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Robert Stewart

Marquis of Londonderry.

Published by Henry Fisher, Caxton, London, Sep 1.1822.

that "the author had spared no pains in preparing his work for publication;" and we may now add, that he seems to have omitted nothing, which can give his abridgment respectability, and ensure its favourable reception in schools and with the public. It is introduced with a short dedication to the Lord Bishop of Durham, who, we may infer from this circumstance, had seen and approved of the volume at large. To have a work thus distinguished, is an honour of no contemptible magnitude; but Mr. Dowson can boast of something more exalted-he has deserved it.

MEMOIR OF THE LATE MARQUIS OF
LONDONDERRY.

(With a Portrait.)

To

refuge from public ingratitude.
these mortifying instances of human
infirmity, we have now to add the
name of a man, distinguished above
most of his contemporaries by vigour
of intellect, the extent of political
knowledge, and an unwearied appli-
cation to his public duties. The dis-
solution of such a man, has made a
breach in society which cannot easily
be supplied; but the loss is rendered
peculiarly painful, by considering the
manner of it, which, with the crowd
of reflections thence resulting, will
make the serious mind exclaim,
"How are the mighty fallen, and the
weapons of war perished!"

But our limits being narrow, we must restrain our feelings, and proceed to narrative.

Robert Stewart, Marquis of Londonderry, was lineally descended from John Stewart, to whom his relative, ONE of the best of the ancient moral- King James the first, granted a manor ists has said, that the spectacle most in the county of Donegal, called Balacceptable to the gods, is, that of a lylawn, or Stewart's Land, with the virtuous man struggling bravely territories and precincts of Ballyagainst adverse fortune; to which we veagh, which manor, with the lands may add, that there is no object more annexed thereto, he peopled with pitiable, than that of a powerful mind Protestants, from his native country of losing its balance in the midst of its Minto, in Scotland. The great-grandusefulness, and, for the want of self- son of this gentleman, Colonel Wilcontrol, becoming the victim of de- liam Stewart, of Ballylawn Castle, spondency. It is affecting to behold raised a troop of horse, at the time the mighty cut down in the vigour of when James the Second closely beset health; but it is more awful to witness Londonderry, and reduced the garrithe sudden eclipse of a brilliant under- son to the utmost distress. By the standing. Such cases, however, are Colonel's exertions, however, the openot new; for many a hero who has rations of the besiegers were consibraved a thousand dangers in the derably retarded, and their supplies field of battle, and stood unmoved the cut off, for which the infatuated moroaring of the artillery all around him, narch caused him to be attainted in has trembled in a storm, and hid his his parliament, held at Dublin. This face from the war of the elements. William Stewart was succeeded by There have also been instances of his son Alexander, who died at the men, who, after viewing death without advanced age of fourscore, in 1781. terror, in foreign climes, and in vari- He enlarged his estates by marriage ous forms, have been appalled on their and prudent management, and transreturn home by the slightest accident; ferred the family residence to Mount and though insensible to fear when Stewart, in the County of Down. surrounded by innumerable enemies, His son Robert, born in 1739, marthey have shrunk from the voice of ried first Lady Frances Seymour Concalumny, and been unnerved by ridi- way, sister to the late Marquis of cule. Thus the illustrious Marlbo- Hertford, by whom he had two sons, rough, after filling the world with the Alexander Francis, who died in splendour of his military achieve- childhood, and Robert, who succeedments, sunk into a state of idiocy on ed to the family honours and estates. the loss of his popularity; and the The second wife of the first Marquis intrepid Clive, after extending the of Londonderry was Lady Frances British empire in the East, was stung Pratt, daughter of the great Earl by the reproaches of those who envied Camden, by whom he had eleven chilhis glory, and sought in the grave adren, to the eldest of whom, Charles

William, Lord Stewart, the British were not likely to render any man ambassador at Vienna, the title, in | popular, who happened to be confailure of issue on the part of his brother, has descended.

nected with the government which sanctioned them, and therefore it was but natural that Lord Castlereagh should come in for his share of public obloquy. In such cases, malice is always inventive, and many shocking tales were told of cruelties that were never perpetrated, and oppressions that never existed. Long after the suppression of the rebellion, these slanders were revived, with such exaggerations, that the noble Lord was reduced to the necessity of exculpating himself in the English House of Commons, which he did completely to the satisfaction of the unprejudiced, and the confusion of his enemies. The next great step in his life, was the parliamentary Union of the two kingdoms; and here again he became the object of popular outcry, which the lapse of years has not altogether subdued. This, however, was a measure, which many great politicians had long before recommended,as being no less necessary to the consolidation of the empire, than particularly beneficial to Ireland; yet, such is the force of national pride, the people there chose rather to have an inefficient and extravagant parliament of their own, than enjoy the broad, vigilant, and powerful protection of the British legislature. The Union, therefore, was an arduous task to accomplish, but Marquis Cornwallis, then Lord Lieutenant, by his prudence, and Lord Castlereagh, the Secretary, by his address, succeeded in carrying the act through both houses. On this occasion the Viceroy made a remarkable observation; for when some persons doubted of the practicability of the measure, even though the votes should be carried through the two houses, the Marquis laconically said, "Let the parliament only pass the vote, and leave the rest to me."

Robert Stewart, the late Marquis, was born at his father's seat, June 18, | 1769. He received his grammatical education at the school of Armagh, kept by the Rev. Mr. since Archdeacon Hurrock; and in 1786, he removed to St. John's College, Cambridge; on leaving which, he spent a short time in travelling through Europe. Shortly after his return to Ireland, the Hon. Mr. Stewart, (his father being then a peer,) offered himself as a candidate for the County of Down, against the Marquis of Downshire, and succeeded, though not without a hard-fought contest, which cost his father between 30 and 40,000 pounds. On entering the Irish House of Commons, the young member was hailed as a most valuable acquisition by the opposition; and the late Earl of Charlemont, who stood at their head, spoke of his talents with rapture and confidence. His first speech was on a very popular | subject, that of the right of Ireland to participate in the trade to India, which claim he asserted with animation and ability. Mr. Stewart did not long act with that party, and at the next election he was thrown out, on which he obtained a seat in the British parliament for the borough of Orford, by the interest of his noble relative, the Marquis of Hertford. He now joined the phalanx of government, and seconded the address to the King, at the opening of the session, in a speech not remarkable for either force of argument or felicity of language. When the Hon. Thomas Pelham, now Earl of Chichester, quitted the post of Secretary of Ireland, under the Viceroy, Earl Camden, he was succeeded by Mr. Stewart, who soon after became Lord Castlereagh, on the advancement of his father to an earldom. | This was a gloomy period to the whole Lord Castlereagh having been the empire, but the condition of Ireland prime agent in this important busiwas frightful in the extreme; a des- ness, became now an effectual assistperate faction having there worked up ant to Mr. Pitt; and when that great the bad passions of the people to the man returned to the helm, after the commission of every atrocity; to pu- short administration of Mr. Addingnish which, and strike terror into the ton, his noble friend was made Presiinstigators, strong coercive measures dent of the Board of Control; and in were adopted, that in some respects | 1805, Minister of War. Of that post aggravated the mischief, by exaspe- he was deprived by the united admirating an already infuriated popula- nistration of Lord Grenville and Mr. tion. These severities, of course, Fox; but he resumed it in that of

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Mr. Perceval; and continued in the he from studying oratorical elegance, office till the unfortunate Walcheren that he appeared as if he thought it expedition, and his duel with Mr. beneath his notice; hence his sentenCanning in 1809, compelled him to ces were often disagreeably abrupt, resign it. On the death of Mr. Perce- and his words ill chosen. Notwith val, in 1812, Lord Castlereagh gained standing this carelessness of his dicthat predominant influence in the tion, the noble Secretary succeeded government, which he enjoyed, without in obtaining a potent ascendency in intermission, to the last moment of that House, where the thundering his life. His powers as a statesman, oratory of Fox was yet remembered had been displayed to advantage on with wonder, and where the captivatvarious occasions, especially in the ing rhetoric of Pitt had left an impreslegislative union of England and Ire- sive effect, that could never be erased land; but his political talents were from the minds of those who had once never completely developed, till he heard it. Lord Londonderry sought became foreign minister, and acted no aid from art, and yet he never rose as our negociator in settling the peace in his place to speak on any topic, of Europe. In December, 1813, when without fixing deep attention; and the revolution took place in Holland, even at those times when he seemed his Lordship set out for that country, to labour under a perplexity of conon his way to join the Sovereigns in ception, and in consequence of it alliance against France, as plenipo- involved his discourse in a cloud of tentiary extraordinary, with full pow-words, he rarely failed at last to carry ers to treat for a general peace. This negociation, however, being rendered unnecessary by the downfall of Buonaparte, and the restoration of Louis XVIII. to the throne of his ancestors, Lord Castlereagh went with the same credentials to the general congress at Vienna, and, on his return, received from the House of Commons the most flattering marks of respect, while, by his Sovereign, he was honoured with the order of the garter, and his venerable father obtained a farther elevation in the rank of Marquis.

conviction home to unprejudiced hearers. This arose from the salutary rule of appealing to the understanding, and never to the passions; by which means, his audience, feeling that they were respected, attended more to his matter than to his manner, to the facts which he stated, than the style in which they were expressed. Another thing which gave advantage to his Lordship as a public speaker, was the dignity of his appearance, and the amenity of his temper, so that by keeping his mind steady and unruffled in the most stormy debates, he was often enabled to obtain an easy triumph over adversaries, who had a greater flow of eloquence, and perhaps possessed an ampler fund of general knowledge. But the prominent excellence of the noble Secretary, as a public character, lay in diplomacy; and here his merits have been acknowledged by the first statesmen in the great courts of Europe, without even excepting those of France, who have always claimed a superiority in this branch of political science. Throughout the negociations in which his Lordship was employed on the contitinent, he gained the esteem and confidence of the royal personages with whom he held occasional intercourse,by the soundness of his judgment, the libe

The rest of the political life of the noble Lord is too much connected with general history, and too well known, to need particular detail in this place. In his official capacity he was sedulously attentive to business, and remarkably courteous to all his dependents. As a speaker in the House of Commons, he possessed great powers, shaded with great defects. He was a master of the art of reasoning, and yet he not unfrequently embroiled and weakened his argument by illogical conclusions. Though he had a command of language, he sometimes uttered ludicrous and even absurd expressions, of which his antagonists did not fail to take advantage. His ideas were usually clear on most subjects of debate; and yet at times he fell into such a periphrastic moderality of his mind, and the elegance of of delivering his sentiments, as almost to raise a doubt whether he had any conception of the matter he was labouring to elucidate. So far was No. 44-VOL. IV.

his manners. Though he never lost sight of the interests of his own country in these transactions, he deported himself as the friend of mankind, and 3 K

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