Eighteenth century vignettes . whoknew him best would have willingly allowedthat, in addition to being widely gifted, he waswell-meaning and kindly, devoted to his familyand friends, sincerely religious, and sociable 204 Eighteenth Centwy yignettes. and hospitable in the best old-world acceptationof the words. If, instead of a couple of notesto Mary Berry, he had left a correspondence,it might, with his gifts and opportunities, haverivalled that of Walpole, at all events in mate-rial. But he was content to be no more thanone of those plain English gentlemen, un-encumbered by rank and easy in f
Eighteenth century vignettes . whoknew him best would have willingly allowedthat, in addition to being widely gifted, he waswell-meaning and kindly, devoted to his familyand friends, sincerely religious, and sociable 204 Eighteenth Centwy yignettes. and hospitable in the best old-world acceptationof the words. If, instead of a couple of notesto Mary Berry, he had left a correspondence,it might, with his gifts and opportunities, haverivalled that of Walpole, at all events in mate-rial. But he was content to be no more thanone of those plain English gentlemen, un-encumbered by rank and easy in fortune, whomGeorge III. rightly regarded as among the mostenviable of humanity. It remains to say of Cantabrigius that heattained to an honoured old age, dying at last inSeptember, 1802. He was then wife, for whom he had always been a loverrather than a husband, survived him for fouryears, when she too departed, in her ninetiethyear. There is a tablet to both in TwickenhamChurch, under that of Pope. Thomas THE OFFICINA ARBUTEANA. TN July, 1757, when Horace Walpole first•*? turned printer, he had been ten years anoccupant of Strawberry Hill. Since he hadbought it in 1747, out of the shop of , the Charing Cross toy-woman, thetiny country box originally built by the Earl ofBradfords coachman, had been pinnacled andembattled and Gothicized out of all years of trees which sprouted away likeany chaste nymph in the Metamorphosishad given a sylvan appearance to the baremeadow-land which is shown in John Rocquesplan of 1741-5, and already the proprietor couldenjoy in full perfection his favourite combina-tion— lilacs and nightingales. It is true thatthe ambitious extensions of later years were asyet undreamed of, but a refectory and libraryhad nevertheless been added ; and although, asalways, the extreme littleness of the housewas incontestable, it was not without its genu-ine admirers. It has a purity and propriety ofGothicism in it (
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Keywords: ., bo, bookcentury1800, bookdecade1890, booksubjectenglishliterature
