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illustre Anglais tout l'érudition de son pays et toute la politesse du nôtre." Bolingbroke, it may be remarked, is said to have given some of the last touches to the "Henriade," which Voltaire had just finished.

CHAPTER IV.

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St. John obtains a pardon in 1723.-Bribes the Duchess of Kendal. His attainder still in force. His return to England. -Again interferes in political intrigues.-Walpole's hatred of him.—Restored to his family inheritance through the influence of the Duchess of Kendal.-Walpole reluctantly supports the bill in the Commons.-St. John's memorial respecting the incapacity of Walpole privately presented to the King by the Duchess of Kendal.-The King shows it to Walpole.-St. John's interview with the King.-St. John's sanguine hopes of supplanting Walpole.-Death of the King fatal to his hopes. He retires to Dawley. His affected love of retirement. - Lord Chesterfield's opinion of him.— St. John's contributions to "The Craftsman."-Fall of Walpole.-St. John pays court to the Prince of Wales.—Interesting anecdote.-St. John's hospitality at Dawley.-Retires to France. His letters to Sir W. Wyndham.-His occupations during his retirement.-Returns to England, and resides with Pope at Twickenham.- Pope's account of St. John's mode of life in France.-St. John finally takes up his abode at Battersea.-Lord Chesterfield's sketch of him in old age. -Declining health of St. John's wife. Her death in 1750. -St. John attacked by a cancerous humour in the face.— Sufferings occasioned by it.-His death in 1751.-His character by Lord Orrery.-Swift's and Pitt's opinions of his oratory. His character as a philosophical writer.-Mallet's edition of his works, and Garrick's epigram on it.

Ar length, in 1723, after an exile of about nine years, Bolingbroke (by means of a bribe of £11,000, which was offered to, and accepted

by, the Duchess of Kendal, the German mistress of George the First) obtained a virtual pardon of his political offences. It amounted, however, to little more than a bare permission to return to his native country. The attainder remained in force; his title was still withheld from him; he was rendered incapable of inheriting the family estates, and was precluded alike from resuming his seat in the House of Lords, and from filling any situation under the state.

Bolingbroke's pardon, however, was no sooner known to have passed the Great Seal, than he departed on his journey towards England. Voltaire writes to a friend, "Une chose qui m'intéresse davantage c'est le rappel de Milord Bolingbroke en Angleterre. Il sera aujourd'hui à Paris, et j'aurai la douleur de lui dire adieu peut-être pour toujours." Nearly at the same time that Bolingbroke received his pardon, it is remarkable that Bishop Atterbury was sentenced to banishment by his peers. It is even said that, at the moment when the Bishop set his foot on the pier of Calais, Bolingbroke was on the point of sailing for England. It was a singular coincidence, and escaped not the observation of Atterbury: "Ah," he said, "it is clear that we are exchanged." Pope writes to Swift at this period, "Lord Bolingbroke is now returned, as I hope, to take me, with all his other hereditary rights. It is my ill fate, that all those whom I most loved and with whom I most lived, must be banished. After both of After both of you left England, my constant host was the Bishop of Roches-*

ter. Sure, this is a nation which is cursedly afraid of being overrun with too much politeness; and we cannot regain one great genius but at the expense of another."

Bolingbroke had no sooner set his foot in his native land, than, forgetting those philosophical principles which he had so recently professed on the banks of the Loiret, and amidst the shady groves of La Source, he was drawn once more into the vortex of politics, and again contrived to lose himself in a labyrinth of intrigues. Walpole, his former schoolfellow and political antagonist, was, at this period, at the head of the English ministry; and to procure the fall of that celebrated man, all the energies of Bolingbroke's mind were called into play. Probably, in the whole history of political warfare, no two statesmen ever personally regarded each other with a more invincible dislike. When the attainder of Bolingbroke was once referred to in the House of Commons, the mere mention of the name of his detested rival effectually destroyed the equanimity of the goodnatured minister. After uttering a volume of invectives against Bolingbroke and his principles, "May his attainder," he added, indignantly, "never be reversed, and may his crimes never be forgotten!"

It has been asserted by Horace Walpole that Bolingbroke was entirely indebted for his recall to Sir Robert. The fact, however, is beyond a question, that the minister retarded in every possible manner, the pardon of his adversary. Wal

pole, indeed, openly opposed the claims of Bolingbroke both at the Council Board and in Parliament; and it was owing to his personal influence and unwearying exertions that the boon obtained for Bolingbroke by the Duchess of Kendal was confined to a mere permission to live unmolested in England. We have been induced to mention these circumstances, because if Bolingbroke had really been indebted for his pardon to Walpole, his subsequent inveterate opposition to the government of that minister must be regarded in no other light than as an act of the most flagrant ingratitude.

After his return to England, Bolingbroke and the minister met, at least, on one occasion. Walpole even invited him to dinner, and Bolingbroke accepted the invitation. "Bolingbroke," says Horace Walpole, "could not avoid waiting on Sir Robert to thank him, and was invited to dine with him at Chelsea. But, whether tortured at witnessing Walpole's serene frankness, or suffocated with indignation and confusion at being forced to be obliged to one whom he hated and envied, the first morsel he put into his mouth was near choking him, and he was reduced to rise from table, and leave the room for some minutes. I never heard of their meeting more."

Irritated at the constant refusals returned to his applications for a reversal of his attainder; panting once more to enjoy the advantages of political influence and distinction; and stimulated by personal feelings of rivalship and dislike, Bo

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