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and simply let it pass; but on the morning after, I was surprised
at receiving a letter from him to tell me what was my offence: it
ended with the words (which are deeply enough impressed on
my memory not yet to be forgotten), 'If I did not look upon you
as a mere boy, I should call you in a more serious manner to
account for your rudeness.' He then told me where he might be
found the following day. Without much reflecting on this
unpleasant communication, I showed it to my father, who was
near me, with several other gentlemen of the county, when I
received it. He asked me whether I had meant any rudeness,
and when I told him I had not, he bid me write an apology, and
particularly charged me not to notice the concluding taunt. He
afterwards mentioned it to two others of these gentlemen, who
both agreed that I had done right in sending such an answer.
But soon after my mind fell into such a torment as I had never
yet known. The answer was certainly right according to
Christian rules, and I suppose the laws of honour would not
have required more; but, at the time, I know not whether it
would not be esteemed in his mind and that of the friends
whom he might consult, to be too gentle for a man of courage.
A most agonizing dilemma I was now in, neither side of which I
could endure. On the one hand, I could not bear to look on
death, and standing to be shot at was what nothing but a fit of
desperation could bring me to. On the other, that awful tyrant,
the world, now, as it were, put forth his hand and claimed me
for his own. To lose my character for courage, and be branded
as a coward, was what I could not anyways endure. I went with
my father in the carriage to sleep at Loughborough; and when,
at the inn, I retired from him to my bedroom, the tumult of my
mind was at its height. I had all but determined to set off and
go that very night to the place assigned me by this gentleman,
who by one disdainful expression had now mysteriously
become, as it appeared, the master of my doom; and, renewing
the quarrel, take my chance of the consequence. But again, I
saw this would not save my honour, if it were already
compromised. It was clear that a change of mind like that
would hardly satisfy the world, which does not forgive a breach
of its awful laws on such easy terms. I finally slept off my
trouble for the present; but my soul remained oppressed with a
new load, which almost made me weary of my life. I remained
convinced that I had not reached the standard of courage in
this affair; and I felt, therefore, that it depended on the good-
nature of this gentleman whether my character should be
exposed or not. He did not reply to my letter of explanation.
Was he satisfied or not? During my first term at Cambridge he
was expected there, and I was even invited to meet him at a
wine party, as one who was known to be one of his neighbours
and friends. I dared not show any reluctance to meet him, lest
the whole story should be known at Cambridge; and if I did
meet him, was he again to treat me with disdain? If he did,
how should I avoid a duel? I knew that having anything to do
with a duel was expulsion by the laws of the University; but if I,
coward as I was, had not yet made up my mind, as I had, that
I must run the chance of his shot, if he chose still to resent the
affront, no wonder, if the spoiling of my prospects in life, by
expulsion from Cambridge, was not much regarded. The present
distress was evaded by his not coming, as was expected. After
this I desired one person who knew him as a friend, and to
whom alone I had explained my case, to write and ask whether
my apology had appeared to him sufficient. The answer to this
was an assurance that the thing had been no more thought of;
but it was two years before I met him in person, and by his
courteous manner was finally satisfied that all was right
between us. I might think it impossible that the great question
could be overlooked by men, what is to become of them in
eternity, if I had not had the experience of my own feelings in
such an occasion as this. In that memorable evening at
Loughborough, I did not indeed altogether overlook the moral
question—Is a duel wrong? I had made the most of what I had
heard said in palliation of it by some moralists; I could not find
any ground, however, to think it right before God; yet the
thought of having, perhaps before the next day was past, to
answer in the presence of God for having thrown away my life
in it, was not the consideration which deterred me from the
rash resolution. Now, how stands the world in England on this
question? It is clear that a Catholic, whether ecclesiastic or
layman, has no choice. He must either utterly renounce his
religion or duelling. A maintenance of the abominable practice
by which duelling is justified would deprive him of communion
with the Church. But how stand Protestants? The clergy are
exempted from this law by the world. But how many Protestant
laymen are there of the rank of gentlemen who dare to proclaim
that they detest duelling, and that they would sooner bear the
disgrace of refusing a challenge than offend God by accepting it,
or run the risk of offending God? for I suppose the greater part
would try an argument to prove that it may be excusable. The
clergy generally, I believe, reckon it decidedly a wicked worldly
law, yet they receive laymen to communion without insisting on
this enormous evil being first abjured. I do not, however, here
propose a further discussion of the question generally. To this
law of the world, miserably as it tormented me for a time, I
believe I am indebted spiritually more than can well be
understood: at least to the misery which it occasioned me. I
have heard it related of blessed (now Saint) Alphonsus Maria di
Liguori that he owed his being led to bid adieu to the world and
choosing God for the portion of his inheritance, to making a
blunder in pleading a cause as an advocate. Having till that time
set his happiness on his worldly reputation for talent, he then
clearly saw how vain, were the promises of the world, and once
for all he gave it up. I knew not, alas! whither nor how to turn
for more solid consolation, and thus the spoiling of my
happiness, which had resulted from a mistake in a ball-room,
did not teach me to be wise; but it contributed materially, and
most blessedly, to poison my happiness at this time. Yet, in a
general way, I went on gaily and pleasantly enough, for serious
reflections, on whatever subject it might be, had no long
continuance."
 CHAPTER VI.
His First Year in Cambridge.

What strikes a Catholic as the most singular feature in Protestant

education is the want of special training for the clergyman. A dozen
young men go to the University for a dozen different purposes, and
there is the same rule, the same studies, the same moral discipline
for all. Such, at least, was the rule in the days of Mr. Spencer's
college life. It seems extraordinary to the Catholic student, who has
to learn Latin and Greek only as subsidiary instruments to his
higher studies; who has to read two years philosophy and four
years theology, and pass severe examinations nine or ten different
times in each, besides a general one in all, before he can be
qualified to receive the priesthood. The clerical training with us is
as different from that through which young Spencer had to pass as
one thing can be from another.

His life for the first year may be very briefly told. He hears from Mr.
Blomfield that he is to attend divinity lectures, and he forthwith
begins. He is advised by a Professor Monk, afterwards Protestant
Bishop of Gloucester, to stand for a scholarship, and he does so
after getting Blomfield's consent. This makes him study very hard
for some time, and though he did not succeed, the taste he had
acquired by the preparation did not leave him till the end of the
year, when he came out in the first class, having left his
competitors, with one exception, far behind. He also spends some
hours every day in athletic exercises, is very fond of riding, goes
now and again to London and Althorp to amuse himself with
attending the theatres, dining out, shooting partridge, and playing
at Pope Joan. He relaxes in his determination to avoid whist, and
indulges so far that he puts a note of exclamation in his journal at
having returned to his chambers one night without having had a
game. This seems to be the regular course of his life at Cambridge,
a course edifying indeed, if compared with the lives of his
companions. He says:—

"I have observed before that the example and conversation of

Mr. Blomfield, while I remained with him, gave an impulse to my
mind towards the love of literary pursuits. I did not think,
however, of exerting myself particularly in that way till the end
of the first term, when I was persuaded by Mr. Monk, the Greek
professor, now Protestant Bishop of Gloucester, to be a
candidate for a university scholarship. Dr. Monk was four years
senior to Mr. Blomfield, and I understood from him that he had
been of great service to him in the same way, when at college,
encouraging his exertions and studies. I was told that I passed
this examination creditably, but I did not stand so high among
the competitors as to make it desirable that I should repeat the
attempt afterwards, and the only honours that I tried for were
confined to Trinity College. I was thus stimulated during this
time to more than common exertions; it gave me a disposition
to study which continued through my time at Cambridge, and
was the only good disposition which was encouraged in me. I
have reason then to remember with gratitude those who helped
me in this way; though it is a lamentable thing that, being there
professedly as a student for the church, in what is the proper
seminary for ecclesiastics of the Church of England, I cannot call
to mind one word of advice given me by anyone among my
superiors or companions to guard me against the terrible
dangers with which I was surrounded of being entirely
corrupted, or to dispose me towards some little care of my
spiritual concerns.

"My studies I followed with great zeal all the time I was at
Cambridge; but, as is generally the case there with those that
aim at places in the public examinations, I managed them
without proper distribution of time. By running through the
journal I kept at the time I find that, when first I began to read
hard, I have often sat without moving from my table and read
the clock round, that is, from three or four in the afternoon to
the same hour the next morning, for the sake of doing what
was counted an extraordinary feat. There is no doubt that
reading with regularity a smaller number of hours every day
would be more available for the attainment of learning than
these immoderate surfeits of study, as one may call them; I
only interposed a few days of amusement, when hardly any
work was done. In the long run, such a course as mine could
not answer, for it was sure to hurt the health and prevent the
attainment of the real end of all a young man's studies, which
is, acquiring knowledge to be turned to account in after life.
Few young men at Oxford or Cambridge, I suppose, have
wisdom enough to calculate this in advance. The object which
they aim at is present distinction, and outstripping their fellows
in the race for college prizes; and, as far as my experience
goes, a glut of reading, if the health does but stand it without
breaking down, is the way to make the most of one's chance at
a public examination.

"The time of my being at Cambridge is one so interesting to me

in the recollection, that I cannot satisfy myself, when giving an
account of my progress through life, without dwelling at some
length upon it. My college course was not very long. At the time
when I was at Cambridge, honorary degrees were conferred on
the sons of noblemen at the end of two years' residence, by
which they came to the enjoyment of the rank and all the
privileges of a Master of Arts, which title was not to be attained,
in the ordinary course, in less than six or seven years. And what
shortens the college life much more is the extravagant length of
the vacations; so that what is reckoned one year at Cambridge
is not more than five months' actual residence in the University.
Yet this is a most important and critical period, and the short
two years during which I was an undergraduate at Cambridge
were of immense importance in my destiny. How vast is the
good, of which I have learned the loss, but which I might have
gained, had I then known how to direct my views! On the other
hand, how may I bless God for the quantity of evil from which I
have been preserved, and how wonderful has been my
preservation! When I remember how destitute I was of religion
at this time, I must say that I have to wonder rather at my
being preserved from so much evil, than at my having fallen
into so much. And how can I bless God for his exceeding
goodness of which I am now reminded, when I think how,
against my own perverse will, against my foolish, I must say
mad wishes, I was prevented by his Providence from being at
this time irrevocably ruined and lost? What can I return to Him
for this blessing? One principal intention in my present work is
to record the sentiments of gratitude, however weak and most
unworthy, with which I at least desire my soul to be inflamed,
and which I hope will engage all the powers of my soul
throughout eternity. Most gladly, if it were for His honour and
for the edification of one soul which by the narrative might reap
instruction, I would enter before all the world into a more
detailed explanation of this my wonderful deliverance; but this I
must not do, for I must not be the means that others, hitherto
in the simplicity of holy ignorance, should be made acquainted
with the dark iniquity of which the knowledge has once infected
my own unhappy understanding. Be this enough to say on this
point, which I was obliged to touch, lest it should seem
unreasonable that I should speak of my case as one of most
marvellous and almost unparalleled mercy, when the
circumstances which I may now detail, and what are generally
known among my most intimate companions, do not justify
such feelings in the review of it.

"By the great mercy of God, I had provided for me a refuge

and, as it were, a breathing time, between Eton and Cambridge.
At Mr. Blomfield's, my progress in evil was checked, and I had
time to prepare myself for the University with good resolutions,
though I knew not what sort of trials I should meet with there,
nor had I learnt how unavailing were my best resolutions to
support me, while yet I had not wholly put my confidence in
God's grace. The vacation which came between my leaving
Dunton and going to Cambridge I spent chiefly in the Isle of
Wight, and my soul was almost wholly occupied that summer
about cricket. I never became a great cricketer myself; I had
lost the best time for gaining the art while at Eton; but, this
summer, what perseverance and diligence could do to make up
for lost time, I think I did. Oh! that I might have the same
degree of zeal now in serving the Church of God, and collecting
and instructing a faithful flock, as I then had in seeking out, and
encouraging and giving and procuring instruction for my troop
of cricketers. The occupation of my mind on this subject was
enough to drive away any ardent attention to religion as well as
to study. I may say, in favour of this passion for cricket, that it
was one of the pursuits which I took to at the recommendation
of my mother. I remember generally that when anything in the
way of amusement or serious occupation was suggested to me
by her, or anything else but my own fancy, nothing more was
required to make me have a distaste for it. Otherwise, how
many useful accomplishments might I have gained which would
now have been available to the great objects I have before me.
My dear mother wished me to learn fencing when I was at
Eton, and a good deal of time I spent, and a good deal of
money must have been paid by my father to Mr. Angelo, the
fencing-master who came to Eton. It might have been better for
me to have gained perfection in this exercise, by which it is
related that St. Francis of Sales acquired in part that elegance
of manner and nobleness of carriage through which he gained
so many souls to Christ. While other boys made fencing their
amusement, I always would have it as a task, and of course
gained nothing by it. At a later period, when we were at Naples,
and I had a weakness in my eyes which made such an
employment suitable, my mother would have had me learn
music. She gave me a guitar, and would have paid for my
lessons; but I could not take to it, and have thus lost the
advantage which, since I have become a Catholic, I should have
so much valued of understanding the science of music, seeing
that the trifling knowledge I do possess is of so much use.
There is the apology, then, for my cricket mania; that she
proposed my taking to it in the summer I speak of. I was
surprised to find myself willing to acquiesce in the suggestion.
What I did take to I generally followed excessively, and she did
not calculate on the violence with which I followed up this. I got
into very little bad company by means of this pursuit, and
perhaps, on the whole, I rather gained than lost by it. It was
manly and healthful, and though, when in the heat of it, I
thought it almost impossible I should ever give it up, yet when I
took Orders I did give it up; and if it was in itself of no use, I
hope that one sacrifice, among the many I was obliged to make
and, thank God, did willingly make to more important objects, it
was not without value. Thus much for my cricketing; I mention
it here as being the only distinct cause to which I can attribute
my losing before I went to Cambridge the habits of serious
thought and of regular prayer, which I have observed I regained
in a good degree towards the latter part of my Dunton time.

"I nevertheless was full of good purposes. I desired and was

resolved to keep myself from giving countenance to immorality
as well as practising it, though after having once given way at
Eton, I hardly ever dared to say a word or even to give a look
in disapproval of whatever might be said or done before me by
bold profligates. I could not bear to appear out of the fashion;
so that when other boys at Eton used to talk of the balls and
gay parties which they had been to in their holidays, I was quite
ashamed, when asked what I had done, to say that I had been
to no balls; for to my mother I am greatly indebted for her wise
conduct in this respect, that she did not, as was done by others,
make us men before our time. So, although I detested and from
my heart condemned the fashionable immoralities of the young
men with whom I came to be associated about the time of my
going to Cambridge, I hardly dared declare my mind, except
sometimes, almost in confidence, to one who seemed to be like
myself. Oh! what good might I have done had I then known the
value of God's grace, and, despising the world, boldly stood up
for the cause of virtue, at the same time continuing to be gay
and cheerful with my companions, and taking a leading part in
all innocent and manly diversions, and in the objects of
honourable emulation which were set before me and my
fellows. I know how much I might have done by supporting
others, weak like myself, by acting at this time as I ought to
have done, by what I felt myself on one or two occasions when
such support was given me. I thank God that the memory of
my brother Robert, who died in 1830, commanding the
Madagascar, near Alexandria, now rises before me to claim my
grateful acknowledgment as having twice given me such help at
a critical time. Never was a man more calculated than he to get
on, as it is said, in the world. He was brave and enterprising,
and skilled in all that might make him distinguished in his
profession; at the same time he was most eager in the pursuit
of field sports and manly amusements; and in society was one
of the most agreeable and popular men of his day. Once I
remember complaining to him that I was ashamed of having
nothing to say before some ladies about balls, when I was
about sixteen. 'What a wretched false shame is that!' said he to
me. From that time I became more ashamed of my shame than
I had been before of my want of fashion. More important yet
was the service he did me when he was about to go on one of
his cruises as commander of the Ganymede. I was talking with
him, the last evening before he left London, about the Easter
before I went to Cambridge. He knew well what I should be
exposed to better than I did and charged me to take care never
to laugh or look pleased when I was forced to hear immoral
conversation. What rare advice was this from the mouth of a
gay, gallant young officer; and if there were more of his
character who were not ashamed to give it to their young
brothers and friends, how many might be saved, who are now
lost, because they do not see one example to show how a
manly, fashionable character can be maintained with strict
morality and modesty. These few words from him were of
infinite service to me. They made deep impression on me at the
time I heard them, and the resolution which I then made
continued with me till after I had been some time at Cambridge,
when the battle I had to bear against the universal fashion of
iniquity once more, as formerly, at Eton, proved too strong for
me, and I again gave way. My fall now was gradual. I began
with the resolution to avoid all expenses which would embarrass
me with debts, and to keep from several fashionable
amusements which would engage too much time. For awhile, on
this account, I would not play at cards; but in less than half-a-
year this determination failed, and I wasted many an evening at
whist of my short college life. I soon grew careless, too, about
my expenses, and should have been involved in great
embarrassments, had it not been for my brother's (Lord
Althorp's) generosity, who, hearing from me at the end of my
first year that I was in debt, gave me more than enough to
clear it all away; and, thus having enabled me to set my affairs
again in order, was the means of saving me from ever
afterwards going beyond my means extravagantly. I might,
however, have given way in some such resolutions as not
playing at cards; I might have entered into some expenses
which I shunned at first, without losing my peace of mind, and
again defiling my conscience, of which the good condition was
partly restored; but these were not the crying evils of the place.
In the set with which I was now associated in the University,
gambling was not at that time much practised, and not at all
insisted on. There were occasional drunken parties, and it was
with difficulty that I kept out of them; but the system of
violently forcing people to drink, as well at the Universities as
throughout genteel society in England, had fallen off before my
time. There were some sets where drinking was practised at
Cambridge much more excessively than in what called itself the
best set of all. I could not help, without offending the laws of
society, being present at a considerable number of dinners and
suppers where men drank immoderately, but I was permitted to
keep myself sober without much difficulty; one or two gave me
countenance thus far, though any intimation of disapproving of
what others did, on religious or moral grounds, I felt would not
have been anyways tolerated; and so I ventured not. Swearing
was among them rather unfashionable than not. Some
undergraduates were notorious for profane and impious
language; and this was excused, and tolerated, and made fun
of, but it was not common, and many among us made no
difficulty of condemning it. I therefore never fell into this habit.
The crying, universal, and most frightful evil of the place was
open immorality. There was at Cambridge, in my time, a
religious set, who were sometimes called Simeonites, from Mr.
Simeon, one of the great leaders and promoters of the
Evangelical party in these latter days, who was minister of one
of the small churches in Cambridge, and for many years
attracted into his influence a certain number of young men.
Among these open vice was not countenanced; but not so the
set to which I principally belonged, and these were as distinct
as if they had not belonged to the same University. I was
introduced to some few of these, and rather valued myself on
having an acquaintance with them, as well as with many of the
purely reading men; and my fashionable friends did not
altogether object to it, though I was generally a little ashamed
at being seen with any of them, and avoided any frequent
intercourse with them. I have wondered since that, if it were
only from mere curiosity, I should never once have gone to hear
Simeon preach, but so it was. I understood nothing whatever of
what is in England called Evangelical religion. Indeed, I thought
nothing of religion; had I paid any attention to it at this time, I
could hardly have escaped seeing how desperate was the
course which I was following, and I might perhaps have taken a
strong resolution, and have joined the serious party at once;
but, very likely, I should have found the power of fashion at
that time too great, and, by knowing more of religion, should
only have made my conscience more guilty; and so I believe it
may be better that none ever spoke to me on the subject all the
time. I repeat it, that in our set, whatever other deviation from
the most established fashion was tolerated, any maintenance of
chastity or modesty was altogether proscribed. It was not long,
then, before I found myself beat out of the position I
endeavoured to maintain. During the first term I stood my
ground rather better. One reason for this was, that among what
were called the freshmen—that is, those who entered with me
on my college life, there were several who were not initiated in
vicious practices. These, remaining for a time more or less in
their simplicity, gave me some countenance in not going at once
in the way of the veteran professors of evil. But as I saw some
of them grow by degrees shameless and bold, and soon
beginning to join their older brethren in upbraiding my
weakness and folly for not being like the rest, I found all my
resolution failing, and, alas! many a deliberation did I take
whether I should not at length enter the same way with them. I
was still withheld, though it was not the fear of God which
restrained me. I knew that my entering a course of open
profligacy would not be tolerated by my parents. I had a
character for steadiness among the tutors and fellows of the
college, which I was ashamed to lose; though even before them
I found it sometimes to answer best not to appear different
from other young men. Besides, as I had resisted the first
period of attacks, and established among my companions a kind
of character of my own, I felt that even they would be
astonished if I at last declared myself as one of their sort. I
could not bear the thought of their triumph, and the horrid
congratulations with which I should be greeted, if once I was
found going along with them in open feats of iniquity. Oh! how
grievous is the reflection that by such motives as these I was
restrained. I was longing often to be like them. I could not bear
the taunts which were sometimes made at me. Here again
some of the old Etonians perhaps would bring up the
remembrance of my ancient propensity to blush, and would take
pleasure in putting me again to confusion. Occasionally, by
strange interpositions of Divine Providence, I was hindered from
accomplishing purposes of evil which I had, in a sort of
desperation, resolved by myself to perpetrate, by way of being
decided one way or other, like a man on the brink of a precipice
determining to throw himself down in order to escape the
uneasy apprehension of his danger. One way or another I was
restrained, so that it has afterwards appeared to me as if I had
but barely stopped short of taking the last decisive steps by
which I might be irrevocably ranked among the reprobate. I
never thought at the time of this danger, otherwise I could
hardly have borne my existence; but, as it was, my mind at
times was gloomy and miserable in the extreme. To make me
yet more so, at the end of my first year I began to be afflicted
with bilious attacks, arising, perhaps, from my imprudent
management in regard to study, to diet, and to hours; and
these occasioned exceeding depression of spirits, under which I
used to fancy myself the most unhappy of creatures. I had no
knowledge of the power of religion to set me free, and make
me superior to all external sensible causes of depression, and I
knew no better than to give myself up to my low feelings when
they came upon me, till some distraction removed them, or till
the fit passed away of itself. Many times at Cambridge, in order
to hold up my head in a noisy company after dinner, I drank
wine to raise my spirits, though not to great excess, yet enough
to teach me by experience how mistaken is the calculation of
those who, when in sorrow, seek to cheer themselves in that
way, or in any way but by having recourse to God by prayer and
acts of resignation. I remember well once being told by a good
aunt of mine, that it was quite wrong to give way to my
depression, about which I one day complained to her, and that
religion would surely cure it; but the time was not come for me
to understand this truth, and I took no notice of her words.

"In the meantime I continued zealous about my studies. I did

not stop to ask cui bono was I working in them. Had I seen
how utterly vain was a first-class place or a Trinity prize-book,
 which I had set before me as the object of my labours, I should
have found but little consolation and refreshment to my
melancholy reflections in these pursuits. On the contrary, I
should only have pined away with a more complete sense of the
truth of the Wise man's sentence which Almighty God was
teaching me in His own way, and in His own good time: 'Vanity
of vanities, and all is vanity' but to serve Thee only. I do not
mean that if rightly followed, such academical honours are
worth nothing. I wish I had followed them more prudently and
effectually. They were the objects set before me by my
superiors at the time, and I should say to another in my place
that he should do his best to gain the highest place in a spirit of
obedience, and for the honour of God, to whom we owe all the
credit and influence in the world which, by just and honourable
exertions, we can gain. In recollecting, therefore, how I exerted
myself, and succeeded in these attempts, I am dwelling on one
of the most happy points of view which that part of my life
suggests to me; for though I did not do this as I ought, yet I
was doing what I ought, and by doing so was preserved from
much evil, and God knows how far the creditable footing I
gained at Cambridge in the studies of the place may yet be
available for a good end."

It is hard to believe young Spencer was so utterly devoid of religion

as he here describes himself to be; we draw a more favourable
inference from a journal he kept at the time. Noticing the death of
the Princess Charlotte, he says: "It appears to be the greatest
calamity that could have befallen us in public, and it is a deplorable
event in a private point of view. It must be ascribed to the
interposition of Providence, which must have some end in view
beyond our comprehension." He speaks of the death of Mrs.
Blomfield thus—"It is for her a happy event, after a life so well
spent as hers has been." A few pages further on he has these
words about the death of another friend of his. "I was extremely
shocked to-day at hearing that James Hornby died last Friday of
apoplexy. It was but a short time past that I was corresponding
with him about the death of Mrs. Blomfield; and little he or I
thought that he would be the next to go. The last year and a half I
stayed at Eton I lived in the greatest intimacy with him, which had
afterwards fallen away a little; but he was very clever and
promising, and I always was fond of him. It must be a wise
dispensation of Providence, and may be intended as a warning to
us, in addition to those we have lately had in the deaths of
Maitland and Dundas. God grant it may be an effectual one!"

These are not the spontaneous expressions of one altogether a

stranger to piety, though they may very well be put down as the
transient vibration of chords that had long lain still in his heart, and
which these rude shocks must have touched and made audibly
heard once more. This conclusion is more in accordance with other
remarks found scattered here and there in the same journal. He
criticises sermons and seems to like none; he is regular at chapel
and puts on his surplice on the days appointed; but he refuses to
take the sacrament for no conceivable reason but that he does not
care about it, and hears it is administered unbecomingly. He is
shrewd and considerate in his remarks upon persons and things;
yet there is scarcely a line of scandal or uncharitableness in the
whole closely written volume. When he records a drunken fit or a
row, he suppresses the names of the rioters; and if he says a sharp
word about a person in one page, he makes ample amends for it in
many pages afterwards; by showing how mistaken he was at first,
and how agreeable it was to him to change his opinion upon a
longer acquaintance. This might not appear very high praise; but
let us take notice of his age and circumstances, and then perhaps it
may have its value. He was a young man, just turned eighteen; he
had been brought up in splendour at home, and in a poisonous
atmosphere at school. That he was not the vilest of the vile is to be
wondered at more than that he preserved as much goodness as he
did. Where is the young man, of even excellent training, who will
be able to contend, unaided and taunted, against a whole college
of the finest youth of any country? His motives may be beneath a
Christian's standard, but the fact that with this weak armour, the
bare shadow of what it might be, he made such noble resistance
and passed almost unscathed through the furnace into which he
was cast, only shows what he would have done had he been
imbued with the teachings of a higher order. The very human
respect and worldly considerations that succeeded in keeping him
from vice, acquire a respectability and a status in the catalogue of
preservatives from the fact of their being successful in his case. His
was a fine mind, and one is moved to tears at seeing this noble
material for sanctity thus tossed about and buffeted by a herd of
capricious companions who could not see its beauty. Let us take up
any young man's journal of his age and read some pages of it,
what shall we find? Jokes played upon green freshmen, tricks for
outdoing proctors, records of follies, or perchance pompous
unreality put on to conceal all these or worse. His diary is the
generous utterance of a noble mind; it is candid, true,
conscientious, and puts a failing and a perfection of the writer side
by side. It is no wonder that he was loved and courted, and that
his companions had acquired an esteem for him in college, which
years and toils have not succeeded in lessening. His keen grief at
the deficiencies of his college life only shows to what height of
sanctity he had reached, when what another might boast of wrung
from him these lamentations.
 CHAPTER VII.
Conclusion Of His First Year In Cambridge.

The events recorded in his journal at this time could very

conveniently be swelled into chapters, if one had a mind to be
diffuse. To trace the fortunes of the gentlemen he comes in contact
with—Denison, Wodehouse, Carlisle, Hildyard, Brougham, and a
host of others, who afterwards shone in different circles, High
Church controversies, pleadings at the bar, parliamentary debates,
and Irish Lord-lieutenancies,—would form some very interesting
episodes. We should add many titles to the off-handed surnames of
the collegian's journal, and say a few words about how those
dignities were procured, earned, and worn by the possessors. It
might be, perhaps, interesting to some readers to know how many
gay young noblemen were enticed into becoming sons-in-law to
some very reverend doctors. All this and more Mr. Spencer notes
down in the journal, but it is not our theme.

"I have before observed that about my first Christmas I was

encouraged by Mr. Monk and by Mr. Blomfield, who had
removed from Dunton and lived then about ten miles from
Cambridge, to undertake a contest for a University prize; but
from this I afterwards drew back. I followed up then principally
the object of getting into the first class at the Trinity College
examinations, which took place at the end of each year, and
which is an honour much esteemed, on account of that College
standing so high in the University, though of course it is not on
a level with the honours gained in examinations where
competitors are admitted from the whole body of students in
the University. It was one object of silly ambition at Cambridge
to do well in the examinations without having appeared to take
much trouble about it. During my second term I fell into the
idea of aiming a little at this, and I went to many more parties,
and took more time for various amusements, particularly cards,
than I allowed myself in the first term. Had I not been checked
for this, I should probably have lost much ground in my race.
But a check did come to me at Easter, when I went to town,
and one evening expressed to my father and mother something
of self-congratulation for having united so much amusement
with my studies. My mother saw the danger I was now falling
into, and, as it seemed to me, with too great severity, for an
hour together represented to me the absurdity of my notions,
and upbraided me with going the way to disappoint all their
prospects. I had no thought of bringing such a reproof upon
myself, and went to bed actually crying with mortification.
However, it had its effect, and I was thankful for it afterwards.
The next term, which was the last and critical one before the
examination, I spent in very severe and regular study, and
cared not how some idle ones might derogate from my success,
and comfort themselves for their inferiority by the thought, that
I had read so hard as to take away from my merit. At length,
on the 18th May, 1818, the very day, as I observed, on which,
ten years before, I had gone to Eton, I went into the
examinations in which was to be gained the little share of credit
in this way which was to fall to my lot. They lasted for a week;
and, a day or two after, I received a note from Mr. Amos, now a
distinguished ...... in London, who was one of the examiners,
and a great friend of mine, which filled me with exultation: 'I
have the greatest pleasure in informing you that you are in the
first class. Ollivant is only eight marks above you, and you and
he have left all the rest of the class at a long, very long,
distance.' I afterwards learnt that the highest number of the
marks was between 1,600 and 1,700, and that while Ollivant
and I were near together at the head, the next to me was at
the distance of 291. Lord Graham, now Duke of Montrose, was
one of the first class, and if he had read as much as I did, there
is no doubt he would have been before me. I was told at the
 same time that I learnt the above-named particulars, as I find it
in my journal, that 'I was best in mathematics, and Grahame
next, although Grahame was first in algebra;' after which I thus
expressed my ambition at the time: 'I hope that Grahame will
not read for next year's examination, and if my eyes last out
(for at that time I was under some apprehension on that point)
I may have a chance of being first then, which would be
delightful.' Such is all earthly ambition, and, as in my case, so
always its effects—disappointment and mortification. Had I
offered all my studies to God, and worked for Him, depending
on His help, I should have done much more. I should have
enjoyed my successes more purely, and should have been
guarded from all disappointment. The second year's examination
is much more confined to mathematics than to classics, and had
I been wise and regular and well-disciplined in my mind, I might
have gained that first place which I was aiming at, for
Grahame did not read for it. As it was, Ollivant, who was some
way behind me in the first year, got up his ground, and beat me
in the second year's examination, in which, though I was
second again, I had no remarkable superiority over the one who
came next to me."

Spencer formed the acquaintance of Sir Thomas Fremantle while

they were both at Dunton under the charge of Mr. Blomfield.
Fremantle went to Oxford and he to Cambridge, but they continued
the intimacy, begun here, to which Spencer pays cordial tributes of
unfeigned gratitude. Sir Thomas was a welcome guest at Althorp;
he and George used to spur each other on to renewed exertions in
the pursuit of literary honours. Spencer formed a plan for the long
vacation, and went, on March 25, to Oxford, to lay the subject
before Fremantle; it was, that they should go somewhere and read
together. Spencer got into the coach in London, and arrived in
Oxford at twelve at night. He lionised the place next day, was
introduced to different celebrities, and dined and "wined" in the
most select companies his friends, Fremantle and Lord Wilton,
could muster for his reception. He lived during the time in the
rooms of a fellow commoner of Oriel. He did not leave a single
department unvisited. He played at tennis with a Mr. Denison;
compared the agreements and disagreements of their ways there
with those of Cambridge; the only thing noteworthy he chose to
put down in his diary, as the result of his comparison, is, that
(when he plays cards in W ***'s rooms, where there are four
tables) "they play high, and I do not like the kind of party so well
as those at Cambridge."

Spencer continued in Cambridge, and read, or idled, as the tone of

his mind directed, until the 31st of July, 1818. This morning he set
off, at half-past five, in the Rising Sun, for Birmingham; he falls in
with a brilliant Etonian, who recounts the progress of things at his
old school; and has to sleep in what he calls "the most
uncomfortable and uncivil inn I have ever seen." He sets off on
another coach next morning for Shrewsbury, and finds, to his
agreeable surprise, that Fremantle travelled by the inside of the
same vehicle. They both travel together into Wales, having first
procured a supply of candles, tea, and other commodities for
housekeeping, which they did not hope to find at hand where they
were going to. After many long stages, up-hill and down-hill,
among Welsh mountains, and strange fellow-travellers, they arrive
at Towyn, at ten o'clock at night on the 2nd of August, having been
nearly three days performing a journey which can now be
accomplished in a few hours.

Towyn is a little town in Merionethshire, situated on the sea coast,

on a neck of land formed by a graceful little creek, into which the
River Doluny empties itself, and a kind of sloping arm of the
channel. Here Spencer and Fremantle took up their residence for
the long vacation, in a nice little house for which they paid ten
guineas a month. They had the whole premises to themselves, with
a waiting-man named Davis, and a maid Kitty. Their mode of life
was very regular. They rose early, bathed in the sea, which rolled
its waves against their premises, breakfasted, and studied till two
o'clock. It was customary with them then to go out exploring with
dog and gun until dinner, dine at five, take another stroll, and read
again until they thought it time to take tea, and chat until bed-
time. Each in turn was steward for a week; they purchased their
own provisions in the little town, thus making a regular home there
for the term of their stay. They read pretty well for the first week
or two; afterwards they got so fond of brisk air and the adventures
they came across in their daily walks, that the reading became less
agreeable, and soon irksome. The first adventure recorded in the
journal is the following. They were both returning home after a two
hours' vain pursuit of game, and came across a gouty old
gentleman, who asked them a number of impertinent questions. He
then asked them to dine, but finding out on inquiry that he was "a
notorious blackguard," although great in lands and money, they
politely declined his invitation. Another time they rode a great way
up the country and stopped at a pretty place, which they found, to
their chagrin, not to be a fairy castle exactly, but "a grand shop for
gossip, kept by two old ladies, assisted by a third," at whose
qualifications in point of age the reader is left to make guesses.
Another day they went out to shoot, and met another serious
adventure, which is thus noted: "I got an immense ducking in a
black mud ditch, which came up to my middle or higher, and
Fremantle got a wetting too, but not so serious as mine." Things go
on smoothly now for about a week; they receive several visits from
neighbouring gentry, and the way in which the return to some of
them is described gives us a fair specimen of the flow of spirits
Spencer enjoyed at the time.

"Saturday, Aug. 15.— We made ourselves greater bucks than

usual to-day, and set off at two to call on Mr. Scott, near
Aberdovey. He takes pupils there. We came home to dinner at
half-past five; and after dinner (still greater bucks) we went to
drink tea at Bodalog, with Mr. and Mrs. Jeffreys, and came
home at half-past ten (14 miles walking)."

The next adventure was one in which they tried their hands at
shooting on the river with Mr. Jeffreys' long gun; whether the
weight of the instrument, or an effort to reach the game that it
killed, drew them nearer the water than they intended, he tells us
that they "got quite soused in the water," and figured at the
gentleman's dinner-table in two complete sets of the apparel of the
old man, to the no small amusement of the company. Nothing
remarkable occurred after this to the two friends, except a trip to
Aberystwyth, where they lodged a few days, met a few old
acquaintances, and enjoyed a ball that was given to the ladies and
gentlemen who were there for the season; until the 14th of
September. This day they had a great battle of words with their
landlord, who did not like their leaving him so soon: in this,
however, they came off victorious. They both travel through Wales,
visit Snowdon, Carnarvon, and meet a body of Cambridge men
reading with a tutor at Conway.

September 29th, he took the mail to London, and thus ended his
long vacation. He stays at Wimbledon with his own family until the
time for returning to Cambridge again. He relates in the journal
that a man comes to teach Lady Spencer, his mother, how to bind
books. This may be thought a strange kind of recreation for a lady
of high rank; but it will not when we read that "this was the same
person who set off the fashion of shoemaking!"

He concludes his first year in Cambridge thus:—

"This day's journal completes a year from the time I began to

keep my history. It has indeed been an important year in my life
the first in which I have been my own master, and have, I fear,
settled my character with all its faults. Several things which I
have both done and undone I shall never cease regretting. I
have only to thank God that there is no more reason for
regret. With my reading, on the whole, I am as well satisfied as
I ever expected."

Two words are underlined in this extract; they were often on his
lips till the day of his death, and frequently formed the subject of
his sermons. If his character had its faults settled with it in his own
estimation, it is pleasing to see the habit of resignation existing as
a virtue in him even at this age. It was one that was confirmed in
him afterwards, to an eminent degree.
 CHAPTER VIII.
Second Year In Cambridge—Takes His Degree.

During the first term of his second year in Cambridge, his average
hours of reading decreased; yet he had still a taste for study, and
had not yet thrown aside what remained of his former ambition to
distinguish himself. He and the Duke of Montrose declaim on the
respective merits of Charles V. and Francis I.; they tossed up for
sides, and Charles V. fell to Spencer. This keeps him at hard study
for some time; meanwhile he hears Ollivant declaim, and thinks he
will get both prizes. After the declamation, in which he comes off
more creditably than he expected, he has half a hope of a prize,
which he says he should be surprised though delighted to receive.
He did get one, but not so high as he expected. Here and there in
his journal at this time a few expressions of discontent escape from
him about Cambridge; the cause being partially what has been
related in the chapter before last. This had also, conjointly with
another circumstance, the effect of cutting short his University
career. He writes in the autobiography:—

"I made some good progress during this year, but I should have
done much more had I been constantly regular. I must have
suffered great loss by my interruptions, as I find by my journal
that for about four weeks at the end of the long vacation, when
I had come home and was taken up with shooting, I did not
make one hour's study; and two more long intervals of
cessation from reading took place in the Christmas and Easter
vacations, when a little steady application, if it were but for
three hours a-day, would have kept my mind attentive, and
given me a great advantage. After my first examination, I
entertained some thoughts of waiving my privilege of taking an
 honorary degree, and going through the Senate House
examinations with a view to University honours; but I lost all
wish to remain at Cambridge towards the end of the second
autumn. I was at times quite disgusted with the place, for such
reasons as I have stated; besides which, my father and mother
had made a plan, which pleased me greatly, of going for a year
on the Continent, in which I was to accompany them. My
brother Frederick, who was come home about this time, was to
be of the party likewise, and happy was I in the prospect of
being again some time in his company; but as an opportunity
occurred for him to go to South America, with Sir Thomas
Hardy, with the hope of being made Commander, this
professional advantage was justly preferred."

Some of the heads at Cambridge as well as Lady Spencer urged

him at this time to stand for a fellowship, but he gave up the idea,
and it ended in his joining a new club they had formed—the Eton
club. These clubs at the Universities are looked upon with no great
favour by proctors and others who have charge of the morals of
the students. Their dinners entail great expenses on the members,
and they end as the first meeting did in his case: "They all made
an enormous row, and I too, by the bye." He came to spend the
Christmas of 1818 at Althorp, and closes the year with a succession
of parties, Pope Joan, and bookbinding. There is one little incident
recorded in his journal at this time which gives us a perfect insight
into his character. One might expect that at this age, nineteen, he
would be very romantic and dreamy, and that we should find many
allusions to those topics which engross so much of the time of
novel-reading youths and maidens nowadays. Nothing of the sort.
There is an affair of the heart, but his conduct in it, with his
remarks on it, are worthy of a sexagenarian. At a party, which took
place at his father's, he dances with various young ladies, among
the rest a certain Miss A., who, he says, "was a great flame of mine
two years ago; she is not so pretty as I thought her then, but she
is a delightful partner. I was again in love, but not violently to-
night." Two or three days after this, he is at another party, and
dances with a new set of partners to the extent of three quadrilles.
Of one of these he thus speaks—"I was delighted with Miss B., who
is a pleasant unaffected girl, and I am doomed to think of her I
suppose for two or three days instead of Miss A. I was provoked
that she would not give me her fan at parting." Was it not cool and
thoughtful of him to mark out the time such a change of sentiment
was likely to last? The next page of the journal brings the subject
before us still more clearly. His mother took him for a walk around
Althorp, and told him that she was planning a house for the
parsonage at Brington:

"Which they say is to be mine when I am old enough; it might

be made a most comfortable and even a pretty place, and if I
live to come to it I can figure to myself some happy years there
with a fond partner of my joys, if I can meet with a good one.
'Here then, and with thee, my N.' [Footnote 2] would have been
my language some time ago; but how my opinions even of such
important things change with my increasing years. This thought
often occurs to me, and will I hope prevent me from ever
making any engagements which cannot be broken, in case my
fancy should be altered during the time which must elapse
before the completion of them."

[Footnote 2: A quotation, as the reader may remember,

from Guy Mannering.]

It will be seen, further on in the biography, how this affair ended.

There is a very good lesson in what he has left for young men of
his age. If reason were allowed to direct the affections, many
would be preserved from rash steps that embitter their whole lives.
It seems amusing to a Catholic to find the prospects of a
clergyman's happiness so very commonplace; but it will be a relief
to learn by-and-by how very different were his ideas when he
became a clergyman, and built and dwelt in that identical
parsonage that now existed only in his own and his mother's mind.
He gets a commission in the Northamptonshire Yeomanry before
returning to Cambridge for Hilary term this year.

Studies seem to him a necessary evil now, and he writes with a

kind of a sigh of relief when he notes, a few pages on, that he has
taken his last compulsory lesson in Latin. Balls and parties of all
kinds are his rage. George and a friend of his had notice of a ball
coming off in Northampton in a few days, and he heard that his
"ladye love" would be one of the company, so they determined to
be there. He writes letters, gets an invitation for his friend, and
makes all the preparation possible for a week previous. The day
comes, it is rainy; but, no matter, they pack their best suits into
trunks, bring the necessary apparatus for making a good
appearance, they search the town for a conveyance, and at length
procure a team for a tandem at Jordan's. Off they go, eighteen
miles the first stage, then eight more; they bait their horses and
dine; off again for full sixteen miles. He has also to run the risk of
a cross-examination from whatever members of his family he may
happen to meet at the ball, and to answer the difficult question,
"What brought you here?" It is raining in torrents, it is a cold
February day; but all difficulties appear trifles to the two young
adventurers as they urge their team over the hills and plains of
Northamptonshire. Even Spencer boasts in his journal that he is
now a first-rate whip. They arrive in high glee, forgetting their
hardships in the glow of anticipation, and are greeted with the bad
news, as they jump from their conveyance, that the ball has been
put off until next month. To make matters worse, the bearer of
these unfavourable tidings assured them that he wrote to them to
give this information, and they had an additional motive to chagrin
in the fact of their having forgotten to ask for their letters in the
hurry and anxiety to come off. He notes in the journal—"Feb. 10.
We set off again in our tandem for Cambridge, truly dimissis
auribus, but with a resolution to try again on the 5th March." On
the 5th of March they faithfully carried out this resolution. The ball
took place, but the ladies they were anxious to meet did not come,
so they only half enjoyed the thing. Spencer took a hack and rode
off to Althorp to make his appearance at his father's. He was very
nervous about the prospect of a meeting with his parents, and
having to give an account of himself. Fortunately the Earl was deep
in some measure for furthering George's happiness, and looked
upon his son's arrival as an auspicious visit. Everything thus passed
off smoothly, and the youngsters arrived in Cambridge with their
tandem "without accidents, but with two or three narrow escapes."
His journal here has few incidents out of the ordinary line of his
daily life; he learns to wrestle with success; so as to bring his
antagonist to the ground with a dilapidation of the res vestiaria.
He practises a good deal at jumping, and one day, in clearing a
hedge, a bramble caught his foot, which brought him with violence
to the ground; by this mishap his eye was ornamented with a scar
which gave him some trouble afterwards. He also gets a shying
horse to ride: this noble charger had a particular dislike to carts: he
shied at one in the market-place in Cambridge, and soon left his
rider on the flags. Spencer mounted again, but found on his return,
after a good ride, that his toe was sprained, and it kept him
indoors for five or six days. This chapter of accidents was amply
counterbalanced by the agreeable fact that he had just attended his
twenty-fifth divinity lecture, and had obtained the certificate which
was to insure him the imposition of his bishop's hands, whenever
he might think it convenient to put himself to the trouble of going
through the ceremony. His course is now coming to an end; he
becomes a freemason, and rises four degrees in the craft before
the end of June. A bishop visits Trinity College, and standing in
solemn grandeur, with a staff of college officers dressed out in their
insignia encircling him, his lordship delivers a grave expression of
his displeasure at the stupidity some twenty students gave evidence
of during their examination. Spencer comes out in the first class
once more; his brother Frederick is in Cambridge at the time, and
as soon as the result is known they take coach for London. Here
they spend their time agreeably between dining at home and
abroad, going to Covent Garden, and taking sundry lessons from an
Italian dancing-master, until July 5th, when George returns to
Cambridge to take out his degree. We will hear himself now giving
an account of this great event.

"My college labours terminated with the end of the second

year's college examination for the classes, which took place on
the 1st of June, 1819. On the 5th of June the result was
declared, when, as I have before said, I was in the first class
again, and second to Ollivant. This was rather a disappointment,
and gave me some reasonable discontent. For the cause of my
not being, as I might have expected, as far above the others as
I had been the year before, I saw clearly was a degree of
carelessness in my reading, especially of one subject that is, the
three first sections of Newton's Principia, which were appointed
for the second year's reading, and for which I had not had a
taste as for other parts of mathematics. However, the time was
now past to recover my place, and soon the importance of this
little matter vanished into nothing. I then went to London till
the beginning of July, when I returned to Cambridge to receive
my degree as Master of Arts from the Duke of Gloucester, who
came in person at the commencement of this year to confer the
degrees as Chancellor of the University, and to be entertained
with the best that the colleges could raise to offer him in the
way of feasts and gaieties. My Cambridge cares and troubles
were now well-nigh past, and I enjoyed greatly the position I
held at this commencement as steward of the ball, and a sort of
leader of the gaieties in the presence of the Royal personages,
because I was the first in rank of those who received their
honorary degrees.

"From this time there has been a complete cessation with me of

all mathematical studies, and almost of all my classical, to which
I have hardly ever again referred. For when I again returned to
regular study, I had nothing in my mind but matters of theology.
It was at this time, after leaving Cambridge, when I remained
principally fixed as an inmate in my father's house, till I was
settled in the country as a clergyman, that I was in the
character of what is called a young man about town. It was
with my dear brother Frederick, who was at home at the time,
as I before observed, that I began in earnest to take a share in
the enjoyment of London life. I have seen the dangers, the
pleasures, and the miseries of that career, though all in a
mitigated degree, from the happy circumstance of my not being
left alone to find my way through it, as so many are at the age
of which I speak. With many, no doubt, the life in London is the
time for going to the full depth of all the evil of which Oxford or
Cambridge have given the first relish. My father and mother
were not like many aged veterans in dissipation—whom in the
days when the fashionable world was most accounted of by me,
I have looked on with pity—who to the last of their strength
keep up what they can of youth, in pursuing still the round of
the gay parties of one rising generation after another. They (my
parents) hardly ever went into society away from home. They
kept a grand establishment, when in London, at Spencer House,
as well as at Althorp in the winter, when the first society,
whether of the political, or the literary and scientific, were
constantly received. It would, therefore, have been
unreasonable in me to be fond of going out for the sake of
society, when, perhaps, none was to be met with so interesting
as that at home; besides this, my father and mother were fond
of being surrounded by their family circle; and if I or my
brothers, when staying with them in London, went out from
home several times in succession, or many times a week, they
would generally express some disappointment or displeasure;
and though I used at the time to be sometimes vexed at this
kind of restraint, as I was at other restraints on what I might
have reckoned the liberty of a young man, I used generally,
even then, to see how preferable my condition was. I now most
clearly see that the feelings of my parents in this matter were
most reasonable, and that it was a great blessing to me that I
was situated in such circumstances. They were desirous that we
should see the world, and when any amusement was going on,
or party was to take place, which she thought really worthy of
 attention, as not being so frivolous as the general run of such
things, my mother zealously assisted in procuring us invitations,
and providing us with needful dresses; as, for instance, at this
time she gave to my brother Frederick and me very handsome
full-dress uniforms (his being, of course, that of a naval officer,
mine of the Northamptonshire Yeomanry, in which I then held a
commission), that we might appear at balls and parties where
full-dress was required, such as foreign ambassadors sometimes
gave. These were, she thought, really worth going to on
account of extraordinary or remarkable characters who came to
them, whether English or foreigners. Thanks to their regular
domestic habits, and to the strict authority which my mother
still kept over us all, while being at Spencer House, I should
have found it almost as difficult as in a well-regulated college to
go into any extravagant irregularities, and so I was hardly
tempted to do so. My feeling habitually was to try and avoid
invitations and engagements from home, far from seeking them
eagerly."

The incidents we are able to add from his journal during the
interval between leaving Cambridge and going abroad are very
meagre, yet, since they are characteristic of the man's feelings, a
few will be inserted. From the journal: "Tuesday, July 20. We got
up and went to a dreadful formal breakfast at 10½. At one we
were dressed, and the company began to arrive for a public
breakfast, to be given to-day to the people of the county in honour
of the marriage of Lord Temple. The collation was in the
greenhouse, and lasted off and on till about 6!" He goes through
the particulars of the entertainment, the quadrilles and country
dances, the partners' perfections, &c., &c.; but when Lady
Buckingham asked himself and his brother to stay a little while
longer, much as they liked it, they would not do so, because their
mother desired them to be home at a certain time. One must
admire his obedience even at the expense of his enjoyment, when
he might calculate upon the implicit consent of his mother to their
acceding to such a request, and from such a quarter. Another thing
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