Ireland; being fearful he should fail in his new situation, from the doubts he entertained whether he could descend to practise the arts supposed to be necessary in such cases, Dr Johnson encouraged him by saying, "Don't be afraid, Sir, you will soon make a very pretty rascal." This humorous assurance was ill-founded; and it is generally admitted, that Mr Windham's resignation, within four months, originated from the most honourable motives. In 1793 he attached himself to Burke's party. Soon after he went on a mission to the duke of York, then commanding our forces in Flanders. The following extract is from a pleasing letter to his sister-in-law Mrs Lukin, dated near Bois-le-Duc, September 12th, 1794.

"We are, as you will have learned from one of my former letters, near Bois-le-Duc, which is rather a large town, and a strong fortress belonging to the Dutch. About three miles from this place are the duke's head-quarters, and at four or five miles further is the camp. The immediate place of my residence is the village where head-quarters are, and I am lodged in the house of a Dutch attorney. The country about is light and sandy, affording very pleasant rides, which are not the less so from your occasionally meeting bodies of troops of different dresses, establishments, and countries. The variety in this respect is not so great as it was last year, nor, from a number of circumstances, is the scene so interesting, after allowing even for the difference of its not being seen, as that was, for the first time. The relief which all this gives, after confinement during the summer in London, and to such business as that of the war-office, is more than you can conceive. It has given me a new stock of health; and the beauty of the autumn mornings, joined to the general idleness in which one lives by necessity, and therefore without self-reproach, has given me a feeling of youthful enjoyment, such as I now but rarely know. You cannot conceive how you would like a ride here, with the idea that if you wandered too far, and went beyond the outposts, you might be carried off by a French patrole. It is the enjoyment that George Falknor was supposed to describe of a scene near Dublin, where the delighted spectator expects every moment to be crushed by the impending rocks." Were public business out of the question, I should stay here probably for a week or two longer; but, as it is, my stay must be regulated by other considerations, and it is probable that the messenger whom we are waiting for impatiently, may occasion my departure immediately. The general state of things is as bad as need be. The shooters in your part of the world must not suppose that they have all the sport to themselves. So strong is the love of mischief among men, that all the shooting of one another that is going on here, does not prevent their filling up their intervals by a little murder of partridges

6

During this trip to the continent, a whimsical mistake occurred between Mr Windham and a Dutch clergyman. The old gentleman was eager in his inquiries as to the doctrines and discipline of the church of England, to which he received satisfactory answers: those, however, were succeeded by others of a more difficult nature, particularly as to the manner in which some English preachers manufacture their sermons. Upon Mr Windham's confessing his ignorance of this subject, the Dutchman in a tone of disappointment exclaimed, “Why then, I find, Sir, after all the conversation we have had, that I have been de

ceived as to your profession. They told me you were an English minister."

On the decease of Pitt in 1806, he again took office, as secretary-atwar and of the colonies, with Fox and Lord Grenville; on the dismissal he returned to the ranks of opposition, which he never afterwards quitted. His death, which occurred in the summer of 1810, was occasioned by the following circumstance: On the 8th of July, in the preceding year, while passing by the end of Conduit-street, he saw a house on fire, and immediately proceeded towards the spot, to render the sufferers all the assistance in his power. He found the flames rapidly advancing towards the residence of the Honourable Mr North, whose valuable library he determined if possible to save from the destruction with which it was threatened. He laboured at the task which he had thus imposed upon himself, for a period of four hours, during a heavy rain, and amid the playing of numerous fire-engines ; and his efforts were so successful, that most of the books were saved. Unfortunately he fell in the course of his exertions and injured his hip; but took no notice of the accident until an indolent encysted tumour had been formed. On consulting his surgical advisers, he found that it was necessary for him to submit to a most painful and dangerous operation. The tumour was removed with success, on the 17th of May, 1810, but unfavourable symptoms soon afterwards appeared, and he expired on the 4th of the following month.

Windham was an able, honest, and indefatigable senator; capable of brilliant efforts whenever he chose to exert himself, and always commanding the respect of the house. His speeches were bold and masculine. The following is a specimen of his parliamentary oratory. He was speaking of the Egyptian expedition: "Whole wars," said he, "might pass over without affording an opportunity of fairly measuring our strength with the enemy. But in Egypt, the very scene seemed to be chosen for a fair trial of strength; the two armies seemed as it were to be withdrawn from the world. They were both left without any other resource than that which they could draw from their own courage and discipline; they had no allies to share the merit of victory, or bear the disgrace of defeat. Their motto seemed to be Væ victi!' and all they asked was a clear stage and no favour. Who were those that we conquered? Not Greeks or Copts, Batavians or Cisalpines, who have been found to recruit those armies by which they have been conquered; but the tried, the chosen, the best troops of France: we were contending with the pride and glory of the republic, with troops whom the French themselves would have chosen as the depositaries of their military character. He would not say that those we had beaten were the best of those troops who had been sent to Egypt; but, undoubtedly, having remained the longest, they had more of that character which is supposed to belong to veterans. We know what they thought of themselves, we know that they boasted that they would destroy us, if they once caught us out of our ships; but, like the young and untried Orlando, we overthrew the experienced wrestler; and he might say, that upon this occasion we had given them a Rowland for an Oliver. would say, in the language of the same piece, that no one would entreat them to another encounter.' He would not do the French army in Egypt injustice: he did not doubt but that they would venture

-

He

another encounter; he would not say that fortune might not be favourable to them in it: but this he would say, that from this time forth no French army would ever meet an English army with any thing like feelings of contempt; they would know that they could not rely upon any superiority of courage or discipline. He thought he had a right to urge all these to the house as compensations for our losses. We might sustain still greater ones; the expedition-which God forbid-might ultimately fail! For no man could say that we were out of fortune's reach; but whatever the event might be, it could not take from us our glory; in that respect we were out of the reach of chance. He did not urge these considerations as a justification of the conduct of ministers, but as compensations for the losses we had sustained."

Cuthbert, Lord Collingwood.

BORN A. D. 1750.-died A. D. 1810.

THIS gallant admiral and good man was a native of Newcastle-uponTyne. He was descended from a most respectable and ancient family. "His ancestor, Sir Cuthbert Collingwood," says a writer in the 'Quarterly Review,' was one of the English knights taken by the Scots at what was called the Raid of the Reidswire, and he is accordingly mentioned in the Border Minstrelsy:'

66

But if you would a souldier search,
Amang them a' were taen that night,
Was nane sae wordie to put in verse
As Collingwood, that courteous knight.

The Collingwoods suffered severely from their devotion to the cause of Charles I., and were subsequently deprived of almost all their land in consequence of their participation in the insurrection of 1715, when the head of the family was taken prisoner and put to death, like his friend Lord Derwentwater; who is made to address him, in the ballad called 'Derwentwater's Good Night,' in a gallant stanza, which we wonder the present writer did not quote:

At a

The subject of the present notice was born in the year 1750. very early age his genius indicated a propension towards a maritime life; he was, however, continued at the grammar-school conducted by the Rev. Mr Moises for the space of six or seven years. In the year 1761 he entered into the naval service of his country, under circumstances precisely similar to those that attended the debût of his friend Lord Nelson we mean that he was consigned to the protection and patronage of his maternal uncle Captain-afterwards Admiral-Braithwaite, who at that period commanded the Shannon frigate, wherein he was rated as a midshipman; in which situation on board the Gibraltar we find him in the year 1766. From 1767 to 1772 he appears to have

been master's mate of the Liverpool; whence he was taken into the Lennox, under the command of Captain Roddam, by whom he was recommended to Vice-admiral Graves, and afterwards to Vice-admiral Sir Peter Parker.

He had now been thirteen years in the service, and in a manner unpromoted; so little did the encouragement which he met with at the commencement of his naútical career countervail his merit. "There is," however, "a tide in the affairs of men." The following year, the American war having commenced, he was appointed fourth lieutenant of the Somerset, and received his commission that memorable day on which was fought the battle of Bunker's-hill; an action in which he was, with a party of seamen, engaged. In the same year, Lieutenant Collingwood was in the Hornet sloop-of-war ordered to Jamaica; the Lowestoffe soon after arrived at the same station; and here his friendship with Nelson, who was then second lieutenant, was renewed. the promotion of the latter into the Bristol, the admiral's ship, Lieutenant Collingwood succeeded to the Lowestoffe; and when the former was, in 1773, advanced from the Badger to the rank of postcaptain in the Hinchinbroke, the latter was made master and commander in the Badger; and again, upon his promotion to a larger ship, Captain Collingwood was made post in the Hinchinbroke; so that in the gradations of preferment the active and energetic spirit of Collingwood seems to have followed the flights of the towering genius of Nelson.

On

In 1780 he was employed in the expedition sent up the river San Juan; and, being supported against the pestilential climate by a strong constitution, survived most of his ship's company. Captain Nelson, who had been promoted to a larger ship, caught, though in a milder degree, the infection; but Captain Collingwood, whose firmer constitution had resisted many attacks, survived most of his crew, having, in four months, buried 180 of the 200 men that had composed it. In December following he was appointed to the command of the Pelican, of 20 guns; though his continuance in this ship was but of short duration; for, on the 1st of August, 1781, in consequence of one of those hurricanes so fatal to the West Indies, which had raged through the night, this vessel was wrecked upon Morant quay. Providence again interposed to save the lives of Captain Collingwood and his ship's company; for, when day-light appeared, they, by the assistance of rafts, which the danger of the hour led them to construct from small and broken yards, &c. got on shore, and upon the sandy-hills in the vicinity, almost without food or water, remained ten days, until the Diamond frigate, which had, in consequence of an intimation of their distress, been sent from Jamaica, relieved them.

The next appointment of Captain Collingwood was to the command of the Sampson, of 64 guns. In this ship he served until the peace of 1783. He was, however, soon after ordered to take the command of the Mediator, and return to the West Indies, where he again met his friend Nelson, who at that time commanded the Boreas frigate on the same station,—a circumstance that was equally agreeable to both. The friendship which subsisted between these two young men, who were destined hereafter to make so conspicuous a figure upon the great theatre of naval and national glory, appears from the letters which were written during this period by Nelson, to his friend Captain Locker.

In one of which, dated on board the Boreas, September 24th, 1784, he says, "Collingwood is at Grenada, which is a great loss to me, for there is nobody that I can make a confidant of." In another, dated November 23d, "Collingwood desires me to say he will write you soon such a letter that you will think it a history of the West Indies. What an amiable good man he is!" Again, March 16th, 1785, St Kitts,"What a charming good man! He is a valuable member of society." Off Martinique, March 5, 1786, he writes, "This station has not been over pleasant had it not been for Collingwood, it would have been the most disagreeable I ever saw." In the Mediator, and upon this station, he remained until the latter end of 1786, when, in consequence of his ship being paid off, he took the opportunity to visit his native country, and renew his acquaintance with his family and friends whom he had left at an early age, and to whom, from his long separation, he had become what might be termed a stranger at home.

At his retirement, in his native county, Northumberland, Captain Collingwood, after a service of twenty-five years, continued to enjoy himself; and in this interval of repose, anxious to seek for connubial happiness, he formed a connection with a lady of great personal merit, and of a family ancient and highly respectable. This lady was Sarah, the daughter of John Erasmus Blackett, Esq., one of the aldermen of Newcastle, and brother of Edward Blackett, Bart. of Matson, Northumberland. From the endearments of a connection so happily formed, and from the social circle of his friends to whom his amiable and virtuous character endeared him, he was, on the breaking out of the war with France in 1793, called to the command of the Prince, Rear-admiral Bowyer's flag-ship; with whom he served in this vessel, and subsequently in the Barfleur, until the engagement of the 1st of June, 1794. The bravery of Captain Collingwood, and the very distinguished share that the ship in which he acted under the admiral had in the victory of that glorious day, are well-known, although at the time his eminent services were not in the official despatches particularly marked, or rather, we may say, remained totally unnoticed, nor was his name included in the list of those who were awarded medals on account of the victory. This act of injustice created much surprise among the officers of the fleet, one of whom, Captain Packenham, of the Invincible, is said to have remarked, "that if Collingwood had not deserved a medal, neither had he, for they were together the whole day." Rear-admiral Bowyer's flag, in consequence of his honourable wound in this day's action, no longer flying on board the Barfleur, Captain Collingwood was, on the 7th of August, 1794, appointed to the command of the Hector; whence he was removed to the Excellent, and employed in the blockade of Toulon. While on board this ship he had the glory of sharing in the brilliant victory off Cape St Vincent. In a letter to his wife, Captain Collingwood thus describes this engagement :-" We flew to them as a hawk to his prey, passed through them in the disordered state in which they were, separated them into two distinct parts, and then tacked upon their largest division. The Culloden, and Captain, Commodore Nelson's ship, were the first that brought them to close action. I by chance became the admiral's leader, (for the circumstances were such as would admit of no regular order,) and had the good fortune to get very early into action. The first ship we engaged was the San Salvador del Mun