[177] A severe character of the Duke is given in the Memoirs of George the Second, vol. i. p. 85; nor has his memory found more favour from posterity. A love of truth, a dutiful consideration for his parents, and a decided preference of active employment, either civil or military, to the intrigues or frivolities of a Court, honourably distinguished him from his elder brother. In other respects he was not much to be esteemed.--E. [178] He was enormously fat, had lost one eye and saw but ill with the other, was asthmatic, and had had a stroke of the palsy, besides the wound in his leg, that had not healed. [179] George Keppel, third Earl of Albemarle, Lord of the Bedchamber to the Duke, and his favourite. The promise was not only renewed, but fulfilled at the end of the year, when the vacant garters were given to the Prince of Wales, the Hereditary Prince, and Lord Albemarle. [The latter was also entrusted by the King with the examination of the Duke’s papers and the administration of his property.--(Keppel’s Life, vol. iv. p. 384.)--E.] [180] A statue of the Duke was erected afterwards in Cavendish Square by General Strode, at his own expense. [181] Robert Adam, projector of the Adelphi Buildings and other known works. [An interesting life of him is given in the Biographical Dictionary of the Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge.--E.] [182] This statue was not finished and set up till 1772. A bitter inscription was affixed to it in the night, supposed to be written by Wilkes. [183] Sir John Lambert was of a Huguenot family. He was born in 1728; he died in 1799.--E. [184] The concession was made too late to be of much benefit to the original holders of the bills. It had been confidentially intimated to the friends of the late Government, before the latter left office, that the point would not be pressed on the French Court, and the bills, in consequence, were sold at a very great depreciation. Sir George Colebrooke, who was one of the sufferers, mentions the circumstance in his MS. memoirs.--E. [185] When the Duc de Nivernois came to England to conclude the Peace, he would never take his remittances in bank bills, lest they should be traced. My cousin, Thomas Walpole, told me that he had paid to that Duke four thousand guineas in specie at a time. I do not charge the Ministers with the guilt of this corruption. They were paid by Lord Bute in places, honours, and power; but that French money had a share in that infamous transaction I do not doubt. The Duc de Nivernois, a man of economy, spent above thirty thousand pounds here in half a year. He kept a table for the tradesmen of London, that they might harangue for the Peace. [186] What the French thought of our glorious successes and of our shameful Peace, appeared from what the famous Madame Geoffrin said to me one day at Paris,--“Vous avez eu un beau moment, mais il est bien passé!”