Happily, however, as will be seen by the following announcement which appeared in the Political Register, November 25th, 1768-their estrangement proved of no long duration : "In consequence of repeated solicitations on the part of the Earl of Chatham, a most cordial, firm, and perpetual union this day took place with his noble brother-in-law, Earl Temple. Mr. Grenville has heartily acceded." 1 Accordingly, before the end of the month, we find Temple on his part paying a visit to his brotherin-law at Hayes, and Pitt in his turn guaranteeing to pay a return visit to Temple at Stow. It was not, however, till the month of July the following year that the illustrious valetudinarian seems to have been well enough to keep his engagement. "Your goodness," he writes to Temple on the 14th of that month, "has encouraged us to come in the true patriarchal way, and to bring you no less than three children, Hester, Harriet, and Pitt, who are almost in a fever of expectation till the happy day comes." Half way between Hayes and Stow, the patriarchal exodus was recognized by, and attracted the observation of Edmund Burke. "Lord Chatham," he writes on the 30th, "passed by my door on Friday morning in a jimwhiskee drawn by two horses, one before the other. He drove himself. His train was 1 See also the 'Grenville Papers,' vol. iv. pp. 398, 403; and 'Selwyn Correspondence,' vol. ii. p. 355. Grenville Papers,' vol. iv. p. 429. 2 66 1 two coaches and six, with twenty servants, male and female. He was proceeding with his whole family, Lady Chatham, two sons, and two daughters, to Stow. He lay at Beaconsfield; was well and cheerful, and walked up and down stairs at the inn without help."' For a graphic sketch of Lord Temple in his later years we are indebted to the pen of Sir Nathaniel Wraxall, who, in 1776, was his fellow guest at Gosfield Hall, in Essex, the seat of Robert Earl Nugent, father of Lady Mary Grenville, afterwards Marchioness of Buckingham. "When I visited Gosfield," he writes, among the guests who attracted most attention might justly be reckoned the late Lord Temple, then far advanced in life, and very infirm. In his person he was tall and large, though not inclined to corpulency. A disorder, the seat of which lay in his ribs, bending him almost double, compelled him, in walking, to make use of a sort of crutch; but his mind seemed exempt from any decay. His conversation was animated, brilliant, and full of entertainment. Notwithstanding the nickname of Squire Gawkey,' which he had obtained in the satirical or party productions of those times, he had nevertheless the air and appearance of a man of high condition, when he appeared with the insignia and decorations of the Garter, seated at table." There formerly existed, and 992 1 Burke's 'Correspondence,' vol. i. pp. 182. 183. probably still exists, at Stow, an outline sketch of Lord Temple by Lady Mary Grenville, confirmatory, it is said, of the accuracy of Sir Nathaniel's picture.1 It was the fortune of Lord Temple to survive nearly every one of such of his more famous Eton schoolfellows or friends as have bequeathed a reputation to posterity. Fielding had preceded him to the grave in 1754; Sir Charles Hanbury Williams in 1759; his brother, George Grenville, in 1770; Lord Lyttelton in 1773; and Lord Chatham in 1778. Moreover, to his infinite and lasting sorrow, he had in the interim followed to the tomb a companion far more tenderly loved by him-the wife of his bosom, the "little woman" of the playful correspondence of his early manhood. Lady Temple died on the 7th of April, 1777. Lastly, to the detriment of the comfort of his declining years, the only child which she had ever borne him, a daughter, Elizabeth, had been snatched from him by death before the completion of her fourth year. Lord Temple, as he advanced in years, seems to have taken less and less interest in the political occurrences of his time. His chief occupations are said to have been the improvement and adornment of Stow; his chief consolation being the society of his nephews and nieces, of whom his favourite appears to have been the heir to his title and estates, ''Grenville Papers,' vol. i., Preface, p. vi., note. the eldest son of his late brother George, afterwards first Marquis of Buckingham. Lord Temple's end was a violent one, having been occasioned by his being thrown from a pony-carriage in the Park Ridings at Stow, from which spot he was carried away with a hopelessly fractured skull. After having lingered for a few days in a state of unconsciousness, he expired on the 11th of September, 1779, having nearly completed his sixty-eighth year. THE RIGHT HON. GEORGE GRENVILLE. Or the many brilliant and ambitious youths with whom the subject of this memoir was a contemporary at Eton, there was probably not one to whose imagination it ever occurred that the apparently apathetic schoolfellow, who cared so little to join their sports and to share their mirth, would eventually mount over the heads of one and all by raising himself to be Prime Minister of England. Yet such was the high distinction which lay in reserve for George Grenville! George Grenville, second son of Hester Countess Temple, and younger brother of Richard Earl Temple, was born on the 14th of October, 1712. From Eton he removed to Christ Church, Oxford, and from Christ Church to one of the Inns of Law, whence, in due time, he was called to the Bar. By the desire, however, of his maternal uncle, Lord Cobham, he subsequently abandoned law for politics; was returned to Parliament by his uncle's interest for the town of Buckingham, and continued to represent that |