HORACE WALPOLE, _after_ Lawrence _Frontispiece._ LAWRENCE STERNE, _after_ Reynolds 60 THE LADY GERTRUDE FITZPATRICK, _after_ Reynolds 132 THE LADY CAROLINE MONTAGU, _after_ Reynolds 148 THE THREE LADIES WALDEGRAVE, _after_ Reynolds 168 SIR JOSHUA REYNOLDS, _after_ Reynolds 188 THE DUCHESS OF DEVONSHIRE, _after_ Reynolds 213 MRS. MONTAGU, _after_ Reynolds 274 HORACE WALPOLE AND HIS WORLD. CHAPTER I. Introduction.--Birth and Parentage.--Education.--Appointments.--Travels.--Parliamentary Career.--Retirement.--Fortune.--Strawberry Hill.--Collections.--Writings.--Printing Press.--Accession to Title.--Death.--Character.--Political Conduct and Opinions.--The Slave-Trade.--Strikes.--Views of Literature.--Friendships.--Charities.--Chatterton.--Letters. We offer to the general reader some specimens of Horace Walpole’s correspondence. Students of history and students of literature are familiar with this great mine of facts and fancies, but it is too extensive to be fully explored by those who have not both ample leisure and strong inclination for such employment. Yet most persons, we imagine, would be glad to have some acquaintance with the prince of English letter-writers. Many years have passed since Walter Scott pronounced Walpole’s letters to be the best in our language, and since Lord Byron declared them to be incomparable. The fashion in style and composition has changed during the interval almost as often as the fashion in dress: other candidates, too, for fame in the same department have come forward; but no one, we think, has succeeded in setting aside the verdict given, in the early part of our century, by the two most famous writers of their time. Meanwhile, to the collections of letters by Walpole that were known to Scott and Byron have been added several others, no way inferior to the first, which have been published at different periods; besides numerous detached letters, which have come to light from various quarters. In the years 1857-9, appeared a complete edition of Walpole’s letters in nine large octavo volumes.[1] The editor of this expressed his confidence that no additions of moment would afterwards be made to the mass of correspondence which his industry had brought together. Yet he proved to be mistaken. In 1865 came out Miss Berry’s Journals and Correspondence,[2] containing a large quantity of letters and parts of letters addressed to her and her sister by Walpole, which had not previously been given to the world, as well as several interesting letters to other persons, the manuscripts of which had passed into and remained in Miss Berry’s possession. Other letters, too, have made their appearance, singly and incidentally, in more recent