DUKE OF NORFOLK.

A NOBLEMAN of solid judgment. The first in rank after the royal family, and in possession of a great fortune. Having no family to maintain, knowing the world well, and not being given to expensive pleasures, he might be expected to patronise the arts, or genius, or merit, or to relieve the indigent: but except some occasional attention to agriculture, and his being the president of that excellent institution, the Society for the encouragement of Arts and Sciences, in the Adelphi, the public knows nothing of his exertions in favour of merit of any sort*.

• When the best friends of the aristocracy of the country, of the nobility, and great land-holders, see the chief men of the kingdom receiving great sums, half of which they cannot use, and perhaps the greatest part of what they do expend laid out on some old gothic

Except some speeches in parliament, which appeared to have come from some honest farmer, who was afflicted with the jaundice, and who now and then attended to the affairs of his country, we see no public spirit in this chief of the British nobility.

To those who remember the ardour of the Earl of Surry at a county election, about thirty years ago, this seems strange; it being taken into the account that patriotism was then a matter of amusement: but that now, to assist the country is what ought to be nearest the heart of every good, and particularly of every rich man, and more so, of the first nobleman in the nation; it is impossible to see the carelessness and apathy of such men at this crisis, without astonishment.

One would excuse misers, governed by invincible, though absurd propensities, for keeping every

castle, to be gazed at once a-year, and left to rot and ruin the rest of the time, it is natural to become indifferent to the fate of such men. If the Howards should be sent to keep company with the descendants of the great families of France, it may naturally be askedWhat will be the mighty injury to mankind?

shilling they could in their own pockets; but the noble duke is no miser, though he acts as if, according to his code of morality, it would be a crime to give away a guinea*.

* When we hear of a poor starving madman perpetually interrupting the Lord Chancellor, and pretending to be the true heir to the honours and estates of Norfolk, we cannot help pitying the man, and asking-Whether, if the man is not altogether an impostor, and not even a bastard, (with Howard blood in his veins), it would not be humane and well at least to put him in the way to share with some of the fat dogs in his grace's kitchen: twenty-five guineas ayear would probably keep the poor wretch from despair: but of the crumbs which fall from the rich man's table, Lazarus is not to have a share.

DUKE OF NORTHUMBERLAND.

His grace was in his youth a brave soldier, and through life has been an excellent private character, and supports opposition politics with a moderation that does him credit; as few men of great power, wealth, and influence, who have embraced that line of policy, have been able to adhere to a moderate line of conduct: he has never taken an active part. He seems never to have had any view to the cabinet, and it is now too late for the field*.

We believe few of the old English nobility keep up the dignity and hospitality of former times so well as the house of Percy, and in this there is more merit, more advantage, and more real satisfaction, than in those political London dinners, where

* During the American war, Earl Percy, then a young man, was a prominent character, and would have gathered laurels, if there had been any growing for English officers: but what with a bad cause, a Washington for an enemy, General Howe for a commander, and a strong opposition at home, success was impos

sible.

the servants are starving on board wages in the hall, and the guests at table striving to outwit each other, and to pillage their country.

His grace raised, at a great expense, a very fine volunteer regiment, consisting entirely of his own tenants and their sons. He is a friend to his country, without ostentation; and a true patriot of the old school, uncontaminated by modern philosophy, or led away by imaginary plans of perfection, founded on wild theories, but not reducible to practice.

His grace is one of the oldest general officers in Europe, and was (when Lord Warksworth) aid-decamp to the Earl of Waldegrave, in the seven years war; and when the French revolution broke out, embraced the right cause, and by permission of his majesty, served as a volunteer in the Spanish armies against France, at the Eastern Pyrenees. Were it not for his afflictions with the gout, his grace, who

is a true soldier, might have been gathering laurels, now that the tide of fortune has turned, and the good cause triumphs.