect all I cou'd wish her to be, and has had an
exceedingly good education." It was not until 1838 that
George's father-in-law died and left to his daughter a large
and welcome estate. By 1852 Georges was in a decline, and
the writer of the French monograph which I have already
quoted says that his last years were embittered by disillusion-
ment. He may have been a musician good enough to realise
how far his own works fell below the level of the highest
excellence. Ih the MS. family history it is recorded that "his
speech, hitherto crisp and vigorous, became hesitating and
feeble/' He died suddenly on the 3rd of October 1853 after
a walk at daybreak. (Arrangements are being made, as I
write, for celebrating the centenary of his death at Clermont-
Ferrand by the performance of some of his works,)

The music of Georges Onslow, though not of a splendid
order, was, and is, playable: it has a dry and fireless amateur
competence*; and surely it is remarkable that a musician of
any sort could thus have appeared as an^c^ffshoot of the
Onslow tree.

32$ THE ONSLOW FAMILY

And Georges was not the only artist who descended from
Edward Onslow. There were two painters, both of consider-
able ability; and there was the eccentric Maurice, who upon
hearing that the Duchesse de Berry was taking a cure at
Mont Dore, slung around him a fiddle and a harp, got on
his horse, and rode over the hills to play a serenade under
her windows. . . .

The son of Maurice (and the grandson of Ned Onslow)
was the best known of the painters. He painted scenes of
peasant life, somewhat in the style of Ostade, portraits, and
religious subjects the best of which is in the church of
St. Christine at St. Flour, where he lived. Like all the chil-
dren and descendants of Edward Onslow, he was a Roman
Catholic. The Abbe Trioullier described him as a man of
saintly character, who had been the pupil of Ingres, Dela-
croix, Delaroche, Coignet and Horace Vernet. His "Chris-
tian virtue" prevented him from studying the nude
"subjects of danger to the soul" but his ability as a painter
procured for him "quelques mentions et m^dailles." He
combined in the most estimable way the qualities of an
ardent royalist and a sincere Christian. His life was one of
complete seclusion and much of his time was devoted to
prayer. He lived alone in extreme poverty " il est mort sous
le toit de Thospitalit^ . . . seule, une sceur de charit lui a
ferme les yeux." This gentle and ascetic man is still re-
membered as "le peintre Edouard Onzlow."

Lord Onslow seems to have visited this peculiar outcrop
of his family on many occasions. A magnificent folio of
engravings at Clandon, displaying the celebrations at Stras-
bourg in 1744 upon the recovery of the King, is thus
inscribed in Onslow's hand: "This Book was the obliging
Present of my worthy Friend Mon: de Chazerat, Intendant
of the Province of Auvergne in 1787. It did belong to
Madame Henriette (eldest daughter of Louis XV) & it
came into Mon: de Chazerat's hands after her Death/'

While his brother Edward was thus unexpectedly found-
ing the "famille d'artistes," Tom Onslow was energetically
though erratically concerned with his father's c

TOM AND EDWARD z*9

Militia. He was Colonel of the second battalion in 1797:
this was disembodied in* 1802 and called up again in 1803.
For some time the battalion was quartered at Ramsgate, and
we are given an admirable first-hand account of Tom Onslow
in The Letters of Private Wheeler > written at Ramsgate in
1 809, and which I here reproduce in part by permission of
the publishers (Messrs, Michael Joseph):

"Viscount Cranley . . . commands the Corps. His Lordship ... is
quite an eccentric character, and I think a much better coachman
than soldier. He rides a low poney when on parade and his dress
being of the fassion some forty years ago, he has a drole appearance.
He has acquired the cognomen of * Punch on a Pig,' This it seems
had come to his Lordship's knowledge, for one morning he rode up
to Major H and said to him loud enough to be heard, 'Major,
what do you think the men calls me?' *I don't know, my Lord'
was the reply. *Why it is Punch on a pig.' The Major began to
smile but he was soon stopped by Lord C asking the Major if he
knew what the men called him. The reply was in the negative.
'Well then I will tell you it is B y Bob.'"

There follows a pleasant anecdote about his Lordship to
"shew the goodness of his heart." While driving to camp he
overtook a soldier who was lame and late and extremely
worried about his reception when he reached his unit. His
commanding officer, he said (mistaking Tom for a coach-
man), was a . "I will spake for you," said Tom; but the
man, though grateful, doubted whether anything "the old
coachman" could say would improve matters at all. How-
ever, he gladly accepted a lift; and was of course delighted
and astonished when he saw how the officer so much dreaded
stood "as humble as a Lamb, bowing and scraping," while
Tom said, "Get down, my good fellow, did I not tell you I
would spake for you."

Tom, who had to write verses about everything, very
naturally composed a militia song called "Thfc Surrey

"V ','*.

Yeomen :

" Of all die ne^ ; r^S Cavalry, it soon shall be confesf d * c
That we ; i&e Sajttif Yi&mfcfc ar^thfc bravest afcd tie b&ft.
*Tis Principles 4tf Hot Beattty, Siz^ or &&,

That gives each Worti^ltmltei la:e a wdb>|n& ai^t r place. I . ."

230 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

Not beauty, size or grace. Nor competence, one may per-
haps be allowed to add, if the portrait of Tom as an amateur
soldier is to be completed. In 18 1 1, when the battalion was
asked to volunteer for service in Ireland, Tom was left at
the depot in command of one sergeant, one corporal and
eighty privates. He resigned his command and handed it
over to his second son, Thomas Cranley, who was then
thirty-three.

The Parliamentary history of Tom Onslow is merely a
list of elections. He was returned with great regularity for
Guildford by means of a systematic dishonesty on the part
of the electors which is described by the fifth Earl (with his
customary charity) as "good will" Such "good will" had
its manifest advantages for the basket-maker, the scrivener,
the mealman, the patten-maker, the bargeman, the glazier,
the cordwainer, the brewer's clerk, the tin-plate worker, the
victualler, the breeches-maker, the peruke-maker, the collar-
maker, the chair-maker and the musician whose names were
to be found on the roll in 1796. But this kind of thing did
not prevent Tom from expatiating publicly and with "much
earnestness and energy" about "the unconstitutional mode
of influence that existed in the abominable practice of
creating votes for the purpose of elections, which excited
his abhorrence."

Although Tom Onslow was returned for many years, the
Onslow influence was declining: there were many un-
pleasant indications of this decline, many distasteful allusions
to a "liveried Lord," a "placed and pensioned Onslow,"
and "a footman." There were obvious reasons for this
diminution of Onslow prestige, as I have already explained:
the first Earl had been rightly condemned as an unscrupul-
ous place-hunter, entirely devoid of political honesty; and
his eldest son was little more than a clowning buffoon, who
might have been honest, but who was clearly unfitted to
represent the people at a time when the state of the country
and the insistent pressures that were leading towards reform
could not any longer tolerate the dummy politican qf , an
earlier period. The lines printed under Gillray's caricature
of Tom Onslow (1804) were extremely pertinent;

TOM AND EDWARD 231

"What can little T. O. do ?
Why, drive a phaeton and two! !
Can little T. O. do no more ?
Yes, drive a phaeton and four!!! !"

Tlirough all vicissitudes, until age overtook him, little
T. O., in the words of Captain Gronow, "was always con-
spicuous in the parks." His, at least, was the celebrity of
owning "four of the finest black horses in England/*

Tom himself was a man without pretences or pretensions,
entirely natural and without any illusions concerning his
own abilities and achievement. With engaging candour,
towards the end of his life, he wrote an essay on driving, and
on his own driving in particular, to which he gave the some-
what pathetic title of "Epilogue/ 7 This Epilogue, which is
among the MSS. at Clandon, may be regarded as Tom's
philosophy and apologia:

"A few desultory thoughts on a topic not very interesting to society,
or useful to mankind . . . fer removed from the enquiries of Phil-
osophy, the pursuits of Literature, the genius of Criticism, or the
contemplation of those who sacrifice at the shrine of Wit, Know-
ledge, Imagination or Improvement! . . . 'The Sublime Art of
Driving' ... I deem myself without any arrogance whatsoever,
perhaps one of the most competent men in all England to handle
this subject; as it requires no talent, and because it would be difficult
to find another man in all the British dominions who had been
sufficiently idle and stupid enough to have driven four horses nearly
every day of his life, for six or eight-and-forty years uninterrupt-
edly! ... I probably have driven a greater number of horses and a
greater number of miles than any gentleman, in any country in all
Europe! I drove six horses in hand every day for a whole season
at Ramsgate! in short, every trick that cou'd be played with 4 or
6 horses I have been fool enough to practice for nearly fifty years
without one accident or one Rival !"

There ,i& much more, with many unfavourable comments
upon the clumsy young amateurs whom he saw driving their
" bang-up'! vetoes p the parkg or on' the roads ^those who
reversed his gp& ambition and w&o "looked lite wchjpten
and drove lik$ gmtj^e^? : |heir ; r^bq^ns in ^ t^igle, their
wheelers and leaders ;^tfi^f^iatyj west aj&d so^th; Few if

232 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

any of these muffs could have done as he did: the whip of
whips, who could swing his four-in-hand at a spanking pace
into TattersalPs "with two gloves on."

Driving was the ruling passion of Tom's life, a passion
that was never cooled by repetition or diminished by experi-
ment. But there was another passion equally constant; his
devotion to his wife. Never could any man have expressed
this devotion in a stranger, more inverted way, in such odd
whimsies of affectionate indelicacy, in such a blunt lewdness,
in patterns of parody almost equal to those of Buckingham:

"Illustrious Button, whom kind Stars allow
To call my Trusty and devoted Sow:
Whose long-mourn'd absence makes me grieve and gruntj
(Because IVe got no little Skugg to hunt:)
Accept this tribute of my unfeign'd love,
Which time or Accident can ne'er remove."

The pig and sow motive occurs frequently, and yet another
epithet is "lovely Stote."

Other verses are of a topical nature, as, for example, the
lines composed when Tom accompanied the royal party in
one of their cruises on board the St. Fiorenzo frigate (1795)-
He will do his best "to sing the sweets that spring from
pitch, and tar, and ropes," though he observes rudely that
"ev'ry dish both flesh and fish seems stew'd alike in tar";
and even more rudely describes the effect of a choppy sea
and of Captain Harry's dinners:

" Brave Harry gives good cheer I own: for when I dine or sup,
As quick as one good dish goes down, another quick comes up."

More felicitously he obeys the command to "celebrate the
Ladies " on board the frigate:

"Your Ladyships then are the Ships I admire,
Like the Ships of Old England you're full of good fire."

Another occasional piece was addressed to "the Dutchess
of Gordon: Lady Chatham: and Lady Madelina St Clair:
on their having left a piece of paper on a Uniform Coat^ *m
which they wrote, Oh, the dear Uniform ."

TOM AND EDWARD 233

"*Oh, the dear Uniform* the Duchess cries,
The lovely Chatham, 'the dear Coat' replies.
Kind, courteous Angels, had I been but here,
To greet you both, so uniformly dear I
I then had ventured on my Knees to dare
To thank the lovely condescending pair."

The gift by Princess Elizabeth of "a publication of prints
taken from her drawings of the Birth and Triumph of
Cupid " provided an opportunity for writing some lines to
"the Royal Fair" who had portrayed "the fickle God" with
her "lovely hand." A more private occasion, celebrated in a
more Tommish way 3 occurred when "the playful charming
Sisters . . . made an apple-pye bed with the Author's
sheets":

" I never again shall get into my bed

Without thinking, sweet damsels, of you!
So I thank you, of Course, for the trick you have playM
(Tho* the Joke is not totally new.)

But if ever I catch you, myself, in those parts

With Kisses the Culprits I'll smother:
For when girls turn my sheets, I expect in their hearts

They'll think me good turn merits another."

His verses produced an exchange of letters between him-
self and George Selwyn (i7i9-9i)> a very much older man,
one of the most quoted though least entertaining of the
eighteenth-century wits. Tom's letter refers to an ingenious
"misapplication of Pliny's words ... to show how easily
wits can make something out of nothing." He continues
gracefully, "My discretion hitherto in life has never kept
pace with my vanity, and in the present instance I very
palpably, sacrifice the one to the other in risquing a corre-
spondence where my inferiority will be so evident."

T. CX must have owed much of his popularity at f the yiirt
of George 111^* iJtore particularly in the Queen's drawteg^-
room, to his Beir Braiii. Thfe grotesque Ifetfe ^l^*ivith
his overblown opiifdyMeiftsf;and his absurd asfio^^wdiild
seem to be tie sttalgefit b 6dm|midti$ AttJ. a^^^eri o
insistent upon the 0B$drtti^^ <of

234 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

young misses who could seldom venture upon anything so
indiscreet as a giggle. Moreover, his friendship with the
Prince of Wales, while it lasted, would have exposed him to
the most benumbing of chills in the royal household.

Bruin herself was much more than a Lady in Waiting to
the Queen : she was the close friend of a stricken and un-
happy woman in the last years of her life, when the King
was a lunatic, wandering among the ghostly ruins of a
disordered memory where pity alone could be his com-
panion.

To this period of the Queen's life belong those touching
little notes that were sent from Windsor to Clandon; and
those queer little snippets of labels, accompanying the
Queen's gifts of almanacs, books and other trifles, proofs
of her affection and esteem for her "dearest Crany." At this
time "Crany" herself was becoming an old woman: she
survived the Queen only by one year.

Not all of these notes are dated, but the earliest would
seem to be one sent from Windsor on the 24th of March
1812:

"Dearest Crany. I send you my little Prayer book full of good
matter. I know but few people like You so earnestly anxious to
fulfill their Duty than Yourself, therefore You will not learn much
by it, but You will at least find therein the reward You are securing
to Yourself by the Benevolence you are Constantly Practising.
Charlotte."

Another note, equally affectionate, comes later:

"My dearest Crany. You will receive this Packet by Sir HL Hoi-
ford, which contains yr Fan & a small little Almanac in which you
will find my good wishes for the Season & as I am deprived of yr
dear Self may I flatter myself that you will kindly receive a trifle
sent by the Coach as a proof of my Remembrance. Charlotte.'*

On little slips of paper, or cardboard squares, there are
the messages that were sent with other gifts. "The gift of
Sincerity to Truth"; "May Every Day and Every Hour of
this New Year prove as Happy as you Deserve is the wish
of Craney's Sincere Friend"; "Dr Crany Remember #*e
Every Day"; and finally, in the smallest imaginable hand

TOM AND EDWARD 235

on a piece of cardboard about one inch square: "Remember
the giver of this as one who participates in yr Prosperity as
well as Adversity. That the first may ever exceed the latter
is the wish of yr Sincere Friend. Charlotte/'

The Queen died on the lyth of November 1818, almost
exactly a year after the death of Princess Charlotte, the
daughter of the Prince of Wales. In the polite words of the
European Magazine, "the portals of the regal Cemetery were
again unclosed"; the Lord Chamberlain expressly forbade
the undertakers to "make a public exhibition of the coffin
of her late Majesty/' and the ladies of the Court were
directed to obtain "black bombazines, plain muslin or long
lawn linen . . . shamoy shoes . . . crape fans/' The King, in
his dark rooms near St. George's Chapel, knew nothing of
what was going on when, on the 2nd of December, the
Queen's body, on a car which ran upon six little articulated
wheels and was drawn by Yeomen of the Guard, entirely
covered and concealed by an immense black velvet pall,
approached the royal tomb. "This ingenious and humane
alteration/' we are told by an observer, "gave the spectacle
a feature of novelty, which it was impossible not to approve.
. . . The solemn effect produced ... by the view of an object
so interesting, slowly advancing, apparently from a motion
of its own . . . was as striking and affecting as it was mourn-
fully magnificent."

Bruin, the Queen's favourite Lady and the much-loved
wife of Tom Onslow, died in the following year (1819).

Tom himself was now greatly enfeebled. The years of his
Earldom were mainly spent at Clandon Park, where he
seems to have been popular. Many stories of his loutish
eccentricity have been preserved, none of them particularly
amusing, but all of the sort which is likely to endear a man
to the common folk when he happens to be a man of rank.
He was a good landlord, and exemplary in his dealings with
tradesmen. Prematurely infirm in his last years* he was
unable to walk aid had to be carried in a chair frbm room
to room by two foqtmen.

He opened to the! public the drive through the park, and
it amused him to stand, a the library window: grotesque,

236 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

red-faced, and perhaps a little crazy, where he shouted with
genial ribaldry or pertinent criticism at those who passed by.
He still took a delight in food and wine; and when his
doctor, called in to cure a touch of indigestion at Christmas,
ventured to suggest that the turkey and the pudding and the
punch were the cause of this disorder, he was annihilated
with "Damn you, Sir; do you suppose that I don't eat a good
dinner every day of my lifer'

This red-faced and white-haired old personage, who
doddered about in the library or was jogged along in his
carrying-chair, a queer ugly bundle of a man (so oddly
wobbling across that superb hall), was never without com-
pany. His two unmarried daughters were with him; and,
for a time, his three sons: the story of his quarrel with the
eldest of these, and its lamentable results, will be told in
the next chapter.

He died on the 22nd of February 1827 at the age of
seventy-two, and his body lay in state on the great bed with
its embroidered Italian hangings and its lofty canopy which
may still be seen at Clandon Park. Among those who walked
past the bed was Rogers the lodge-keeper at the Merrow
gates who, living to the age of ninety, could still relate in
the eighteen-eighties his last impressions of Thomas, the
second Earl of Onslow.

And what could little T. O. do? His descendant, the fifth
Earl, said that he was "too wise a man to be led to extremes."
But the mere avoidance of extremes hardly amounts to real
distinction: indeed, no distinction is within the reach of
those who are incapable of running to extremes pretty
frequently.

He would have done very well as a jocular, moderately
educated, horse-loving, wine-loving, wife-loving, joke-loving
country squire. Perhaps, in this Sense, it may be said that he
did actually do very well, with a little militia-training and
some formal duties thrown in. Beyond this we cannot go.
Although he delighted in those pungent ribaldries which are
among the solaces of the elderly and the ineffective, he did
not often rise to the level of genuine wit. ;

And yet, although he fell short, in stature, gifts

TOM AND EDWARD 23?

achievement, of what is commonly expected of a nobleman,
there is a vigorous and refreshing honesty about little Tom,
a native gusto and a smartness of comical invention which
make him infinitely more attractive than his father. At least
he could never be accused of meanness and evasion. We
know of nothing which reflects adversely upon his personal
honour. The stories told of him have the bald and rugged
quality of elemental farce, they are stories of the stable-room
and the inn-parlour, not the pretty flippancies of Almack's
or Devonshire House where Tom would have been em-
barrassed and unwelcome but there is nothing in any of
them which is morally discreditable; possibly the reason
why most of them are so dull. He was too careless or too
pleasant a fellow to become immersed in political intrigue;
and although his second wife brought him. into close relation
with the Court, he never tried to make use of his privilege
except as an occasion for harmless rhyming. A correspondent
in the Genthmaris Magazine^ one of the few who wrote on
the occasion of his death, observed that "on representation
of distress his hand was always open/' and added that "he
paid his tradesmen with the most regular punctuality." The
care of the poor was always one of his first concerns, and he
himself would often ladle out the stew from a huge copper
cauldron which may be seen, resplendently polished, in the
dining-room at Clandon Park*

Thomas Onslow left behind him three sons and two
daughters. The eldest son, Arthur George, succeeded him
as the third Earl of Onslow.

The second son, Thomas Cranley, the direct ancestor of
the present Earl, entered the Scots Guards, commanded a
battalion of his regiment in the Peninsula, and saw hot
service in 1 81 1. In the following year he married Susannah
Elizabeth, the second daughter of Nathaniel Hillier of
Stoke Park near Guildford, through whom he acquired
properties in Surrey, Essex, Lincolnshire and Norfolk* For
many years he commanded the Surrey Militia whicfc fee had
taken over from his father in i&rfc, resigning h^^pccmand
to Lord Lovelace at the time of the Crimcattv^a^ia- 1854.
He had lived with his wife and children at Clandon Park

2 3 8 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

during his father's lifetime, but afterwards he bought Upton
House at Alresford.

The third son, Edward, also entered the Scots Guards,
serving in Egypt in 1801 under Abercromby and in 1809
with Wellesley in Portugal. He settled at Woodbridge near
Guildford with his two unmarried sisters*

Arthur George, Third Earl of Onslow (1777-1870). From a photograph.

CHAPTER XVIII
Chiaroscuro

T T 7HILE the Onslow influence in Surrey had thus been
VV sadly reduced by the time-serving intrigues of the
first Earl, George Onslow, and the failure of Thomas
Onslow to maintain the proper dignity and usefulness of his
rank, the family name was acquiring splendid renown upon
the high seas.

Born in 1741, ten years after his brother, little Cocking
George, Sir Richard Onslow was the son of Lieutenant-
General Onslow, the brother of the Speaker. He died in
1817, exactly ten years before the death of Tom Onslow.

Admiral Sir Richard Onslow represented in an almost
ideal way the sailor of the eighteenth century. He was brave,
bluff, coarse and intemperate, highly skilled in his profes-
sion, of unimpeachable honesty, warm and affectionate with
his family, zealous in the Service, directly concerned with
his men's welfare and the fighting trim of the ships he
commanded. No finer seaman ever trod a plank or steered
a pinnace.

Richard Onslow entered the Navy when he was ten, and
at seventeen he was commissioned Lieutenant in the Sunder-
land on the East India Station under Pocock. After service
in Pocock's flagship, Yarmouth, this precocious young officer
obtained his first command when he was only nineteen. In
1 762 he was given a forty-gun ship, the Hwnber^ in which he
served on convoy duty in the Baltic. From this time his pro-
motion was steady and assured. In 1776 he command
i?/. Albam of sixty-^four guns, in which he sei^ed'
Howe during i$ie American war, and afterwar4s i
Barrington. He took part itrthe repulse of D^st;^
St. Lucia in the West Indies. After this, he Q^^unclfr the
orders of "Foul^weather Ja^

24 o THE ONSLOW FAMILY

of the poet), a man associated by superstition with tattered
sails and roaring seas.

The sequence of Onslow's promotions and activities need
not be related in detail. It is enough to record here that in
1790 he commanded the Magnificent, a seventy-four ; in
1793 he was Rear-Admiral of the White, and in 1794 Vice-
Admiral: then, after a short period of command at Ports-
mouth (where the Magnificent was visited by the King and
Queen), he was appointed second-in-command under
Duncan in the North Sea, hoisting his flag on board the
Nassau.

At the time of the naval mutinies in 1797 Onslow (riding
at anchor in Yarmouth Roads) received an address from his
ship's company. This is reproduced in the MS. family
history at Clandon :

"The humble address of the ... ship's company sheweth that from
a due sense of your accustomed clemency and goodness, and being
fully assured that your main object has always been as much as
possible to remove any inconvenience attending not only your own
ship's company but all those under your command, therefore
actuated by the hope of obtaining redress from your Honour's
hands and through your influence we the aforesaid ship's company
do thus humbly beg leave to submit to your perusal a statement of
the present grievances we labour under. Having had 19 months*
wages due to the ship and being in general in want of almost every
article of wearing apparel that may conduce to render our lives
comfortable in this situation of fife, we flatter ourselves to think
your Honour will be kind enough to take the same into considera-
tion and remedy that inconvenience by obtaining leave from the
Board of Admiralty for a Commissioner to come to this Port if it
be not convenient to have the ship ordered to a King's Port when
she might be paid ."

The document shows convincingly that Onslow was both
liked and trusted by his crew. Precisely what happened is
not clear, but Onslow reported that, in his opinion, the meni
would refuse to weigh anchor and to leave Yarmouth Roads
until the pay was forthcoming. This in fact was true, for
the Nassau refused to weigh nine days later. HoweVdr,
Onslow appears by this time to have been transferred to the

CHIAROSCURO 241

Adamant^ one of the two ships of the line which could be
depended upon: the other was Duncan's own flagship, the
Venerable,

For many weeks Duncan and Onslow hovered off the
mouth of the Texel playing an elaborate though entirely
successful game of bluff. Signals were made for the benefit
of Dutch telescopes to ships that were supposed to be in
the offing, but, in fact, were not there at all. Or the ships
flew different colours at different times, to give the impres-
sion that they were merely the screen of an enormous fleet.
Gradually more ships real ships joined the Admirals, and
on the i yth of June came the welcome news that the mutiny
was over, and orders were given to blockade the TexeL

On the 2 ^th of July, Admiral Onslow left the Adamant
and hoisted his flag on the Monarch. For nearly eleven weeks
the wearisome blockade continued; but at last, on the yth
of October, the Dutch began to shake out their topsails and
slowly to move away from the Texel anchorage.

This was the moment for which all had been waiting,
though the fleets did not engage in close action until four
days later. The number of first-raters on each side was the
same (sixteen), but the broadside power of the English fleet
was slightly superior to that of the Dutch. .

After the signal for action had been given, the ships under
Duncan and Onslow bore down upon the enemy's line with
a following wind and in loose order.

The hazards of this action were clear. The Dutchmen
were moving in line about five miles off shore where the
depth of the water was no more than nine fathom. Well
aware that a supreme display of courage and of seamanship
was now required, Duncan sent up the signal to pass
through the line and engage to leeward: he thus exposed
himself to the danger of running crippled ships aground,
but he would gain the advantage of getting betwfcm the
enemy and the- coast- and of throwing his line into dis<kder.
NautiodlyV of miitsfej the difficulty lay in heating upitd
windward again after the broadsides had been (delivered; '

Thus begin tke battleof Camperdown, as; brilliant and as
bloody an action ^as wasUe^er//fdught >*ut;;sca* Omslow, in the

242 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

Monarch, bore down upon the rear of the Dutch line. So
close to each other were the enemy ships that his Captain,
Edward O'Bryen, said that he saw no chance of getting
through. "The Monarch will make a passage," replied
Onslow, with a bluff resolution worthy of Nelson himself.

With admirable seamanship, O'Bryen took Monarch
through the rear of the enemy's line. The gun crews were
standing in silence with matches ready, and in silence the
Vice-Admiral slipped in past the Jupiter and the Haerlem.
Then, having forced the enemy to swing wide, he let loose
both broadsides at once in a single tremendous roar, covering
both ships in the rolling and reeking clouds of action.

Duncan, in the Venerable, shortly afterwards cut the line
in the van, and the battle developed in a series of bloody and
thundering duels between ship and ship. On board the
Adamant (formerly Onslow's ship) one of the men's wives
helped her husband in serving his gun, until a round-shot
carried away one of her legs. And so the fight rolled and
roared; but at last the heavier metal and the fine seamanship
of the Englishmen prevailed and the Dutch Admiral hauled
down his flag. The surrender of the Vice-Admiral was
received by Onslow; a scene commemorated in the heroic
manner by John Russell, R.A., who painted or pastelled so
many of the family portraits.

His fine behaviour in this battle (admirably seconded by
the magnificent handling of his ship by O'Bryen) justly
procured for Onslow the highest honours. He was treated,
with Duncan, to a dinner by the East India Company, at
which Nelson was present. He was given the Freedom of
the City of London, and a sword worth a hundred guineas.
He was created a baronet; and in 1799 was promoted to the
rank of Admiral of the Blue. In the previous year he had
resigned his command on account of ill health and he had
no further employment.

Admiral Onslow was described by Hotham as being
"below mid stature and of a florid countenance with a strong
likeness to the Royal Family." His manner was abrupt anjd
irritable, but "his ideas and disposition were alike generous
and he was an affectionate husband and indulgent father/'

CHIAROSCURO 243

Unfortunately, "he had a nautical predilection for con-
viviality, without strength of constitution to support it/*
in other words, he was too fond of his grog. This, it would
seem, gave people the impression that he was drunk when,
in reality, he was merely unwelL

A brief impression of Onslow is recorded by Fanny
Burney, dated the 26th of August 1789, "our last day at
Saltram":

" From the window ... I had a call from Captain Onslow, who was
waiting the King's return in the park. He told me he had brought
up a brother of mine for the sea. I did not refresh his memory with
the severities he practised in that marine education."

The brother was James Burney of the Bristol.

Admiral Sir Richard Onslow married in 1773 the
daughter of Commodore Matthew Mitchell, by whom he
had four daughters and three sons. His younger brother,
Arthur Onslow, was Dean of Winchester. "We know/* says
the fifth Earl, "that he was flogged at Eton." We do not
seem to know very much more, except that he secured
various clerical appointments, became a Fellow of All Souls,
printed two sermons and provided the troops in Flanders
with flannel waistcoats.

The Admiral was made a G.C.B. in 1815, and he died at
Southampton two years later. In his Will he directed "that
his funeral expences should not exceed the sum of twenty
pounds, to prevent any unnecessary ostentation; and it is
remarked, that 'the funeral of a brave and honest sailor costs
a much less sum/*' His personal estate was sworn under
jiooo. He was "a brave and honest sailor' 1 while he lived,
and a poor man when he died.

No member of the Onslow family, after the death of the
Admiral, could, for sixty years or more, be described as
highly distinguished, though many were usefully teipployed
as Justices f :ihe Peace* In the hands of Tom O|$k>% ^
we have seeri, tke! Earldom had ceased to be notfe; jn the
hands of Ariintf George,, who followed hirn^ i
observable;

244 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

strangest figures in the family history, or in any family
history. He is dark, elusive, mysteriously unpleasant, though
rarely definable. Born in 1777, he was educated at Harrow
and Christ Church, but (like so many of the Onslows) he
took no degree. His grandfather made him a Deputy
Lieutenant and a Justice of the Peace shortly after he^came
of age. He served under his father, Tommy Onslow, in the
Surrey Militia: and then comes the astonishing statement
"In 1798 Arthur George resigned his commission and his
doings during the next twenty years are decidedly obscure"
(MS. family history: my italics).

Now, there must be something very extraordinary, some-
thing negatively distinguished, about a man who manages
to live in decided obscurity for so long a period as twenty
years. Where was he, and what was he doing ? The questions
echo in the cavernous void of the past, and there is no
answer. Nothing in the hand of Arthur George, except his
name in a book or two, is to be found among the archives
at Clandon : no letters exist, so far as I am aware, either from
him or to him. Were it not for the MS. history written by
the fifth Earl, it would be virtually impossible to give any
account at all of this most extraordinary and umbrageous
man.

It is known that "he travelled" in the early years of the
nineteenth century. He had money. He bought "works of
art," and he displayed an extravagant enthusiasm for every-
thing connected with Napoleon Bonaparte.

Walking with Delaroche in the Louvre he pointed out the
absurdity, or at least the neglect of realism, in David's
dramatic picture of Napoleon crossing the Alps: all that sort
of thing was vulgarly theatrical, it was not the way in which
heroes and their deeds ought to be coirimfemorated: it was
not the veritable scene as it would have appeared to those
present! Look at the prancing horse (a show-piece of the
haute cok\ the whirling folds of the cloak, the gesture of the
outstretched arm, pointing to vacancy how ridiculous! It
would have been so very different: a cold grey huddled
figure on a drenched and weary horse, led forward :
slowly by an Alpine guide. : ; s ' y

CHIAROSCURO *45

Now, said Onslow, I want you to paint me a picture
showing as nearly as possible the exact scene. That is what
painters ought to do; it is their proper business. You will
have to find the guide himself, and he will have to take you
over the route, and then we shall get the actual men (if we
can) and the actual accoutrements, and you will be able to
draw the very rocks and the perilous track, and then we
shall have a true picture; and of what use is a picture if it
is not true ?

All this may seem very fantastic, but it is none the less
certain that Delaroche found the guide and followed the
route and painted the picture, "as far as possible from
natural models" which hung for a while at Clandon Park
and is now in Liverpool.

This romantic enthusiasm for Napoleon (shared by many
Englishmen) led to the purchase of other portraits and
relics, most of which appear to have been dispersed. But in
Lady Onslow's drawing-room at Little Clandon there is a
small but exquisite marble bust of Napoleon by Canova
which is said to have belonged to Josephine. Another
marble bust, though clearly not from the hand of the master,
stands at the foot of the staircase at Clandon Park.

The pictures collected by Arthur George included
Reynolds' portrait group of Mr. and Mrs. George Went-
worth, three Canalettos, four Ruysdaels and a Hobbema;
and among his busts were those of Fox and of Pitt by
Nicoli. He also collected Sfevres china and French furniture,
most of which were sold at Christie's in 1 893, when nine of
the Sevres pieces fetched 1250.

One would like to know whether, in the course of his
travels^ Arthur George visited his uncle Edward and his
family at Clermont-Ferrand. It seems very probable that He
did so: it would certainly have pleased him to meet one of
Edward's sons^who had served in Napoleon's army and whjb
won the Cross of; the Legion at Leipsic. M u ,;i'li<

But these twetify) years of obscurity flow on with a?da!rfc,
featureless aiid l^ellmdmotony, a stream of ^^hted ajtid
impenetrable oblivioitifirom the 4ulJ sturface o^,wfaich mtittdr
image nor incident bmeargesr Thfere is a proses tefetwce to

*46 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

the hunting of harriers in the Clandon country . . . and there
is a poem written to Maria Edgeworth during a visit to
Edgeworth Town in 1811 : "Lines to Miss Edgeworth on
Leaving Her H6use after a Visit." Of the friendship or the
occasion which produced the poem, nothing is known. The
ingenuity of the lines, such as they are, depends upon refer-
ences to the titles of Miss Edgeworth's books (Clandon
MSS.):

"Tho' 'Castle Rackrent' as 'Belinda's Fame'
Might in themselves immortalise thy name,
Thy tow'ring genius every walk pervades,
And * Leonora * paints its lights and shades.
When 'Bulls and Blunders* have beguiled our hours,
'Parent's Assistant' shows us different powers,
'Modern Griselda' now corrects our wives,
Then 'Education' forms our children's lives.
And long $s wit, or sense, or taste prevails,
Thy stories will be ' Fashionable Tales,'
While I'm well satisfied that all agree
My pen, like yours, Ma'm, can produce 'Ennui'."

When he was forty-one Arthur George married a woman
considerably younger than himself; Mary Fludyer, daughter
of George Fludyer and Lady Jane Fane, daughter of the
ninth Earl of Westmorland. But this marriage does not raise
Viscount Cranley (as he then was) out of the obscurity which
enveloped him during the whole of his life. He lived at
Clandon Park with his father, Tom Onslow, until at some
date which does not appear to be known there was a
quarrel.

Trifling affairs will bring long-sustained animosities to
the point of explosion; and this is what happened at Clandon
Park. Evidence makes it sufficiently clear that Tom Onslow
had never liked his eldest son (he preferred the second,
Thomas Cranley); and one can scarcely imagine a more
difficult father than. Tom Onslow himself.

The explosion occurred one evening at dinner, "Why
d'you never go to Court ?" said the Earl to his son; and
Arthur George replied with sour asperity that he had $o
Court suit. Upon hearing this, Tom said that he woidd lend

CHIAROSCURO 247

him his own an offer which implies that Viscount Cranley,
like his father, was "below the middle size." The reply was
admittedly somewhat offensive, for Arthur George said that
he had given this "threadbare garment " to his own valet.
This indeed was a piece of sullen impudence which might
well have enraged the gentlest of fathers, and it threw Tom
(who was now an old man) into a crimson and raging temper.
Other members of the family were present, and Arthur
George's wife shrill, tremulous and exasperated beyond
endurance rose in a flurry from the table, and with an
angry tearful cry of "I hate you all, and I will never come
into this house again," she ran out of the room.

After this unpleasant and undignified scene Arthur
George and his wife moved into the house known pompously
as Clandon Regis, close to the park and on the eastern side
of the road which runs from north to south through the
village of West Clandon.

Two things at least are clear about Arthur George: he
loved his wife as much as he detested his father, and almost
everyone else. Having occupied Clandon Regis, his insane,
pretentiously malevolent ambition was to make the house
finer, larger, more renowned than Clandon Park. He there-
fore began to make it sprawl out in a grandiose though
tasteless way, in a kind of builder's Baroque, by adding
rooms and roofs, Corinthian pilasters and irrelevant piles of
stonework; so that the whole thing was better fitted to be
the home of a retired stockbroker than the seat of a country
gentleman.

Viscount Cranley's hatred of his father was extended,
when he succeeded him and became third Earl of Onslow,
to the beautiful house of Clandon Park and everything which
it contained. The havoc and loss due to this brooding,
malicious and frustrated man cannot be estimated. He sold
the Speaker's collection of portraits. He took away the
Russell pictures a0d all the family plate. It was his intention
to rip the floor out of the "Palladio room" and have it laid
at Clandon Regis; but from this he was dissuaded by one
of his brothers*
When his wife died in 1830 his sorrow was |>oUred into,

248 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

and augmented, the dark and thickening stream of his
bitterness. Her rooms at Clandon Regis were locked, noth-
ing was to be touched; there was the embroidery, there the
needle, threaded and ready as her fingers had left it on the
last day of her work.

Clandon Park was never occupied by the third Earl of
Onslow when he became its owner. For a period of more
than forty years it was totally abandoned by the family.

The gardens disappeared under a wild weedy confusion,
a wilderness of tall grass, of interlacing briars, of robustly
rioting shrubs, uncontrollable trees, and everything which
makes up an English jungle. Birds built in the clammy
chimneys, owls hooted on the balustrades, water trickled or
ran or spouted from the broken pipes. Swarming bees
buzzed in the library, depositing their undisturbed honey
in the strangest of corners. Only a few fires were lighted
from time to time by "an old woman" who acted as the
solitary caretaker; and who grew to be so old that she could
do nothing at all. There is evidence that some of the window-
frames rotted away completely. Writing in 1841 (fourteen
years after the abandonment of the house), Brayley says
"the whole house has a forlorn and deserted air; most of the
pictures and furniture having been removed; the present
Lord Onslow preferring a smaller seat in the adjacent
village." He adds, that the library contained "nearly all the
works printed at Strawberry Hill."

After the death of his wife, Lord Onslow, darker, more
retracted, possibly more insane (for his conduct seems never
to have been that of a normal man), withdrew for much of his
time to the family property at Richmond, where he con-
verted two houses ifato one. His desire to make a palatial
house of the absurd architectural jumble at Clandon Regis
had now evaporated; his life was void of ambition or hope.
The few stories that are related of him in the family MS.
history are dull and ugly. When he was asked by his agent
whether he would let a cottage in Clandon, he snarled
stupidly, "Paint it black, and then no other damned fool
will think it pretty and want to take it." Yet he seems
to have been a popular landlord, though in a somewhat

CHIAROSCURO 249

limited way*: he never repaired his houses, but he never
raised the rents.

His only son died in 1 852 ; his other child, Augusta, who
inherited her father's quarrelsome and refractory disposition,
survived unpleasantly till 1891. But Arthur George himself,
wretched, useless and unhappy, lived to the great age of
ninety-three.

Born in the year when Johnson was at the height of his
conversational powers, he had seen the premiership of
Gladstone, the period of the great Victorian reforms. He had
survived Dickens. He had lived through the last resplendent
phase of the English aristocracy, when the merchants and
yeomen could justify their claim to be genteel. He had
observed (perhaps) the strange decline of taste and elegance,
culminating in the curly bulging horrors of 1851; and the
vast improvements in the bathroom and the water-closet.
Steam had replaced horses for travel, and was driving sails
from the sea. Miss Emily Davies began formidably though
firmly to organise the education of women, greatly to the
advantage of these reluctant though slowly improving
islands. And finally, he had passed from the age of the
miniature or the flattering canvas to the age of the cheap
and veracious photograph.

By his contemporaries he was unnoticed and almost un-
known. Although he sometimes appeared in the House of
Lords, and was understood to be a "strong Tory" (why are
such epithets habitually applied to Tories, I wonder?), he
never spoke. The one good deed recorded of him is that he
gave the land on which the Royal Surrey Hospital was built
on the outskirts of Guildford: this was in 1863, when he
was eighty-six. Ten years previously he had revoked the
bequest of his pictures to the National Gallery, alleging that
the Trustees had issued "an unsatisfactory report/* On his
ninetieth birthday, in 1867, he received the inevitable silver
inkstand from his tenants. "

He died at Richmond in October 1870. By the terms <
his will, he left his pictures and residuary personal estatp to
his daughter. Lady Augusta Onskrwy his .executrix; with
remainder to his daughter-in-law,, Lady G^iley, for life;

2 5 o THE ONSLOW FAMILY

with remainder to her three daughters for their lives ; with
remainder over in default of their issue for the benefit of
the Church in the diocese of Winchester.

Arthur George had survived his brother, his brother's
son, and his own son. After 1855 it was clear that the
property and the Earldom would pass (if he survived) to
William Hillier Onslow, then a child only two years old,
the son of the third Earl's nephew. This child therefore'
became the object of the Earl's deep and sombre hatred; so
far was the old man removed from the charm and warmth
of ordinary human life. He had seen the boy, or so it was
alleged, killing a moorhen with a stone; and this had so
wrought upon his darkened and wandering mind that he
resolved upon the spoiling of the estate and the ruin of the
boy's future; so far as these things lay within his power; so
far as they could be devised in the crazy wretchedness of
his own decline.

A portrait of the third Earl at Clandon Park shows him,
perhaps at the time of his marriage, as a pale man with
d'Orsay whiskers, a very long prominent nose, thin pinched
lips, receding chin, and the general air of a man to whom
generosity is unknown ; a man of small, mean, vindictive
character. In a carte-de-visite photograph, probably taken
when he was about ninety, age has imposed a meagre dignity
upon his features without the redemption of warmth or
kindliness.

This dark and thwarted man, living so long and so
wretchedly, could be shown as a tragic figure, if only he were
more discernible. As it is, he withdraws into the pretentious
though incomplete obscurity of Clandon Regis, and after-
wards to Richmond, He left behind him a pitiably neglected
mansion and a name of greatly diminished honour. A silent
voter, one who rarely spoke and was only rarely seen, he was
among the strangest of Earls; stranger, more bitter, more
withdrawn as he grew old; moving like a shade among the
shadows of a world that, for him, had lost its meaning and
its familiar form. Men wondered only at this that he, a
man so cheerless and remote, so little attached in any-
ordinary way to life, could live to so great an age.

CHIAROSCURO

When he died, reluctantly giving place to the boy he
hated, it was like the passing of a creature hardly percept-
ible: so old, so forsaken, so inattentive to his daily concerns,
he was a ghost before he died,

His abandonment of Clandon Park implied also the
abandonment of the Onslow pride and ideals, a loss of belief
in the family's dignity and usefulness, a blackly perverted
.pleasure in the acceptance of defeat- The old Onslow
nobility was lost through family action, and even its relics
were scattered or destroyed.

All depended now upon the boy, William Hillier, who,
when he inherited a derelict mansion and a name of lost
repute, was a youth of seventeen.

CHAPTER XIX
Splendid Youth

/GEORGE AUGUSTUS CRANLEY ONSLOW, the

vJfather of William Hillier Onslow, was born in 1813;
the son of Thomas Cranley Onslow, brother of the third
Earl He was sent to Harrow in 1825, where he distin-
guished himself as a classic. His annotated Greek and Latin
texts were at one time preserved at Clandon. In 1831 he
was head of the school; but his Oxford career at Christ
Church was disappointing, and he came down with a third.
He was fond of sport, but was thoroughly bored by the
Surrey Militia, that persisting family curse. In 1848, when
he was thirty-five, he fell in love with Harriet Loftus, the
eldest daughter of General William Fraser Bentinck Loftus
of Kilbride, a cousin of the Marquess of Ely. Two extra-
ordinary letters relating to his courtship are among the
unpublished family papers at Clandon. The first is from
George Augustus himself, sent from Upton House, Aires-
ford, the home of his family. Although undated, it was
almost certainly written in 1 848 :

"My dear Miss Loftus. I almost regret that I did not speak to
you on the subject upon which I am now about to write, but the fact
was that I felt most painfully the embarrassment of my position and
entertaining as I did the sincerest affection towards you, I could
not bring myself to enter on an explanation, which however neces-
sary in my circumstances, might be declared by the more romantic
of your sex, as somewhat too cold and mercenary, for a very
enthusiastic admirer. I have however too good an opinion of your
good sense than to feel that you will not readily acknowledge the
reasonableness of my conduct in endeavouring to secure a suitable
provision before I enter into the exigencies and responsibilities of a
married life. In thus writing to you I take for granted that the
General has explained to you the nature of the conversations we
have had upon this somewhat delicate subject, and as it is one upon

SPLENDID YOUTH 253

which I hate to dwell, I will say no further than that if your father
is enabled to comply with the very modest request which I have
presented to him, I trust I shall have your own assurance that I may
be considered as the accepted suitor of her, who has long occupied
my thoughts, and at length entirely engaged my affections, of your
own dear self, whose presence I feel necessary to my happiness, and
whose interests and feelings I would proudly hope are now identified
with my own/*

This is odd enough; but what follows is even more peculiar:
"Much as I desire to hear from you an acknowledgement of reci-
procal sentiments towards me, nothing would give me greater pain
than to suppose that I might ever possess your hand, without your
heart, or that, for the sake of obtaining what might be called worldly
advantages, you had consented to sacrifice for ever your peace and
happiness in an ill-assorted union. Pardon my suspicions, I ought to
know better than to dream of such a thing, but I am afraid I am
naturally jealous, and having been, I hardly know how, looked
upon by the world as a good ' parti 9 '(certainly without much reason),
now that I feel myself in love I cannot help entertaining certain
misgivings as to the nature of her feelings, whose amiable qualities
have awakened within me the sincerest sentiments of regard and
affection. I hope my dear Harriet will take in good part what I have
written. . , . I have written to General Loftus by tonight's post,
and have entreated him to let me know as soon as possible what
steps he will be able to take in securing the provision I have asked
for. . . . Whatever the issue of the business be, I trust you will give
me the credit for haying acted to you throughout in an honourable,
respectful and straightforward manner, and I can assure you on my
own part that should circumstances unfortunately interfere to prevent
our union, I shall ever entertain towards you the same feelings of
love and affection, with which you have always inspired me. . . ."

I have quoted the greater part of this letter, because of its
period style and its astonishing blend of business, love and
respectful conceit. His love is imperishable; but the marriage
depends upon the General's ability, and willingness, to
plump dowitf a.few thousands in ready cash. The same
" delicate matter " is raised in an equally astonishi&g letter
from his father, 1A0ffias Granley Otislow, tci General Loftus :

u My son Augjiis!its/%e iys ftanfefy, "is a man df expensive habits

in which perhaps I la^t^i m^

given him and others ... reason to Relieve that iny means are very

z$4 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

much greater than they are. Upon his application to me upon the
present occasion, I have plainly told him that they are of that
extremely limited nature so as totally to deprive me of all power to
assist him, beyond the annual addition of jioo to what I at present
allow him. . . , My Son . . . has mentioned that it is your intention
to hand over to my Son the sum of ^3000 as your Daughter's
Marriage Portion . . . you will perceive that the Difficulties he will
have to struggle with are those that will follow immediately upon
his Marriage, rather than those that will beset him after his father's
and mother's death. ... I have thought it my duty to signify to my
Son the withholding of my consent ... on the Grounds I have
taken the liberty of stating to you: aware as I am that no Marriage
ever turned out well that began in poverty though it may terminate
in affluence."

And so, what with the means or the meanness of Thomas
Cranley Onslow and the limited liability of General Loftus,
it looked as though William Hillier would not succeed in
getting born at all. But matters were settled in time: George
Augustus married his dear Harriet, and they lived together
at Upton House with George's father. Here, in 1853,
William Hillier was born: a child so frail, clinging so pre-
cariously to life, that he was baptised on the day of his birth.
Two years later, when he was out shooting, George Augustus
was "incautious enough to drink some stagnant water in a
peat bog" (or so we are given to understand), from the
effects of which he died.

After the death of her husband, Harriet Onslow lived
with her child at Upton House until, in 1861, Thomas
Cranley died and the house became the property of his
daughters. She then spent a winter at Cannes; where
William Hillier ("Hillie"), now aged eight, began his long-
continued practice of keeping a diary. He showed already
that quick and happy interest in observable things which
filled every day of his life with renewed enthusiasm. " Caught
a Leafinsect [sic] a cricket and two grasshoppers. . . . Went

to see Lord Brougham's villa Had a beautiful view from

the top of the hill on which Villa D&mna is situated."

In 1 862 Mrs. Onslow took a house at Dorking, and there
she lived until her son became the owner of Clandon Park
in 1870.

William Hillier, Fourth Earl of Onslow (1853-1911). From a photograph.

SPLENDID YOUTH 255

William Hillier, after studying at Mr. Tabor's excellent
academy at Cheam, was sent to Eton, where he seems to have
pleased his masters. A slightly pompous report from one of
these Arthur Coleridge James was sent to Mrs* Onslow
in 1869, Hillier 's last year as a schoolboy:

"Your son has shown his desire to leave Eton with credit, and with

the esteem, both of the Masters and his Schoolfellows I cannot

help feeling that his purposes have been unmistakably in the right
direction, . . . Besides the knowledge of the world which he natur-
ally possessed, he has showed [sic] a tact and a discrimination which
the knowledge of the world does not always give. There has not
been that loudness and fastness in his demeanour which I was at
one time rather afraid of, & from his deportment during the last
few months at Eton I am sure we may augur well for his discretion
and modesty for the future."

Hillier himself records that he was "nailed'' at Eton in
this very year for playing billiards. He had visited Paris
with his mother in March 1869, where he had dined with
Lord Carlingford and Lady Waldegrave, and met the Duke
of Cambridge. In October he was at Frankfurt, where he
was instructed in music, in riding the velocipede, and in the
art of knitting. The riding of velocipedes became a
favourite pastime, and early in the following year (1870),
when William Hillier was at home again, there is mention
of a "new velocipede" which "answered much better than
the last" although it had the inconvenience of being
"painted black and yellow/'

At the start of the Franco-Prussian War in 1870 he
expressed a desire to see military service and was offered
a post by Von der Thann; but his mother put a stop to this
folly. In August 1870 he failed to matriculate at Oxford.
Then, on the 24th of October, he made a memorable entry
in his diary; "Heard that Lord Onslow had died at one
o'clock this morning."

Arthur George had died on the day preceding his ninety-
fourth birthday. Not a single member of the family was
invited to the funeral at Merrow; for malignity lingered still
in the house of Clandon Regis. . . ,

z$6 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

It was a strange inheritance; it might have been a dismay-
ing and useless inheritance to a boy less eager, less resolved,
less happily elated than William Hillier. The Onslow name
and the Onslow mansion were so grievously decayed, the
one so darkened, the other so forlorn, that there seemed
little hope of an immediate revival. The wilderness of wild
weeds and of waving grass under the walls of the house, the
fluttering birds in the chimneys and the trickling of water
down the broken pipes, the whole dolorous picture of
neglect and abandonment, offered a prospect of ruin that
might well have daunted the inheritor.

Not only was it estimated that more than 25,000 would
be required to put the farms, cottages and fences "in reason-
able order," to say nothing of repairs to the great house;
but the sanitation at Clandon Park was at least fifty years
out of date: in fact, there was "no drainage," and, "except
for a well," there was no water supply. Aunt Augusta was
determined not to give up the family pictures, or anything
else; there was neither furniture in the house nor game in
the coverts; those who began to cut a way through the
jungle in the park had to be specially protected from the
attack of hissing vipers.

The young Earl drove over from Dorking to Clandon
Park on the second of November, and (at a later date)
recorded his impressions in the Estate Book (Clandon
MSS.):

"I drove ... to Clandon Park, and was the first person who, for
many years, had been allowed to enter the house. It was almost
bare of furniture, and all blinds, curtains, etc, had perished. The
only occupant was a Mrs. Dallen, a woman of considerable age,
who stated that she had lighted fires and opened windows until her
strength failed her, and she was compelled to discontinue. The
great thickness of the walls, however, preserved the interior in a
marvellous manner. . . ."

It was now, when he was only seventeen, that William
Hillier showed himself no idle and ordinary youth. He
entered upon life and its difficulties with enormous en-
thusiasm, a happy confidence which never deserted him for
a moment, the certain knowledge that he knew what to do,

SPLENDID YOUTH 257

and that what he did was right; a swiftly-moving exuberant
zeal; a clear simplicity of aim and direction ; a mind that was
neither subtle nor profound, though admirably adapted to
all the purposes to which he devoted himself.

In the Estate Book which I have quoted, there is another
significant entry:

"Before the close of the year I was able to get into the house at
Clandon, and occupied the library and two rooms immediately
above it called Lady Harriet's bedroom and dressing-room." In his
diary he noted that the house "had not been touched for forty-three
years."

At the same time, the boy's preoccupation with the affairs
of his rank and inheritance did not prevent him from taking
his customary, natural delight in smaller things bowls,
quoits and the sticking of pictures into scrap-books, the
purchase of oysters, the setting-up of a lathe and extreme
zeal in the shooting of rabbits.

In March 1871 he succeeded at last in matriculating and
went into residence at Exeter College, Oxford. In London
he spent a morning at Collard's and ChappelPs inspecting
organs, harmoniums and American organs. He blithely
criticised the singing of Albani. He looked in at the Tich-
borne trial: a famous affair, in which his uncle, Guildford
James Mainwaring Ellerker Onslow, was making a very
conspicuous fool of himself. And then, with his usual dis-
arming confidence, he called on his detestable Aunt Augusta :

"She made me exceedingly angry by her pettishness. Nothing in the
House worth having but Delaroche's Napoleon, Thorwaldsen's
Shepherd, Canova's bust of Napoleon, & Hogarth's House of
Commons, the latter I still hope to g& hold of. Made me look at
her absurd temple & strawberry beds."

The work of restoring the Clandon estate and of getting
the house in order continued all the while, and in this the
young Earl was nobly helped by his mother and his cousins,
the Cranley girls {jthe children of the third Earl's son).
Furniture was brought to Clandom Park from ;the house at
Dorking, and before vfang William HUfe ^toised the
first of a long series of amateur theatricals m which he took

258 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

the greatest delight. Among the distinguished people who
took part in these was the Hon. Robert Milnes, afterwards
Marquess of Crewe. Only when he felt "seedy" was there
the slightest pause in his varied activities. Nor were those
activities of a sort which he could always anticipate. On the
1 3th of June 1872 he wrote in his diary:

"Left Ascot by the 4.20 train and dressed in the Guard's Van. To
my horror I found that they had packed me up Fat Lane's trousers
instead of my own. On arriving at the Middle Temple to dine with
the Masters and Benchers on this their tercentenary I was horrified
to find it a tremendous affair to which all the Judges and Law
Lords were invited: and also Lord Derby and several literary peers.
I went in with Dr. Vaughan, the Master, and was further horrified
on finding my name down for the toast of the evening . . . which
however I suppose I managed fairly, as Lord Derby, Karslake and
others came round me to make my acquaintance and congratulate
me."

His diaries, volume after volume, are written with a swift
unpausing hand which runs across the paper in loops,
whirls, dashes too hasty for punctuation and often barely
legible. He was always jumping into carriages or trains, to
be taken here or there with all imaginable speed. One cannot
imagine him in a reflective or doubtful mood. Knowing
precisely what to do and how to do it, he did everything
well. He fitted into the system of his life as naturally and as
capably as Arthur Onslow the Speaker had fitted into the
Chair: and when he himself became Chairman of Com-
mittees in the House of Lords the comparison with Arthur
was fully justified. His energy and success in high society
were equally remarkable, though equally natural. The
diaries are full of such notes as these:

"Took Lady Sebright in to dinner, who is very amusing. . . .
Hayward told several un-Bowdlerised stories after dinner, . . .

"To stay with Lady Molesworth Nobody thought of going

to Church.

"Charlie Beresford drove Royalty in his drag and afterwards
rode in a hurdle race which he did not win. . . . The Duke of
Edinburgh presented me to the Prince of Wales who received me
kindly*

SPLENDID YOUTH 259

"To Richmond to stay with Lord John Russell who is grown
very old and failing."

Once, when Lord Beauchamp invited him to a breakfast
party, he found himself placed between two bishops, and
then discovered that they wanted him to vote (when the
time came for voting) against the Deceased Wife's Sister,
"I have steadily voted for her ever since," he observes.

As the time of his coming-of-age drew near, William
Hillier became interested in presentable girls; and they in
him. Here, as in all matters, he could be depended upon to
act with an undivertible sense of duty and honour: to choose
an entirely suitable woman at an entirely suitable time and
with entirely appropriate sentiments and enthusiastic
decency*

The young women are observed and reviewed with
Hillier's customary precision. One (Isabel Warburton) was
"small & not pretty, badly dressed, but a good girl";
another (Kate Onslow) was "a good hearted girl, & with
education might have been made marriageable "; and yet
another, more saucy, "is inclined to flirt, or why make such
eyes?" And of course there were rumours. Here is one,
dated the I4th of January 1874:

"Walked with the two Wrottesleys Clara Wrottesley asked me

if I liked Clara Middleton & went on to say she did not, as she set
going the story about our being engaged, & said that she (C. W.)
was behaving very badly setting her cap at me tho' so much older.
That she had said in reply that she was nearly old enough to be my
grandmother, that she knew me very well and liked me very much.
She then went on to recommend me not to marry unless I liked the
person very much, unless I chose to marry for money. I contented
myself with saying that I thought it very wrong of Lady M. to
circulate so ridiculous a report."

William Hillier was orthodoxly religious; he knew that
th& Church of England was right, just as jie knew that^the
Tory party was right; it was quite impossible for a sensible
decent fellow fc> think otherwise. He therefore ^recorded
some religious occasions; his tisual Sunday routine being*
church in the morning, kennels in the afternoon.

Sitting in Lord Cheloifcford's pew at St. P&er's, Eaton

260 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

Square, he heard "Wilkinson on the Holy Ghost's influence
in the inner man i hr. 5 mins."

A more astonishing experience, indeed one which is
totally inexplicable, was noted after a visit to St. Peter's,
Windmill Street, where he was present at "a curious service
and savouring of Blasphemy; Women singing bawdy songs
under cover of the hymns," Certainly very curious.

The coining-of-age was celebrated at Clandon on Satur-t
day, the yth of March 1874. It was a modest affair, showing
the good taste of the Earl and his mother. Bells rang "at an
early hour"; the villagers presented a card tray and candle-
sticks; the tenants produced some handsome Queen Anne
silver; and William Hillier threw fourpenny-bits out of the
windows for the children. After lunch, when the more
substantial tenants were honoured by sitting down with the
Onslow party, food was distributed to " sixty old people of
Clandon and Merrow*"

On Monday morning, after "marking trees," William
Hillier rushed off to London, got himself appointed Deputy
Lieutenant for Surrey, took his seat in the House of Lords,
and made his Will.

He quickly set about raising money to put his estates in
order. He sold the Hillier property of Stoke Park, disposed
of "manoeuvring land" to the Government, and "success-
fully promoted a railway from Guildford to EfEngham and
Surbiton, which opened up a large residential country and
brought his building land near Guildford into the market."
With equal success when was he unsuccessful ? he "took
a hand in various commercial adventures."

Clandon Park was now filled with such honest and well-
ordered gaiety as it had never known before. Crowds of
young people danced and laughed arid earnestly rehearsed
their amateur theatricals. They rode, they drove and shot,
and played croquet on the restored lawns. Nor were great
and solemn occasions lacking: when the new Bishop of
Winchester and his wife were entertained at Clandon he
'being "thin, dry, and having a very small head" no fewer
than one hundred and ten people sat down to luncheon in
the great hall:

SPLENDID YOUTH 261

" I took in Lady Lovelace & Mama the Duke of Northumberland,"
Hillier wrote in his diary. "I proposed the Bishop's health. . . .
Augusta sat between the Bishop and Harkness & was in the yth
heaven accordingly."

While Clandon was thus being restored to life and order
and the joys of youth, William Hillier observed with a
slightly disapproving amusement the behaviour of his uncle,
Guildford Onslow.

This curious man was the second son of Thomas Cranley
Onslow, Hillier's grandfather. Having run away at the age
of twenty-four with his cousin Rosa Anne, the daughter of
General Denzil Onslow of Staughton, he settled down with
his wife at Ropley, near Alresford, In 1858 he was returned
to Parliament as a Liberal for the borough of Guildford; but
for some reason "he never succeeded in gaining the atten-
tion of the House of Commons." From 1867 to 1874 he
succeeded in gaining a most unpleasant amount of attention
as one of the most oddly bewitched and resolute supporters
of the Tichborne Claimant.

Sir Roger Tichborne, at the age of twenty-four, sailed for
Valparaiso; and after many adventures in South America he
embarked in the Bella for New York. The ship went down
with all hands: and that, presumably, was the end of
Tichborne.

The Claimant, whose real name was Arthur, Orton, was a
butcher, and the son ,of a butcher, from Wapping. By the
most Astonishing coincidences, Orton, when in Australia
and elsewhere, picked up the story of Tichborne (whom he
is alleged to have met in South America) and a mass of
information about the family and its estate. It occurred to
him that he would represent himself as the missing Tich-
borne, "picked up by an American ship" after the sinking
of the Bella y and that he would come to England and claim
the title and e$tae. In 1886 he sent illiterate arid mis-spelt
letters to Lady Tichborne, Sir Roger's mother, whom he
met eventually m Paris, and who s before she died shortly
afterwards, made ah , affidavit declaring that Ortom was
indeed her son. The \ Claimant tfeep came t$ JS|3@laiid ,and
became the central figure in two of the ; sttai^e^UBd longest

262 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

lawsuits ever heard in this country; one as the Claimant and
one as a perjurer.

To all reasonable minds the imposture of Orton was
perfectly clear. Tichborne had been a well-educated though
ill-behaved young gentleman, an excellent French linguist
and a horn-player of some ability. The Claimant ^ could
neither speak nor write good English; he could give no
account of the loss of the Bella ; the meaning of such a word
as "quadrangle" was unknown to him; he thought Caesar
was a Greek author, and said that physiology was about
" the appearance of the face" or "the formation of the head";
he knew nothing whatever about music and was unaware that
the horn was a transposing instrument; he could not say
whether John Bunyan was a general, a bishop, a master of
foxhounds, or a prize-fighter; and of French he understood
nothing at all His answers were perky, stupid, ill-bred and
fatuously irrelevant. He did succeed in producing one
notable and deplorable sensation when he alleged that he
had seduced "his cousin/' Kate Doughty (Mrs., afterwards
Lady, RadclifFe), in a grotto. The sensation was greatly
intensified by the actual presence of Mrs. Radcliffe, with
her husband, in court. t

Guildford Onslow displayed, in this case, a ^ degree of
spontaneous infatuation so complete and uncritical that it
bordered upon the obsession of a lunatic. He seems to have
been under the most complete delusions when in the pres-
ence of Orton, as though he were actually hypnotised. He
invited Orton to his house and provided him with thousands
of pounds.

"Over a cigar in my smoking-room," he wrote, "we have
passed many an hour, full of anecdote, full of fun," He
observed, as one of the many proofs of identity, the skill
with which Orton "threw his fly when fishing." Orton's
behaviour in the drawing-room with ladies was "kind and
engaging": he was "a very good and scientific painter . . .
an excellent judge of pictures." At a dinner party he talked
of politics, religion, travel, Byron, Shelley and Shakespeare,
After his arrest and release on bail the Claimant went to
Ropley as Onslow's guest.

SPLENDID YOUTH 263

Meetings were organised, a fund was raised. The Tich-
borne Gazette was published ; and the Claimant, with Onslow,
triumphantly entered Alresford preceded by "a large body
of respectable looking men with blue rosettes" and accom-
panied by a brass band. "At the villas and houses of the
well-to-do people of the neighbourhood ladies appeared at
the windows or at the gates and waved handkerchiefs. . . .
The horses were taken from the waggonette . ; the vehicle
was drawn into the yard of the Swan Hotel," Onslow made
a speech " expressive of his entire belief in the Claimant's
virtues and identity" and the party then adjourned to the
Swan, where the Claimant made a speech to the same effect.

Guildford Onslow was denounced by The Times \ and he,
with other supporters of the Claimant, was fined 100 for
contempt of Court. Even the complete exposure of Orton
(who got a sentence of fourteen years) did not shake Onslow's
confidence. In 1875 ^ e published in The Englishman a list
of the bodily peculiarities of Tichborne (and of Orton),
including an " unmentionable malformation" which could
have been recognised by "a married woman by whom
Mr. Roger Tichborne had a child," and which had earned
for him a nickname in the Carabineers which was "too
indelicate" to be given in print.

All these doings on the part of Guildford Onslow had
infuriated his constituents. He was opposed by his cousin
Denzil at the election of 1 874: a family conflict which was
marked by extreme bitterness and even sank to the level of
savage indecency.

When young William Hillier drove to Guildford on the
29th of January 1874 he found that the Claimant and the
affair of the grotto were telling heavily against his uncle.
One of the most infamous of die squibs consisted of four
lines: /;

"If th Kpj^ht of the GFQ#X> had managed aright,
, Qi* tte Tt^djome estates he'd have lived and got tight. ^
But iiow; ;t^t f f^e game has quite fallen through ;
He's qome ^|ng,again 3 ikpofl Harry arid you.**

, ;**/'/, * i w"' /J*T' * ) ) < ' > > * , , ,' ", f , i , ' ' "' '

Hillier drove in again cin the following dqtyx&m, lie sa^r,
posted up everywhere,; % g06d photo ; . representing the

264 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

grotto with sheep eating down large elms." In the fore-
ground of this unimaginable picture was Guildford Onslow
speaking to the borough of Guildford, who replies, "What,
help to rob a woman of her character for the sake of
dirty acres and then come and pay your addresses again
tome!"

Guildford Onslow was heavily defeated by his cousin,
who was returned with a majority of 243 "the largest ever
known in Guildford/' according to William Hillier.

But this was not the end. Guildford Onslow attacked his
cousin in the press whenever he had a chance of doing so, and
he circulated a Tichborne poster headed "The Claimant's
Opinion of Mr. Gladstone as a Leader!" and quoting a
letter from the Claimant: "Dear Onslow ... I do not think
you ought to blame my case for losing your seat. Better say
because you followed such a Leader"

Uncle Guildford and his Tichborne antics were decidedly
awkward. A man of his age (he was in the sixties) ought to
have known better. Still, these were not things of much
concern to William Hillier. His work, his delight, his
exulting purpose, was the restoration of Clandon Park, of
the family name, and the honour of an Earldom.

Before long he had transferred the history of the Clandon
Onslows from a history of dolorous decline to one of
brilliant and sustained revival. He had a quality of enormous
gusto, a vast enthusiasm for the affairs of a country estate,
the life of a country house; an unimaginative though im-
petuous concern for all matters political, social and economic.
His devotion to the service of his country was magnificently
honest, and entirely devoid of selfish ambition. For him,
everything had to be done as well as possible, and also as
quickly as possible. When he played golf he ran over the
course, pursuing the ball immediately after he had struck
it. Leisure was totally alien to this energetic nature. Duty and
amusement were the objects of equal zeal, enjoyment and
resolution. Dressing-up was one of his delights, and he was
only dissuaded with much difficulty from appearing in
public as a matador.

He danced into the Clandon scene, a bounding sprite

SPLENDID YOUTH 265

with a head of soft red hair, like a fairy prince announcing
transformation in a pantomime.

Up to this time the Onslows, for the greater part, were a
little reserved and a little uncertain. They were schemers,
depending upon caution and opportunity, rather than open-
minded and open-hearted men with a zest for life and a
readiness to offer the hand of friendship without an ulterior
design. As a consequence, they were themselves regarded
with equal caution ; and one of the facts which immediately
come to the notice of their historian is the almost complete
absence (before William Hillier's time) of warm and endur-
ing friendships between the Onslow family and any other.
It will be remembered that the only substantial relic of a
friendship which is to be found in the earlier Clandon
archives is the large collection of letters written by a schem-
ing clergyman to his patron, the first EarL

But William Hillier gave Onslow affairs an entirely new
turn. In the first place, he represented the full dignity, grace
and importance of an Earl, which none of his predecessors
had been able to do. Without the subtleties or the con-
taminated suavity of a place-hunter he took up his duties
and enjoyed his pleasures with a youthful confidence that
was more engaging and more disarming than all the calcul-
ated overtures and all the shaping of intention which had so
frequently lowered the family reputation in the past.

His friends were many, and uncourted. His enemies (if
such there were) disliked him only because of his opinions.
The total absence of doubt or cynicism in his nature, his
impervious belief in the rightness of his party and religion
so strong that arrogance was unnecessary gave him with-
out effort many of those advantages which greater, more
intellectual, men do not always obtain after a lifetime of
devoted labour.

We must forgive him for having disfigured the west front
of Clandon Park with his abominable porch. We must refuse
to allow such things as taste and aesthetic sensibility a place
among the higher virtues ; and so many of the higher virtues,
if not all of them, were embodied in William Hillier, fourth
Earl of Onslow.

a66 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

Before Hillier's time, the Clandon Onslows were men of
position rather* than men of action. With Hillier, action
came first: position might or might not be its necessary
consequence. It is not so much in his formal portraits that
the character of this incessantly animated man is discernible.
He was more effectively commemorated by "Spy" in 1883
a spare, brisk little red-bearded figure, tense and alert in
every line. . . .

The full story of his later life is beyond the range and
intention of this book. In 1875 he married Florence, the
elder daughter of the third and last Lord Gardner. (This was
the second occasion on which the Jamaica trade had en-
riched the family, for the first Lord Gardner had married
Susannah Hyde Gale, another "West India Fortune,") His
mother moved from Clandon to Levyl's Dene, that charming
old house, where the great Speaker had once lived, and
where she surrounded herself with parrots and little dogs;
and where, in due time, her grandson, the fifth Earl, was
bitten by a Rosella cockatoo.

In 1880 William Hillier became a Lord in Waiting to
Queen Victoria. He was twice Under-Secretary for the
Colonies. From 1882 to 1892 he was Governor of New
Zealand. His other appointments included those of Under-
secretary for India, Privy Councillor, and President of the
Board of Agriculture. He was Chairman of Committees in
the House of Lords from 1905 to 191 1 ; in which year he
died after a short illness at the age of fifty-eight.

It is no part of my plan to review the Onslow procession
from the sixteenth to the nineteenth centuries ; from Richard
Onslow, the first of the Speakers, to William Hillier, the
fourth of the Earls.

This procession, like others, reveals a notable variety in
character, standing and achievement. As to character, one
may be inclined to suggest that a deterioration was evident
throughout the century from 1770 to 1870; for in the whole
of that period the single noteworthy Onslow who deserves
unqualified respect is the Admiral, Sir Richard.

There was little of true splendour in the Earldom until it

Guildford Onslow, M.P. (1813-1882). From a photograph.

SPLENDID YOUTH 267

descended upon the youthful head of William Hillier. The
first Earl, on the admission of his own great-great-great
grandson, the fifth Earl, lowered the family reputation
through treachery and intrigue; the second Earl, Tom
Onslow, was a man with no pretence to usefulness or
nobility; and the third Earl withdrew himself obscurely
from all the proper concerns of his rank and indeed from
all the proper concerns of a man's life,

Of those who preceded the Earls of Onslow, by far the
most remarkable was "the great Speaker,** Arthur Onslow.
Historically he is the most important of all; he contributed
in a very signal and distinguished way to the building-up
of our Parliamentary tradition. One has reason to believe
that the first of the Onslow Speakers, Richard, was a man of
great worth, of unpretentious dignity and immense learning.
His grandson, Richard the Fox, was far from ordinary; it
may be considered that he was also far from honest; his
character excites the interest, though it baffles the curiosity,
of the historian. Sir Arthur Onslow, son of the Fox, eludes
close investigation, slipping away quietly and with no
conclusive gesture into the greys and the browns of a harm-
less and undistinguished life. The Clandon Barons are less
ambiguous, but only the first of these (the second Speaker
Onslow) is a man of notable character. The second and third
of the Barons appeal to us if they appeal at all as country
gentlemen of pompous magnitude and of querulous temper,
with an eye for external aggrandisement and some preten-
sions to fashion or taste.

But we owe to the Barons one of the loveliest of English
country houses, the noble glowing mansion of Clandon
Park: lovely at all times, whether summer sunlight passes
through the line of the great cypresses, or the lawns are grey
and silver in the winter frost.

APPENDIX A
A Brief Note on the Present Family

WILLIAM HILLIER ONSLOW, the fourth Earl, was succeeded by his
son, Richard William Alan, the fifth Earl, who was born in 1876.
The year of his birth was commemorated by the building of the porch
at Clandon Park and the planting of an avenue.

The fifth Earl resembled his father in being a man of ceaseless
activities. He married in 1906 Violet Marcia, daughter of the third
Baron Poltimore. After a distinguished career in the Diplomatic
Service, which he entered in 1901, he served in the First World War.
He became Undersecretary of State for War in 1924. He was a
Privy Councillor, and was Chairman of Committees in the House of
Lords from 1931 until shortly before his death in 1945* His interests
were greatly varied. He was a Fellow of several learned societies, and
was at one time President of the Zoological Society.

The sixth and present Earl of Onslow, William Arthur Bampfylde,
was born in 1913* He joined the Life Guards in 1931, and resigned
his commission in 1938, with the intention of entering political life.
But the Second World War compelled an alteration of plans. Lord
Onslow served with distinction in the 4th County of London Yeo-
manry in the Middle East and in Italy. He won the Military Cross in
1942 and was placed in command of his regiment, which he led from
the Salerno landing to the passage of the Volturno. The Division in
which he served was recalled to England to train for the invasion of
Normandy. Ten days after " D Day" Lord Onslow was captured, and
he spent die last months of the war in a prisoner-of-war camp.

Shortly after Lord Onslow's return home in 1945 his father died.
Clandon Park had been used, during the war, as a repository by the
Public Records Office; but as soon as the records had been removed
Lord Onslow decided to live in the family home. But this proved
impracticable, and in 1950 Lord Onslow and his family moved to a
delightful house in the village of West Clandon. The great Palladian
house is now opened, seasonally, to the public.

Lord Onslow is Deputy Lieutenant of the County of Surrey, High
Steward of Guildford, and Captain of the Yeomen of the Guard.

He married in 1936 Pamela, daughter of the nineteenth Viscount

268

APPENDIX 269

Dillon, and has two children: Michael William Onslow, Viscount
Cranley, born in 1938; and Lady Teresa Lorraine Onslow, born
in 1940.

APPENDIX B

The Family Pictures at Clandon Park

As I have stated in Appendix A, when Lord Onslow decided to move
from Clandon Park to a relatively small though very charming house
in the village of West Clandon he made arrangements for opening the
family mansion to the public. It is thus possible for visitors to see many,
though not all, of the pictures, tapestry, furniture and other things
acquired by the Onslow family, as well as the splendid hall and the
rooms on the ground floor, I think it may be interesting to give a
very brief account of the earlier family portraits which are to be seen
at Clandon Park.

These portraits, naturally of the first interest to the biographer, are
not all of the highest order of merit, and the only masters of the
English school here represented are Kneller and Hogarth; but the
pastels of John Russell and of Daniel Gardner have much to commend
them.

Kneller is represented by three portraits possibly by six. He
painted Sir Richard, afterwards the first Baron Onslow (the " second
Speaker") and his wife, Elizabeth Tulse, at the time of their marriage;
and a later portrait of Sir Richard in old age as Chancellor of the
Exchequer. At the time when this latter was painted Kneller himself
was an old man, close upon seventy. The first two are excellent
specimens of Kneller's dextrous, flexible though highly mannered
style. It is not unlikely that the full-length portrait of Elizabeth
Knight, wife of the second Baron Onslow, is from the studio of
Kneller, as well as those of Sir Henry and Lady Tube.

Hogarth and Sir James Thornhill painted in collaboration the well-
known picture of Speaker Arthur Onslow and Sir Robert Wafpole in
the House of Commons. Various , conflicting opiniohs have been
expressed as to the method of collaboration and the respective Shares
of Hogarth and his father-in-law: I will not presuiMe to etitdf this
controversy. Hogarth was-tWj^y-three and ThoMttI fifty-foulr \vhen

270 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

the picture was painted in 1730. It will be noticed that a scroll in the
picture states that it was "done by Sir James Thornhill then a Member
of Parliament.**

John Russell, who depicted so many of the Onslows, was a Guild-
ford man, the son of a bookseller who was five rimes Mayor of
Guildford. Born in 1745, he became a disputatious Methodist; he
caused much annoyance by trying to "convert" his patrons, regardless
of their rank, and was once the cause of a riot He painted the great
Methodist leaders Wesley, Whitefield and the Countess of Hunt-
ingdon but is best known as a worker in "coloured crayons" or
pastel. He was elected an R.A. in 1788. Many royal portraits were
painted by him, and in 1792 he was appointed "Painter to the King
and the Prince of Wales, also to the Duke of York." In the great
house at Clandon, Russell is shown at his best in the pastel portraits
of Nathaniel Hillier and his wife (the parents of Susannah Elizabeth
who married Thomas Cranley Onslow, brother of the third Earl) and
in the charming portrait in oils of Henrietta, Countess of Onslow, as
an old lady.

Daniel Gardner is a pastellist who lacks the solid confidence of
Russell and is greatly inferior to him as a draughtsman but is pleasing
and elegant in manner. He has the defects of a sleek prettiness which
may be anticipated in one whose work is fashionable. He was born in
1750 and soon attracted the attention of Reynolds when he was a
student at the Royal Academy. Several of his portraits were engraved,
and although he only exhibited once at the Royal Academy he had
many sitters among people of high rank: one of the best of his portraits
is that of Elizabeth Spencer, Countess of Pembroke. At Clandon
Park he is represented by an inset conversation piece over the Adam-
style mirror in the "Hunting Room". This shows a game of chess
the board wrongly set between two players whose identity cannot be
definitely established, while Lord Pembroke looks on and a negro
servant stands in the background. It has been suggested that the left-
hand player is Lord Fitzwilliam (1745-1816), Lord Pembroke's
cousin; while the other player, of extremely youthful appearance, is
possibly Edward Onslow, son of the first EarL But another suggestion
(which I consider less plausible) is that the players are Lord Onslow,
afterwards the first Earl, and Lord Fitzwilliam. I am indebted to
Lord Herbert for the first of these two theories, which has the
advantage of fitting in with the apparent ages of the players and the
date of Gardner's birth, facts which cannot be accommodated with
the other hypothesis.

As in all family collections, many portraits of great interest are by

APPENDIX 271

unknown painters. Here the most notable example is the portrait of
Sir Richard Onslow, the Parliamentary Colonel, known as the Red
Fox, which hangs over the chimney-piece in the Morning Room.
In this pale enigmatical face, where the Puritan severity is tempered
with a sly and supercilious vigilance, the painter has clearly revealed
the subtlety of a character that still remains problematical. The
portrait of his son, Sir Arthur Onslow, is also of interest and is a very
competent piece of work.

Portraits of Thomas Onslow, the second Earl, in late life, and of his
wife "Bruin," though not the work of a known artist, are strongly
painted and of a suitably convincing vigour: that of Tom is particularly
brisk, florid, irascible, humorous and weather-worn.

In the so-called "Speakers' Parlour" are three large portraits of the
Speakers, that of Arthur being attributed to Huyssing, who painted a
much better portrait of him now in the National Portrait Gallery.
Over the fireplace is a portrait of the first Earl of Onslow, "Black
George," by Stewardson (1781-1859). This was engraved in mezzo-
tint by Ward. It shows the Earl seated, in the Windsor Uniform, and
one need not doubt that the extremely unpleasant face which is here
portrayed closely resembles its original. Many important people sat
to Stewardson, who was himself painted by Opie and Romney.

The house also contains much excellent furniture, some good china,
a flock wall-paper of exquisite design, and two sets of tapestry one
("The Seaons") of seventeenth-century date, and the other (hunting
scenes) of middle eighteenth-century style.

APPENDIX C

Additional Note on Clandon Park

THE origin of Clandon Park as an enclosed estate is to be fomid in a
Charter of Henry, VIII, dated 25th of May 1531, whereby Sir
Richard Weston of Sutton Place was given licence to empark 600
acres of land andpastoce* 5:0 acres of woodl^d
and heath m the pjmsfaes of Merrow and
"huntine lodsreJ' wJilcfa

^^^ THE ONSLOW FAMILY

much larger houses which were built afterwards, appears to have been
built by Weston. Much of the land was disparked at a later date.

Brayley and Britton (1850) described the present house as having
"all the architectural ornaments applicable to a brick edifice," and
asserted that "the centre compartment of the principal front ... is
cased in white marble." The basement was "hidden by a projecting
balustrade which, with a handsome double flight of steps that leads to
the grand entrance, forms the boundary of a continued terrace in front
of the building."

The most accurate pictorial records of the original west front are
photographs, taken prior to 1876, which are now, unfortunately, too
faded for reproduction. They show (far better than the early painting,
made about 1733) the graceful austerity of Leoni's design.

In both of die so-called World Wars the house was shaken by enemy
bombs, though not seriously. A Zeppelin flew over Clandon in
October 1915, dropping its bombs near the Portsmouth road and
rattling the doors and windows of the house which was then being
used as a military hospital. There were many troubles in connexion
with the hospital work, and it did not become u a going concern" (I
quote the fifth Earl of Onslow) until January 1916, under the manage-
ment of the then Countess of Onslow. The small room in the north-
east angle of the house on the ground floor, originally Lady Onslow's
boudoir, was converted into the operating theatre, and there no fewer
than 747 operations were carried out in the course of the war. In the
Second World War, as I have stated in Appendix A, the house was
used as a repository by the Public Record Office. No damage was
caused to the building by enemy action, though many bombs, including
"flying bombs," fell in the neighbourhood.

APPENDIX D

George Wither and Sir Richard Onslow

THE following relevant extracts from Wither's pamphlet, Justitiarius
Justificatus (1646), are of the greatest value in showing the case
against the Red Fox, Colonel Sir Richard Onslow, a case which tin-

APPENDIX 273

doubtedly represented the opinion, whether reasonable or otherwise,
of those who opposed the Onslow interest in Surrey. In my transcrip-
tion I retain the original spelling, but omit the italics.

"Sir Richard Onslow, and some other of his Friends in the Countie
of Surrey, have as it seems found it pertinent to the establishing of
their Designs or Government there, that I should be thrust out of the
Commission of the Peace, as I have been, out of some Committees,
and out of my habitation, for no other causes, but such as are concealed
in the breast of the said Sir Richard; who, having got (as it were) the
Supremacie over all Causes, and all Persons Ecclesiasticall and Civill,
within his Dominions, disposeth of Elections, prefereth Deputie-
Lieutenants, maketh and unmaketh Justices of the Peace, Committee-
men, Colonells, and all other inferiour Militarie Officers, Marshalls,
Treasurers, and Collectors, as hee pleaseth; yea, favours and dis-
favours, imposeth and taketh off, imprisons and sets at libertie, builds
up and pulls downe, armeth and dis-armeth, ordreth and dis-ordreth,
according to his discretion, with little or no contradiction

" I was (without my seeking or knowledge thereof, until it was deter-
mined) freely and unanimously nominated for Colonell, by the Com-
mittee of the Militia for Surrey (being a very full Committee sitting
at Kingston) and was (by the same Committee) August 7, 1644,
ordered to take charge of all Forces, then raised, and to be raised, in
the East, and middle Divisions of Surrey; and ... I presumed to accept
thereof, without Sir Richard Onslowes consent; who, indeed, was
much out of patience therewith, and could never after be at quiet,
untill he had contrived the new modelling of the Militia, there,
according to his own fancie. . . .

"I seldome concurred with him, in his designes; especially in his
opposition to the Association; in his arming Malignants, and others
promiscuously; and, in his putting the County into those postures, and
to those excessive-impertinent charges, and troubles, which, in my
judgment, were more likelie (by weakening, and discontenting the
people) to indanger, then to secure, those parts

"For, when I consider the series, and concatenation of his pro-
ceedings in Surrey, and his continuing-endeavours from time to time,
in prosecutions, with reference to that Castle [Farnham], (with the
manifold charges, disturbances and divisions, which have been occa-
sioned, by his resdesse seeking to accomplish some secret designe of
his own, which, I conceive he hath, or hath had, upon that Place) I
am still so perswaded, my thoughts have therein done him no wrong;
that, I professe againe, I do verily believe, he hath aimed at some
establishment there, for Ms own advantage, ever since die warre

274 THE ONSLOW FAMILY

began; and, that he hath thereby occasioned most of the miseries
which have wasted Hampshire, and Surrey. . . .

"If the said Sir Richard conceive, that such thoughts, and such a
beleefe of him, as is afore expressed, are a wrong unto him; or, if it
be injurious unto him, for me to think (as, I confesse, I do, upon verie
good grounds, in my opinion) that he is the greatest Favourer of
Delinquents, and the most bitter and implacable Enemy to them, who
are eminently Well-affected to the Parliament, of any man in Surrey,
so much pretending the contrarie, as he hath done; Verily, he him-
selfe, and not I, is cause of the injurie (if any be) by giving many
occasions of such thoughts. . . .

"These particulars considered, Sir Richard Onslow might have
manifested more prudence, by forbearing, to provoke mee beyond all
moderation; for, the patient creature, who can passe by scornes, and
injuries, or let a Foole ride him, three or foure years together, without
kicking, or hurling his Rider into the dirt, may be pinched in such a
place, or Wither-galPd in such a hot season, that his wronged patience
may, perchance, turne into madnesse, and so, both the Foole, and the
Asse, mischiefe each other. . . ,

"But, Flat voluntas Dei, I have discharged my conscience, and, am
assured, that God, who hath manie times heretofore delivered me
from powerfull, and malicious Enemies, to my reputation, and their
shame, will be as mercifull unto mee, now, and hereafter."

INDEX

Acton, East, 112
Anlaby, Susannah, 37
Anne, Queen, reign of, 39 ff.
Arnold, Edward, 61 ff.
Arundel, Earl of, 10
Atterbury, Bishop, 46, in

Barlow, Francis, 24, 25

Basing House, 15, 1 6

Bouverie, Edward, 175, 219

Bouverie, Mrs., 218, 219, 220

Bridges, Anne, 90

Bridges, Rose, 112

Burlington, Earl of, 32, 33

Burney, Fanny, 243

Bute, Earl of, 137

Butler, John (Bishop), 83, 84, 147, 155,

160, 161, 170, 175, 179 ff., 214, 215,

223

Camperdown, battle of, 241, 242
Caroline, Queen, 28, 45, 94, 95, 100,

"3
Carteret (Earl Granvilk), 104, 105,

121, 123

Charlotte, Queen, 234, 235
Chesterfield, Earl of, 105, 106, 138
Clandon Park, 10, n, 32, 33, 34, 48,

54, 56, 74 ff., 171, 199, 205, 235,

Clandon Regis, 247, 255
Claremont, 90, 144
Cromwell, Oliver, 15, 17, 18, 19
Curzon Street, 134, 144

Delany, Mrs., 54, 172
Dorking, 14, 25^
Dudley, Lord Richard, 4
Dunbar, battle of, 17

Edgeworth, Maria, 246
EEzabeth I, Queen, 5 A . /
Elwell, Sir Edward, 82
Ember Court, 90, 99, 144, i$fy*
Epsom, 146, 161, 223.

Evelyn, Sir John, of Wottqn, 33, 56
Evelyn, John, diarist, 23, 36, 62

Falconbergh House, 127
Farnham, 13, 14, 83
Fitzherbert, Maria, 175, 176, 198
Foote, Sir Thomas, 23, 24
Frederick, Prince of Wales, 56, 113

George I, King, 35, 45, 92

George II, King, 55, 58, 63

George III, King, 128, 130, 136, 137,

178, 197, 198, 200, 20 1, 202
George, Prince of Wales, 174, 175, 176,

208, 217

Godalming, 21, 57, 71
Guildford, 10, 23, 26, 37, 49, 55, 61,

78, 161, 230
Guildford Races, 35, 80, 8 1, 218

Harding, Catherine, 6
Hares, destruction of, 172
Haslemere, 36, in
Henrietta Street, 112
Hereford, 193, 194
Hillier, Nathaniel, 237
Hillier, Susannah, 237
Hogarth, William, 99, 100
Home, see Tooke
Howard, John, 37

Imber Court, see Ember Court

Jacobites, 39, 46, 71, 87, 132
Jamaica, 51, 52
James I, King, 8
Jones, D. H. ? 95, 124
Junius, 103, 159, 162, 163, 178, io,
181 \ * l l ,

King, Peter, Lord Ockham, z8, 29

275

2 7 6

THE ONSLOW FAMILY

Knoll or Knowle, 6, 7, 10
Knyff, ii

Lamballe, Princesse de, 200
Lane, John, 100
Leoni, Giacomo, 32, 33, 74, 75
Levyl's Dene, 89, 266
Locke, John, 29, 94
Locke, Peter, 29
Loftus, Harriet, 252, 253
Loftus, General W. F. B., 252

Macclesfield, Earl of, 91
Mainwaring-Ellerker, ,,213
Marlborough, Duke of, 29, 44
Marston Moor, battle of, 15
Merrow, 35, 60
Molyneux, S., 58

Newcastle, Duke of, 90, 103, 104, 122,
138, 140, 144, 145, 148

Oglethorpe, James Edward, in, 112

Oglethorpe, Lewis, 36

Onslow, Arabella, 213

Onslow, Arthur, Speaker, 7, 26, 42,

47> 49> 5 6 > S8 ff-> I2 4 ff'? Ho> H9>

150 ff.

Onslow, Sir Arthur, 9, 12, 23
Onslow, Arthur George, third Earl of,

237? *43 #> 255

Onslow, Augusta, Lady, 249, 257, 261
Onslow, Charlotte, Countess of, 214,

215, 216, 234, 235
Onslow, Denzil, 24, 25, 37
Onslow, Edward, 174, 177, 222 if.
Onslow, Sir Edward, 7
Onslow, Foote or Foot, 36, 37, 38
Onslow, Fulk or Fulke, 4
Onslow, George, first Earl of, 79, 82,

100, 119, 120, 133, 134, 135, 138 ff.,

154 ff., 164, 168 ff., 184, 196 ff,, 208,

209
Onslow, George, Colonel, 113, 135, 165,

i66ff., 177
Onslow, George Augustus Cranley,

252, 253, 254
Onslow, Georges, 225-27
Onslow, Guildfbrd J. M. E., 261 ff.
Onslow, Henrietta, Countess of, 197
Onslow, Richard, Speaker, 3 ff.

Onslow, Richard, first Baron, 25 ff., 44,

88,89
Onslow, Richard, third Baron, 78 ff.,

i44

Onslow, Sir Richard (1601-64), 8 ff.
Onslow, Admiral Sir Richard, 119,

239 ff.
Onslow, Lieutenant-General Richard,

100, 1 10, in, 112, 113
Onslow, Richard William Alan, fifth

Earl of, 2, 1 6, 209, 217, 225
Onslow, Roger, 4
Onslow, Thomas, second Baron, 30, 48,

50 ff., 6 1 ff., 78, 86
Onslow, Thomas, second Earl of, 174,

176, 177, 187, 210 ff., 229 ff.
Onslow, William Hillier, fourth Earl

of, 76, 209, 250, 251, 254 ff.
Onslows, family analysis of, 39, 47, 266,

267

Orton, Arthur, 261
Oxford, 39, 132

Pelham, Henry, 120-24
Pine, John, 116
Pope, Alexander, 40, 41
Poyner, Margaret, 4
Prior, Matthew, 30
Pyrford, 24

Richardson, Samuel, 127

Ripley, 24, 80, 167

Russell, John, R.A., 242, 270

Selwyn, George, 233
Shelley, Sir John, 119, 134
Shirley, Sir Thomas, 7
Sloane, Sir Hans, 58
Sodomy, prevalence of, 132
Soho Square, 99, 127
South Sea Bubble, the, 47, 90
Southcott, Joanna, 207
Speaker, office of the, 96
Strangways, Arthur, 9
Surrey, 8, 10, 22, 79

Temple, Richard, Viscount Cobham,

102, 103
Temple, Richard, Earl, 103, 138, 141,

146

Thornhill, Sir James, 99
Thorpe, Jane, 167

INDEX

277

Tichborne case, the, 261 ff.
Tooke, Home, 159 ff.
Tracey, Mr. Justice, 65, 66, 71
Tulse, Sir Henry, 27

Van der Gucht, 150
Vere, Lady Harriet, 54

Walpole, Horace, letter from, 151, 152
Walpole, Sir Robert, 45, 93, 94, 106,
109, 113, 114, 115, 120

Walton, Pooley, 112, 113 '

Weston, Sir Richard, n

Wilkes, John, 138 ff., 154 ff., 165, 180

William III, King, 27, 28

Wither, George, 13, 14, 22, 272 ff.

Worcester, battle of, 17, 1 8

Wotton, 24

Wyndham, Sir William, 108

Young, Edward, 40