Finding the Duke of Wellington was in town yesterday, I called on him. He talked to me a great deal about Brougham and the Dover dinner, and told me a comical anecdote with reference to his giving the toast of the Duke's health at the dinner. The Committee invited him and, as the chairman was a man who could not speak at all, they, thinking it a catch to get so great an orator to do the office, proposed to Brougham to give the toast of the night. He accepted, and then they found that Lord Guilford, a man of the first rank and consequence in the county, and therefore entitled to this distinction, was highly affronted at the preference of Brougham to him. They got embarrassed, and desired to take the toast from Brougham and give it to Lord Guilford, and when he got down there this was suggested to him; but he said 'it could not be, for he had not only written his speech beforehand, but had already sent it to be published, so that no alteration was then possible.' The consequence was, Lord Guilford would not come to the dinner, and he was only pacified afterwards by the Duke himself, who went to call upon him for the purpose of soothing down his ruffled plumage; this he succeeded in doing by telling him this story, and nothing the Duke said reconciled him so much to what had passed, as the fact of Brougham's having written his speech beforehand. He told me what Brougham had said of Macaulay (whom he hates with much cordiality), when somebody asked if he was to be Secretary at War. 'No, Melbourne would not consent to it: he would not have him in the Cabinet, and could not endure to sit with ten parrots, a chime of bells, and Lady W----.' The more I see of the Duke, the more am I struck with the impression that he is declining; that he is not what he was a year or two ago. He is vigorous and hearty, cheerful, lively; his memory does not seem to be impaired; he talks with sense and energy. If anybody asserted that they saw symptoms of mental decay, it would be easy to deny the fact, and to support the denial by ready and numerous examples of his force and sagacity in discussion, or in the transaction of business; but nevertheless I am persuaded that a change has come over him, that it is gradually spreading more and sinking deeper, and that we must begin to make up our minds to the deprivation of his noble spirit, full of honesty, wisdom, and patriotism as it is.[4] [4] [The Duke, however, lived and flourished for thirteen years after this prediction.] September 21st, 1839 {p.241} [Page Head: THE AFGHAN EXPEDITION.]