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opinions as to the celebrity which he attained in sculpture, but this extract from the Patrie must suffice:

"Count D'Orsay," says that journal, "was not only a perfect gentleman, gifted with intelligence, talent, fortune, and birth, but he was a real artist. Even if he had not given to the world anything but his equestrian statue of the Emperor Napoleon, that would alone confer on him the title of artist. That great work, in fact, is worthy to be placed by the side of the equestrian statue of the First Consul, by the illustrious Barye."

But all the while the worm was gnawing at his heart. He could not. refrain from being lively when he wrote to his old friends and acquaintance, but that he did not feel his loss less bitterly is only too apparent in the accompanying letter from the correspondence to which we are already so largely indebted:

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"MON CHER AMI

"38, Rue de la Ville l'Evêque, Paris, 23 Avril, 1850.

vous a bien exprimé combien je vous aimois, et combien de fois nous causions de vous; le fait est que je vis entièrement de mes souvenirs, et ils sont tellement mélangés de chagrins et de plaisirs que je redoutois souvent d'écrire à ceux qui étoient les mieux calculés pour me comprendre. Imaginez que jusqu'à ce jour je n'ai pas écrit à E- B. Vous me comprendrez, j'en suis convaincu. Hier je dinois avec Lamartine et Victor Hugo chez Girardin, et dans le courant de la conversation, Lamartine me dit qu'il venoit de lire un article taux et abominable de L- P—, déguisé sous la plume de C―; je l'ai engagé de répondre de suite avec la plume d'aigle au Q- R. qui a si injustement inséré ce tissu de faussetés, écrites avec la plume de ce cock-sparrow."

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After desiring the most affectionate remembrances to various friends in England, he says:

"Il me semble que je vous ai quitté hier; my recollections are so vivid que c'est réellement du Dagueréotype du cœur que rien ne peut effacer. J'adore ma vieille Angleterre et je tremble d'y retourner. Jamais homme n'a souffert autant que moi par la perte que j'ai éprouvé! J'admire ces gens religieux qui adoptent la haute religion pour se consoler très vite; ils ne sentent pas, les imbéciles, qu'il y a une grande et bien plus grande religion dans un vrai chagrin qui ne se cicatrize pas.

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"Une autre fois je vous parlerai politique, c'est trop dégoutant pour le moment. Lamartine me disoit hier: 'Plus je vois des représentants du peuple, plus j'aime mes chiens.'” The love which he felt towards England and everything English again appears in a letter written on the 3rd of May in the same year.

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'Fancy the visit I had yesterday! Old General Damas, of The Lady of Lyons,' poor B, who lost his wife. I was glad to see him, and he felt it; in fact, the English coming here consider that I am their property, and I feel proud to have been adopted by the good old John Bull. When you write to L- tell him I have adopted for the monument his last epitaph.

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"P.S. You saw, by the election of Eugène Sue, how right I was about public opinion here. It is extraordinary to see how Power blinds the people."

It was granted to only a few cherished friends to know how deep was his affliction for the loss he had sustained; but even those who best knew the susceptibility of his nature, and might have guessed that such affliction could not be borne without injury to his health, were not prepared for the event which so rapidly followed the earliest indication of the illness which was his last. The first warning was given in a letter written from Paris on the 3rd of January in the present year, in which his former robust health is spoken of as being shaken, recent events having considerably occupied and agitated him; at the same time his thoughts and feelings are described as being, if possible, more English than ever, clinging to the memory of old times and places with all the energy and warmth that invariably marked them.

The "better" time, alas, never came! The bow was "bent and drawn;" the "shaft" soon followed! The scene of Alfred D'Orsay's

death is described, by one who knew him well, as exhibiting the most angelic patience, and gentleness and consideration for all around him, in the midst of sufferings that were truly agonising; though wearied and worn with pain, the spirit within seemed to have given new lustre to his beauty, and happily, the great aid was not wanting, for he showed a perfect consciousness of his religious responsibilities and a simple trust in Divine mercy which filled those around him with gratitude and comfort. His last moments were perfectly tranquil; he became unconscious towards three o'clock in the morning, and drew his last breath near four without a struggle.

That he truly merited the affection which he carried with him to the tomb, is affirmed by those who were most intimately associated with him in the relations of private life. They loved him for his truth, his honesty and his tender nature, and knew that on his upright mind and clear judgment they might rely in every doubt and every trial.

What man need wish for a better epitaph?

Let us add to this general testimony the opinions expressed by M. Emile de Girardin and Madame Georges Sand. The former says:

"The regret which this death causes will be deeply felt by all the numerous friends of the deceased in France and in England; in all ranks of society, and all classes of politicians. In London, Gore House was always open to all political exiles, whether they were called Louis Bonaparte or Louis Blanc, to all the shipwrecked of fortune, and to all the illustrations of art and science. In Paris he had only a vast studio; but whoever knocked at his door in the name of misfortune, or for the aid and encouragement of progress, was sure to meet with an affable reception, and to receive cordial co-operation. Before the 2nd of December nobody made greater or more reiterated efforts for a policy of a different course and of the highest aspirations; after the 2nd of December no man exerted himself more to assuage the stroke of proscription. Pierre Dupont knows this, and can certify it. The President of the Republic had not a more devoted and sincere friend than Count D'Orsay, and it is at a moment when the prince had attached him to his person by the title and functions of Superintendent of the Beaux Arts that he has lost him for ever. This is an irreparable loss for the arts and for artists; but it is a still more irreparable loss for the cause of truth, and for the President of the Republic; for palaces have only two doors open to truth-the door of friendship and the door of adversity-of friendship, which is to adversity what lightning is to thunder. Invisible justice, equal justice for all, the justice of which death holds the scales, counts days when it does not measure gifts. Alfred D'Orsay was too highly gifted-a warm heart and elevated mind, a pure taste, antique beauty, athletic strength, incomparable address in all the exercises of the body, incontestable aptitude in all the arts to which he applied himself—drawing, painting, sculpture. Alfred D'Orsay had too many gifts for his days not to be parsimoniously reckoned. Death has been inexorable, but it has been just. It has not allowed him to become a common man. It has not taken him: it has chosen him."

Madame Georges Sand, in reply to a letter from the editor of the Presse, announcing the death of Count D'Orsay, observes in it:

"My acquaintance with Count D'Orsay was of recent date. His sphere was the world, mine was retirement. It was necessary for exceptional circumstances to occur for us to become acquainted-and they did occur. He was kind and devoted, like a father, like a brother, to those who interested me deeply. Hence arose our friendship, which, having commenced late, seemed to be desirous of making up for lost time. I was attached to him by gratitude, which is the most serious and the sweetest of all ties. He pitied the victims of political tempests, and even on his death-bed, thought of and endeavoured to serve them. He was the friend of the unfortunate."

Nor did the President of the Republic fail to testify his sense of his loss. In a letter addressed by him to the Duchess de Grammont, he says that, informed too late of the time at which the funeral of Count D'Orsay, her brother, was to take place, he much regretted that he could not send his household to attend, "as a feeble mark of the grief he felt at the loss of one of his best friends."

NEW MONTHLY MAGAZINE.

SOME REMINISCENCES OF THE DUKE OF WELLINGTON.

THE death of the Duke of Wellington recals the passage in the Cyropedia of Xenophon, where the hero is described as laying aside his attire to depart where neither fame, nor experience, nor comprehensive views of things, nor courage, nor fortune in advanced age, can give immunity from the common doom. We now contemplate the ruins of what was lately so goodly; we cling to the memory of the decrepit wrecks of what was long familiar to us, consecrated by cherished recollections, and glorious in our national annals. "They who saw the broken heaps of Pompey's theatre," says one of our old writers," and the crushed obelisk, and the old face of beauteous Philænium, could not but admire the disordered glories of such a magnificent structure, venerable in the dust;"just such is the feeling inspired by the recollection of the great soldier who has just rejoined his parent earth.

The world is fain to gather all it can in relation to departed greatness -greatness of talent-none else survives the funeral anthem. Thus materials are sometimes collected for the biography of those who have occupied a large share of public attention, or received the merited gratitude of contemporaries-such materials cannot be too voluminous. Hence, if those who chanced to come in contact with the Duke of Wellington have preserved anything in relation to him, however trivial, and would throw it into a common stock, they might aid some future biographer in illustrating his character. I say "future," because no contemporary of that great man, either of the past or present generation-and the Duke belonged to both-can be expected to do justice to his subject. The most distinguished will ever be the most overlauded or reproached by those who inevitably partake in the predispositions and antipathies of the passing hour. Wellington courted none, but worked out his objects under an heroic reserve, the promptings of a matchless prudence, and the soundest judgment possessed by any man of his age. Hence it seemed exceedingly difficult to understand him. Thus his previous habits appeared to militate against any change in opinion as he grew in years, while, on the contrary, he exhibited a singular adaptation of mind to the advancements in political science, and kept pace with the required changes accordingly. Remaining fresh, and even youthful in hope to the last, he met the mutations of policy required by time and an enlarged popular intellect, in a manner one of superior perspicacity could alone have done. When he commenced his career he little supposed that the most prolonged of human existences would see the triumph of toleration which he effected, or that the support of a system of Free-trade-the commercial heresy of his youth would have been one of the principles of his old age, and he himself be mainly instrumental in carrying out. But I digress.

The first time I ever saw the Duke of Wellington was at a critical Nov.-VOL. XCVI. NO. CCCLXXXIII.

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moment in his splendid career of public service, just after the battle of Vimiera: it was at Plymouth. I was awoke one morning by the landlord of a neighbouring hotel sending up to my room, requesting to see me. He told me that Sir Arthur Wellesley had arrived at his house in the night from Portugal, and was extremely anxious to peruse the newspapers of the latest date; that he (the landlord) had no paper but of the day previous; that the mail had just passed, and he was aware that if any one in the town had a London paper it was myself. In those days the mail occupied two nights and a day to reach Plymouth, and as sorting the letters took a considerable time, I paid the guard of the mail to bring them down, and deliver them passing. I sent a paper over to Sir Arthur at once, and promised a second should follow it in a few minutes. I dressed, and took over the other myself. The great man was then in his fortieth year, and appeared to be as old: his arduous services in India had perhaps contributed to this. He was dressed in a blue coat, knit pantaloons, and Hessian half-boots. He was then of a compact and slender rather than broad frame. There were one or two persons, probably officers, with him, but I do not remember who they were, if I heard at the time, which I do not know that I did: the conqueror of Vimiera alone engaged my attention. The breakfast things were upon the table. I expressed my pleasure at being able to oblige him, and regretted that I had only two papers to offer him. He thanked me, and said, "We only want to know what people are saying, not having seen a paper for some time-we shall leave immediately." By that I imagined he intended to intimate that they should proceed before the post-office was open, and had therefore got the landlord to apply to me when he told him I had them. He thanked me. I bowed, and retired. On his departure he left strict orders about the papers being immediately delivered to me.

It was thus evident the Duke was a reader of the papers in those days, as he always was most attentively in his subsequent years. The Cintra Convention made a great noise, and Sir Arthur Wellesley's objections to it were well known before his arrival in his own country. It was the general topic of conversation in the garrison at Plymouth, where the joke ran that General Burrard had superseded Sir Arthur Wellesley on the field of battle, and that he had written home after due inspection of what he did not half as well understand; that as his commander he approved of Sir Arthur's disposition of the English forces on the field; while Burrard himself, superseded the next day by Sir Hew Dalrymple, and in turn robbed by him of the command as he had robbed Sir Arthur, must be equally flattered that he (Sir Hew) perfectly approved of Sir Harry Burrard's disposition of the French forces in letting them go off with bag and baggage.

Six years afterwards I saw Sir Arthur as Duke of Wellington, and not at all changed. It was after his arduous Spanish campaigns, when the Emperor Alexander and the late King of Prussia were with him. That he had not altered in personal appearance I recollect, because I had imagined he must have been changed by his hardships in Spain.

The next time I saw the Duke was in Paris, a little time after the battle of Waterloo. The army of occupation was falling back from Paris on the north, and I passed through it: the head-quarters were fixed, I believe, at Cambray. I was in France until 1818, and being two years of

the time in Paris, I saw the Duke during his residence there, nearly up to the period when the allied armies quitted France. Except in short visits to the army, or to England, the Duke lived in Paris entirely. I saw him almost every day, meeting him continually on horseback, riding leisurely along the Boulevards, through the streets, or in the Champs Elysées. On those occasions he had no other attendant than a very youthful groom. I have met him when he stopped his horse to speak to my companion, addressing him familiarly by his Christian name "Bob." Except an occasional "God-dem" from some lower class Frenchman, spoken often in the same tone to any English passenger, I never heard of the Duke's meeting an insult in his daily rides about-at least none that caused any public remark or complaint. I have still his inflexible figure when on horseback before my eyes, almost savouring of the drill; his, on the whole, fresh, healthy complexion, and active make, notwithstanding his services in the burning climates of the south. He had the appearance of being taller than he really was; latterly he had seemed to shorten, and grow broad. His countenance was always striking, the upper part, above the mouth, being exceedingly fine; this organ was not so good; it exhibited the teeth, a defect of which nature in his last years relieved him by their loss. No portrait represents the Duke's mouth with accuracy as it was in middle life; not even Lawrence's are faithful delineations of that organ. I imagine the Duke, continually shifting the expression when he sat to an artist, prevented the natural, careless outline from being closely followed. At Plymouth, I remember, I was much impressed with his appearance, though his celebrity might have made the effect on my mind greater. Sir John Moore was a finer and a handsomer man. He sat his horse better. But the Sir Arthur Wellesley of that day looked: made for greater exploits, his countenance being stamped after one of "Plutarch's men." Moore, in my eyes, exceeded him in the graces, with far less sternness of manner, more amenity, and, I should fancy, less decision of character.

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In referring to Paris, it may be proper to mention the report of two attempts made upon the Duke's life during the period of his residence there. I believed neither to have been real at the time. I had opportunities of knowing more than most of my countrymen at that moment. If any one intended to take the Duke's life in good earnest, the opportunity continually presented itself. Daily the Duke might be found in his rides sufficiently insulated from others for such a purpose. ments of the great soldier were public enough. No one in earnest vengeance would have chosen the moment when he was entering his residence, where there was a regular guard, and in his carriage, too. The Duke rode himself at one jête of Longchamps. I saw his carriage there at two, but that was filled with ladies both years. I believe in the fête of 1816 he was out of Paris, in the north. The attacks were plots of the police at a moment when the old emigrants were all-powerful at court, and continually playing them off for one purpose or another. The Duke received the French generals and marshals at his residence indiscriminately. The old party hated all who had belonged to the Napoleon dynasty. A common professional feeling, and the talent of the men, naturally led to the Duke's intercourse with them there, as in England with Soult afterwards. Louis XVIII. was dependent upon them for the

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