Private Letters of Edward Gibbon (1753-1794) Volume 1 (of 2)

What gratulations thy approach attend!
See Gibbon rap his box: auspicious sign
That classic compliment and wit combine."

Another description is given of Gibbon in "The Luminous Historian; or, Learning in Love," written by George Colman the Younger (Eccentricities for Edinburgh, pp. 73, 74).

"His person look'd as funnily obese
As if a Pagod, growing large as Man,
Had, rashly, waddl'd off its chimney-piece,
To visit a Chinese upon a fan.
Such his exterior; curious 'twas to scan!
And, oft, he rapt his snuff-box, cock'd his snout,
And ere his polish'd periods he began,
Bent forwards, stretching his fore-finger out,
And talk'd in phrase as round as he was round about."

Footnote_71_71

Exilles commanding the valley of the Houlx, Fenestrelle holding the Col de Fenestrelle, and La Brunette guarding the Pas de Suze, were strongly fortified posts on the Italian side of the Alps. The two latter forts were destroyed in 1796 and 1798 respectively.

Footnote_72_72

John Child Tylney, second Lord Tylney, F.R.S., M.P. for Malmesbury.

Footnote_73_73

John Byng, youngest son of the Hon. George Byng, and grandson of the first Viscount Torrington.

Footnote_74_74

La Société du Printemps was the name of the society of young ladies at Lausanne, mentioned in the Memoirs.

Footnote_75_75

Madame Besson.

Footnote_76_76

Captain J. Eliot, R.N., was connected through his sister-in-law, Mrs. Eliot of Port Eliot, (née Catherine Elliston), with Gibbon. He died unmarried, an admiral and governor of Newfoundland.

Footnote_77_77

William Ponsonby (1744-1806), eldest son of Speaker Ponsonby, and first Lord Ponsonby.

Footnote_78_78

Thomas Lyttelton (1744-1779), son of the first Lord Lyttelton, afterwards known as "the wicked Lord Lyttelton," had engaged himself, while at Oxford, to a daughter of General Warburton. He was sent abroad, while the settlements were being arranged. The engagement was broken off in consequence of his bad reputation.

Footnote_79_79

Sir Horace Mann (1701-1786) was appointed Assistant Envoy at the Court of Florence in 1737. Three years later he became Envoy, and held the post till his death in 1786. From Florence he kept a close watch on the movements of Charles Stuart, and carried on his voluminous correspondence with Horace Walpole.

Footnote_80_80

George Nassau, Lord Fordwich (1738-1789), who succeeded his father in 1764 as third Earl Cowper, married in 1775 Miss Hannah Gore, and died at Florence in 1789.

Footnote_81_81

The Princess Augusta, eldest child of Frederick, Prince of Wales, born August 11, 1737, married the Duke of Brunswick.

Footnote_82_82

Near Stansted in Sussex, purchased in 1746 from the Earl of Tankerville by Sir Matthew Featherstonhaugh, M.P. for Portsmouth.

Footnote_83_83

The Manor and Mansion-house of Lenborough, in the county of Bucks, passed, by purchase from the families of Ingoldsby and Dormer, into the hands of Mr. John Rogers, of Buckingham, who, about the year 1730, sold them to the grandfather of Edward Gibbon. The "Mansion" was converted into a farmhouse for the tenant of the farm.

Footnote_84_84

The grandfather of Edward Gibbon died in 1736, leaving one son and two daughters. Catherine, the eldest of these two daughters, married Mr. Elliston, of South Weald, Essex, and her only child married, in 1756, Mr. (created in 1784 Lord) Eliot, of Port Eliot in Cornwall. Their three sons were Gibbon's nearest male relatives.

Footnote_85_85

Henry Ellis (1721-1806) wrote an account of an expedition in which he served to discover the North-West passage. His Voyage to Hudson's Bay, by the Dobbs Galley and California in the years 1746 and 1747, for Discovering a North-West Passage, was published in 1748. He was afterwards appointed successively Governor of Georgia and Nova Scotia.

Footnote_86_86

Mr. (afterwards Sir William) Hamilton (1730-1803) was appointed Envoy at the Court of Naples in 1764. In September, 1791, he married, as his second wife, Amy Lyon, who as Emma Hamilton became famous.

Footnote_87_87

John Murray, Resident at Venice, was appointed in November, 1765, ambassador at Constantinople. He died at Venice in August, 1775.

Footnote_88_88

Sir T. Worsley.

Footnote_89_89

Gibbon's Essai sur l'étude de la Littérature was published in 1761. The essay, translated into English, was published in 1764.

Footnote_90_90

Madame Necker, writing to Madame de Brentès, November 7, 1765, thus describes this visit of Gibbon to her married home: "Je ne sais, madame, si je vous ai dit, que j'ai vu Gibbon; J'ai été sensible à ce plaisir au-delà de toute expression, non qu'il me reste aucun sentiment pour un homme qui je vois n'en mérite guère; mais ma vanité féminine n'a jamais eu un triomphe plus complet et plus honnête. Il a resté deux semaines à Paris; Je l'ai eu tous les jours chez moi; it étoit devenu doux, souple, humble, décent jusqu'à la pudeur; témoin perpétuel de la tendresse de mon mari, de son esprit et de son enjouement, admirateur zélé de l'opulence, it me fit remarquer pour la première fois celle qui m'entoure, ou du moins jusqu'alors elle n'avoit fait sur moi qu'une sensation désagréable" (Lettres diverses recueillies en Suisse, par le Comte Fédor Galovkin, pp. 265, 266: Geneva, 1821).

Footnote_91_91

Theophilus Bolton, who was making the tour with Mr. Holroyd and Major Ridley, died of consumption at Genoa.